Episode 43: A Marine's Spirit with Johnny 'Joey' Jones

out Allowed with Gianno called well. Welcome back to Allow with Giano called well. I'm Gianno called well. And on this week's show, we're talking about the military, overcoming adversity and helping others. My guest today know something about all three. He's Johnny Joey Jones, a retired U. S Marine who served two combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan in eight

years of active service in the Marine Corps. In twenty ten, Joey suffered a life change and injury while deployed in Afghanistan as an explosive ordinance disposal technician after stepping on an improvised expulsive device placed by the enemy. He lost both his legs above the knee and suffered severe damage to his right forearm and both wrists. Since recovering, Joey has dedicated his work to help veterans and their families.

In twenty nineteen, Joey became a Fox News contributor and now he currently hosts Fox Nation Outdoors and Fox Proud American Podcast. Today, we're going to discuss his life story, all things military, and what drives him to devote so much of his life to help veterans. And with all of that, I welcome Joey Jones to the show. Thank you so much for coming on out lot with Gianno Caldwell. Well, thanks for having me on. Man. When you when you hit me up about this, I was really excited. I

love these long form conversations. No, I'm excited myself now. I want to just go right into it because you've achieved great success in your life and you have so much going on professionally. But I want to begin this conversation by going back before all of that, even before the military. I know you come from humble beginnings. You were the first in your family to graduate high school. Big deal. Yeah, No, sincerely, I'm telling you it's someone

who's coming from these kind of environments too. I know how big of a deal that is. And at one point you worked as a forklift operator at a flooring manufacturer. Can you talk a bit about how you grew up and the values that were instilled in you at a very young age. Yeah, you know, I mean that kind of says it, all right. The first one in my family to graduate high school, to walk across the stage. And it's not for lack of intelligence, it was for

lack of opportunity because you had other responsibilities. My dad had two brothers, my mom had four siblings herself, and they were both born for the purpose of being a part of the family farm kind of thing, like you needed all hands on deck. That's why you had children.

And I kid all the time and tell people like my dad's experience went from like nineteen fifty nine to two thousand, and he didn't really catch all that that happened in between, because it was like he stayed in this kind of no technology, you worked hard and and take care of your family mentality up until he was sixty and had no choice but to have a smartphone to talk to me and Uh. And so all that time in between, things were pretty pretty much. You know,

you're a lot on your family and your you. You owe what you owe to your family and they owe it to you. And there were a lot of hiccups and a lot of problems, a lot of adversity. But to have that coming out and going into the world. UM, any success I've had, it's because I had that foundation. Mm hmmm. Now you just mentioned something that I want to dig into more. You said that there was a lot of problems and a lot of adversity. You mind talking about that a little bit? No, not at all.

And I talked about this fairly freely. My dad was an alcoholic and my mom suffered from her own problems. Uh. I think her diagnosis is manic. Um, I get him mixed up like mannic or bipolar or something. She has really high highs, really low lows and doesn't trust anybody. And when she's in her lows, she thinks everybody's legit

at me, trying to undermine her, hurt her. And it's because she was, um, you know, abused in a lot of ways growing up and um like, for example, my mom was woken up at fifteen and said, hey, you're gonna go with this man and you're gonna marry him. And it's because he had traded her dad basically his truck and um, and that's in South Alabama, you know. And so not not to paint everyone that from her side of the family is bad, but that was the

experience they had. So my mom, you know, lost her virginity and and got pregnant on her wedding night, and my sister was born. She was was sixteen, seventeen years older my sister, and so and my sister's early years, my mom was figuring it out. She went through a lot of depression and drug addiction, and when she found my dad, she also kind of found redemption. And he had had his own struggles through his first wife and and they were kind of each other's saving grace at

that time in their life. And from it came me, and then a few years after that came a marriage. So I mean, if you can talk about as as redneck and hill bill as it, yes, that was it. But from that adversity came a lot of things that they were never able to overcome, but always had the heart and the mindset to overcome it, you know, they, more than anybody I've ever known, focused on making life better for their kids than what they had had. And my dad's family was very positive. I mean they were

solid of the earth. I mean not as not as maybe parody backwards, but very much likely the clamp its from Beverly Hillbillies. Like they just everything was about the family. My dad had two brothers, his mom and dad. My grandparents on my dad's side was the epitome of what a love should be for two people. And so when my safe for example, like my dad always wanted me to play football, but he only ever came to two

football games because he couldn't drink there. But I had a grandfather and two uncles that were there, So if you put all four of them together, I had all the right positive experiences for a father and um and I was a lucky in that, you know, and we talk all the time about like a nuclear family and

how important the father is. Well you know what aunts and uncles and grandparents are important to like it does take a village and um, and I just wish people would understand the honor and importance it is to be in a child's life, regardless of kind of where what position you hold by title. Because it took my aunts and my uncles and my grandparents and my older sister um and they all invested in me, and man, then I just owe it to them to go out and

get it done. Wow that man, you know as you talk, it's so much reminds me of my own life, although the circumstances were a bit different. My mom was addicted to crack cocaine and my dad was in my life. I saw him on the weekends, my grandfather's small business, plumbing construction business, if you take me with them on the weekends. But things were really rough during the week at home and the things that I saw, and it

reminds me so much of my own upbringing. And I know that even years after being removed from that environment because I'm thirty four years old now, moved out of the house when I was nineteen years old, those issues from way back when still impact me today. And you think about the reality of how you think right now, how you move, you know, when people say things to you, how it makes you feel. How is that impacting you today?

You know this, And what I love about this is we're so different yet so alike and that's that's what

cause the human conditions consistent. Right, Like more than likely you and I were exposed to the type of trauma and had the just the good luck or good influence respond to it in a way that it ultimately became a positive thing for us because when we started to experience trauma as adults, we had tools to deal with it and it didn't just wreck us because hey, we've been there, We've done that, and we figured it out through God's grace, good luck and maybe some good people.

And so not to jump over away from your your question to begin with, but today, when I experienced trauma, like for example, getting blown up in Afghanistan, I've got a basis of knowledge, Like I've been through the valley and I know that I'm gonna make it to the mountaintop, like I've done that before. I mean, I've I sit there and watch my dad get mad about things and throw the refrigerator out the back door and my mom just crying, and it's like, man, it can't get worse

than this. And then we wake up the next morning and he takes us to breakfast, and he owns up to what he did wrong, and he explains himself when we go on about our lives. And it's not because that will never happen again, but it's because he doesn't never want it to happen again. Right, And so, like

humans make mistakes and keep making them. But if you can survive that as a child and come out in a positive way, come out knowing these people loves you, even if they hurt you sometimes and not on purpose, and and we're remorseful, and you can learn to forgive them and see something in them that's better than your than their worst moment. Then when you go through trauma of your own as an adult, one you know whatever that is, you're gonna survive it. Two, when you do

make mistakes, you know there's redemption there for it. And three you see that love is complex and it's not black and white. It's not a m calm. It comes with its own skeletons, but it also comes with the sunshine too. And and so that's kind of with the way I process things. And and it's been very helpful, Like it you and your words said, I'm very successful, and I think I am, but I'm successful because I have two kids and I love them and they know it,

and I just don't know that there's more success than that. Man, I mean, you're just dropping jewels. Is what you're saying is very profound, and I think for a lot of people who are listening right now, they can just apply some of these principles to their own lives, no matter if they came from a wealthy family, no matter if they came from a poor family, whatever the set of

circumstances were. They can take exactly what you're saying and just reevaluate their lives based on that and say, man, I can do battert what do you say with the grace of God, um, good luck and some good people. I think that's just I think that's really amazing. Thank you for sharing that. Joey No, you mentioned Afghanistan and you joined the military when you were eighteen years old. Why did you join the military at a you know, what was your experience like during the first few years

in the military, including your deployment in Iraq? You know why during the military is you know, I'm a product of that nine eleven generation, right. It affected all of us and we all found different ways to respond to it. But I don't believe any of us did not have the trajectory of our lives changed if we were adolescent preteen or teen and watched those towers fall and what happened to our country afterwards. For me, the military was just the avenue, like I remember, um, you know a

lot of people remember the towers falling. I saw that, but it didn't have an immediate impact because growing up in North Georgia with not a lot of money, never been on an airplane or even a bus. New York was as far away as Tel Aviv, Like, it just was not even it didn't even register. So I didn't have that immediate impact of hey, they attacked us on our home school. But what I did have was a few years later when a guy that was on my football team and upper classmen deployed and came back and

just the changes in him he had seen ward. Yeah, but it also boys become men and women or girls become women, and like he had seen a new team in a brotherhood, and and just you could see that's what came from it, not just the war. And I thought, man, how how cool to be to have some of that in my life. So when I graduated high school, that

was the accomplishment. There was no expectation beyond that for my parents, who had never seen that, that was the accomplishment, even in two thousand four when college was more mainstream. So for me it was like, well, I didn't have the financial support or really the attention span to go into college. Laying brick and block was not easy. So I joined the industry in my town, which was to make carpet and didn't really like that a whole lot,

and it just needed to be something more. And I just remember the day I woke up and realized my mom cleans houses and my dad builds them. They provide services for other people, and they do it with hard work. What can I do? Like, how do I honor that? How do I honor everything they give up to give me decent clothes to go to school in in a vehicle to drive things they didn't get? How do I honor that? And the military just was the most obvious thing for me. So in short, because nothing I say

short kind that's okay. I kind of went for selfish reasons because it was about me in my life, but it was also for others in the sense that I'll put three this way. I joined the Marine Corps eighteen and that was all about me, but by the time I was twenty, it was all about being something, a part of something bigger than myself and and serving it. Really did everything they preached. Man, I just soaked it up and it made sense to me more with Joey

jem was right after this. How old are you? Joey, I'm thirty four for about three more weeks, so I'm I'm hanging in there. Wow, bro, I'm thirty four two. Okay, so you're a little older, been than me by what five months or so? So now that that's great to know. I didn't really realize that. Now you were deployed in Afghanistan. It's a technician, and I mean there was a life event that pretty much changed your entire existence. Now, it was a day that you stepped on you improvised explosive

device i e. D and lost both your legs. Can you take us back to that day? Can you describe what happened? Yeah? Unfortunately or unfortunately one of the big mixed numbers and movies are probably to blame for this, but also just trauma in general. Like people think when you get hit by a bomb, you're knocked out and you wake up in the hospital, And the truth is,

unless your head gets hit, you don't go unconscious. A matter of fact, you're going through shock, which means in some ways you're way more alert than you probably want to be. So my job as an e O D. Explosive ordnance disposal or bomb technician, it's kind of like the movie hurt Locker, although the movie doesn't really show the job correctly in in reality. By two thousand ten, in Afghanistan, we didn't wear bomb suits, and we worked on two man teams, not three men teams. And we

were walking on foot with a patrol. We weren't in a vehicle with robots, and the majority of the work we did was by hand. Um. We tried to use robots when we could, but in Afghanistan the bombs were placed in in so remote places we couldn't get the equipment there. And so my number one tool for taking a part of bomb was a pair of trauma shares um and like a little hook with some cord on it so I could get some distance when I needed to black tape and in another explosive charge, I've had

to blow it in place. And it was all by hand. And so I say that because a lot of people don't understand that, and so how did this for six months on that deployment, and then on the sixth morning of an operation it was August six. We started it on August one. The job was to go in and clear out a town called Safar Bazar. You can look it up and google it. We have our little Wikipedia page.

It was Operation Roadhouse too, and we took a couple hundred marines in six bomb texts, and those six bomb texts were three teams of two men each, and each team had its own responsibility, and my team mate and I had the responsibility of being with the main effort, so clearing the main path ahead of us. And so for five days we cleared city blocks, street by street, and then on the sixth day we started clearing the buildings,

and the town was pretty much a ghost town. Because our respect for collateral damage in civilian life means we're gonna let them know we're coming. And this town was known for stockpiling the bomb parts that they would send up to other places. So when we told him we were coming in order to keep the civilians safe, the bad guys took all those bomb parts and put them in the ground and made a mind filled out of

the town. But we had to go in and clear to the town because they were using it basically as a as an enemy base. And so for five days we were very successful. I worked thirty eight eight s and five days, and UM on the sixth morning, Basically what happens. I stepped on an idea I didn't know it was there, and that happens. It's kind of ironic, considering I had knelt down and touched a hundred of them with my hands, and it was the one I didn't even know it was there that got me UM.

And the unfortunate part about that day is that a marine engineer, Corporal Daniel Greer from Knoxville, Tennessee, UM lost his life to the same bomb. And that's really the irony war I stepped on it. He was twenty ft away a piece of a wall, a big rock hit him in the head. Traumatic brain injury took his life. And of course I lost my legs, but man, you know, it would be very selfish to me to complain about losing my legs when that could have taken my life.

And so really what that was, if anything, was just a wake up call. It kind of kind of reset my compass a little bit. As I began to recover, a lot of other things changed in my life and and I had a chance to just kind of refocus. And my recovery was an opportunity, to to say the least. And it's you know, I tell people all the time, let today be the last worst day of your life, which means you can change your perspective and make every day after a tragic event better. Um, and that's what

I chose to do. Did you have children at that point? I had a son, And you know, I told you before we got started. I love these kind of conversations, get a chance to kind of let it go. And uh So the whole story of my son is I was very single and very much a marine and in very good shape and enjoyed to meet new people, to include ladies. And so I had a son from a one night stand and I just found out about him right before I deployed. He had made it to about

five months old before I met him. And uh I like to say I did the right thing, but I just did the the only option I had, which was I was ecstatic I had a child. I gave him my name. His mom and I worked together to figure it out and do all the legal stuff. We we didn't get together, but we decided to raise this sun as two parents that love him. And so when I got hurt, I'd only spent two or three days with him. And by the time I got hurt and made it home,

he was a year old. Um. And so I tell people, you know, we learned to walk together and uh. And that's how we became friends and and the father and the son, and he's been here with me ever since. Now I've got a little daughter. M h. That's a that's a man. I tell you, that's one of the more interesting stories, especially when you know that life isn't all about you anymore. And you had this experience that

you just mentioned was from a one night's thing. You didn't know that you had a child out there, but you find out right before you go. And I'm imagining as you have this experience, because you talk about a bit about the recovery, but as you have this experience, mentally, I just wonder what was going on with you at that time you got you got a child. Now you're like, okay, how you know, how are they gonna look at me.

I didn't spend much time with them. Your family, I'm sure probably was, you know, all concerned about what was going to happen, what life was gonna be like for you, And I know you were wondering what life was gonna be like for you, you know, one of the I guess unfortunate blessings of my job and there when I joined the Marine e O. D. Field And and what's different about the Marine Corps than the other services. Has

to become a bomb tech. You volunteered into it, but you have to have served for a certain amount of years and reach a certain rank before you can do it. And they really want anybody that goes through that training to be dedicated to it and know really what they're getting into. And so just to join the Marine Corps e O. D. Field, Man, I had seen it happen. I'd had Buddy's deployed come back without legs. I kind

of knew the process. And then even on that deployment, I've seen it happen a half a dozen times, either right in front of me or showed up immediately after and help clean it up. So when I lost my legs and went through the recovery, it was more about just kind of uh, setting a goal and checking it off. Setting a goal and checking it off. I can't say that I was prepared for it, but it didn't hit

me by surprise either. If your job to take bombs apart, you better be mantally prepared for the probabilities, if not, if not, the possibilities and uh and so for me, like, for example, man, I got a picture of the first time I pete standing up, and it's kind of funny, but it was also a goal I set, like, Hey, that's something I used to do without thinking twice. I

can't do that anymore. I need help to go to the bathroom when I'm walking enough that I can take myself to the bathroom and stand up and urinate like I'm gonna take a picture of it. Mark that a And I did that with every goal. And as far as my son goes, I mean, I often say he kind of saved my life because I never wanted for motivation. Nothing motivates you like responsibility, and I had his responsibility to be a father. And you can't do that laying

in the hospital bed worried about what you lost. You gotta be able to appreciate what you have and do the right thing. And so for me, it was like, you know what, I've got learned how to throw a baseball without legs. I've got to learn how to teach this kid to drive. I've got to learn how to take him to a restaurant. I gotta learn how to discipline him and work him like my dad did me. Um, and these legs can't be the reason why I don't do that. He deserves more than that, you know, Joey,

thank you for sharing that story. But I'm reminded of how we first met, and I believe, if I'm correct, the first time we met was in a Fox Nation studio and we were on a panel together, and I just remember thinking and seeing you and wondering, how the hell does this guy have such a a great attitude? You were just and every time I've seen you since we were just hosting a show together on Fox News Channel, maybe you were three weeks ago or so, and you're

just always in good spirits. I text you your good spirits? How do you have such a good disposition after all that has happened um to you, and and and and certainly with your family, how do you continue, You're happier, seemingly to me than people who have had everything good go for their lives. And I get it. Not everyone's had everything good going for the lives, but certainly they got all kind of things to call for money, success and all these other things. You're more happy than they are.

How is that possible, Joey? You know, you see these movies and you have these full brass and are always complaining because they've never they've never needed to want for something, and they had created this false expectation that everything's supposed to happen and happens when they wanted to. That is

never a factor in my life. I'm not saying that I wasn't taken care of, but it was never presented to me that things will go the way I wanted them to, or even in my favorite was presented to me that things got to get done towards gotta get done work. It's gotta get done and you've gotta be the one doing it. And so I just have a gratitude for the positive things that happened in my life, and it's hard for me not to focus on them

about it. You know, there's some people that are really good at sports, are really good at dancing and seeing it. I don't have any of those gifts, but life has a way of working out for the for the positive things I want in my life, and I'm always grateful for that. That's a blessing. And I mean, I wish I had a better answer, because I know, I know

how difficult it is for some people. Um, but I just, you know, something clicks for me a long time ago that made me just incredibly grateful to still be alive, but also to still have these blessings in my life. And I've never felt like they were supposed to happen. I've never felt like I was oathed them. I never

felt like they were gonna happen no matter what. And so when you're raised to work for it and then things happen and you don't feel like you've even worked that hard for like you're like, it's hard to explain, but it's like I didn't do anything for my daughter to love me but make her, but she loves me unconditionally. Oh my god, that's such a blessing that I wake up happy. Like when I wake up and I hear her say Daddy, It's like, why in the world would would she be so happy to see me like that?

Those things happen every day. And if you're not grateful for that, if it doesn't make you happy, like I don't know you can be happy? And I worry for you. Man, this is your an adultes is so inspiring. Now, let me ask you this question, what role does guy play in your life? Because I hear a lot of tones and what you say and everything you say, and you've've seen it on air. What role do this guy really ultimately play in your life? All the roles and none

of them are defined. Like I was raised in church and I don't go to church now, um, but I don't have anything against it, just isn't um the experience I'm looking for. I have a very spiritual experience. I pray and talk to out a lot and um, but I don't want to limit God. And so my experience is that the difference between faith and religion is religion as we as people trying to figure it out, and

faith is just feeling it. And so I've leaned into faith and a and I'm worried that if I ascribe to a specific um dogma, I guess I would be limiting God's ability to play a role in my life. If I if I put rules on God, then perhaps I limit God. And so I believe in faith, and I believe in things of that nature. Um, and I don't I don't corner it, so I don't stop it from from working the way it's supposed to. I don't think any human being makes it through most of life's

adversity for any of us, by ourselves. And if it's through the works of a deity or other people, um, I call that God and I give it credit. And it doesn't have to be one to fine thing for me to believe in it. Now, thank you for sharing your perspective on that. Now you have to retire ring from the military. You want on to graduate from Georgetown University in teen with a degree in liberal studies and social and public policy. And you often went to Capitol

Hill to introduce yourself to politicians there. What were you thinking at that time? You know what I was thinking. I was thinking, every one of these dudes and ladies up here are gonna want to take a picture with me because I'm a shandy object. Right, I'm a warder and uniform that lost his legs. But what they don't know is I'm smarter than they think, and I'm gonna sneak up on them what's something I care about and make them care about it too. And so that's kind

of how I handled that. I um, I kinda it's a crazy story, and if I don't have enough time to say it, But basically, when I was recovering, I recovered pretty quickly and the paperwork couldn't keep up with my pace. UM I got injured August six, two thousand and ten. I was walking and by all accounts, fully recovered by February two thou eleven. And it takes about

two years just for the retirement process to happen. And usually in those two years, you go to college or you do Paralympics, and they kind of keep you busy E up in d C back in during this time. But I wanted something more than that. I knew I wasn't gonna lay breaking block for a living. I knew I probably wasn't gonna earn my living as a marine for the rest of my career. So what can I do. I can go educate myself. And so I started college with a community college on campus October. So I got

injured in August. I started doing classes in October, and as soon as I was independent could leave campus, which was around February. I had rolled at Georgetown and started school there, and in doing school while I became interested in policy because I was at Georgetown and we were learning kind of how policy started for mankind. And so I had an opportunity to go up to Capitol Hill and meet Chairman Jeff Miller. Actually I met him over at Eighth and N if you're familiar with d C

over at the Marine Corps barracks. And I rolled up to Chairman Miller, who's the chairman of the Veterans Affairs Committee at the time for the Republicans who were in charge. But more importantly, he represented the first District of Florida, where the e O D School is and a lot of EO D retire. And I said, Mr Chairman, I know all your constituents and they think you should give me a job, which was a very ignorant thing to say, but it worked. No, it wasn't. It wasn't ignorant, so

it was naive maybe, and uh it was attention. He thought I was retired. He didn't know all his active duty and had a daily commitment to the hospital and was living right beside it. So that was on a Friday. On Monday, they're like, hey, will you come up and submit a resume where we'd like to look at hiring you for a fellowship or an internship unpaid. So I

went and bought a suit. I typed up probably the worst resume that has ever made its way to Capitol Hill and was successful, set in front of him, did an interview, and they're like, yeah, next week to lot four, but the Monday after that would love for you to start coming in And I did a fellowship, So I went and worked out with my therapist from seven and nine. I was at Capitol Hill by ten, and then I left at three or six, depending on the day, at three two to three days a week to go to

college that night. And that was kind of my routine until the Marine Corps found out out that they had some realgunded warrior working up on Capitol Hill and they're like, listen, you gotta have ethics training and it's got to be approved. And by that point, I've been there so long that like they didn't have a choice but to leave me there, and so I ended up having a pretty good impact on some policy and just really have been involved in

some way with it ever since. So that's interesting. And you were in in d C the same period I was there. I was there from twelve seventeen, so we we might have even ran into each other, maybe the r n C or something like that, who knows, but I would have remembered you, for sure. I would have some I'm thinking probably not, but we were in the same place. So you go from Capitol Hill, you had some good impact on policy. I'm interested real quick, what was that policy? And I want to I want to

get to your started Fox News. Yeah, so what the big things at the time was right before I started working for Age fact, John Baynard being the Speaker of the House and put some kind of a hiring freeze and so like. Basically it was all about the fiscal responsibility side of being a Republican. They weren't letting Congress just hire and fill all the seats and jobs that the Democrats had held before him, and it was kind of more of a we're gonna show you all that

it can be done fiscally responsible. It's what that meant was. I didn't even havev into college education. And I was working as the only other staff member in the Disability Assistance and Momoral Affairs Office of the House Winners Affairs Committee, And so I set across the table from veteran service

organizations lobbying for different things to be done. But I had a little bit of a card that I could pull because they were used to sitting that across the table from civilian Harvard grads, not guys and gals that

actually been through the system. And so there was something called the improvised or the it's called the I D E S. I can't remember what the eye stands for, but it's the disability evaluation system, and so used to when you got injured like me catastrophically, you were completely evaluated by the D O D. They finished their evaluation, then you got a rating from them, and then you started from scratch with the v A and then a

full evaluation with them, and you got your pension. And we were able to combine that into one process and UM and they really looked to me to give the user experience side of it. And then there were other things where people were just lobbying for random things, and I could really sniff the bull crab, this podcast the bullshit and uh and and let the decision makers know, hey, this is not something that this has not helped the veteran community, or this is not what it looks like. Um.

And so those were two of the places. I mean. Unfortunately, even back then, getting substantive bills passed was not easy, but just having that type of influence on policymakers was a lot of fun. We're talking to Fox Nation hosts and retired US marine Joey Jones. You got so much more with him right at their kid break. How did you go? You? You talked about your background, family background, and you talked about going into the military. What happened there?

And then you just happened to go up to someone to say your constituents, I know a lot of your constituents, give me a job. How did you from all of that experience, how did you end up on TV? Where did Fox News come and play with all of this? Well, basically what happened is in all of that, I really got a lot of assistance from military nonprofits, and I felt guilty about it early on, like, hey, yeah, well doing way too much for me. How can I help you? Like,

obviously I'm a communicator. I like to talk. Maybe I've got a gift for it. Can I lend my voice and communication experience to you. One of those nonprofits was out of d C, and of the many things they did, they took monded veterans to NASCAR races and did some

fun stuff. And I ended up meeting this lady, Jen Williams while I was volunteering for that, which was about the same time I worked on the Hill and went to Georgetown and most of my voluntering town was on the weekends, and um Jen Williams had been a Fox and Friends producer and left to be freelance and she was working on a project with a NASCAR and I

met her that way and we became friends. A few years later in Kyle Carpenter, who had taken my fellowship that I created and took it after me was about to get awarded the Medal of Honor I had recovered with him and and Gay and told them, Hey, this is the guy you want working on the Hill. So she asked me to come on and talk about him during Gression Carlson's show at the time because it was

called The Real Story. So I go and a mike up and it's my first time doing live TV and I'm just gonna talk about my buddy Kyle, and President Obama interrupts and does the speech and he's like, hey, there's a scroup called ISIS and we're probably gonna have to go to war with him. And she's like, Hey, since you already miked up, do you mind to just

talk about it? What was an important enough speech and lasted long enough that everybody had tuned in, So if you were tuned into Fox News watching President Obama when it cut away, there was Joey Jones giving you given Obama the what for on this and UM, and that was my introduction to television news. And from there, I've

had a really a fast success on Twitter. And Greg gutt Felt and Mike Huckabee saw me on Twitter, didn't even know I had been on each invited me onto their new shows, respectively, and the rest kind of went from there. What what did you say about Obama at that time? UM? I don't remember. You know, I was still in uniforms UM up until twelve, so at that time I was recently retired and I just didn't um. You know, here's the best story I can get. For

President Obama. I went to the White House and had dinner with him with a bunch of four star generals, and while I was having dinner, he kind of looks at me, goes, Johnny, if you were back in the same place doing the same thing, how would you do it differently? And I said, well, Mr President, I'd step left, and like you know, Maddess started laughing, but none of the other ones got it. And what it was is like, you know, when I stepped right and step on a bomb.

But the bigger point there was, hey, man, that's for you to figure out. Like my job was to do what was in front of me, the big stuff up to you, like figure it out. And um, so that's how I've treated all politicians. Like I tell you, he's very charismatic and very good at his words, but I never, really it always felt like he was on. I mean in actually a handful of times, and it it always felt he was performing. And I can't be insincere because I

haven't met another sitting president. I met Trump before he was president, I met Bush after. But I can imagine it may be that they're all kind of feeling like they're performing at all time. So I was never overly harsh of President Obama. But I've always called balls and strikes with any of the presidents. That's just who I am speaking of. I would like for you to put on your Fox News Fox Nation hat for a minute before we close out this show. First, you're a veteran

of war in Afghanistan. I just read on Fox News dot Com that all US forces have been removed from the Bagram Airfield, the largest military base in Afghanistan. We're going to be completely out of Aghanist Afghanistan by September eleven, according to the Biden administration. A lot of Americans want out of the longest war in American history. But we also see now that we're leaving the Taliban taking over

district after district from the Afghan government. It looks like the Taliban could very well take over the country in a matter of months. And of course, the Taliban is aligned with al Qaeda. So with all that in mind, what's your opinion of America's policy towards Afghanistan as it stands today. You know, I'm glad you're talking about wrapping it up with this this most important policy thing we'll talk about right rest of us just Joey's story. And

so now we talk about some business. Um, here's the deal. I don't think we've been in the twenty year war. I think we've been intend to year wars because in America we hold our politicians accountable and sometimes that's even to our own detriment. And what I mean by that is politicians have a way of of crafting their foreign policy to reflect what the ballot box has in mind. So if it becomes populars and not want troops to Afghanistan,

then they'll change their mind. And if if it becomes posular to go attack, um isist, and they'll do that. And and a lot of times it feels like it's not really about what makes us safer as much as what gets us to vote. And so the really I don't have an opinion as much as questions, which is the problem, right Like I lost my legs in Afghanistan and I've got more questions than than definitive opinions on it.

And that's the problem right there. But if I were talking to the President Biden, I would say, you know, in two thousand and ten and eleven, you were the second person in charge. It was it was the Obama Biden administration that believed in this war and the victory of it enough to send forty troops to Afghanistan and me being one of them, and to let my buddies die and me lose my legs. That's how much you

believed in it. Now you're president and you're unconditionally withdrawing, which means you don't ask for anything in return, You're just bring everybody home. What changed? What changed for you? Why did you go from believing in it enough to let me die for it to not believing in it enough to have anything to show for it? And that would be my question if he answered it correctly, I you know, if he answered it genuinely and understood, maybe I'd accept it. But right now, that's my question. Are

you optimistic about the future of America? Always? Eternally? Look, man, there was a time where we were at war with half the western world out the eastern Western world, right and and our grandparents, I mean, your grandparents didn't have rights that mine had at that time. I mean, that's just insane to me that even though the world existed that way, but all of our grandparents were turning in still for the cause right and get and standing in the government cheese line because we have a rash in

our food. All of that just for fight for our survival, and now we fight over how we feel. And so we've advanced a long way, and we've been through tougher times, and I just believe that it's in our in our blood that we will when we're backed against the wall, honestly, we'll survive and do the right thing. We just unfortunately, even with nine eleven in my war, maybe we haven't been backed against the wall and we've been left to

our own devices a little too much. Now, my last question before we get into projects you may have coming up in your Fox Nation show and all that good stuff you said before you were raised the Republican and still hold many of those beliefs, but are still critical of the right these days looking at the GEO p and the right more broadly, do you think conservatives are

going in the right direction? You know, it's fun as raised as a conservative, but back then that was a blue dog Democrat, right like, because we were poor, So you couldn't be poor and be a Republican back in the eighties and early nineties, and so the conservative idea of personal responsibility and respecting someone else's ability to live their life and doing it without the government growing to

the point that it becomes just arbitrary authority. That's never changed in me, it's just who represents that from one moment to the other, or if anybody does it all changes depending on who the politicians are. And so for me, like I'm more critical of the people on the right because they're the ones that are supposed to represent my ideas, and when they mess it up, it matters the people on the left that I don't always fully understand their ideas, so it's hard to be critical of it because I

don't agree with it. So I can't tell you how to do it better. I can just say I don't like it. But if you're on the right and I feel like you are taking advantage of our passion for the opportunity get elected, then I'm definitely coming after you or at least asking you to explain yourself. And that's kind of position I've holden. And as far as um you know where we are now with politics. If you've got a team mentality, you know, the Georgia football fan.

If I've got the ninth best quarterback in the SEC. I'm going to give you a full throated argument on why it's really the third best because that's my team, right And we can't do that with our politicians. We can't make excuses for them. We can't make a reality that isn't true. We've gotta be able to be honest about it, and sometimes that means critiquing the politicians are supposed to be on our side. I love that we

share that. I absolutely appreciate that. I'm gonna start calling you common sense joe common sense Joey, you're you're up now before we go, Do you have any big projects coming up at the folks at home so you know about and what can people find you on social media and elsewhere? Yeah? On social media Twitter and Instagram is permotional. I think I'm active on that's Johnny j o h N and why Underscore Joey j o e Y same

handle as far is what I'm involved in. You know, I have I have my own little podcast called Proud American on Fox News Radio. You can get it wherever podcasts are and we'll have you on there soon, I'm sure and thank you absolutely. And then on Fox Nation, have a couple of different projects. I've done two seasons of Fox Nation Outdoors is really cool. It's a hunting show, but it's really about learning the country abroad. Um. And

then I have a couple of projects. One it's called USA Inc. That tells the history of tattoos in America and all the military involved. And I've got a project that's dropping July four, um, and I don't know, you know kind of when people will access this, Yeah, it's the day after. It's July five, So you get you had a project that came out yesterday. Basically we're recording on the Friday before. Guy, So I gotta I got a really cool thing that should be available on Fox

Nation around the Monday after the fourth of July. They haven't told me, but I sit down with four veterans from Vietnam, Desert Storm, Iraq, and Afghanistan and talk to them about why they're proud Americans and where they see the country today. It's pretty amazing, yo. I just want to thank you for joining me, Joey Jones, And it's so wonderful actually to know even more about your story and know how we really are connected. I want to

consider you my new brother. Because there's so much connectivity there and I look forward to being in touch with you and building a stronger brotherly bond with you. So thank you for joining me here on out Loud with Gianno Caldwell. And I'm sure you're gonna get a lot of new followers who are going to be interested in your story because it's one that's amazing. I hope that you've got a book that you're working on because you're hill billy. Elgie was a great book, but yours would

be much more powerful and profound. That's my opinion. I appreciate it, man, I appreciate you and all you do, and I look forward to working with you more. M I want to thank Joey Jones a good for a great interview. If you're joining show, wease leave us a review us the Five Stars on Apple podcast. If you have any questions for me, please email me at out Loud at Gingerishtree sixty dot com and I'll try to

answer them in our future episodes. And please sign up for my monthly newsletter at ginglish Street sixty dot com Slash out loud. You can also follow me on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and parlor at Giano Caldwell, and if you're interested in learning more about my story, please pick up a copy of my best selling book titled Taken for Granted, How Conservatism Can win back to the Americans that liberalism failed.

Special thanks to our producer John Cassio, researcher Aaron Klingman, and executive producers Debbie Myers and speaker New Gingridge, part of the Ginglish Street sixty Networks