Best of the Program | Guests: Charlie LeDuff & Delano Squires | 8/5/26

**Glenn Beck** (0:01)
Hey, we have a great podcast today. You know, the full-length podcast, we talked about the election that happened, but we also talk about it here a bit in the best of of today's podcast. We start with Charlie LeDuff, who is up in Michigan, and he is going after ActBlue. He is looking at where have all these donations come from. And I mean, he's a hard-smoking kind of guy.
And a real journalist, and I love it. We had a great conversation with him. Then we talked about the water hacks that are happening here on our water systems in America. This one is vital, because this one, you don't need a politician to help you, at least a national politician. You don't have to vote for anybody. You are the key to solving this, and this is really disturbing what is happening with our water systems. Somebody is trying to hack into them. There has been seven or ten of them hacked into in the last ten or fifteen days.
It can be fixed, but you are the key to getting it done, because most of these local communities just think, oh, well, there's no problem with us, and that's where it's happening. You won't believe the details on this. In a fascinating conversation with Delano Squires, he has written a new book, The Vanishing Black Family. This is a must-listen to interview, and I think a must-read book, The Vanishing Black Family, Delano Squires. All of that on today's podcast. Don't forget, there's an extra for Torch subscribers. I did an hour right after the show. 1984 is now.
What happens when we cross this threshold and things begin to vanish? You'll understand and it's critical. Just become a Torch member. You can listen to it on demand now at glennbech.com/torch.

**SPEAKER_2** (2:00)
You're listening to The Best of the Glenn Beck Program.

**Glenn Beck** (2:08)
Charlie, how are you?

**Charlie LeDuff** (2:10)
I'm great, brother. How are you doing?

**Glenn Beck** (2:13)
I hate your smoke, and I love it. I saw an old clip from Edward R. Murrow the other day. I don't know what I was watching, and he had that smoke just kind of making rings up off of the table. And I went, where are those journalistic anymore? Where are those people?
And here you are.

**Charlie LeDuff** (2:29)
So welcome. Do you remember that bit from Saturday Night Live?
Martin Short, when he's on 60 Minutes getting grilled. He's got the Coke bottle glass in his ear.

**Glenn Beck** (2:38)
Yes.
Yes. Yeah, I miss those days. Anyway, Charlie, thanks for everything that you do. I really appreciate it. I think you're fabulous and you're exactly what America needs in journalism. Tell me about what you are finding with El-Sayed's campaign donors.

**Charlie LeDuff** (2:59)
Okay. Let me preface it by why I'm looking. Okay, because he fashions himself as the small donor king, the grassroots swell.
He's the number one guy on ActBlue, you know, in Michigan. Small donations from around the country. Eighty percent of his money is from ActBlue, and 70, 75 percent of the actual money is coming from out of state. So I can't go out of state, so I'll look in state. Is this true? Because he's the guy that wants to get money out of politics. Okay, you want to get money out of politics, where's your money coming from?
So we just, you know, we go into the FEC database, we download it, we put it on a spreadsheet, we run it, we have AI check it, then we double check AI, and then we double check each other. So we've got 120 donors, average age about 75 in Michigan. And altogether in the last decade or so, 120 people have made three quarters of a million donations. Okay, so we pick one, and we go out to the countryside, and there's an old lady, and her house is burned down, she's living in a trailer, no internet, no computer, no running water. And I was going to bring her the printout, but her donations were 15,000 over five years totaling 150 grand. And I told her I would have brought you the printout, but I ran out of paper. Did you, madam, in fact, donate 15,000 times to the tune of $150,000 with no house? And she donates, and she says ActBlue is the bank. I go to ActBlue, but nothing, nothing of that size, she was shocked, so to wrap it in a bow for you, you want to keep dark money out of politics. Everybody knows, everybody knows ActBlue is corrupt.
We need to look at it, and I challenged Abdul, listen, man, if you want to get money out of politics, return all the ActBlue money, because it's elder abuse. You're stealing ActBlue, it's almost obvious, I'm just gonna say it, you're stealing old people's identity, and you're running money from unknown sources through their names, and it's gotta stop. Again, one more time, Abdul out raised Haley, I'm rounding off, $15 million for their general fund, their campaign fund, she raised 11 So forget special interests and the super PACs, he out raised her, what's the source of the money? Let's go, come clean.