Best of The Program ｜ Guests： Gov. Kristi Noem & Todd Bensman ｜ 3⧸23⧸21
Episode Stats
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Summary
Todd Ben-Avraham, a homeland security expert who served as a Homeland Security Analyst with the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) and served as the Senior National Security Fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) in Washington, D.C., joins us to talk about the surge of illegal immigrants crossing the border into the United States from Mexico.
Transcript
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We're going to be mighty popular today because on today's podcast, we have Kristi Noem and she didn't do well on Tucker last night.
00:00:09.200
At least that's the perception. Tucker went after her and said, you know, you're selling out your values for this NCAA debacle where South Dakota is saying, wait, we're not going to fight this in the colleges because we might lose.
00:00:23.340
There's a lot of half information and wrong information out there. And going into the podcast, I didn't know if I was going to agree with her or disagree.
00:00:32.760
And when we disagree, we tell people to their face. And so they they hate us. They hate us. So did she hate us or not? What really happened?
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Yeah, we'll get into that. I think that's it's an interesting conversation about just the conservative direction in general that we get into as well there.
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Let's talk about the border quite a bit today. Yeah, we had an expert who was down on the border just about to cross into Mexico because he is a, you know, homeland security guy.
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Been with the DPS here in Texas. He's he's a guy who knows this inside and out.
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He said, I can't get any information from anyone on the American side.
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But boy, people talk on the other side of the border. And he told us what's really going on there.
00:01:16.600
So don't miss it. All that and so much more on today's podcast.
00:01:19.640
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00:01:25.400
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You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.
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Todd Benzman. He currently serves as the Texas based senior national security fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, Washington, D.C.
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Policy Institute. He led the counterterrorism intelligence for the Texas Department of Public Safety's intelligence and counterterrorism division in its multi agency fusion center.
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Before his Homeland Security service. He was a journalist for 23 years covering national security after 9-11 as a staff writer for major newspapers and reporting in 25 different countries.
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He is also the author of the book, America's covert border war, the untold story of the nation's battle to prevent jihadist infiltration.
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He joins us now. I believe you're in Mexico now, Todd, is that right?
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And as soon as we're done with this call, I'm going to head over into Piedras Negras, which is on a smaller city on the Mexican side across from Eagle Pass, Texas.
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And yesterday I spent all day in Ciudad Acuna across from Del Rio.
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So tell me what is really happening on the border.
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Well, migrants are coming from all over Mexico, southern Mexico, and also from other parts of Mexico where ports of entry are walled or they're better walling in those areas and harder to get across.
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So what they're doing is they're sector shopping for the easy routes in.
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And this happens to be one of the easy sectors they perceived easy to get through and into the United States and be released.
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And so just in the past week in this sector, about 5,700 migrants crossed over and were apprehended or got away, about 1,700 got away estimated, which compares to like kind of in the low hundreds on a normal week.
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So we're really seeing a major, major spike happening in this sector because it's perceived to be forgiving and easy to get through.
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So is this happening with the Texas Border Patrol as well?
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I mean, because we've had this problem before with Obama, not this bad.
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But Texas DPS has been down on the border, and they are different than the Border Patrol from CBP.
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I've, you know, there's a trooper car just about a mile behind me on the road here.
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And the purpose of that is to fill the gap because Border Patrol is spread very thinly in an area like this.
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This is why it's easy to get through here where there's no walling.
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They just come through and either bum rush the agents who are here and get past them or they can, you know, family units know that they can turn themselves in.
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So some are running and some are turning themselves in.
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And the family units are being paroled right into the country with notices to appear.
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And now they're not even bothering with notices to appear in some parts of the border.
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They're just waving them through the turnstile into the Greyhound bus stations.
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Are we, the United States government is paying for these trips all over America, right?
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I wouldn't say that they're paying for the bus fare, but they, there are NGOs that are facilitating communications and wire, you know, the migrants are getting money wired in from relatives and they're paying for their bus fare.
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But there are NGOs that are assisting and cooperating with all of, all of that.
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They can't hold them for long and they call border patrol comes and picks them up.
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We have, we have good relationships with the border patrol and we are, we're getting a total blackout.
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People won't talk to us and it is leading us to believe that there, that is, there's something happening here on the border and nobody wants to talk about it.
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Is that just me being me or are you experiencing a kind of a blackout as well?
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It's the Biden administration caused all of this with their campaign rhetoric during the campaign.
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And then their very first moves were to just open the border wide, reinstitute, catch and release.
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The migrants that I talked to over there on Mexico side, all tell me with a, to a man and woman, that the reason that they came now was to take advantage of Biden's policies.
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And it's embarrassing to, you know, to the Biden administration.
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They'll tell you privately that that's what it's all about.
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And they don't want to advertise what they've done and what they're going to be doing.
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And I think that, you know, you could get the story without their cooperation.
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I didn't even bother after the first couple of phone calls.
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There was going to be no embedding and no interviews with Border Patrol.
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And I'll tell you this, Glenn, I've got a lot of Border Patrol agents all from California to the Gulf of Mexico who do talk to me on a regular basis.
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And I know what's going on, at least through their eyes.
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But the most important thing is that you can see it through the eyes of the migrants if American reporters would just bother to interview them.
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What are they saying besides we came because of Biden?
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Well, they're saying, A, we came because of Biden.
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And they're saying that they know that they can get in now.
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They're going to get in now, sooner or very soon.
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Nobody who's coming to the border doesn't believe that they're not going to get in during this administration.
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And they're very frank about the fact that they're coming in for economic reasons.
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Nobody is talking about political asylum, how the government persecuted me.
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They don't usually say that until they get coaching from an NGO legal group that tells them what to say to get asylum.
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None of these people are here for asylum, but they're all going to use the asylum system to just get in through past the border patrol.
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And win, lose, or draw, they're going to stay inside the United States illegally, legally, win, lose, or draw on their claim.
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Can you give me the name of any of these NGOs that you feel are instrumental in all of this?
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Riesis, if I'm pronouncing that right, is a key one.
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They're a legal support group, and they are all over this.
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That's one that immediately comes to mind, and I can get in touch with you after the show and shoot you some other ones.
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We had the pictures that came out yesterday, and we tried to get a hold of anyone yesterday.
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We were completely ghosted by everyone when we were asking for verification of what James O'Keefe said yesterday,
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that there is sexual abuse and abuse happening in these centers, and no one will get back to us.
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As far as what's happening inside the detention centers, that's just a blackout for me and everybody else.
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And, unfortunately, I don't have ICE sources that are close to the detention centers at the moment.
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Well, you know, you can't keep that kind of a secret for very long.
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I mean, sometimes I will say that I have seen those kind of claims, especially during the Trump administration,
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made frequently and not turn out to be supported.
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Because they use those claims to force releases.
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Oh, well, we've got to release them now because everybody thinks that they're, you know, so...
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So tell me this, because I was there under the Obama administration, and I saw what was happening with the cartels.
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The word is they're making more money on this than they even are on the drug trade right now.
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Can you tell me how dangerous it is and what this policy is forcing people into...
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Not forcing, but is leading them into these relationships with the drug cartels?
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There are sectors along the border that are entirely controlled by the cartels.
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That's absolutely true, and nobody gets across in those sectors without paying the PISO to those guys.
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The coyotes and the smugglers all have to pay the cartels for access to the Texas border.
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They are flooding in in such huge numbers that even the cartels are having to reconstitute themselves
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And they're giving these migrants risk bracelets.
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That's actually happening, especially in the Rio Grande Valley sector and Laredo.
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sector now, where you have to prove that you've paid by wearing one of these wristbands.
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They're numbered, which indicates a registration system on the Mexican side.
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In the area where I am right now, they're less active.
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The migrants that I talked to yesterday just crossed themselves over.
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There are some sectors like this that are not heavily involved in the smuggling trade.
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But as I said, migrants are shopping for the easy routes in, so they're coming to this sector
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And it's just a matter of time before the cartels assert themselves over here in this one, too.
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I've heard anywhere from $2,000 to $20,000 to get people over.
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How much money is it actually taking for people to have their kids or their families smuggled over?
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So, it ranges in price, of course, by nationality and location.
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So, in the RGV right now, the Rio Grande Valley sector, the demand is so strong that the prices
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And it's $2,500 for a Mexican or Central American individual just to cross the river.
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We're not talking about the money that it costs to get from Guatemala and through the southern
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So, how are all of these people affording $2,500 on top of what they've already spent?
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I mean, if you're from Africa, remember, there are migrants coming from all over the world.
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Africa, the Middle East, we've got Middle Yemenis coming through.
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My book, America's Covert Border War, is all about that kind of migrant.
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If you're from an Arabic country, Arabic-speaking country, you're paying $9,000.
00:15:06.720
And where they get the money is, to the best of my knowledge, a few places.
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One is that they have U.S.-based relatives, especially like the Cubans and the Haitians,
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have U.S.-based relatives that will wire them money to get in.
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And then there's another thing that is happening with especially Central Americans who don't
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really have $2,500 to get over the border is they owe it to the cartels.
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So they have to give the names of their family members cell phones that are called to prove
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that the family member answers, home addresses, and that sort of thing.
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And if they don't pay the price, then there are repercussions or the threat of repercussions
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And that's kind of an indentured servitude, a kind of a slavery.
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It's a terrible thing that's happening with that.
00:16:02.740
And then also people in the home countries will raise money.
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Relatives in home countries like Bangladesh or Syria will raise money and get it here
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because if they could get somebody anchored in here, then their relatives will come in
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So it's a great investment for somebody in northeast Punjab in India or Pakistan.
00:16:39.760
Tell me about the Iranians that have just crossed.
00:16:44.880
Yeah, well, we had 11 Iranians cross in Arizona.
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We had three Yemeni migrants on the terror watch list that crossed in New Mexico
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and a Serb who crossed in New Mexico who also was on the terror watch list.
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We have about 20 a year, by my reckoning, who are on terrorist watch list before they get
00:17:13.160
And what typically happens in – this is way longer than a minute, but there will be – there's
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supposed to be security investigations that happen inside the detention facilities.
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FBI and ICE intelligence and DIA and intelligence community agencies are supposed to be on this.
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But when the border systems break down under the crush of a mass migration surge, all bets are off on that,
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where everybody gets waved in and nobody has time to mess with Iranians or Yemenis or Syrians coming over.
00:17:59.060
Well, for one thing, people need to contact their representatives in Congress and the Senate
00:18:06.560
and make sure that the eye remains on the ball in terms of special interest aliens.
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These are the guys coming in from those countries through Panama right now.
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They're all coming in right now hoping to make the best of the Biden border and make sure that nobody forgets about that.
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And really, the best thing that ever happened in illegal immigration control was to remain in Mexico.
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And the deportations to the third countries, they got rid of those right away, put those back.
00:18:48.820
Todd Benzman, the name of the book is America's Covert Border War.
00:19:10.940
If you are ready for some really great news, keep listening.
00:19:18.820
If you've been listening to my show this year, I love Built Bars.
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Plus, they've reset the code for this new launch.
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I'm going to talk to you about a couple of things that are really important.
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They are the tiny little blocks made of silicon, cobalt and copper, and they power everything we rely on.
00:20:24.820
Watches, your refrigerator, clock, television, washing machines, dishwashers, everything.
00:20:38.560
But the supply chains are down, and no one has any idea when they're going to get any better.
00:20:47.240
The Guardian says that the global shortage in computer chips has reached a crisis point.
00:20:54.140
In cars, we need computer chips for airbags, power windows, radios, dashboards, catalytic converters, all of it.
00:21:02.160
The BBC just did an interview with the CEO of Volkswagen North America, and here's what he said.
00:21:09.600
I think the first thing, there's been massive instability in the supply chains, whether it's been COVID, whether it's been other issues.
00:21:15.900
So we have at least gotten very good at managing that instability.
00:21:19.560
And frankly, that's what we've been doing week to week, car by car, looking at our profit margins, looking at where we have shortfalls, and managing that.
00:21:27.300
I think things will get stable by the fall, but certainly it's going to be complicated and it's going to be challenging.
00:21:32.960
But I think we'll navigate it, particularly here in the U.S. market, between our two main plants, Puebla in Mexico and Chattanooga in Tennessee.
00:21:52.640
Ford has already started canceling shifts at two of its plants and expects $2 billion in damage as a result of the computer chip shortage.
00:22:07.200
That means workers here in America, industries even that stand to benefit from the computer chip shortage.
00:22:16.560
They're having a hard time because of the COVID-19, it caused a surge in electronic purchases.
00:22:25.060
Apple is the biggest buyer of computer chips in the world.
00:22:33.640
The demand for computer chips is so high that even Apple has to wait in line.
00:22:39.860
Even Apple, last year, they delayed the release of the iPhone 12 by two months because of a shortage.
00:22:47.400
Samsung is the largest, sorry, second largest buyer of chips.
00:22:54.240
They sell roughly $56 billion worth of semiconductors and they consume $36 billion worth.
00:23:02.900
The COVID-19 lockdown is only one of the problems.
00:23:10.460
The pro-lockdown people want everybody to stay home at their office.
00:23:15.820
But the things we rely on to operate, they require more computer chips.
00:23:22.820
And the shortage is troubling, more troubling than any one cause really.
00:23:31.220
Last week, there was a major fire at one of the biggest computer chip suppliers in the world.
00:23:37.980
Last month, the power failure here in Texas caused two factories in Austin, Texas to suspend production,
00:23:48.680
Then there is talk of what's happening with the global economy.
00:23:54.400
China is the world's largest importer and consumer of computer chips.
00:24:01.120
They've spent the last decade working on strategies for a tech self-reliance, and they've been stockpiling computer chips.
00:24:09.040
This is what the Biden administration really means by infrastructure, by we need to invest in our infrastructure.
00:24:16.480
We are becoming more like China, public-private partnerships.
00:24:20.320
And you will see more and more that we are going to get into the investment world.
00:24:27.200
Last month, Bloomberg reported Chinese businesses bought $32 billion of equipment used to produce computer chips from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and elsewhere.
00:24:52.420
The chip shortage also affects the defense industry.
00:24:57.180
We need computer chips for all of our guided missiles, for our airplanes, for everything we do.
00:25:10.160
Prices are going to rise for anything that has a chip in it.
00:25:19.520
We're living in a country now that I don't recognize.
00:25:30.880
What do you mean it'll be six months before it's here?
00:25:39.520
Well, as somebody who has had to buy a lot of plywood lately, really?
00:25:44.940
Because that piece of plywood used to cost about $1,2, $15.
00:25:57.460
we are hitting inflation and fourteen hundred dollars in biden bucks is not really going to
00:26:07.320
hold us over this is more important than the other headline news we have a real crisis at
00:26:15.460
our border that we need to pay attention to but there is a you know there is a article run in
00:26:22.620
the scientific american about how climate anxiety is an overwhelmingly white phenomena
00:26:29.440
so it's not enough to be concerned about the climate if you're white and you're doing it you
00:26:36.760
must be part of the problem we need to reevaluate our priorities and be less concerned about whiteness
00:26:45.580
and climate anxiety and more about the technology that fuels human civilization and the
00:26:52.440
country that is pioneered most of it there was another story that i read uh yesterday
00:26:59.560
and i don't even know where this was from let me see it was on um
00:27:06.840
okay it doesn't say um but this was an uh an article that uh came out and it was talking about how
00:27:16.140
collecting has become a very big deal since covid and it talks about you know retailers are
00:27:23.900
reticent to speak about the trend stating that they don't wish to be on the record talking about
00:27:28.500
nearly sold out of ninety thousand dollar earrings during a time of growing wealth inequality
00:27:34.940
uh people are buying watches because they're on the home at computers all the time and so these
00:27:42.520
people who are really rich are just going through the uh online uh catalogs and looking what's up for
00:27:49.540
auction etc etc uh rolex day dates that sold in the secondary market in 2020 for 30 000 are now going
00:27:57.600
upward of 50 000 patek philippe watches are now you could buy them for 85 000 now they're going for
00:28:05.580
200 000 and the reason is they say because switzerland they're not making any watches right now
00:28:12.320
so there's the demand this article was written to make you hate rich people and how they're just
00:28:20.860
buying a mickey mantle uh you know baseball card and how much that's worth now or how they're buying
00:28:27.840
these old classic cars because they're how much they were my grandfather told me that during the
00:28:34.400
depression you watch what the rich people did before things got bad because it was as if the rich people
00:28:45.940
knew something that we didn't know and that's true and there weren't a lot of rich people there were
00:28:53.660
people like rockefeller back then now there's people with real wealth all around the country and so
00:29:02.460
some of them might be spending this money because they're bored or usually we go onto the yacht but
00:29:08.860
we can't get out onto the water now so i might as well buy a 250 000 coffee table
00:29:15.180
what this article does not tell you is that some rich people are now buying things of value
00:29:26.820
because they know things of intrinsic the germans did this in hyperinflation and before the war
00:29:38.280
they were buying things of real value because the dollar or their case the mark was not worth
00:29:48.520
what it was just the year before and as you start to devalue some people say now that your dollar
00:29:55.780
is going to lose about 48 cents in the next four years about the 15 percent each year will be lost
00:30:05.700
on the value of your dollar so if you have a hundred dollars in the bank in four years you'll still have
00:30:12.940
a hundred dollars but it will only have the purchase power of 51 or 52 dollars okay
00:30:19.120
that's cutting your wealth in half and it's only because of what they have done at the central bank
00:30:29.040
the fed and in washington to that dollar you've played by the rules this kind of situation helps
00:30:37.920
hurts people who have played by the rules don't be surprised when you see things that auctions of art
00:30:46.980
and everything else going for huge amounts of money and cars all of a sudden are going for huge amounts
00:30:51.840
of money and that that was a 1968 mustang why is it going for so much because people who know
00:30:59.120
people who see over the horizon are buying things with of intrinsic value they know that if they put in
00:31:09.360
i don't even know what an old mustang cost i'm a hundred thousand two hundred thousand dollars
00:31:14.980
whatever i mean a like a very nice mustang yeah i have no idea but like a showroom quality you know
00:31:21.560
what i mean school you know that that two hundred thousand dollars in that car is not going to lose
00:31:29.200
fifty percent of its value in four years it's not going to somebody will buy that for the equivalent
00:31:37.160
of two hundred thousand or maybe even a hundred and fifty thousand four years four years down the road
00:31:43.160
but not in american money you know not not it will be more expensive in american money people are using
00:31:52.940
these items as a store of value they're using them as a savings account that's why bitcoin is going
00:31:58.780
and doing what it's doing because bitcoin has gone up two hundred percent okay you could go down
00:32:05.900
175 percent uh okay still i i'm gaining 25 percent where i'm gonna have it in a bank account and i'm gonna
00:32:18.500
lose 15 20 percent yeah you might want to think about that the reason why i'm telling you this
00:32:28.700
is not that you know we have an audience that's going to go out and buy really expensive you know
00:32:32.700
mustangs jay leno i'm not sure if he listens to this program um but uh you need to start thinking
00:32:40.060
about those things you know i said to somebody the other day i don't smoke and i don't drink
00:32:46.380
but i think it's a probably a pretty good idea to buy cigarettes and uh vacuum seal them
00:32:53.600
to buy alcohol and just keep it because if you don't have any money people are going to look
00:33:02.200
to trade things and i i don't know cigarettes i don't think i know anybody that really smokes
00:33:09.220
but i've been trying to start but i haven't you haven't been going yet you know it's tough that
00:33:14.860
was my new year's resolution uh but you know alcohol things that people use you don't have to
00:33:23.240
go out and buy a mustang you just have to think what could i have what could i have a value that
00:33:29.540
people are going to need or want need is where most of us can get into and uh protect ourselves
00:33:39.840
what is it that people are going to need that they may not be able to afford to buy but they
00:33:46.460
might have something else that i can trade for that i might need you have to start thinking about
00:33:53.520
protecting your wealth differently uh i think really for the first time uh since the great depression and
00:34:04.020
maybe the first time ever because if this continues and we continue to spend like this
00:34:09.560
there will be no dollar left so every dollar that you're holding on to will become worth less
00:34:19.680
this is the best of the glenbeck program and don't forget rate us on itunes
00:34:27.960
i uh really respect tucker carlson um i would say tucker and i were not friends i mean
00:34:39.540
we knew each other but we weren't friends or anything uh you know five years ago but i respect
00:34:44.760
him now i think he is uh a very brave voice he had christy noem on uh last night was that the
00:34:51.780
thumbs up she's here no you have the audio she was on with tucker carlson last night and uh here's
00:34:58.300
what happened efforts and i don't think so you're saying so hold on just to be clear it's not the
00:35:02.920
bill you're saying many times over and over again but wait wait wait so you're saying the ncaa
00:35:08.440
threatened you and you don't think you can win that fight they said if you sign this we won't allow
00:35:13.680
girls in south dakota to play and you don't think you can win in court even though the public
00:35:19.820
overwhelmingly supports you nationally and so you're caving to the ncaa i think that's what you're
00:35:24.660
saying no that's not right at all tucker in fact you're wrong completely i've been working on this
00:35:30.840
issue for years in fact several years ago i fought i fought usda to make sure that 4-h rodeo and that
00:35:37.900
the sport of rodeo could keep girls events girls events and boys events boys events so i've been
00:35:43.200
working on this for many many years and back since november i've been consulting with legal scholars
00:35:48.180
and professors across the country asking them how do i protect women's sports and they've gone
00:35:54.240
through the steps to how i would legally challenge the ncaa and keep them from bullying the state of
00:35:59.280
south dakota and what they've told me to do is that i need to build a coalition so that's why today
00:36:04.560
i launched defend title nine now.com and that's going to allow us to build a coalition of states that
00:36:11.340
can fight the ncaa okay listen i'm here's the thing and i don't know that this is well let me
00:36:17.740
just ask her because she's on with us now and i i just ask her first christy noem welcome to the
00:36:24.940
program hi glenn thanks for having me on you're welcome um so i so can we pick that conversation
00:36:32.200
up where you were last night about coalitions because you're getting a name that you know people
00:36:39.000
it's amazing how how fast people can turn um but uh people are saying on the right that you're caving
00:36:47.600
to this transgender ban and i can understand because i feel like we don't have many hills left and this
00:36:55.300
one is is popular with 80 percent of the people this one is a hill we should die on uh and it looks like
00:37:03.000
you're lowering the flag so tell me what you're doing with the coalition and why that's important
00:37:08.300
well when have you ever known me to cave glenn i didn't go through this whole last year um being
00:37:15.100
the only one to keep my state open in the entire nation and to fight for what was right and have
00:37:20.160
everybody piling on to cave on something like this so i'm trying to be smart and solve a problem and i
00:37:26.880
think a lot of times um we get bullied we get bullied by the left but the right can bully too and
00:37:33.980
they're not looking at the facts so in this situation the coalition that i'm forming is to
00:37:38.860
go after the ncaa they have been bullying states for a long time with their policies by forcing us
00:37:44.480
to allow men to participate in women's sports i'm a small state south dakota small we had to fight hard
00:37:51.260
to even get any tournaments or games in the state of south dakota and i recognize that the ncaa can come
00:37:56.680
in and crush me and can make an example out of me and then point to south dakota and say see
00:38:01.000
no other state better challenge us whatsoever so that's why i'm trying to be smart about this
00:38:06.340
and build a coalition of athletes of states of governors attorney generals and show the ncaa that
00:38:12.560
we're going to fight to make sure that only girls can play in girls sports now is why the website
00:38:17.180
defend title nine now dot com is out there and i'm hoping everybody will go there look at the
00:38:22.440
information sign up so that we can send that message okay so is it's not the ncaa that you're
00:38:29.000
worried about uh worried about alone it's what these organizations can do with the woke capital and
00:38:38.360
the woke uh businesses exactly that's exactly it so um we have to stand up and defend um the right that
00:38:49.140
we have and the the title nine federal law that's in place that women are women and only women should
00:38:56.340
play in women's sports and we can do that in a way that picks a fight that says and uh that that fails
00:39:04.400
or we can do it in a smart way and build momentum so that we can actually win i've talked to legal
00:39:10.120
scholars and professors about this issue for months in fact glenn i've been working on this issue for
00:39:15.280
years if people would do their homework once and go back and look years ago i fought usda and the
00:39:21.860
federal government when they were trying to force rodeo to let boys into girls events and to make
00:39:26.800
girls participate in boys events and i fought them alone and got south dakota to be able to still
00:39:33.320
keep boys and girls events separated and usda um you know turned around did a 180 on the issue and
00:39:41.580
allowed us to keep boys events boys events and girls events girls events so there's no gray area for me
00:39:47.940
on this i've proven myself for years on this issue and i'll continue to do that regardless of
00:39:53.660
of who decides that they want to try to attack me and bully me so christy you know me well enough
00:40:00.020
to know because you've listened to the show for years you know that if i disagree with you
00:40:05.840
i would tell you um yes and i hope my audience knows this because the passion is uh going against you
00:40:15.320
on this right now and i completely understand that but i think it's misplaced um you know i told a
00:40:22.640
story yesterday about abraham lincoln uh before the um before they did the second confiscation act
00:40:30.660
abraham lincoln i have a a note from him that he wrote to the speaker of the senate and said please
00:40:37.140
don't adjourn they were supposed to adjourn that night uh and they were going to pass the the second
00:40:42.520
the second confiscation act which took slaves from the south and freed them and uh he wrote and said
00:40:50.980
don't don't don't pass that don't wait wait i have another idea and he was because he was an attorney
00:40:57.560
he realized this will come back to bite us because once the war is over we have to return the property
00:41:07.520
to the two people so we need something else and that's what led to the emancipation proclamation
00:41:13.740
and got rid of the confiscation act because it wouldn't hold and he knew that and i right because
00:41:20.660
i know what we're all up against right now you're not going to be able to fight this by yourself
00:41:27.580
and if you indeed are putting together a coalition of states and and others that is critical
00:41:36.880
because a we don't want any bad case law uh stacking up exactly right glenn exactly right and listen um
00:41:46.000
you know this is this is the war that we're in and we have to be smart and strategic so we can win it
00:41:51.280
we've seen this play out in the pro-life movement for years um everybody believes we we should ban
00:41:57.520
abortion outright but we know we can't win in court and if you look at south dakota i'm in the eighth
00:42:02.840
circuit um which every person who's done an analysis on that circuit says i south dakota i and
00:42:10.580
can go ahead and and look at collegiate sports and we can we can ban all um activities for anybody who's
00:42:19.800
male in a female sport and then nta and those organizations will come after me and then i can sue
00:42:25.220
them absolutely i can do that but across the board and i've been talking for months to legal scholars
00:42:31.640
and professors about this across the country they say you will likely lose there's a very very very
00:42:37.840
good chance that you will lose this and then that will make an example out of south dakota so build the
00:42:43.060
momentum so that they can't just focus on a little state like south dakota now the the lies about what's
00:42:49.040
going on in south dakota right now are rampant across the country i did not veto a bill i did not veto
00:42:55.420
the bill that the legislature sent me what i gave them was a style and form revision that they can accept
00:43:01.400
and if they accept that i can protect all students under the age of 18 in our k-12 system
00:43:07.020
and make sure that in the state that we are making sure that only girls playing girls sports only boys
00:43:12.180
playing boys sports i can fix all of the other items that they sent to me in that bill that are a trial
00:43:18.480
lawyer's dream and keep all the litigation out of this so families don't have to sue 20 times to get
00:43:24.220
fairness and let me do that and then let me build the coalition to win at the collegiate level
00:43:28.940
and so i did i did not veto a bill that's a complete lie that's out there this is a style
00:43:33.820
and form revision and i'm hopeful my legislature will see that this is the way that we can actually
00:43:38.520
fight the fight and win and at the end of the day have a victory that really does protect women
00:43:43.480
is it a fair character characterization governor that you you basically are sending back let's just
00:43:49.980
say three quarters of the bill that you you want to push through uh and you're going to make changes
00:43:55.200
to the other quarter is that a i mean because you're the way i understand your reasoning here
00:43:59.600
is that the everyone who is not in college would be covered by this right and you also had an issue
00:44:05.240
with with uh with performance enhancing drugs right that there would be lots of lawsuits that would
00:44:11.520
be associated with this the way that it's written can you talk about that for a second
00:44:14.600
yeah you're exactly right everybody that is not in college sports would be protected if they would
00:44:20.860
accept my revisions and also they sent me some regulations and reporting requirements
00:44:26.320
that don't define what performance enhancing drugs are and they also allow any student that didn't make
00:44:33.280
a team to go back and to sue that team and that school and that individual student who would use a
00:44:38.520
performance enhancing drug retroactively but they also don't define it so then that opens it up to all
00:44:44.260
kinds of opportunities for a student who didn't make a team to go after someone a year in the past that
00:44:52.120
also allows them to sue for emotional damages for physical damages for um you know and it's far
00:44:58.860
reaching so the litigation aspects of what they sent me just isn't workable as far as what good
00:45:05.120
conservative governing do and people tell me conservatives tell me chris you just signed the bill
00:45:09.980
politically it's it's easier for you it fix everything well governors don't do that governors
00:45:14.800
don't get to make political decisions we have to govern and we have to take care of our people
00:45:20.520
and be smart about what we're doing and making sure we're not arbitrarily you know taking a political
00:45:25.640
position and then hurting people in the long run so this is doing the right thing here i know that i am
00:45:31.560
i'm hopeful that people care enough about the truth in this day and age that they will see it
00:45:35.680
and that we'll have the opportunity to go forward and ensure that at all levels in collegiate sports
00:45:41.000
as well that only girls play girls sports and that we protect title nine it strikes me uh governor as
00:45:47.580
the the audience that you know saw you stand up during covid and i would argue a much stronger
00:45:53.040
tougher place to stand up uh where standing up for women playing women's sports seems relatively obvious
00:45:58.420
um so my knowing the audience as we've seen over the years they're they they can i think what
00:46:05.020
you're saying is logical to to most people but they're concerned that what happens over and over
00:46:11.060
again with politicians is they say well i can't do this right now i'll do it later and we'll put
00:46:16.400
together this coalition we'll fight and then they don't see that fight and they'll hold you accountable
00:46:20.340
if you don't if you don't follow through with us can you speak to the people that feel quite honestly
00:46:25.640
like i do come on don't surrender we please we are in the fight of our life and we've got to have
00:46:33.980
somebody who's willing to stand do you understand that feeling from the people who are upset and can
00:46:40.920
you speak to that i can but i don't know why they're doubting me the last 12 months 18 months
00:46:49.620
hasn't proven myself and you have to go back three years to see that i've already fought this fight
00:46:55.860
in my state and stood and was the only one i didn't have any help from my congressional delegation or
00:47:00.940
the state government or any time when i was fighting for 4-h rodeo and for rodeo to remain
00:47:06.360
girls events and boys events i did that alone with with that sport in the state of south dakota so the
00:47:12.840
fact that people are questioning me is because they haven't done their homework and they don't know me
00:47:17.620
and they haven't watched my career and i can go home you know and uh and i'm in south dakota and can
00:47:24.260
be happy and and do that but the people who are judging me right now or the people who are the
00:47:29.980
political ones and they're they're not the ones who really care about governing and making sure
00:47:35.360
that we're doing what needs to be done in this country so what's unfortunate to me is the um lies
00:47:41.880
and deceit that are out there around this issue because there's nobody that's proven themselves
00:47:46.260
more on this particular issue than i have i've already delivered for them in my state and i will for
00:47:51.400
the country if they will give me the chance to build this coalition and show that we can get it done
00:47:56.940
uh governor christy noem uh i honestly didn't know for sure which way i was going to how this
00:48:04.360
interview was going to end um but i can tell you i am happy to say uh you haven't disappointed me
00:48:12.360
i think you're doing the exact right thing and a lot of people don't understand that yet
00:48:18.000
uh because uh they're so they're so used to politicians caving um but thank you for that
00:48:26.740
also thank you for the abortion uh as a dad of a special needs child i know that you're signing a
00:48:33.940
bill today that has passed the house and senate uh has been in the works for for uh you know a long
00:48:40.440
time and weeks ago it it passed you're uh going to sign this today uh that is a good hill to
00:48:46.800
to not die on but to live on thank you absolutely absolutely thank you glenn you bet