Best of The Program ｜ Guests： Ken Cuccinelli & Michael Anton ｜ 9⧸1⧸20
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Summary
Joe Biden has finally come out against all the rioting in the streets, Ken Guccinelli and Michael Anton join the show to talk about the possibility of civil war in the next election, and more. Also, we have a new segment called "The Stakes" where we talk about things no one likes to think about: secession, civil war, and the things that could happen because of this election.
Transcript
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Hey, podcasters, welcome to the program today. Great, great show. We kind of covered a lot of
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things today, but we had to start with Joe Biden and his speech in, where was it, Pittsburgh or
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Philadelphia? Pittsburgh, I think, where he now suddenly is against all the protests and the
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rioting. But don't worry, he knows he's going to fix it because he knows what will fix it,
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and that is getting rid of Donald Trump, getting rid of the real problem, Donald Trump.
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We also had Michael Anton on talking about his book, The Stakes, talking about things that nobody
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likes to think about, secession, civil war, the things that could happen because of this next
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election. It is a really powerful 15 or 20 minutes that I think you really need to hear. Also, Ken
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Guccinelli was on with us. And, you know, more, more on the Democrats and the media saying how they
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are the peacemakers and Donald Trump is fanning the flames of war. How do you get that from the
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actions and the words from the left? Just a quick reminder, all on today's podcast.
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Now, I have some good news for you. I think that that battle is going to be uphill for them,
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but they can swing it up to, was it 10 or 15 points? I just read it again this morning.
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It's an enormous amount that they can swing it. Tech can swing the election. So we're going to be on
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that tomorrow, but it is going to be, I think, a bigger blowout than what the polls are showing.
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I could be wrong. I usually am wrong. I want to be really clear. I usually am wrong when it comes to
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politics. But let's just wait and see. The Democrats, they think they're in trouble, so much so that they
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think that they can get away with something because apparently their voters are so stupid
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that they don't remember that for months they've heard nothing but crickets from the left when it
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comes to condemning the riots and the violence. And I mean, it's been a slow burn horror movie
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gradually smoldering amongst the desperate Democratic Party that had zero message, zero unity,
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and facing a serious inter-party civil war. So what did they do? They just blew. Hang on,
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I think I got a spark. And they've been trying to get a race or class riot started for a very long time.
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Now what happens when it looks like it's backfiring on them? They're trying to reverse course and
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and not saying, you know what, we made a mistake. No, no, no. They are acting as if none of that
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happened. Here's clip one from yesterday, Joe Biden in Philadelphia.
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You know, this is a tragic fact of the matter that about his perilous hour, that how he's dealing
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with this perilous hour in our nation. And now we have to stand against violence in every form it
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takes. Violence we've seen again and again and again of unwarranted police shooting, excessive force,
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seven bullets in the back of Jacob Blake, knee on the neck of George Floyd, killing a Breonna Taylor
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in her own apartment. Violence of extremists and opportunists, right-wing militias, white supremacists,
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vigilantes, you know, who infiltrate protests, carrying weapons of war, hoping to wreak havoc
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and to derail any hope and support for progress. That is quite a statement coming from Joe Biden. First
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of all, the American people were not against the stopping of any of those guys. There was,
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there was not a problem with any of those shootings. Far as the American public, we were all on the
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same side. We wanted them to stop. We didn't think that that George Floyd should have had a neck or knee
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on his neck. We all agreed. But no, no, the Democrats wanted to make sure there were protests and not
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peaceful protests. They did nothing in city after city to stop riots and looting. I'm sorry, that's a
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different story. And we've all seen that story. We've also seen Maxine Waters stand in front of a
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crowd and actually tell people to track down and harass cabinet members. We saw Eric Holder say,
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when they go low, we kick them. We've heard Hillary Clinton say, we just can't be civil anymore.
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And when the rioting that they so desperately hoped would happen actually happened, we watched Nancy
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Pelosi say, you know, people will do what people do. Congressman Nadler told the violence was a myth.
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Ayanna Pressley went on national TV and said, there needs to be unrest in the street.
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So did Nancy Pelosi. Let's not forget. Why aren't people rioting? But it wasn't just the Democrats in
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D.C. Their propaganda arm, the mainstream media was quick to back the play. CNN hilariously said
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the protests were peaceful while standing in front of a parking lot full of burning cars. They did it
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again last week. You know what they actually came out and said they actually now have come out and said,
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hey, a few blocks is not a whole city. Well, tell that to the people who live in those few blocks.
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Do you not care about individuals at all? And what what neighborhoods are they burning down? The nice
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ones? The old the overall grand strategy was to let America burn, hoping that it would make Trump look
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bad. Well, it backfired and dare I say it bigly. Polls are now turning the so-called early route that
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Democrats thought they were seeing a few months ago now into a virtual tie. Real, real clear politics
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just released their new betting odds for who will win. And it's a toss up. But I don't think it actually
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is a toss up. I think there were millions of Democrats and independents who might have
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not liked Donald Trump. But they see what's happened to their Democratic Party and they want nothing to do
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with it. Seems like Americans just don't like blood in the streets. They don't like rioting and violence.
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They don't like when their livelihoods are destroyed and their elected officials just stand by watching
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it happen. I'm going to be very interested to see what happens in the next mayoral election
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So now we have a few Democrats that are willing to come out and publicly state that the that rioting is
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bad, the obvious. But that's not what they actually believe. Because they're on record saying the exact
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opposite. The only reason why they're saying it now is because they're now pointing the finger
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at Trump. I want you to listen to cut, uh, cut three.
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I look at this violence and I see lives and communities and the dreams of small businesses
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being destroyed. Oh my gosh. The opportunity for real progress and the issues of race and police
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reform and justice being put to the test. Donald Trump looks at this violence and he sees a political
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Never mind. Never mind. A black lives matter started under the Obama administration.
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Do you remember that? Do we have the video of Ferguson? When did that happen?
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That happened under the Obama administration. Go ahead and play it, please.
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You need to disperse immediately or you will be subject to arrest. Do it now.
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This is not Donald Trump's America, as Joe Biden is saying.
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broken into and looted. Uh, tear gas has been thrown, water bottles we witnessed being thrown
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at police. If you remember, tear gas just dropped right near us. It's going to get very bad here if
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we don't have masks. If you remember right, uh, in Portland, they were rioting under Donald, uh,
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under, uh, uh, Joe Biden and Barack Obama's America as well. This has been fomented. This has
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been really well crafted. It is the Democrats that have put $175 million into Black Lives Matter
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Inc.'s coffers. This is not, you're watching a stage play. And now the playwright sees that at
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intermission, everybody is walking out and he's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. And he's trying
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to change what the character said in the first half. Nobody's going to buy that.
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These are democratic governors, democratic mayors, democratic city councils. These are progressive
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hell holes that have, these people have been in power for decades. So how is that Trump's fault?
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I mean, do you really believe Democrats? And I'm talking about the Democrats in power.
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Do you really believe your voters are this stupid? I mean, even I don't believe that. And I, you always
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say, I think the worst of the Democrats that are voting. No, I don't. I think they're patriotic
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Americans, many of them liberals that I disagree with, but they're not revolutionaries. They don't
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hate America. They don't go out and burn the flag. They come with us to 4th of July.
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They, they, you know, and yes, even some of them occasionally weep during this, the, uh,
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the fireworks, the star spangled banner. Many of them are very patriotic. You don't think
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they are. You think they're all revolutionaries and dumb ones at that because they won't remember
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what you've been saying. You know, how is it? How is this Trump's fault? It's his fault that the
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same democratic officials are now rejecting help from federal law enforcement, refusing the national
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guard, telling their cops to stand down. That's Trump's fault. Was, was Ferguson's Trump's fault as
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well? Was Ferguson really in 2014? And if this is the case, why didn't they use that line at any time
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during the DNC? Because the polls hadn't come out yet. Democrats were getting exactly what they
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wanted. And now Americans are pissed off. They think you're stupid. I'm sorry. I don't think America
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is that stupid. A few weeks ago, Senator Ted Cruz repeatedly gave the good Senator from Hawaii
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multiple opportunities to call out the rioters. She actually got up and walked out of the room.
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She wouldn't declare the rioters as a problem. It's the same song and dance that Democrats like
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Pelosi, Nadler, refusing to call out the violence. It was their strategy. They wanted the main street
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of U.S. to burn down and they coordinated their collective silence. Let's remember the,
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the vice president want to be Kamala Harris was on the late show with, with Stephen Colbert.
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Here's what she said about the riots. Oh, we don't have, sorry, we don't have it. Two months ago,
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she said, quote, this is a movement. I'm telling you, everyone beware. Protesters are not going to
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stop before election day in November, and they're not going to stop after election day. They should not.
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They should not. And we should not. This is the best of the Glenn Beck program.
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Michael Antoni was former national security official in the Trump administration,
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senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, and he has a new book out called The Stakes,
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America at the Point of No Return, which is exactly where we are. Michael, welcome to the program. How are
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you? Thanks for being on. I just, I want to mention also my, my, my day job, my primary affiliation is
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that I'm a lecturer at Hillsdale College at our campus in Washington, D.C. Oh, really,
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really good institution to be associated with. A fine institution, indeed. Okay. So you, um,
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you are, of course, with this book, you're going to be called, um, crazy conspiracy theory or overreacting.
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It's all of these things. Trust me, I've been called this for a very long time. Uh, and,
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I can't punch a hole in what you're saying is coming because I don't think people really realize
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the end of America as we know it is here and it's just waiting for November 3rd to see which way we're
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going to go. Yeah. I'd love to be wrong. I've never more wanted to be wrong. You know, you don't want
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to put six months of your life into something as grueling as writing a book and then say that you
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hope your entire thesis is wrong, but you know, what, what patriotic decent American wants to be
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right about the end of your country as you know it. I, I, I certainly don't, but I had to write the
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book honestly and call it as I saw it. And it's pretty obvious to me, first of all, from having
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grown up in California and lived in New York, I've seen what happens once voting patterns,
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demographics, et cetera, tip a place permanently blue so that there's no effective opposition
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and what Democrats and liberals do. And it's very bad. Second of all, all you have to do is listen
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to what they say and watch what they try to do at the national level to get a picture of what they
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will do when they have, when, and if they gain blue dominance coast to coast and essentially turn
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the USA into a giant California, New York. Um, it's not hard to figure out what they're going to do.
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All you got to do is look at what they've already done, look at what they're doing now and look at what
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they say they want to do. So again, if, if I'm, um, crazy alarmist and it's all, you know, it's all
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not happening, I'd like to hear a convincing refutation of why they won't do what they're already doing
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and say they want to do. Okay. So describe, uh, America, you know, a year from now, should the
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Democrats win? Well, I look, think about some of the completely radical things on their agenda that
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they, that they ran on, um, tearing down existing sections of the wall, right? Not only are they
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against president Trump's wall, which is still not complete, not because the president doesn't want
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to build the wall, but because he faces so much internal opposition from the federal government,
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they want to tear down sections that immediately exist. Joe Biden has said he will amnesty, uh,
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every illegal immigrant in the country. And he uses the, the, the fake number 11 million,
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which we've been hearing for something like 20 years now. How is it that with porous borders and about
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a million and a half new entries a year or whatever it is, it's gone down under the Trump
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administration. The 11, 11 million figures remain static for a couple of decades. That seems
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unlikely, doesn't it? Well, Yale university put out a study last year. Uh, I think it's actually in
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late 2018 saying, we think the number is more like 22 million, right? We don't know how many illegal
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immigrants are in the country, but Joe Biden will amnesty them all. And then they will be eligible
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for family reunification, uh, visas for, uh, relatives abroad, which is a dumb part of the
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immigration law that president Trump would like to get rid of, but hasn't been in so-called chain
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migration, but hasn't been able to do because he, you know, he can't, it's impossible to get any
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piece of good legislation through Congress. So just in Joe Biden's first term alone, we could see the
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additional importation of tens of millions of new people, all fast track to citizenship, um,
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uh, so that they can tip purple States blue and produce an electoral lock for the, for the
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democratic party. Uh, remember the first democratic debate when they were asked to 10 candidates were
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asked, how many of you would extend, uh, Medicaid to illegal aliens? Uh, they, of course, they never
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would use the phrase illegal alien. They use whatever euphemism they used undocumented immigrants
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or something. All 10 hands went up. So we're going to bankrupt these federal programs designed,
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however, imperfectly designed to help American citizens by giving it, by giving the, uh, care
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away completely free to people who broke the law to come into the country in the first place.
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I mean, this is just, these are just the beginnings of the radicalism of their agenda that I'm convinced
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they will implement if they get in and take power. So I'm, I'm, um, I'm with you on those
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things, Michael, but I am more concerned. Um, that's a, that's a hard thing to say, but I am more
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concerned that the silencing of voices, the silencing of our churches, the, um, the silencing
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of conservatives. I mean, it is not unusual now to hear people on CNN or whatever saying,
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you know, conservatives really need to be reeducated. Um, you know, they, they are,
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they are, they are in a very frightening, uh, Stalinist kind of path right now.
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And for the most part, so far, they're doing it through their, they've outsourced the silencing
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of voices, censorship and so on to private companies, to the social media companies and others. And so you,
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you guys do this and the government doesn't necessarily need to do it. Um,
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I, I, I shudder to think what they will do when they also have complete state power. Look,
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I think their preference is, yes, we absolutely want a lockdown on what can be said, uh, but we'd
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prefer not to have to use the government to do it because that can get messy. And, you know,
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there might be court challenges we might lose. It might be unpopular, but you know, so far there's
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been very little pushback on tech censorship and, and complete tech control of speech and thought
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in this country. And the Dems like it that way because they know that they can
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count on the tech companies to do exactly what they want them to do. Um, but all of
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that, all of that will get worse that, you know, there should be right now, there should
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be significant governmental pushback on these tech monopolies. And there isn't any, we know
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for an absolute fact that the tech companies are overwhelmingly democratic in the voting
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patterns of their employees and in the donations of their executives. And so when you have a democratic
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administration in the white house, again, I think you'll see these two, um, uh, institutions
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work hand in glove to an even greater extent than they have so far. And that will be disastrous
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for freedom of speech and freedom of thought. And you mentioned churches. I'm the one thing,
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another thing that worries me very, very much is the way these lockdowns have taken place.
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Uh, you know, we have a legislative branch for a reason. And if there's a need to change policy
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because of an emergency, right, we should be working through legislative institutions,
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whether that's the Congress, whether it's a state legislature, whether it's a city council,
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but all over the country, we've seen mayors and governors just say, as if they have the power,
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you can't go outside anymore. Now that's ruled by fiat. I mean, that really is, I mean,
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they call president Trump a fascist and all these kinds of names. Oh no. What, what is this extra
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legislative, extrajudicial power where an executive without color of law and in any respect just says,
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I've gave an order, you now must follow it. I don't know, but that's not the kind of government
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America is supposed to be. And it's not the kind that I want to live in.
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So they are, they are making rules up for themselves where you can't, uh, you can't go
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to church, but you can go out and protest. Uh, you know, you can go out and riot, uh, but you can't
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peacefully protest if you're on the wrong side in some states. Yeah. It seems like the more,
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I don't, I hate to use such terminology, but I don't, I can't think of any other,
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it seems kind of like the more destructive a thing is the more they're willing to tolerate
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or even encourage it. And the more peaceful and constructive it is, the more they hate it. So
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they'll shut down all kinds of businesses, but make sure the pot dispensaries stay open and liquor
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stores stay open. Now, why is that? There's a, there, I sense a kind of sinister agenda from what
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I call in the book, the ruling class that they want as much sort of soul destroying garbage in the
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culture as possible because it keeps the population from getting too restive and from noticing
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their bad governance and maybe fighting back. I mean, that is that that's, that was part of the
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deal with the Weimar Republic. Yeah. And so, you know, I mean, why are we legalizing marijuana all
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over the country and what, why are Republican, you know, Republicans, um, lawmakers when they get,
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go leave Congress and including, including a former speaker of the house, becoming lobbyists for
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marijuana, which is a substance, a substance, whatever you think of it. I mean, it's, it's not conducive to
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having a constructive life or to, you know, ultimately to the social order. I think it's
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because they think, you know, well, the more people are just on the couch stoned, then, you know, the
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less trouble they're going to give us. You talk in the book about a couple of things that I would
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like you to expand on. Um, Caesarism. Yeah. Explain. Caesarism is a form of, so it's obviously named
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after the first Caesar, Julius Caesar, who took over the last remnant of the Roman Republic, uh,
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about 50 years before the birth of Christ and turned it into a one man rule state, but it's a
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particular form of one man rule. Uh, another way of terming one man, absolute rules, you know,
00:22:16.280
you call an absolute monarchy or you can call it a tyranny, right? But it's a particular form that
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becomes, uh, in a sense, it's not justified, uh, maybe necessitated when the constitutional order
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is broken and can't go on. Uh, and so you're, you asked me about this. This is in a chapter of the
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book, chapter seven, in which I speculate, I basically don't take sides. I don't make
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recommendations, but I say, if the present ruling arrangement is a thing that can't go on forever,
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and I think that's, it's possible, then it'll have to stop. It'll have to break. Well, what will
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follow it? What will, and I, Caesarism is one of those things that could follow it. If, if,
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if present trends continue, especially without president Trump and his closest allies fighting
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them, I think the country as we've known it could break and then something has to follow. And that
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Caesarism could, could be one of those things. And Caesarism could emerge from either side. It's
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easier to imagine Caesarism coming from the blue side or the democratic side, just because they have
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all of the commanding heights, uh, you know, powerful institutions in America now, except one,
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the white house, which they're determined to get back this fall. It's, it's harder to imagine a path
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for a Caesarism of the, of the other side to happen, but not impossible. And I, you know,
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I give all of the reasons and sort of speculate about how this one might happen or that one might
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happen just because I think no one's thinking about these things. Uh, and I, I, I point the finger
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in particular at conservatives, you know, I'm not going to name names necessarily, but there's a
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strain of conservative thought, which is so in love with the idea of American exceptionalism that it
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thinks that it, nothing can ever get bad enough for America, for America to fundamentally change for the
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worse. So human possibilities that have been around since there has been mankind, you know,
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the fall of Republics, tyrannies, civil wars, things like that. We don't even have to think about them
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in America because they can't happen here anymore. And I think that's foolish. And somebody needed to
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begin the conversation about, well, what happens if it does get bad enough? And so I, I stuck my neck
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out and did that. So Michael Anton, he's the author of the stakes. Um, and I want to talk to you
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about, cause I think we're closer to these things, Michael, than most people do. Um, I could see a
00:24:31.020
breakdown on the election. It's already going to happen with, with the Democrats saying mail-in votes.
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It'll be days before we know that will be a shock to the system. Um, and it will, you know, probably
00:24:45.260
will end that night with Trump being ahead. Then these, these ballots will trickle in and trickle in
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and it will appear as a stealing. Even if he, even if Trump continues to hold, they are going to say,
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look how many people are being disenfranchised. They're throwing all these ballots out because
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the typical number of ballots on mail-in that are thrown out is about 20%. And they'll make this into
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some new scandal. I could see either side standing up and saying, that's not my president. It's not my
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point. And, and, and secession, serious talk of secession where states say, I'm not abiding by
00:25:27.480
you because you're out of control. I, I worried about this too. I, you know, I do go into some
00:25:33.520
of these election issues in the book. Um, I couldn't, you know, it, they're so vast and complicated,
00:25:39.060
right? An entire book about how, you know, to, to do modern election fraud, especially with the way
00:25:44.100
these changes are taking place. So I'm foreseeing exactly the same possibility that you foresee.
00:25:50.240
I mean, the best, you know, we probably won't have what we had in 2016, where by about two or
00:25:55.540
three o'clock in the morning, if you were still awake, you knew who the president was going to be,
00:25:59.220
right? It was over. Um, and, and it, you know, days may be optimistic. It could be weeks or months.
00:26:04.560
So I have a section in that famous chapter and well, famous, it's not famous yet, but it might
00:26:09.440
be chapter seven in which I say states could secede and this could happen from the blue left or the
00:26:16.300
red, right. Depending. Um, now I don't necessarily even know that, you know, there's two ways to talk
00:26:23.100
about secession, right? One is actually pulling it off, right? Because the other is just giving it a
00:26:29.840
try. So what happens if the state just passes a state legislature passes a resolution and says
00:26:34.340
we've seceded from the United States of America? Well, it's not really accomplished until the issue
00:26:39.620
is settled and both sides agree. Yeah. Yeah. We're, we're separate countries now. Are the feds going
00:26:43.720
to necessarily accept that? And if they decide that they don't want to accept it, what are they going
00:26:47.080
to do about it? And will what they try to do about it be effective? Um, these are all questions that
00:26:52.780
I think we've barely begun thinking about, much less thinking through. Um, I admit, I don't resolve any of
00:26:59.820
them in the book because I don't know the answers, but I think I have, I think I have raised all of
00:27:03.880
the questions that we need to be talking about. And if I haven't, I urge people to read what I wrote
00:27:08.320
and, and, and, you know, write it up somewhere and say, well, Anton forgot this. And he didn't think
00:27:12.860
about this. He didn't think about that. Cause we need to get on this right away. So I tell you,
00:27:16.320
Michael, um, I thank you for doing this from, uh, the point of view from the conservative, uh, right.
00:27:23.560
Um, because I do believe the left has already war game this years ago. I, I,
00:27:29.260
yeah, I don't know. They, they, they, you say the war game, they war game did pretty recently.
00:27:34.240
If I, I'm assuming you saw the leak that they deliberately planted in, I can't remember if it
00:27:39.080
was Politico or the New York times about a month ago where they got together and they had a war
00:27:42.800
game scenario that included session. And then they deliberately put that out into the press
00:27:47.560
for, for reasons, you know, we can only speculate about, but they don't, you don't leak something
00:27:52.140
to the press unless you think you're going to benefit from the leak. So they must think
00:27:54.980
that they benefit from the leak somehow. And in one of those scenarios, um, uh, in which
00:28:00.460
president Trump wins, this is a member, these are democratic and anti-Trump players playing
00:28:05.500
this game. Trump wins convincingly in the electoral college, but loses the popular vote, just like
00:28:10.060
2016. And the Biden campaign refuses to concede and tries to urge, um, states where Trump,
00:28:18.160
that Trump won to send Biden electors. And from there, uh, the dispute gets to a point where
00:28:26.220
remember, if it, if the election gets kicked into the house, it's not the full house that
00:28:30.820
votes. It's the state delegations. Each state has a vote. So even though the Democrats control
00:28:37.700
the house, they don't control, um, they don't control it. Right. Each state delegation in that
00:28:43.380
sense. So under this scenario, uh, certain states, I think they had California and some others
00:28:48.800
seceded because they didn't want to live under president Trump. Now call me crazy. And many
00:28:53.420
people will, but I have a hard time imagining red America saying, Oh no, California, please don't
00:29:04.220
You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.
00:29:13.380
This is the Glenn Beck program. Ken Cuccinelli is with us. He's the acting DHS deputy secretary,
00:29:22.060
former attorney general of Virginia. He is a federalist, meaning he believes the state rights
00:29:30.240
are the most, uh, important, uh, and is not looking for any kind of national police work,
00:29:37.820
but he is, uh, is now working in, uh, Portland and all over the country where these riots are
00:29:46.680
happening. And as soon as the governor asked for the help from the federal government, they're
00:29:53.140
sending it in. Welcome again to the program. Ken, how are you? Good to be with you, Glenn. I'm doing
00:29:58.980
well. Thank you. I wanted to talk to you about Portland and this, this, uh, this shooting. I think
00:30:05.160
this was an, an execution that happened in Portland and, uh, and, and by a really, really bad guy,
00:30:14.160
apparently. Can you tell us what we know about the alleged shooter? Well, it is preliminary and,
00:30:22.260
and, uh, it's a messy situation. The investigation has just begun. And one of the tough things about
00:30:27.680
this sort of a situation, especially for us Americans is, you know, we're so antsy and impatient.
00:30:33.600
We want everything done yesterday. Uh, but to do an investigation correctly does take some time,
00:30:39.020
but, but the initial person, uh, of interest is clearly someone with a track record and, um,
00:30:46.600
yeah, generally to put it. And, um, uh, you know, when you invite and frankly, encourage violence for
00:30:55.500
months at a time, what you get is violence. And, um, you also, and frankly, in some respects,
00:31:03.220
uh, it took longer than I thought it would, you invite in other elements. And I don't mean
00:31:10.740
necessarily bad people who are just fed up, who are so frustrated with the failure of the rule of law
00:31:16.520
that they want to go do it themselves. And historically we've called the vigilantes, but,
00:31:20.200
but the reality is America policed itself for, you know, the first hundred years of its existence,
00:31:25.840
right? There were no police. Um, there was you and me in our neighborhoods and, um, and that attitude,
00:31:33.280
that cultural element, uh, has never left us completely. And when people like the mayor of
00:31:38.560
Portland intentionally decline to adequately police their own communities, um, you invite more violence
00:31:47.940
in violence begets violence. It doesn't burn itself out. And we've seen that all over the country,
00:31:53.340
the obvious comparison being Kenosha, where a somewhat reluctant governor Evers did bring in
00:31:58.960
national guard, you know, small amounts at first, but when he finally put enough people there, um,
00:32:06.120
after some more violence happened, um, the president had urged him to do so peace broke out and has
00:32:13.080
remained in Kenosha. Um, this is the peace through strength concept that Ronald Reagan made famous in
00:32:19.840
international relations simply applied to domestic tranquility. And that's the goal. It's the goal of
00:32:25.280
the president. It's the goal of many people, but apparently not the mayor of Portland or the governor
00:32:30.200
of Oregon to achieve peace. So let's talk about Wisconsin here for a second. Um, if you watch that
00:32:36.480
video and I'm not saying this kid should have gone down there, but that is what people do. I mean,
00:32:41.980
you know, it's crazy that the left is, we were just talking about it, right? So people show up
00:32:46.660
because they don't see the government doing their job and it offends them. And so they show up to help
00:32:52.040
out their fellow Americans. Right. And isn't this, isn't this just what happened, uh, in Charlottesville?
00:32:59.800
I mean, the, the Nazis were there and the left decided to show up to stop it. And that caused the
00:33:05.680
problem. And those of course, were the good guys, according to the media. Now somebody shows up and says,
00:33:10.940
hey, uh, you know, we got to at least protect these businesses, et cetera. He's a bad guy. But
00:33:16.680
that said, I wouldn't have had my son there and I would be really upset if my kids went to that.
00:33:22.320
Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. However, he, it, the video looks like it was self-defense,
00:33:27.720
especially with all of the other videos showing this guy really trying to jump him several times.
00:33:33.560
And the left is acting like it, like none of that matters. And they're saying, look,
00:33:39.940
first degree murder. Ken, how are they charging this kid with first degree murder?
00:33:46.460
Well, first of all, they did it so quickly that you knew they were just slapping on a charge.
00:33:52.340
Um, and remember the standard to charge is much lower than to convict. I would be astonished if that
00:34:02.260
charge weren't dramatically reduced, possibly ultimately dropped, but dramatically reduced
00:34:08.860
before they go forward with it. Um, because, uh, in the absence of other information that we haven't
00:34:16.840
seen. And one of the things about having all this public video, it can be a little chaotic,
00:34:21.260
but it does give everybody at least some window into what happened. And, um, you know, you clearly,
00:34:28.160
as you've said, Glenn, see this kid and his lawyer, you know, broadcast, they're going to defend on
00:34:34.720
self-defense and, um, and you, you have a right to defend yourself. The real question, I think that
00:34:42.120
the whole thing will come down to is the amount of force used. Was it appropriate under the
00:34:47.740
circumstances? And, um, I think that's what the whole thing will turn on. And if a jury finds that
00:34:54.120
it was a legitimate, um, use of force, meaning the using a gun was appropriate under the circumstances,
00:35:01.500
then he will, he will not end up being convicted of anything under those circumstances.
00:35:07.200
So let's go back to, uh, Portland. They, uh, the, the press is making this, this guy who lost his life
00:35:18.420
as, you know, uh, a guy who is inciting violence. Ken, doesn't it look like an execution? Is, is there
00:35:27.720
a defense for somebody, you know, saying, you know, Hey, I, I don't agree with you. And just even
00:35:35.900
forcefully, I don't agree with you, but, but not having a weapon and then somebody just pulling
00:35:40.760
out a gun and is shooting you. Yeah. See when they, when you've got, if, if it's one-on-one,
00:35:47.540
we don't have nearly the kind of video coverage that we do of the Kenosha situation that you and
00:35:53.040
I were just talking about. So the facts surrounding what actually happened are much less certain here.
00:35:59.580
And, um, but one of the factors, if this is a one-on-one situation is, um, an armed person
00:36:08.480
and an unarmed person, um, and that, you know, that's with my captain obvious cape on, right.
00:36:15.280
But, uh, but that's a factor here. And it also raises the question of malevolence to your point,
00:36:23.260
was this premeditated in some way? Um, and, uh, that is still, you know, a long way off from being
00:36:31.220
resolved. That one's going to be, um, in many ways, murkier and more difficult to investigate,
00:36:38.140
I think, than the Kenosha case in part, because there's so much video in the Kenosha situation.
00:36:43.100
Um, you know, whenever you have video of violence, you need to understand the context and you need to
00:36:47.680
be able to know what happened before and sometimes after, but, um, but at least you have it,
00:36:54.140
it becomes a baseline to, to, to analyze the facts. And, you know, I, I don't have the luxury
00:36:59.700
like people outside of, uh, federal government and the state government that's responsible for this,
00:37:06.340
of going too far down the road of potential conclusions. Um, you know, the, the restraint we
00:37:15.160
have to show in talking about this, um, impairs our ability to address the particular situation.
00:37:21.720
I will say that the indications where you have two groups facing off like this and, and some of
00:37:30.080
them randomly just, you know, okay, rallies are over, we're walking out. And some people may go
00:37:34.560
picking fights with, with others who don't agree with them. You know, that, that, that is all invited
00:37:40.840
by the kind of path this mayor and governor have encouraged. They haven't merely allowed it.
00:37:47.680
They've encouraged it. And, um, it's, uh, it's really quite extraordinary that, um, an entire
00:37:56.420
state would allow this to go on like this. And undoubtedly, Glenn, you saw the governor's
00:38:01.540
quote plan unquote for resolving the violence in Portland, relying on surrounding law enforcement,
00:38:07.500
uh, uh, uh, sheriff's offices. And they, they declined to enter. And one of the most
00:38:14.280
outstandingly written letters that I have seen in a very long time was by one Washington County
00:38:20.900
sheriff nearby. I think it was Washington County, um, who said, I cannot, I want peace. I'll help
00:38:27.400
analyze social media. I'll do these other things to help at a distance, but I, without the political
00:38:32.540
support and without the prosecutions being undertaken and putting, I cannot put my deputies in that kind
00:38:39.620
of danger in that sort of, and the most interesting phrase was something along the lines of legally
00:38:45.360
questionable situation, meaning you won't protect them, right? You won't protect them. I have an
00:38:52.940
obligation to my own deputies to not put them in those situations. And, and I think that sheriff was
00:38:58.180
absolutely right. This mayor and this governor have all the tools they have ever needed to bring
00:39:04.520
peace to Portland tomorrow, tomorrow. And yet they refuse to do it. So this is a decision on their
00:39:12.740
part that, that somehow the violence is politically preferable to them than, um, than the alternative.
00:39:20.880
And I've said, you know, with the mayor's response to the president's most recent letter,
00:39:25.180
this mayor hates president Trump more than he loves the people of Portland that he's responsible
00:39:32.260
to protect, not just represent, but he's the chief of police too, but to protect. And he is failing
00:39:38.420
intentionally in that obligation. I know you have a meeting you've got to run to. Can I get just a
00:39:44.240
couple of short answers, uh, on two questions? One, um, the media is now claiming this is the right
00:39:51.620
wing in flaming the protests. And the second is the, you know, your boss, Chad Wolf said,
00:39:57.740
we are targeting and investigating the heads of BLM and Tifa and those who fund them comments on both
00:40:04.960
of those things. So, uh, on the, on the second one, there are literally hundreds of federal
00:40:11.720
investigations running across the country into the violence around the country, not just Portland and
00:40:18.160
Kenosha. And inevitably those will also involve, uh, not just the occurrence of violence, but to the
00:40:24.980
extent funding was required to pull it off where that came from and what networking, uh, might be
00:40:30.600
involved in it. So that's unfolding as we speak, um, literally hundreds of investigations involved
00:40:36.200
there. There's nothing too specific to point to. What was your, your first, again, the first one is
00:40:40.600
the, the right wing is inflaming the protest. Right, right, right, right. This is just the latest
00:40:45.020
narrative. Look, when we, when, when we augmented our federal forces in Portland, you heard all the
00:40:50.340
media say, Oh, they cause the violence. Well, you know, that was a little ridiculous with five weeks
00:40:57.040
of violence and declarations of riots before we, before we were even seen there. Um, and Mayor Wheeler
00:41:03.340
on July 3rd saying the violence has to stop. This is from, you know, the, the main opponent there.
00:41:08.920
This is just the latest narrative, Glenn, and not one of them has survived. When the, we caused the
00:41:16.020
violence failed. They said, we made it worse. It was getting better. We made it worse. Well, we showed
00:41:20.660
the data that showed it was actually getting worse before we got there. It's why we came. Every single
00:41:25.940
narrative of the left, promptly propagated by the subservient mainstream media has been utterly
00:41:33.400
defeated by that most powerful force in the universe. Truth and truth, uh, not only will set
00:41:41.740
you free, but it will also accurately describe what's going on around you. Ken Cuccinelli. Thank
00:41:46.720
you very much. Acting DHS deputy secretary. You can follow him on Twitter at Homeland Ken.