As state legislatures enter peak session, something rare happens in American politics.

Votes are cast in public.
Records are created.
And elected officials preparing for primary elections can no longer hide from their own actions.

In this episode of the Bring Our Troops Home podcast, we examine why legislative session combined with primary season is the moment when citizens have the most leverage — and why that leverage terrifies the people who have built careers around endless war.

We begin in Arizona, where Defend the Guard is moving through the state legislature and where a small amount of organized citizen pressure can have an outsized impact on U.S. foreign policy.

From there, we look at the re-emergence of Jeb Bush and his role at United Against Nuclear Iran, and how old neocon networks attempt to reassert influence when state-level resistance begins to form.

We close with Lindsey Graham’s very public fundraising panic, his long record of cheerleading undeclared wars, and the real human cost of treating the National Guard as an unlimited resource for conflicts Congress never voted on.

Arizona is the case study.
Federalism is the mechanism.
Consent is the missing ingredient.

If America is going to fight a war, the people deserve debate, a vote, and accountability before the first deployment — not panic after the system starts to crack.

Support our work:
https://BringOurTroopsHome.us

Support Defend the Guard:
https://DefendTheGuard.us

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On Christmas night, while families across the country were gathered together, the President announced U.S. military strikes in Nigeria.

Another war.
Another country Americans never debated.
Another decision made without a vote of Congress.

In this episode of the Bring Our Troops Home podcast, we respond directly to that announcement.

We acknowledge the very real persecution of Christians in northern Nigeria and the human instinct to feel sympathy and moral urgency. But we also draw a hard line between compassion and constitutional authority.

Moral outrage does not declare war.
Social media posts do not create consent.

This episode examines how undeclared wars begin, why “limited strikes” rarely stay limited, how the National Guard becomes a human tripwire, and how the same logic used to justify intervention today can be stretched tomorrow — whether for terrorism, resources, or even something as absurd as cocoa.

Nigeria is the case study.
Process is the issue.
The Constitution is the standard.

If America is going to fight a war, the people deserve debate, a vote, and accountability before the first strike — not an announcement after the fact.

Support our work:
https://BringOurTroopsHome.us

Support Defend the Guard:
https://DefendTheGuard.us

Follow Bring Our Troops Home on X, YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts for new episodes, clips, and updates.

The Truth About Dick Cheney — The Cost and the Choice

This episode closes the circle.

For six episodes, we’ve traced how Dick Cheney built a doctrine, assembled a machine, and helped normalize undeclared war. In this final chapter, we stop talking about power in the abstract and confront what it actually did to real people.

This is the human toll of Cheney’s worldview.

Not in statistics.
Not in talking points.
In lives.

National Guard units pulled away from their communities.
Service members sent into wars Congress never voted on.
Veterans who came home carrying wounds they were never given the truth about.
Families left with folded flags and unanswered questions.

This episode connects the dots between unchecked executive war powers and the damage done at home. How the National Guard was quietly transformed from a force meant to defend the states into a permanent overseas deployment pool. How Congress stepped aside. How war became routine. And how the cost was shifted onto citizens who never had a say.

But this is not just a postmortem.

This episode is also about the choice still in front of us.

Defend the Guard is not a slogan or a protest. It is a constitutional pressure point. A state-level law that forces Congress to do its job before the National Guard can be sent into foreign combat zones. No blank checks. No executive shortcuts. No pretending the Constitution doesn’t apply when it’s inconvenient.

This is the practical path forward. The last off-ramp before the next generation is asked to fight another war no one voted for.

If you’ve stayed with this series, this episode explains why it mattered. Not to relitigate the past, but to reclaim the future.

This podcast is produced by Bring Our Troops Home, a veteran-led organization committed to ending endless war and restoring Congress’s constitutional authority over war. Our work focuses on passing Defend the Guard across the country, state by state, before the next crisis is used to justify another generation of conflict.

Learn more or support the mission:
BringOurTroopsHome.us
DefendTheGuard.us

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If this episode hits you, share it. The truth only matters if people hear it. And the Constitution only works if we’re willing to enforce it.

Welcome to the final chapter of The Truth About Dick Cheney.