Adam Brandon, president of Freedomworks, joined Glenn on radio Friday, to tell listeners how they can begin to network with other like-minded activists to help fix our country. Freedomworks will hold a 9/12 Grassroots Summit in Orlando, Florida on Saturday 9/12, where Glenn will be speaking along with GOP presidential candidates, members of Congress and other political influencers.
During the interview, Glenn pointed out he felt so strongly about this event, he actually invited himself to be a part of it.
"If my memory serves me right, I asked you if I could come. And I want the audience to know that," Glenn said.
While admitting he often says, "I'm done with politics" on air, Glenn said it's critical we actually stay engaged.
"It's really easy for us to say, 'I'm not going to be engaged.' But we are actually winning," Glenn said.
Listen to the full interview or read the transcript below.
Below is a rush transcript of this segment, it might contain errors.
GLENN: Adam Brandon is with us. He's from FreedomWorks. I wanted to give him a couple of minutes here to talk a little about the 9/12 Summit that we're doing tomorrow, or that he's doing tomorrow and I'm a part of. They graciously asked me to attend. And the people that are coming. So, Adam, what's the key to tomorrow?
ADAM: Well, thanks for having me on, Glenn. I'm excited to see you. You've had one busy week. Events in Washington, events down in Florida. Jeez, where are you going next, my man?
GLENN: I know. On Sunday, I'm doing three other events as well. So it's been good though. I get to see a lot of people.
ADAM: Yeah, it is. And that's the thing. There's a lot of people that want to see you. Because we're dealing with a lot of very important issues. And I do have to applaud you for going to Washington and taking a stand on hyping the awareness of the problem with this around you. I know it's not on the FreedomWorks issue set, but pat on the back to you and to everyone else that did that that day.
GLENN: I will tell you that the people that were there are the Tea Party people. And I don't know if the politicians -- even some of the good ones, you know, I don't judge them. They're just so far out of -- they're so far away from where the people are, that they just don't -- I don't think they even really get it. So, Adam, what is coming? And what are we going to learn tomorrow?
ADAM: Well, that's the perfect segway. Earlier in the year, we knew that tomorrow was going to be 9/12. We knew we had to do something to commemorate that march that we did years and years ago that some estimates as high as 2 million people marched on the National Mall. And that was kind of the coming-out party for both FreedomWorks and the Tea Party movement. And we wanted to do something to kind of show progress. Because it's very easy to look around at all these problems and say, "Hey, we're doing all this work. We've been in the streets. We've been in elections. We've been on the phone. What's the progress?"
So we wanted to have a day where we get everyone together to kind of fire people back up and show, "Look, there is progress." So we're going to come together, kind of celebrate that march and kind of show -- you mentioned the politicians. We are going to have a bunch of them on that stage tomorrow. Members of this House Freedom Caucus. This is the caucus that has given Boehner all the problems. There was a headline last week showing that John Boehner knows he doesn't have the votes to survive a vote of confidence. He could be removed. John Boehner might not make it out of this Congress.
GLENN: Go ahead.
ADAM: It's people like Congressman Mark Meadows, talk about courage. Ron DeSantis. Thomas Massie of Kentucky. This is the hit list for the establishment. But none of these guys -- none of these guys wouldn't have been in office if it wasn't for your listeners and if it wasn't for this movement that we all created.
GLENN: And I will tell you this, that I am meeting -- and I want to talk to you off-air tomorrow a bit about some guys that I've met in the last few weeks that are so far under the radar. They are not guys -- and what really gives me hope, they don't want the publicity. In fact, they told me some things that they were doing. They were like, "Don't talk about this. Please don't talk about this." And I said, "But that's really inspiring." And they're like, "Don't talk about it. I don't want the publicity. I don't want anything. They'll never see it coming." And there are some things on people that the Tea Party has put in, they are not stopping. They're not sleeping. There's some really good people and some dramatic things on the horizon. Would you agree with that?
ADAM: I 100 percent agree with it. And I fall prey every day to talking about presidential politics. When there are about 30 members of Congress -- and we all know Mike Lee. We all know Ted Cruz. We all know Rand Paul. But these 30 members of the House Freedom Caucus. And I hope everyone who is listening who has never heard about the House Freedom Caucus, Googles it, learns about it, and supports those folks because this is that thin red line in the House of Representatives.
GLENN: It is.
ADAM: And we need to grow that thin red line. And folks tell me, "Hey, Adam, let us -- you know, we want to do our work quietly." But I'm sorry, I'm going to the top of the roofs and scream their praises for the work that they're doing because I know it's lonely, it's awful, and it's horrible. And they're doing it. They're going to Washington and they're doing it. It's not enough yet. It's not critical mass yet. But that's why we want to get together tomorrow in Florida to celebrate our movement and to show those guys some love and respect and give them courage to keep going.
GLENN: Yeah, I will tell you this, I -- I'm not going to shout their name from the rooftops, the few that I want to talk to you about them. Because I don't even know if you know what's going on in some of these things. I'm sure you do. But I am so encouraged by what I see behind the scenes. And out of these 30 guys, let's say in Congress. They're the ones -- I don't think the average American understands how close we are to eviscerating the G.O.P.
ADAM: Yes.
GLENN: I don't think they have any idea. They see the G.O.P. -- well, the G.O.P. is winning. The G.O.P. is winning. The G.O.P. is winning. And they don't look afraid. But I'm telling you, they're about to be done. They're about to literally be finished as a party if they don't get their own leadership out of the way and change their ways. And I don't think the average American feels that yet.
ADAM: No. And I think it's -- there's always -- I always love that saying "the Stone Age didn't end because they ran out of stones." And I think the G.O.P.'s age, the old establishment's age, they have all the trappings of the power that they used to have. But all those television ads they used to run and the committee chairs they used to control and the lobbyist state dinners, none of that has the effect that it once did because you've got these congressmen who are going to Washington -- Tim Hill's camp, who will be speaking from Kansas, votes against bloated agriculture subsidies. In Kansas. And he's got two establishment challengers already. And we either step up as a movement to protect him, to support him, to keep him elected, or the old guys will take -- you know, get one of their own back in there. So it will be a fight from coast-to-coast. Not just the presidential race. Not just Senate races. And there will be a bunch of doozy Senate races. But we have to make sure we protect these 30 members of the House Freedom Caucus and grow their ranks.
GLENN: Well, I will tell you, I don't think you guys asked me to be a part of this. If my memory serves me right, I asked you if I could come. And I want the audience to know that. If you're listening and you're anywhere in the Orlando area, I asked to come to this because while I say on the air I'm done with politics, I'm done with politics, I want you to know, this is critical that we actually stay engaged. It's really easy for us to say, "I'm not going to be engaged." But we are actually winning. You know, that seven stages of a movement, we're at that seventh stage where you think you've lost and you're about to fall apart.
ADAM: Right. Right.
GLENN: The next stage is, "Surprise, you've won." But we have to do the things that we need to do for this next election. We can't just get frustrated with big government progressives in the G.O.P. leading in the polls. We need to understand, we're still a long way away. And there's a lot of hearts and minds to be changed. And there's a lot of mistakes to be made by all of these candidates yet.
ADAM: We're going to be talking about -- Steve Moore, who joined Freedom Works recently, is going to be talking about a very pro-economic growth agenda. And one thing that is scary to me, throughout our history, basically since the Pilgrims, we've grown at about three and a half percent per year, on average. And now we're growing at about one and a half percent, 2 percent. And that's not good enough. This is why America's middle class has not seen a raise in 25 years. We need to grow as a country.
And the only reason we're not growing is the regulations, is the bureaucrats, is Washington, is Obamacare. You could go down the list. And that hurts people. The people that have been hurt the most in this in the last few years are single mothers, they're black Americans, young Americans. The very people who got Barack Obama elected have been the ones who have been hurt the most in this nongrowth era. And so let's take that positive pro-growth vision and message to all corners and all parts of our society.
GLENN: You know nobody looks at it this way, but I've been in so many churches over the last six months, and I'm speaking at three churches -- or, two services and another church. So two different churches just this Sunday in Tampa. And what amazes me is nobody looks at it this way, but the churches aren't really hurting for money. The churches are able to build these great buildings. They're able to change neighborhoods. I mean, it was just in Houston, and I was talking to all of the politicians and all of the firefighters and all of the people in Houston, and that one church, where they had that service in Houston last week, that one church has fundamentally changed the way services are required and passed out through the local government because the church just took it. And why are the churches growing in money and ability? Because they're the least regulated. You can't regulate.
ADAM: Right.
GLENN: So when a church says, "I want to fix something in our community," they just do it. The reason why we're having these problems is because everything else in our society is overregulated and overtaxed. And so you don't have the ability to do anything.
ADAM: No.
GLENN: If we would just start to get our own country, our own private industry and our own private households closer into line to where the churches are, where they're not asking for permission, they're just doing it, we could fix the problems.
ADAM: Just do it. Here about this economy right now. We have some of the lowest levels of entrepreneur start-ups in our history. When you look at the trends. When you look at the labor force -- it is, since the 1970s, the lowest level of labor force participation. This affects people's lives. We're talking about opportunities and dreams that are not happening because the bureaucracy is growing. And these guys in the House Freedom Caucus get it and they're fighting it every day.
And I think that's one of the reasons we did that march back in -- five, six years ago on 9/12, was because people just wanted to unleash American prosperity. They just wanted to, let's go back to our core principles that made us great. And I see the hope. And as you travel, you see the hope. But we have to do it together, in the sense, you got to get together with your church, your neighbors. And that's why it's important to do these events like we do every once in a while, just so you can also feel that fellowship, walk in there with a few thousand people who think and act the way that you do and believe in this country and get fired up and go be an evangelical in your own community about how great America is.
GLENN: Thank you very much, we'll see you tomorrow.
ADAM: All right. Can't wait.
GLENN: If you'd like to attend. Go to 912summit.com. 912summit.com. The Orlando area at the arena here -- I think it's in Orlando. Where is it? Yeah, in Orlando. So come on out and join us. And you can find out all the information at 912summit.com. That's tomorrow. Then I'm also going to be speaking at Crossing Church. That is Sunday. And I'm going to be speaking at the 8:30 service and the 10:30 service at Crossing Church in Tampa. You can find out the information on that. And then at 4:00 p.m. -- I think it's at 4:00 p.m. in the afternoon. And I don't even have the location, but it will be up at GlennBeck.com. And I'm speaking at an LDS steak center at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. And you're welcome to attend either one of those. But that's this Sunday. If you're anywhere near the Florida area, I would love to see you. And find out all the details on all those activities this -- for this weekend at GlennBeck.com.
