178: Chapter 178 Questioning the Extraterrestrial Crisis, Enraging Voters and Leading to Turn Against Them

Prant raised one hand and pressed it downward, waiting for the wave of sound to subside slightly before continuing.

Just at that moment,

in the crowd, someone suddenly shouted at the top of their lungs and asked:

"Was the two-hundred-thousand fleet that appeared over the Hoover Dam that night the legendary Deep State?!"

Prant did not pause.

He switched the microphone to his other hand, leaned forward slightly, and switched his tone from the passionate fervor of just a moment ago to a steadier, cooler rhythm.

"All of this is Biden's incompetence."

"Facing such a huge threat, you saw it with your own eyes, you all saw it with your own eyes, what did he do?"

"He did nothing!"

"Not only did he do nothing, but he also imposed martial law, prevented anyone from discussing this matter, and had the military take to the streets to block all videos and pictures."

"Did you ever think back then, if someone intended to surrender to the Alien fleet, his approach would be exactly the same: block the news and prevent anyone from speaking."

"Biden has done simply terribly."

"If you let me sit in that position, I would definitely be better than him!"

"Because no one understands how to be president better than me!"

He did not directly answer the question about the Deep State, but instead precisely targeted Biden.

Down in the audience, those who had lived through those days of martial law felt their memories automatically drift back:

that night, they watched the live broadcast of the Alien fleet on their phone screens, frantically refreshing and spamming the comment sections that exploded across the United States,

and then, the signal suddenly cut out,

all videos were deleted, all posts were blocked,

and the next morning, even mentioning "what was that in the sky last night" on social media would be automatically flagged by the system.

Someone was even tracked down by local police just for saving a video.

That suffocating feeling of being gagged by one's own government was still stuck in their throats to this day.

Therefore, all the dissatisfaction in the audience found the exact same bullseye within the same second, and the wave of sound converged from all directions toward the same slogan.

"Biden is incompetent! Biden is incompetent! Biden is incompetent!"

After letting the slogan cycle for about a dozen rounds, Prant raised his hand again and pressed down slightly.

His tone suddenly dropped, no longer using the fervent heat of his previous speech to supercharge the audience, but lowering it to a range that felt almost heart-to-heart.

"Although Biden blocked the news, everyone in your hearts knows the threat left behind by Grey Alien that night:"

"A million-strong fleet will soon open a spatial rift and descend upon the Solar System."

Then he looked straight into the audience and asked:

"At that time, do you think Biden can perfectly handle this crisis from the Aliens?"

The audience fell into a brief silence.

People looked at each other in silence,

and then a worker in the front row with a sun-reddened neck pulled the sweat-drenched brim of his cap down toward his knees, and shouted in a rough voice toward the microphone:

"No!"

The sound scattered in response, and within seconds, negative evaluations of Biden spread across the entire open space like a chain reaction.

They had witnessed with their own eyes that Biden's only response to the two-hundred-thousand fleet was martial law,

arresting everyone in the country who had recorded a video, and pinning everyone discussing the matter to the ground.

They had no way to believe that when facing a million-strong fleet, Biden would pull out a more effective tool than martial law.

How could anyone expect a person who knows nothing except censorship to command humanity against an alien civilization?

Prant stood on the stage, waiting for the despair-soaked silence in the audience to spread to its maximum radius before raising the microphone again.

His voice suddenly rose—not a shout, but a rope thrown out from the darkness.

"But I am different."

"I am more suited to be president than Biden."

"If I sit in that position..."

"I can assure you, I have a hundred ways to repel Grey Alien, so that they will never dare to invade Earth again, not even entertaining the slightest thought of it!"

The audience fell silent for several beats.

This time no one responded immediately.

A strong man wearing a trucker hat in the front row raised his head to look at him, and shouted hesitatingly:

"Sir, are you really sure you remember correctly? Those are Aliens! Hundreds of thousands of cosmic fleet Aliens!"

Due to Biden's martial law and complete blockade, the truth of what happened above the Hoover Dam that night had been fragmented, and various versions of news spread disorderly among the common people. What most people believed now was:

the mainstream narrative re-pieced together from the constantly alternating rumor fragments in public opinion: "The fleet of twenty-thousand Grey Alien appeared above Earth."

But even if there were only "twenty thousand," it was enough to make any human army look like ants before it.

Another person chimed in: "Human technology simply cannot build cosmic warships."

"Fighting an alien civilization is no longer a question of who leads."

"No matter who becomes president, the ending should be pretty much the same."

Someone else added, "Even if President Roosevelt were resurrected, he wouldn't dare guarantee a one-hundred-percent defeat of Grey Alien' fleet."

Scattered, bitter smiles began to ripple through the crowd.

That was the sound of finding joy amidst suffering, born from a despair that had nowhere to vent after being repeatedly crushed by reality.

They did not believe in Biden,

they believed Prant could make corn export prices rise, continue building the border wall, and reopen the mines in Idaho,

but facing the Alien fleet, the bitter smile at the corner of each of their mouths was itself their response to themselves.

Prant looked at the permeating despair in the audience and fell silent for a few seconds.

No particular expression could be seen on his face under the stage lights,

but his patience had been forged at real estate negotiating tables and in the war rooms of campaign legal teams,

he knew when to wait, knowing that only after the other side swallowed their despair would it be the optimal time to hand them hope.

Then he spoke, his tone suddenly lightening up a bit, as if he were chatting with a group of old friends about a piece of news he had just witnessed firsthand—something they hadn't heard yet, but which would definitely make everyone jump up.

"I know you don't believe it."

"At the very beginning, I didn't believe it either."

"But until my good friend Elon Musk came to find me in person, I realized that our human technology can completely crush Grey Alien."

Sporadic whispers began to rise and fall in the audience.

Someone raised their phone, turned on the flashlight, and shone it toward the stage.

Someone muttered in a low voice:

"How is this possible? Musk's Falcon 9 hasn't even broken through the continuous power supply threshold of nuclear reactors for Earth orbit acceleration, how could it crush an interstellar civilization?"

Someone else shouted:

"Mr. Prant! Don't pull our legs!"