(The Epoch Times)—During a rally in New Hampshire, former President Donald Trump revealed how he would bring the increasingly divided United States back to a posture of unity.
President Trump spoke to reporters before taking the stage in Laconia, New Hampshire, where he fielded questions from NTD, The Epoch Times’ sister media outlet, and others. It marked his last campaign stop in the Granite State ahead of the first in the nation primary.
Asked how he would bring the United States back together after years of deep political division, President Trump told NTD that he would do it through “success.”
Now, in a head-to-head with former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley for the nomination, President Trump refrained from saying he thinks she should drop out, telling NTD, “That’s up to her.”
The comments come as team Haley is praying for a win in New Hampshire, where some polls have shown her roughly neck and neck with the former president.
But President Trump didn’t seem worried. Asked whether he thought he could replicate his historic Iowa win in New Hampshire, President Trump was confident he could.
“I think we’ll win by big margins,” he said.
Despite some polls giving Ms. Haley a reason for optimism, most polls still show President Trump with a sizable lead in New Hampshire, which helped deliver him to the White House in 2016.
Former Rivals Take the Stage
President Trump was joined in Laconia by three of his former rivals for the nomination, who’ve since dropped out and endorsed him.
These included biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, and Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.).
“Now is the time for the Republican Party to come together,” President Trump said. “We have to unify.”
President Trump then turned to his erstwhile adversaries, who spoke in favor of their former rival.
“Right now, we need a commander-in-chief who will lead us to victory in this war,” said Mr. Ramaswamy. “That is this man standing right here.
“If you want to seal the border, vote Trump. If you want to restore law and order in this country, vote Trump. If you want to defeat the deep state, vote Trump. If you want to fight inflation, vote Trump. If you want to revive national pride in this country, vote Trump. If you want to revive our national identity in this country, for Trump. If you want to make America great again, vote Trump.”
Mr. Ramaswamy then turned the podium over to Mr. Burgum.
“Biden has been a disaster on the economy,” the governor said. “He has been a disaster on energy, and he has been a disaster on national security, including the border.
“Under Donald J. Trump, our cities were safer. Our country was safer, and we were absolutely economically better off than we are today. Now, Joe Biden’s energy policies are empowering … dictators, and they’re hurting our economy.
“They’re raising the prices of what you pay for gas in your car, food on your table, and energy to heat your homes. We need Donald Trump. America needs Donald Trump.”
Up next was Mr. Scott, who spent his time on crowd engagement.
“If you want four more years of Donald Trump, let me hear your scream,” he shouted.
The MAGA crowd screamed back.
“If you want the race to be over tomorrow, let me hear you scream,” he said.
Another round of cheers.
“Four more years of low inflation under Donald Trump,” he added. “Four more years of low crime and high law and order under Donald J. Trump.”
President Trump also mentioned Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, emphasizing the proper pronunciation of his name rather than using the now-retired nickname “DeSanctimonious,” and saying he ran a great campaign.
Interrupted by Hecklers
President Trump also faced interruptions from three sets of hecklers during a speech in Laconia, New Hampshire.
The hecklers, whose remarks were unclear, appeared to be climate protestors who’ve recently crashed a series of GOP events in the state, including those of Ms. Haley.
The interrupters were quickly escorted out by security in turn, facing boos and jeers from President Trump’s supporters as they left. Some appeared to be wearing face masks, and members of the crowd shouted against “Antifa.”
The hecklers heralded back to an earlier day of President Trump’s political tenure when hecklers were commonplace. However, President Trump hasn’t faced much strong opposition during his rallies recently.
Trump Says He’ll ‘Free the J6ers’
President Trump said he would free those arrested, convicted, and detained in connection to the Jan. 6 Capitol breach.
While President Trump was speaking at a rally in Laconia, New Hampshire, his final campaign stop before the first in the nation primary election, someone called out “Free the J6ers!”
“We will,” President Trump replied.
The comment falls in line with past comments President Trump has made calling on the administration to free several of those held on charges related to Jan. 6, who he’s described as “hostages.”
With the conclusion of the rally, President Trump wraps up his long series of campaign stops in New Hampshire, as this was his final rally ahead of the New Hampshire primary.
The New Hampshire primary is an important test for the viability of Ms. Haley, the sole remaining contender still battling for the nomination.
While she only received third place in Iowa—over 30 points behind President Trump’s historic win—New Hampshire is less conservative and less religious, making it more amenable to her sometimes anti-Trump messaging.
A win in New Hampshire could keep her in the race, potentially giving her the momentum to become a serious rival to President Trump—a long shot given President Trump’s domineering lead nationwide, but not unheard-of in the history of presidential politics.
Failure to win the state would indicate trouble for Ms. Haley’s presidential aspirations. A win for President Trump, meanwhile, would all but cement his place as the Republican nominee.
A loss, meanwhile, would still leave Ms. Haley with a great deal of ground to catch up on in future battles, where she still largely trails President Trump by wide margins.
T.J. Muscaro contributed to this report.
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Two Storms, One Harvest
Every food crisis in living memory has been a one-shock event. The 2008 price spike was a commodity bubble. The 2020 shortages were a logistics failure. The 2022 grain scare was a war on one exporter’s ports. Each time, the system bent, adjusted, and recovered, and each time the experts assured us afterward that global markets are simply too big and too diversified to fail.
What nobody in Washington seems eager to discuss is that 2026 is shaping up to be something the modern food system has never actually faced. Two independent shocks, one climatic and one geopolitical, are converging on the same harvest cycle at the same time. Not sequentially. Simultaneously.
Start with the weather. The Pacific Ocean is currently building toward what forecasters now openly call a record event. NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center puts the odds of at least a strong El Niño near 88 percent, with roughly two in three odds it reaches “very strong” status, the tier reserved for perhaps three or four events in the entire satellite era. Every major global model now projects a median peak in Super El Niño territory, and most of them project it exceeding the 2015-16 event, which until now held the modern record. Sea surface anomalies were already brushing the super threshold in mid-July, months before these events normally peak. The atmosphere has already shifted into El Niño mode, and the event is forecast to crest in late fall and early winter.
This is not about “climate change.” It’s about the standard cycles of weather, and the cycle we’re currently in is one that has likely devastated societies in the past. We’re better prepared as a society today, but not all Americans are equally prepared.
Serious households have started doing the quiet math on their own. Grocery bills tell part of the story, and the forecast maps tell the rest, which is why long-term food storage has moved from fringe hobby to mainstream line item in the family budget, with established suppliers like Heaven’s Harvest seeing demand from people who five years ago would have rolled their eyes at the idea. That instinct is not paranoia. It is pattern recognition, and the pattern is worth walking through carefully.
Editor’s Note: Heaven’s Harvest IS a sponsor, but the warnings of this article are real and would be written even if we didn’t have a survival food sponsor. With that said, those who take advantage of what they offer can use promo code “Patriot” for 15% off.
The Fertilizer Clock Is Already Running
While the Pacific warms, the second shock has been unfolding in the Strait of Hormuz. The conflict with Iran turned the world’s most important energy chokepoint into a contested waterway, and the consequences reach far beyond the gas pump. Roughly a third of global fertilizer trade moves through Hormuz, and the disruption sent urea prices up 86 percent year over year by March, with a 53 percent jump in a single month.
The World Bank projects energy prices rising about 24 percent in 2026 and fertilizer about 31 percent. By its own accounting, fertilizer prices ran 35 percent higher in the first five months of this year than the same period last year.
Here is the mechanism the nightly news will not explain. Fertilizer is not a grocery item. It is a time-delayed input. The nitrogen a farmer in Iowa or Punjab could not afford to apply this spring does not show up as a problem this spring. It shows up as a thinner harvest six to twelve months later.
The World Bank’s own food security brief concedes that the effects of reduced applications earlier this season “are likely to become visible only later in harvest outcomes.” Translate that from institutional language into plain English and it means this. The damage is already done, it is already in the ground, and we are simply waiting for it to arrive on the shelf.
Now check the calendar. Six to twelve months from the spring planting season lands us squarely in late 2026 and early 2027. Which is precisely when the strongest El Niño in the instrumental record is forecast to peak, bringing its signature droughts to Southeast Asia, Australia, southern Africa, northern Brazil, and South Asia, the very regions that grow the world’s rice, sugar, and oilseeds.
The World Bank warns openly that a strong El Niño “could disrupt multiple crop belts simultaneously” on top of the conflict-driven input costs. Their baseline projection assumes the Middle East disruptions ease by autumn. What in the last two years of Middle East history suggests that assumption is safe?
The System Has No Slack Left
The comfortable answer is that global markets always adjust. But adjustment requires slack, and the slack is gone. Global cereal production is expected to decline from last year’s records even before El Niño does its work. The UN World Food Programme, hardly a den of right-wing preppers, is calling this the most significant disruption to its supply chains since Covid and the invasion of Ukraine, and its supply chain director put the stakes bluntly.
Today’s supply chain challenges are tomorrow’s hunger crisis.
There is also a political dimension that markets cannot price. When food gets scarce, governments do not behave like economists. They behave like politicians. Export bans, hoarding mandates, and panic buying at the national level turned the modest rice shortfall of 2008 into a global crisis, and analysts are already warning that import-dependent nations are the first dominoes.
The 2015-16 Super El Niño, a far weaker event than what is now forecast, threw tens of millions into food stress across Africa and Asia. This one is projected to be stronger, and it arrives with fertilizer already rationed by price and shipping lanes already contested by missiles.
What Joseph Knew
Scripture does not treat preparation for lean years as faithlessness. It treats it as wisdom delivered in advance to those willing to act on it.
Behold, there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt: And there shall arise after them seven years of famine; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt.
Joseph did not respond to that warning with a hashtag or a committee. He stored grain during the years of abundance, and when the famine came, Egypt stood while its neighbors begged. The lesson is not that famine is certain. It is that the time to prepare is precisely when preparation still looks optional.
Nobody who filled a pantry in a year of plenty has ever regretted it, and nobody standing in an empty aisle has ever been glad he waited for certainty.
None of this calls for panic, and panic is the enemy of sound judgment anyway. It calls for the same unglamorous prudence our grandparents considered ordinary. Keep some cash margin, know your local growers, and put real food in deep storage while it is cheap and available, because the entire arc of this story is that cheap and available is a closing window.
Families looking for a straightforward place to start can visit Heaven’s Harvest and use promo code Patriot for 15 percent off long-term storable food. The forecasts may yet soften, the strait may yet reopen, and we should pray they do. But hope is a fine thing to hold and a foolish thing to eat.
