Episode 2950: What Actually Happened In Ohio; Organizing For 2024
Episode Stats
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Summary
On this episode of War Room, we are joined by three of my favorite members of the House Freedom caucus: Bill Mcginley, Caroline Wren, and Bryan Kennedy. We discuss the House oversight committee, the ongoing Pfizer scandal, and the need for a special counsel for the Russia investigation.
Transcript
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this is the primal scream of a dying regime pray for our enemies because we're going to
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medieval on these people here's what i got a free shot all these networks lying about the people
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the people have had a belly full of it i know you don't like hearing that i know you try to do
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everything in the world to stop that but you're not going to stop it it's going to happen and
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where do people like that go to share the big line mega media i wish in my soul i wish that any of
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these people had a conscience ask yourself what is my task and what is my purpose if that answer
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is to save my country this country will be saved war room here's your host stephen k band
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saturday 12 august year of early 2023 we're now going to get you know we had uh we had carrie at
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iowa we had matt rosendale with a big update of what the house freedom caucus working on of course
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naomi on this explosive ongoing story on pfizer uh we now get to the meat of what i'd hope had been
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two hours and i want to say we're this is a kickoff of of of a lot of effort we're going to put in this
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and i've got three of my favorite people bill mcginley caroline wren and brian kennedy to join us
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first and i'll start with uh mcginley because i'll get the legal aspect and bill was uh cabinet was the
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secretary of the cabinet in president trump's first term and and someone that people in the trump
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movement have come to rely on uh with his wisdom and judgment and discernment not simply his legal
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uh understanding acumen bill the first thing i want to put to you caroline and kennedy is this
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move yesterday by merrick garland i mean here we're talking about impeachment efforts or you know i'm
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all over rosendale this morning about when are you going to start the impeachment effort just walk through
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it i know you're not a criminal lawyer but just walk through what exactly is going on and do you think
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this was more of a strategic move by garland to to shut down any other investigations that could
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could be going on well there's a couple of things that i'm looking at the first one is i'd like them
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to release if they haven't already the letter from david weiss to merrick garland recommending that he be
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appointed as a special counsel to give him even more autonomous authority to investigate hunter biden
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but also the letter from garland designating him a special counsel and the reason i want to see that
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letter is i'd like to see the parameters the boundaries of the scope of the investigation
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if you remember when jeff sessions appointed um moeller on the russia probe it talked about the
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you know potential collusion but it basically gave him authority to follow the facts wherever they lead to
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uh to make whatever prosecutions does garland grant weiss the same type of authority uh to follow the
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facts and apply the law uh that sessions did with moeller the other thing is is this has the
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potential to be a uh an iron wall that falls down on the congressional investigations both into hunter
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biden his business dealings uh and the potential of joe biden's involvement i mean over the last couple
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of weeks the house oversight ways and means committee um have been releasing some documents and evidence
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that they've been able to develop both in terms of the llcs the banks but also the whistleblowers from
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within the the investigation itself saying that we were not given free reign to follow the facts
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and so will those people the whistleblowers are they off of the case now uh will they be reserved
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we restored um will um additional independent prosecutors who have not been involved in fbi agents irs
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agents and others be brought into this investigation um the one thing that that a lot of folks haven't
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focused on is when you appoint a special counsel um at the conclusion of the investigation the special
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counsel is required as garland said to submit a report to the attorney general explaining why he or she
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decided to prosecute the individuals that they did charge but more importantly why did they decline
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to charge uh individuals who got swept up in the investigation and they decided not to pursue
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and so what that really does is that you know garland should immediately make that uh document public
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once he receives it from weiss but i'm not optimistic that this is going to be wrapped up before the 24
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election and that leads really to the punchline that i think everybody needs to focus on um this is why
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the 24 election is now even going to be more important uh because we need to make sure that
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we have a republican house um we need to have a republican senate um and we need to take over the white house
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wow uh in fact let me go to you brian because you're the strategist uh is is bill right does this even put
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more uh uh pressure on this and and your thoughts about why garland would appoint this i don't know is it
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three or four years into this thing with weiss uh you know why why now why the day after jack smith
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says oh i want to go to trial on j6 on let me pick a random date how about two january 2024 a couple
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weeks before the iowa kicks off the primary process brian kennedy yeah no i think thank you steve i think bill
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is absolutely right um this whole thing though to me looks like this is a kind of theater
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that you just want to have lawfare continually piled one after another with these confusing
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layers of legal maneuvering most of which is designed to perpetuate in any kind of news cycle
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this idea that there has been wrongdoing by president trump that ought to be punished that there are all
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these co-conspirators and that the trump administration was illegal then should be illegal
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now and that the entire apparatus of the communist left that dominates the democratic party and its
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politicians is going to be put reinforcing that view jack smith will be one angle of attack
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and the special counsels will be another angle of attack all designed to give the illusion that
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there's a kind of law and order and justice being carried out when in fact for most americans it's
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going to look purely political but they and msnbc and what have you are going to do their best
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to make this look like something legal is happening and the republicans really need to step up their game
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and challenge all this for what it is which is political theater designed to demoralize maga
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and and that that's our big challenge right now getting the republicans motivated is it's your
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we had we had rosendale on the start the show are you saying you think that challenge or a start when
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they get back about this whole appropriations and funding of it all because you you would argue
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that the special counsel here is really to obfuscate and hide right right when there is some momentum
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to go to have some sort of open uh informal impeachment inquiry yes that i think absolutely
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i think this is theater designed to to confuse the american people look we're living in the age of mass
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propaganda the government spreads this begins the propaganda the various agencies within the
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government propagated as well and the news media does its part in making sure that this is presented
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everywhere in the most confusing possible way and the only thing that stops that are republicans
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in congress who have the authority in these committees to either defund them challenge them
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or hold oversight of them but to the extent that any of these special counsels will then claim
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if they're allowed to go forward that they can't speak about these matters because there's an ongoing
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investigation which is the usual game played in washington then this just gets perpetuated and
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again it's designed to confuse the american people
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i want to put a pin in uh something that bill mcginley said uh to finish and i'm gonna get uh brian
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and and caroline uh as we go into this thing about ohio the stakes couldn't be higher now
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with this and bill and uh and brian's exactly right lawfare is at a level propaganda is at a level
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this is all going to get down to political will and and the politics of it because this more than ever
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now we went now we need to not just take back the presidency we need to take these senate seats and
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take the senate we need to hold the house and actually build on this majority and at the same
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time get some leadership in there that has some stones caroline some of the people looking at this
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with a jaundiced eye and saying that they believe that with everything and they would agree even agreeing
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with mcginley and and and kennedy that this is actually a first step a very cynical first step
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of the ability of the democrats understanding they got a losing hand with the biden regime
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because now he's trailing trump trump's got what a hundred indictments against him with a thousand
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years in prison uh the american people are kind of over it right they think it's political interference
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that this is the first step that they can as the special counsel develops they can then uh do the
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pivot to the uh newsome michelle obama you know uh whitmer you name it your thoughts
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yeah that could absolutely be what's going on here but i i do think merrick garland and joe biden
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seem to be very much in cahoots together so i'd be surprised if that is the the play that is happening
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there you know i i think it is all theater as well i have like no faith at all in this judicial system
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i mean anyone that merrick garland would appoint you there's no reason why we would trust any of this
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they've been claiming to be investigating hunter biden for forever and there's no consequences but i do think
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the for at least for the public side a lot of this the process is the punishment and i would like to
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see that a little bit on the left you know what i would love to see the republicans be doing more
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to investigate and bring in their their fundraisers and their campaign staff and that they're trying
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to bankrupt on the republican side anyone who works in republican politics whatsoever like who's paying
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joe biden's legal bills is anyone asking these who's paying hunter biden's legal bills are people
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fundraising are they setting up legal defense funds these are all questions that we should be asking these
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are the kind of behind the scenes warfare at least that i follow i can't speak as much to the i'm not
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an attorney on the the legal side of these things but i would like to see some process punishment for
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these folks and that the republicans who have the ability to do this through the house need to step up
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a little bit more and be doing it and some media asking these type of questions instead of just being
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in the tank for the biden family okay i want to pivot now mcginley raised the stakes now it's in high
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relief we got to win and we got to win everywhere i want to go back to ohio and i want you to summarize
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and then we'll go to break and i'll bring the guys in i want you to summarize what exactly happened
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in ohio we conservatives and pro-lifers in the ohio assembly selected the date they selected the
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the issue uh to not get to november and have to face this thing head on the abortion issue they they did
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this on a constitutional basis in early august when they thought that only the the most serious people
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would vote tell us what happened i don't think there was any smart coordination or thinking forward
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when they did it and it seems to me like a lot of this comes back to frank larose who's now thought
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this could be a launching point for his senate race and instead was a total disaster he's the secretary
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of state in ohio and we have a turnout problem we have a turnout machine problem in our party and so
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the idea we used to be great at turning out in special elections that is not the case right now
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we've lost in the wisconsin special election we got killed as we've talked about there's also been
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special elections in 2019 we really i mean lost everything in 2018 2020 2022 and so the idea that we
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were going to pull off some special election on this um in the dead of summer is ridiculous now it
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wouldn't have been ridiculous back in past cycles going back to 2004 to 2016 we did well so what
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happened was they put this amendment on the uh to to the voters and it was very confusing in fact i was
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in ohio and they'd sent me over this briefer to talk about you know issue one because carrie was out
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there and i'm reading it i couldn't even really figure out what this issue was necessarily about
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there was no messaging strategy and the left was screaming this is about abortion abortion abortion
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and on the right i you know it was about oh we just want to raise this 60 threshold
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for a constitutional amendment to pass but like that is not going to get people in the summer when
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they have their kids to go to the go to the polls like it was confusing messaging there was not any
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serious money behind it in fact i think there was about 16 million or so spent in ohio and 14
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million of that was spent on behalf of the democrats trying to kill this and there was no cohesive
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money strategy no messaging strategy and we got crushed in fact issue i mean tim ryan who was on their ballot
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almost got this issue almost got the same amount of votes as he did as a democrat senate candidate in
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ohio that is how big their turnout was and trump had won ohio by eight points in 16 and 20 we lost
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this by 14 points that is a massive swing in the other direction and now this is something that will be on
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the ballot they're going to do it in 2024 in ohio and also they're doing it in arizona there's several
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other states they found this a winning you know mechanism to really really drive their turnout and
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no republicans have a strategy that i've heard of okay uh what we're going to do is we're going to
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take a commercial break we're going to return we're going to go through i'm gonna start with
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mcginley we got brian kennedy we got caroline run there's more than what meets the eye here there's a
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deep structural problem that the left has grabbed onto with foreign money of you know um international
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money an apparatus they've set up kind of off off balance sheet and it's not seen to the direct
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politics of joe biden's campaign or other campaigns we're here to deal with the reality
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of politics in the 21st century and why everything may not be what you think it is
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at first short commercial break bill mcginley caroline grant brian kennedy joins in the world
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use your agency bill mcginley um you have warned people for a number of years that that the actual
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infrastructure apparatus of politics has changed in the 21st century and quite frankly a lot of people
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the media and a lot of people have not caught up with it um and now we've seen in you know the wisconsin
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situation of the supreme court the kansas situation with the the proposition for for um
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abortion of what happened in in um in um ohio the new york times has said hey they have an issue they have
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a coalition that's coming together they have an infrastructure that's coming together
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a simultaneous article came up and said there's two the the biden apparatus and the biden campaign
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looks a little sleepy uh not raising a ton of money but there's two billion dollars i think have
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already been committed for 2024 by these ngos outside groups not for profit and as caroline ren's been
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pointing out a huge funder that's a guy in switzerland is not an american citizen so just walk us
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through this warning you've given and now that you've raised the saying hey uh note to uh the
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war room posse and to the mega movement we have to win not just the white house you also have to
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increase the the hold this house and increase the seats and you have to win the senate what is going on
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what is this structural change that's happened in american politics look i mean this story really
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begins decades ago uh when the left decided that the best way for them to win elections and really
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dominate politics in part was to build out a dark money infrastructure to juice their get out the
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vote uh efforts they've been at it really since the 2004 election when uh president bush surprisingly won
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re-election afterwards they really decided that they need to get together get more organized
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coordinated um and really start uh what can only be called a merit-based approach to try and determine
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which organizations and leadership including the boards of directors the officers the consultants
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are really going to give them the best opportunity to start winning elections 2004 was their wake-up
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call uh i i hope that 2000 uh 2020 2023 is going to be the wake-up call for the republicans so what
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have they done what they've really done is they've established a couple of groups um carolina is really
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good about the arabella advisors and i'll let her talk about that but another one was democracy alliance led
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by then a guy by the name of rob stein and what he did is he went around with a powerpoint
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presentation talking about what the what the right did uh uh appropriately and correctly to try and
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dominate not only the issue environment uh the messaging environment but also to try and turn their
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uh voters out to the poll and engage in micro targeting and pulling republicans out of deep blue
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precincts uh where most people wouldn't have done that republicans didn't leave any republican voter
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stone unturned and in 2004 that was the last time the republican party at the presidential level
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was able to exceed the uh the the polling margin by about three to four points and it was done before
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big tech was there and it was done by something called the 72 hour program which was friend to friend
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neighbor to neighbor family member to family member making sure that they were turning out to vote
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now steve if you remember in the 2020 election uh you and i would talk a lot about a couple of very
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basic concepts that we would ask the war posse to do and i think that a lot of the charge does lie
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with the with the war the war room posse the first one was own your vote remember we said check your
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registration make sure your registration is up to date it's complete and it's accurate
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you know be a force multiplier make sure that not only are you voting early or on election day but make
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sure that all of your friends and family are doing the same and also to volunteer for the efforts that
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you want now that is only one component because when the left um is doing has built out this
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infrastructure it allows them to innovate not only the messaging but the techniques to drive their
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voters to the poll and i think in 2023 what we're seeing in real time um is to get out the dark money
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get out the vote infrastructure for the left running vote labs they're testing their messaging
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they're testing their techniques how do we get it in if you remember before the ohio vote everybody
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was talking about uh the significant early vote that was coming in and that maybe it favored uh the
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conservative side i was always very doubtful and i think you know our fears were confirmed uh the
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other night when ohio came in and they lost by 14 votes the democrats and their soft money
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infrastructure is able to juice this get out the vote operation um and it's very troubling we should
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be running uh to borrow a bad sports analogy the conservatives should be doing two a days right now
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to get ready for election season um we should really be testing everything and seeing what works
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yeah what does that's what we got to test it in the uh we got to test it in this in the in
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kentucky and louisiana this fall and in ohio we have to do it uh by the way that was 14 points
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not 14 votes 14 percentage points your point is it's a huge spread uh kennedy i'm gonna get
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caroline in here to talk about arabella but and when bill just goes through um the the you know
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everything he's talking about there with you know own your vote enforce multiple and all that
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the war room posse are fabulous but at the end of the day they're not professional political
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operatives they're the these are concerned citizens i would say amateurs aren't we faced with
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these ruthless professional political operatives that look at this totally different than we look
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at it and that's what you're seeing now these blowouts and these are blowouts and these things
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there's a difference between a killing machine they're setting up with big time dark money much of
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it foreign uh with these uh vicious political operatives that are coming up and just organize
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with technology databases uh you know every advanced system you have to make sure that they dominate these
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races sir no i think that's right steve if you look at i mean i think what bill said is right i think
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what caroline said was right too though i mean initiatives of the kind that they were trying to pull off in
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in ohio are not ideal for getting people out to vote changing you know parts of the constitution
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in order to make it more difficult to change the constitution are not easy for people to understand
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and people's natural inclination when they see something confusing is to say no and i'm pretty sure
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that's what's happened in ohio substantially but your main point is the right one on the political left
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today they have a professional class of people who operate that are well funded well organized and
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motivated by ideology and hatred of this country and they're the ones running all these operations in the
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various states now on the right we are amateurs we do things out of love but during the summertime and
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most of the time we're simply operating out of love for our family and working hard and going to
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church and working in little league and doing the kind of things that americans do we're not focused
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on politics 24 7. i mean even the war room here which is probably the most powerful political force
00:24:06.920
in the country and and really the heart of maga it still has lives to lead and jobs to to perform
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and so you can't expect them to do everything all the time and you have the republican party and what
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does it do it's mostly an opponent of maga right now and so if you're going to change that dynamic
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we have to take this much more seriously than we are today because it's nice to say we ought to win
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you know hold hold the house and win the white house today we're not organized at all to achieve
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that we have the greatest candidate conservatives have the greatest candidate in donald trump but
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they're all by themselves in in the form of maga trying to help him there's no organized effort to
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help donald trump become the president in those six wing states we're not organized today to win
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in the same way we were crushed in ohio the other day we're going to get crushed in november of 2024
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if we don't figure out what it will take to win the states we won last time and to win the six swing
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states and today that's not happening and so there needs to be kind of there needs to be a wake-up call
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for americans more broadly that the political right has a lot of work to do if we're going to have free
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unfair elections and eventually recover constitutional government that today is not in the offing that
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uh caroline i've got uh 30 seconds before we're going to go to break uh i thought that was the
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purpose of the rnc am i missing it caroline give me 30 seconds i'm gonna bring you back right after
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the break i thought the rnc was in charge of this organization effort at the national level and the
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state party level i mean they could be but they're doing they're not doing anything and i think that
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it has to be donor-led in 2004 when the democrats came together it was donor-led it was in fact george
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soros who called a meeting and invited the top 30 progressive donors in the country who told the
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consultants of the party committees hey you just collectively wasted hundreds of millions of our
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dollars and we have nothing to show for it and we are done funding you until you come back to us with a plan that
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involves investing in people ideas and institutions that live beyond one election cycle and he said we
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just had our pearl harbor you better fix it this is our pearl harbor moment the donor should step up
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and say fix it or we're not funding okay hang on for one second brilliant point short commercial break
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robbie robertson who passed away this week at 80 years old the weight be back in a moment
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i picked up my bags and went looking for a place to hide
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she said i gotta go but my friend can stick around
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