The Anchormen Show with Matt Gaetz - July 27, 2020


Episode 54 - I Just Filed a Criminal Referral Against Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Antifa's Not a Myth. Chicago Woes.


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Length

22 minutes

Words per minute

155.04228

Word count

3,533

Sentence count

206

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Toxicity

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

2

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Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Mark Meadows on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos with his hot takes and descriptions of the negotiations on the next round of coronavirus relief legislation. Matt Gaetz on Florida s approach to dealing with the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Welcome to Hot Takes. I'm Congressman Matt Gaetz. Let's talk about the news.
00:00:20.840 The news in Washington is the intense negotiation on the next round of coronavirus
00:00:26.180 relief legislation. The White House is arguing for liability reform so that businesses aren't
00:00:33.380 sued out of existence as they're dealing with the already significant challenges of reopening,
00:00:39.620 and also workforce reforms to ensure that people have every incentive to go back to work.
00:00:45.400 On the other side, Democrats are arguing for trillions in additional spending,
00:00:51.020 including funds for state and local governments, hospitals, and a variety of other programs that
00:00:57.120 they simply want to see enhanced. You saw in the prior rounds of coronavirus relief legislation,
00:01:02.580 Democrats lobbying for everything from changes to immigration policy to even the Kennedy Center
00:01:09.480 getting a facelift. So a lot of that's still in what they are seeking. Here's Mark Meadows on ABC's
00:01:16.140 this week with George Stephanopoulos with his hot takes and descriptions of those negotiations.
00:01:21.860 I've actually been on the phone with Secretary Scalia, Secretary of Treasury Steven Mnuchin.
00:01:27.860 We believe that in a combination of working with Secretary Mnuchin and Secretary Scalia,
00:01:33.700 we'll be able to find a way to actually provide a threshold that will meet that guideline.
00:01:39.260 Yes, some of the state benefit computer systems are antiquated, and so we're going to have to work
00:01:46.800 from a federal government standpoint. Secretary Mnuchin is willing to step in and help with that.
00:01:51.800 It's our goal to make sure that it's not antiquated computers that keep people from getting their benefits.
00:01:58.100 But as we look at trying to make sure that we get this economy back going again,
00:02:03.720 and actually the president's done an outstanding job there. We had an estimated 40 million people
00:02:11.120 that were going to be unemployed. It never got even close to that number. We're still well beyond
00:02:17.400 where we would hope a healthy economy would be, but it's improving very quickly. And so the Secretary
00:02:24.600 and I have been on Capitol Hill, as you know, over the weekend. We'll be back there again today,
00:02:29.780 putting the final touches on a bill that Leader McConnell plans to introduce tomorrow.
00:02:36.920 But honestly, I see us being able to provide unemployment insurance, maybe a retention credit
00:02:43.980 to keep people from being displaced or brought back into the workplace, helping with our schools.
00:02:52.500 If we can do that, along with liability protection, perhaps we put that forward,
00:02:57.040 get that passed as we can negotiate on the rest of the bill in the weeks to come.
00:03:02.220 So here's my hot take. Both sides likely are going to need to revise their strategy
00:03:07.040 to get the workforce engaged and ready and prepared not only to deal with a reopening,
00:03:13.420 but to continue to deal with the consequences of this virus. In Florida, I think that our model
00:03:19.240 can be a guide from a policy standpoint. Obviously, in the state of Florida, technically,
00:03:24.100 we had a website that was a disaster and that really caused unnecessary delay for a lot of
00:03:30.280 Floridians in receiving their benefits. But the policy Florida employs is one that I think we could
00:03:35.880 tuck into this major bill. That is this. If someone is on unemployment and they are offered their old
00:03:43.340 job back that they lost that was the result of them going on unemployment, they have a period of time
00:03:48.960 to take that job. Otherwise, they lose those unemployment benefits. Here's why this is the
00:03:54.600 best approach. There are some jobs that are still illegal that people can't go back to. And in those
00:04:01.300 cases, what the White House is asking, which is a 70 percent sort of valuation on their earnings in
00:04:08.680 terms of the size and scope of their benefits, that is not going to get it done for a lot of American
00:04:16.680 families. While at the same time, Democrats are proposing the policy options that will keep people
00:04:23.740 at home, that will at times, you know, yield a higher dollar amount for those who stay out of work
00:04:30.480 than those who go to work. I'll tell you the story of an Uber driver who picked me up here in Washington,
00:04:35.800 D.C. He runs his own business as a limousine service. And his drivers, he told me, make on average
00:04:44.380 about 1500 bucks a week. And if they don't go to work, if they stay on unemployment, they can make
00:04:50.840 1100 bucks a week. And what he was telling me is that a lot of folks are just choosing to continue
00:04:57.520 to receive their government benefits, and then not have an on the books job, you know, have some sort
00:05:02.960 of side hustle that they aren't reporting to make up that other loss in revenue. And so that is not
00:05:08.900 going to lead to an energetic, engaged workforce. That's not going to lead to the V-shaped recovery
00:05:15.280 that I know the president and so many of us want. So it is my advice. It is my suggestion. It is my
00:05:21.240 hot take that if someone has a job that is illegal, they should not see a reduction in their benefits
00:05:28.040 as a consequence of Washington not doing its job. While at the same time, Washington shouldn't make
00:05:34.080 it harder for small businesses to onboard their workforce by keeping those folks on extended
00:05:40.940 benefits. So if you have a job, you need to get back to it and lose your benefits. And if you don't,
00:05:47.700 then we should ensure that we provide for our people.
00:05:52.900 I believe Mark Zuckerberg has lied to Congress. I believe Project Veritas has exposed those lies.
00:06:01.540 And today I am writing the Attorney General of the United States to ask him to investigate Mark
00:06:08.020 Zuckerberg for lying to the United States Congress. On April 10, 2018, Mark Zuckerberg testified in the
00:06:15.640 Senate Judiciary Committee and in the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. And the very
00:06:20.980 next day he testified to the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee. And repeatedly in that
00:06:27.500 testimony, Mark Zuckerberg said that people weren't being censored or denied access or experiencing any
00:06:35.900 bias as a consequence of their conservative speech or their politics. Zuckerberg dismissed this suggestion
00:06:43.020 and he rejected any accusation of editorial malfeasance or misbehavior. But then Project Veritas,
00:06:54.020 through their exposed Facebook investigation, showed that Mr. Zuckerberg was lying. Two content
00:07:00.580 moderators, Zach McElroy and Ryan Hartwig, both worked on the content review generated by Facebook.
00:07:09.380 And these content moderators have tremendous power to manipulate what you see and what you hear. And
00:07:15.380 I think the objective sometimes is for them to manipulate what we're all thinking.
00:07:19.880 So on June 23, 2020, Project Veritas published some of the results of their undercover investigation.
00:07:27.460 They saw whistleblowers. They saw people who were moderating speech. And in fact, this Project
00:07:34.380 Veritas investigation shows that there's a tremendous amount of footage detailing political
00:07:40.240 activity that is going on behind the scenes at Facebook. There is no way that moderators are
00:07:47.760 punishing people for supporting President Trump or putting Make America Great Again on their timeline
00:07:53.980 without the knowledge and understanding of Mark Zuckerberg. And if Mark Zuckerberg didn't know
00:07:58.740 that this was going on, he should have answered that way. When Mark Zuckerberg goes before the Senate
00:08:03.660 and says that there is not bias, and in fact, there was bias, I seem to think that that would warrant
00:08:10.200 an investigation. And that's why I'm asking the Attorney General to take action. The Attorney General
00:08:15.880 will be before the Judiciary Committee tomorrow. The following day, Mark Zuckerberg will be before
00:08:22.000 the Judiciary Committee. It should be an interesting week.
00:08:27.880 Chicago is a war zone with shootings and violent crime on the rise. Here's the president's critique
00:08:34.820 of Chicago and their current leadership.
00:08:36.880 Chicago is a disaster. The mayor is saying don't come in. The mayor is telling us not to come in.
00:08:43.360 At some point, we can void that if we have to, and we may have to because it's out of control.
00:08:49.800 I assume she's saying that for political reasons. I think it's negative political reasons. She's a
00:08:54.160 she's a Democrat. I'm going to be nice. She's a Democrat. She's making a big mistake. People are dying
00:09:00.720 in Chicago and other cities, and we can solve the problem. They have to ask us, but we can solve the
00:09:06.220 problem.
00:09:06.600 And Mayor Lightfoot was on State of the Union with Jake Tapper this Sunday. Here was her perspective
00:09:12.900 on what the federal government could do to reduce crime in Chicago.
00:09:16.540 I sent him a letter on Monday outlining the very specific things that the federal government is
00:09:21.720 uniquely qualified to help with, starting with common sense gun control. The fact of the matter is,
00:09:28.200 our gun problem is related to the fact that we have too many illegal guns on our street, 60% of which,
00:09:34.800 60% of which come from states outside of Illinois. We are being inundated with guns from states that have
00:09:42.620 virtually no gun control, no background checks, no ban on assault weapons. That is hurting cities like
00:09:49.700 Chicago. That is the thing that the president really wanted to help. That and the other things I
00:09:54.340 identified and my letter he could do today, tomorrow, but he's not really interested in
00:10:00.360 helping in that way.
00:10:01.440 Gun control. This is crazy. You have circumstances where the liberal leadership in a lot of these
00:10:06.840 cities is straight up abandoning their people. And then in addition to not providing the necessary
00:10:12.660 funding for police, in addition to denigrating police so that they don't get out and engage in
00:10:18.420 effective, proactive policing, now you have the mayors and liberal leaders in a lot of these
00:10:23.940 cities wanting to disarm the law abiding Americans who want the opportunity to protect themselves.
00:10:29.860 Gun control is not the answer. Law and order is the answer. Gun control only will restrict the 0.88
00:10:38.140 ability of people who aren't the criminals to defend themselves. Because I don't see any of these
00:10:44.840 Antifa warlords abiding by gun control regulations. I don't see the criminal gangs in Chicago shooting up
00:10:53.600 funerals for people who died in other drive-by shootings likely to adhere to gun control.
00:11:00.560 So I support the Second Amendment. I support the president's efforts to send in federal assistance
00:11:06.940 in places where you have seen total chaos and anarchy because a great nation does not allow her cities to fall.
00:11:14.580 Drugs are getting cheaper. That's always good news for our cherished senior citizens in my beloved
00:11:24.100 Florida. President Trump taking unprecedented action to reduce the price of prescription drugs
00:11:31.360 in the state of Florida and throughout the country. Here's my hot take. Every major drug that gets
00:11:38.220 developed in America is developed as a consequence of partnership with the government and taxpayers.
00:11:45.500 And then what large pharmaceutical companies do is that they take the research and development costs
00:11:50.640 that American taxpayers are fronting and they don't charge those to citizens around the world.
00:11:56.960 The consequence is that drugs are far cheaper in Canada, in Europe, in Latin America,
00:12:02.940 in Africa, oftentimes than they are in the United States. And so Americans are essentially subsidizing
00:12:10.200 drug costs in other countries and sometimes even subsidizing costs in socialist countries.
00:12:17.520 And so Governor DeSantis and I had an idea. We went to President Trump and said, look, let's allow Florida
00:12:23.960 to be a pilot project where we import these cheaper drugs from Canada or elsewhere to lower costs
00:12:31.940 costs for our state, for those we serve in our corrections facilities, and particularly for Florida
00:12:37.660 seniors. And if you allow the state of Florida to do this, then likely drug companies will reduce
00:12:43.780 costs for Americans broadly because we will blow a hole through this loophole that exists allowing drug
00:12:51.780 companies to sell these very important life-saving substances to people elsewhere at just a different price
00:13:01.180 than they charge Americans. Here's President Trump in his description of this historic event.
00:13:07.500 So today I'm taking a bold and historic, very dramatic action to reduce the price of prescription drugs
00:13:14.240 for American patients and American seniors. Previous administrations did nothing, absolutely nothing,
00:13:22.900 as drug lobbyists, special interests in foreign countries fairly ripped off
00:13:27.560 our citizens. Under the last administration alone, drug prices rose a staggering 55 percent.
00:13:36.340 Thanks to my administration's aggressive action since taking office, we have successfully lowered drug
00:13:42.580 prices for the first time in 51 years. Governor DeSantis also weighed in. Here's his remarks.
00:13:48.560 Obviously Florida, you know, we did some groundwork, but really it's a result of presidential leadership.
00:13:54.100 So the people of Florida, I want to thank you for siding with us on this. Like I said, this could have been
00:14:00.460 done for almost 20 years, and it hasn't been done. So you're the one that got it done. So, Mr. President, thank you.
00:14:05.740 We also heard from the HHS Secretary, Alex Azar. Here's what he's had to say.
00:14:10.620 You're taking on the drug companies. You're taking on the middlemen. You're taking on the European socialists.
00:14:15.720 All for the forgotten men and women of America who show up at a pharmacy counter. And for that,
00:14:20.760 I am so proud of what you are doing today. Thank you, Mr. President.
00:14:23.700 Thank you very much.
00:14:24.160 Lower drug costs for Floridians and Americans. It's a big America first win.
00:14:32.400 Judiciary Chairman Jerry Nadler apparently thinks that Antifa is a myth. Here's the exchange he had
00:14:39.220 outside the Capitol.
00:14:40.220 Do you disavow the violence from Antifa? That's happening in Portland right now?
00:14:44.260 That's a myth that's being spread only in Washington, D.C.
00:14:48.360 About Antifa in Portland?
00:14:49.620 Yes.
00:14:50.080 Sir, there's videos everywhere online. There's fires and riots. They're throwing fireworks at
00:14:55.060 federal officers. DHS is there.
00:14:57.500 A myth, Chairman? We have Antifa rioters and protesters for nights and weeks on end destroying federal
00:15:06.040 property, scaring their fellow citizens, limiting the ability of emergency vehicles to be able to
00:15:12.380 render care to people. Americans have died as a result of Antifa. They are a terrorist organization
00:15:19.300 in our country. Our Attorney General should use law enforcement to hunt them down, arrest them,
00:15:25.840 hold them responsible for their crimes. And I think it's quite telling that Jerry Nadler,
00:15:30.960 the man who thought he saw Russia collusion despite the total absence of evidence thereof,
00:15:39.180 now all of a sudden can't see Antifa even though they're right in front of him. Shame on Chairman
00:15:45.160 Jerry Nadler for denying the reality that our fellow Americans are facing. And let's mobilize this
00:15:51.680 government and clean that trash, clean that terrorism, clean that violence, clean that disruption
00:15:58.160 off of our streets so that we can return to our lives as safe, prosperous, loving, compassionate
00:16:04.860 Americans. Should social media companies go dark on politics before an election? What is Facebook
00:16:13.940 contemplating? And would Twitter and other social media platforms follow suit if there was this sort
00:16:19.400 of political dark period before the voting? Well, Chuck, they've got very different tacks that
00:16:25.020 different platforms do. Twitter, for example, has already said we're not going to do any political
00:16:30.480 advertising whatsoever. YouTube and Facebook are still doing that. Facebook says, hey, we've got
00:16:35.940 35,000 now people in our security team going out kind of proactively trying to police this stuff.
00:16:42.940 They've not said that they're going to go dark on political information. And frankly, I mean,
00:16:48.340 at a time like this, where in a pandemic, there's probably going to be less face-to-face gatherings.
00:16:53.400 We can see that with what's happening with the conventions. Probably a lot of these campaigns
00:16:58.100 and their surrogates are going to be relying on social media and electronic media more than ever
00:17:03.200 to reach voters from the big candidates to the smaller ones. And Facebook sees that as part of
00:17:09.500 their role too. So how they thread the needle here is going to be tricky. It's interesting that the MSNBC 0.99
00:17:14.780 chosen analyst seems to utilize this 35,000 person workforce at Facebook as some sort of block
00:17:25.000 against interference. What if those 35,000 employees are the interference? What if their politics guides
00:17:32.960 what you see, what is suppressed, what trends, what shows up in a newsfeed? I'm deeply concerned about
00:17:40.440 any technology company that would utilize a 35,000 person strong workforce to try to influence the
00:17:48.220 political discussion that's occurring on their platform. Particularly if a lot of those folks
00:17:53.340 have their genesis in Silicon Valley, or if they're farmed out folks from the SPLC, the Southern
00:18:01.920 Poverty Law Center, a group that had, I would say, righteous beginnings, but is now functionally turned
00:18:08.440 into a hate group that goes after conservatives and targets a Christian dogma, Jewish dogma as hate
00:18:16.000 speech. And it's absolutely ludicrous. So those are the types of people that Facebook is counting on 0.99
00:18:21.160 when they seek to enter politics. I don't know. I think that Chuck Todd may have an interesting question.
00:18:28.180 I think Israel may have an interesting approach. What would our politics look like if they were removed 0.99
00:18:33.660 from social media in the days before a political campaign? Would they be better? Would they be worse?
00:18:39.340 Would they be more informed? Interesting discussion.
00:18:44.720 Joe Biden is still hiding. And that's not leadership. One thing that I'll say about President Trump,
00:18:51.960 he will take on his toughest critics. He'll go on the television shows of reporters and hosts who don't
00:18:59.460 share his view of the world, who've been very critical of him. And he'll joust and engage
00:19:04.340 on a policy standpoint, on an intellectual standpoint. And Joe Biden doesn't seem to have
00:19:10.540 the same willingness to do so. Fox News' Andrew O'Reilly reports, Biden campaign declines Fox News
00:19:17.380 Sunday interview one week after Chris Wallace's Trump sit down. Chris Wallace is a very, very tough
00:19:24.540 interview. I think people on both sides of the aisle would recognize that. President Trump was
00:19:29.320 willing to engage in that interview, lay out his vision for America, lay out his case for re-election.
00:19:35.300 And Joe Biden seems to prefer a very managed, a very closely curated environment. And that's just not
00:19:41.540 what the presidency calls for. I mean, if you're going to be president of the United States, you have
00:19:45.360 to be able to sit across the table and go toe-to-toe with Xi. You have to make demands of our allies so
00:19:52.340 they pay their fair share. You have to negotiate trade deals. You have to be able to instill in our
00:19:58.860 adversaries a sense that America will be strong and resilient and faithful to our mission and to
00:20:06.600 our values. And with Joe Biden essentially hiding from the tough interviews, hiding from the tough
00:20:13.080 issues, some might say, I doubt that he's up to the presidency and I doubt that he could hang with
00:20:19.320 President Donald Trump. He won't be able to hide long. We'll be having the debates before you know
00:20:23.960 it. But until then, I would encourage Joe Biden, get out there, take a tough interview and show the
00:20:30.340 American people what's in your heart, what you believe and what you're able to defend. I know Chris
00:20:35.480 Wallace is tough, but I assure you, President Xi and others will be a lot tougher.
00:20:41.700 There appears to be a coronavirus outbreak in the clubhouse of my favorite baseball team,
00:20:50.220 the Miami Marlins. Yes, the Marlins are winning games, but they also appear to be in the middle of
00:20:56.640 a bit of a coronavirus challenge. Jason Stark and Ken Rosenthal have the story with the Atlantic
00:21:02.420 entitled, Why Did the Marlins Play Baseball on Sunday? And it details a Sunday game the Marlins play
00:21:08.300 against the Phillies. And it is known three days before that Marlins players, three of them in
00:21:15.980 fact, tested positive for the coronavirus. And as the Stark-Rosenthal report lays out,
00:21:22.340 infectious disease experts are saying this is the definition of a clear outbreak of the virus within
00:21:28.700 the team. And the story goes on to raise the doctrinal question, what are we going to do on a
00:21:35.820 baseball club when you have a few players test positive, evidence of an outbreak? What are you
00:21:40.360 going to do in an office space in a school? And so I think that it's really important for corporate
00:21:45.220 America, government, our innovators in the science and technology and academic fields to work together
00:21:52.460 to ascertain when you have a series of test results that are positive, who do you have to quarantine?
00:21:59.400 How long? Is there a way to see whether or not the viral load is built up with others in that
00:22:05.260 learning space or in that workspace? Because if we have this dynamic where you have an outbreak,
00:22:11.860 you have positive test results, you engage in your commercial or professional or educational
00:22:16.720 activity anyway, and then you have further positive results that come as a consequence,
00:22:22.240 that creates a liability problem, that creates an erosion in trust. And so I look forward to seeing
00:22:28.320 these doctrines developed, deployed, used so that we're able to build that confidence and get our
00:22:34.560 economy moving again. Thanks so much for listening to Hot Takes. I'm Congressman Matt Gaetz. Don't forget,
00:22:41.480 subscribe, rate, leave us a review, and make sure to join us tomorrow for more Hot Takes.