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--:-- John Bickley: A Biden-appointed Fed governor is refusing to step aside after President Trump said she's fired, setting up a legal showdown. We need people that are 100 percent above board, and it doesn't seem like she was. I'm Daily Wire, executive editor John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Wednesday, August 27th, and this is Morning Wire.
--:-- Georgia Howe: In a surprise move, President Trump is clearing the way for hundreds of thousands of Chinese students to attend U.S. universities. Having these folks come here be educated by American universities and then leave, I think, is a problem that he recognizes and a lot of people recognize.
--:-- John Bickley: And the Department of Transportation is cracking down on truck drivers who don't speak English and the states who license them. We are going to give these states 30 days to come into compliance, or we're going to look at federal funding.
--:-- Georgia Howe: Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know. America is built on hard work and powered by American energy. Chevron has spent $44 billion with local businesses across all 50 states since 2022, fueling infrastructure and communities, all while strengthening local economies. Last year, Chevron increased U.S. production nearly 20 percent, powering communities and businesses from the heartlands to the coast. We're helping to fuel America's energy advantage, building a brighter future right here at home. Visit chevron.com slash America to discover more.
--:-- John Bickley: President Trump continues his effort to reshape the U.S. economy, shaking up leadership at the Federal Reserve and setting off another legal battle. Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips has the latest on this high-stakes showdown.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Hey, Cabot, so a major move from Trump against the Fed here. Unprecedented, as a lot of outlets have reported. What exactly happened?
--:-- Cabot Phillips: So for context, President Trump has been really ramping up his attacks on Federal Reserve leadership, primarily Chair Jerome Powell, whom he says has intentionally been keeping interest rates low in order to harm the economy and then harm Trump politically. But also in recent weeks, he started to ramp up his criticism of Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook buying an appointee. But because the Fed is designed to be independent from political pressure, appointees can only be removed with cause. Policy disagreements don't count. But on Monday night, Trump fired Cook, saying that he now has cause.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: All right, so Trump's saying he has cause here and thus authority to fire her. Walk us through the case here. So this month, the DOJ began investigating whether or not Cook had committed mortgage fraud after purchasing two properties in separate states, allegedly claiming in paperwork for those purchases that each home would be her primary residence.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: According to Bill Pulte, director of the Federal Finance Housing Agency, Cook made those claims, quote, in order to potentially secure lower interest rates and more favorable loan terms. And for Trump that was enough evidence to fire her. He wrote a letter to Cook informing her that quote the American people must be able to have full confidence in the honesty of the members entrusted with setting policy and overseeing the Federal Reserve In light of your deceitful and potentially criminal conduct in a financial matter, they cannot, and I do not have such confidence in your integrity.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Here's Trump elaborating on that decision yesterday from the White House during a cabinet meeting. She seems to have had an infraction and she can't have an infraction, and especially that infraction because she's in charge of, if you think about it, mortgages.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, as you can imagine, that move drew immediate outrage from Democrats who say that Trump all along was just looking for any reason he could come up with to fire Cook. Senator Elizabeth Warren, for example, called it a, quote, authoritarian power grab. Other Democrats implied that the action was racist because of the fact that Cook is black. And Congressman Sean Caston had a more blunt assessment saying, quote, Trump will tank the economy before he stops being an ass.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Now, for their part, Republicans say that it's crucial that federal employees have some form of oversight and are held accountable and that they're not above the law. They say that Americans must have full trust in Fed officials.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: All right, so unsurprisingly, Democrats coming to her defense. What about Cook herself? How has she responded? She is ready for a fight, John. She released a statement immediately after the firing saying, quote, President Trump purported to fire me for cause when no cause exists under the law and he has no authority to do so. I will not resign. I will continue to carry out my duties to help the American economy, as I've been doing since 2022.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: And then on Tuesday, she went a step further, saying she planned on filing a lawsuit against the president. Now, that case could potentially go all the way to the Supreme Court, as right now there's just not a ton of president on just how much power the president has when it comes to personnel at the Fed.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Keep in mind, this is the first time in the Federal Reserve's 100-plus year history that a president has removed a member of the Board of Governors. Now, more broadly, if this firing is allowed to stand in court, it gives Trump even more power over reshaping the Federal Reserve. First, he'll be able to name Cook's replacement. And then the big one, he'll get to appoint a new Federal Reserve chair in May of 2026. That is when Jerome Powell's term ends. That is assuming that Trump doesn't find cause to remove him before then.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Right. In the end, Powell has been the major target of Trump in terms of his criticism over the last few months. Now, reshaping the economy under the Trump administration, we've just seen a major move by them with the Intel deal. Again, pretty unprecedented here. Tell us about that.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Yeah, a major move here that sort of went under the radar. In recent days, the tech giant Intel has agreed to sell a 10% stake in its business to the United States government. That move will result in nearly $9 billion in new investments on top of the $2 billion in federal assistance the U.S. government has already given them through the CHIPS Act.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: That makes this arguably the largest federal intervention in a private company since the fallout from the 08 financial crisis when the U.S. poured billions into the auto industry. This move is part of a broader effort to not only revive Intel, one of the country's most important tech companies, but also the U.S. semiconductor industry as a whole.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Remember, the White House views the production of this technology as a national security interest, and they are intent that we not fall behind the rest of the world and also that we're not reliant on China and other adversaries.
--:-- Cabot Phillips: Right in the end, a lot of this comes back to our concerns about China, so they're making some aggressive moves here.
--:-- John Bickley: President Trump wants to bring in hundreds of thousands of additional Chinese students to American universities. The move comes months after Marco Rubio announced a plan to aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to talk about Trump and China.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So Tim this is controversial. Why is Trump suddenly so friendly towards Chinese students?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Yeah, he taken some heat for this but Trump wants to raise the quota for Chinese students allowed into the U to 600 That would be the most ever. And that has some people who are typically his loudest supporters pretty skeptical of this move.
--:-- Tim Pierce: For instance, Laura Ingraham grilled Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on this on Monday night on Fox News. But Trump defended his position in yesterday's cabinet meeting.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Here's some of that. We're getting along very well with China. And I'm getting along very well with President Xi. I think it's very insulting to say your students can't come here because they'll go out and they'll start building schools and they'll be able to survive it. But I like that their students come here. I like that other country students come here.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And you know what would happen if they didn't? Our college system would go to hell very quickly. You'd have, and it wouldn't be the top colleges. It would be colleges that struggle on the bottom. And you take out 300,000 or 600,000 students out of the system, I like having, and I told this to President Xi, that we're honored to have their students here.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Now, with that, we check and we're careful and we see who's there. And Marco wants that. We spoke. We're in the same position. But we have a tremendous college system, the best in the world. Nobody even close. That's why China sends them here.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So according to the president, U.S. universities, specifically a lot of less prestigious institutions, couldn't survive without a lot of Chinese nationals filling their ranks. So what's the president's goal with this?
--:-- Tim Pierce: For that, I spoke to Brett Manley with the Energy Fair Trade Coalition. Here's what he said. I think we should wait and see a little bit. I mean, Trump has a history of floating things, you know, via press conference or question and answer period, just to see how I think it'll land with the base, you know, and then he moves on.
--:-- Tim Pierce: But again, we'll see, right, the devil's in the details. You know, there's a big difference, I think, between, you know, daughters and sons of officials in the Communist Party secretly being admitted and protected, essentially their identities protected by our elite universities and just a rank and file, ordinary, everyday Chinese student who excels at some particular field of study that wants to come to the United States.
--:-- Tim Pierce: And Trump seems to be committed to strict vetting of Chinese nationals. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced in May that the Trump administration would aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students with ties to the Communist Party or who are studying in, quote, critical fields.
--:-- Tim Pierce: So you may have just alluded to it there, but what are the main risks that the critics are pointing to as to why he shouldn't do this?
--:-- Tim Pierce: Well, there are always concerns that Chinese students may be pushed to steal tech and research from the United States. According to the Hoover Institution, China also uses the United States education system to train its own workforce, and that could have some pretty significant impacts on China's military industry.
--:-- Tim Pierce: Beijing has also built extensive influence networks in the United States. For instance, the New York Times has reported on China-affiliated groups having exerted some influence over New York City politics. A close ally of Mayor Eric Adams has been subjected to several federal raids allegedly over close ties to groups friendly with the Chinese Communist Party.
--:-- Tim Pierce: That aide, Winnie Greco, was suspended from Adams' campaign recently over an attempt to bribe a reporter. Right, there are a variety of ways the Chinese government is trying to exert influence.
--:-- John Bickley: The Department of Transportation is enforcing a new rule from the Trump administration, requiring truckers to demonstrate English language proficiency. The move comes after an illegal alien from India driving a semi-truck killed three people. Here to discuss the developments in the wake of that tragic crash is Daily Wire investigative reporter Spencer Lindquist.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: A Spencer So we reported on that crash last week. Really horrifying incident in Florida that prompted this action from the Trump administration. First, remind us what happened there.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: Yeah, sure thing. So there is an illegal alien from India named Harjinder Singh, and he's been charged with three counts of vehicular homicide after he caused a crash while trying to perform an illegal U-turn on an interstate in Florida.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: The Department of Transportation says that the state of Washington gave Singh a commercial driver's license, even though illegal aliens and asylum seekers are ineligible for them. And California also gave Singh a limited term license.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: New Mexico State Police pulled over Singh this summer, but did not administer an English language proficiency test, despite a Trump administration order mandating those tests. And the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration later said that Singh was not proficient in English and could only identify one out of four highway traffic signs.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: Singh flew to California after the crash in Florida, but he was apprehended by the U.S. marshals. ISIS placed a detainer on him, and the agency will gain custody of him after his criminal trial concludes in Florida.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: All right, so that's what sparked all this outrage and this action from the Trump administration. How are they responding?
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: So the Department of Transportation is cracking down and enforcing an order from the Trump administration mandating that truckers are proficient in English. And that comes after the president declared English the national language of the United States earlier this year.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: Here's Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy speaking at a press conference. This is about keeping people safe on the road. Your families, your kids, your spouses, your loved ones, your friends, we all use the roadway. And we need to make sure that those who are driving big rigs, semis, can understand the road signs, that they've been well trained.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: and that when they're pulled over by law enforcement, they're stopped by law enforcement, or there's a crash and law enforcement responds, they can effectively communicate. Duffy also noted that the states currently in violation of the order include Washington, California, and New Mexico, and that the Department of Transportation is giving these states 30 days to come into compliance.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: But if they don't, Duffy says that the department will look at withholding funding from these states. We don't want to take away money from states, but we will take money away and we'll take additional steps. that get progressively more difficult for these states.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: There's a lot of great tools that we have here that we don't want to use. We just want to keep drivers safe, not in just red states. We don't, this is, Americans drive in all states. And California, Washington, and New Mexico, Americans drive in, and they deserve to be safe in those states like in every other state.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: And California openly said earlier this month that they have no intention of following this federal guidance. So that's the Department of Transportation taking action. The State Department has also made some moves here. What have we seen from Marco Rubio and his team?
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: So Secretary of State Marco Rubio came out and said that they are pausing all visas for foreigners trying to come into the United States to work as truckers. And Rubio wrote in a post on X that, quote, the increasing number of foreign drivers operating large tractor trailer trucks on U.S. roads is endangering American lives and undercutting the livelihoods of American truckers.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: Well, some decisive action being taken by the Trump administration here again after a lot of outrage from Americans.
--:-- John Bickley: Thanks for reporting, Spencer.
--:-- Spencer Lindquist: Thanks for having me.
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--:-- John Bickley: That's all for today's show. Thanks for listening to Morning Wire.
