Rumors Fly Following Sudden Departure of Two Trump Team Members

Filling in for Glenn on radio, former New York City police officer John Cardillo offered his commentary on the controvertial departure of two Trump transition team members A.J. Delgado and Jason Miller.

"This situation seems to have sorted itself out the way it ought to have sorted itself out," Cardillo said. "It's going to be very, very interesting to see how this plays out."

Listen to the segment or read the transcript below.

JOHN: Good morning. Welcome to the Glenn Beck Program. I'm John Cardillo. Sitting in for Glenn Beck while he's on a well deserved vacation. And if you're just tuning in, I'll tell you a little bit about myself. So I got my start in media with Glenn. But I am not a media guy by training. I was a New York City cop, and I was an entrepreneur. Started a company where we provided security services to large online communities and wound up spending more time in the legislative arena and really got a front row seat at how law enforcement and our legislative process worked and realized our country was kind of a mess.

And so when I was in a position to do so, needed to expand my platform -- decided to expand my platform so I could get some of this information out to you.

And, luckily, Glenn Beck found me about three -- three and a half years ago. I was like a little shelter dog, but Glenn found me. We had a great conversation on air. We did a segment -- we did a political analysis segment.

We went on to profile some of the radical groups in the US and created a very nice relationship. And I went on to host my own show, down here in Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, and was so flattered, when I was asked to stand in for Glenn today and tomorrow on the Glenn Beck Show.

And being a guy who was pro-Trump -- and Glenn was so anti-Trump. It was even better. It was even better. Because it proved to me there are still some great people in this industry who want their audiences to hear all sides. And it also showed me how we can be friends and disagree on an issue. Isn't that a novel concept?

We don't have to get into these knockdown drag-out grudge matches where we lose friendships over political candidates. We lose colleagues. We lose professional relationships. It's silly. Don't do it. Don't do it.

But there is a bit of turmoil in the Trump campaign right now. I don't know if you've seen the stories on this. But a couple of days ago, the Trump communication director Jason Miller resigned to spend more time with family.

Now, I've got an unfair advantage on this one because one of the players in this little drama is A.J. Delgado -- and you've probably seen A.J. out there. She's -- she was a South Florida -- and then a national surrogate for the Trump campaign.

And prior to that, A.J. was a conservative pundit. You would see her frequently on Fox News, many, many radio and television programs. And she wrote a column.

But I had a front row seat to many of the goings on with the Trump campaign in South Florida, as a member of the media. I was at every rally. And what this is shaking out to be -- and I've got impeccable sources still inside the transition.

And what's happening here -- and you're getting pieces of this in the print media. But I was on the phone all last night, and this might be the first place right here on the Glenn Beck Program that you're going to hear what's really happening from sources inside the transition.

It looks as if -- and now what it's shaking out to be that A.J. Delgado and comes director Jason Miller were having an affair. And it makes it all the more troubling in that Miller is married with children, a child or children. And I believe his wife is also expecting.

Now, I will tell you, from personal experience, I had been at two rallies where A.J. Delgado was present. And I am not a moralist. I'm not a moral cop. I really don't care. But I go to political rallies. I go to events. I don't care who the candidate is. I go to business functions. There's an appropriate way to look, act, and dress. And I will say, that A.J. Delgado was dressed, in my opinion, highly inappropriately for these events. It was a skin, skin, skintight dresses, six-inch heels.

No other women, even the young attractive women were not dressed the same way. But even worse, it was -- and I was with an adviser, very close adviser to the Trump campaign. He was a friend of mine. And he and I were sitting during one of the rallies -- the rally in Miami, down in the Brickell area of Miami at the night center.

I think it was the last rally that Donald Trump held in South Florida before the election. And he and I were sitting there. And people were leaving the VIP, the closed area where the candidate was, where Donald Trump was.

And about 15 people who had come out complained about the way A.J. Delgado was acting. And no one understood why. No one understood how this girl who was picked up as a surrogate and was supposed to just be out there, doing her part in the media, when -- when she was asked to, was all of a sudden acting like she was senior campaign staff.

And I saw it, as an on-air guy down in South Florida and as somebody that was working with the RNC coms people and the Trump coms people, as a conservative radio host, I could not guests booked. We couldn't get guests booked. When Miller was running coms, it became nearly impossible.

Now, the people that were running coms prior to Miller and that team, it was very easy to get good guests booked. So I started seeing a difficulty in getting guests booked.

And then every time I turned on the television, turned on radio, or read something in print, A.J. Delgado had apparently replaced everyone else on the campaign as the premier spokesperson, spokeswoman. It was very weird to me.

Quite candidly, I never saw this coming. We thought maybe she had a relationship with one of the daughters or one of the daughters-in-law, or maybe she had done some legal work for some people previously or she had a patron that was a donor.

But what really crystallized for me that there was something else going on, was when she became the representative to the Cuban American community, which is a very important, very significant voting bloc in South Florida.

And when I was interfacing with some of the old guard -- and these were the solid conservatives. They go to Versailles Restaurant, and they hold court there. And if you don't know what Versailles is -- if you're ever in Miami and you watch any political campaign, whether it be presidential, gubinatorial, congressional, senatorial -- when you want the Cuban vote -- and believe me, you need it if you're going to win Florida. You go to Versailles. It's a restaurant down in Little Havana. That really is the kingdom. That's where you need to hold court and meet with the old guard.

And when I started talking to those guys and those women, they didn't know who she was. They said, who? Huh?

There were so many prominent Cuban Americans that should have had that role, and many of them were dismayed that A.J. Delgado, a young girl in her 30s, who really came out of nowhere, who was a columnist and, you know, commentator, pundit about the media, took a role that many, many other people were better suited for. Well, now it all makes sense.

Now, look, I'm not the moral police. So I'm not here to judge anybody. But campaign affairs happen. And people who work on campaigns know they happen. And typically, both sides are smart enough to know that that affair ends when the campaign is over. People go back to their life.

They take jobs in the administration. There's more -- there's more scrutiny on the players at that point, on the ancillary staff. During the campaign, it's all on the candidates. There's limited airtime. The candidates are dueling it out. They're duking it out. But when the campaign is over, they start looking at staff, right?

Because if you're the left-wing media and you want to hurt a candidate, well, you have vetted that candidate to hell and back during the campaign. So barring them doing something really stupid or really egregious, there's not much more to report, other than your normal hit pieces and attacking their policy positions. And in the case -- Donald Trump, they beat him up on his tweets, which I happened to like, but I'll tell you why later.

But you look at the staff. And so Miller was a smart enough guy to realize, "Hey, they're going to be looking at me. This was a fun fling. Now it's time for real work. Now we are the candidate. Now we've got to go govern. Okay. Playtime is over. Let's get back to work."

Well, apparently this didn't set too well with Ms. Delgado. Now, what I've been told is an email went out to all of the major players on the transition team, depicting and detailing the affair.

Hell hath no fury like a Cubana scorned. I mean, from what I'm hearing, it was pretty bad.

She then took to Twitter with a series of tweets. And one of them referenced a -- and it's almost embarrassing for me, as a grown man, to say this on air, a baby daddy, which seemed to imply there was a little more to this affair and she had directed this at Jason Miller.

Well, her whole Twitter feed gets deleted. And I was told yesterday that both she and Miller were fired. Miller was allowed to quietly resign and save face. And A.J.'s face was quietly killed and she was made a pariah. And I was told she is on the, quote, unquote, warpath by someone very senior on the campaign.

But my point of bringing this to light, we have a duty -- right? Whether we're in the conservative media, the liberal media, when we get information like this, we've got a duty to let you know who the players are.

And I think -- I personally -- Donald Trump is going to be a very good president. And I'm going to tell you why in the next hour. I'm going to explain to you why his rhetoric and his style never scared me. It didn't bother me, as much as it did to other people. But I'll explain why I understand that it did bother and offend and scare some people.

But when -- when I looked at people that worked around this campaign -- and let me tell you, there was some of the hardest working, most honest, most diligent people, working on this campaign. And I knew them. And in the south Florida region -- and Florida on the whole, many of them were friends of mine.

It was very disappointing to me to see people taking the limelight. A.J. Delgado was one of those people. And A.J. Delgado and I haven't -- don't really know each other. She blocked me on Twitter a couple of years ago. I think I disagreed with her on -- she was pro Common Core, because she was a moderate. A center moderate. Quote, unquote, conservative. And then she became this newly minted conservative. I just think it was -- she's replaced Chuck Schumer as the person that is most dangerous between them and a camera.

But I -- I need to bring this out because a lot of good people were hurt by these grandstanders. Hard-working people. And I don't care where you stand politically. People that do work, people that are the grinders that have the ethic, that are doing the work and that don't want the thanks shouldn't be treated poorly by those who seek glory.

And karma is an interesting thing. Divine intervention is a really interesting thing. And all I'll say -- and I'll leave you with, this situation seems to have sorted itself out the way it ought to have sorted itself out. It -- it's going to be very, very interesting to see how this plays out.

But progressives also don't live by this standard. They think they're impervious to any critique. To all the rules. And can act in any way they want. And that was really -- really made evident when two gay men attacked a mom and her children on a JetBlue flight a couple of days before Christmas.

Featured Image: Julie Dermansky/Getty Images

A nation unravels when its shared culture is the first thing to go

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Texas now hosts Quran-first academies, Sharia-compliant housing schemes, and rapidly multiplying mosques — all part of a movement building a self-contained society apart from the country around it.

It is time to talk honestly about what is happening inside America’s rapidly growing Muslim communities. In city after city, large pockets of newcomers are choosing to build insulated enclaves rather than enter the broader American culture.

That trend is accelerating, and the longer we ignore it, the harder it becomes to address.

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world.

America has always welcomed people of every faith and people from every corner of the world, but the deal has never changed: You come here and you join the American family. You are free to honor your traditions, keep your faith, but you must embrace the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. You melt into the shared culture that allows all of us to live side by side.

Across the country, this bargain is being rejected by Islamist communities that insist on building a parallel society with its own rules, its own boundaries, and its own vision for how life should be lived.

Texas illustrates the trend. The state now has roughly 330 mosques. At least 48 of them were built in just the last 24 months. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex alone has around 200 Islamic centers. Houston has another hundred or so. Many of these communities have no interest in blending into American life.

This is not the same as past waves of immigration. Irish, Italian, Korean, Mexican, and every other group arrived with pride in their heritage. Still, they also raised American flags and wanted their children to be part of the country’s future. They became doctors, small-business owners, teachers, and soldiers. They wanted to be Americans.

What we are watching now is not the melting pot. It is isolation by design.

Parallel societies do not end well

More than 300 fundamentalist Islamic schools now operate full-time across the country. Many use Quran-first curricula that require students to spend hours memorizing religious texts before they ever reach math or science. In Dallas, Brighter Horizons Academy enrolls more than 1,700 students and draws federal support while operating on a social model that keeps children culturally isolated.

Then there is the Epic City project in Collin and Hunt counties — 402 acres originally designated only for Muslim buyers, with Sharia-compliant financing and a mega-mosque at the center. After public outcry and state investigations, the developers renamed it “The Meadows,” but a new sign does not erase the original intent. It is not a neighborhood. It is a parallel society.

Americans should not hesitate to say that parallel societies are dangerous. Europe tried this experiment, and the results could not be clearer. In Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, entire neighborhoods now operate under their own cultural rules, some openly hostile to Western norms. When citizens speak up, they are branded bigots for asserting a basic right: the ability to live safely in their own communities.

A crisis of confidence

While this separation widens, another crisis is unfolding at home. A recent Gallup survey shows that about 40% of American women ages 18 to 39 would leave the country permanently if given the chance. Nearly half of a rising generation — daughters, sisters, soon-to-be mothers — no longer believe this nation is worth building a future in.

And who shapes the worldview of young boys? Their mothers. If a mother no longer believes America is home, why would her child grow up ready to defend it?

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world. If we lose confidence in our own national identity at the same time that we allow separatist enclaves to spread unchecked, the outcome is predictable. Europe is already showing us what comes next: cultural fracture, political radicalization, and the slow death of national unity.

Brandon Bell / Staff | Getty Images

Stand up and tell the truth

America welcomes Muslims. America defends their right to worship freely. A Muslim who loves the Constitution, respects the rule of law, and wants to raise a family in peace is more than welcome in America.

But an Islamist movement that rejects assimilation, builds enclaves governed by its own religious framework, and treats American law as optional is not simply another participant in our melting pot. It is a direct challenge to it. If we refuse to call this problem out out of fear of being called names, we will bear the consequences.

Europe is already feeling those consequences — rising conflict and a political class too paralyzed to admit the obvious. When people feel their culture, safety, and freedoms slipping away, they will follow anyone who promises to defend them. History has shown that over and over again.

Stand up. Speak plainly. Be unafraid. You can practice any faith in this country, but the supremacy of the Constitution and the Judeo-Christian moral framework that shaped it is non-negotiable. It is what guarantees your freedom in the first place.

If you come here and honor that foundation, welcome. If you come here to undermine it, you do not belong here.

Wake up to what is unfolding before the consequences arrive. Because when a nation refuses to say what is true, the truth eventually forces its way in — and by then, it is always too late.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Shocking: AI-written country song tops charts, sparks soul debate

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A machine can imitate heartbreak well enough to top the charts, but it cannot carry grief, choose courage, or hear the whisper that calls human beings to something higher.

The No. 1 country song in America right now was not written in Nashville or Texas or even L.A. It came from code. “Walk My Walk,” the AI-generated single by the AI artist Breaking Rust, hit the top spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart, and if you listen to it without knowing that fact, you would swear a real singer lived the pain he is describing.

Except there is no “he.” There is no lived experience. There is no soul behind the voice dominating the country music charts.

If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

I will admit it: I enjoy some AI music. Some of it is very good. And that leaves us with a question that is no longer science fiction. If a machine can fake being human this well, what does it mean to be human?

A new world of artificial experience

This is not just about one song. We are walking straight into a technological moment that will reshape everyday life.

Elon Musk said recently that we may not even have phones in five years. Instead, we will carry a small device that listens, anticipates, and creates — a personal AI agent that knows what we want to hear before we ask. It will make the music, the news, the podcasts, the stories. We already live in digital bubbles. Soon, those bubbles might become our own private worlds.

If an algorithm can write a hit country song about hardship and perseverance without a shred of actual experience, then the deeper question becomes unavoidable: If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

What machines can never do

A machine can produce, and soon it may produce better than we can. It can calculate faster than any human mind. It can rearrange the notes and words of a thousand human songs into something that sounds real enough to fool millions.

But it cannot care. It cannot love. It cannot choose right and wrong. It cannot forgive because it cannot be hurt. It cannot stand between a child and danger. It cannot walk through sorrow.

A machine can imitate the sound of suffering. It cannot suffer.

The difference is the soul. The divine spark. The thing God breathed into man that no code will ever have. Only humans can take pain and let it grow into compassion. Only humans can take fear and turn it into courage. Only humans can rebuild their lives after losing everything. Only humans hear the whisper inside, the divine voice that says, “Live for something greater.”

We are building artificial minds. We are not building artificial life.

Questions that define us

And as these artificial minds grow sharper, as their tools become more convincing, the right response is not panic. It is to ask the oldest and most important questions.

Who am I? Why am I here? What is the meaning of freedom? What is worth defending? What is worth sacrificing for?

That answer is not found in a lab or a server rack. It is found in that mysterious place inside each of us where reason meets faith, where suffering becomes wisdom, where God reminds us we are more than flesh and more than thought. We are not accidents. We are not circuits. We are not replaceable.

Europa Press News / Contributor | Getty Images

The miracle machines can never copy

Being human is not about what we can produce. Machines will outproduce us. That is not the question. Being human is about what we can choose. We can choose to love even when it costs us something. We can choose to sacrifice when it is not easy. We can choose to tell the truth when the world rewards lies. We can choose to stand when everyone else bows. We can create because something inside us will not rest until we do.

An AI content generator can borrow our melodies, echo our stories, and dress itself up like a human soul, but it cannot carry grief across a lifetime. It cannot forgive an enemy. It cannot experience wonder. It cannot look at a broken world and say, “I am going to build again.”

The age of machines is rising. And if we do not know who we are, we will shrink. But if we use this moment to remember what makes us human, it will help us to become better, because the one thing no algorithm will ever recreate is the miracle that we exist at all — the miracle of the human soul.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Is Socialism seducing a lost generation?

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A generation that’s lost faith in capitalism is turning to the oldest lie on earth: equality through control.

Something is breaking in America’s young people. You can feel it in every headline, every grocery bill, every young voice quietly asking if the American dream still means anything at all.

For many, the promise of America — work hard, build something that lasts, and give the next generation a better start — feels like it no longer exists. Home ownership and stability have become luxuries for a fortunate few.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them.

In that vacuum of hope, a new promise has begun to rise — one that sounds compassionate, equal, and fair. The promise of socialism.

The appeal of a broken dream

When the American dream becomes a checklist of things few can afford — a home, a car, two children, even a little peace — disappointment quickly turns to resentment. The average first-time homebuyer is now 40 years old. Debt lasts longer than marriages. The cost of living rises faster than opportunity.

For a generation that has never seen the system truly work, capitalism feels like a rigged game built to protect those already at the top.

That is where socialism finds its audience. It presents itself as fairness for the forgotten and justice for the disillusioned. It speaks softly at first, offering equality, compassion, and control disguised as care.

We are seeing that illusion play out now in New York City, where Zohran Mamdani — an open socialist — has won a major political victory. The same ideology that once hid behind euphemisms now campaigns openly throughout America’s once-great cities. And for many who feel left behind, it sounds like salvation.

But what socialism calls fairness is submission dressed as virtue. What it calls order is obedience. Once the system begins to replace personal responsibility with collective dependence, the erosion of liberty is only a matter of time.

The bridge that never ends

Socialism is not a destination; it is a bridge. Karl Marx described it as the necessary transition to communism — the scaffolding that builds the total state. Under socialism, people are taught to obey. Under communism, they forget that any other options exist.

History tells the story clearly. Russia, China, Cambodia, Cuba — each promised equality and delivered misery. One hundred million lives were lost, not because socialism failed, but because it succeeded at what it was designed to do: make the state supreme and the individual expendable.

Today’s advocates insist their version will be different — democratic, modern, and kind. They often cite Sweden as an example, but Sweden’s prosperity was never born of socialism. It grew out of capitalism, self-reliance, and a shared moral culture. Now that system is cracking under the weight of bureaucracy and division.

ANGELA WEISS / Contributor | Getty Images

The real issue is not economic but moral. Socialism begins with a lie about human nature — that people exist for the collective and that the collective knows better than the individual.

This lie is contrary to the truths on which America was founded — that rights come not from government’s authority, but from God’s. Once government replaces that authority, compassion becomes control, and freedom becomes permission.

What young America deserves

Young Americans have many reasons to be frustrated. They were told to study, work hard, and follow the rules — and many did, only to find the goalposts moved again and again. But tearing down the entire house does not make it fairer; it only leaves everyone standing in the rubble.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them. The answer is not revolution but renewal — moral, cultural, and spiritual.

It means restoring honesty to markets, integrity to government, and faith to the heart of our nation. A people who forsake God will always turn to government for salvation, and that road always ends in dependency and decay.

Freedom demands something of us. It requires faith, discipline, and courage. It expects citizens to govern themselves before others govern them. That is the truth this generation deserves to hear again — that liberty is not a gift from the state but a calling from God.

Socialism always begins with promises and ends with permission. It tells you what to drive, what to say, what to believe, all in the name of fairness. But real fairness is not everyone sharing the same chains — it is everyone having the same chance.

The American dream was never about guarantees. It was about the right to try, to fail, and try again. That freedom built the most prosperous nation in history, and it can do so again if we remember that liberty is not a handout but a duty.

Socialism does not offer salvation. It requires subservience.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Rage isn’t conservatism — THIS is what true patriots stand for

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Conservatism is not about rage or nostalgia. It’s about moral clarity, national renewal, and guarding the principles that built America’s freedom.

Our movement is at a crossroads, and the question before us is simple: What does it mean to be a conservative in America today?

For years, we have been told what we are against — against the left, against wokeism, against decline. But opposition alone does not define a movement, and it certainly does not define a moral vision.

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

The media, as usual, are eager to supply their own answer. The New York Times recently suggested that Nick Fuentes represents the “future” of conservatism. That’s nonsense — a distortion of both truth and tradition. Fuentes and those like him do not represent American conservatism. They represent its counterfeit.

Real conservatism is not rage. It is reverence. It does not treat the past as a museum, but as a teacher. America’s founders asked us to preserve their principles and improve upon their practice. That means understanding what we are conserving — a living covenant, not a relic.

Conservatism as stewardship

In 2025, conservatism means stewardship — of a nation, a culture, and a moral inheritance too precious to abandon. To conserve is not to freeze history. It is to stand guard over what is essential. We are custodians of an experiment in liberty that rests on the belief that rights come not from kings or Congress, but from the Creator.

That belief built this country. It will be what saves it. The Constitution is a covenant between generations. Conservatism is the duty to keep that covenant alive — to preserve what works, correct what fails, and pass on both wisdom and freedom to those who come next.

Economics, culture, and morality are inseparable. Debt is not only fiscal; it is moral. Spending what belongs to the unborn is theft. Dependence is not compassion; it is weakness parading as virtue. A society that trades responsibility for comfort teaches citizens how to live as slaves.

Freedom without virtue is not freedom; it is chaos. A culture that mocks faith cannot defend liberty, and a nation that rejects truth cannot sustain justice. Conservatism must again become the moral compass of a disoriented people, reminding America that liberty survives only when anchored to virtue.

Rebuilding what is broken

We cannot define ourselves by what we oppose. We must build families, communities, and institutions that endure. Government is broken because education is broken, and education is broken because we abandoned the formation of the mind and the soul. The work ahead is competence, not cynicism.

Conservatives should embrace innovation and technology while rejecting the chaos of Silicon Valley. Progress must not come at the expense of principle. Technology must strengthen people, not replace them. Artificial intelligence should remain a servant, never a master. The true strength of a nation is not measured by data or bureaucracy, but by the quiet webs of family, faith, and service that hold communities together. When Washington falters — and it will — those neighborhoods must stand.

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This is the real work of conservatism: to conserve what is good and true and to reform what has decayed. It is not about slogans; it is about stewardship — the patient labor of building a civilization that remembers what it stands for.

A creed for the rising generation

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

For the rising generation, conservatism cannot be nostalgia. It must be more than a memory of 9/11 or admiration for a Reagan era they never lived through. Many young Americans did not experience those moments — and they should not have to in order to grasp the lessons they taught and the truths they embodied. The next chapter is not about preserving relics but renewing purpose. It must speak to conviction, not cynicism; to moral clarity, not despair.

Young people are searching for meaning in a culture that mocks truth and empties life of purpose. Conservatism should be the moral compass that reminds them freedom is responsibility and that faith, family, and moral courage remain the surest rebellions against hopelessness.

To be a conservative in 2025 is to defend the enduring principles of American liberty while stewarding the culture, the economy, and the spirit of a free people. It is to stand for truth when truth is unfashionable and to guard moral order when the world celebrates chaos.

We are not merely holding the torch. We are relighting it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.