HOUR 1 - The April 3, 2026, broadcast of The Charlie James Show featured the F-15E downing in Iran, the fallout from Pam Bondi’s firing, record ATL airport travel, and March’s 178k job growth.

What this episode covers

00:00 And welcome to the program on your Friday afternoon. Glad to have you along with us. Always a pleasure to chat with you folks. Yes, you heard at the top of the hour. uh An F-15E Strike Eagle was downed over Iran. We don't know if it was shot down. We don't know exactly what happened. No official confirmation. Although the Muslim, uh who is it? Iranian, the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard. 00:28 is claiming responsibility of this. president has been briefed um on the matter as confirmation continues to come in. The original report by Iranian media claimed that it was an F-35, but US sources have confirmed that it was an F-15E Strike Eagle uh allegedly shot down over Iran. Axios reporting that a search and rescue operation is underway for the crew. They have given 00:57 One of the crew members has been rescued by special forces. That has already happened. So you know what that means. You know what that means, right? I just put a couple of these puzzle pieces together. If an F-15E Strike Eagle pilot was uh rescued by special forces in Iran, that means there are special forces in Iran. Okay? So now... 01:28 Iranian state media and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard claim responsibility, describing it as a successful air defense engagement through details on the aircraft type, um though details on the aircraft type vary across reports with some pointing to an F-15E strike eagle. First confirmed loss of a US manned fighter jet to Iranian fire since the start of Operation Epic Fury in late February of this year. 01:56 U.S. Central Command has not issued an immediate confirmation or denial, but we are hearing that the, on Iranian state television, that they are offering a reward to, for the capture of the other pilot um now. So, number one, you need to be sending prayers for that pilot right now. 02:23 You need to be sending all the prayers you possibly can up for the safe recovery of that pilot by U.S. forces. That's what we need because we know what these people are like. We've seen how they operate. 02:43 This pilot, they were both male, has got to be just absolutely scared to death. there was a picture of an ejection seat reportedly from an F-15E um that they are claiming has been located near the crash site in western or southwestern Iran. So we'll see what happens with that. We don't know. Right now the point is we just don't know, but we need to be praying about this. But again, the first... 03:13 downing of an American aircraft uh since the Operation Epic Fury began. Trump was, like I said, Trump was briefed on this. So man, I'll tell you what, this could get ugly. It could get ugly over there. any. Remember during it was during Obama, wasn't it? When Iran captured one of our ships. 03:41 and humiliated our soldiers. Do you remember that? Yeah, that actually happened. Broadcasted all over Iranian television, all over, everybody in the world picked it up. 03:54 I would hate to imagine what would happen to this pilot if the Iranians find them. Hopefully that doesn't happen, but again, we are hearing that the first pilot was rescued by special forces. And that does tell us that special forces are in Iran. 04:17 Unfortunately, it also tells them that too. uh just again, thoughts and prayers going up. Also, we heard that Pete Hegseth has fired General Randy George. He was fired uh over there at the Department of War. Coming up in just a little bit, I'm gonna tell you about General Randy George. 04:43 He was not apparently a very nice guy. This guy was a Biden appointee. 04:51 So you know how I probably felt about this administration, right? So we'll talk about that. again, ah we have any, if we have any new details coming up about the rescue mission for that downed F-15E pilot, we will certainly bring it to you. Coming up also, CNN, have you seen the jobs reports? 05:18 The jobs report came out yesterday. It was unbelievable. We had so much to talk about yesterday, we kind o ...

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