The Anchormen Show with Matt Gaetz


Episode 53 - Bombshell Memo： The FBI Tried to Set Up Trump. Convention Canceled. Joe Biden Said...What？


Summary

On August 8th, 2016, the FBI received a text message from Peter Strzok and Lisa Page saying, "No, we'll stop him regarding the Trump presidency." On August 17th, they sent a defensive briefing to the Trump campaign.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 You ever watch this guy on television?
00:00:03.820 You all were not telling the truth and you should not be trusted.
00:00:06.880 Congressman Matt Gaetz, thank you for what you did for your country tonight.
00:00:09.280 Be offended with the Democratic whip, not House of Republicans.
00:00:12.240 Like a machine, Matt Gaetz.
00:00:16.320 Welcome to Hot Takes, I'm Congressman Matt Gaetz.
00:00:19.120 Let's talk about the news.
00:00:21.060 Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, my former colleague in the House of Representatives,
00:00:25.800 making news with very significant disclosures regarding the setup of President Trump and
00:00:32.960 General Michael Flynn by the FBI during the Obama-Biden administration.
00:00:38.380 I'll walk you through the specifics and how it relates to the overall Russia hoax endeavor.
00:00:44.660 You'll remember that at the end of July, the FBI opens the Trump-Russia investigation.
00:00:50.140 Then, on August 8th, you get the text messages between Peter Strzok and Lisa Page saying,
00:00:57.780 no, we'll stop him regarding the Trump presidency.
00:01:00.900 So, it is inconceivable to think that on August 8th, they're not talking about stopping Trump
00:01:07.260 through the vehicle of the investigation that they just got opened.
00:01:11.420 And remember, it was an investigation that they got opened with Andrew McCabe's assistance,
00:01:16.220 the same Andrew McCabe, who is caught lying four times, thrice under oath by the Inspector General.
00:01:24.120 So, that happens on August 8th.
00:01:25.580 No, we'll stop him.
00:01:26.920 Then, on August 15th, you get the text messages between Strzok and Page regarding the insurance
00:01:32.880 policy.
00:01:33.960 You'll remember that.
00:01:35.860 Following the insurance policy messages, on August 17th, you have the first defensive briefing
00:01:43.340 from the FBI to the Trump campaign.
00:01:46.400 Now, remember, the defensive briefing is supposed to be a warning.
00:01:49.600 It's supposed to be a collaborative, helpful effort.
00:01:52.940 It's supposed to be the FBI saying, hey, Trump campaign, there may be some Russians who are
00:01:57.700 trying to discredit you or discredit our election or discredit the election's process.
00:02:02.680 And we're here to give you the tools to be on the lookout for those very things.
00:02:06.800 The reality is, now that we've seen the declassified memos from that defensive briefing, it was,
00:02:14.880 in fact, an effort to entrap and ensnare President Trump and Michael Flynn.
00:02:20.540 The FBI was supposed to be warning President Trump and the Trump campaign that they could
00:02:26.500 be a target of Russian interference.
00:02:28.900 But the reality was, it was our own government.
00:02:31.800 The FBI engaged in the targeting of the Trump campaign and thus their own endeavor for interference.
00:02:39.900 Now, how do we know that this was a targeting endeavor and not an endeavor to warn and assist
00:02:45.840 and help?
00:02:46.940 You need look no further than the cover page from the memos and transcripts generated from
00:02:52.640 the August 17th meeting.
00:02:54.360 And what label do they put on the cover page?
00:02:57.920 Crossfire Razor.
00:02:59.720 Now, why does Crossfire Razor matter?
00:03:02.340 That is the name of the investigation to go after Michael Flynn.
00:03:06.840 So this wasn't defensive.
00:03:08.660 It was offensive.
00:03:10.180 This wasn't about Russian meddling and Russian interference.
00:03:13.240 This was about targeting from the FBI directed at President Trump and General Flynn.
00:03:18.480 And oh, by the way, who did the FBI send to go and engage in this defensive briefing?
00:03:24.300 They sent Peter Strzok, the very same person talking about the insurance policy and the
00:03:30.440 stoppage of a Trump presidency.
00:03:32.260 They sent FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith.
00:03:35.780 Clinesmith was the person who absolutely changed and altered evidence before the FISA court.
00:03:42.440 That's not even in dispute anymore.
00:03:44.180 The Obama-appointed inspector general found that.
00:03:48.280 And Clinesmith is likely, I think, to go to prison as a consequence of altering that evidence.
00:03:53.700 And he's there as Strzok's wingman along with Joe Pienka, who has his own problems and shouldn't
00:03:59.180 even have been there in the first place.
00:04:00.780 I broke the news yesterday on Lou Dobbs' program.
00:04:04.680 Here's that interview.
00:04:05.380 He is Congressman Matt Gaetz, member of the House Judiciary Committee, Armed Services Committees.
00:04:10.620 His new book is called Firebrand, Dispatches from the Front Lines of the MAGA Revolution.
00:04:17.640 It's available for pre-order now, and we are delighted to have its distinguished author.
00:04:23.420 That is Congressman Matt Gaetz.
00:04:25.100 Matt, great to have you with us.
00:04:26.220 John Ratcliffe, within the last few hours, has just declassified the memo that describes
00:04:32.140 the August 17th briefing the FBI gave President Trump back in the 2016 election.
00:04:37.760 Now, the FBI had been telling us that this was a defensive briefing, but the evidence that
00:04:42.460 we have today proves that this was a setup of the president and of Michael Flynn.
00:04:47.700 Here's how.
00:04:48.440 You'll remember that at the end of July in 2016, the FBI opened the Trump-Russia investigation.
00:04:54.220 On August 8th, Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were saying, no, we'll stop him.
00:04:58.560 On August 15th, the insurance policy.
00:05:01.240 And then August 17th is the first defensive briefing that the Trump campaign gets.
00:05:05.760 And who does the FBI send?
00:05:07.300 Peter Strzok, Kevin Kleinsmith, who was the lawyer that literally changed evidence before
00:05:12.240 the FISA court, and Joe Pianca, who shouldn't have been there in the first place.
00:05:15.860 And in that meeting, they weren't trying to warn the Trump campaign.
00:05:19.820 They were literally trying to ensnare Michael Flynn.
00:05:22.420 And on the documents released today, they are labeling that meeting as part of the Crossfire
00:05:27.400 Razor investigation, which was the Flynn investigation.
00:05:30.420 So they should have been there to protect the president from any Russian interference.
00:05:35.280 Instead, they were there to frame the president and try to put pressure on Michael Flynn.
00:05:39.640 This is what we've been talking about for years now, even more evidence that it's the case.
00:05:43.520 My colleague and friend Jim Jordan was on the Hannity program to discuss
00:05:47.480 these breaking insights from the August 17th defensive briefing.
00:05:53.360 Here's Congressman Jordan.
00:05:54.220 The FBI went to then-candidate Trump, told him Russia might try to target you and your campaign.
00:06:00.020 What they didn't tell him is, we're targeting you.
00:06:02.960 They told him Russia might try to spy on you.
00:06:04.720 What they didn't tell him is, we're spying on you.
00:06:07.300 And they did it just 17 days into this investigation.
00:06:10.360 It opens on July 31st, August 17th.
00:06:13.680 They do this, 13 minutes for the defensive briefing, the part of the briefing he's supposed
00:06:18.940 to get, and then an hour and 42 minutes where they're trying to get information and set the
00:06:23.600 president up.
00:06:24.360 All this comes after, as you said, Sean, the August 8th text message where Peter Strzok says,
00:06:29.440 we'll stop Trump, and the August 15th text message where he says, we got an insurance policy.
00:06:34.320 And they start implementing that insurance policy two days later.
00:06:39.640 Coronavirus is causing us to rethink so many of the assumptions we've made about regulation
00:06:45.880 and businesses and liquidity.
00:06:48.280 And certainly in these times, our small businesses are the most fragile to the dynamics and changes
00:06:55.500 and economic conditions and regulatory impulses from governors and mayors, whether there's
00:07:00.760 occupancy restrictions or certain types of mandates or indoor, outdoor, different protocols
00:07:08.240 that people have to follow.
00:07:09.620 And so with this changing environment, I'm proud to see that the Trump administration is doing
00:07:14.720 all that is possible to deregulate maybe some of the different standards and protocols that
00:07:21.200 are less relevant today than prior to coronavirus, while we are having to, of course, retailer
00:07:27.600 regulations to ensure that the public is safe as we reopen and revive the American economy.
00:07:33.820 Jovita Carranza has the report from Fox Business.
00:07:37.080 In coronavirus economy, Trump administration pulling out all the stops to help small businesses,
00:07:42.840 according to the SBA administrator.
00:07:45.040 And there are certain features here when it comes to lending that are critically important
00:07:49.600 to small business.
00:07:50.520 Small business essentially needs two things to get rolling, cash and customers.
00:07:55.580 And obviously, coronavirus has impacted the customers.
00:07:58.860 And with banks having to push through these PPP loans and deal with their own challenges,
00:08:05.440 we have needed, I think, some relief to create that liquidity in small businesses and to give
00:08:11.400 them the resources to be able to make the investments that might be necessary for the safety protocols
00:08:17.500 that can lead to more cash and customers.
00:08:19.940 So these regulatory changes are increasing the approval rates for loans for small businesses
00:08:26.040 with our banks.
00:08:27.320 That is critically important.
00:08:29.080 And in May and June, you know, more than seven and a half million of the 22 million jobs that were
00:08:34.380 lost, you know, were lost in our small business sectors.
00:08:39.060 And so I think that it's critically important to remember that and to know that this is an element
00:08:44.180 of the economy that requires some special attention.
00:08:47.320 We believe that these regulatory changes will have to continue to be ongoing as states continue
00:08:53.540 to shuffle the dynamic at which they'll allow reopening.
00:08:56.900 But it's great to see the Trump administration, particularly in the area of lending, maybe
00:09:02.820 raining back a little on the regulation, getting the cash out the door, getting the American
00:09:07.820 economy roaring again through the small businesses that function as the backbone of this great
00:09:13.720 nation.
00:09:14.020 The Sierra Club is a left-leaning group.
00:09:19.420 I've worked with them from time to time on issues of environmental protection and preservation
00:09:24.480 because I love our environment and I want to keep it clean and beautiful and unfilthy.
00:09:30.040 But the Sierra Club now is having to cancel one of its own founders and most revered members,
00:09:38.560 John Muir.
00:09:39.880 That's right, the California organization having to come to some reckoning with the history and
00:09:46.320 past statements of some of California's founding fathers.
00:09:50.380 It's time to take down some of our own monuments, starting with some truth telling about the Sierra
00:09:56.320 Club's early history, the organization said, and we're getting this report from the LA Times
00:10:02.360 as a managing editor.
00:10:04.400 And additionally, along with Muir, founders of the Sierra Club, Joseph Liconti and David Starr
00:10:11.180 Jordan were apparently white supremacists and Jordan was a believer in eugenics.
00:10:17.100 Muir is one of the most revered figures in California history.
00:10:20.820 His writings greatly influenced the environmental movement and the gripe.
00:10:26.120 with Muir and Liconti and Starr Jordan apparently is that the land that they were trying to save
00:10:32.840 was in many circumstances taken away from indigenous people in California.
00:10:38.960 There were Indians that occupied a lot of this beautiful country that the Sierra Club would go on
00:10:45.040 to change and save and preserve.
00:10:48.840 But folks were there previously and it appears as though Muir and some of these other folks
00:10:53.740 wanted to see them off of that land so it could be preserved for others.
00:10:58.200 Muir was depressingly conventional on matters of race,
00:11:01.580 afflicted with a garden variety Victorian white supremacism,
00:11:06.060 writer Daniel DeWayne wrote in a Times opinion piece back in 2015.
00:11:11.560 So this is something that the Sierra Club has reckoned with.
00:11:14.960 And now the club is outlining plans to make the group better reflect the diversity in America today
00:11:21.360 as the organization deals with the legacy of this past.
00:11:25.720 Apparently Muir held bigoted views toward Indians.
00:11:29.060 He called them dirty.
00:11:30.960 He called them superstitious, deadly, lazy, squirrelish, and wife-stealing.
00:11:36.740 Wife-stealing.
00:11:37.320 That seems remarkably specific and potentially personal.
00:11:41.160 But wife-stealing is one of the critiques that Muir launches in a bigoted way against a group of people.
00:11:48.700 Here's my hot take.
00:11:50.720 We should judge people based on the best contributions that they make.
00:11:55.620 And of course, context regarding anything that is uncouth or off-color or unfitting with our time and reflection today
00:12:03.300 is important context, but I'm not ready to cancel John Muir.
00:12:09.220 I'm not ready to cancel the Sierra Club.
00:12:12.000 I think that if people are able to express a positive contribution,
00:12:17.360 if they're able to bring greater enlightenment or understanding in one issue,
00:12:21.800 but perhaps they didn't bring that same enlightenment and understanding to other issues such as race or indigenous people
00:12:27.820 or other cultural elements of their time,
00:12:30.740 it doesn't mean that we take down the statues of Muir.
00:12:34.800 Muir is an important person when we think about the environment,
00:12:39.220 not just in terms of what it can do for us, but its inherent and intrinsic beauty.
00:12:44.740 Muir is pictured with former President Teddy Roosevelt on the front of this LA Times piece,
00:12:49.400 and Roosevelt really had an understanding of conservation that was pretty serving of the human beings, right?
00:12:57.720 I mean, Roosevelt believed that we ought to conserve public lands
00:13:02.120 because humans would benefit from the exploitation and enjoyment of those lands
00:13:08.780 through hunting and fishing and hiking and a lot of the things that Roosevelt liked to do.
00:13:13.540 Muir, I think, substantially improves upon that perspective of conservation by saying,
00:13:19.400 in addition to human enjoyment, conservation can be an important end unto itself.
00:13:25.720 We should conserve not just for the sake of humans, but for the sake of conservation itself,
00:13:31.740 for the sake of replenishing our air and filtering our water and allowing the earth to be able to heal
00:13:39.540 from some of the things that human beings do to pollute her.
00:13:43.580 And so I think that Muir makes very strong arguments in favor of conservation for conservation's sake.
00:13:49.540 Obviously, the arguments he makes regarding indigenous peoples are not reflective of what we think today
00:13:56.480 or even what we should have been thinking at the time, but it was a perspective.
00:14:01.760 It was a widely held perspective in the day, and I just don't believe that we should go around canceling Americans
00:14:08.660 based on the worst things that they thought and said.
00:14:11.500 I think that's important context, but to love and uphold Americanism,
00:14:16.460 we also have space to celebrate the meaningful enlightenment that people like Muir brought to our national conversation regarding conservation.
00:14:25.820 I won't cancel Muir, even if his own club, the Sierra Club, is so woke that they now feel the pressure to do so.
00:14:33.680 President Trump is back, leading press briefings of the coronavirus task force.
00:14:42.520 Let's listen in to the president.
00:14:43.540 Our case fatality rate continues to decline, and we want to push this rate even lower.
00:14:48.640 The therapeutic research continues daily on new and very promising treatments,
00:14:54.480 including antibody treatments and the use of blood thinners and steroids.
00:14:59.280 A lot of different things are happening, and a lot of things are coming out that we wouldn't have known a number of months ago.
00:15:07.220 We're doing tremendously well on therapeutic research and tremendously well on the vaccines.
00:15:12.880 And frankly, therapeutically, or maybe a word even beyond that word is cure, would be the best of all,
00:15:20.460 and we'll see what happens.
00:15:21.700 But that would be great if we could go into the hospital and just cure people.
00:15:25.760 And we're at a position where we're actually able to, to a certain extent, with what we have right now.
00:15:33.300 And we think in a very short period of time we'll be able to do that.
00:15:36.560 The Republican National Convention in Jacksonville has been called off.
00:15:40.760 Hear the remarks of the president.
00:15:41.880 So I told my team it's time to cancel the Jacksonville, Florida component of the GOP convention.
00:15:49.340 We'll be starting in North Carolina for the Monday, as has always been planned.
00:15:53.420 We were never taking that off.
00:15:54.780 That's remaining as it is.
00:15:56.100 The delegates are going to get together.
00:15:57.820 That's where they do their nomination.
00:16:00.260 So the delegates are going to North Carolina, and they'll be doing the nomination.
00:16:06.780 And we're going to do some other things with tele-rallies and online the week that we're discussing,
00:16:13.800 which will be really good.
00:16:15.840 I think we're going to do it well, and I'll still do a convention speech in a different form.
00:16:22.900 But we won't do a big, crowded convention per se.
00:16:26.800 It's just not the right time for that.
00:16:28.280 And while it's certainly disappointing for Floridians and Republicans and supporters of the president
00:16:33.880 to not have the big, raucous, exciting convention that we were looking forward to,
00:16:39.480 I can understand the concerns of bringing people in from all over the country, the necessary movement on buses and transportation in and out of convention sites,
00:16:50.180 the gathering of folks who would necessarily be yelling and cheering and potentially projecting virus on others is a risk that the president didn't want to have to take.
00:17:00.520 And so in our politics, where assembly has always been so essential to the energy and enthusiasm that drive successful movements,
00:17:09.240 we will have to adjust.
00:17:10.820 And that's not just a Republican dynamic.
00:17:13.600 That's a dynamic for all people involved in all politics.
00:17:17.040 There will likely be a real enhanced emphasis on digital communication and digital organizing.
00:17:23.800 Matter of fact, I can't imagine any other election in American history
00:17:27.000 where the onboarding of supporters to digital platforms would be more important.
00:17:33.180 And the Trump campaign has successfully onboarded, I think, over 60 million people to some digital platform or another that they are involved with.
00:17:43.100 And so it's great to see that there still remains an opportunity for people to organize and interact and share ideas politically,
00:17:50.540 even if we all can't get together in Jacksonville and wave our pom-poms.
00:17:57.000 Russia report UK considers tougher security laws after criticism by members of parliament.
00:18:05.660 This coming to us from the BBC, and it appears as though our friends in the United Kingdom are going to copy some of the resiliency efforts
00:18:14.300 that we've engaged in in the United States to ensure that where there are foreign agents,
00:18:19.740 potentially foreign spies in our country, that we have mandatory registration requirements for those agents,
00:18:25.580 and that we keep pretty good tabs on those who may be collecting intelligence in our country.
00:18:31.200 So I'm glad to see that the UK wants to be more resilient, wants to be safer and more secure.
00:18:37.900 And I think that this is an innovation that is uniquely American to want to know who's in your country, why,
00:18:43.880 and then to have the ability to take action when necessary to expel those folks.
00:18:48.380 And it seems noteworthy here to, again, draw attention to the fact that no American administration in recent times
00:18:56.220 has been as tough on Russia as the Trump administration, with dozens of their quote-unquote diplomats,
00:19:03.400 who, by the way, are spies in many cases, being expelled from our country following Russia's malign influence.
00:19:10.640 Russia is a declining power, but she may be more dangerous in her decline than she ever was in her ascent.
00:19:18.840 They have essentially blurred the lines in Russia between criminal behavior and government behavior.
00:19:25.800 And that's not to say that they don't still pose danger to the world.
00:19:29.680 It's, in fact, thugs and criminals and cartels on our southern border that bring us so much of a challenge.
00:19:35.360 And so I think we've got to keep an eye on Russia, but we also should remember that Russia is not this, like, grand, you know,
00:19:44.100 power with intense control over many satellite nations the way they used to be.
00:19:50.320 It looks as though most folks are trying to get out of Russia with all of the cash and arms that they're able to steal and launder in the time being.
00:20:00.260 And so the resiliency efforts by the UK are important.
00:20:03.840 The accountability efforts by the Trump administration are noted and critical to ensure that we push back against Russian malign influence.
00:20:12.460 While keeping in mind, Russia is not the grand foe that we face.
00:20:17.200 China is.
00:20:18.140 That should be the focus of our country, because that is what will determine who wins the 21st century.
00:20:23.600 Does Joe Biden want people breathing up his nostrils?
00:20:30.820 A strange question indeed.
00:20:32.760 Listen to the former vice president.
00:20:34.040 And I had a nurse at nurses at Walter Reed Hospital who would bend down and whisper in my ear.
00:20:42.540 Wow.
00:20:43.020 And go home and get me pillows.
00:20:44.660 They would make sure they'd actually probably nothing ever taught in you can't do it in the COVID time,
00:20:50.240 but they'd actually breathe in my nostrils to make me move to get me moving.
00:20:55.260 I have talked to a number of nurses, and I do not know the medical remedy that would require someone to breathe up the nose of someone else in an effort to awaken them.
00:21:05.740 And by the way, if Joe Biden needs people breathing up his nose to wake up,
00:21:09.580 that is probably a warning sign that he might not be ready to be president of the United States.
00:21:13.240 So who knows?
00:21:14.680 We've had Joe talking about children rubbing his hairy legs at the pool, confusing his wife and his sister,
00:21:22.020 asking people to vote for him for the United States Senate instead of the presidency,
00:21:26.120 and now a little bit of titillating nostril activity.
00:21:30.740 Weird.
00:21:32.100 Thanks for listening to Hot Takes.
00:21:34.020 I'm Congressman Matt Gaetz.
00:21:35.640 We always appreciate your ratings and reviews.
00:21:38.700 We hope you'll share our podcast content so that more folks are able to interact with these ideas and issues and research.
00:21:45.900 And we hope you'll be back next week for more Hot Takes.