Senator Tim Sheehy
Appearances
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Thanks, Ben. Good to see you.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
It's a solid A, Ben. Turning an organization the size of the DOD is a great challenge. It's like trying to turn an aircraft carrier quite literally. But they've come in with a purpose, with an aggression that's absolutely needed. They've reformed and refocused our military. It's not perfect yet. It's going to take some time.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
But as you well know, during the Obama years and then especially during the last four Biden years, which, as you know, is basically with the same foreign policy extension, except far worse. was we saw weakness all over the world, and that weakness abets enemy strength.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And we saw that when we pulled out of Afghanistan, that kicked off a domino effect that led to the Russia-Ukraine war, led to the disgusting Hamas attack on Israel and the proxies all over the region becoming emboldened.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And what we've seen in the last 120 days is strength, focus, and aggression to make sure our military is focused on one thing, and that is killing the enemy and bringing home our men and women alive.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
We should be very worried, Ben, because you'll hear the term near-peer conflict thrown around all the time. We've got to be ready for near-peer, near-peer this, near-peer that. I don't know who they think the near-peer is, but the reality is right now China builds ships 230 times faster than we do. They have a standing army that by some accounts is 10 times bigger than ours is.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Just about a week and a half ago, last week, we had Pakistan and India face off in an air dominance battle that really we haven't seen an air superiority battle like that in several decades. It appears as if the Chinese integrated air dominance technology beat the Western technology five to zero. So that's a very big concern for those of us who are watching carefully because
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
We all hope we don't have to go to war again. Ben, I know you hope that. Your family and friends in Israel have been fighting for the last year and a half. We know how brutal war is. We do not want to go to war, but we owe it to our people, especially our young men and women in uniform, that we are ready for the war when it comes. And America, unfortunately, in our track record,
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
is we usually have to absorb a lot of pain and a lot of losses before we change our behavior and last time we had great power competition in the pacific we got our ass kicked for the first year there's a lot of ships at the bottom of the ocean and a lot of dead americans because we were not ready to face off against this threat right now china has been preparing they are more prepared than we are we've seen a massive atrophy of our base infrastructure in the pacific and most importantly our ability to build replace and maintain our naval vessels which have been the guarantors of freedom of navigation around the entire world for the last 80
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
They should be thinking about the men and women that are still deployed overseas. That's actually where I will be spending Memorial Day as I'm leaving this weekend to head overseas to where I see our deployed troops from Montana and our special operations forces that I used to be a part of. visiting them before deployed where they are.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
here. So I'm very concerned, Ben. I know that many of my former, sorry, many of my comrades in the Senate are equally concerned on both sides of the aisle, I might add. Senator Tim Kaine from Virginia has been a great voice of reason, too, in this saying we need to make sure our Navy's ready. So we've got a lot of work to do.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
I think Pete's up to the job and the president has very clearly said it's time for us to get ready.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
You're absolutely right. And that's something that Americans don't like to think of ourselves as a military empire of projecting force around the world. We like to think of ourselves as, hey, we want to mind our own business here at home and we'll deal with a problem if it comes to us. And that's certainly a noble cause. And I think for the most part, we all agree with that.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
But the truth is, unfortunately, we have to be ready to defend our interests globally. And frankly, that goes back to the beginning in our Constitution. Our founding fathers in our Constitution stated very clearly that we are constitutionally required to provide and maintain a Navy. And the reason why is because building a Navy takes time.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Although most Americans don't feel like we're at war, the truth is around the world, the American empire and the American ideal are all over the world and requires us to defend it constantly. And right now in the Red Sea, we've had the longest continuous run of naval combat since World War II.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
It's expensive, it's hard, and the skills around a Navy take years to develop. And an Army is, of course, an equally important capability to have, But especially at that time, our founders were concerned about a standing army in America becoming used as a force of tyranny by a runaway government.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Whereas the Navy was understood that as a mercantile republic, we had to have open sea lanes available to keep our businesses running, to keep our economy strong. And as you correctly pointed out, 250 years on, very little has changed.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
The technology is different, the products are different, but the reality is we have to be able to move products into and out of our marketplace, and so does the rest of the world. And right now, frankly, for the last eight years, the entire global economy has rested on the bedrock of freedom of navigation that sits on the backs of the U.S. Navy. So we have to be ready to defend those interests.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And right now, as we've seen in the Red Sea over the past year and a half, since October 7th, Although it's a small example of what can happen worldwide, we're very lucky to have the Navy we have. But unfortunately, the Red Sea is a tiny speck on the map compared to the Indo-Pacific region.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And we're not ready to spread that capability across the whole region the way China is rapidly pacing towards.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Also, my mom says when I was about three years old, I was running around the woods with a stick for a gun. So she said, I don't know why, but you always knew you were going to do it. But it's interesting that there was an image stuck in my head when I was about five years old. We were invading Kuwait during the first Gulf War. And I was sitting on the floor playing with trucks and toys.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And it was, you know, the old school CNN back in the early days of 24 hour news. And I saw this image and it was a night vision video of an American soldier running through the desert and he dropped down on his chest to fire his weapon.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And I realized it occurred to me even at that young age, at four or five years old, that there was somebody half a world away fighting for our country and keeping me safe all the way back home. And even as a small child, I understood that concept that there's somebody deployed overseas in the middle of the night,
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines are over there constantly fighting the Houthis, which are a proxy arm of Iran, to keep those sea lanes open and keep commerce flowing worldwide. It's an incredibly important mission. And that's what Americans should be thinking about on Memorial Day. Have fun, have a barbecue, go water skiing, do whatever you want to do. That's great.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
wearing body armor with a rifle, fighting the fight so that we could be safe back at home. And that concept for me was something that was very powerful. And I said, you know what, I want to be a part of that. When I grew up, I want to be the guy on the wall protecting this beautiful way of life that we have. And of course, that stuck with me.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
met my wife at the naval academy we both served she was a marine i was a seal and we spent uh our 20s deployed all over the world fighting for this country and we're proud to do it so it's it's a really special day memorial day is of course veterans days in the fall focusing on veterans memorial day is focused on on those who we've lost focused on of course the memorials that have been built to to honor those lives uh and there's again nothing nothing greater we can do to honor those lives and then simply take a few moments to remember
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
that all the great things we have in this country were not perfect. We never have been. We never will be. But this is about the best damn governance experience and experiment that's ever happened in the history of mankind. And frankly, we have to preserve it and protect it.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
And the only way we can really do that is if we have those people who are willing to make that sacrifice all over the world for all of us. So it's a special day. Thanks for taking a moment to honor it for all of us.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
Well, I have these bracelets that we're actually all the time, 24-7. And I used to have one. But as the names have grown over the years, they all carry names of teammates and friends that I lost overseas. And actually, I started wearing these all the time because I realized when I came home from the wars, I did about five deployments all over the world that very few people at home
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
just didn't think every day. To them, the wars didn't exist. They didn't affect them day to day. And for me, it was very important that we remember those names. So the name I always at the top of my list is a guy named Ben Tiffner. He was a special forces captain in the U.S. Army.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
I actually didn't know Ben that well or for even that long, but he was an early mentor of mine in the special operations community when I was going through ranger training before I became a SEAL. And he was a guy that took the time out of his busy schedule to help train me as a young teenager as I became enmeshed in the world of special operations.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
He didn't have to take the time he took, but he did. And then a few months later, he was killed in Iraq, and I was one of the guys that carried him off the plane at Dover Air Force Base when he landed. And that was my first experience was losing somebody I knew closely. I would go on to lose many other folks I knew closely, but you always remember the first and that one is Ben.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
So I wear them every day and think about them on a daily basis. I'll certainly be thinking about this weekend.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Memorial Day: Remembering The Fallen w/ Sen. Tim Sheehy
We're proud to have Americans enjoy their day off. But just do so remembering that you're allowed to do those things because a very small number of men and women have chosen to stand on the wall and protect your ability to do that.