Michael Reagan Reflects on President Reagan’s Speech at Normandy 40 Years Later

The following is an edited transcript of a Morning Wire D-Day Tribute interview between Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley and Michael Reagan, son of the 40th president of the United States.

June 6, 2024, is the 80th anniversary of the day that ultimately turned the tide of the Second Great War: the Allied Forces’ invasion of Normandy. Code-named “Operation Overlord,” the invasion involved 156,000 Allied troops, half of them Americans, who launched a bold assault on five German-occupied and heavily fortified beaches. Morning wire sat down with Michael Reagan, son of America’s beloved 40th President Ronald Reagan, who famously traveled to Normandy four decades ago to honor the brave soldiers who stormed those beaches.

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JOHN: Joining us now to discuss the 80th anniversary of D-Day is Michael Reagan. Michael, thank you for coming on.

MICHAEL: Thank you.

JOHN: First, why is recognizing D-Day still so important 80 years later?

MICHAEL: Well, because this anniversary would be the last big anniversary where anyone who came out of a plane on D-Day 80 years ago is going to be present there in Normandy, France. There are a million people there right now. There are 46,000 people there right now guarding the million people and the president who’s going to be arriving. It is a huge, huge day, this 80th anniversary of D-Day. I’ve been there on two or three occasions. They were large, but this one is humongous.

JOHN: Now, many have commented that today’s youth and military look a lot different than the generation that stormed the beaches. What aspects of the Greatest Generation are missing that you think need to be brought back into today’s culture?

MICHAEL: I think today’s youth would dive out of planes to save the world as these did back 80 years ago. My problem is the people who are in school who don’t even know why D-Day exists. Not too many years ago I played golf with a young man, and I was invited to Normandy to raise the American flag at the American Cemetery. I was telling him I was headed to France to do that. And he asked me, ”Why is there an American cemetery in France?” He had no idea, no concept. I looked at him and I said, ”Did you think D-Day is when your report card came out?” He had no concept why there was a cemetery in France. If you run a survey of high school kids today, probably even college kids, and ask them about D-Day — they have no idea about D-Day, why we have a cemetery there, why it existed and why we saved that part of the world and actually saved the whole world. That is the thing that bothers me. Not the ones who are in the military now, who have given their lives, their arms, pieces of their body and what have you. The ones who are really scary to me are the kids in school who have no concept why and what we’ve done.

JOHN: And what could be done to remedy this? How can we best go about educating today’s students on World War II and the Holocaust?

MICHAEL: You know how I learned it? I learned it from my dad. Sitting in the right front seat of a station wagon any given Saturday morning. Picking me up from my mom’s house. Driving me out to the ranch in Malibu. You all remember the ranch dad had during the presidency. This is the ranch I grew up on in Malibu. And regaling me — Songs, military, Army. Navy, Marine Corps, Coast Guard — and telling me about this country, telling me about how great it was and is, telling me stories. Too often we parents, conservatives also, leave it up to the schools to educate our kids. Well, how’s that working out? It’s not working out. So we’ve got to take it back ourselves, homeschool the kids or at least educate them on this D-Day, this 80th anniversary, and what these people were willing to do and willing to give to save the world.

JOHN: You mentioned your father. Can you explain your father’s significance around recognizing formally D-Day?

MICHAEL: Well, it’s interesting because President Biden is going to Normandy to speak on D-Day, but it was my father 40 years ago who was the first president to actually go to Normandy on D-Day and speak as he did.

JOHN: Right, a truly historic moment in 1984. Here’s a bit of that famous speech:

When men like Private Zanata and all our Allied Forces stormed the beaches of Normandy 40 years ago they came not as conquerors but as liberators when these troops swept across the French Countryside and into the forests of Belgium and Luxembourg they came not to take but to return what had been wrongly seized. When our forces marched into Germany they came not to prey on a brave and defeated people but to nurture the seeds of democracy among those who yearn to be free again and we salute them.

MICHAEL: I would also suggest going to YouTube and pulling up dad’s speech at Pointe du Hoc, about the boys at Pointe du Hoc, and watch those videos. The cliff these kids climbed at 17 — some lied about their age at 16-, 17-, 18-years-old — going up these cliffs with machine gun fire, firing down at them. Listen to that speech. He was the first president to speak on D-Day in Normandy, France, and now every president since my father has followed suit and been in Normandy on D-Day to speak.

JOHN: The education of young conservatives continues through the efforts of the Reagan Library and the Reagan Ranch. Is that the legacy of your father?

MICHAEL: Absolutely right. The library does a great job. Big events, like celebrating the 20th anniversary of my dad’s passing this week. Of course, the 40th anniversary of him going to Normandy. What they do there, the scholarship programs that they have there. I go there so often, I’m probably there once a month, I take people on tours, I play docent for a day, if you will. I love doing it. They refer to me at the library as the prequel because I have stories to tell behind the stories that they tell, which is great. I work a lot with the Young America’s Foundation, who bought the ranch back in 1998. I’ll be speaking to 200 high school students at the Ranch Center in Santa Barbara on the 19th of this month. They’ll be able to walk in the footsteps of my father, see the building. The ranch house is exactly the way it was the last time my dad was there. He didn’t know he wasn’t going back because of Alzheimer’s, and Young America’s Foundation has done a phenomenal job of taking care of it. They now have bought the boyhood home in Illinois, they’re in charge of the home. He was born in Tampico, Illinois, and they bring kids from the Midwest — all over the world, actually — to come in and learn about my father. That’s where the legacy is. It’s through the Young America’s Foundation, and the ranch, and the homes, and the, and the Reagan library, with what his accomplishments were prior to becoming president, but also as president. If you haven’t been to any of those places, you need to go.

LISTEN: Catch the full D-Day Tribute interview with Michael Reagan on Morning Wire

JOHN: And why do you think it’s important for younger generations to understand who Ronald Reagan was, and what do you think they need to know about him and his beliefs?

MICHAEL: The humility. We’ve lost humility in this country. Nobody’s humble anymore. One of my dad’s greatest lines was, don’t worry who gets the credit. You can accomplish so many things if you don’t worry who gets the credit. And today there’s too many people taking credit and not giving credit. I mean, look at what he accomplished with Mikhail Gorbachev, because he was willing to give him credit. He knew he had to build up Mikhail Gorbachev in Russia in order to ultimately get what he needed, which is the Berlin Wall coming down. He had to work with many people to do that. You talked about this country with leadership and where we are, but there are no leaders in the world. There are no leaders like Margaret Thatcher, Václav Havel, Helmut Kohl, Mikhail Gorbachev, Pope John Paul. None of those people exist today. Dad found a way to work with all of them to accomplish ending the Cold War and bringing down the Berlin Wall. Through my Reagan Legacy Foundation, (ReaganLegacyFoundation.org) we have a scholarship program for the kids that serve on the USS Ronald Reagan. We provide them scholarships, not only for them but for their family members at home waiting for them, trying to get a better education. We have a brick project. You can go online and purchase a brick for 250 bucks with tax deductible, 501(c)(3), put a name on it. Or, if you don’t donate the money to the foundation, we’ll put the name of someone who dove out of a plane in the European Theater 80 years ago, and we’ll honor them with a brick at Saint-Mère-Église, Normandy, France, which is the first town freed by America on D-Day at 4:00 AM in the morning. So, go there and see what we’re doing. If you really want to get involved, that’s the way to get involved.

JOHN: Final question, have you seen the new Reagan film starring Dennis Quaid?

MICHAEL: No. There’s a big preview of it on August 20th here in Hollywood, and I think it opens on Labor Day weekend.

JOHN: Are you excited or nervous about watching it?

MICHAEL: I’m always nervous when I see somebody play my dad. I’ve known Mark Joseph forever, So I trust him, but I always get nervous. My family will be there on the 20th of August to see the whole thing.

JOHN: Thank you so much for talking with us.

MICHAEL: Hey, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. God bless.

JOHN: That was Michael Reagan and this has been a special D-Day Tribute edition of Morning Wire.

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