The Anchormen Show with Matt Gaetz - Episode 43 - More Cowbell： Democrats' Impeachment Fever. Worship is Essential. Goya Stands Strong.

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Hot Takes. I'm Congressman Matt Gaetz. Let's talk about the news.

00:00:20.680 And the news in the House Judiciary Committee is that the Democrats have impeachment fever

00:00:26.220 and it seems the only cure is more cowbell. Democrats are engaged in their investigation

00:00:32.400 to ultimately impeach Attorney General Bill Barr. Yesterday they brought in as their principal

00:00:38.520 witness Jeffrey Berman who had been fired from his position as the U.S. Attorney from the Southern

00:00:44.340 District of New York and here's how the Berman story goes. He gives testimony that on the 19th

00:00:50.760 of June the Attorney General calls him up to his hotel suite and tells him that the Attorney

00:00:56.100 General wants to make a change at the Southern District of New York. Berman is then offered

00:01:00.840 a position at the Department of Justice to lead the Civil Division. He's also asked later on

00:01:07.380 if he would be interested in serving as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission and

00:01:12.780 the reason is that the administration would like to move Jay Powell who had served as the

00:01:18.120 Security and Exchange Commission chairman into the role of U.S. Attorney for the Southern

00:01:23.840 District of New York. This obviously deeply upsets Berman. He doesn't agree to it and then he gets

00:01:29.920 fired. So now he's disgruntled, probably a little embarrassed, his feelings are hurt, and he shows up

00:01:36.780 to the House Judiciary Committee to try to lay blame on Bill Barr. The reality is that Jeffrey Berman

00:01:43.340 was never confirmed by the United States Senate to lead the Southern District of New York. He was there

00:01:48.360 in an acting capacity and when you're acting, the Attorney General has the ability to move you out

00:01:54.280 and move someone else in awaiting confirmation of the person that the President has ultimately picked

00:02:00.400 to lead the office permanently. Jeffrey Berman believes that only his deputy would be an acceptable

00:02:08.620 choice. Instead, the Attorney General initially contemplated moving in another U.S. Attorney from New

00:02:15.380 Jersey, but that was scuttled and the deputy was named. What does it all mean? Why does it matter?

00:02:21.940 I don't think it matters much at all when evaluating the service of Bill Barr because he acted within the

00:02:28.720 scope of his authority. I don't think that it matters much in terms of evaluating Jeffrey Berman,

00:02:34.760 frankly. It's not as if there was some terrible allegation of wrongdoing on the part of Berman. It simply

00:02:41.080 was that they thought his skill set stack would align with different positions in the administration.

00:02:46.960 But the real reason that I think it doesn't implicate the office in a negative way is that there was no

00:02:54.920 pressure. There was no discussion of witnesses, cases, defendants, persons of interest. There was no

00:03:03.420 articulation by Bill Barr that if Berman changed his behavior or prosecutorial conduct in any of these

00:03:11.020 cases that it would be a different outcome. It would be improper for an Attorney General to sit down

00:03:15.900 a U.S. Attorney and say, hey, look, I want you to take these following steps on these following cases

00:03:21.260 for political reasons, and if you don't take those, I'm going to remove you. Here, the conversation was

00:03:26.960 much different. The Attorney General said, I'm removing you. There was no negotiation. There was no bargain.

00:03:32.360 Berman was ultimately removed, and I think history will judge this less as some cataclysmic impeachable

00:03:39.320 offense and more as a disgruntled former employee with hurt feelings wanting to trash his boss. It

00:03:46.700 shouldn't indulge the work of the United States Congress to become the HR board for the administration,

00:03:54.260 but nonetheless, Democrats, addicted to impeachment, can't get enough of it, lost impeaching the

00:04:00.380 president. Now they're going to Bill Barr. Goya Foods is one of the largest companies in America

00:04:09.100 owned and operated by Hispanics, and the CEO of Goya Foods was at the White House sharing the

00:04:17.180 president's vision for building and construction and development and economic success in the Hispanic

00:04:23.180 community. Here's Robert Wanaway in the Rose Garden with the president.

00:04:27.500 We're all truly blessed at the same time to have a leader like President Trump, who is a builder.

00:04:34.860 And that's what my grandfather did. He came to this country to build, to grow, to prosper. And so we have

00:04:42.300 an incredible builder, and we pray. We pray for our leadership, our president, and we pray for our country

00:04:50.780 that we will continue to prosper and to grow. So after this meeting, after this strategy session

00:04:58.540 on building up the Hispanic community and creating more opportunities for success, what was the result

00:05:05.000 from the radical left? Was it engagement? Was it assistance? Was it ideas? Was it some element of

00:05:11.300 their agenda that they thought would dovetail nicely with the administration's goals to see

00:05:16.300 a great prosperity for Hispanics in the United States? No. It was an effort to boycott Goya Foods.

00:05:24.380 This is so crazy. Now, if a leader in business and industry even takes an audience with the

00:05:31.580 president of the United States and works together towards goals that I think should be virtuous to

00:05:37.660 all of us, to see communities thrive and prosper and achieve really the pinnacle of their American dream,

00:05:46.620 if that's not allowed, what is anymore in this country? You see, President Trump is always accused by

00:05:52.460 the left and the media of being divisive and, you know, being a person who tries to pit the country

00:05:58.940 against each other. But nothing could be further from the truth. Here, the president is trying to

00:06:03.340 create really, I think, the right dynamic by highlighting a business owned by a person of Hispanic

00:06:13.020 heritage in our country and then doing all he can as president to see that the business, the sector,

00:06:19.100 and the opportunity created for people. The other important point here is that there is political

00:06:25.260 opportunity in the Hispanic vote. Let me bring you back to the Florida governor's race in 2018.

00:06:31.260 That was Ron DeSantis, who's now the governor of Florida, against the Democratic nominee Andrew Gillum.

00:06:37.660 And just just Google Andrew Gillum if you want to see how his story ended. We don't have time to get

00:06:42.460 into that today. But suffice it to say, Andrew Gillum, an African-American candidate, utilized race

00:06:48.300 as really the organizing principle of his campaign. And he would repeatedly call Ron DeSantis a racist in

00:06:56.300 one form or another. And, you know, he did it in kind of a clever way. He said, oh, well, I don't

00:07:00.860 think you're a racist, but the racists think you're a racist. I'm not calling Mr. DeSantis a racist.

00:07:05.820 I'm simply saying the racists believe he's a racist. And when Gillum did that, we just happened to have

00:07:11.420 a poll out in the field during this debate sequence when Gillum tried to label DeSantis a racist. And we saw

00:07:20.540 just dramatic turnaround in the polling, particularly with working class Hispanic men with Hispanics

00:07:27.740 across the board. But working class Hispanic men do not want to see African-Americans just accusing

00:07:34.780 white people of racism all the time. I don't know why. I don't know what it is. That's not my experience.

00:07:41.020 But I could just tell you as a political scientist and someone who knows how to read polling,

00:07:46.060 that African-Americans do not do themselves political favors with Hispanics when they are

00:07:52.220 constantly playing the race card against white people, against anybody, really. And so I think 0.53

00:07:58.220 that the president is playing on the right goals for the country when he tries to build up Hispanic 1.00

00:08:04.540 businesses. I think also he leans into a political vulnerability for Democrats. If it's all about race

00:08:11.260 all the time and it's not about success and it's not about unifying the country, I think that will

00:08:16.860 really cost Democrats. I think it will really cost them with Hispanic voters. I'm proud of my president 0.75

00:08:22.460 and I'm proud of Goya Foods for accepting the outreach and working together to build one strong,

00:08:27.900 great nation for everyone. NFL player Deshaun Jackson is an electric wide receiver,

00:08:36.860 a diminutive guy, at times a slot guy, very fast. He started his career at the University of Southern

00:08:45.980 California. He then goes and plays for the Eagles and he's back with the Eagles now making news with

00:08:52.460 some anti-Semitic and racist posts on his social media that have been deleted and some quotes that had been

00:08:59.100 falsely attributed to Adolf Hitler. So you never want to be quoting Hitler. You never want to be

00:09:04.540 falsely quoting Hitler in a social media inflamed moment. That has led to a substantial amount of

00:09:11.260 backlash. But I think it's worth noting Deshaun Jackson is an interesting guy with an interesting

00:09:16.140 history with the Philadelphia Eagles. So they take him out of the University of Southern California

00:09:22.700 in the draft. He plays there. He's a good player. And then just very suddenly he gets cut from the

00:09:29.340 Eagles. And they release a statement that they're cutting him because they are concerned about his

00:09:36.220 relationship with criminal gang activity in South Central Los Angeles, I guess stemming back from his

00:09:42.940 connections or time at the University of Southern California. And so he gets cut. He ends up playing

00:09:49.500 and getting opportunities at other NFL franchises because, again, he is a very electric playmaker at the

00:09:55.260 wide receiver position. And now, later in his career, not quite the player he was after some

00:10:00.700 time with the Buccaneers and the Redskins. He's back with the Eagles. I guess they're satisfied that

00:10:06.380 there's no criminal gang activity that they're going to be worried about. But now it's not the gang

00:10:11.580 activity. It's the online mob that Deshaun Jackson seems to have joined. Again, quoting Farrah Khan, who we've

00:10:19.580 discussed on this program as an explicit racist who seems to get a pass from the left, and then also

00:10:25.340 quoting falsely Adolf Hitler. So the posts have been taken down. A fellow NFL player, I guess ex-player

00:10:33.820 now, Chris Long called it an effing disaster for the NFL, for the Eagles, and for Deshaun Jackson. And I

00:10:41.100 just think it's quite something that you seem to see an uneven application of the outrage culture

00:10:49.740 in the NFL with some of their players. Look, I'm not for the cancel culture. I think it does highlight

00:10:56.140 the double standard. It does highlight the problem the NFL has as they try to cater to the most extreme

00:11:03.820 political whims of some of their players. And it's my hope that we'll all just get a little more

00:11:10.860 capable at dealing with each other's ugly moments online, and that it won't lead us all to go clutch

00:11:17.340 our pearls, cancel everyone, and then attempt to live in some antiseptic society where no one says

00:11:22.860 mean things. There are bullies in the world. There are mean people in the world. There are folks who have,

00:11:28.460 I think, flawed values. And we don't erase those people. We don't cancel them. I think we use it as an

00:11:34.060 example to say, you know, no, these are not the values we have. We confront bad speech with better

00:11:40.860 speech. And ultimately, that's how we become more enlightened, not by pretending that bad views don't

00:11:47.340 exist. We've got to acknowledge them. We've got to deal with them. We've got to deconstruct them.

00:11:51.980 There's no need to cancel everyone all the time for every stupid thing online. 0.98

00:11:59.500 On the podcast, I've covered this Russia bounty allegation. I've given, I think, 0.99

00:12:06.300 the right context and the right frame that there are always Russians and, frankly, other countries

00:12:12.460 in Afghanistan who use the turmoil and the chaos to try to harm Americans. We had a hearing on this 1.00

00:12:19.500 before the Armed Services Committee with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper and Chairman of the Joint

00:12:24.780 Chiefs General Milley. Here are Secretary Esper and General Milley in their opening statements.

00:12:30.540 We take very seriously any threats to our forces, whether in Afghanistan or anywhere else across

00:12:35.020 the globe. I want our adversaries to know that we will always do our utmost to ensure their safety

00:12:39.820 and security. In closing, I want to assure the American people that the Department of Defense

00:12:45.820 takes seriously our oath to defend the Constitution. With many having paid the ultimate sacrifice to

00:12:52.860 protect the sacred rights and freedoms, this document guarantees all of us.

00:12:57.340 I'm incredibly proud of the professionalism exhibited by the citizen soldiers to make up our National Guard.

00:13:02.380 Since their formation, they have operated in support of local and state governments

00:13:06.700 throughout history, responding to hurricanes, forest fires, health crises, COVID-19, the pandemic,

00:13:12.940 and many forms of civil unrest throughout the years. By my research, I count at least 19 times

00:13:19.580 that National Guard and militia troops were used in support of the Insurrection Act,

00:13:23.100 and it's important to note the Insurrection Act was not invoked in the last several weeks.

00:13:29.020 The United States military comes from the people of our nation, and we remain dedicated to the

00:13:34.940 Constitution. We will never turn our back on that document. We swore an oath of allegiance at the cost of our

00:13:41.980 lives to an idea embedded within that document, and we will always protect it.

00:13:48.380 When I had the opportunity to question them, I thought it was important to point out

00:13:53.340 what other nations are creating problems for us, and also the need to solve those problems not by

00:13:59.820 entangling ourselves further in Afghanistan, but by leaving. And here's my exchange with the senior

00:14:05.740 leadership of our military. General Milley, I'll allow you to respond to Congressman Moulton

00:14:09.980 specifically as it relates to the depth, duration, and extent of the Russian malign influence campaign

00:14:16.540 in Afghanistan, and perhaps the extent to which that well predates the current administration.

00:14:20.940 Specifically to the bounties. That is a unique, discrete piece of information that is not corroborated.

00:14:27.260 You've all been briefed on it. I have too. And I am, I and the Secretary and many others are taking it

00:14:32.700 serious. We're going to get to the bottom of it.

00:14:34.060 I'm glad you mentioned the other countries. September 5th, 2010, this is from the Times of

00:14:40.380 London. Iran pays the Taliban to kill U.S. soldiers.

00:14:43.980 Right.

00:14:44.620 Then also following up on that, there's a December 2nd, 2015 report from Fox News report Iran paying

00:14:51.100 Taliban to kill U.S. troops. Is it safe to say, given these reports along with the testimony you just

00:14:56.860 provided that the environment in Afghanistan, the very nature of the place and the very nature of

00:15:02.700 the entities involved, means that our presence there does create these risks where our foreign

00:15:09.420 adversaries create incentives and resources and opportunities for our service members to be harmed.

00:15:17.020 Any time you commit U.S. military forces anywhere on earth, there's going to be risk.

00:15:20.860 We went to Afghanistan for a single purpose to prevent Afghanistan from ever being a platform to attack

00:15:25.100 the United States of America with terrorists. And we've been there ever since to do that.

00:15:29.180 We are drawing down forces in accordance with the agreement that was signed with the Taliban.

00:15:33.260 It's a risk I know you both appreciate, given your service to the country.

00:15:36.460 It's a risk I know the President appreciates. I've had the occasion to join him at Dover when my

00:15:41.980 constituents have come back for a dignified transfer. And that risk being so ever present,

00:15:47.740 presence seems to accentuate the importance of your mission to draw down troops, to create some

00:15:54.860 semblance of normalcy in Afghanistan to the extent to which that's even possible. And I believe that it

00:16:01.100 is an unrealistic goal to say that we have to chase every terrorist into every cave forever and stay

00:16:07.980 there forever in order to protect the homeland.

00:16:10.220 And it's just worth noting that, you know, the Obama administration goes and gives Iran these

00:16:16.780 billions of dollars. They're flying cash over there. At the conclusion of this financial transaction

00:16:23.660 between the Obama administration and Iran, we see a massive increase in military spending. We see

00:16:29.900 resources funneled out to, you know, Hezbollah and to other Iranian proxies at a far higher volume

00:16:37.980 than previous. And when you see these these bad countries and these bad entities more resourced

00:16:45.180 as a consequence of bad U.S. policy, then American lives are endangered. So it's quite rich for Democrats

00:16:51.980 who loved up on Iran following President Obama's nuclear deal and delivery of cash to Iran,

00:16:59.580 then turn around and act as if they're just, you know, incensed that the Russians are engaged in malign

00:17:06.380 activity when in fact that malign activity is also occurring from Iran and essentially funded by

00:17:12.380 the United States. So let's be consistent. And I think that the right approach here isn't to stay

00:17:18.220 in Afghanistan for another 20 years while we try to figure out who to blame for funding proxy violence

00:17:25.180 against our service members. It's to bring those service members home to fly over Afghanistan at a high 0.97

00:17:31.260 altitude, bomb the hell out of them when necessary, when they're creating the capability to strike our 0.97

00:17:36.300 homeland. But the answer is not another 20 years in Afghanistan. 0.97

00:17:44.140 Let my people worship, especially during the time of strife, especially during a time of pandemic.

00:17:51.020 Religious services are essential and no government should be standing in the way of an American and

00:17:57.980 their access to their church, their faith, their fellow parishioners, their pastor, and certainly

00:18:04.700 their God. The United States Navy had taken a position just weeks ago that restricted the ability

00:18:11.660 of military families, Navy families, to access worship services during this pandemic. I opposed this

00:18:19.260 decision. I supported the, I think, more realistic view that the Air Force took and the Army took,

00:18:25.420 that worship is an essential service and that that would not be constrained by the United States

00:18:30.700 military. But the Navy took a different position. And very quietly, a number of congressional offices,

00:18:35.980 ours included, shared our thoughts with military leaders about the Navy deviating from this practice

00:18:42.460 that the other service branches had adopted. And that particularly at bases like mine, where it's not

00:18:48.460 a bunch of people getting on and off a ship and coming off of it after being at some port,

00:18:52.940 but it's really a naval aviation and technology training center. And then with joint installation

00:19:00.220 with the Coast Guard, that would not justify this type of restriction of worship and religion and faith.

00:19:08.220 And so a number of members of Congress reached out to the Navy just yesterday. The Navy has reversed

00:19:13.500 their position and our great sailors are going to be able to worship and congregate. And we hope that

00:19:19.820 everyone, regardless of their military service or how they worship or where they worship, we really

00:19:25.900 hope everyone takes some social distancing into account. Wash your hands and make sure that you give

00:19:32.780 folks space as you worship and access the full complement of your First Amendment rights. Good job,

00:19:39.100 Navy. Way to reverse the decision. Good news for our sailors and their families.

00:19:43.100 Thanks so much for listening to Hot Takes. I'm Congressman Matt Gates. If you subscribe to

00:19:49.660 our podcast on Apple or whatever podcast platform you use, that's the way to make sure that you get

00:19:55.740 each and every one of our daily shows right to your platform, able to listen to. Also make sure to give us

00:20:02.220 a five-star rating. That helps others see our content. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next week with more Hot Takes.

00:20:09.260 We'll be back next week with more Hot Takes.

00:20:21.820 We'll be back next week with more Hot Takes.

The Anchormen Show with Matt Gaetz - July 10, 2020

Episode 43 - More Cowbell： Democrats' Impeachment Fever. Worship is Essential. Goya Stands Strong.

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