Andrew Bustamante Reveals Why Israel Didn't Kill Charlie Kirk and What CIA Really Knows About Epstein

Your whole job as a CIA agent is really to learn how to manipulate people. >> Absolutely. Sometimes you want to steal secrets. Sometimes we want to find a way to create sabotage. CIA thinks very much like criminal enterprises because what CIA does is [music] illegal. FBI had mounds of information. CIA had mounds of information. And it wasn't until the buildings came crashing down. Thousands of people were dead. Al-Qaeda claimed a massive victory. The world was in panic. And then somebody said, "Let's take a look at how we missed this." [music] When I look at this Epstein case, the CIA asset piece is the lowest probability. >> With the Charlie Kirk, there's a lot of influences that are blaming Israel. Does Israel wield the power that people are thinking? I'm only hearing this currently. I mean, the last several months, Israel [music] almost controls the United States, controls the world. I mean, is this true? >> We can keep ignoring it until we basically have a cancer that's so bad that our middle class disappears. our poverty-stricken classes start to literally die because they can't afford life. And the wealthy just continue to insulate their own to make sure that that becomes who runs the country. Hey everyone, welcome to another sitdown with Michael Francis. Hope everybody is doing well. All is very good, very blessed on this end. And as always, my friends, I give all the praise, honor, glory, and thanksgiving to our God for that. I've had many special guests uh on this podcast. Today I have someone that's uh kind of different. I would say I've spoken to ex FBI agents, ex law enforcement people, but today the first time that really I'll be speaking to a uh an ex CIA operative. Both him and his wife were CIA operatives. His name is Andrew Bamante. You might have seen him before. Very intelligent guy. And I'm really looking forward to this conversation, people, because um I'm going to get into a lot of different things, unbiased, a lot of different things. I'm going to ask him about um the Charlie Kirk situation. I'm going to ask him about Israel. I'm going to ask him about Mandami, a socialist now mayor that we have in New York. I'm going to ask him about Epstein, of course, from a CIA perspective. A lot of stuff has been floating around about the Israelis, about Epstein, about And this is going to be unbiased. I have no clue what this guy is going to answer. I have no idea what his feelings are, but he is ex CIA and he should be extremely knowledgeable about some of the things that have been going around about all of these situations and all of these uh issues that we're talking about. So, I'm looking forward to it. Again, unbiased. I'm not going to hold anything back. Let's see what he has to say. My very special guest, Andrew Bustamante. Well, you know, I have to start off with something, Andrew, that's probably the hottest topic, unfortunately, of the day, and that is the whole Jeffrey Epstein matter and all the um you know, talk around him being a an operative for the Israeli, an operative for the CIA. Um based upon your knowledge and experience, what do you what can you say about that? >> Such a great question because I I too am just a lay person right now. I only have access to what the government shares with us publicly. And my estimate on Jeffrey Epstein has changed over time as new information has come out. And I actually I love that I get to have this conversation with you because [music] where I land on it currently based on the available information is that he was most likely an intelligence asset, but not for any of the normal, you know, typical intelligence categories. He wasn't MSAD. He wasn't CIA. He could have been. You can see how there's attractiveness to both, but probability wise, he was most likely an intelligence source for FBI. >> Really, >> an FBI CI. And I don't know if you ever came in contact with an FBI officer that tried to approach you with something similar. >> Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So, um, then you already know a a CI, a covert informant, >> is a protected category of criminal where the FBI or the judicial department, uh, they know that that person's committing crimes and they're using the crimes that that person commits as a leveraging tool, a negotiating tool to get them to basically narc. So Jeffrey Epstein did some nasty without a doubt. But what FBI is really concerned with isn't crimes of sexual abuse and trafficking and racketeering. That's not what their primary goal is because they know racketeering is hard to prove >> and they know that sex crimes are are a different level of success than say conspiratorial or corrupt politicians. And Epstein was connected to so many corrupt politicians not just in the US but abroad. It makes complete sense that FBI would have approached him. FBI would have said, "You're doing terrible things. We could send you to jail or you can agree to collaborate with us. We will carve out your current crimes. You won't be held criminally liable for those crimes that you commit in support of our larger operation." That's where my predominant theory is taking me now. >> Wow. I I've never heard that before. I never thought of it, but you know, I recently did a uh a piece on the FBI's, I would say, negligence when they found out that he was dead. >> Um their officers are right across the street from the prison, from the jail, I would say, because I was in that jail. I know, right? Uh it took them seven hours to get to the crime scene, >> the FBI. Seven hours. And I said, "Why?" You know, they would have been called immediately, I would assume, by the Bureau of Prisons, and yet they took that long. So maybe there is something there. Are you of the belief that he definitely wasn't CIA or MSAD? >> The I I don't have a definite opinion. CIA teaches us to look at everything through probabilities. You know, one of the things that I really like about ever getting to sit down with with former criminals, current criminals, convicted criminals. We think very much alike. CIA thinks very much like criminal enterprises because what CIA does is illegal. We're just protected. We're a protected category under American law where we're allowed to commit espionage if it's against foreign targets and it benefits national security. If it doesn't do both of those things, it's still illegal for us, too. >> So, we're trained systematically to think the way criminals learn to think through life on the streets, through the school of hard knocks, through on the job training. So, we look at everything through probabilities. it. There's no guarantee of anything in life, but you can take certain steps and make certain actions and assess certain information to determine when is the right time to have the most likely success and the least chance of failure. That is 100% how criminals think. That's not how the average person thinks. The average person wants guarantees. The average person doesn't take action because there is no guarantee of success. Criminals take action all the time based on probabilities of success based on a mix of controllable and uncontrollable inputs. That's how CIA teaches us to think. So that's why when I look at this Epstein case, there's no guarantee he wasn't CIA. But of the three predominant theories, FBI, CI, foreign intelligence source or or known CIA recruited asset, the CIA asset piece is the lowest probability where the other two are much higher. >> Wow. You know, and I do know obviously, you know, the FBI comes to the rescue of of their informants. No doubt about it. And but, you know, wouldn't we have seen cases built upon his information? But then again, how would we know that? Yeah. How would we know that? And what FBI is the most and the reason I really feel like this theory carries the most weight, most gravitas is because it would the the pomp and circumstance where the president who sits in the executive branch continues to say release the files, release the files, you know, let the house vote on the files. It's all a it's a it's a show. It's it's stage theater because the executive knows he has the power over the judicial branch. Mhm. But the people don't know that. So he can say, "Hey, Congress, part of the legislative branch, you have to do this thing that forces the judicial branch to take action." Even though he knows he could do it, too. And then that puts all the pressure on Congress. And even if Congress votes to have the files released, the Justice Department still gets to determine what gets released, what gets redacted, whether a 100 files are there and 100 files released or only 95 files are released. Because to your exact point, the the details of what's in there and the accusations that will spread from that throughout our government, whether it's the president or a congressman or state governor or a professional athlete, that's all going to fall under different jurisd within the jud the justice department to decide whether or not it gets released to the public the first if the files are released they'll be released to the house to the congress >> congress gets to look first before any human before any American citizen gets to look and then they will take and they'll make their redactions and they'll send it back to the justice department who will make their redactions and then after everybody has had their dirty trail redacted with a black marker then maybe it'll go to a reading room where you and I can it. >> So the bottom line is you'll never get to the truth. Never. >> And we're not supposed to get to the truth. The thing that is happening now is people are starting to learn the unfortunate truth that I think you and I have always known. The government doesn't have to tell us anything. They they hold their secrets because as a representative republic, we have voted. We've used our rights to give them position and power to decide what they tell us and what they don't tell us. That's how the United States was built. It wasn't built for transparency. It was built so that a small representative group, a group of elites, know all the information, make all the decisions, and we little peeons, we farm every day of the week. We manufacture every day of the week. We pay our taxes every day of the week. And we only have to think critically once every two years. >> Wow. You know, it's it's something that you suspect, but to hear it from somebody like you, it really confirms it. somebody with your experience. Let me ask you, do you I I have to ask you this too, going back to the whole Kennedy situation. I've been asked this a million times because I believe the Warren Commission report was absolute nonsense and based upon what I've been told by the right sources in my former life, there's no question that Jack Ruby was involved with us and that he was designated to take Oswald out. Absolute fact. No question about it. I I would I would take that to my grave. That's how much I believe it. But everybody denies that. >> And I've said the reason for that is I don't think that um those classified documents would ever be revealed. My my take on that and you just clarified something is that because they would never want um the American people or the world to know that a president was taken out by the mob in any way, shape, or form. Does that make sense to you? The reason I'm asking because so so many people have asked me this. >> It makes complete sense you when you think of it logically. The only reason that the federal government [music] has the legal ability to continue to reclassify information after after time has passed is if it still has real world implications on national security. So the typical intelligence report is classified at something called 25x2 which means 25 years times two cycles. So any intelligence report that's being written right now anywhere in the world by a CIA officer is going to be immediately classified at the highest level for 50 years by default. By default and that's been in place for many many decades. So now if we go all the way back to the Kennedy era every intelligence report by FBI, CIA, NSA, DoD, they're all default marked 25X2. when Donald Trump was going back and promising to reveal the Kennedy Files, it was it was already beyond that 50-year mark, but the 25x2 was up for debate. Like, this was we had we've met the minimum criteria. Now, we can legally release these files. So, in that secondary review, the only way that they could maintain those files and reclassify them for another 25x2 is if they had current real world implications. So that absolutely confirms what you're saying. If the mob had any role to play in the assassination of a president, organized crime had any role to play in the assassination of a president and that became public knowledge, >> would that increase or decrease our national security status? >> Yeah, >> it would decrease it significantly. It would give our it would give foreign enemies the chance to start working with organized crime. >> It would weaponize foreign organized crime organizations. And it would make the sitting president and all the candidates who are considering becoming sitting presidents, it would deter them from taking office because they would realize, "Holy we can't stop organized crime." The world doesn't need another wine. It really needs a reason to raise a glass again. A reason [music] that's real. A reason that means something. Because most [music] people, they drink to forget. We drink to remember where we came from, what we stand for, and who we still fight to become. We don't follow trends, we break them. Our bottles don't look like anyone else's because [music] our story, it isn't like anyone else's. It's about freedom, about redemption, about family. That's what's inside every bottom. So to [music] the ones who think different, who live different, who drink different, salute. The the myth of the United States is that we are law-abiding, fair, equal opportunity, right? We are the place where you go when you want opportunity. That's not really true. We are fairer. We are freer. We are more secure than our competitive countries, but we are not the most in all categories. We are not the best in all categories and we're certainly not consistent from year to year. So, we survive by propagating that myth because as long as we all believe that we're safe, we focus on what we're supposed to do. And what we're supposed to do, like we discussed earlier, pay your taxes, do your job, farm your land, manufacture in the in the factory. [music] Like that's what you're supposed to do. Be happy, have sex, make babies, in ensure the continuation of the population. The government looks at this a whole different way. They've got to keep the masses calm. And if information would upset the masses to a point where they could claim it has a national security impact, they can just classify the information and keep it from spreading. >> Wow. So, so let me ask you this with again going back to Epstein, we know that there's tremendous, at least publicly, tremendous division between Donald Trump and and the left, everybody on the left. But do you think in the back of all of this, it's like, hey, we know what we have to do here. We can't let this stuff out. You know, we may do this publicly. We don't like each other and all that, but the bottom line is we can't let any of this stuff out. There's too many big names involved in this. You think that's that's what's going on? Yeah, that's and that's very much what's what most insiders in the on Capitol Hill recognize. When you watch two politicians, one with a red tie and one with a blue tie debate each other, argue each other, point fingers at each other, send out tweets or ex messages at each other, that's all show. That same those same two people at 12:30 log off, go out to lunch together, have a midday martini, sit at the same table, make the same jokes, joke about the same ex-girlfriend that they had, talk about the the [music] intern that they're going to swap over the summer because the person does a really good job reading policy bills or whatever. They're friends. They know that their success is intertwined with each other. Which is why you you see periodically people will change their votes like we just saw with the continuing resolution. How did eight Democrats decide to vote on the continuing resolution? Because they always were going to. They're friends with the Republicans. They're they're they all realize that the red blue hyper polarization is just a game. It's a game to keep them in office and to keep a small population of very aggravated people going to the polls every two years. The rest of us are kind of giving up. The the silent majority doesn't even vote anymore. It's only the really extreme far-left farright voters that show up. And the game that they have is how can we how can we mo how can we motivate our most extreme group to vote but still make sure that we keep each other in office by not becoming so incompetent that our radical base stops voting for us. >> Wow. You know, Andrew, as you're saying this, I'm thinking back to my to my time in the mob and one particular instance when um I uh I realized I had something with the gas business. I was basically defrauding the government. I had a tax on every gallon of gasoline. So I went to my boss at the time and I said, "Listen, I'm on to something. It's going to be big. It's going to be as big as since prohibition, not drugs, something safer." And I explained it to him and I said, "But here's the deal." I said, "Everybody's going to want to get involved in this. Once that happens, we blow it. So if there's ever an argument over this, I have to win. Don't play any politics with the other families because they do that at some time. They'll sacrifice their own soldiers, their own members if they have a deal going on with the other families, even though it's ne never supposed to be that way. Your loyalties with your own family. So, I'm looking this and I wrote a book, Mafia Democracy. I said the biggest mafia we have is in the government. That's it right there. And it seems so similar right now. I mean, you're confirming that to me really >> remember we were just talking not long ago about the myth of government. And one of the big myths of our government is that our government is not corrupt. That's a myth. Our government is absolutely corrupt. It's just not as corrupt as what we're seeing in the rest of the world. It's not as corrupt as Venezuela. It's not as corrupt as Colombia, as corrupt as Mexico, India, Pakistan, Russia, North Korea, Thailand, Cambodia. It's not as corrupt, >> but it's still really corrupt, man. You still have this game that's played, this this covert influence campaign that's constantly waged. You still have people getting people supporting foundations that are paying them in the back door for for uh support, for endorsement, for whatever else. I mean, we had a sitting president, Joe Biden, nominate his vice president to be the president after already saying that he was going to run for office. Like that's if that isn't a perfect example of party based corruption, >> then what is >> no primary, right? >> Right. Skip the primary and go right to >> and and what happened after that? Everybody got behind Camala Harris. [music] >> Yeah. >> Again, I don't mind that Camala Harris was the the candidate that the Democrats put forward, but was that a fair equal opportunity process? And did anybody question it after it happened? And if nobody questions an unfair process, is that not the definition of a corrupt process? >> Yes, absolutely. So, let me ask you this. Is are we really controlled by this? I don't know if it's called a worldwide deep state. Are the money people that really control everything that goes on with the world? It's not our president. It's not whoever. It's these people in the background, the billionaires, whatever they want to call them. >> Control is such a great word. Uh, and that's the word I'm going to key in on here because what we're all afraid of is being controlled. And CIA has a saying, if you're not under control, if you're not if you're not in control, then you're under control. Right? So CIA teaches us if you're not in control, then you're under control. The emphasis in our saying is the first term, you have to be in [music] control. Well, what can you be in control of? You can really only be in control of those things that you can control. Your actions, your thoughts, what you say, where you say it, where you go, what you're wearing. Those are the things that you can truly be in control of. When you are trying to control another person, it's significantly harder. You can suggest, you can encourage, you can motivate, you can uh manipulate, you can try to coersse, you can do all sorts of things to try to control another person, but at the end of the day, another person isn't out of your control. But that doesn't mean that they're in control of themselves. So, when we talk about a deep state, what people are afraid of in a deep state, they're mislabeling. They think they're being controlled. They're not being controlled. People can buy whatever whatever milk they want to buy. They can buy whatever bread they want to buy. They can buy whatever candies they want to buy. They can choose when they shop. They can choose what grocery store they they stop they shop at. They don't realize the government's not trying to control them. It's trying to direct them, direct their activities. We don't care what milk you buy, but we want you to buy milk. We don't care what bread you buy, but we want you to buy bread. We don't care what grocery store you shop at, but we want you shopping at major grocery stores. Right? That's how the government thinks. How do we direct the [music] masses? Because we want to funnel them in a productive direction that benefits the the national economy. We want to maximize GDP so that we can take the maximum chunk out of GDP to invest in military, surveillance, government, etc. So, we need them to go in a productive direction that benefits us. But we need to give them enough freedom in that lane that they decide whether they buy sprouted Ezekiel bread or whether they buy Wonderbread that's heavily bleached. Think of like a highway that's got six lanes. You can choose what lane you're in. You can choose the speed, when you switch lanes, what car you drive, but you're only going in one direction. So, let me ask you this. You brought up something very interesting. As a CIA operative, how do you make sure that you're in control right off the bat? What is your motus operande in that? When you're with a person, you're always trying to do the same thing that the government does with the mass. You're always trying to direct their behavior. You know that you can't really control them. I can I can want you to drink a cup of coffee, but I can't force you to drink a cup of coffee. I can't control that you drink what I want you to drink. So instead, I have to use tools that help to direct that [music] activity. We use a lot of what's known as assessment tools. Assessment tools are tools that give you verbal and non-verbal feedback in the moment so that you can start to understand the [music] person's thoughts, the person's feelings, the person's behaviors, values, patterns, ideas. And as you learn about what that person cares about, you try to reflect it back to them. Something called mirroring. So, you talk about your faith, I'll talk about my my faith. Uh, if I see you wearing all black like I see you today. The next time that we would meet together, I wouldn't be wearing white, right? I'd be wearing nicer shoes cuz clearly shoes matter to you. You've got a ton of very specific fashion here, right? With the with the metals that are crossing over each other and the low cut socks. Like, there's a there is an intentionality to the way that you're dressed. >> So, if I want to mirror you, I need to show more intentionality in the way that I dress. And that's how we go about building this assessment and building this subconscious trust. And then after we have that subconscious trust, we can become more direct in how we're trying to direct you. It it would be kind of rash for me to just order you a a cappuccino right now. I don't know if you even drink coffee, but if we have a second or third meeting together, it's fair enough for me to say, "Hey, do you drink cappuccino? Cuz there's a great one here I'd love to order for you." Mhm. >> And now I'm that much closer to getting you to do what I want you to do. Replace cappuccino with tell me about your bank accounts. Tell me about your boss. Tell me about a new project that you're working on. Right? How exactly do you leave North Korea since most people can't leave North Korea? It it gets us in the direction of where I need to go, but it's not based on control. It's based on direction. >> So is it kind of uh manipulation in a way? Manipulation is a very fair word to use. Uh you'll I I do a lot of uh using CIA terminology because CIA ter it gives you such great insight into CIA to understand how they choose their words. Manipulation is a word that many people use and it's a nefarious word. It has it has malicious intent behind it. It's not a positive word. Nobody wants to be manipulated, right? CIA teaches us that manipulation might be one way of interpreting what we're doing. If you imagine a coin, right, a large gold coin. >> The coin has two different sides. And on each side is printed a different symbol. That's what we call heads and tails. Right. >> Right. So the heads might have the head of a famous president. The tails might have a picture of a famous landmark. But the head side and the tail side isn't what actually carries the value of the coin. It's still a gold coin. The value is the metal itself. We see manipulation the same way. Manipulation is one side of the coin. Motivation is the other side of the coin. So whether you manipulate somebody or motivate somebody is irrelevant. The value is the metal itself. The value is getting them to do what you want them to do. You can manipulate people to get them to do what you want them to do, but you can also motivate people to get them to do what you want them to do. So when people accuse CIA of manipulation, you have 10,000 undercover CIA officers who are saying, "You don't get it. We're just motivating them." >> Right. Yeah. Very interesting. I have to do something right now because since you brought up Cappuccino, my viewers are very in tune to this. Okay. I was going to pour you a glass of wine. This is, by the way, unalcoholic. You drink it. You don't have to drink it. >> No. But I'll tell you the [clears throat] difference. And this is after a few minutes talking to you. If I were to pour the wine this way, my viewers would say, "I'm not paying attention to this guy." Because an old mob technique, let's say we're all sitting at a table and somebody walked over and wanted to sit down and join into the conversation. Well, if somebody recognized that this person we shouldn't be speaking in front of, when I poured the wine, I would pour like this. >> So, hey, this guy's not on the level. Don't talk in front of him. Silence. But since we're talking, you're coming this way cuz I I trust what you have to say, Andrew. >> That's a great that's a great technique. >> We had our summer techniques, too. >> Yeah. >> You know, in that life. But so this is this is >> and then I I want to share one of our alcohol techniques with you. >> I love it. >> It smells nice. >> I'm non-alcoholic. You have to have a taste for it. But >> people are loving this firework. >> Oh, that's interesting. >> Yeah. >> So I have to share our alcohol tip with you. So CIA knows that alcohol gets people relaxed. It gets people to let go of certain inhibitions. Keeping secrets is something that inhibits people from talking. But when you're sitting with a Russian, a Romanian, a Ukrainian, uh a Japanese, a North Korean, or a South Korean, a Chinese, they can drink, especially their own local drink of choice. They can they can absolutely outdrink any foreigner who's trying to start a conversation over alcohol. So, we're taught that we go to the bartenders early and we tell them, "Hey, the tab's going to be on us." And we give them a huge tip early. $50 tip, $100 tip, depending on what we think we're going to spend, right out of the gates. Hey, I'm over here. Tab's on me. Here's your tip. Now, here's what I need you to do. >> I need you to dip the rim of my glass in the alcohol of choice, but then fill my glass without any alcohol in it. So, if we're having an oldfashioned, if we're having a ginonic, if we're having whatever, make it look right with the right ingredients, but don't put alcohol in my drink. Just keep it on the rim. And we'll tell the bartender, "Hey, I'm with some heavy drinkers and I just want to make sure I can drive myself home at night." They never have an issue at all because they already got their tip. >> Right. >> Right. So, they are happy to dip your rim in whatever they want to dip it in, charge full price for it, nobody's losing, and then give you a drink that when you go to the bathroom and your and your asset smells your drink. No, it's it's definitely got jin in there. And they never realize that you're actually drinking a virgin drink. >> Wow. Might I use that? You can use mine now. Is that [laughter] They may think you're a mob guy, though, if you do. That's No, that that's really cool. That's great. So, let me ask you, so you're your whole job as a CIA agent is really to learn how to motivate, manipulate people. That's that's really what it is. >> Absolutely. >> Wow. >> And we do it with a couple different end goals in mind, right? Sometimes we want to steal secrets. >> Mhm. >> Sometimes we want to find a way to create sabotage. Sometimes we're looking to gain a connection. So, we realize that your secrets are good, but not as good as that other person's secrets. So we need you to connect us. So there's different types of outcomes that we're looking for, but at the end of the day, it's all people. CIA is the [music] United States primary human intelligence agency. Human intelligence is a specific term known as human. It's a specific intelligence type of several intelligence types that exist inside the United States. Human intelligence is human. Signals intelligence like what NSA does is sigant. Measurement intelligence is mazint. Defense intelligence is defint. Imagery intelligence is imint. And there's all these different types of ins. And there's a different agency that masters each one. CIA is the premier agency in the United States for human intelligence. Andrew, with all the the training, the technology, and the knowledge of all the, you know, covert things that are going on in the world, this this just hit me. How did you not know um what was going to happen with the attack on 9/11? How did that get by everybody? It's a it's a great point. Let me answer in two kind of two ways. The the first way is to highlight again the myth of government. And the myth of government is that the government wants us to believe we're safe. They want us to believe that nothing gets past FBI, CIA, NSA, DIA. They want us to believe that. You of all people know. >> Mhm. >> You can get past anybody you want to get past. So, it's a myth. To think that we're safe because of what our government provides us is 100% not real. We are just being directed on the highway in the direction they want us to go. I must be safe. I mean, they got my driver's license and my passport, and there's cameras in every airport, and my license plate is on record, so there can be no crime. Surely, or crime is rare. Surely, crime is rare because it's only rarely that we ever find out about a criminal prosecution. Crime is not rare at all. If you just look at the justice.gov records, you'll see that there are hundreds of arrests happening all the time, of which 2% make it into the newspaper. So the first part of of this answer is that we're not as safe as we think we are. We believe that we are because the government wants us to believe that we are because that's how we remain productive. Imagine how much productivity would be lost if we started protecting ourselves if you actually put up security cameras and reviewed your own footage. If you actually, you know, um put fencing or gating around your property to make sure nobody could get in. How many hours would you spend doing those things when you could be spending your hours doing something else that is more beneficial for the GDP? The second way to explain what happened on 911, not either or, but and in addition to the myth that we were safe, there was also incompetence in the in the way that FBI and CIA communicated and the uh al-Qaeda terrorist group that was behind 9/11. I don't think they understood how poor the communication was between CIA and FBI, but I think they knew that the two organizations didn't communicate very well. Smaller operations, smaller attacks, various successes. They have their own network of informants as well would have communicated to them, hey, you know, CIA creates a report and they call people with pseudonyms or cryptonms. FBI makes a report and they call people by number codes. So, somebody who's been codenamed gravity on a CIA report could be the same person on an FBI report that's given the number 335566. But CIA doesn't know that 335566 is the code name gravity. And FBI doesn't know that the code name gravity is the same person as 335566. That's just one example. Different communication systems, different platforms, different sending schedules, written in different formats on different paper with different ink. That is what the world looked like September 10th, 2001. >> Wow. >> And from that FBI had mounds of information about a expected terrorist attack. CIA had mounds of information about a suspected terrorist attack. But CIA was ignoring FBI information because culturally they thought that FBI didn't know what they were doing. And FBI was ignoring CIA information because what does that CIA know? >> Wow. >> And it wasn't until the buildings came crashing down. Thousands of people were dead. Al-Qaeda claimed a massive victory. The world was in panic. And then somebody said, "Let's take a look at how we missed this." And the most humbling part is we didn't miss it. It was there. We literally just didn't read what was there. >> That is so shocking. But you know what? It confirms something that I learned in my former life. We always thought that the government was this welloiled machine with all different agencies communicating with one another until I realized there's more rivalries than there are good communication. 100%. They don't want to work together. and uh but to do it on this level and and and some of the thoughts or some of the things that we said, well, we knew this was going to happen. We allowed it to happen or the president allowed whatever it was. You always hear those rumors flying around and that wouldn't be true. It would just be that they didn't communicate properly. One of the fundamental flaws in our government is that there's there's two that are complimentary fundamental flaws. First, our government is not a meritocracy. You don't climb in the ranks by being the best at what you do. You climb in the ranks by playing the game, by being part of the political establishment, by knowing when to say yes, when to say no, when to act like you didn't read that email, >> right? And that encourages and incentivizes people to become loyalists to senior leaders rather than loyalists to the mission of the agency itself. So, we're already flawed because we're not creating people who are loyal to the American people. We're creating people who are loyal to the specific job category they're in. And then the second problem that we have is a is a problem of of enticements of um of reward. Not only does merit not help you climb the ladder, but we don't incentivize you to even do a good job. So there's no way of rewarding somebody with a bonus. There's no way of rewarding somebody for a job well done. There's no way of giving public recognition for for somebody who's an exceptional officer. So all the things that drive the public sector, promotions, raises, bonuses are gone in government. I remember there was a period of time when I was with CIA where they would give us something called a uh a professional incentive award. And these professional incentive awards were gift cards. So they would say, "Hey, here's a $200 gift card to Starbucks. Here's a $100 gift card to Applebee's." It's silly. It's silly to think about CIA giving somebody >> Yeah. >> a gift card for Applebees because they did a great job in overthrowing the FARC, right? >> It seems silly. >> Well, what's even sillier is that about 2 years into my CIA tenure, the government determined that those incentives were actually potentially illegal against the policy for how you can give recognition to a federal officer. You can't give them monetary incentives. So they were like, "Well, that $100 gift card to Applebee's is a monetary incentive. So now we have to actually do away with the whole professional incentive award because we're not allowed to give incentives to federal officers because anything that could be determined as a financial benefit is unfair to the other federal employees. So they had to get rid of this award. As silly as it was, even it was taken away and they started replacing it with like, you know, cards, not gift cards, but actual like Hallmark cards where, hey, thanks for doing your job. We appreciate you, you know, >> working above and beyond, but no no reward, no incentive, no way that that has a substantive impact on their success as a future officer or their future assignments. >> Wow. Well, I'm just thinking uh you know thinking back on that is when we seen this in the movie when uh Joe Piston who was Donnie Brasco at the end of the film and I know Joe very well we become friends believe it or not but um you know at the end of his whole investigation which he did a tremendous job six years undercover it's unbelievable and u they gave him uh I think 500 bucks at the end of it they were allowed to do that probably and some kind of an award that lasted the whole ceremony only lasted he said about 3 minutes and that was it. After 6 years undercover doing all that work sacrificing his family in a big way. Government has some crazy rules don't they? I mean crazy. >> It's it's incredible how disconnected the federal government really is from the modern American. >> Go back 30 years and it fits. You go back to my to the time when my parents were starting their profession. Loyalty was important. Spending 30 years working in one job was important. Knowing who to rely on, finding your rabbi, finding your godfather, finding your your uh coattails, those were important things. And the government was very well suited to that, right? I mean, I'm saying 30 years. It's really more like 50 to 60 years. Yes. >> 60s and 70s that was the way that you climbed the ladder, >> right? >> Well, the problem is the government doesn't evolve as fast as the rest of the world. I mean, if you we're sitting here using, you know, the the most cutting edge uh iOS operating system. We're using cloud-based technology. We're using AI to help create everything from content to booking calls. The federal government is 20 years behind us always because they can't adopt current technology because there's too many bugs. There's no guarantees that it isn't hacked. There's available backdoor entryways. So they're always stuck with technology from 20 years ago. They're stuck with a culture from 50 years ago. So it's impossible for us to conceive how the government must think about things. And it's even harder when you think that the government is always trying to recruit new talent. Well, what happens if you recruit a modern-day 25-year-old who's used to moving at the speed of their thumbs? Then they go into government and they have to go back to physical keypads in front of a stationary computer, >> right? >> And all of a sudden they're like, "What what am I doing with my life? the longer I'm in this job, the more I'm going to lose pace with what's happening in the rest of the world. And that's been a major problem for government, hiring and retaining real talent. They can still hire, but they're hiring the worst employees with the least innovation and the slowest processing power when it comes to, you know, creative capacity. Because anybody with real talent goes in, realizes, woof, I only need to be here for three years before my resume says CIA and then I can punch out and I'm done with this. >> The person who actually makes a 20-year career, the person who becomes future leadership of the intelligence agencies, those are not your top performing people. Your top performing people get in and then get out because they smell blood in the water. >> Wow. So Andrew, in your opinion, has the government gotten to such a behemoth stage, it's so huge and so set in its way as a system. Do you think it could ever be brought back to I'd probably say something silly the way our ourh forefathers envisioned this government to be? It's you picked such great words for that question because you're exactly right. We are so far from what our forefathers envisioned. The only way that we can even try to explain that where we have evolved is in line with our forefathers is if you really put some creative license on the idea that our forefathers wanted anything like what we have this you know now um I do believe that the government can write itself and when I say the government can write itself what I mean is the government can again remind itself that it was created for the people by the people of the people Right? That's what it's supposed to do. Simultaneously, however, it is also supposed to protect the same people that it's comprised of and who it's leading. So, it has to have dominance. Dominance is required for protection. >> Mhm. >> So, no one is trying to say that we need to I'm not trying to say [clears throat] >> that we want a weaker government because a weaker government is somehow more safe. We don't want a weaker government. We want a government that's there to protect us and that government has to be strong. People debate what a strong government looks like because they start to define strong in different ways. Our forefathers knew exactly what they wanted strength to look like. Strength was the ability to stand against tyranny. Strength was the ability to make independent decisions, self-direction, right? That's what they wanted. We have given up on so much of that in this pursuit of what other people along the way have defined as strength like equality or egalitarianism or equal opportunity or you know you name it some sort of ideological distraction other than safety and strength. And we're really seeing it now because it used to be the United States was the preeeminent world superpower. Now we're competing to maintain that role. And if we lose the role of preeminent superpower, we suffer. We become less safe. Not just less safe in our house, less safe with the currency that we use, less safe in our financial institutions, less safe in what language we have to speak. Just think about that. Right now, we all grow up. We all teach our kids language. Nobody thinks twice about it. What the hell are we going to do if another superpower emerges? >> Now all of a sudden it's not enough to just speak English. You may have to also learn Chinese. Your kids might have to also learn Chinese. Your dyslexic child who struggles with English will now be a dyslexic child who struggles with both languages that are required for basic life success. So let me ask you in your view is the world a safer place when America is the superpower the world. >> Yeah. I do not think the world is a safer place. But Americans are safer. Americans are safer. And one of the things I'm very grateful to my time at CIA for showing me is that all the arguments about humans being humans, humans having something in common in terms of, you know, human rights, human freedoms, basic human necessities. It's not, it's really not true. There may be basic human rights but I don't have to do anything to protect the basic human rights of somebody on the other side of the world. My responsibility is to protect my humans, my family, my neighborhood, my community, my workplace, my colleagues. People who carry the same passport as me. People who contribute to the same future as a nation as me. They have to come first. So, CI did a great job of of teaching me what the Bible always taught us. There will be suffering always. >> Mhm. So, how do you spend your time to help those that you have the most impact to help? How are you a blessing at the highest level rather than diminishing your blessing by trying to spread it too far? So, for me, it's very simple. Americans are the top of the food chain. What can I do to protect Americans? What can I do to help America succeed? What can I do to help the Constitution of the United States and everybody else comes second or lower? And especially if somebody else is a threat to the very same America that I put as a top priority, I have no problem blocking, rejecting, standing in the way, hurting, tearing down whoever that person or that entity or that business or that function is because it goes against what I have the opportunity to bless with the most impact. >> Wow. I mean, this is I got to tell you, it was just fascinating. But it, you know, I I I I've always thought along the same lines as what you're telling me now, but you've you've really gone into it in a deep way. That makes so much sense. I think you're right on point. I really mean that. >> And I would love to take credit for it, but I just I can't I it had to be taught to me. I remember I've never told anybody this story. So, when I was 12 or 13 years old, we lived in a um a duplex >> in Pennsylvania. And I started shoplifting from the grocery store that was one block away, big grocery store. And it started small. It started with like, you know, dad, can I have this? And he would say no. And I was like, well, I know I can just walk to the grocery store later on. And, you know, it was a pack of baseball cards. It was a stick of or it was a package, a small package of gum, something like that, right? And every time I got away with it, I got a little riskier. I was like, "Wait a second. If I can take one Fifth Avenue candy bar, why can't I take two? Why can't I take four? Why can't I take the box? And I start learning the patterns of the security guards and the apathy of the checkout register and the fact that the manager is really only there on the floor between, you know, 2:00 and 3:00 because he has to be. And after 3:00, he's already prepping to check out for the day at 5:00. So, I have this window of time between 3 and 5 when everybody's ready for shift change and they're all slammed busy with real customers who are following the rules. That's the perfect time for me to slip through and get whatever I want. I started stealing boxes of candy and selling it at school. So, I'm getting my source for free and I'm selling candy bars at 5 cents less than what they get from the vending machine. Like, so I'm selling 45 cent candy bars that I paid zero dollars for. And of course, my my book bag's filling up with candy, filling up with money, and that's what I'm doing. And the thought very realistically went through my head. I was like, why do I even have to go to school? >> Oh god. >> Why do I even have to follow the rules at all? Like, >> I'm I'm making more money in a week right now with candy than my dad makes in his professional job, right? Why would I Why would I ever be a straight player? There are not many people who share that thought. You had that thought at some point. >> Yes, I was going to say you're you're fortunate you didn't catch the eye of any of the mob guys in Philly. You might have went that way. [laughter] >> But there are a group of people, a large group of people in the United States who had experiences like that. And we had to choose, do we play it straight or do we play it a different way or life intervened? Like you said, there wasn't a mobster in central Pennsylvania that found me. And what did happen is my mom checked my backpack and saw a ton of money and she was like, "What? What are you doing?" And I was dumb enough to think that my mom would be proud of my entrepreneurial endeavors. Right. >> Yeah. >> But CIA taught me when I was there. They were like, "Hey, the 500 people that were in the room with me, they were like, "Here's what we already know about all of you. We already know all of you came from childhood trauma. We already know that you didn't earn the respect and love and adoration of your mom or your dad or possibly both for any number of reasons, right? Maybe they were killed before you were old enough to recognize their love. Maybe they were too busy or too successful in their job. We don't care. We already know that that's you. We also know that every one of you had a moment in your life where you had to choose whether you were going to be a criminal or whether you were going to play it straight because you realized that the line between hero and villain is razor thin >> and it's a choice. Mhm. >> And even the term hero and villain is a label that the outside world puts on your actions because in your world, you were a hero. With people that serve beside you, you were a hero. But the label that's put on you by the outside world is a different label. The same thing is true of CIA. There are people who layer on CIA that CIA officers are heroes. And there are people who layer on CIA that CIA officers are villains. >> Yeah. You know, so often in my life, um, law enforcement people would come to me and say, "There's such a thin line between us." Such a thin line. It is so true. It really is. But I I get everything you're saying. I have to ask you, there's some current things that are going on with the Charlie Kirk murder assassination. There's a lot of influencers um on social media >> that are blaming Israel. and MSAD has something to do with it. And they give all the alleged facts that they've compiled to support that. Does this look like an operation of Mossad with Charlie Kirk? Israel, do you think they're behind it? Does Israel wield the power that people are thinking now? I'm only hearing this currently. I mean, the last several months that Israel almost controls the United States, controls the world. I mean, is this true? >> No, it's not true. It's it's a it's a conspiratorial flyaway hair that is gaining traction only because there is a now current global distrust of Israel. Had the same thing happened prior to Gaza and the atrocities in the Gaza Strip. Had the same thing happened then, this conspiracy would have never had any >> footing. But because Israel has ostracized itself from the world [music] and because Netanyahu has basically shown that he is powerful, much more powerful than I think any of us previously assumed he was, that's what kind of feeds this conspiracy theory. And I'm I will speak directly to any in influencer who's trying to say that Israel's behind Charlie Kirk, you know you're wrong. They know they're wrong. You know, the evidence that you're collecting isn't complete and accurate. They know it. But they can't reject the clicks. >> They can't reject the audience. They can't reject the sponsorship money. They can't they can't turn away from the financial benefits of spreading what they already know. What you already know is incomplete and inaccurate information. >> They are intentionally capitalizing on a global bias against Israel that when you look at the facts, it's ludicrous. MSAD has proven to be one of the most secretive and capable organizations in the world over and over again in the last two years. They've launched drones from within Iranian borders. They neutralized the entire air defense shield of Iran. They mobilized the United States president to drop bombs on an an Iranian enrichment factory, an Iranian enrichment um plant. And they motivated a president who swore to not start wars. Like Israel is an incredibly capable organization. Do you really think that that organization would be an organization that some influencer would crack be like, "Oh, we see the breadcrumbs. We see the trail that Israel left behind." No. It's ridiculous to think that an organization that professional could be cracked by an untrained, unprofessional, unvetted influencer. There's a second thing that we have in the in the uh intelligence world called circular reporting. Circular reporting is when one source gives a piece of intelligence and then you hear the same intelligence from a separate source and then you think to yourself, oh, I'm hearing it from two different sources. That must increase the reliability of it being real, being true. What we don't realize is that the second source learned the information from the first source. >> So really, it's the same information from the same source, but we're reporting it as two different sources. That's why we call it circular. So when you have one influencer who basically posts a conspiracy theory and then five other influencers just repeat the same conspiracy theory. To us, it feels like there's five people saying this, >> right? >> It's only one. They're all just piling on to the same thing. They're all on the same gravy train. The last thing I want to say here on on whether Israel would be involved in this, it it doesn't make any sense when you look at geopolitics and the importance of blowback. Blowback is when you make a geopolitical error that has massive consequences. So, uh we saw that there were ceasefires that fell apart and there was blowback. There were consequences internationally. >> Uh when Russia invaded Ukraine, there were sanctions. That was blowback. That was international. As much as Israel has taken the steps it has taken, as ostracized as it's been, as as polarizing as it's been, um it couldn't it would not risk killing a conservative American influencer when their support base in the United States is conservative Americans. And the the argument that people are making here is oh well like two weeks beforehand Charlie Kirk said he was going to split away from from Judaism or supporting Israel. What do you think when when Israel assessed that break with Charlie Kirk? Do you think that they thought to themselves, h we need to publicly kill this man? Or do you think they said something more along the lines of we need to work on the next 6 to 12 months finding a way to bring him back into the fold? because he has decades worth of utility if we can make him a supporter again. But if we kill him, think about the risk of blowback. If they were to actually kill him and if they were to be caught or if they were to be formally implicated, that's going to destroy their relationship with the conservative base of the United States for decades. Israel can assassinate and they can assassinate effectively, but when they assassinate, they use MSAD agents. They don't use kids that dress up in bunny costumes and make out with their male roommate. That's not what they use as an assassin. >> Well, I always thought that was absurd. You know, why would First of all, my point, look, Charlie Kirk was an influential figure, but that influential that you have to take him out like he's going to destroy Israel if dumped you. It made no sense to me. >> But I I think you you nailed it in that really. Let let me ask you this. I have a friend. Two things I want to say. Well, let let me ask you this first. How does the CIA stack up against MSAD? Would you consider one a superior agency or the the professional answer here is that you have to look at the different categories cuz intelligence has multiple categories. >> When it comes to uh size and scale of capability, CIA crushes MSAD. We have a much higher budget. we have a a much wider international footprint and where we can operate, where we're prepared to operate, the network that we have in those different countries. MSAD is really only focused on a few countries and really primarily Iran >> and then proxies of Iran. So where the United States is the premier superpower, we have 160 countries that are all trying to take us down. Israel has one country that's trying to take it down, >> right? It's got a couple other threats that are collegiations, but they're not trying to eradicate the country like Iran is trying to eradicate the country. So, your budget gets spread pretty far and wide when 160 countries are vying for you versus when just one is. So, when it comes to size and scope, CIA crushes MSAD. But when it comes to refined, sophisticated um high-risk operations, nobody touches MSAD because MSAD has no problem executing assassinations because the blowback from for their concern, the blowback is worth it because the people they assassinate by and large are people who are actually posing a existential threat to the homeland. Again, not Charlie Kirk, not influencers, that's not who threatens Israel. Nuclear scientists in Iran are the threat to Israel. Generals for Hezbollah and Hamas, right? People who are sworn to destroy the entire independent nation of Israel. That's who they that's who they assassinate. So, because they have to have a plan for that, they take risks that none of us in CIA would take. They'll send 10 people on a hit team and they'll assess that only five will come back and they'll still go. Where our Navy Seal teams, if they assess that high of an attrition rate, they'll second guess their plan and and go back to the drawing board and reinvent it all over again. So, their risk tolerance is higher because their threat vector is so much higher. So, and those two just separate categories, you can see how different the two are. Israel's capability for sabotage, especially clandestine sabotage, sabotage that would never be discovered, is astronomically high. The United States, we spread our sabotage operations far and wide. It's very hard for us to sabotage a Russian factory and a Chinese factory and a North Korean factory using the same system. So, we have to create three completely different systems. All three of them have the risk of being captured and caught. we have to worry about being penetrated by the Russians and the Chinese and the North Koreans technologically and in terms of human inside sources. You can just see how the risk profile for the United States goes up significantly where Israel can keep its operations secret from the United States. Israel's even recruited spies who are American military members without the United States realizing that those same military members are informing Israel. So you just you can really start to see that they're comparable on points but not as an entire service. >> So all the talk about Israel uh really controlling the United States, you wouldn't place much weight in that at all. >> No. The the what we're seeing when we think that Israel has this grandiose control of the world, when we think that they're part of some deep state pulling the strings, right? What we're seeing there is that Netanyahu specifically who has who is without a doubt an authoritarian leader who has been in office more than a decade like all the signs of the people that we generally say are bad leaders. We we attack Xiinping, we attack Vladimir Putin, right? >> And yet we're seeing it with Netanyahu, one of the closest allies of the United States. What we're seeing is that his authoritarian um actions are influential and impactful because he knows how to play the geopolitical game. He understands the leverage that Israel has. He knows when to push a little bit further. He knows how to influence the president, not through secret documents that Epstein might have or might not have. He just understands what the president wants and how to get the president to agree to terms that Israel benefits from. And they've been doing this long before Donald Trump was in office. They've been doing this for as long as we've had a close relationship with Israel. Netanyahu, when he was prime minister, he was doing it. When he wasn't prime minister, he was doing it. That like we've had this relationship with Israel for a long time. So much of the United States's success is tied to the Jewish diaspora. And even still, Americans can't tell the difference between a Jew and an Israeli. >> They're two different things. >> So, we just end up completely missing the boat and landing on some stupid oversimplified idea that, oh, Israel must run the world. No, you just have a very sophisticated person who's in an authoritarian position who understands that we can't tell the difference between a citizen of his nation and a follower of the same faith. You know, it's funny because I have a very dear friend of mine, 30 some odd years, very dear friend. He's Israeli. And I said to him, you know, why does it seem you don't like uh Netanyahu? And he said, I don't not like him. I hate him. And I said, why is that? And then prior to saying that, I said, you know, I've never seen such anti-semitism as we're seeing now. And I think he relates in the United States, he relates Netanyahu to the anti-semitism here. Do you see that as a a direct correlation? >> Absolutely. What I see is that we are Americans who are not careful with their words or who are not sophisticated enough in their own worldly knowledge are not understanding that Jews are not the problem. The faith that a Jewish person follows is not the problem. It's the nation and the policy of Israel that is the problem. And the policy makers in Israel are just people, not necessarily people guided by faith. They're just people guided by their own self-interest and the own and and what they believe are in the best interest of their country. So what happens is these less knowledgeable or unsophisticated or or or uncareful people here in the United States, they start saying anti-semitic things. They start acting in a way that's anti-Semitic, not understanding there's a difference between the Israeli government and the Jew, the Israeli citizen and the Jew. Jewish people are wonderful people. The Jewish faith is a wonderful faith. It's a it's a communityoriented faith that's that builds groups up. It it's it's not dangerous. It's not self-s serving. It's not it's not negative. And when we start to focus our anger on Jewish people, we're completely ignoring the fact that we are angry because of Israeli policies. >> Totally different things. But how do you get people first of all, how do you get people to understand that? And then the the biggest frustration, Michael, is that even our Congress doesn't understand the difference. So, we've had members of the House who have put forward policies that basically make criticism of Israel a sign of anti-semitism. Now, we're making it legislation that the two are the same thing. Now, thankfully, those bills weren't passed. Smarter people prevailed and said, "Hey, this is not the same thing." But jeez, man. We have we have our own representatives that aren't smart enough to tell the difference between a faith set and a nationality. That's dangerous. >> Andrew, I have never in my lifetime uh seen incompetence in government, in Congress like I've seen now. I I look at it, I'm in shock. >> How did this person ever get elected? >> It it's just it's just terrible. I mean it it's like to me it's a joke. It it would be a joke if it wasn't so serious because these people have control over our lives and some of them I I just don't get it. >> But you know it's fascinating. I have to ask you this. We have now in New York a um a democratic socialist who's going to be mayor of the biggest city in the country. >> Yeah. >> What's your feeling on that? I mean do you feel you've had experience all over the world. Is socialism good for the United States? >> Socialism isn't good anywhere. >> I mean, even when we I don't It's funny to me when you see people reference the same small handful of countries where they highlight that socialism is a success story. Especially when you consider that many of those same countries are actually monarchies. >> Mhm. [clears throat] >> We we fought a war to not be part of a monarchy. And now we're referencing current monarchies as signs of of wealth and success. If if you want to be a monarchy, I'm pretty sure we have a president in office that would be okay with being the first new monarch, >> right? But we fought a war to not be controlled by a monarch. Don't reference other countries as signs of socialist success when they are actually monarchy countries that are being successful. Socialist countries are failing. France is an actual socialist country >> and they are burning cars in the streets. They haven't they've had five different prime ministers in the last two years. >> They are they are ex they are more in debt than they are making per year, right? >> And they're still in a better debt position than we are in the United