The Great America Show - ED ROLLINS SAYS TRUMP OWNS THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND IF HE RUNS, HE WINS

00:00:00.000 Hello, everybody. I'm Lou Dobbs, and welcome to The Great America Show. Thanks for being with us.

00:00:05.760 And I want to thank President Trump again for being our guest here on The Great America Show yesterday.

00:00:11.120 The president was, as always, terrific. The president is clearly rested, he's strong,

00:00:16.740 and bringing much-needed leadership to the Republican Party, still the America First Party,

00:00:22.460 and certainly still the Trump MAGA Party. Much, I'm sure, to the great discomfort and frustration

00:00:28.280 of some, such as Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, and the liberal rhino wing of the entire GOP.

00:00:36.020 As for the Democrats, they're as confused and out of touch with the American people as ever.

00:00:41.600 They're simply delusional, whether it's on Capitol Hill or Joe Biden, the puppet president.

00:00:47.200 How will it all work out this November? No one, no one is more qualified to answer that question,

00:00:53.680 to analyze the American political scene than our good friend, Ed Rollins. He is the political savant,

00:01:00.820 preeminent political strategist, political scientist, historian, and no one has led more campaigns than

00:01:07.420 Ed. Ed famously chaired the Ronald Reagan 1984 campaign when Reagan won the electoral votes of

00:01:14.980 49 states in a historic landslide. A truly great American.

00:01:22.940 Ed Rollins, it is so great to have you with us on The Great America Show. Welcome, my friend.

00:01:28.880 My pleasure, Lou. It's nice to be back with you. We miss you.

00:01:31.540 Well, thank you very much.

00:01:32.800 You miss our daily fix of Lou.

00:01:34.280 Well, there's no reason for that. You can listen to me every day on The Great America Show.

00:01:41.640 It's a little different vehicle, but it's a great vehicle. I love this podcasting, man.

00:01:46.480 It's still the same smart analyst by you. That's what counts.

00:01:52.960 Well, thank you so much. Ed, let's get to the body politic and the times we live in.

00:02:00.000 Well, first, the elections, the president is doing great. I mean, he has something like a 90s

00:02:07.440 plus record of wins on endorsements and a handful of losses. What I get a kick out of anybody else,

00:02:15.700 they would be calling him Nostradamus. But if it's Donald Trump, they're saying, well,

00:02:21.680 why doesn't he have them all? Your thoughts?

00:02:24.160 My thoughts are he is the most significant ex-president in his own party and in the country

00:02:31.400 of anyone in my 50 years in active politics. And I worked for Reagan. I worked for Nixon.

00:02:38.660 Even Reagan, as popular as he was when he was done, he was done. I mean, he went out and

00:02:43.140 built his library and those kinds of things. But Trump is not. Trump is today owns this party.

00:02:48.720 Uh, the big question now is, does he want to run for another shot? And if he does, then obviously

00:02:55.100 he's going to be the nominee and he'll be a very significant factor, uh, in anybody else's race.

00:03:01.880 Uh, you know, he he's, he's out, he's raising tons of money. Uh, and it's just a question of

00:03:07.560 what does he want to do? Nobody else can do anything significant until he decides what he wants to do.

00:03:12.600 And he can decide it as late as he wants. Uh, uh, you know, the way the system is set up,

00:03:17.340 you're not, you're not going to beat him in primaries. Uh, uh, you're not going to beat

00:03:21.280 him on primaries. You may be some of the candidates that are out there running for other things as a

00:03:25.240 couple yesterday. And I think, I think where he's not been as successful as, you know, a governor has

00:03:31.280 a lot of built-in resources and, and like yesterday in, in, uh, in Georgia, I mean, the governor there was

00:03:38.020 basically, uh, someone that Trump had serious problems with over the, over the election. But the

00:03:44.620 reality is the governor was able to beat a not very good candidate and why, why Trump picked

00:03:50.380 Purdue to be his candidate is beyond me because he wasn't a very good candidate when he ran for the

00:03:54.400 Senate. Because his name wasn't Brian Kemp, I believe. Well, I think that may be, I think that

00:03:59.640 may be, but at the end of the day here, the game's going to be the same again. I mean, we've got the

00:04:04.820 key, the key States. Uh, we've had two presidential races back to back in which literally by less than

00:04:10.120 100,000 votes in both of them, uh, 100,000 votes combined in both of them, uh, Trump won

00:04:16.520 beat Hillary and came back next time. And, and, you know, the official report is that he lost by 40,

00:04:22.760 41,000 votes. That's probably going to be the same playing field again. Uh, uh, the difference is that

00:04:29.260 Biden runs for reelection. He's a very, as we said often on your TV show, he was a very weak candidate

00:04:34.900 who neither of us thought could win. Uh, and he probably wouldn't have won if it wasn't for

00:04:38.960 COVID and all the rest of it. Uh, but the reality is he's people have got to see him up close. Uh,

00:04:45.360 the, the expectations, which are low, uh, have been exceeded. Uh, he's a record low and approval

00:04:51.520 rating for a president. Uh, he's got nothing but problems ahead. He's bought the same old team back

00:04:56.600 from the Obama days, uh, uh, players by name and number that played before. Uh, and I think to a

00:05:04.480 certain extent, their view of where this country should go is so far to the left of where the

00:05:09.200 country is deserves. It should be, uh, that my sense is that if Trump gets in this or any other

00:05:16.020 Republican who ends up being the nominee, if for some reason, Trump doesn't run, uh, then,

00:05:20.260 then I think, I think Biden himself will have a very difficult time getting reelected.

00:05:24.760 There's a fascinating dynamics at work as you're, as you're saying, uh, amongst them, by the way,

00:05:30.660 uh, is your own involvement in a new pack that's raised a few eyebrows. Tell us about this ready

00:05:37.080 for Ron pack, uh, that you're heading up along with Lillian Rodriguez-Maz of, uh, Florida. Uh,

00:05:44.740 she was quoted saying, uh, we're not concerned whether or not Trump is going to run. Uh,

00:05:50.720 what are we to make of that? Well, first of all, it was a big mistake. And I chastised her big time 0.99

00:05:55.540 yesterday. Our, our whole drill and, and, and my comments are that it's, it's, it's Trump to make

00:06:01.620 his choice. If Trump wants to run. And as I just said, he can do it as late as he wants. Uh, uh,

00:06:07.960 he's, I supported him all through his presidency and we'll support him again if he's the nominee

00:06:12.260 of the party. Uh, she's a young girl who basically, and part of my intention, uh, and putting this

00:06:18.440 together was to have some young people in here. She's a Floridian and she's, this is her first game.

00:06:23.360 Um, and, uh, but she doesn't, she doesn't speak for the, for those that are going to be supported.

00:06:28.960 The vehicle is, uh, there's a lot of things you have to do to get ready for presidential. Um, and,

00:06:34.280 and we did a lot of this for Trump, uh, before he ran five years ago, uh, before you get a campaign

00:06:39.700 up and particularly when you're, when you're in a governor, you got to run for reelection. Uh, you

00:06:45.020 know, you're, you're out doing the things you have to do to get reelected and you can't be out

00:06:48.480 saying, I'm reelect me. I'm going to run for president six months later. So they're, they're,

00:06:53.000 there's a lot of people have come forth and said, if I can't have Trump, I want DeSantis. A lot of

00:06:57.580 people will say, I want DeSantis and we're trying to give them a vehicle where they can, uh, donate

00:07:02.440 some money, do some things, get, get, feel like they're part of the process. But I make it very

00:07:07.580 clear again. And I've said this, I said this in the announcement, uh, this fact, if Trump wants to

00:07:13.340 run, uh, no one's going to beat him in our party. Uh, you can take a shot at him, but it's not going to

00:07:17.800 Mike Pence isn't going to beat him. No one else is going to beat him. And I think to a certain

00:07:21.480 extent, uh, uh, he'll, he'll, he'll romp through a primary process. Uh, the party is his, I've never

00:07:28.040 seen an ex president have the control that he has. I worked for Ronald Reagan was very popular

00:07:33.040 president. Uh, Ronald Reagan, when he was out of office, went and built his library and wasn't a

00:07:38.440 part of part of the political process. Uh, and Trump has decided he wants to be active and he is,

00:07:44.500 has been active and, and, uh, people still turn out for his rallies and he's raised money,

00:07:50.340 like record numbers still as an ex president. So until he decides everything else is kind of on

00:07:55.500 hold. And if, if he does decide to run, will your pack, will you turn the money over to, uh,

00:08:02.420 we will give him, we'll give him all the vehicles that we, we, uh, pick, we've gone to the FEC, uh,

00:08:07.340 to get permission to do that because you can't do that at this point in time. And that's certainly

00:08:11.440 our intent. If he, if he, if he's wants to run, as I said, this is a great America pack,

00:08:16.880 which I've run for the last four years with a Trump pack. Uh, and this is kind of, this is kind

00:08:21.340 of a whole, uh, a placeholder in the sense of, you know, you need to, there are people who don't

00:08:26.840 live in Florida who want to be active in, in, in a conservative campaign. And again, I think he

00:08:32.880 doesn't want to announce at this point in time because it then limits how much money he can

00:08:37.600 raise and where he can go and what he has to do. He then becomes a, so, but I think certainly by the

00:08:42.880 midterms, uh, uh, and depending on what happens there, that he needs to get in the game and march

00:08:48.480 forward. I mean, he is in the game, but I mean, he needs to announce what his intentions are and no

00:08:52.520 one else, no one else can play. I mean, they can all get out and talk about it. You can have Pompeo

00:08:56.380 and you can have tents and all the rest of them, but no one's going to be viable.

00:08:59.460 And, uh, nowhere, uh, is there anyone who can, uh, hold a candle to Ed Rollins as political

00:09:07.540 savant and the number of campaigns that you've run participated in over the years. Uh, this is

00:09:14.240 a different kind of feel to it right now, uh, because of what you talked about. President Trump

00:09:20.380 is such a dominant force, uh, being, uh, a former president or as of right now, and the party

00:09:28.640 is resisting him. The establishment party is resisting him. His own vice president, uh, is

00:09:35.100 behaving as if he were at the top of the ticket, uh, for, for the 2016 campaign and is a big time

00:09:41.780 draw. Uh, Mike Pompeo, who is diffident and obtuse with his language, uh, and somewhat meddlesome

00:09:49.720 in, uh, the race with, uh, uh, in, uh, with Dr. Oz in Pennsylvania. Uh, and I want to turn

00:09:57.560 to that in a minute, but I mean, these are people that are not grateful. They don't have

00:10:01.360 a sense of proportion. They have no sense of apparently their own standing in the world.

00:10:08.080 Well, that's all of the illusions that sometimes happens to people that get to ride around in

00:10:13.260 big cars, limousines, and have fancy titles and sit in big offices for a couple of years.

00:10:18.400 They think they earned it. There's only one guy who got votes for the Republicans. That was

00:10:22.680 Donald Trump. Uh, the rest of them are all basically live off of reflected power. Uh,

00:10:27.760 and you would think there would be more gratitude, but there's not, uh, but it doesn't matter to the

00:10:31.840 public out there, to the Republican base. Uh, uh, he is, he is the Republican party today and

00:10:38.360 anybody that tries to step up and get in his way is, is going to get rolled over. Uh, you know,

00:10:43.460 again, you take situations like governors, uh, which is the couple, the three or four races that

00:10:48.820 he's endorsed and lost, uh, he's gone up against pretty popular Republican governors and people

00:10:55.280 look at governors in a little different way. So it's not, it's not a question of him being on

00:10:58.580 the tickets and trying to help people. And that's what's clearly the case yesterday with, uh, in

00:11:02.880 Georgia. Yeah. And we've got a lot of primaries coming up. As I said, his, have you ever seen

00:11:09.720 any, uh, you know, president or otherwise, I've never seen anyone come up with a record on his

00:11:15.060 endorsements, uh, and victories that he's got the highest winning percentage in history. Don't you

00:11:21.900 think? Absolutely. Well, first of all, let me, let me just tell you something. I was Ronald Reagan's

00:11:26.940 political director, uh, in the white house and ran his reelection campaign. Uh, Reagan never endorsed

00:11:32.540 a candidate. Uh, he did not want to participate in primaries and art. And part of that reason was,

00:11:37.620 uh, there was a lot of, when he ran against Ford, he was, he, he, he, and Ford was the incumbent

00:11:43.240 president. Uh, he wanted to have, he felt it's important to let people go out and choose

00:11:48.480 their, their, their players. In Trump's case, Trump wants to pick people that he, you know,

00:11:53.800 he sees it almost as a parliamentary type thing. You'd be a part of my team and you, I support

00:11:59.140 you. Uh, he's, he's swamped everybody in the fundraising. I mean, he has got, he's more

00:12:04.920 powerful than anybody's ever played in the Republican party in a long, long time, if ever. So my

00:12:10.700 sense is, uh, you know, you're, you're whistling by the graveyard and whether you like them or don't

00:12:14.820 like them. And there's some few people who don't, and certainly the, if there's any, if there's any

00:12:19.920 questioning, it's whether he's stayed too long trying to argue the election, as opposed to saying,

00:12:25.380 okay, uh, there was, there was mischief that went on, but let's move forward. Uh, we're going to deal

00:12:30.880 with it next time. And I'm going to talk about the great issues that I, that I, that I had

00:12:34.940 obviously have been altered by, by Biden. I mean, I think the thing that I worry about is,

00:12:41.700 um, and the media certainly is not a friend of ours, except for maybe Fox and a few others, but, uh,

00:12:47.080 the end of the day is, is, is legacy, uh, which obviously is, is magnificent when you compare it to

00:12:54.280 the Biden legacy, uh, on all, whether it's the economy or whether it's on the immigration issues

00:13:00.160 or whether it's foreign policy, uh, uh, uh, you know, he should be getting applauded every single

00:13:05.620 day, but he doesn't, uh, to those of us that know what he did, uh, you know, we applauded, but, uh,

00:13:11.980 but, you know, he's, he's gotta, he's gotta go remind people of that. And I think the certain,

00:13:15.980 you know, I mean, I think, you know, he's a tough guy who wants to basically grind down people that

00:13:20.020 stood up to him. And I think the reality here is that he needs to go out and be a salesman,

00:13:24.800 put a salesman hat back on. Here's what I did. And here's what they're not doing.

00:13:27.860 And that's what they're trying to undo. And that would do a great service to the country.

00:13:32.260 Yeah. When listening to the president, uh, I talked with him yesterday when he said,

00:13:37.960 and I'm not quoting, I'm paraphrasing when he said it is a very sad thing to be watching all of

00:13:44.580 these American cargo aircraft coming back from Europe, bringing in baby formula just to feed our

00:13:52.880 children. Uh, he was, he was emotional about that. It matters to him. Uh, you know, when,

00:14:01.800 when we talk about the pain of these high prices, it's the gas pump. When we talk about what the

00:14:07.680 working man and woman in this country is facing, uh, and their families every day under this, uh, 0.98

00:14:13.040 this idiotic, uh, set of economic policies by this administration, uh, what is, what does 0.98

00:14:20.660 president Biden do when I ask about it? He starts talking about the great transition. Uh, it's 1.00

00:14:26.960 mindlessness. He's, he is simply remote, uh, unconnected, uh, and out of touch.

00:14:33.840 Well, can you just imagine, I mean, finding a solution for COVID, which obviously Trump

00:14:38.240 was critical in making happen. Absolutely. We have baby formula where mothers can't get 1.00

00:14:45.320 formula to feed their children. The greatest nation in the world, basically it's, it's embarrassing

00:14:51.800 and appalling. Uh, and, and, you know, they say, oh, we're going to get it worked out. It'll be

00:14:58.060 another eight or 10 weeks. Well, how many babies are going to die or have their lives affected by

00:15:01.880 that? Uh, that's something should have been priority. Number one, and he had slammed his fist

00:15:06.700 on the desk and it said, get it done. And it would have got done. Uh, and I, and no excuses,

00:15:11.900 the economy can't go along like this. We're doing record, we're still doing record spending, uh,

00:15:19.160 and, and no one knows what we're spending. We just had one of the biggest scandals in my lifetime.

00:15:24.100 I grew up in a Navy town, as you know, my father built nuclear submarines. We're now going to basically

00:15:28.740 take brand new Navy ships. So supposedly the state of the art, uh, and anti-submarine anti-Soviet submarine,

00:15:37.540 uh, uh, ships, and we're going to tear them apart because the system doesn't work. They're brand new

00:15:44.220 boats, spent billions of dollars on that. You barely see a word on that. You ought to be taking

00:15:50.160 the makers of those ships and just rake them over the coals. Uh, and, you know, I, I just feel we've

00:15:57.080 lost control of the, of the spending, which is important. Uh, you know, we're not, we're not

00:16:02.840 doing anything for the quality of life of people here. Uh, and I think to a certain extent we, we

00:16:08.060 need moral leadership and, and, you know, we, we don't have any, and then the, the idea that

00:16:13.360 the foreign front, we don't know what our strategy is in Ukraine. I mean, obviously we, we need to,

00:16:19.480 we need to do what we can, but you know, every other day it's something new. Uh, the president going to

00:16:26.080 Japan and North Korea on the edge there and talking about a 30 year old Taiwan policy that's

00:16:33.460 we walked away from. I mean, to me, it's so embarrassing to watch an American president

00:16:38.440 go up, make a statement, stumble through it. And then five seconds later, his staff turns out and

00:16:43.440 says, no, no, no, he didn't mean to say that. Uh, uh, that was a mistake. That's, you know, I mean,

00:16:48.240 it's, uh, as I said, I've worked for three presidents. That doesn't, that's not what you're

00:16:52.100 supposed to do. And the staff doesn't get to run it. Staff gets to advise, uh, if you, if a president

00:16:58.100 wants the advice, but this president every day, it's a stumble every day. It's, I mean, it's almost

00:17:03.480 to an, I mean, he, you know, and he, even last night watching him come back, uh, you know, this

00:17:10.820 tragic, tragic massacre in Texas, which obviously our hearts all ache. First thing he does is attack

00:17:17.880 the NRA and basically doesn't do anything to provide, offer solutions or any of the rest of

00:17:24.660 it. So, uh, he's, he's just not providing the leadership. And I, and I go back to the point

00:17:29.940 of, you know, I think, I think this is a president that could be defeated in a heartbeat if the

00:17:35.800 election were this week or next week, or even in, in, in November. Uh, but we've got three more

00:17:41.260 years of this and two and a half more years of this, and it's just appalling and we need a powerful

00:17:46.180 voice on the other side and it's not the Congress. And we've never seen, uh, we've never seen this

00:17:53.620 level of disgust with where the country is headed. I mean, we're talking over 70% of the country says

00:18:00.960 we're headed in the wrong direction. Now you're, you're the, the expert, the, the, the genius of

00:18:07.440 strategy and tactics and politics and presidential politics in particular, but I don't know if you need

00:18:14.200 to take another poll when you've got 70% of the country saying you're going in the wrong direction.

00:18:19.220 Do you? No, you don't. You know, at the end of the day here in the, uh, we have too many polls,

00:18:27.020 uh, the, the, the people know things aren't working. Uh, young people are so disgusted,

00:18:32.940 you know, where, where are their, where are their role models for the future? Uh, uh, and, you know,

00:18:38.740 we went through this terrible disaster with the COVID for the last couple of years, young people

00:18:43.700 don't want to go back to work. I know people that own restaurants and other things here in New York,

00:18:48.400 and I can't get it, can't get people to go to work. I don't want to go to work for enormous sums of

00:18:52.660 money, uh, $25 an hour to wait on tables, uh, $50 an hour to cook in a kitchen. They don't want to do

00:18:59.020 it. Uh, no, no, no, thanks. I'll get the government program. I'm going to sit home,

00:19:03.640 play on my computer. Uh, and I think it's just tragic. Uh, so, you know, they get up there and

00:19:09.160 they rattle off a bunch of statistics that don't mean anything. And I think the confidence of the

00:19:14.200 young people, which is really what matters here is the next generation, uh, is really being, uh,

00:19:19.720 diminished daily. And they watch the political squabbles go on. Uh, you turn on any of these cable TV

00:19:26.120 shows and you and I've been on them for many, many years. It just, it's, it's all, it's all

00:19:30.380 rhetoric. Uh, it's not, it's not any solutions. It's not any, any viable people that can change

00:19:37.260 any of this because they don't have the guts to do that. So at least Donald Trump, you know,

00:19:41.980 he got in there and basically made things happen. Uh, and I think someone like DeSantis and others

00:19:46.440 who sort of are the same mode, uh, uh, obviously can do things similar. Well, let me, let me turn,

00:19:53.100 if I may, to something that's, uh, well, two things that are very important. I think one is

00:19:59.320 William Barr through his book and all of his press announced press engagements and promoting his book

00:20:05.760 acknowledged that he knew Joe Biden was lying in the second and final debate of the presidential

00:20:12.860 election in 2020. He also acknowledged that that Hunter's laptop from hell, that that laptop and its

00:20:22.420 contents were proof of the Biden family corruption. And he chose not to say anything as the attorney

00:20:29.480 general of the United States, as he heard a former vice president lying to the American people seeking 0.60

00:20:36.900 their votes and knew he was corrupt and lying. Uh, and so, and so doing he intervened on behalf of

00:20:46.900 Biden, William Barr, Trump's own attorney general is in my judgment. Uh, if you just consider his

00:20:55.120 actions alone, responsible for a horrible cheating of, uh, the American people of a fair election and

00:21:03.100 changing history and not for the good, your thoughts.

00:21:07.020 I couldn't agree with you more. My, my, my sense is there's been such a failure, not only by someone

00:21:13.780 like Barr, but by establishment institutions that we used to have great respect for the FBI can't

00:21:20.560 function and won't function. Uh, the intelligence communities all over the place are just failing

00:21:26.460 and failing miserably. Uh, you know, our, our, our military leadership, not our soldiers and our

00:21:32.300 sailors, but our military leadership can't figure out what they're supposed to be doing. Uh, you know,

00:21:38.700 and they're all getting their ready for their books when they're retired. And as I said, it goes back

00:21:42.140 to, they drive around in big limos when they're in the office, they have big flags in their office. Uh,

00:21:47.000 they have big offices, uh, and they don't do the job. And the job is basically what the president

00:21:53.700 needs to have done to help them. Uh, and then the justice department to me, it's just absurd. It's just, uh,

00:21:58.300 you know, we're now going on our second year. We're going on our third year on the, on the January

00:22:03.760 6th, uh, you know, in about 48 hours, you could, you don't have to interview everybody and work

00:22:08.820 the cameras and see the guys over the ringleaders there and do whatever you want to do to them.

00:22:12.820 But, uh, at the end of the day here, we're going to go through, you know, the, the country's bored

00:22:17.300 with this stuff. The country just wants to fix it, get it done.

00:22:22.760 You know, and I'm afraid, I'm afraid you're right that they're bored when in point of fact,

00:22:28.300 right now, they should be tuned into what the Sussman trial, the Michael Sussman trial is

00:22:33.760 revealing. It revealed with, from the mouth of the, of the Robbie Mook, the campaign manager

00:22:41.020 in 2016 for Hillary Clinton, that she was the person responsible for ordering the Russian

00:22:47.680 hoax and for carrying it out with the democratic party, the national democratic national committee,

00:22:54.180 as well as her campaign in, in, in alliance with the deep state pervasive throughout the

00:23:01.800 federal government. You're talking about the justice department. The justice department is a

00:23:05.760 radicalized institution, uh, filled with Marxist Democrats pressing an agenda. And we have now the

00:23:13.220 deep state, the Democrat party, so-called, and the white house all aligned behind what are Marxist

00:23:21.220 principles. And they mean to destroy the, the very foundation of this country. Don't you think?

00:23:27.360 Absolutely. Couldn't agree with you more than they, you know, that they have a holier than thou attitude

00:23:34.380 that we're a law, uh, and they're not the law. The law, the law is what's written in the constitution

00:23:39.860 been passed by the Congress and upheld by the constitution and the Supreme court. Uh, they're

00:23:45.040 not, they're not fixing the laws. They're not basically imposing the laws. You know, we have a

00:23:49.800 breakdown and, you know, we've got district attorneys now who are running on, we're going to dismantle the

00:23:55.800 police. We're going to put people in jail and we don't have a bail system. I mean, I live in New York

00:24:01.660 city. Every other day I pick up, pick up something where, you know, Goldman Sachs guy writing to work

00:24:07.360 on in a, in a, and it's robbed at gunpoint and turns out the guy who robbed them is, is someone

00:24:13.480 with 25 arrests and never been in jail. I mean, we have a real breakdown in our judicial system.

00:24:20.060 So I said to my daughter who's going to Mexico next week, I said, I want you to be real careful,

00:24:23.820 uh, when you're down there. Cause there's a lot of, a lot of stuff that's going on down there.

00:24:27.440 She's dead. Can't be any more unsafe than New York city. Uh, you know, getting on the subway here is

00:24:33.120 a, is a real challenge. You know, that's a 26 year old young girl. Uh, and it's, it's just, you

00:24:38.480 know, we, we, the failure of Giuliani at the end of his career here, uh, should not diminish what he

00:24:45.860 did when he was mayor for eight years. And when he came in and cleaned the city up, we now have the

00:24:50.840 worst mayor in the history is going to run for Congress. De Blasio can't give up the public trough

00:24:57.440 he's going to run for congressional seat. Uh, even there, the most important city in the country,

00:25:02.220 one of the most important city, the worst mayor by far, uh, you know, it just, and the whole,

00:25:09.480 the whole premise is, you know, the bad guys get out and the good guys get punished. Uh,

00:25:15.620 and me and the good ordinary people go to work every day. They're getting robbed on the street.

00:25:19.900 They got to live, live in fear. And now you're going to see everybody saying, oh, because of this

00:25:24.560 terrible tragedy in, in Texas, which was a terrible tragedy, they're going to take everybody's 0.98

00:25:28.700 guns away. Uh, and you know, it's absurd. It's just not going to happen. And equally as important,

00:25:32.920 uh, if anything, uh, I've been more people going out and buying guns today and next month, uh, to

00:25:38.600 protect themselves, uh, certainly protect, protect their kids. Uh, so there's no breakdown in our

00:25:44.760 society. And it's just, uh, and again, uh, there's no leadership. There's no clarity, uh,

00:25:50.560 we're spending $40 billion to supply Ukraine, which is a country struggling, uh, in, in fighting for

00:25:58.520 democracy and we should help, but is there a plan? Uh, do we have a plan? Do they have a plan? Does

00:26:04.060 NATO have a plan? Uh, I don't see any, uh, and I think to a certain extent, uh, you know, they want

00:26:11.460 to talk about Putin being crazy and all the rest. It doesn't matter. Putin's a bad guy. What are our

00:26:16.800 plans for him for the future? Uh, so I get, I get frustrated. I want to, I just want to go through

00:26:25.920 something because I think you just said the words that are, that sum up our situation right now in

00:26:31.100 the United States of America. We are in the midst of a breakdown of society. I think you've said it

00:26:38.220 exactly right. We can't trust our government. We can't trust our institutions. We are facing forces

00:26:46.020 that our leadership can't even comprehend, let alone respond intelligently to through public

00:26:51.880 policy. What are no world is it going to take? Because we keep waiting for one election to the

00:26:58.620 next. We finally elected a president in 2016 by pure to me, uh, a pure adventure to bring in Donald

00:27:06.780 Trump, not a politician, a man who was very certain of his values and his purpose and carried them out.

00:27:12.840 And he was allowed to be overthrown by his own attorney general, by the deep state, by the

00:27:22.480 Democrat party, by changing election laws, all of that. But at the very bedrock bottom, the Republican

00:27:31.520 party is riven with a division that no one wants to acknowledge. No one talks about the liberal wing,

00:27:38.720 the left wing of the Republican party. They do about the democratic party, but the rhinos only 11 0.94

00:27:46.060 senators. And as you know, only 11 Republican senators voted against that $40 billion for Ukraine

00:27:54.080 money without purpose, without a target. And by the way, uh, the NATO nations, European nations have

00:28:02.860 only put up a fraction of that $40 billion and it's their problem, not ours. What are we to do?

00:28:11.180 You know, I, I, I, I've been getting worked up on this issue because obviously I spent a lot of time

00:28:16.580 watching this war and I, and I watched the president of Ukraine show great courage, but at the end of the

00:28:25.360 day here, uh, what is our plan? And I, I went back and I read Dwight Eisenhower's, uh, his farewell

00:28:33.280 speech. He talked about the military industrial complex and the fears of that. And that's where we

00:28:40.380 have become. We now produce weapons and sell weapons and that's the game. Uh, I go back to the point of,

00:28:48.000 of spending billions of dollars to destroy brand new ships, state of the art ships. Uh, this was the

00:28:54.900 ship that was going to be able to go out and find the Russian submarines, uh, supposedly the best

00:28:59.980 technological stuff in the world doesn't work. So we're going to tear them, scrap them, send them

00:29:05.080 home, uh, uh, send them to a junkyard. Billions of dollars and nobody cares. It's one little story

00:29:12.940 somewhere. Uh, and the problem we have today is, is probably too much clutter coming at people every

00:29:19.220 single day. You know, it's, uh, uh, uh, you know, used to be the nation would sit around and back in

00:29:23.960 our day, you know, you'd watch one of the news networks at six o'clock or six 30, and you'd sort

00:29:29.240 of know what the agenda of the, of the, at least the news media was and the Congress and what have

00:29:32.800 you. Now it's 24 hours a day. It's, uh, you know, hundreds of stations. It's, it's distorted stories.

00:29:39.100 Uh, uh, and you know, where do you find the truth? And what happens is people, young people 0.98

00:29:44.680 in particular find their own little niche and that's all that they want to look at. They don't

00:29:48.480 want to go beyond that. Uh, you know, I've read newspapers all my life, uh, and I've read all

00:29:53.900 kinds. I read the wall street journal. I read the Washington post and new York times. I want to know

00:29:58.880 the full story and I'm going to make my own judgments. Kids don't even read today. Uh, they,

00:30:03.980 they put their headphones on and they get, I want all the news I can hear in three seconds or 30

00:30:09.020 seconds, maybe five minutes. Uh, then I want to get back to playing war games and, and, you know, 0.86

00:30:14.300 it just, uh, uh, and we're now going to have a big debate on this tragedy in Texas, which is

00:30:22.020 outrageous. But even, even if you put the most severe law, this is a troubled kid. This is a kid

00:30:27.920 who obviously has now been killed justifiably, but at the end of the day, uh, the idea that you're

00:30:35.120 going to have some kind of red flag, uh, it's an 18 year old kid. He wasn't on record. Uh,

00:30:41.500 he's a poor kid who basically was harassed, uh, in school and drifting. And we're, we're

00:30:48.580 to decide. He probably had never shot the guns before. Uh, so he goes on, he buys two guns

00:30:53.480 and he goes into school cause he's just, and it kills 19 little kids. Now, you know, we

00:30:59.300 need to examine that. We need to, and the answer is not all to stick with everybody's guns, which

00:31:03.120 is what will be the Democrat strategy, uh, what's going on in the society that's creating

00:31:07.640 all this. Uh, and you know, it's every week there's something somewhere. So, yeah. And

00:31:13.700 by the way, public schools have to start taking responsibility as well. Uh, there is no reason

00:31:19.520 that his teachers didn't know what was going on with that kid. There is no reason that there

00:31:24.920 aren't resources within that school to give him mental, uh, at least make a mental, uh, assessment

00:31:31.760 of his state of, uh, of his state. Why in the world are we keep looking to take everybody's

00:31:38.520 guns away? What is the purpose of that? Uh, will we take out, you know, it, these are

00:31:43.800 tools, they're instruments. The fact is we've got deeply troubled children in this country

00:31:49.500 and they're growing up into deeply troubled adults, creating even more problems for a society

00:31:55.420 that acts indifferent, uh, to their, to their issues, their problems. We've got teachers

00:32:01.260 more interested in educating and indoctrinating children five to nine years of age about gender

00:32:08.960 choice, uh, and sex. This is madness. We're institutionalizing madness. And what do we expect

00:32:17.020 the result to be? And then we have an impaired president standing out, uh, blubbering nonsense 1.00

00:32:23.560 about guns when he should be talking about much deeper, much more profound issues, uh, which

00:32:31.260 he obviously can't comprehend, but you would think there would be someone in the white house

00:32:35.200 somewhere, uh, in the education department, uh, to who could deal with these complex issues

00:32:41.740 and mount a policy, but there is no policy. There is no response.

00:32:48.320 No, you're, you're absolutely right. And every day it gets worse. I mean, obviously every little

00:32:52.560 kid that's in the first or the fourth grade, it's going to wake up today and hear something

00:32:57.460 of the story and start having nightmares. Uh, and it's, it's, you know, I, I, I, again,

00:33:06.460 I, I look, I know you're a grandfather and love your kids. I love my daughter. Uh, I worry

00:33:14.420 about the world for them. And it's not, this great nation's been through lots of things in the past,

00:33:20.540 but we're more interested in renaming confederate generals, military bases than we are. How are

00:33:27.380 training our troops and what are we training our troops to do? And what is our other policies? Uh,

00:33:32.760 so, uh, I'm not overly encouraged, nor am I, uh, my good friend, nor am I, but you know what,

00:33:42.380 we're going to press ahead and we're going to prevail somehow, some way. I want, one of the ways is our

00:33:48.620 political choices that we'll be making this year, the midterms, give us, give us your, uh, outlook

00:33:54.880 on the midterms and what will be the result. Uh, we talked about most of the country, the vast

00:34:01.740 majority of the country thinks we're on the, going on the wrong direction. How will that reflect in

00:34:06.460 the midterms? Do you think? Well, mid midterms are always kind of a, uh, of a change agent and,

00:34:11.820 and, uh, historically the president's power party almost always loses seats, uh, uh, with one or two

00:34:19.180 exceptions in modern times, uh, we will take back the house. There's no ifs, ands, or, or bet that's

00:34:26.340 not going to happen. Uh, the Senate's going to be close. We can certainly win that back. What I worry

00:34:31.640 about is what are we going to do with it when we get it? Uh, what is our agenda? Uh, what are we going

00:34:37.700 to talk about? Uh, you know, our agenda for the last two years has been, you know, sort of stop

00:34:43.260 Biden and Biden's programs, but what are we going to do? Uh, and that's the key thing that the party

00:34:49.980 that finds the answers here, and certainly the Democrats can't find them. Their answers spend

00:34:55.540 more money on whatever, uh, our answers don't spend any money and don't do anything. Uh, that's not a

00:35:00.960 good agenda. Uh, and I, and I, and so I think to a certain extent, uh, Senate, Senate's going to be,

00:35:07.680 uh, there's five or six seats that are going to matter. Uh, we have to win that Georgia seat with

00:35:13.580 Herschel Walker last night. We have to win the Pennsylvania seat once that our candidate is

00:35:18.040 decided there, uh, we have to not lose any of our incumbents. We have to win in Nevada with the young

00:35:25.620 Laxalt, uh, former attorney general, grandson of the great Senator who was Reagan's chairman.

00:35:30.960 Uh, fall Laxalt, uh, but it's, it's going to come down again, either, either way. If we win the

00:35:37.940 house, it may, maybe we have a 10 or 15 seat margin, uh, which means you've got to play lowest

00:35:43.700 common denominator. The Senate, as it is today, any, any member of the Senate can be king. Uh, uh,

00:35:51.580 you need, you need to get some numbers here where you can really move some people. And even if you

00:35:56.660 lose one or two, uh, but it's not a question of going in and changing as the, the, the filibuster

00:36:02.620 rule and all the things that Democrats talk about, uh, uh, I, I just say, thank goodness for Joe

00:36:08.580 Manchin is, is what would be the difference between the house and Senate if it's all majority vote,

00:36:13.400 uh, uh, you know, and I just think as a, as a political scientist, as someone that studied

00:36:18.420 the presidency and taught about the presidency for decades, uh, I don't know when the presidency

00:36:23.520 works anymore. I don't, I don't know if our basic fundamental system of government works

00:36:28.080 unless we get a real person in there who really wants to lead, who has an agenda. Uh, he used to

00:36:34.800 be in the country, uh, governors, uh, a lot of the Southern governors in particular, there's a couple

00:36:39.360 of them left, only got one term. So in four years, you had to be decide what you were. Were you going

00:36:45.580 to be the education governor and devote all your time and energy to that? Are you going to be a public

00:36:49.360 works and rebuild roads, uh, or are you going to be a governor that basically tries to do all things

00:36:53.920 to all people? Uh, my sense of the presidency today is all things to all people, uh, and nothing gets

00:37:00.560 done. Uh, there's no overhaul. There's no, no saying to the justice department. Why isn't it working?

00:37:06.960 Why isn't our intelligence system working? Uh, why can't, why in something as important as the presidency,

00:37:13.520 we can't basically know that one side is lying and cheating, uh, and, and manipulating the process.

00:37:20.960 Uh, so, you know, it's, it's, I'm an old man now, you know, and at the end of the day,

00:37:27.520 it's been an extraordinary country and extraordinary life that I've lived, but I worry about the future.

00:37:32.800 And I worry about what we sit and see is critical. You know, we've always bragged about where the,

00:37:38.160 where the beacon to the rest of the world on democracy. If we don't make it work,

00:37:42.240 we don't believe in it as deeply as we did. Hey, it's going to work. Uh, you know,

00:37:46.720 it's going to work if the Russians are pounding on your door and you're trying to save 0.64

00:37:50.400 country as they are in Ukraine. But at the end of the day, what's, what's the long-term plan? What is

00:37:54.640 the, what is the plan for China? What is the plan for trade policy? How do we, how do we make sure

00:38:00.000 that people get and build jobs and housing and the things that we need to, uh, without bankrupting

00:38:06.560 ourselves? Uh, right now spending is at a level that's unsustainable,

00:38:11.520 but yet we go on under this president and it will go on under this president until the Republican

00:38:18.000 party comes to term with what they're going to do with rhinos and how they're going to do it.

00:38:23.120 And the future of Kevin McCarthy, uh, and Mitch McConnell, the leadership of the party on Capitol

00:38:29.440 Hill, as you well know, is rhino to the bone. And no one, no one that I've seen has the courage to

00:38:36.480 stand up and say, this is unacceptable. This is the, this is the America first party. 0.90

00:38:43.440 This is Donald Trump's party. This is make America great. And what do we have to lead us?

00:38:49.840 Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy, your thoughts.

00:38:53.440 Well, they're not, they're not leaders. I mean, I've known McCarthy forever, at this point in time,

00:39:02.080 he lost the speakership once and he's going to do anything to make sure he doesn't lose it again,

00:39:06.880 as opposed to saying, okay, if we get 218 Republicans, which I think we are, this is what I

00:39:13.120 want us to do for the next two years or four years or eight years or whatever. Uh, you know,

00:39:17.760 the wonderful thing is, and I, and I go back to the president I worked for, for Reagan. Reagan was

00:39:22.640 for strong national defense. We had to rebuild the defenses of the country after the Vietnam

00:39:26.240 debacle and what have you. He did that. He was for getting taxes lower because they were record high.

00:39:31.120 He did that. He was for trying to advocate for small business, which he did that. Uh, he was

00:39:35.680 trying to get government off the backs of, of, of, of, of, you know, the small business people. And he did that.

00:39:41.280 But the guy that followed him, who he handed the baton to, cut defense, uh, increased spending,

00:39:49.360 increased taxes, uh, and couldn't understand why he hit his reelection where the campaign I ran for

00:39:55.600 Reagan, we got 59% of the vote. Bush got 39% of the vote seven years later. And that's, and we're

00:40:01.920 somewhere in between there now, you know, it's just, uh, as opposed to saying, all right, here is our

00:40:06.480 policy. Economic policy is critical. Trade policy is critical. Immigration policy. My God, 0.80

00:40:12.240 you look at these nightmare scenes on the, on the border. Uh, and, and it's, uh, you know,

00:40:18.880 everybody wants to come here. Uh, those who are here have to, have to decide what they want. Uh,

00:40:26.480 and at the end of the day here, it's a scary thought. A scary thought. And I, I'm going to, uh,

00:40:34.160 give you what we do, uh, with each of our guests on the opportunity for closing thoughts. Uh, you

00:40:39.920 get to have the very last word. The last word is go out and find someone who believes like you do

00:40:48.560 and help them get elected wherever it is, state assembly, Congress, make the political system work

00:40:55.440 again. Uh, and if it doesn't work, throw them out. Don't be afraid to throw them out. And that's

00:41:00.880 what we need to do. Ed Rollins, the savant and great American. Ed, it has been, uh, a fascinating

00:41:10.480 conversation. Thanks for being with us. I look forward to talking with you again soon. Uh,

00:41:15.200 thank you. And God bless you, Ed. Ed Rollins. Thank you, my friend. And thanks everybody for being with

00:41:21.600 us today. I hope you'll join us here tomorrow. We'll be taking up the chaos on our Southern border,

00:41:27.520 a border kept wide open by president Biden and his puppet masters. Millions of illegals,

00:41:34.160 deadly drugs pouring across that border into our country this year, already at record levels. Our

00:41:40.880 guest is Mark Morgan, former commissioner of customs and border protection. Please join us here

00:41:46.720 tomorrow. Till then. God bless you and God bless America.

The Great America Show - May 26, 2022

ED ROLLINS SAYS TRUMP OWNS THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND IF HE RUNS, HE WINS

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