On Friday’s Mark Levin Show, the Department of Justice decided to drop the case against NYC Mayor Eric Adams, leading the left to jump to conclusions and say this was purely political by the Trump administration. This decision is more about the case’s inherent weakness rather than politics. The case was frivolous from the beginning. Also, the NTSB suggests that the helicopter crew involved in a collision with a plane near Reagan National Airport might have missed a key instruction from the control tower due to an incomplete radio transmission, particularly not hearing “pass behind the.” This, coupled with potential data issues regarding their altitude, indicates that some critical communications were possibly interrupted or unclear, leading to the crew recognizing they were in a perilous situation. Later, a Senator is saying that the U.S. should get out of NATO. NATO was established post-WWII to prevent another global conflict and to counter fascist regimes without deploying massive U.S. forces again. The surest way to ensure another war world is to get out of NATO. Those advocating for withdrawal know nothing about history and military dynamics. They are the anti-American warmongers. Afterward, the left keeps saying that Elon Musk wasn’t elected but neither are the majority of federal government officials. Musk has been effective in exposing what the Democrats are doing so they attack him.
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Helicopter crew in collision with plane may not have heard key instruction from tower, NTSB says
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Rough transcription of Hour 1
Segment 1
Hello America. Mark Levin here. Our number 877-381-3811. 877-381-3811. Well, first of all, an update that’s breaking now from the Associated Press. We will not call the Associated Press the Associated Press, until it recognizes the Gulf America as the Gulf of America. The crew of the Army helicopter that collided in midair with an American Airlines jet near Washington, D.C., Ronald Reagan Airport may have had inaccurate altitude readings in the moments before the crash and also may have not heard key instructions from the air traffic controllers to move behind the plane, investigators said. This is breaking news. National Transportation Safety Board chairwoman Jennifer Hammond told reporters that the recording from the Black Hawk helicopter cockpit suggested an incomplete radio transmission may have left the crew without understanding how it should shift position. Just before the January six crash, in which all 67 aboard the two aircrafts were killed, the transmission was interrupted. It was stepped on, she said, leaving. Than I’m able to hear the words, quote, pass behind that because the helicopter’s microphone key was pressed at the same moment. Hamadeh said their helicopter was on a check flight that night where the pilot was ongoing an annual test and it test on using night vision goggles. Investigators believed the crew was wearing night vision goggles throughout the flight. Let me continue here. Well, take more than a year to get the final NTSB report on the collision. And Hamadeh warned reporters that many issues were still being probed. We’re only a couple weeks out from the crash, he said. We have a lot of work to do. So let me just repeat. That they’re looking at the possibility there may have been bad data. She said bad data, meaning they didn’t know how high they were. The collision likely occurred at an altitude of about 325 feet, which will put the Black Hawk above its 200 foot limit for the location. Cockpit conversations a few minutes before the crash indicated conflicting altitude data, Ahmadi said, with a helicopter pilot calling out that they were at 300 feet. But the instructor pilot saying it was 400 feet. We’re looking at the possibility there may have been bad data. Now, that generation of Black Hawks typically has two types of altimeters, one relying excuse me, one relying on barometric pressure and the other on radio frequency signals bounced off the ground. Helicopter pilots typically rely on barometric readings while flying, but the helicopters black box captures its radio altitude. The radio altitude at the time of the impact, put the helicopter at 278 feet. But I want to caution, she said, that doesn’t mean that’s what the Blackhawk crew was seeing on the barometric altimeters in the cockpit. Now, the Army also said the Black Hawk crew was highly experienced and accustomed to the crowded skies around the nation’s capital and Colorado. Don’t worry. All right. So now we’re knowing that some of the information they may have had was inaccurate and some of the information they received. Not just on the equipment, but some of the information they received, whether it was sent, I should say, was actually not received. It was stepped on, she says. Now, reading between the lines, I suppose what that means is you’re pressing down a button to speak. At the same time the information’s coming in. It’s not explained any further by the Associated Press. But nonetheless. There may have been a technical problem with the information that was received by the helicopter before it slammed into the to the airline. So the collision occurred at about 325 feet. The helicopter pilot calling out that they were 300 feet, but the instructor said they were at 400 feet. They knew they were in trouble. I mean, with with nanoseconds before the crash, they knew they were in trouble. Is Maya is my guess from reading this information that just breaking information from the Associated Press. It’s a lot of loose ends out there, and I want to address some of them. So there was a decision by the. Department of Justice that the case against the mayor of New York ought to be dropped, that the case against Adams should be dropped. That was communicated to the Southern District of New York. The U.S. attorney’s office there and the acting U.S. attorney. Has resigned in a long letter, apparently explaining why she resigned. A couple of people at the Department of Justice, I suppose they’re still, you know. Sympathizers to the prior regime. I guess they resigned. Hey, they’re welcome to resign. That clears things up pretty easily. But I want to address something because there’s some confusion here. The United States Attorney’s office is not in charge of prosecutions. The attorney general’s in charge of prosecutions. That’s the hierarchy. That’s how it works. Now, the attorney general, as a practical matter, cannot be involved in all the decisions that are made by the 93 U.S. attorneys. And there various offices. And so their power is effectively delegated. While the U.S. attorneys are presidential appointees, the fact is that they ultimately report to the attorney general who ultimately reports to the president. And so there been some writings by leftists and Never Trumpers alike saying that this was clearly a political decision. Well, it’s fascinating how they know these things. I don’t know who they interviewed that they interviewed the attorney general. Did they interview the. Deputy attorney generals, the individuals in that office that they interview the president, they didn’t interview anybody. That’s what they say it was. And then they play semantics with statements that are made by the Department of Justice. But I can tell you, this is somebody who was chief of staff to an attorney general. There were occasions when U.S. attorneys offices. Did bring cases. That were problematic in many ways, not often, but in many ways to mean justice. And that main justice did step in. Or took actions after the fact to deal with what took place in the U.S. Attorney’s office, or for that matter, in the criminal division, the public Integrity Section as well at Main Justice. The U.S. Attorney’s office is not an independent entity, independent from the rest of the government. It’s part of the executive branch. Whether federal prosecutors like it or not, they do answer to somebody else. And the idea that they beat their chests and back themselves and pat themselves on their backs about how they make decisions that are purely in the interest of the public, how they make decisions that are purely based on the facts and the law. Well, maybe some do and maybe some don’t. Maybe they mostly do. But so what? They still are held to account. So to say this was a political decision and nothing more to say nothing. You folks know. As soon as I read that indictment, I told you this week. I read the entire thing. It wasn’t that big of a deal. Didn’t require a lot of brainpower. Not a picky, almost silly stuff in there. About bribery. And I’m not the only one who came to this conclusion. Other highly experienced attorneys, including defense counsel, including. Constitutional scholars, including some former federal prosecutors, came to the same conclusion that this was a mickey Mouse case. The lawyers who represented. Governor Bob McDonnell. Who has faced one of these Mickey Mouse cases cost him his governorship. Probably his marriage went all the way to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court unanimously overrode it. You may recall the prosecutor was with Smith. Jack Smith. And yet the prosecutors thought, oh, you know, they’re doing God’s work. I mean, after all, the the federal district judge oversaw and he was okay with everything, but it wasn’t okay. It was terrible. They basically rewrote the bribery statute to include meetings and we’ll get into all the details. But I’m very, very familiar with this case. Or maybe the late Senator Ted Stevens. Well, he was prosecutor of the public integrity section of Main Justice. But there is a little problem with that case. The prosecutors withheld evidence that was helpful to the senator, that that proved his defense and they withheld it. And they were. Admonished one of them, I believe, took his or her own life. And God knows what else happened. But that was a disaster. It was terrible. And there are many other cases I can remember when I was at Justice. There was a NASA administrator by the name of. Jim Beggs. James Beggs. And he’d been indicted. For his work, I believe it was as a senior executive at General Dynamics, if I recollect properly. And that poor man was hounded out of his position. His reputation was destroyed. He went broke virtually. His family suffered. He suffered. And then 17 months later, the the federal prosecutor said, well, you know what? I don’t think we have enough. I’ll drop the case. Well, drop the case. So disgusted and appalled was Attorney General Meese. If it wasn’t his last act as attorney general, it was nearly as last week. He called me into his office. I was his chief of staff. He said, Please bring a pen and paper, which I did. We didn’t have all these laptops and iPhones back then. And he dictated a letter to me. We were only. Couple of the couple that people left out of the political appointees in the Reagan Justice Department on the attorney general, attorneys general floor there. And I wrote out the letter and we issued it. It was a profound apology, I believe. Was the phraseology a profound apology? To Jim Briggs, who he said was a completely innocent man who was wronged by federal prosecutors. Attorney General Meese had originally asked William Weld, who’d been the head of the criminal division at the time as the assistant attorney general, he went on to stab Meese in the back and to become governor of Massachusetts. I don’t know what street he lives on these days. Probably selling cigarettes or something of the kind. I just don’t know. Well refused to. Sir. Missed it. And instead I remember him saying to me, Did we ever write that, Leonard? Apologizing to Beggs for that horrendous attack on him. I said, No. He said, Well, I’m going to do it now. And so upon reading the charges against Adams. Which is what I suspect happened, like so many of the rest of us. A different conclusion was reached. By the new Department of Justice and the deputy attorney general’s office. Why the deputy attorney general’s office? Because traditionally. The criminal federal elements are within the auspices and the management of the deputy attorney general were the other elements. And the civil elements are under the associate attorney general. The deputy’s number two, the associates, the number three. And they made a decision that they were not going to pursue the case against Adams. And yet you have Never Trumpers and you have the left and the media. They jump to the conclusion that this was pure politics, that they just wanted to help. ADAMS Because. He had a better position when it was coming to immigration and so forth and so on. That had nothing to do with it. I’m sure. It was a bad case. And of course, on the way out the door, the leaks come from the Southern District of New York, and it’s known for its incessant leaks. And they said when we were going to we were going to bring other charges against him because they were, you know, like destruction of evidence, you know, the how they throw in the process crimes. Oh, yes. Obstruction of evidence with his iPhone and all the rest of it as they were going to pile on the charges. Too bad. Too bad. The problem was the case in the first place. In the first place. Was a weak case. And it looked highly political to me, and I said it at the time. It takes a lot of guts to pull back once the trigger has been pulled because you take a lot of hits. You’re accused of a lot of things. They people who pretend that they know better and they know nothing. I’m no special pleader for Adams. I don’t give a damn about the guy. I just don’t. One way or the other. I don’t know him. I don’t seek to know him. I think he’s been a relatively incompetent mayor. Quite frankly. But at least he’s not the cameo who’s a complete nutjob. I mean, that’s the standard. At least he’s not him. But that’s my take. I’ll be right back.
Segment 2
I want to remind you, as we discussed a month or two ago, of what the great former associate justice of the Supreme Court, attorney general, the United States before that, the lead Nuremberg prosecutor for the United States, Robert Jackson, said in an address to a roomful of United States attorneys. On April one, 1940. It would probably be within the range of that exaggeration permitted in Washington to say that assembled in this room, it’s one of the most powerful peacetime forces known to our country. The prosecutor has more control of her life, liberty and reputation than any other person in America. His discretion is tremendous. He can have citizens investigated, and if he’s the kind of person he can have this done to the tune of public statements and veiled or unveiled intimidations. The prosecutor may choose a more subtle course and simply have a citizens friends interviewed, and he goes on and on. The power that they have, the start a trial, the power that they have at a trial, the power they have at sentencing, just enormous power. And he says that as a former prosecutor, you know, prior to Donald Trump, A, I would give the benefit of the doubt. The prosecutors. I don’t do that anymore. And so if the Department of Justice looked at this, as we did here on this program and said this is a phony case, then it should have pulled it.
Segment 3
How many of you think we should get out of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? Naval. Do you know what NATO is? You know how it came to be. You know why there’s a native? Some long haired. I think he’s a senator. Says it’s time to get out. And NATO. Let me just provide a thumbnail of history and context. We lost over a half a million soldiers. Wounded and killed in action. In World War Two. Europe is soaked with the blood of your parents and grandparents. And if not, your parents and grandparents, the parents and grandparents of other American soldiers. It was a hellish war. I won’t even get into the Pacific where most of my relatives fought. But the battles were horrendous. The battles were brutal. Millions and millions of people died as a result of that war. At the end of the war. There was a big effort. By the Soviets to devour the entirety of Europe. They succeeded in a very bad agreement with FDR, who was being advised by, among other communists, by the name of Alger Hiss, who was really a. Effectively a spy for the for the Soviets. And Europe was divided effectively, and Germany was divided right down the middle. Berlin was divided right down the middle. And the Cold War was born. The Berlin airlift, you may remember, under Harry Truman. The great Ronald Reagan. Was committed to breaking the back of the Soviet Union without firing a shot. That’s what he did. And the old Soviet Union crumbled. And after a period of time. When it looked like now Russia. Was going to engage the West and you’re positive way. Putin, the old lieutenant KGB. Brutal operator who was in charge of East Germany, which was one of the worst. Worse places under the Soviet control over KGB control. He threatened his way to the top. And took control and hasn’t relented. Russia is loaded with nuclear weapons. Russia still has its allies. Brutal regimes as a new friend, a new ally, Communist China. So why do we have a treaty with these countries? We didn’t make treaties with these European countries. So much for the Europeans as we did for ourselves. Because we didn’t want to send millions more troops over to Europe to fight some other fascist or Marxist regime. Once again. We already lost hundreds of thousands of men. Killed and wounded. They were worrying about the fight over the same territory this time. With nuclear warheads being lob back and forth over time. Starting in the sixties and I guess more in the seventies and today. Europe in many way ways is the forward base for the United States. We have critical bases there, including in Germany and elsewhere. So we don’t have to send. Massive numbers of troops. We are forward based there so we can get to the rest of the world, we can get to the Middle East, we can get to North Africa. We can get to where we need to go. NATO. Has kept the peace pretty much in Europe. No native countries have gone to war with the East and now the West. Because of this security pact. This security pact. So Russia, maybe China or some other country can’t start picking off the smaller European countries. But Mark, it didn’t stop Russia from invading Ukraine. Ukraine is not part of NATO’s. Ukraine was a captive nation under the old Soviet Union. It had been its own country for more than a thousand years. But my goal isn’t to do a history on Ukraine or anything of the sort. We have Ford based jet fighters there. We had four base infantry there for us. Because when you have allies that are facing down. Enemies that are also our enemies. It helps us. That they’re the front line of defense for us. We get a tremendous amount of intelligence as a result of our presence in NAITO. All things that are intended to prevent another world war. So when some idiot member of Congress, I think a senator says it’s time to get out of Naito. These are individuals who know nothing, absolutely nothing, not just about history. Or military dynamics. But it makes me wonder if they had any member of their family fighting during World War Two. Maybe they did. I don’t know. The surest way to ensure that we have a world war is to follow what that idiot has to say. It’s crazy. It’s crazy. Unless, of course, you want America enter into a new war. Which of course, we don’t. So no, we shouldn’t leave Naito and any moron who says it should be called to account. Because they truly are anti-American. They truly are the warmongers. Because what we know is that kind of isolationism, that kind of weakness, that kind of insanity. Well in fact result in a draft and your children and grandchildren going to war. In some ways it reminds me of the 1920s they passed a. An agreement called the Kellogg Brand Agreement. You ever hear this, Mr. Producer? I think I talked about it over the years. So these countries get together, you see. War is horrendous after all. And they agree to outlaw war. Outlaw. Yeah, they said we’re going to outlaw it. In an international arrangement. So they outlaw war. The problem with outlawing war is. By agreeing to outlawing war. You don’t outlaw war. In fact, you entice you encourage, you motivate evil regimes, and other regimes say, oh, they just outlawed war. And what did they do? They were beginning to unilaterally disarm or to disarm in a way that they weren’t prepared to even defend themselves. And that’s what happened. And that’s what happened. We might get out of Naito. But our enemies aren’t going to get out of anywhere or do anything of the sort. You know, what have we learned from what’s gone on in the Middle East with Israel and the enemies that surround it? That would drawling or begging for a peace or even entering into land swaps will get you peace. Of course not. Get your murder. Get your. The war. Now, you know, you’d think we as Americans would have learned this by now, and most of us have. We’ve been through horrendous wars. Not because we’re imperialists, not because we’re colonials, not because of us, but because of the enemy. Because of the enemy. You truly have to be a moron. To argue that we should get out and Naito. There are things that need to be done with Naito. They need to find there. There are militaries. Donald Trump is doing it exactly right. He’s putting pressure on Naito. The NAITO countries. To arm up. If we have to arm up, they have to arm up to now, he says. The difference is we have an ocean, and ocean doesn’t matter anymore. The Russians have nuclear submarine, say, of hypersonic missiles with nuclear warheads that can literally be launched and hit our country in 20 minutes. It’s not about an ocean. We need friends. We need allies who have real militaries, who have armies who are equipped to defend themselves and help us. We didn’t fight World War One on our own. We didn’t fight World War Two on our own. And we wouldn’t have one on our own, wouldn’t even fight the Revolutionary War on our own. We would have lost. But for the French. Morons. Morons. I think the guy’s a senator. I forget who it was, but what an idiot. We should get out of Naito. He’s the militarist. He’s the war monger. Because sure as hell that paves the way to war. Sure as hell that paves the way to war. You know, in the old days, if somebody said something like that, you’d think they’re on the old Soviet Union payroll, Mr. Producer, wouldn’t you? You really would say, wait a minute. Wait a minute. We’re going to get out of Naito. So who benefits from that? All of our enemies in Europe. And Southeast Asia. They benefit from it. And you sure as hell better believe there’ll be a massive break out of war in this time. When nuclear weapons. Or tactical nukes. Because even some country that’s not a frontline nuclear country but has a nuclear weapon, they’re not going to tolerate their country being overthrown. So Naito has resulted in the longest peacetime period. Before Russia invaded Ukraine and Crimea and Georgia. In a thousand years. In Europe. So when somebody blithely says ignorantly, you know, we had to get out of. It’s one thing when Trump says that he has no intention of getting out of Naito and he uses that as a bargaining chip to force these dumb bastards to spend more money on their defense. And he’s done that, and I’ll have to do more of it, apparently. But that’s not what we’re talking about here. That’s not what we’re talking about at all. The government is doing everything and it’s doing everything poorly. At a minimum, it needs to keep this country safe. I think some of these eggheads need to be primaried and defeated. I really do, because to me, they sound like the radical kook left. Of 30, 40 years ago. Talk about slashing the United States military by 25 to 50%. That was McGovern. That was McGovern. Their positions when it comes to NADO and our national security and so forth, are the old positions of the old Reds. Believe it or not, the old communists. Things have come full circle. I’ll be right back.
Segment 4
You got a bunch of clowns out there who are rewriting a history of our church. A water eagle, but a regal being. Really? Shave your duty. Jenny stupider than that. We should get out of Naito. Do you know what Naito is, Nimrod? You know why? There is a Naito with these people. They’re out of their minds. But worse, the cost us lives. Like I said, it wasn’t that long ago. When these were the arguments of of the new left. These were the arguments of the. Of the communist sympathizers. These were the arguments of the radical Democrats. Reject them, America. Or we will be going to war, a massive war, and your kids and grandkids will be dragged into it. There’s no question about it. How do we know? Because it’s happened on more than one occasion. Surrender all of Europe. Surrender it. Why? Because some Nimrod says so. Some senator. Congressman says so. Some jerk with a microphone says so. They don’t know a damn thing. And they don’t want to know it. Here’s the thing. What have I told you over and over again? The thing about we constitutional conservatives is this. We’re not ideologues. We’re not ideologues. We are individuals. They use prudence. That’s what’s at the center of constitutional conservatism. Prudence. That’s what’s at the center of foreign policy, not an ideology. Prudence. You learn from experience, you know, from your own history as a country and the history even of the ancients moving all the way forward. You take a look at these things, then you look at the enemies, the potential enemies. You see what you have. You see what you have to do. Now, you know what? I’m tired of? These. These forever wars. We all are. We all want to avoid war. Isolationists cause war. They’re provocative. So surrender all of Europe. Surrender the Middle East. For God’s sakes, surrender the Panama Canal. What’s the problem? Meanwhile, the Chinese are in our hemisphere. I guess the Monroe Doctrine doesn’t mean any more or anything. Meanwhile, we don’t have enough sailors for our ships, so we have to mothball 19 ships. Meanwhile, we barely have a shipbuilding industry anymore, and the Communist Chinese are outdoing us day in and day out. And it’s a big problem. That’s right. What’s the problem? The problem is we have a ruling class that is stupid, that’s incompetent, and that includes the left. And some of these clowns who claim to be on the right. But they’re not on the right. They’re not anywhere. Have we ever had a dumb ruling class in our country? I can’t think of one. And their mouthpieces? No, I don’t think so. I’ll be right back.