The Ben Shapiro Show - July 15, 2024


Trump’s "Unity" RNC BEGINS…PLUS Trump Documents Case DISMISSED


Episode Stats

Length

1 hour and 8 minutes

Words per Minute

205.24248

Word Count

14,107

Sentence Count

972

Misogynist Sentences

5

Hate Speech Sentences

7


Summary

Latest updates on the assassination attempt against President Trump, and the death of a Pennsylvania firefighter who dove on to the bodies of his own family members in order to save them from the shooter. Also, a new name has been named in the case of the Pennsylvania shooter, Corey Comparatore, who was a high school student and avid supporter of the former president, Donald Trump. President Trump is on the ground in Milwaukee, Wisconsin as the Republican National Convention begins, and is expected to announce his VP pick this afternoon. We ll get to that in a little bit. First, we discuss the latest updates from the latest on the attempted assassination attempt on President Trump. Second, we find out more details about the shooter and his family. Third, we learn that the shooter was not on the FBI s radar as a potential threat before the shooting. Fourth, the name of the shooter has been identified, and it is a young man named Corey Caudatore. Thanks to everyone for all your support, stay safe, and God Bless! - Your continued support is so appreciated. -Jon Sorrentino, Josh Shapiro, Governor of Pennsylvania, and Cory Caudotore, his family, Corey's wife, Kristian Caudetore, and all the families affected by this tragedy. Thank you for all the love and support you've shown so far this week. -Jon and Corey's family. - Thank you Corey and Kristian's family for being there for all of your support. - and God bless you, God bless! - Jon and Corey, Jon & Kristian, Thank you, Lord Bless You, Lord Lord Lord and Thank You, God Bless You for You, Bless You Truly, Thank You For You, Much Bless You. -Amen, Blessings, Bless, Bless Me, You, Ode, You're All, Bless Us, You All, We'll See Me, We Love You, We're All For This, We See You, You'll See Us, We Say It, We Truly, We All See Him, We Hear Him, Bless Him, And We'll Come Back, OTHERS, We Miss You, Gave Me, OOTY, OTC, And You'll Hear Me, GOTYO, AND THANK YOU, WE'LL SEE YOU, YESTERDAY, AND SO MUCH SO MUCH, MRS. -SOMEBODY, CHEERS, AND YESTER DAY!


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Well folks, tonight the Republican National Convention begins.
00:00:03.000 President Trump is in fact on the ground in Milwaukee, Wisconsin right now.
00:00:07.000 He's expected sometime this afternoon to announce his vice presidential pick.
00:00:11.000 We'll get to that in a little bit.
00:00:13.000 First, all the latest updates on the assassination attempt against President Trump that happened on Saturday.
00:00:19.000 According to the Washington Post, the FBI is saying the investigators have not yet identified any ideology fueling the gunman.
00:00:24.000 I have an idea of what the ideology is.
00:00:26.000 He didn't like Donald Trump.
00:00:29.000 I don't know.
00:00:30.000 It might be a mystery wrapped in an enigma.
00:00:31.000 I'm going to go with he didn't like Donald Trump.
00:00:33.000 You've heard a lot of stuff about how he was a registered Republican.
00:00:35.000 It appears that this particular shooter, who had given some money to ActBlue, which is a Democratic super PAC, it appears that he registered Republican in order to vote against Trump in an open primary in Pennsylvania.
00:00:48.000 With that said, apparently, This particular shooter acted alone.
00:00:52.000 That is, of course, what they are saying right now.
00:00:54.000 We have no evidence to the contrary.
00:00:56.000 At this point, we're also finding out new details about the shooter.
00:01:00.000 Thank God he was a terrible shot.
00:01:02.000 Apparently, not only was a terrible shot, he actually had applied to be on the school shooting team and he was a bad shot so bad that they rejected him from the school shooting team, which is presumably the reason he missed the shot.
00:01:13.000 Although, of course, only through the grace of God was President Trump not killed.
00:01:17.000 His head exploded on national television.
00:01:19.000 I mean, truly.
00:01:20.000 Because you can see in the original assassination attempt video that President Trump shifts the angle of his head at the last moment to look at a chart that they put on a big screen.
00:01:29.000 And in doing so, he shifts the angle of his head so the bullet travels through his ear as opposed to through the back of his head.
00:01:36.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, investigators found rudimentary explosive devices in the shooter's car parked near the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.
00:01:43.000 They also found bomb-making materials at the family home one hour to the south.
00:01:48.000 Again, the FBI says that he acted alone.
00:01:51.000 Crooks had not been on the FBI's radar as a possible threat before the shooting.
00:01:54.000 Investigators found no indications of mental health issues either.
00:01:59.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, he appeared to have little social media presence or much record of political activism.
00:02:03.000 He appeared to have an account on Discord, a social media outlet popularized by video game enthusiasts, but he hadn't used it much.
00:02:08.000 He hadn't posted with the account in months, according to a spokeswoman for the platform.
00:02:12.000 On President Biden's inauguration day, Crooks gave $15 to Progressive Turnout Project, a Democratic-aligned political action committee that rallies voters.
00:02:22.000 One of his classmates, a person named Sarah DeAngelo, she said he never outwardly spoke about his political views or how much he hated Trump or anything.
00:02:29.000 She recalled him playing games on his laptop during homeroom before the school day began.
00:02:33.000 Apparently people described him as a possible school shooter at school.
00:02:36.000 Again, always there are red flags.
00:02:38.000 She said he was somewhat of a loner.
00:02:40.000 He didn't have a friend group.
00:02:41.000 He didn't fit in with everybody else.
00:02:43.000 As a sophomore, he was photographed in the yearbook wearing a t-shirt of an American flag with the faces of past presidents at Mount Rushmore.
00:02:49.000 And as a senior, he won a $500 National Math and Science Initiative Star Award.
00:02:54.000 So, again, we just don't know that much about the shooter at this point.
00:02:59.000 What we do know is that this could have been significantly worse, and it was bad enough as it was.
00:03:05.000 The man who died, his name has now been announced, his name is Corey Comparatore.
00:03:10.000 Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro announced his death yesterday, announced the circumstances of his death, pointed out that he died a hero.
00:03:17.000 Apparently he dived on the bodies of his family members in order to protect them from the shooter, and in doing so, was shot in the head and killed.
00:03:25.000 Here is Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro.
00:03:29.000 We lost a fellow Pennsylvanian last night.
00:03:33.000 Cory Comparatore.
00:03:37.000 I just spoke to Cory's wife and Cory's two daughters.
00:03:43.000 Cory was a girl dad.
00:03:46.000 Cory was a firefighter.
00:03:48.000 Cory went to church every Sunday.
00:03:52.000 Corey was an avid supporter of the former president and was so excited to be there last night with him in the community.
00:03:58.000 Cory was an avid supporter of the former president.
00:04:02.000 He was so excited to be there last night with him in the community.
00:04:10.000 I asked Cory's wife if it would be okay for me to me to share that we spoke. She said yes. She also asked
00:04:18.000 that I share with all of you that Corey died a hero. That Corey dove on his family to protect
00:04:28.000 them last night at this rally.
00:04:31.000 Obviously, obviously a tragedy. Josh Shapiro went on to talk about the necessity of taking
00:04:39.000 down the level of rhetoric, which of course has become the order of the day.
00:04:45.000 It comes off better for Josh Shapiro, as we'll see, than President Biden, who attempted to make that same pitch last night.
00:04:49.000 Meanwhile, all the questions surrounding the activities of the Secret Service here continue to swirl.
00:04:54.000 How exactly did the Secret Service miss the shooter in the first place?
00:04:59.000 Why exactly was that roof not cleared?
00:05:01.000 Again, it was only about 150 meters.
00:05:04.000 From the place where President Trump was speaking, it was the only building in the area that did not have Secret Service on top of it, well within the range of a normal AR-15.
00:05:14.000 The range of a normal AR-15 is maybe 500, 600 meters if you're a decent shot.
00:05:20.000 In this particular case, he was extremely close.
00:05:22.000 And again, it's only through the grace of God that President Trump is not dead.
00:05:24.000 Not only that, video has now emerged showing that the shooter had plenty of time to get ready.
00:05:29.000 People saw him climbing on the roof of the building.
00:05:32.000 They commented on this.
00:05:33.000 They were videoing him.
00:05:35.000 Where was local law enforcement?
00:05:37.000 So we've been told by Secret Service professionals that the way that typically these sites are secured is there's sort of an interior area that is controlled by Secret Service.
00:05:44.000 And then slightly outside of that perimeter, there's another area where they coordinate with local law enforcement.
00:05:49.000 As we will discuss in a moment, local law enforcement signally failed here, not only because they allowed a shooter to get onto the roof of the building, but also because a member of local law enforcement apparently had an actual physical confrontation with the shooter on the roof.
00:06:04.000 And apparently, according to the Associated Press, A local cop actually confronted the shooter on the roof and then had to retreat because the shooter swiveled the gun around.
00:06:14.000 And then when the shooter swiveled the gun around, he went down the ladder up to the roof, the local cop.
00:06:20.000 And at that point, he swiveled back around and started shooting at the president.
00:06:23.000 According to the Associated Press, a local law enforcement officer climbed to the roof and found Crooks.
00:06:27.000 That's the name of the shooter again.
00:06:29.000 I normally don't mention the names of mass shooters or shooters on the show.
00:06:32.000 This is an exception when you try to kill the president of the United States.
00:06:36.000 A local law enforcement officer climbed to the roof and found Crooks, who pointed the rifle at the officer.
00:06:39.000 The officer retreated down the ladder.
00:06:41.000 The gunman quickly fired toward Trump.
00:06:43.000 That's when U.S.
00:06:44.000 Secret Service gunman shot him.
00:06:45.000 So, presumably, if not for the cop having distracted the shooter, he might have gotten off a better shot.
00:06:51.000 Again, the questions continue about how the gunman got so close to the president in the first place.
00:06:55.000 Kevin Rojek, the agent in charge of the FBI's Pittsburgh field office, said it surprised him the gunman was able to open fire on the stage before the Secret Service killed him in the first place.
00:07:04.000 The Wall Street Journal I wouldn't be doing this job.
00:07:06.000 failure for the Secret Service in decades, which clearly is true since we
00:07:10.000 haven't had a major assassination attempt on a president or presidential
00:07:13.000 candidate in several decades. The last major assassination attempt on a
00:07:17.000 presidential candidate was in fact on President Ronald Reagan going all the
00:07:22.000 way back to the early 1980s in which President Reagan was shot at very close
00:07:25.000 range. Here's the video of the shooter again he had plenty of time to get ready
00:07:29.000 up on top of that roof. You can hear President Trump's voice in the background.
00:07:39.000 Somebody is filming and then we can hear people discussing the fact that there is someone on the roof with a gun.
00:07:44.000 Right there, see him?
00:07:46.000 He's laying down, see him?
00:07:48.000 Yeah, he's laying down.
00:07:49.000 What's happening?
00:07:56.000 Yeah, look.
00:07:57.000 There he is.
00:07:57.000 Look how much time there is.
00:07:58.000 Because if we do, we're going to make America better than it's ever been.
00:08:02.000 Yeah, look. There he is.
00:08:04.000 Because we have millions and millions of people in our country that shouldn't be there.
00:08:09.000 Look how much time there is. Someone calls an officer.
00:08:12.000 We have criminals. We have...
00:08:14.000 He's on the roof! He's right here!
00:08:16.000 We have people that should not be here.
00:08:18.000 Right here! Right on the roof!
00:08:20.000 He's getting up now.
00:08:22.000 He went right on the roof, they got.
00:08:25.000 An absolutely extraordinary failure by the Secret Service here.
00:08:29.000 I'm...
00:08:31.000 According to Susan Krabs reporting for RealClearPolitics, she says, Why?
00:08:34.000 This is the problem my Secret Service sources have cited.
00:08:37.000 Secret Service's resources were diverted away from Trump.
00:08:40.000 Why?
00:08:41.000 Because Jill Biden had a local event.
00:08:43.000 They followed agency protocol, applying to Trump as a former president,
00:08:47.000 according to two sources within the Secret Service community.
00:08:50.000 There were also many supplemental agents from different field offices, not Trump's regular detail, providing security at the rally, because Trump's regular detail has been overworked, some working seven days straight, and only two counter-snipers.
00:09:01.000 That, of course, is an insane story, given the fact that the threat level to President Trump is so much higher, obviously and clearly, than the threat level to, say, Jill Biden.
00:09:09.000 It's more on the Secret Service's failures in just one second.
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00:10:19.000 So again, the crisis that has now engulfed the Secret Service is quite real.
00:10:23.000 Yesterday, CNN's Shimon Prokopis confronted a Secret Service representative asking questions about Trump's shooting.
00:10:30.000 They had no answers whatsoever.
00:10:33.000 You have one of the most significant events in the Secret Service's history occurring
00:10:38.000 on the day that no one from the Secret Service has publicly decided to take questions about
00:10:43.000 what happened.
00:10:44.000 The FBI today openly giving us a non-directed briefing about their investigation, but yet
00:10:50.000 we still have not heard from anyone from the Secret Service about what happened, about
00:10:55.000 what they've changed to see if, about what we know in addition to the event of the Security
00:10:59.000 and I just want to know how you think that that's okay.
00:11:03.000 So my role in the Secret Service is the RNC coordinator so that is my purview.
00:11:08.000 Any questions regarding yesterday's event can be directed to our public affairs office out of D.C.
00:11:15.000 That is a stonewalling from the Secret Service agent Audrey Gibson Ciccino.
00:11:19.000 That is the Secret Service RNC coordinator.
00:11:22.000 The question, in case you couldn't hear it, was, I don't understand why it is you have one of the most significant events in the Secret Service's history and no one from Secret Service has publicly decided to take questions about what exactly happened.
00:11:32.000 Well, President Biden is reacting to this tragedy, and now we are going to get the walkback.
00:11:36.000 But it's not a real walkback.
00:11:37.000 the country is lucky as hell that President Trump was not murdered up on that stage.
00:11:41.000 The tragedy occurred nonetheless. Well, President Biden is reacting to this tragedy and now we are
00:11:50.000 going to get the walk back, but it's not a real walk back.
00:11:54.000 So the walk back that we are seeing from the Biden administration, from the Biden White House
00:11:58.000 is an acknowledgement that we need to cool the rhetoric, that the rhetoric has to calm down,
00:12:02.000 which of course is something that I have been saying for years in this country, is that when
00:12:06.000 you declare that your political enemies are such a threat to the republic, that if they are elected,
00:12:11.000 it will be say the last election, it'll be the end of America, that you and your friends are
00:12:16.000 going to end up in actual You're not joking about it, you actually mean that.
00:12:20.000 When you say that sort of stuff, you are exacerbating political divides to the extent that somebody could take you seriously and then go attempt to shoot the President of the United States in the head, for example.
00:12:30.000 Well, yesterday, about 2 p.m., President Biden comes out and he makes a statement.
00:12:33.000 Now, it's pretty clear, politically speaking.
00:12:36.000 And politics, of course, is enmeshed in all of this, because President Biden is running a really rough re-elect campaign against President Trump.
00:12:42.000 By polling data, Donald Trump is leading him by about three points nationally.
00:12:45.000 If Donald Trump were to win the popular vote by three points, then he has a 100% chance of winning the Electoral College, according to Nate Silver, the poll analyst.
00:12:53.000 Joe Biden, until the assassination attempt, was the center of the news, specifically because he is clearly in mental distress.
00:13:00.000 He is a person who clearly Is sundowning late in the afternoon evening.
00:13:05.000 We'll get to that in a moment because as it turns out he did yet another Oval Office address in which he struggled to make it through a teleprompter address.
00:13:12.000 So he did an event about 2 p.m.
00:13:14.000 yesterday.
00:13:14.000 He was flanked by the Vice President Kamala Harris, the Attorney General Merrick Garland, the Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas.
00:13:22.000 He issued a rather banal statement saying an investigation was underway.
00:13:26.000 He said that he had called President Trump.
00:13:27.000 Here is what President Biden had to say about 2 p.m.
00:13:30.000 Eastern time yesterday.
00:13:32.000 Last night, I spoke with Donald Trump.
00:13:37.000 I'm sincerely grateful that he's doing well and recovering.
00:13:41.000 And we had a short but good conversation.
00:13:44.000 Jill and I are keeping him and his family in our prayers.
00:13:47.000 As this investigation continues, here's what we're going to do.
00:13:51.000 First, Mr. Trump, as a former president and nominee of the Republican Party, already receives a heightened level of security.
00:13:59.000 And I've been consistent in my direction of the Secret Service to provide him with every resource, capability, and protective measure necessary to ensure his continued safety.
00:14:08.000 Second, I've directed the head of the Secret Service to review all security measures for the Republican National Convention, which is scheduled to start tomorrow.
00:14:20.000 And third, I've directed an independent review of the national security at yesterday's rally to assess exactly what happened.
00:14:29.000 And we'll share the results of that independent review with the American people as well.
00:14:35.000 So that was his rather blasé statement yesterday.
00:14:38.000 That was earlier in the day.
00:14:40.000 Now, the Biden team is saying, and they've leaked this to Axios, for example, that Biden is going to try to get out in front of this.
00:14:46.000 He's going to try and make himself as public as possible here, mainly because it doesn't require him to take any serious questions about his fitness for office.
00:14:53.000 He's been able to shift the narrative because of this horrifying circumstance away from himself.
00:14:58.000 And now the entire focus of the American electorate is on President Trump.
00:15:03.000 Which gives President Trump the possibility of actually reshaping this election in extraordinary ways.
00:15:08.000 Meaning that President Trump, as we'll see, is going to completely shift the tone and tenor of the RNC.
00:15:15.000 There's capacity here for President Trump to win 40 states.
00:15:17.000 I am not kidding.
00:15:19.000 President Trump is now in a position, politically speaking, because he can actually be a voice for unity, which is what he is going to do.
00:15:25.000 The way that he responded, by the way, to Joe Biden's statement here is by putting on Truth Social a two-word statement, UNITE AMERICA in all caps.
00:15:32.000 He's reshifting his entire campaign messaging.
00:15:35.000 That also comes with the risk, presumably, of the fact that the focus is now back on Trump.
00:15:40.000 Meaning that when all the focus was on Biden, politically speaking, that means that Biden is going to lose because no one likes Joe Biden as president.
00:15:45.000 They think that he's done a terrible job.
00:15:46.000 And they also happen to think that he is quite old.
00:15:48.000 I mean, the fact is that after Joe Biden finished that mid-afternoon statement yesterday, he shuffled out of the room looking like Mr. Burns from The Simpsons.
00:15:57.000 He's holding his hands in a bizarre way.
00:15:59.000 And here is some video of him walking away from the podium That video is not particularly flattering to Joe Biden.
00:16:12.000 He's holding his hands stiffly in front of him.
00:16:15.000 He can barely move.
00:16:17.000 We can barely move.
00:16:18.000 Merrick Garland has to reach behind and make sure the door is open wide enough that Joe Biden can get through.
00:16:23.000 Remember that the news cycle until the assassination attempt was all about the fact that Joe Biden might be ousted by his own party because he's trailing in polls and clearly declining every single day.
00:16:33.000 But the focus has now shifted back to Donald Trump.
00:16:35.000 Donald Trump responds to that press conference, as we say, by saying, Unite America, we'll talk about Trump's messaging in just one second.
00:16:41.000 But it also puts Biden on the defensive because the reality is that, as we discussed yesterday on the show, The people have been heating up the rhetoric to the point where there was an assassination attempt against Donald Trump, have been doing so for 10 years, and they include people like Joe Biden, who all the way back in 2011 was suggesting that Tea Partiers were terrorists, that they were akin to terrorists.
00:16:58.000 He's a person who suggested that Mitt Romney wanted to put black people back in chains.
00:17:02.000 Joe Biden has spent large swathes of his career engaging in the most extraordinarily radical type of rhetoric with regard to his political opponents, full-scale demonization.
00:17:13.000 And now Joe Biden has to try and walk that back.
00:17:14.000 We'll get to that momentarily.
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00:18:17.000 Okay, so Joe Biden made two statements yesterday.
00:18:21.000 There was the earlier statement.
00:18:22.000 Then, around 8 p.m., he made another statement from the Oval Office.
00:18:26.000 Now, again, because of his sundowning, there had been a lot of talk about the idea that he was going to pre-tape this.
00:18:32.000 And then apparently after it leaked that he was going to pre-tape it, he decided to do it live, which as it turns out, imagistically, was a bad idea because he fumbled and bumbled his way through a very short six-minute televised address.
00:18:43.000 He made a bunch of significant errors.
00:18:45.000 We'll go through them as we see them.
00:18:48.000 The message that he was attempting to purvey is a fine message.
00:18:52.000 The problem is that coming from Joe Biden, who refuses to dissociate from his central campaign message, which is that his opponent is a fascist who is going to destroy the country wholesale and turn himself into a Hitlerian dictator, it rings pretty false.
00:19:06.000 So yesterday, Josh Shapiro, the governor of Pennsylvania, he also said it's time to take down the rhetoric.
00:19:10.000 Many people said it was time to take down the rhetoric.
00:19:12.000 The difference is Josh Shapiro hasn't said that his political opponents are going to literally end democracy.
00:19:17.000 Joe Biden's entire campaign has been about how his political opponents are going to end democracy and institute a fascist dictatorship.
00:19:24.000 That if he does not win re-election, then his political opponent is so evil and so bad that there will likely never be another election.
00:19:31.000 That democracy will be fatally undermined.
00:19:33.000 And so when Joe Biden says, we all need to take down the rhetoric, I'll take that from him the minute that he's willing to say, including me.
00:19:42.000 If he says including me, then okay, we can let bygones be bygones.
00:19:47.000 We can have some conversations about what level of political rhetoric is justified by the sort of claims that you are making.
00:19:54.000 You can talk about Donald Trump's disregard for democratic structures because that's normal.
00:19:58.000 It's a different thing to do that than to suggest that Donald Trump is going to come into office and institute the Handmaid's Tale, which is precisely what Biden headquarters tweeted out like two weeks ago.
00:20:09.000 Just a couple days before the shooting, Joe Biden's Twitter account tweeted that Donald Trump would be a full-scale dictator.
00:20:16.000 So the minute that Joe Biden is willing to dissociate from the central message of his campaign, I will take more seriously his talk about lowering the political temperature.
00:20:27.000 And again, I've been consistent on this.
00:20:29.000 I think there are people who are on the right who have spent years saying unhinged things about their political opponents.
00:20:35.000 No one comes before I do when it comes to criticizing the Democratic Party and the risks to the American public that the Democratic Party platform poses.
00:20:44.000 The dangers on foreign policy, the dangers on domestic policy.
00:20:46.000 I wrote an entire book called The Authoritarian Moment about the rise of authoritarian executive government.
00:20:51.000 That came out just a few years ago.
00:20:53.000 I get it.
00:20:53.000 But there's a difference between saying that and saying that, say, if Joe Biden wins, there will never be another election.
00:20:58.000 And no one actually believes that, because you know what I've been saying for years?
00:21:01.000 If you truly believed That your political opposition was so evil that this was the final election, you would actually have a moral obligation to do something violent.
00:21:09.000 But now, we are seeing Joe Biden, who's engaged in precisely that sort of rhetoric, dissociate from the violence.
00:21:15.000 Okay, well, that's fine, but then you have to stop saying the thing.
00:21:20.000 In just one second, we'll get to Joe Biden's actual address from the Oval Office last night.
00:21:25.000 It was not good for him.
00:21:26.000 Again, I think that the message that he is generally stating is the right message.
00:21:30.000 I think that he delivered it really horribly.
00:21:32.000 And I think also that he was missing just that one phrase, including me.
00:21:37.000 Get to that in a moment.
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00:22:44.000 Rules and restrictions may apply. Okay. So last night about 8 PM, Joe Biden sits down in the Oval
00:22:49.000 Office to make a statement. And he begins by saying the usual slogans, talking about how we're
00:22:56.000 fellow Americans. My fellow Americans, I want to speak to you tonight about the need for us to
00:23:04.000 to lower the temperature in our politics.
00:23:07.000 And to remember, while we may disagree, we are not enemies.
00:23:11.000 We're neighbors.
00:23:12.000 We're friends.
00:23:14.000 Coworkers.
00:23:14.000 Citizens.
00:23:15.000 And most importantly, we are fellow Americans.
00:23:18.000 We must stand together.
00:23:21.000 Yesterday's shooting at Donald Trump's rally in Pennsylvania calls on all of us to take a step back.
00:23:27.000 Take stock of where we are.
00:23:29.000 How we go forward from here.
00:23:33.000 So, again, this sort of rhetoric about how we need to take a step back and take... Your central message was precisely the opposite of this thing.
00:23:41.000 It was precisely the opposite of what you're saying right now.
00:23:45.000 You're saying we're not enemies, we're friends.
00:23:47.000 You literally said in the debate, that was just a few weeks ago, you said you were asked a direct question, are the people voting for Donald Trump a threat to democracy?
00:23:55.000 And you said the more they find out about him, yes.
00:23:58.000 You labeled what is likely to be 80 million Americans threats to the democracy.
00:24:02.000 That is a hard one to walk back unless you are willing to just clearly say the thing, including me.
00:24:08.000 It's not all that hard.
00:24:09.000 It's not all that hard.
00:24:10.000 Now, many of us in public life, we've said things that we regret.
00:24:14.000 Many of us have said, if I could do it better, I would have done it better.
00:24:17.000 And now I hope to do it better in the future.
00:24:19.000 Or, here's a generalized political problem in which I myself have engaged.
00:24:22.000 It happens all the time, but Joe Biden can't find it in his heart to do it.
00:24:25.000 Why?
00:24:25.000 Because he can't let go of the message.
00:24:27.000 Understand, he is stuck now between a rock and a hard place.
00:24:30.000 The rock is that his centralizing platform, his centralizing message, is in fact inherently dangerous.
00:24:38.000 That is the big issue.
00:24:39.000 Okay?
00:24:40.000 Because that's the rock, and the hard place is that if he keeps embracing that message, it obviously is the impetus for violent actors.
00:24:48.000 That's the rock and that's the hard place, and he can't escape that, except he's gonna try and walk between the raindrops here by suggesting that everybody needs to take down the temperature, except for me, except for him.
00:24:58.000 That's the big problem here.
00:24:59.000 And again, I do believe that everybody needs to take down the temperature.
00:25:02.000 I think all of the talk about incipient dictatorship in what is historically one of the freest countries in the history of the world is absolutely insane and overwrought and ridiculous, as important as I think politics are.
00:25:14.000 I've been saying that for pretty much my entire career.
00:25:18.000 With that said, Joe Biden is not saying that thing.
00:25:22.000 President Biden continued his Oval Office address last night by issuing his condolences to the families, which of course is something that you would imagine that he would and should do.
00:25:30.000 Here he was last night.
00:25:32.000 Thankfully, former Trump is not seriously injured.
00:25:36.000 I spoke to him last night.
00:25:37.000 I'm grateful.
00:25:38.000 He's doing well.
00:25:38.000 And Jill and I keep him and his family in our prayers.
00:25:42.000 We also extend our deepest condolences to the family of the victims who was killed.
00:25:46.000 Corey was a husband, a father, a volunteer firefighter, a hero, sheltering his family from those bullets.
00:25:53.000 We should all hold his family and all those injured in our prayers.
00:25:58.000 Again, there's sort of two issues here.
00:26:00.000 One is the actual stuff that he's saying, and then the second is how he's saying it.
00:26:03.000 This is the President of the United States at 8 p.m.
00:26:05.000 He has passed his bedtime, and he is starting to lose it in the middle of the speech.
00:26:08.000 Former Trump.
00:26:09.000 Not former President Trump, former Trump.
00:26:12.000 Then he gets into the actual main message of the speech, which is that violence is not the answer.
00:26:16.000 And again, Agree.
00:26:18.000 I just wish that your party agreed after having winked and nodded at violence on college campuses throughout this year on behalf of Hamas.
00:26:24.000 I wish they had not winked and nodded and tried to bail out protesters, if you are Kamala Harris, during the BLM riots of 2020.
00:26:29.000 I wish that they had not soft-pedaled the attempted assassination of Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
00:26:34.000 I wish that they had not pretended that the assassination, the attempted assassination of Congress people during a baseball game in 2017, Had nothing to do with them.
00:26:43.000 I really wish they'd done all of those things.
00:26:45.000 And the only phrase that's missing from this particular address, and the one that would have made all the difference, was, including me.
00:26:52.000 That's it.
00:26:53.000 That's all he had to do.
00:26:54.000 And if he had done that, it would have been a big political win for the President of the United States, because then he could have been a unifying figure.
00:27:00.000 But by eliding that phrase, after his political opponent, who he has attempted to use his DOJ to prosecute, He's targeted him.
00:27:09.000 His entire campaign has been about how his political opponent is Orange Hitler.
00:27:14.000 Ignoring that phrase, including me there, including himself in the critique, is a massive and clear omission.
00:27:23.000 We cannot, we must not go down this road in America.
00:27:27.000 We've traveled before throughout our history.
00:27:30.000 Violence has never been the answer.
00:27:32.000 Whether it's with members of Congress of both parties being targeted and shot, Or a violent mob attacking the Capitol on January 6th.
00:27:40.000 Or a brutal attack on the spouse of former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
00:27:44.000 Or information and intimidation on election officials.
00:27:49.000 Or the kidnapping plot against the sitting governor.
00:27:52.000 Or an attempted assassination on Donald Trump.
00:27:55.000 There is no place in America for this kind of violence, or for any violence, ever.
00:28:00.000 Period.
00:28:01.000 No exceptions.
00:28:03.000 We can't allow this violence to be normalized.
00:28:07.000 Now again, each one of the cases he mentions there is a unique case and an individual case, and you actually have to go and look at the circumstances surrounding each case, sort of grouping them all together in one giant basket is, I think, a little bit intellectually dishonest.
00:28:19.000 For example, when you look at the kidnapping plot on Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, that plot was actually fomented by federal agents, so much so that the people who were tried in that particular case were not convicted in that particular case.
00:28:32.000 And not all of these cases are quite the same.
00:28:35.000 And some of these cases involve people who are clearly mentally ill, as the man who attacked Nancy Pelosi's husband, Paul Pelosi.
00:28:42.000 And some of these cases are clearly politically motivated.
00:28:44.000 Say the congressional baseball shooting.
00:28:45.000 He says that that was about attacking members of both parties, but it wasn't.
00:28:48.000 It was about targeting Republicans.
00:28:50.000 January 6th was a different case in kind than the attempted assassination of President Trump in the sense that the vast majority of people on January 6th who were arrested were arrested for trespassing and were not carrying weapons.
00:29:02.000 And the only person who was actually killed on January 6th was not, in fact, a politician.
00:29:06.000 It was Ashley Babbitt, who was one of the rioters.
00:29:08.000 So again, each one of these cases, but the general overarching point, which is that the heat of the rhetoric should go down is something with which I generally agree.
00:29:16.000 But again, here's the problem.
00:29:18.000 Coming from Joe Biden, it rings hollow.
00:29:20.000 So here is the president of the United States again saying that the political rhetoric is too much.
00:29:25.000 We have to cool it down.
00:29:27.000 You know, the political record in this country has gotten very heated.
00:29:32.000 It's time to cool it down.
00:29:34.000 We all have a responsibility to do that.
00:29:36.000 Yes, we have deeply felt strong disagreements.
00:29:40.000 The stakes in this election are enormously high.
00:29:43.000 I've said it many times that the choice we make in this election is going to shape the future of America and the world for decades to come.
00:29:52.000 I believe that with all my soul.
00:29:54.000 I know that millions of my fellow Americans believe it as well.
00:29:58.000 And some have a different view as to the direction our country should take.
00:30:02.000 Disagreement is inevitable in American democracy.
00:30:05.000 It's part of human nature.
00:30:07.000 But politics must never be a literal battlefield, and God forbid, a killing field.
00:30:14.000 Again, all of this would be fine if he just included that phrase, including me.
00:30:20.000 When he says, we all have to cool it down, we all have to take note, we all have to... We all is a way of evading responsibility if you don't say, we includes me.
00:30:29.000 Otherwise, like at that point, we reads as you, when you are in some sort of argument with your spouse and we say, we all need to, if she accuses you of something, you say, we all need to take responsibility.
00:30:40.000 What you're really saying is you want to avoid culpability.
00:30:43.000 And then President Biden goes on to mention the Republican convention and suggest that the Republicans need to make their criticisms in good faith.
00:30:52.000 Their candidate was nearly shot to death the other day.
00:30:55.000 Maybe you might want to focus on like your own side for a second, Mr. President.
00:31:00.000 Republican convention will start tomorrow.
00:31:03.000 I have no doubt they'll criticize my record and offer their own vision for this country.
00:31:07.000 I'll be traveling this week making the case for our record and the vision, my vision of the country, our vision.
00:31:14.000 And then he says, it has to be done in good faith.
00:31:17.000 Then he adds sort of one final botchery in his speech.
00:31:19.000 He says that we solve our issues at the battle box, which first of all, like if we're going to do that, I'm all in favor of battle boxes.
00:31:25.000 That sounds amazing.
00:31:26.000 It sounds like a great TV show.
00:31:27.000 I'm all for golfing for the presidency and battle boxes, but I don't think this is what he meant to say.
00:31:33.000 I'll continue to speak out strongly for our democracy, stand up for our constitution and the rule of law, to call for action at the ballot box.
00:31:42.000 No violence on our streets.
00:31:44.000 That's how democracy should work.
00:31:46.000 We debate and disagree.
00:31:48.000 We compare and contrast the character of the candidates, the records, the issues, the agenda, the vision for America.
00:31:55.000 But in America, we resolve our differences at the battle box.
00:31:58.000 You know, that's how we do it.
00:32:01.000 At the battle box.
00:32:02.000 Not with bullets.
00:32:04.000 The power to change America should always rest in the hands of the people, not the hands
00:32:08.000 of would-be assassins.
00:32:09.000 Again, there's the message and then there's the deliverer of the message, and it is not
00:32:13.000 a particularly well-delivered message from the President of the United States.
00:32:17.000 Now, as we'll say in just a moment, this is not a message that's just coming from the
00:32:22.000 It's a message that's being echoed on the right.
00:32:24.000 Some people have more credibility with this message and some people have significantly less.
00:32:27.000 First, you might think you're getting everything your body needs from that green juice that you've been chugging down every morning.
00:32:32.000 You, however, are likely not.
00:32:34.000 Most people still fall short of the essential nutrients that their bodies need to function at their best.
00:32:40.000 My good friend and colleague, Christine, who happens to be a triathlete, Chelsea's mom with a toddler, has been taking Momentus Creatine Omega-3 and protein daily to cover all her bases.
00:32:47.000 She is thrilled with the results.
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00:33:11.000 athletes and experts use and help develop Momentus products. So if you're like Christine and
00:33:15.000 you want to take supplements that are made by and used by the best in the world, head on
00:33:19.000 over to livemomentus.com slash Shapiro or use code Shapiro for 20% off. Again, that's livemomentus.com
00:33:27.000 slash Shapiro for 20% off.
00:33:29.000 Also, the images of former President Trump narrowly avoiding an assassin's bullet this weekend
00:33:33.000 should be utterly incomprehensible.
00:33:35.000 But while the world watched in shock, there was a sinking realization this is not nearly as surprising as it should be.
00:33:40.000 There's a pattern.
00:33:41.000 It's disturbing.
00:33:42.000 The violence against our democracy and anybody who dares to stand up against the left's radical agenda continues to ramp up.
00:33:46.000 Here at The Daily Wire, this near-tragedy, an actual tragedy since someone was killed, has only strengthened our resolve to expose the truth.
00:33:53.000 While the mainstream media continue to try to sweep the facts under the rug, We are shining a spotlight on the reality they are desperate to hide from you.
00:33:59.000 The stakes have never been higher.
00:34:00.000 The truth has never been more critical.
00:34:01.000 I mean you know that.
00:34:02.000 You've been watching the show for the past few days.
00:34:03.000 We can only do that with your support.
00:34:05.000 Go to dailywire.com slash subscribe right now and become a member.
00:34:08.000 It's the moment to join the fight.
00:34:10.000 Visit dailywire.com slash subscribe and join us today.
00:34:13.000 Meanwhile, again, it is not only President Biden who's been calling for a tamping down of the rhetoric.
00:34:16.000 Speaker Mike Johnson, who will be joining us a little bit later on in the show, he also says that we need to tamp down the rhetoric.
00:34:22.000 The difference is that Johnson has always been a person who uses stayed and normal rhetoric, as opposed to President Biden, whose entire campaign is based around the idea that his opponent is Hitler.
00:34:32.000 Here is Speaker Johnson saying what has to be said on The Today Show.
00:34:35.000 Again, he's not just him.
00:34:36.000 Josh Shapiro in Pennsylvania said the same thing, and he's on the left.
00:34:39.000 There are people in politics who are responsible and there are people like President Biden who are irresponsible.
00:34:44.000 And the reality is, Speaker Johnson, it comes better from Speaker Johnson.
00:34:49.000 America awakens to a rather surreal morning.
00:34:52.000 This is a horrific act of political violence that ought to be roundly condemned.
00:34:57.000 Obviously, we can't go on like this as a society.
00:35:00.000 You know, our prayers are with President Trump, all the rally attendees, certainly the family of the individual that lost their life and those who were injured.
00:35:09.000 I've gotten briefings from law enforcement.
00:35:11.000 I spoke to Secretary Mayorkas last night and asked him some pointed questions with regard to Homeland Security and what happened there.
00:35:18.000 I've already announced that Congress will do a full investigation of the tragedy yesterday to determine where there were lapses in security and anything else that the American people need to know and deserve to know.
00:35:30.000 But in the meantime, we've got to turn the rhetoric down.
00:35:33.000 We've got to turn the temperature down in this country.
00:35:35.000 We need leaders of all parties on both sides to call that out.
00:35:41.000 Speaking of less credible sources saying this thing, here is Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont.
00:35:45.000 He's saying the same thing.
00:35:45.000 Democracy isn't about radical rhetoric.
00:35:47.000 The only problem, Bernie, is that that's been your entire stock in trade for legitimately your whole career.
00:35:53.000 The bottom line is what we need is a nation.
00:35:56.000 What a democracy is about.
00:35:58.000 It's not radical rhetoric.
00:36:00.000 What it is about is a serious discussion of where we are as a nation and how we go forward.
00:36:06.000 You know, in a certain way, Kristen, politics should be kind of boring.
00:36:11.000 You know?
00:36:13.000 Our health care system is dysfunctional.
00:36:16.000 How do we fix it?
00:36:17.000 Well, it's kind of a boring discussion, but we need a health care system that guarantees health care to all people.
00:36:23.000 We have massive income and wealth inequality.
00:36:25.000 Well, maybe a boring discussion.
00:36:27.000 Should three people own more wealth than the bottom half of American society?
00:36:30.000 So I think what we have got to see is serious discussion of serious issues and not this kind of harsh rhetoric that we have heard for the last number of years.
00:36:43.000 Harsh rhetoric, again.
00:36:44.000 How about an including me, Senator?
00:36:47.000 How about an including me?
00:36:48.000 This is a quote from Bernie Sanders from January of this year, asked about the re-election of former President Trump.
00:36:55.000 He said it will, quote, be the end of democracy, functional democracy, quote.
00:36:58.000 He's made that clear.
00:36:59.000 There's a lot of personal bitterness.
00:37:00.000 He's a bitter man, having gone through four indictments, humiliated.
00:37:03.000 He's going to take it out on his enemies.
00:37:04.000 We've got to explain to the American people what that means to them, what the collapse of American democracy will mean to all of us.
00:37:12.000 Again, when you say those sorts of things, and then you say, well, we just need some moderation in our rhetoric, I don't believe you until you do it.
00:37:18.000 I don't believe you until you do it.
00:37:19.000 Meanwhile, the Washington Post, they ran an editorial talking about taking down the rhetoric as well, which is hilarious, coming from, once again, a very extreme newspaper, the Washington Post.
00:37:29.000 The main message of the Washington Post, however, is that the RNC and President Trump are responsible for taking down the rhetoric.
00:37:36.000 And that really, Joe Biden, well, maybe a little bit.
00:37:39.000 They say Democrats, too, need to recalibrate their rhetoric.
00:37:42.000 But Biden struck an appropriate tone on Sunday.
00:37:44.000 Unity is the most elusive goal of all, but nothing is more important than that right now.
00:37:48.000 But at no point do they call on the president to stop saying that his political opponent will become a Hitlerian dictator.
00:37:53.000 Presumably, in order to avoid that sort of rhetoric, the Hitlerian dictator rhetoric, MSNBC told on itself today.
00:38:01.000 They actually pulled Morning Joe off the air after the shooting.
00:38:04.000 Why?
00:38:04.000 Because they were afraid that Joe and Mika were going to whole hog suggest that President Trump maybe sort of a little bit... Clearly they were afraid of something.
00:38:15.000 There's a reason you pull your highest rated show on MSNBC off the air.
00:38:19.000 There's a reason that happens.
00:38:21.000 According to CNN, MSNBC will not air Morning Joe, its celebrated politics roundtable program on Monday, opting to instead air continued breaking news coverage of the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
00:38:32.000 It's certain to raise eyebrows.
00:38:33.000 A person familiar with the matter told CNN the decision was made to avoid a scenario in which one of the show's stable of two dozen plus guests might make an inappropriate comment on live television that could be used to assail the program and network as a whole.
00:38:43.000 Given the breaking news nature of the story, the person said it made more sense to continue airing rolling breaking news coverage in this fraught political moment.
00:38:49.000 But Joe and Meek aren't the anchors.
00:38:50.000 They should theoretically be able to handle that.
00:38:52.000 What they are basically admitting right there is that MSNBC's Morning Joe has become a propaganda outlet for the idea that Donald Trump is Orange Hitler.
00:39:02.000 Meanwhile, in other breaking news, I mean, there's just too much news happening right now.
00:39:06.000 A federal judge has now dismissed, according to the Wall Street Journal, the classified documents prosecution against Donald Trump on Monday, siding with the former president's argument that special counsel Jack Smith was unlawfully appointed.
00:39:16.000 So that indictment has been effectively thrown out with all of its 40 felony counts.
00:39:23.000 That is the classified documents case.
00:39:25.000 Judge Eileen Cannon, she says that Jack Smith, who's the special prosecutor in this case, his appointment violates both the appointments and the appropriations clauses.
00:39:34.000 So the appointments clause sets as a default rule that all officers of the United States, whether inferior or principal, must be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate.
00:39:43.000 And then the appropriations clause prohibits money from being drawn from the Treasury unless that money was appropriated by an act of Congress.
00:39:49.000 And so Eileen Cannon writes, After careful study of the seminal issue, the answer is no.
00:39:52.000 as framed in the motion, raise the following threshold question.
00:39:55.000 Is there a statute in the US code that authorizes the appointment of special counsel Smith
00:39:58.000 to conduct this prosecution?
00:40:00.000 After careful study of the seminal issue, the answer is no.
00:40:02.000 None of the statutes cited as legal authority for the appointment give the attorney general
00:40:06.000 broad inferior officer appointing power or bestow upon him the right to appoint a federal officer
00:40:11.000 with the kind of prosecutorial power wielded by special counsel Smith.
00:40:14.000 The bottom line is this, the appropriate, the appointments clauses
00:40:16.000 a critical constitutional restriction stemming from separation of powers.
00:40:20.000 It gives the Congress a considered role in determining the propriety of vesting appointment power
00:40:24.000 for inferior officers.
00:40:25.000 The special counsel's position effectively usurps that important legislative authority, transferring it to a head of department, and in the process, threatening the structural liberty inherent in the separation of powers.
00:40:34.000 If the political branches wish to grant the AG power to appoint special counsel Smith to investigate and prosecute this action with the full powers of a U.S.
00:40:41.000 attorney, there is a valid means by which to do so.
00:40:43.000 He can be appointed and confirmed through the default method prescribed in the appointments clause.
00:40:48.000 So she is throwing out, dismissing all charges in this case.
00:40:52.000 Presumably that will be appealed.
00:40:53.000 It will go up to higher courts.
00:40:54.000 It will end up in the Supreme Court.
00:40:56.000 But bottom line is that classified documents case is absolutely dead.
00:40:59.000 It was already dead prior to the election.
00:41:01.000 Now it is certainly dead prior to the election.
00:41:04.000 All of which is leading Democrats to freak out on a political level.
00:41:08.000 According to NBC News, one Democrat said, quote, we are no longer talking about Joe Biden's age.
00:41:13.000 But according to NBC News, at a time when President Joe Biden
00:41:16.000 has been struggling to shore up support with fellow Democrats,
00:41:18.000 some professional Democratic political operatives said Saturday's shooting will end up sealing the incumbent's
00:41:22.000 electoral fate.
00:41:23.000 We are so beyond effed, one longtime Democratic insider said, noting the image of Trump thrusting his fist in the
00:41:28.000 air with blood dramatically smeared across his face will be
00:41:30.000 indelible.
00:41:31.000 The presidential contest ended last night, said a veteran Democratic consultant.
00:41:35.000 Now it's time to focus on keeping the Senate and trying trying to pick up the house.
00:41:38.000 Meanwhile, Axios saying the same thing.
00:41:41.000 According to Axios, most lawmakers who spoke to Axios said it's too early to say whether the cessation of tensions will last until the DNC next month.
00:41:49.000 But, quote, we've resigned ourselves to a second Trump presidency, according to one House Democrat.
00:41:53.000 Now, that doesn't mean Republicans should get complacent here.
00:41:55.000 They absolutely should not.
00:41:57.000 They absolutely should not.
00:41:58.000 You can't afford to be complacent.
00:42:00.000 In the middle of a historic election cycle.
00:42:03.000 And Joe Biden is a terrible president who needs to be put out to pasture, clearly.
00:42:06.000 Donald Trump must be elected, so don't be taken in by the sort of false waving of the white flag by the Democratic Party here.
00:42:12.000 However, are the odds seriously stacked against Joe Biden?
00:42:15.000 Yes.
00:42:16.000 But the problem is that because the assassination story took the wind out of the sails of the Dump Biden movement, now they're trapped.
00:42:22.000 Here is CBS News reporting that Biden's challengers have basically stopped calling.
00:42:28.000 I've been speaking with some top Democrats.
00:42:29.000 They believe that those Democrats who have the concerns about President Biden are now standing down politically, will back President Biden because of this fragile political moment.
00:42:38.000 All of that talk about the debate faded almost instantly among my top Democratic sources.
00:42:43.000 As this unfolded, they say it's time for the country to stick together, and that means Democrats sticking together as well.
00:42:50.000 Again, the Democrats are going to try to stick together, but they're going to go down together at this point.
00:42:54.000 Meanwhile, the RNC, as we've mentioned repeatedly, begins today.
00:42:59.000 Democrats are trying to swivel this into a referendum.
00:43:01.000 The assassination attempt on Trump, they're trying to swivel into a referendum on the evil rhetoric of the Republicans.
00:43:06.000 Good luck with that.
00:43:07.000 Here's Jen Psaki, former White House press secretary on MSNBC, who is trying to say that the RNC is really the place where all of this change needs to happen.
00:43:15.000 And listen, I think the smart thing for President Trump to do is run an absolutely moderate, unifying campaign.
00:43:21.000 If he does that at this point, he's going to win 35, 40 states.
00:43:24.000 If President Trump does that, he's going to win not only swing states like Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin.
00:43:28.000 He's going to win Virginia.
00:43:29.000 He's going to win New Hampshire.
00:43:31.000 He's going to win Minnesota.
00:43:32.000 All these are within spitting distance.
00:43:34.000 Here is Jen Psaki, however, trying to scare tactic this thing.
00:43:38.000 I think you're absolutely right.
00:43:39.000 That is the question.
00:43:40.000 And Jen, in fact, we've already seen the finger pointing begin.
00:43:45.000 Some people even blaming President Biden.
00:43:48.000 We heard that very forceful condemnation by President Biden of what happened.
00:43:54.000 As someone who used to work with the president, what are you anticipating in terms of, he's obviously pulled his political ads forward, but as Carol said, the question is how long does this moment last?
00:44:04.000 And how do you think he sees his role right now?
00:44:07.000 I mean, I think his role, I'm betting that how he responded was as a human being, which is how we just saw Lindsey Graham at moments during that interview and Senator Sanders and Senator Coons respond.
00:44:18.000 That's how everybody should be responding.
00:44:20.000 For anyone out there who has a platform, who thinks the moment right now is to be political and attack the other party, you are feeding into the danger.
00:44:28.000 You are making it more likely there's retaliation.
00:44:31.000 I'm incredibly scared.
00:44:32.000 I'm scared for journalists.
00:44:33.000 I'm scared for people who have public platforms of all parties.
00:44:37.000 And that's how people should feel.
00:44:38.000 Okay.
00:44:38.000 Alright.
00:44:39.000 Maybe, maybe, maybe, again, if you're going to impute violent rhetoric to the other side, you know, we've talked on the show about rhetoric that I think is totally inappropriate from the right side of the aisle.
00:44:50.000 We've done it repeatedly on the show.
00:44:52.000 I've never heard that from Jen Psaki about the left.
00:44:55.000 Like, pretty much ever.
00:44:56.000 And herein lies the problem.
00:44:57.000 President Trump, for his part again, he's running a very smart campaign.
00:45:00.000 He has completely rewritten his convention speech in light of the assassination attempt against him on Saturday, according to the Washington Examiner.
00:45:06.000 He said, the speech I was going to give on Thursday was going to be a humdinger.
00:45:08.000 Had this not happened, this would have been one of the most incredible speeches, mostly at the policies of Joe Biden.
00:45:12.000 Honestly, he said, it's going to be a whole different speech now.
00:45:16.000 He has switched, he said, from planning to excite his voter base to one that demonstrates his belief The attack on him at a rally in Pennsylvania had changed the election campaign entirely.
00:45:24.000 Trump said, Again, he says that he is going to speak about unity.
00:45:26.000 different walks of life and different political views have called him.
00:45:28.000 He noted he was saved from death because he turned from the crowd to look at his
00:45:30.000 screen showing data he was using in the speech.
00:45:32.000 That reality is just setting in, he said. I rarely look away from the crowd had I
00:45:35.000 not done that in that moment, well we wouldn't be talking today,
00:45:38.000 would we? Again, he says that he is going to speak about unity. He has also
00:45:42.000 announced that he will be making his VP announcement today.
00:45:47.000 Quick rundown on possible VP candidates who are sort of at the top of the
00:45:50.000 list unless he goes completely off the board.
00:45:52.000 The ones who have been mentioned publicly a lot are Senator J.D.
00:45:55.000 Vance.
00:45:56.000 J.D.
00:45:56.000 Vance is incredibly young.
00:45:57.000 He's 39 years old.
00:45:58.000 He's most famous for a memoir that he wrote in 2016 called Hillbilly Elegy, which was largely about the predations of the welfare state and the effect that that has on blue-collar, low-income people.
00:46:08.000 He was the junior senator from Ohio since 2023.
00:46:10.000 So he's brand new, like brand spanking new.
00:46:13.000 Enlisted in the U.S.
00:46:13.000 Marine Corps, served as a combat correspondent in the Iraq War.
00:46:17.000 He has a JD from Yale.
00:46:19.000 That means that he's a lawyer from Yale.
00:46:22.000 He's been a very fiery candidate, obviously.
00:46:25.000 He tends to land on the more isolationist side of the foreign policy spectrum.
00:46:28.000 He also tends to land on the more big government side of the political spectrum, which is a shift from his hillbilly elegy days.
00:46:33.000 He's an incredibly good speaker.
00:46:35.000 He's very, very articulate, and he's incredibly aggressive.
00:46:37.000 He would be an excellent attack dog.
00:46:39.000 His politics, as we say, are a little bit heterodox from the sort of normal traditional Republican Party, which, for some of his supporters, is the appeal.
00:46:46.000 Senator Marco Rubio is another candidate who is up for this.
00:46:49.000 Obviously, people know Senator Rubio from his 2016 run against President Trump.
00:46:53.000 He's 53 years old.
00:46:55.000 He was the Florida Speaker of the House from 2006 to 2008.
00:46:56.000 He's been a senator in Florida since 2011 with a JD from Miami Law.
00:47:03.000 Rubio's upsides, he's Hispanic, which means that he is going to be able to speak Spanish to an entirely different crowd.
00:47:09.000 Donald Trump is really outperforming with Hispanic voters right now.
00:47:12.000 He also happens to be a really good speaker.
00:47:14.000 The downside is, like J.D.
00:47:15.000 Vance, actually pretty much all these candidates in this race have at one point or other criticized President Trump because of President Trump's various foibles.
00:47:23.000 Governor Doug Burgum, 67.
00:47:25.000 More in line with sort of the age range that we've been looking at in our presidents.
00:47:28.000 Governor of North Dakota since 2016.
00:47:30.000 MBA from Stanford University, 1980.
00:47:32.000 Extremely wealthy.
00:47:34.000 Has an estimated net worth of $100 million.
00:47:38.000 Excellent on the economy.
00:47:40.000 Excellent on energy.
00:47:42.000 His bona fides are really more domestically laden.
00:47:45.000 And then there are some candidates who are sort of off the board who I think are interesting.
00:47:49.000 So were I President Trump, I would pick Glenn Youngkin.
00:47:52.000 He's been the governor of Virginia since 2022.
00:47:54.000 He's the governor of a purple state.
00:47:56.000 He's very popular in that purple state.
00:47:58.000 He has an MBA from Harvard, extremely pro-business.
00:48:01.000 Is the sort of dark pick, Darth Kors pick, VP pick for Trump.
00:48:05.000 I think that if Trump picks Junkin, not only is the election over, I think Trump wins a bunch of swing states that he might not otherwise win.
00:48:11.000 Mainly because the image that you project going forward here, especially looking for a unity campaign, is going to be one that appeals to those suburban moms.
00:48:19.000 This is actually Trump's opportunity to win back many of the crowds that he's lost in 2016 and 2020, while maintaining the crowd that he picked up in 2016 and 2020.
00:48:27.000 I think that Junkin might be the single best pick for that.
00:48:31.000 I'm gonna put out there the idea that maybe he goes with someone from New York also, because we know that President Trump really is obsessed with New York.
00:48:37.000 He is from New York originally, obviously.
00:48:39.000 There are polls that show him within spitting distance of New York.
00:48:41.000 If he won New York, not only would this be a landslide, this is almost a 50-state landslide at that point.
00:48:45.000 So, not completely crazy to suggest he might pick somebody like Elise Stefanik from New York or Lee Zeldin, who is the former gubernatorial candidate who came within six points of beating Kathy Hochul in an extraordinarily blue state.
00:48:55.000 We're going to find that out very, very shortly.
00:48:59.000 Again, Too much news happening.
00:49:01.000 Joining us directly from the RNC is Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson.
00:49:05.000 Speaker Johnson, of course, is serving as the 56th speaker since October 25th, 2023.
00:49:10.000 He's from Louisiana.
00:49:11.000 Speaker Johnson, thanks so much for the time.
00:49:15.000 Hey, my friend.
00:49:15.000 Great to be with you.
00:49:18.000 So I assume that you're in Milwaukee in preparation for the RNC, which is supposed to begin this afternoon and tonight.
00:49:24.000 So what's the mood in Milwaukee right now?
00:49:29.000 You know, it's a little different than we might have expected.
00:49:31.000 There was lots of anticipation and excitement, and it's still here, but there's a little bit different feel, of course, after the events over the last couple of days.
00:49:40.000 I wouldn't say subdued, I would just say that it's sort of changed the mood.
00:49:43.000 People feel the weight of the moment.
00:49:44.000 They feel the weight of history that's upon us.
00:49:47.000 I'll be chairing the proceedings here in a few hours, and we go through the mechanics, all the procedural things, and then it builds up to the crescendo of the speeches each night in primetime, and ultimately President Trump's address.
00:49:58.000 And I think people feel that we're in a very good place, that we're going to win this election cycle, I think, from top to bottom.
00:50:05.000 That's a great thing for the country.
00:50:06.000 But it's more than just a political cycle right now.
00:50:09.000 It's really about, in a very true sense, saving the country and turning us back to where we need to be.
00:50:14.000 And I think people feel that and it's affected the mood here.
00:50:19.000 Speaker Johnson, obviously, you've spoken out since the assassination attempt against President Trump on Saturday that thank God failed by legitimately centimeters.
00:50:26.000 I mean, it's an astonishing act of God that President Trump was not killed on stage on Saturday.
00:50:31.000 And you've spoken out about the fact that the rhetoric has been too hot.
00:50:34.000 And obviously, I agree.
00:50:36.000 I think it's been one of the signal failures of the Biden campaign has been the centralizing focus
00:50:40.000 on the idea that President Trump is not just a problem if he were to be elected,
00:50:45.000 which is sort of normal political rhetoric or that President Trump has the wrong policies
00:50:48.000 or anything like that.
00:50:49.000 There's been a lot of focus from the media for the last 10 years,
00:50:52.000 from the Biden campaign over the last several years on the idea that President Trump is an incipient dictator.
00:50:57.000 I mean, just days before the attempted shooting, President Biden was tweeting out
00:51:01.000 that Donald Trump would be a dictator.
00:51:03.000 The New Republic ran an issue in which the cover was a mashup of Donald Trump's face with Hitler's face.
00:51:09.000 When you say that sort of stuff over and over and over again, as I've said, you know, any shooter is responsible for what the shooter does.
00:51:15.000 But if you keep turning up the temperature on the pot of water on the stove, you shouldn't be surprised when it boils over.
00:51:21.000 And it seems to me that that centralizing message that if your political opposition wins, it's the end of the country, that sort of talk is inherently dangerous.
00:51:31.000 Well, of course it is, and I've been saying that in interviews throughout the weekend and last night on CNN.
00:51:36.000 I went live a few minutes before President Biden gave his address, and I said that same thing, and I pointed out that, you know, many of our Democrat colleagues in Congress, and of course Biden himself, Have done exactly what you said, Ben.
00:51:48.000 They've said that Donald Trump's election will be the end of democracy.
00:51:52.000 People feel like it's a last resort kind of thing.
00:51:55.000 And some people are easy to puss over the edge.
00:51:58.000 I mean, we've got to turn the temperature down.
00:52:00.000 We need to have vigorous policy debates and disputes.
00:52:03.000 Obviously, we don't agree with those guys on anything.
00:52:06.000 And we provide answers to all the great challenges facing the country, but the way that we do that is really, really important.
00:52:12.000 We've seen a couple of comments that President Trump himself has made over the last day or so.
00:52:17.000 He's spoken to a few reporters and comments he's given publicly, and he said he's even changing his own speech here.
00:52:24.000 He was going to hammer Biden on all of his policies.
00:52:26.000 Of course, we all will.
00:52:27.000 That's easy to do.
00:52:29.000 But he wants to talk about unifying the country.
00:52:32.000 That's the kind of visionary leadership that we need right now.
00:52:35.000 He's the candidate that can provide it.
00:52:37.000 And if he does that and does it well, I think this election is done in a landslide.
00:52:41.000 I think President Trump will be the next president, and I think he can guide us and our country through what is probably one of the most tumultuous times, the most turbulent times we've had.
00:52:51.000 Probably since the Civil War.
00:52:52.000 I don't think that's even disputable anymore.
00:52:55.000 And so we need that right now.
00:52:56.000 We need steady leadership.
00:52:57.000 We need steady hands at the wheel.
00:52:58.000 We need strong leadership.
00:53:00.000 But we need it to be done in the right way.
00:53:02.000 And I think President Trump gets that.
00:53:05.000 Mr. Speaker, John, I don't know if you had a chance to actually watch President Biden's address from the Oval Office last night.
00:53:09.000 He said many things about cooling down the rhetoric.
00:53:11.000 The one phrase that seems to be missing for me was, including me.
00:53:16.000 It's one thing for the President of the United States to sort of, on a general level, say that the rhetoric needs to cool.
00:53:20.000 It's another thing to say, okay, that includes me as well, since, of course, he's one of the people who's running for President, and he is currently the President of the United States.
00:53:27.000 I felt that signal absence.
00:53:28.000 I'm not sure what you thought about that.
00:53:31.000 Well, I didn't hear the whole speech, I heard parts of it, but if that was missing, that was a glaring miss.
00:53:36.000 Because, look, he's not only President of the United States, he's obviously the leader of his party.
00:53:41.000 And there are a lot of lieutenants below him on that totem pole in the party who have just taken this thing to ridiculous levels.
00:53:48.000 What they've said about Trump, what they've said about many of us in Congress is just
00:53:53.000 unconscionable and it has led to violence.
00:53:56.000 Remember, the assassination attempt on Trump was not the first of these.
00:54:00.000 My brother Steve Scalise was almost killed on a baseball field a couple of years ago.
00:54:05.000 We've had attempts on people on both sides of the aisle.
00:54:08.000 It really has gotten out of control.
00:54:10.000 We live in the age of social media.
00:54:11.000 We live in the age of, you know, where voices are amplified that are caustic and it's a problem.
00:54:18.000 So you need leaders, you need duly elected representatives of the people to be able to remind them of our better angels as Lincoln used to say.
00:54:27.000 I've tried to do that.
00:54:28.000 Reagan was a good model for that.
00:54:30.000 He was a happy warrior.
00:54:31.000 That's what we need to be.
00:54:32.000 Here at the RNC, I'll be reminding all of our colleagues and friends, let's be happy warriors.
00:54:36.000 That's what our party represents.
00:54:38.000 It always has, and we can do that in this moment.
00:54:41.000 You know, Speaker Johnson, you mentioned that President Trump has already explained to Selena Zito that he has rewritten his entire convention speech.
00:54:47.000 It seems like the entire theme of the convention has shifted from talk of policy to talk of unifying going forward, which makes perfect sense.
00:54:54.000 Have you had a chance to speak to President Trump about any of that and what you expect to see from him this week?
00:55:00.000 Well, via text.
00:55:01.000 He's been overwhelmed, of course, and I didn't want to be one of those other voices in his ear that he had to answer the call.
00:55:08.000 I look forward to seeing him.
00:55:08.000 I'll be with him, spend a lot of time with him here over the next couple of days.
00:55:12.000 But I've been very heartened to hear what he's saying.
00:55:16.000 A lot of people don't know this.
00:55:17.000 it was reported a little bit, but way back during Thanksgiving, I was down at Mar-a-Lago
00:55:21.000 with him and I was doing some fundraising events down the beach the day after we had
00:55:27.000 dinner with him. And when I say we, I was with my sons, my 18-year-old and 13-year-old
00:55:32.000 son. The next morning, they were on the beach while I was doing fundraising events and they
00:55:36.000 both almost drowned. They got pulled out in a rip current out to sea into the Atlantic.
00:55:41.000 It's a long story, but they were miraculously saved. A parasailor flew by and saw them going
00:55:45.000 under, almost lost both of them. And President Trump, when he heard about this story the
00:55:50.000 next day, he was so moved by that. And we talked about it at length multiple times about
00:55:55.000 God had very miraculously saved the lives of both of my sons, and it really moved him a lot, and I've noticed in some of the things he's saying, some of the comments he's saying in the last couple of days, he's echoing some of those things that we talked about.
00:56:08.000 I think he feels truly the providential moment that's before us.
00:56:13.000 This is another thing, just a footnote of history, but when Washington, we used to call George Washington the bulletproof president, right?
00:56:19.000 Remember the famous battle where he was The French and Indian War, where they took multiple shots at him.
00:56:25.000 He had bullet holes in his coat.
00:56:27.000 That happened less than 50 miles away, in the same state of Pennsylvania, where the bullet grazed the ear of President Trump.
00:56:34.000 And George Washington used to say that it was the hand of providence that saved him.
00:56:37.000 He wrote that extensively, and he believed it.
00:56:40.000 I think President Trump believes that as well.
00:56:41.000 Not to over-spiritualize everything, as you and I are accused of, Ben, right?
00:56:44.000 But this is a big thing.
00:56:46.000 I think God's going to give our nation another chance, and I think President Trump is going to be the leader that does that.
00:56:53.000 Mr. Speaker Johnson, obviously a lot of anticipation today on a wide variety of topics.
00:56:57.000 So we actually just found out that the documents case against President Trump has now been dismissed in Florida.
00:57:03.000 That obviously will be a big relief to the President, considering that that was, in all likelihood, the most viable case against President Trump.
00:57:09.000 Obviously, we've seen the weaponization of the DOJ against President Trump.
00:57:13.000 We've seen the weaponization of the Justice Department or the justice system in New York against President Trump.
00:57:18.000 That has to be a load off his back.
00:57:20.000 And the news is just coming incredibly quickly.
00:57:21.000 And obviously, the President Well, nothing is normal anymore.
00:57:35.000 Conventionally, that's what happens on the first big night of a convention.
00:57:41.000 But we're in unconventional times, right?
00:57:43.000 So I'm not sure.
00:57:44.000 I don't know if he'll tease it a little bit longer or go another couple of days.
00:57:48.000 We can change the agenda here on a fly, as has already been done.
00:57:51.000 I'm, like I said, I'm presiding over the, I'm chairing the proceedings during the day on all the mechanics, and we may have to change the script a little bit if he's not ready to announce it yet.
00:57:59.000 But, you know, at the end of the day, President Trump knows how to put on a show, right?
00:58:03.000 And he's building the anticipation, and it is great here, and it'll be exciting.
00:58:07.000 I'll tell you what, really, at the end of the day in this election, Ben, I don't think it really matters as much who the Vice President is.
00:58:13.000 I think this is the Trump election, and whomever he names will be an asset to the ticket, I know.
00:58:19.000 But this is about him and his leadership and where we're going to go as a country, and all of us together.
00:58:24.000 I'm absolutely convinced we're going to win the White House, take back the Senate, and grow our House majority.
00:58:29.000 And we will have unified government at a unifying time, and we'll be able to fix all these great problems that face the country.
00:58:35.000 We're excited to do it, ready to go.
00:58:38.000 So, Speaker Johnson, speaking of exactly what will happen if all of that occurs, if President Trump does go on to win a big victory, if you and the House grow your majority, if the Republicans actually gain back control of the Senate.
00:58:48.000 There's been a lot of talk on the left side of the aisle and in the media about bogeymen and buzzwords like Project 2025.
00:58:54.000 Obviously, that's a 922-page document with a wide series of policy prescriptions.
00:58:58.000 I'm sure some will be taken up.
00:58:59.000 I'm sure many will not be.
00:59:00.000 What exactly is top of the agenda if Republicans take back unified control of the elected branches of government?
00:59:08.000 Well, not to put the cart before the horse, but we've been working very methodically and steadily on putting together a very aggressive first 100 days agenda for the new Congress.
00:59:16.000 We've got to be prepared to lead on day one, because as I told President Trump, he can be the most consequential president of the modern era, and by extension us, the most consequential Congress.
00:59:26.000 But we've got to be ready to run that agenda, and we will.
00:59:29.000 And it'll be the things that the American people want and need and deserve.
00:59:33.000 You don't have to look at the polls to know what the problems are.
00:59:36.000 We've got to close the border immediately.
00:59:38.000 We have to get the economy humming again.
00:59:40.000 We know how to do that.
00:59:41.000 It's tax policy.
00:59:42.000 It's reducing regulations dramatically.
00:59:45.000 It's doing a lot of the things that we did in the first Trump administration, frankly, after the first two years.
00:59:49.000 We had the greatest economy in the history of the world because we implemented the policies that we all believe in.
00:59:56.000 Energy policy is a big part of this.
00:59:57.000 It's about restoring our stature on the world stage.
01:00:00.000 We have done nothing but project weakness for the last three and a half years and that's why the world's on fire.
01:00:05.000 So it's going to be so exciting to have a strong visionary leader in the White House and to have a Senate and a House that are completely in tune together.
01:00:16.000 And that's a big part of this as well.
01:00:18.000 We're going to do this in a bicameral fashion.
01:00:20.000 What a concept.
01:00:21.000 You'll have Republicans in the Senate and the House working together on a playbook that's being designed right now.
01:00:27.000 So we're really excited, Ben.
01:00:29.000 And the reason our candidates are running such strong races around the country right now for these House seats is because they're out there providing these answers.
01:00:37.000 We have answers to all these great challenges and they're providing it with the right tone.
01:00:40.000 These are serious, credible people because we've got a serious job to do and we're ready to do it.
01:00:46.000 You know, Speaker Johnson, before the election, obviously there's been a lot of talk of various investigations that are underway in the House.
01:00:53.000 One of them that seems to be gaining steam and should be gaining steam, in my opinion, is the scandal that is the cover-up of Joe Biden's health condition.
01:00:59.000 We've seen, since the debate, an enormous number of stories breaking about the fact that the President of the United States has not held, for example, a Cabinet meeting in nine months.
01:01:07.000 About the fact that two years ago, there were foreign leaders who were commenting on the President's lack of acuity.
01:01:14.000 the fact that the president has been essentially sundowning at 8 p.m. and
01:01:18.000 there are members of the executive branch who have been participating in
01:01:22.000 what appears to be a pretty obvious cover-up of the president's
01:01:26.000 health conditions. What sort of indicators have you had that there are
01:01:30.000 going to be moves in the house to take a look at the oversight inside the
01:01:33.000 executive branch because obviously if you have somebody who's not capable of
01:01:36.000 fulfilling the office certain hours of the day that's a massive problem. It is a
01:01:41.000 big problem and we've been talking a lot about this the the most appropriate ways
01:01:45.000 to go about that oversight.
01:01:47.000 It's a big job.
01:01:47.000 I mean, our oversight committees and all the committees of jurisdiction that have oversight responsibility, and all of them do, have just been worn out in this Congress.
01:01:55.000 There's so much to look into.
01:01:58.000 The weaponization of the federal government is a real thing.
01:02:00.000 I served on that select committee before I became Speaker, and every stone that we underturned There was another series of scandals and questions.
01:02:07.000 And so that's what you find here as well.
01:02:09.000 The thing about the mental acuity of President Biden is that everybody knows it.
01:02:12.000 Everyone has.
01:02:14.000 And certainly those in close proximity to him.
01:02:16.000 His staff, leading Democrats in Washington.
01:02:19.000 This is an open secret.
01:02:21.000 But the fact that they tried to cover it up, the fact that they went out and said exactly the opposite, even recently, even within a week or two of the big blunder at the debate, tells you a lot about You know, his usefulness to the party.
01:02:36.000 I think that there's a lot of interest groups and leftist groups who have been running the country, frankly.
01:02:40.000 That's a big question I get all around the country.
01:02:42.000 Who is running the show?
01:02:44.000 It's clearly not Joe Biden.
01:02:46.000 And now that's on display for everyone to see.
01:02:48.000 So Congress has a role in getting down to the facts and finding out who knew what and when.
01:02:54.000 But I think the results of it are out there now.
01:02:56.000 I think everybody sees this.
01:02:58.000 I think you're seeing that being reflected in the polling.
01:03:01.000 I think people have lost confidence in this president, and I think they should have.
01:03:04.000 They should have done it a long time ago, and if they had been honest about it, everybody would have known this.
01:03:10.000 Speaker Johnson, obviously another one of the investigations that's now been announced is the House looking into what Secret Service did or did not do in the lead up to the assassination attempt on President Trump.
01:03:20.000 There are a ton of open questions.
01:03:21.000 Secret Service has been effectively a black box to the media with regard to its response.
01:03:26.000 The real question here that people have been asking is not really about the response to the shooting because once the shot was taken, the shooter was taken down quite effectively and quickly.
01:03:35.000 The question is, Why this shooter was on a roof 150 meters away from the president of the United States for legitimately minutes?
01:03:42.000 I mean there's video that's now emerged of people who are literally pointing up at the guy on the roof and yelling at officers to go do something about this.
01:03:49.000 We know local law enforcement apparently actually confronted the man on the roof.
01:03:53.000 He turned, he swiveled, they then retreated for a moment and that's when he took the shots.
01:03:58.000 What sort of investigations are planned into Secret Service, their priorities?
01:04:02.000 There's been a lot of questions about staffing at the Secret Service, including questions about DEI at the Secret Service and their prioritization.
01:04:08.000 What sort of investigations do you think would be appropriate there?
01:04:13.000 Well, it's already begun, and it began just within hours of the event.
01:04:17.000 I had Secretary Mayorkas, the head of Department of Homeland Security, on the telephone, asking him very pointed questions, many of which he did not have the answers for yet.
01:04:27.000 I mean, one of the simple questions was, by way of example, I said, Mr. Secretary, please tell me there was drones covering the area.
01:04:34.000 That's standard practice now.
01:04:35.000 He did not know, at least as of Saturday night, whether drones were used.
01:04:40.000 Obviously a drone would have detected someone on a roof.
01:04:42.000 I mean, there are some very serious questions.
01:04:45.000 We had a call yesterday, organized a call with all the House Republicans.
01:04:48.000 Some were traveling here, some were back home in their districts.
01:04:51.000 We had everybody on the phone.
01:04:52.000 150 or so, or more, and we went through it and we've got a lot of former law enforcement personnel, we have guys who worked in U.S.
01:05:00.000 attorney's offices, we have a former FBI agent who are Republican members of the House, and there's lots of insight.
01:05:05.000 Military guys, there's lots of insight there.
01:05:07.000 We are compiling a list of the most searing questions and I'm going to be presenting those to Mayorkas today.
01:05:13.000 The first hearing on this subject is already scheduled for next Monday after this convention.
01:05:18.000 We all get back to Washington on Monday morning.
01:05:20.000 We're going to have the head of Secret Service, Ms.
01:05:23.000 Cheadle, come in and answer some questions about that as well.
01:05:27.000 We'll be talking with the FBI.
01:05:29.000 The FBI is looking over the shooter and the plot there, and if anyone else is involved, the criminal aspects of this.
01:05:36.000 But the oversight over what happened with Secret Service and everything else, Congress has a huge role to play in that.
01:05:42.000 We're going to take it very seriously and be very aggressive about it, and it's already begun.
01:05:48.000 Speaker Johnson, obviously one of the big matters of the day is the voting on the GOP party platform.
01:05:54.000 There's been a lot of ink spilled over the nature of this particular platform, which is softer than some other platforms have been on issues like pro-life issues or marriage issues.
01:06:03.000 Can you speak to the importance of the platform?
01:06:05.000 Is it really all that important, generally speaking?
01:06:08.000 Is the perception of the platform itself sort of shifting inside the Republican Party given the fact that President Trump is a unique candidate, he is more of a pragmatist than sort of a traditional down-the-line conservative, and that means that the sort of idea of running on a national platform itself may be a matter of the past, at least for this election cycle.
01:06:28.000 Well, it feels like that right now.
01:06:30.000 I mean, the platform is really important to party loyalists and party activists.
01:06:34.000 I've been deeply involved in it myself in the past.
01:06:37.000 But to your point, we're in a different moment.
01:06:39.000 It doesn't mean that we abandon any of the core principles of the party or any of the things that we've always stood for.
01:06:44.000 We will stand for those issues.
01:06:46.000 And, you know, it's interesting that in the modern era, the way things go, because of the way media works, 24-hour news cycle, social media and all the rest, You could probably count on one hand the number of people who actually dive into a party platform and even read it.
01:06:58.000 I mean, you know, most of my constituents don't.
01:07:00.000 Most of the people that I visit with around the country are not aware of what's in that document.
01:07:04.000 So I think it probably matters a little bit less what's on the paper and how we lead and the policies that we actually implement.
01:07:11.000 And I think we're in a great place.
01:07:13.000 It doesn't matter whether the platform is 60 pages or 16 pages, the Republican Party stands for the core principles.
01:07:19.000 Individual freedom, limited government, the rule of law, you know, peace through strength, fiscal responsibility, free markets, human dignity.
01:07:25.000 We believe in the sanctity of all life.
01:07:28.000 I mean, it's listed in our nation's birth certificate, the declaration in the very beginning.
01:07:32.000 We believe in the self-evident truths that God created us.
01:07:35.000 He made us in His image.
01:07:36.000 He's the one that gave us our rights, not the government.
01:07:38.000 And that separates us.
01:07:40.000 That core principle and all those that emanate from it separate us with a wide chasm from the Democrat Party and where they are and where they're headed.
01:07:47.000 These are two completely different visions for America.
01:07:50.000 It's not even really R's versus D's anymore.
01:07:52.000 I mean, it is.
01:07:53.000 But more than that, it's two visions about who we are as a country, who we're going to be.
01:07:58.000 And I am so grateful these days to be a Republican.
01:08:01.000 Always have been, always will be.
01:08:03.000 And I'm grateful to be on the party and in the party that stands for those principles.
01:08:06.000 And there's 50,000 people out here in this arena for the next three nights that will be enthusiastically supporting that and representing millions and millions and millions of others around the country.
01:08:16.000 This is our moment.
01:08:17.000 This is our time.
01:08:18.000 And I think it could be a real renaissance in the country.
01:08:21.000 Well, Speaker Mike Johnson, really appreciate the time.
01:08:24.000 Obviously, we'll all be watching closely as the convention proceeds.
01:08:26.000 A lot of news breaking every single moment.
01:08:29.000 Stay safe out there and really appreciate your hard work on behalf of the country.
01:08:34.000 Thanks, brother.
01:08:34.000 Great to talk to you.
01:08:35.000 God bless.
01:08:37.000 Alrighty, folks.
01:08:37.000 We've reached the end of the show.
01:08:38.000 We'll be back here tomorrow with so much more because the news is like a firehose at this point.
01:08:43.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.