On Friday’s Mark Levin Show, President Trump’s proposed minerals deal would massively benefit both the U.S. and Ukraine. We’d gain access to billions, maybe trillions, in rare earth minerals and metals from Ukraine, boosting American businesses and jobs there. Ukraine would get huge investment and revenue in return. Plus, a strong U.S. presence would likely deter Russia from invading again, making NATO membership less critical for Ukraine. Heated and emotional exchanges happen privately between nations, but Zelenskyy shouldn’t have argued publicly— the focus was finalizing a deal that was supposedly already set. The goal was for him to leave D.C. with a game-changing economic win for Ukraine. Russia and China would hate this, which is another plus. Zelenskyy needs to apologize, mend fences, and lock in the deal. Trump’s all about America First, killer deals, and peace— that hasn’t changed. Zelenskyy’s got to step up and fix this. Later, you’ve heard about the supposed Medicaid cuts in Congress’ resolution, but the Medicaid program isn’t even mentioned in the resolution Republicans passed in the House. Nobody is cutting Medicaid except for the fraud. Democrats love to inflate these programs and get as many people enrolled as possible. They’re so ideologically tied to a bloated government.
Rumble
MUST WATCH Full Exchange – Things Get Heated Between Trump, Vance, Zelensky, minerals, rare earth,
Breitbart
India Seeks Critical Minerals in Zambia, Congo, and Australia
PJ Media
Hakeem Jeffries Asked to Provide Proof of GOP Medicaid Cuts, Comes up Empty
X
Medicaid is for single mothers with small children who are just trying to make it.
Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP
The podcast for this show can be streamed or downloaded from the Audio Rewind page.
Rough transcription of Hour 1
Segment 1
Hello? What did he say? That he’s going to put his own sub in. Is that what the guy said, Mr. Producer? Well, we’ll have to circle back with him, won’t we? Damn right. Hello, America. Mark Levin. Our number is 877-381-3811. 877-381-3811. I’m sorry, folks. I got very sick yesterday. Hit me like a ton of bricks. Really? Up until about 2 hours before the show, I was going to do it. I tried. You can hear me now. And I feel much, much better than I did yesterday. But I can’t have people stabbing me in the back trying to replace me. So I’m going to deal with that over the weekend and deal with it next week. But that’s a separate issue. I support Ukraine against Russia. But for the life of me. I don’t understand why Zelenskyy just didn’t come to Washington to sign this minerals deal and then go back to Ukraine and deal with the next phase. When the next phase comes up. I spent time behind this microphone. I’ve spent time on FOX. I’ve spent time on Blaze explaining why I feel. That this minerals deal is a tremendous opportunity for the United States and a tremendous opportunity for Ukraine. Now, there are left wing Democrats, you know, my former editor for my books, who’s a left wing radical leftist, Mitchell Irish, keeps writing me like a stalker. This stuff, you know, Zelensky’s right. You know, this is not a matter of that. It’s how do you get things done? And so the Democrats are just lined up. Anything Trump does anti-Trump, Trump, Trump, they’re all Trump haters. So therefore, anything Trump does, they hate. But I look at this straightforwardly and I think to myself. You got tremendous minerals. The American people elected Donald Trump. The Democrats, the media and the left. Like it or not. This is who he is. And he had a brilliant idea on what to do with these minerals that will make Ukraine wealthy. That will make more Americans wealthy. That will have American businesses and personnel physically present in Ukraine, meaning the likelihood of any future invasion is almost nil. And I mentioned this on Saturday. Do you have that, Mr. Producer? Let’s take a listen at this. Go ahead. So I got to thinking, Donald Trump comes up with this idea. He says to Ukrainian President Zelensky. We want access to your minerals, your rare minerals. You have an enormous. Resource there natural resource. There were trillions and trillions of dollars underdeveloped. We have spent hundreds of billions of dollars in your defense. We should figure out. How to access them. How to mine them. How to use them. You didn’t talk about going in there and stealing them? We didn’t talk about going in there and conquering. We’re not a colonial power, an imperial power. And I thought to myself, Zelinski says, No. I wouldn’t say yes. Mark, What are you talking about? Now, by the time you hear this program, maybe home will make a U-turn and say yes and negotiate a deal. Why? I want you to think about this with our economic might, with our ability to mine, with our business confidence, especially with President Trump. Can you imagine the wealth that we would create for Ukraine and for the United States and the national security imperative? This is access to minerals we don’t have or don’t have much of? Rather than relying on communist China, can you imagine what communist China and Russia would think if we had this kind of an economic alliance with Ukraine where the people of Ukraine benefit, the people of the United States benefit? It’s genius. Just like his guys, the plan is genius. Now, you know, when it comes to Putin versus Ukraine, I support Ukraine. Yes, I do. You’re not a bad man. He’s got a thousand nuclear missiles aimed at the United States. His jets keep buzzing our ships. He’s taking over with ten military bases, the Arctic Circle, which is one of the reasons, again, brilliant point. Donald Trump is saying, wait a minute, we need Greenland. So Donald Trump’s thinking about these things. And so I’m thinking this was like a quasi Marshall Plan, but without us just giving money, more money to Ukraine. It’s a business relationship and a financial relationship that benefits both countries. Now, it went on for quite a bit and I went into the type of minerals we’re talking about and how we would benefit from them. And I went on to how you basically have a national security presence there because you’re going to have Americans and American businesses there and American capital invested there and so forth and so on. In other words, you can have a very close relationship with Ukraine, Americans working next to Ukrainians. And Donald Trump liked what I said so much that he said that what I said that night and what I said the following night, Sunday night, they would have build a museum and put those those shows in the museum. That’s his view. I didn’t have any conversation with him in advance. I could just see how he’s developing the whole process in his mind. And I’m thinking back then, that was last Saturday. Today is Friday. Why wouldn’t you grab a deal like that? This is a lifeline. Well, it doesn’t have any security provisions. It doesn’t have the one step at a time, brother. One step at a time. Maybe there’ll be security provisions, because Europe has already said, Britain and France, that they would contribute troops and so forth and so on, which is perfectly fine. Europe can do what it wants. This president’s not going to do that, but he is prepared to do something that will revitalize Ukraine, help rebuild Ukraine after a war like this. It was just, to me such a massive opportunity. Again, as somebody who supports Ukraine against Russia. And has no doubt about it. Now, what I’m hoping is and I don’t know. That’s a landscape. We’ll find some way to fix this. To fix it. Because his country needs us. His people need us. And he has an opportunity here. To not go the Biden way because it’s not going to happen anymore. The pouring money into Ukraine. First of all, even if Trump wanted to do it, Congress is not going to do it. So it’s not going to happen. It’s just not going to happen. Period. But this is better than that. This is better than the Marshall Plan. The Marshall Plan was the grant of money to rebuild the economies of these countries that we conquered to make sure it wasn’t like after World War Two. Were the the victorious countries basically rape the. The defeated countries of all their industrial might and all the rest of it. When he contributed to the rise of Adolf Hitler and so forth. This is a brilliant idea. Shared interests, shared businesses, shared investments. And here’s a deal. Ukraine hasn’t really been able to exploit its natural resource. Why does it doesn’t have the capital, it doesn’t have the equipment right now that the people. We can provide that. So it creates American businesses. It improves the lot of businesses that already exist. It creates American jobs. It creates a bond between the Ukrainian people and the American people. American business and Ukrainian business. So I’m thinking. How do you blow that? Just come to the United States. Do what these presidents and prime ministers and the rest of them do. Smile, shake hands, do your thing. You’re going to debate the debating behind closed doors. But even why do that? Why do that? This is about a minerals deal. It’s not about Russia. So I think it was a missed opportunity and I think Zelenskyy needs to do everything humanly possible. Look, I don’t know the man. I haven’t interviewed the man. But you to do everything humanly possible to figure out how to breathe life back into this. And so want to hear the Democrats going on and on. It’s Trump’s fault. It’s very annoying to me or Lindsey Graham, who plays three sides of a two sided game. I don’t know why he’s up front doing anything, quite frankly. Somehow he’s always in the middle of these things and they never turn out very good. He was for the two state solution, still is for the Palestinians. He’s got his head way up. The crown prince of Saudi Arabia took us. I just. Look, I bumped into him. He’s friendly, so forth and so on. But his foreign policy ideas are bizarre. They just are. So I just think that. This was a blown opportunity, a truly blown opportunity for Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians. And I see Lindsey Graham’s now calling on. Zelenskyy to resign or something or other and so forth. This is what I mean. And I’m not sure where he’s coming from. He resigns, he resigns if he does and if he does. And I don’t understand. We are colonialists or we’re not colonialists, we are imperialists, we’re not imperialists. We reach into other governments. We tell them what to do or we don’t tell them what to do. I think the best thing that we can do now. It is urge Zelenskyy. The fix it. He broke it. Now fix it. He broke it. Now fix it. He came to the United States. The deal was worked out, according to the Treasury secretary. That means Zelenskyy’s relevant cabinet people. And by the way, is Parliament all agreed to it? All it needed to be done was to have it signed. That’s it. And he didn’t do it. And he’s not dealing with Biden anymore. Now, one of the positive things that’s going to come out of this is the Europeans are really going to have to step it up. And I think they’re going to. They’re really going to have to step it up. And they’re coming out today not attacking the United States or President Trump, talking about how they support the Ukraine. And they’re talking tougher than before. They’re talking about having to provide more resources than before. And so that’s a good thing. I’m all for that. So my view of this is. Absolutely clear. This is the view I take. It’s consistent with the principles I’ve always held. It’s consistent with American security. America’s economic interests. And that proposal by Trump. With respect to. Minerals was absolute genius. And so I just build on it. Hoping that it would come to fruition. And I still think it will. Believe it or not, I still think it will because it’s still in the best interests of Ukraine and the United States. But Zelenskyy going to have to be the one to get this fixed. Unfortunately, he broke it and he has to fix it. I’ll be right back.
Segment 2
There’s less than a minute prepare, asks President Zelensky. Is he going to apologize? Go ahead. So I’m not hearing from you, Mr. President. I thought that you owe the president an apology. Now, I respect the president and I respect American people. And if I don’t know if I think that we have to be very open and very honest and I’m not sure that we did something, but I think maybe sometimes some some things we have to discuss out of out of media with respect to democracy and to a free media. But there are things that where we have to understand the position of Ukraine and Ukrainians, and I think that is the most important thing. Well, he did say there that he. I guess that I guess he wished it wouldn’t in the open like that. You know, part of the problem could be English to Ukrainian. I guess that’s the language. I don’t know. But whatever he does, he’s going to have to use, I would say, nonpublic channels, not so much public interviews to address this huge opportunity missed. And again, if I were him and of course, him not having gone through what he’s gone through as people go through hell and all of it. I’d certainly reconsider this particular issue. You know, sometimes you got to do with reality. Sometimes you’re going to do really, you know, a lot of the money near the end that Biden was providing to the Ukrainians wasn’t actually passed by Congress. He was taking them from different accounts. He could only do that for so long. And Donald Trump was of no mind to do it anyway. But just keep in mind how difficult it would be. It’s not going to pass Congress. It’s simply not going to again, even if you had a president who wanted to do it. That’s the reality. Excuse me. That’s the reality. And I think this was a great opportunity here. I hope the I don’t even know if they want to reconsider it. I hope they do, because I think it’s very, very important. I’m going to play some of what took place in the Oval Office. And we also opened the phone lines to you all over the country. To get your input on this and get your take on this as well. I’ve always found that when I open the phones like this, which isn’t often on a particular specific issue. Get a lot more smart thinking and commentary than we do from people who do it for a living. So when we come back, we’ll play say, I can’t play at all, but we’ll play some of the elements of. What took place in front of the cameras there and for the media. This is the other thing that’s the big issue. What took place in front of the cameras? For me, that’s an issue. But a bigger issue is how is this resolved or is it going to get resolved? To me, that’s a bigger issue. We’ll be right back.
Segment 3
Well, didn’t sound like to me what I heard. I didn’t hear at all that Zelinski apologized. Did it sound that way to you, Mr. Producer? No. So we shall see where that goes. I’m not going to play this whole exchange. It goes on for ten or 11 minutes. Let me play a few minutes so you get a taste of it. Those of you who didn’t hear it earlier today, you know, the assumptions always made that you have. But, you know, people work for a living. You’re busy, you haven’t got one go. For four years, the United States of America, we had a president who stood up at press conferences and talked tough about Vladimir Putin. And then Putin invaded Ukraine and destroyed a significant chunk of the country. The path to peace and the path to prosperity is maybe engaging in diplomacy. We tried the pathway of Joe Biden thumping our chest and pretending that the president of the United States, his words mattered more than the president of the United States. His actions. What makes America a good country? Is America engaging in diplomacy? That’s what President Trump is doing. Can I ask you? Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So he occupied it. So right here, let’s just stop. So there’s a lot of responses that could be made to advance. There was diplomacy in 1994 on nuclear weapons. Ukraine gave up all its nuclear weapons, a disaster and gave them back to Russia. And so it doesn’t have that. And there are other deals he made with Russia along the way. And Russia obviously violated those, too. So you can stand there and go toe to toe with J.D. Vance. But why would you? You want to get your deal and get out of there. Right. And go home to Ukraine. Until the Ukrainian people look what we’ve just achieved. We’re not done. There’s a lot we have to do. The Russians are still attacking us. But this is a great first step. You see my point, Mr. Producer? So why go toe to toe? I mean, diplomacy doesn’t always work. Diplomacy can be a disaster. Just depends. But so what? You’re not there to debate. Certainly not there to debate in front of the media. And it’s not a debating society. And when we get that deal, which apparently was already agreed to, this is what’s a little confusing to me. All the reports were that this deal had already been agreed to by both sides. And so this was going to be somewhat of a formality. And then this happens anyway. Go ahead. Also of Ukraine, parts of east and Crimea. So he occupied it on 2014. So during a lot of years, I’m not speaking about just Biden, but those time was Obama, then President Obama, then President Trump, then President Biden, and now with President Trump and God bless now President Trump to stop him. During 2014, nobody stopped him. He just occupied and took he killed people. You know what? The contract 2015, 2014, 14, 20, 24 to how he goes not here. Yeah. By physically right now. Yes. But during 2014 till 2022 this was the situation the same. What. I mean this, this is. You’re there to make your deal. They had to go through all this stuff. You’re there to cut your deal. A good deal that will help your country going forward. You’re not there to get into a debate. About what took place before. And I will say Donald Trump was the first president to give offensive weapons to Ukraine when Obama refused javelins to knock out helicopters and low flying jets. He gave that to them. But if you’re the leader of another country and you see there’s been an election and you think one of the issues is we’re going to get out of these wars, we’re going to get out of this war. You’ve got to calibrate your diplomacy. You’ve got to calibrate your viewpoint. And in this case. A tremendous opportunity. Tremendous opportunity because nobody was going into Ukraine and doing what President Trump has proposed. Now, my view Russia not only has invaded Ukraine because the territorial ambitions and we know that because Putin has said so. So the Putin words out there who pretend that, oh, no, they’re just wanting to say no, Putin’s a bad dude is a killer. But he also wants their minerals. And Trump knows that. Which is why he was trying to make that deal. China wants the minerals to. This is why China and Russia in the end, and I’ve talked about this, are in the Arctic Circle. Russia has ten military bases. China is building bases there. This is why President Trump is talking about Greenland, which is very significant and very important. And by the way, tons of rare earth minerals in Greenland, too. So the president is thinking very strategically. So this is this is what is perplexing to me. This is what’s perplexing to me. That is. Tremendous opportunity. Better than a Marshall Plan. Better than a Marshall Plan. To really enrich Ukraine, enrich us. Pay down the debt. And have access to these. These rare earth minerals rather than. Say a Russia or China. And they’re very, very important. So that’s why President Trump, I think, is a little fed up right about now. Go ahead. On the contact line, nobody stopped you. You know that. We had conversations with him. A lot of conversation, my bilateral conversation, and we signed with him. Me like a new president in 2019. I signed with him the deal. I signed with him, Macron and meditated. We signed Ceasefire. Ceasefire. All of them told me that he will never do old. But here’s my point. Cease fire. No cease fire. If the United States has a significant presence in Ukraine. And I heard him say about an hour ago or half hour ago, you know, you had two energy companies talking about that. We’re talking about mass mining and development. Massive capital investment. Trillions of dollars on the line. Nobody else is going to do that but us and share it with the host country. Nobody else is going to do that. Host country, that’s a war that has Russia right on the border. Who else is going to do that? Nobody else. And this is what President Trump came up with. You know, it’s like President Trump came up with what to do in Gaza. Move the Palestinians out of Gaza. It was never there is to begin with. And Egypt and Jordan should take them in. After all, their so-called homeland is Jordan. And Egypt has an enormous amount of land. And they’re right on the border there. No, Israel didn’t say no. We don’t think that’s good. He said, Yeah, that’s a great idea. It’s a great idea. The point is this. Some of these things have to happen in stages. Maybe not. But if this had taken place, and I still think it can. We’ll see if this does take place. But let me put it to you that way. Ukraine will be in a much, much better position. So will the people of Ukraine. Because Americans are not going to invest American companies capital. The massive. Transport that’s necessary to. Dig for these minerals and remove these minerals, and that we find these minerals to develop them and ship them overseas. You’re going to need ports. You’re going to need all kinds of mining facilities. You’re going to need all kinds of housing and buildings and all the rest. This is how you develop a country. I’m just saying that’s not a lot of countries can do that. We can, number one, and not a lot of countries would do it under these circumstances with Russia on the border. President Trump says he will. Tremendous opportunity for the Ukrainians. It’s very frustrating to see. Many people. Well, I’m not going to go through the rest of this. It goes on and on. It’s pretty unpleasant, to be perfectly honest with you. I don’t like the fact that the Russians are going to love it and the Chinese are going to love it. But the Russians and the Chinese need to be careful, too, because what did they see there? Well, they saw him beating up on Zelenskyy. No, they saw more than that. They saw the president of the United States who may well be dealing with them in a similar way, depending on what happens. They’ve only begun to talk to Russia. And they haven’t even begun to talk to China, meaning we when it comes to Taiwan. So we shall see. But. They much rather would have had a Joe Biden or a Kamala Harris. There’s no question about it. Now the Democrats are attacking Donald Trump tonight. I just have a question for them. What is your resolution for this? You’re not going to get billions and billions more passed through Congress. So what your resolution I’m just curious. You have none. You have nothing. Zippo. As a matter of fact, there’s a big percentage of you when we look at the other another part of the world, another region, the Middle East. That we’re supporting, boycotting Israel, withholding weapons from Israel. In fact, you did withhold weapons from Israel. And you weren’t supportive of Netanyahu and the things he wanted to do to defeat Hamas, and he did them anyway and the things he wanted to do to clobber Hezbollah and defeat Hezbollah. But he did them anyway. And the things he wanted to do to to Iran. And he did them anyway. But you held him back from the main thing, which was the destruction of their nuclear weapons. Kind of strange, isn’t it? Very strange. All in for Ukraine, but not all in for Israel. What’s that all about? But don’t ask them that. Because they can’t explain it. I can explain it. It’s a Jew hatred that’s growing. So it’s it’s metastasizing. It’s a poison in the Democrat Party, in their academic institutions, in their media and elsewhere. Waiting for Mitchell Irish to write me about that. But he won’t because he’s a coward, in my humble opinion, anyway. Who’s he? He’s nobody. Don’t worry. He should become famous, at least infamous. But they literally cut weapons off from. From Israel. Weapons that Israel already paid for. They cut him off anyway. But they’re and they’re full bore providing weapons to Ukraine. Look, the bottom line is it’s not going to happen. There’s not the votes in Congress. And there’s not support for that in the White House. And for a very simple reason. Where is this going? Nowhere. Nowhere. I’ll be right back.
Segment 4
This Gene Hackman and family stuff is so weird in the public comments by law enforcement. So, so weird. First comments does look like foul play. Next comment, It looks suspicious. Of course it’s suspicious. Hell knows what took place here, but it’s very strange. Now, remember, America, we have our wonderful affiliates and other platforms. But in the end. You’re in charge of what you listen to, and you’re in charge of how you listen to it. And so I want to remind you that you can always listen to us on any of your devices, any time of day or night. All hours. 2 hours, one hour, 3 hours. Go to Mark Levin Showcase. Click on the audio Rewind and select your favorite platform or search Mark Levin Show on your favorite podcast platform. That’s Mark Levin Show on your favorite podcast platform. You can also find our full podcast, which is the radio program, interviews and Specials on YouTube. We have our own YouTube channel. So just search Mark Levin show on YouTube. That simple. Mark Levin show on YouTube or go to YouTube.com at Mark Levin show. So there’s myriad ways to listen. Well as serious. Satellite as well as direct streaming. Mark Levine at iHeart Radio app, our friends at iHeart other ways, too. We’re always here. We’re never leaving. It’s go to Jean. Remember, I’m going to take your calls and get your take on what what you know about the events in the Oval Office today. Gene in California. Sirius Satellite. Gene, go right ahead. Hi, sir. You’re my favorite, mind you. What is the difference between the Clintons selling uranium and Zelinski up to his eyeballs in corruption, not looking out for his country? I mean, I’m going to I’m just going to put that out there. You’re very clever. I have no idea what you’re talking about. Do you? Okay. So they made I’m not know. I’m on your side. They are. I’m just confused. What are the Clintons and uranium have to do with Zelenskyy and so-called corruption? What’s that all about? Um, we’re. We’re rare. I’m sorry. Rare. Most of the rare earth minerals they have not all, but most of them are under the ground. They haven’t been mine and they haven’t been developed. Some have, but not enough. And they’re sitting there and it’s one of the reasons Putin has his eyeballs on Ukraine. Ukraine was always considered the breadbasket of Europe, too. It’s their very rich soil. They grow an enormous amount of wheat and corn and other things. Go ahead. Zelinsky doesn’t have it. I mean, you want to talk about corruption, but we can talk about Putin. We can talk about Gee. We can talk about the Democrats. We can talk about all them, but I’m not sure what that has to do with cutting a deal with Donald Trump in order to get the kind of economic growth and prosperity in your country that you really need. And we, in return, get the kind of minerals that we really need as we’re dealing with communist China and fascistic Russia. Well, I suppose his missing from Zelensky’s approach is he’s not really looking out for his country. He’s up to his eyeballs in corruption. He’s very popular in his country. It’s very popular in his country, and most of his countrymen will back him in this battle with Trump. That’s just the truth. So that so. People can smear him all they want. I notice the Putin roids with their hemorrhoids. They do it all the time and they say very little about Putin. And we can go through that. It’s really not particularly productive. They’ve accused him of being a neo-Nazi, which he clearly is. And his parents survived the Holocaust and he’s Jewish. And I can go through all that. But I’m not really here to respond to all of the absurd allegations. He blew this. If it’s going to be fixed, it’s going to have to be fixed by him. And it’s my understanding, obviously, I’m on the air, so I couldn’t watch him. During his interview with Brett Baer, he didn’t really apologize. I mean, my understanding is he did try and explain and so forth and so on. So they’re going to have to work hard behind the scenes, I guess, and try and breathe some life into this. Look, I want this deal to for the United States, I think we need to have access to these minerals. I’ll be right back.