The Tucker Carlson Show - Sen. Eric Schmitt： FBI and DOJ Corruption, and How Politicized Judges Are Undermining America

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00:00:39.420 So you were Attorney General of the state of Missouri for four years, and you've been in the Senate for three?

00:00:45.680 Yeah, almost three.

00:00:46.540 Almost three.

00:00:47.580 What job was more powerful?

00:00:50.340 Well, I think the Senate is sort of the apex of how you can affect a number of things.

00:00:56.000 But the Senate, in many ways, is kind of broken the way it's currently constituted.

00:00:59.680 And it's proclaimed to be the world's most deliberative body, but a lot of it's kabuki theater, honestly.

00:01:06.520 But I think in the time in which I served as Attorney General when you had a Democrat president, you could affect a lot of things by challenging the extremism we saw from the Biden administration in court and win.

00:01:19.580 And you didn't need to ask anybody's permission for that.

00:01:21.420 You could just make that decision.

00:01:22.440 You didn't need 50 other people to vote for it.

00:01:25.600 So I think for me at that time, it was a critical moment in our country's history.

00:01:32.180 And I just happened to be in that position at that time.

00:01:35.680 And you've got to remember, too, I think, if you take a step back, President Trump was out of office.

00:01:40.880 And so this responsibility sort of fell to a relatively unknown group of people to kind of hold the line, which is why, you know, the last line of defense and how to beat the left in court is the title of the book.

00:01:55.040 Because I felt like we were really holding the line for the country until reinforcements could come.

00:02:00.580 And thankfully, they came with President Trump.

00:02:02.040 It's just interesting.

00:02:24.120 And you were principled and very aggressive, which are the two, I think, qualities necessary to succeed really in any job.

00:02:31.900 But the reason I ask the question is because serving in the Senate is, you know, it's the highest level for a legislator.

00:02:38.280 You travel to any country in the world.

00:02:39.900 You go through the, you know, diplomatic airport terminal.

00:02:43.520 You get a motorcade.

00:02:44.600 I mean, it's a big deal to be a U.S. senator.

00:02:47.140 But it does seem like the center of gravity has shifted from the legislative branch to the courts.

00:02:54.620 I mean, it does seem like courts have more power than voters.

00:02:58.520 I'm not.

00:02:59.380 Will you flush that out a little bit since you've had both jobs?

00:03:01.500 Yeah, no, I think it is a, and one of the reasons why I wanted to write the book was to, number one, lay out the landscape.

00:03:11.120 Because in that job, you saw, I saw, the threats that were coming from all directions, from the highest levels of government and the censorship enterprise that was created by Biden and big tech companies, to the local superintendent that somehow got bought into this training that you divide every classroom by race through critical race theory.

00:03:31.900 So you got to see that entirety of the landscape.

00:03:35.000 Yes.

00:03:35.660 And take action.

00:03:36.920 In detail.

00:03:37.300 In detail.

00:03:37.820 And take action.

00:03:39.900 And that is what I loved about the job, is if you were committed to taking action, you can make a difference.

00:03:44.440 And that was happening in the courts.

00:03:46.000 So to answer your question, I think conservatives for a long time have viewed the courts as sort of where the left wins, where they cement their policies because judges sort of make it up as they go along.

00:04:00.520 I do think there's an opportunity now, especially after Trump's first term, when he appointed 200 plus federal judges, and now in the second term, where you're going to have more members of the judiciary that view the law as it is not how they want it to be.

00:04:13.840 But that also requires people to step up and push back.

00:04:18.080 And, you know, you just think of the wins that we were able to have, like preventing 100 million people being forced to be vaccinated because OSHA, which was an agency created to make sure forklifts beep when they back up, somehow created this rule that 100 million people had to be vaccinated to keep their jobs.

00:04:37.200 You just think of the guy that's, like, swinging the hammer and just wants to feed his family.

00:04:41.180 He had to do that to keep his job.

00:04:43.080 It's totally insane.

00:04:43.740 So we went to the Supreme Court on that.

00:04:44.840 We won.

00:04:45.940 Of course, the student loan debt forgiveness case.

00:04:47.920 Missouri had a little-known loan servicing agency called Moheela that gave us standing to sue.

00:04:54.880 Our argument was, look, Moheela is this loan servicing agency.

00:04:57.840 If you eliminate all the student loan debt, which he wasn't allowed to do by law, that might go out of business.

00:05:02.960 Therefore, we had standing to bring suit to challenge Biden's action.

00:05:06.720 And we won.

00:05:07.320 The Supreme Court said, yeah, Joe Biden and the Secretary of Education didn't have any authority to wipe away a half a trillion dollars worth of debt.

00:05:14.040 So we took that to the Supreme Court.

00:05:15.320 We won.

00:05:15.480 We had some wins on the border wall to stave that off as long as we could, even though ultimately this mass migration plan that Joe Biden had came through.

00:05:23.240 But I think probably the biggest example was, you know, we intuitively knew that something was happening inside the Biden administration to suppress speech.

00:05:35.140 And we filed that lawsuit in May of 2022.

00:05:39.900 And we sought discovery first before we sought a preliminary injunction that was an important strategic decision.

00:05:46.420 And the judge granted it.

00:05:48.100 And because of that, we saw all of the emails.

00:05:50.700 We saw all of the text messages.

00:05:52.800 This vast censorship enterprise that had been created was exposed.

00:05:56.300 And this was before Elon Musk buys Twitter.

00:05:58.720 It's before you had the congressional hearings.

00:06:00.740 And I think, you know, being able to draw attention to that and flesh out the truth through our court system was a really important thing to do.

00:06:10.860 So, yes, I think this is a front that we have to fight in.

00:06:16.000 And that's what this is.

00:06:17.500 This is sort of like, hey, we took on when school districts were forcing five-year-olds to wear a mask all day long.

00:06:23.540 We sued 65 school districts in the state of Missouri, and we won.

00:06:27.840 When the biggest cities in Missouri were forcing people to wear masks all day long and close businesses, we sued, and we won.

00:06:35.360 When we took on ESG, we launched an investigation against some of the biggest banks in the world who controlled nearly half of the assets in this country.

00:06:43.500 We opened up an investigation because we were saying that their actions violated antitrust laws.

00:06:49.540 They backed away.

00:06:50.300 So, really, the story, I think, is there requires a lot of courage, right, to go do this stuff.

00:06:58.400 But if you do it, you find out that when you're in the arena, what people are really looking for is authentic leadership, right?

00:07:05.320 People can spot a phony.

00:07:07.160 And if you really believe this stuff and you're fighting for the people, the kid who's wearing, have to wear the mask or the deaf student who couldn't learn, 0.88

00:07:13.600 we would get, you know, reports of these things that were happening in school districts that you can fight for those people.

00:07:17.940 And as attorney general, I was able to go do that, and we were able to score some big wins.

00:07:22.540 And also, it lays out, I think, a playbook for the future because this isn't the last of it.

00:07:28.340 You already see the, you know, the left-wing lawfare machine coming out to try to stop President Trump's agenda,

00:07:36.040 which is inherently disruptive of the status quo, which is a good thing.

00:07:39.540 So they want the status quo to come back.

00:07:42.160 We want things to change, and you're going to need people who are aggressive to defend those things, too.

00:07:46.660 It's also a really sad story.

00:07:47.980 I want to, because none of this should have to happen.

00:07:52.340 I want to ask you about the details, particularly of the censorship regime, in a moment.

00:07:56.980 But first, it just, it seems like an attorney general in an ideal society would be fighting crime.

00:08:03.460 Not trying to push back on social policy changes made in the courts.

00:08:08.860 Like, that's the legislative branch's job because it's the most democratic arm of government, obviously.

00:08:13.720 So it reflects most precisely what the people want.

00:08:16.840 How do we get to a place where every big social change from abortion to gay marriage to censorship to COVID,

00:08:24.240 all of this stuff is determined in the courts?

00:08:26.740 And where the hell is Congress?

00:08:28.060 Right. Well, Congress has abdicated its responsibility to a lot of these administrative agencies over the decades, right?

00:08:34.680 And so, honestly, some of the court actions that you take on, like, you know, this is a little bit in the weeds,

00:08:39.920 but the Chevron deference that existed where essentially the court said,

00:08:43.360 yeah, we're going to defer to these agencies because they're the so-called experts.

00:08:46.500 Well, that got blown up, and that's a good thing now.

00:08:48.500 In Congress, Congress actually now has to write laws that are more prescriptive.

00:08:51.640 We should. We should do that.

00:08:53.080 But Congress has abdicated its responsibility for a couple of reasons.

00:08:56.140 But most notably, I think, because they're able to say, many congressmen are able to say,

00:09:00.620 I voted for this greatest bill in the world, but I can't believe what the EPA just did.

00:09:04.740 Well, that's not good enough anymore, I don't think, right?

00:09:06.640 You've got to rein in the authority of these agencies that have gone completely rogue.

00:09:11.160 And it kind of starts with Woodrow Wilson in this progressive era.

00:09:15.340 It's hypercharged by FDR.

00:09:18.640 And then this monstrosity, by the way, which has existed and grown in Republican and Democrat administrations over the years.

00:09:24.580 One of the things I think that's most exciting about what President Trump is doing is he put together this group of disruptors to disrupt that.

00:09:34.840 And so, but look at the hue and cry that comes out in D.C. when you're trying to, like, pare down the size of government.

00:09:40.360 People lose their minds.

00:09:41.280 And why, again, the courts are going to be really important here because President Trump and whoever the executive is certainly has Article II core powers to control programming and personnel, right?

00:09:53.920 And the Democrats don't want him to go do that.

00:09:56.480 Now, the good news is he's, by and large, won these cases.

00:09:59.300 There might be a district court case here or there, but that ultimately, as it makes its way to the appellate courts, the Supreme Court, President Trump is winning on this front.

00:10:06.980 So, again, I think it's a testament to the idea we have to be willing to fight, whether it's in the legislative branch, in the executive branch, or in the Article III branch for the things that we hold dear in this country because they're constantly under assault by the left.

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00:14:48.820 Ought to be.

00:14:49.220 But the net effect is to convince people in a way that was not true when I was a kid that the courts are political.

00:14:55.700 Even the highest court is fundamentally a political body, which maybe has always been true.

00:15:01.800 But it does seem a little scary when everyone thinks that because, I mean, it used to be if there's a Supreme Court decision, you have to abide by it, whether you like it or not.

00:15:10.320 But if people think it's all just partisan, then maybe they stop obeying.

00:15:15.640 Yeah, but I think that's, again, why, and I referenced this in the book.

00:15:19.960 When I was sort of coming of age, when I went to law school, people were still talking about this thing called the living constitution, which is a fiction, right?

00:15:27.540 It should be.

00:15:28.260 And Scalia was the first one who wrote with this sort of dramatic prose about originalism.

00:15:34.300 And I think that's our best hope moving forward is the constitution means exactly what it says, nothing more, nothing less, right?

00:15:41.460 It shouldn't be the Supreme Court, shouldn't be the super legislator, which is what the left has traditionally wanted.

00:15:47.740 You take Roe versus Wade, for example, right?

00:15:49.620 They sort of invented this right out of whole cloth and took that decision away from the people as this is supposed to be decided in the states by legislatures.

00:15:57.780 And now we're kind of back to that.

00:15:59.140 So my hope is that as you have a more conservative court, it's not about our ideology winning because somebody's wearing a red jersey or a blue jersey.

00:16:08.520 It's that Congress passes laws and those laws are interpreted as they are written, not making stuff up as you go along.

00:16:15.560 And I think that's what we need to get to is return to that.

00:16:18.100 That's the only way you're going to have credibility.

00:16:19.300 But the Democrats, you know, when Chuck Schumer is saying you're going to reap a whirlwind and you have these hearings about, you know, trying to on the Supreme Court.

00:16:28.340 We know especially they target Clarence Thomas.

00:16:30.420 They really despise him for a variety of reasons.

00:16:34.000 But he is, you know, now I think like the sixth longest serving Supreme Court justice of all time.

00:16:39.600 But but they want to undermine the courts because ultimately they want to pack the court.

00:16:42.840 And that's if they ever really I mean, if you play this out, Tucker, if they ever had.

00:16:47.500 And what we have right now, which is a Republican or a Democrat House, Democrat, Senate, Democrat president, they would pack the Supreme Court.

00:16:55.900 They would make D.C. a state, maybe Puerto Rico.

00:16:58.160 They would federalize our elections.

00:16:59.780 They would have amnesty.

00:17:02.300 I mean, they are they are in this now for a total power grab.

00:17:06.560 And I just want to make sure there's judges that view again, view the laws.

00:17:11.060 It's written out how they want it to be.

00:17:12.120 That's all you can ask for.

00:17:12.900 You see what has happened in Brazil.

00:17:15.400 Bolsonaro lost a couple of years ago to a socialist Lula, a convicted felon.

00:17:19.280 And everyone imagined that Lula would, you know, move the country hard left, which I think he'd like to do.

00:17:25.380 But it's really been a Supreme Court justice who has made all the major decisions in Brazil ever since.

00:17:32.460 I mean, basically, that country is run by a single Supreme Court justice in a way that's, you know, it's a dictatorship.

00:17:39.300 Yeah.

00:17:39.380 So how how does that not happen here?

00:17:42.400 Well, I think it's we're we were perilously close to that happening here through lawfare.

00:17:47.640 Right.

00:17:48.180 You just think of what and we can get into it on the sort of the Russia hoax stuff.

00:17:53.220 But what that did, it gave all the folks on the left a sort of a reason or a cause to undermine not just the president of the United States, but to spy on a on a candidate like they did.

00:18:06.000 And I think justice should be coming for the people that are involved.

00:18:10.760 Brendan, Clapper, Comey, there should be indictments that come because what they did to this country, not just for those four years, but it extended when Trump was, of course, out of office and they tried to put him in jail for the rest of his life.

00:18:22.660 He had bankrupt bankrupt his entire family.

00:18:24.320 The Hunter Biden laptop part of the FBI was very well aware.

00:18:29.660 I mean, we took the deposition in Missouri versus Biden of Elvis Chan, who admitted that they had months and months of monthly meetings pre bunking that story, telling them there was a Russian hack and leak operation.

00:18:39.440 Yoel Roth, who was the integrity person at Twitter, said they specifically mentioned the Hunter Biden laptop.

00:18:49.180 The FBI had the laptop in November of 2019.

00:18:51.980 They had it all along, but they were claiming it was a Russian hack and leak operation.

00:18:55.140 So how do you get there?

00:18:56.240 Well, you have a system that's captured by people who were obsessed with taking President Trump down and then they never wanted to get back in office and they can't believe it.

00:19:05.700 I think what you're seeing right now, this sort of weird phase, the Democrats are in, they can't believe he actually pulled it off.

00:19:11.540 They can't believe that he's back.

00:19:12.640 They literally thought he had him buried, right?

00:19:14.840 Yeah, we are in this weird phase where the Democrat, the Democratic Party really doesn't seem like a factor in the national conversation in American politics.

00:19:24.040 All the real fights are between, you know, our intra-Republican fights, Republican versus Republican.

00:19:29.080 But that's got to be just a period, right, that we're in.

00:19:32.640 Yeah.

00:19:32.740 Yeah, that's why I think it would seem, to your point, it almost, I think the tendency would believe that all of this, and now that we're on the other side of the fever dream, that this was all inevitable, right?

00:19:48.060 That what we're seeing, all the things that are taking place, the dismantling of some of these things, you know, going after USAID, having a Justice Department that's not going after Catholics because they're traditional Catholics or parents because they show up to school board meetings.

00:20:01.120 I think it's an important reminder, which is, you know, a big part of the book, too, is just how close we were to losing it all.

00:20:10.380 I, to me, people say power corrupts.

00:20:15.560 I think power reveals more than anything else.

00:20:18.440 You see the true nature of people when they have power, how they handle it.

00:20:22.100 And I think particularly during COVID, people who never should have had that kind of power had it, and they wield it in ways that people could have never imagined in this country.

00:20:30.580 And then you look at the lawfare.

00:20:32.100 You look at what they were willing to do to dissent, to silence dissent.

00:20:36.080 This is all happening, not some other place, but here.

00:20:39.480 And we have to be vigilant in standing up against that because, you know, these things, we like to think that majorities are forever.

00:20:44.920 They're not.

00:20:45.380 Nothing is forever.

00:20:47.840 And so in many ways, it's sort of a playbook of how you push back, what strategies you employ to go do that.

00:20:55.880 And you have to be aggressive and you have to, I think that my biggest takeaway from my time as attorney general is you have to be willing to be in that arena, take the criticism and, you know, fight for the things that you believe in.

00:21:07.140 And I think that is, you know, that I ask judges, now I'm on the Judiciary Committee, when judges come forward, I ask less about, I mean, I want to know what their judicial philosophy is.

00:21:16.000 That's very important.

00:21:17.200 But to me, I think the next phase, the next line of questioning that's most important moving forward is do you have the courage when people are outside your home, when you're being threatened, when people at the cocktail parties in Washington may not want you to do something, will you rule the appropriate way?

00:21:33.180 Like, that's what we need more of.

00:21:36.260 Why would that be a concern?

00:21:38.300 Well, I think we've seen it happen.

00:21:40.980 Yeah, we have.

00:21:41.500 Go the other way, right?

00:21:42.420 We have.

00:21:42.860 And I don't think it's from a lack of decency.

00:21:44.760 I don't think Amy Coney Barrett is an indecent person or like some closet lefty or sandwich on Roberts. 1.00

00:21:50.940 They're just afraid like everybody and they want, you know, they don't want to be snarled at when they go to the Chevy Chase Club for cocktails or whatever.

00:21:58.520 I mean, they're just people.

00:22:00.020 And so how do you identify the brave ones?

00:22:02.680 Clarence Thomas is brave, whatever you think of.

00:22:04.500 Yeah, well, he is brave.

00:22:06.120 Yeah, I think obviously some, maybe some positions that they took.

00:22:09.860 I mean, I'll just, you know, some of the judges that in some of these cases that are cited in the book, you know, basically in the Missouri versus Biden case, when we got favorable rulings, not only the district court, the appellate court, I mean, really went on a limb and said this is the most egregious violation of the first amendment we've seen in American history.

00:22:31.800 When you look at the sprawling expanse of the agencies that were captured by this.

00:22:37.240 Okay, so would you mind telling that story just from beginning to end?

00:22:40.360 Because I think even people who are interested in the topic may not fully appreciate what happened.

00:22:45.140 So the Biden administration comes in and on the third day, the third day in office, start to begin to hammer this home.

00:22:53.240 Now, there had been semblances of this that predate the Biden administration in that the FBI, for example, when we took the deposition of Elvis Chan, he was the FBI guy in Northern California that's working with the big tech companies.

00:23:05.900 Okay, even in the Trump administration, they were, the FBI was working with Democrat staffers to connect with big tech companies to look for things to censor under the guise of Russian disinformation, right?

00:23:19.020 This was, this was the thing.

00:23:20.060 Again, it's, it's kind of a legacy of what that hoax really meant for the country.

00:23:24.520 That foundation was laid down for a lot of folks in the administrative state or the deep state, whatever you want to call it, as a way to undermine an agenda under the guise of this is misinformation or disinformation.

00:23:35.640 So when Biden comes into office, all these agencies that are galvanized, you're mentioned actually very ironically, Tucker Carlson was mentioned, Alex Berenson was mentioned, RFK Jr. were mentioned in these emails about people promoting vaccine hesitancy or these sort of things that they wanted to stamp out.

00:23:54.640 So you couldn't have a debate, right?

00:23:56.120 You couldn't have a debate about things.

00:23:57.820 They just wanted those voices silenced, deplatformed.

00:24:01.200 How do you do that since it is so obviously unconstitutional?

00:24:07.360 Every child knows that.

00:24:08.700 Well, that's correct.

00:24:10.580 The government can't do it and they shouldn't be able to outsource it either, which is what was happening.

00:24:15.740 So they're outsourcing their censorship to some of the biggest companies in the history of the world.

00:24:19.980 And so we had some sense of this.

00:24:21.840 So here's a company we're always excited to advertise because we actually use their products every day.

00:24:26.900 It's Merriweather Farms.

00:24:27.760 Remember when everybody knew their neighborhood butcher?

00:24:29.880 You look back and you feel like, oh, there was something really important about that, knowing the person who cut your meat.

00:24:36.860 And at some point, your grandparents knew the people who raised their meat so they could trust what they ate.

00:24:42.960 But that time is long gone.

00:24:44.160 It's been replaced by an era of grocery store mystery meat boxed by distant beef corporations.

00:24:50.220 None of which raised a single cow.

00:24:52.740 Unlike your childhood, they don't know you.

00:24:55.640 They're not interested in you.

00:24:56.860 The whole thing is creepy.

00:24:57.980 The only thing that matters to them is money.

00:25:00.040 And God knows what you're eating.

00:25:01.740 Merriweather Farms is the answer to that.

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00:25:42.380 You may have noticed this is a great country with bad food.

00:25:46.700 Our food supply is rotten.

00:25:48.760 It didn't used to be this way.

00:25:50.360 Take chips, for example.

00:25:52.040 You may recall a time when crushing a bag of chips didn't make you feel hungover, like you couldn't get out of bed the next day.

00:25:59.800 And the change, of course, is chemicals.

00:26:02.600 There's all kinds of crap they're putting in this food that should not be in your body.

00:26:06.320 Seed oils, for example. 0.99

00:26:07.460 Now even one serving of your standard American chip brand can make you feel bloated, fat, totally passive, and out of it.

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00:27:08.720 Highly recommended.

00:27:10.440 But can I just ask, I mean, there are lawyers involved in every decision that the executive branch makes.

00:27:16.840 So, White House counsel signs off on that?

00:27:19.400 Sure.

00:27:20.320 Yeah.

00:27:20.480 Yeah, and by the way, in a weird quirk of history, James Baker, who was the general counsel for the FBI, goes, and after he does his stint at Brookings, is the general counsel for Twitter.

00:27:37.780 So, one hand washes the other.

00:27:41.480 They were more than willing to work with the Biden administration to censor points of view on that platform.

00:27:47.400 So, you have people who were in this kind of ecosystem all along that were, it didn't take much convincing.

00:27:53.920 But the Biden administration knew that they needed to silence this sort of level of dissent.

00:27:58.460 But it was, you know, it was Hunter Biden laptop.

00:28:01.260 It was certainly during COVID, any kind of questioning of election results or whatever.

00:28:06.900 I mean, all this stuff was on the table.

00:28:08.620 And what they did was, is they worked, as we took the depth, you know, this sort of plays out.

00:28:12.760 But Jen Psaki's at the podium, if you recall, saying, we're flagging things that we find offensive for Facebook.

00:28:21.360 Joe Biden is threatening to take away Section 230 protections.

00:28:24.420 What's Section 230 protections?

00:28:25.800 Those are basically, in the 1990s, when the internet becomes a thing in the Telecommunications Act, they say that these are platforms that can't be sued, unlike publishers who can be sued.

00:28:37.440 Publishers are supposed to be more arbiters of what you can say.

00:28:40.540 It's why CNN gets sued by President Trump for false things.

00:28:45.460 But like Twitter, Facebook, those are considered platforms.

00:28:48.760 They're immune from lawsuits.

00:28:49.860 So Joe Biden starts threatening Section 230 protections.

00:28:52.660 They start threatening investigations.

00:28:54.360 So if someone libels you on social media, you can sue the person, but you cannot sue the company that hosted it.

00:28:59.860 Whereas if someone libels you in a newspaper or television channel, you can sue the newspaper or television channel.

00:29:04.320 That's right.

00:29:04.620 And so Section 230 protection is a multi-billion dollar sort of subsidy in some ways.

00:29:11.460 Now, I happen to think, look, if you're actually having this platform where people can express their point of view, that's a great thing.

00:29:17.160 Amen.

00:29:17.700 But that's not what was happening, right?

00:29:20.260 Through immense pressure from the government, they were censoring all sorts of things.

00:29:24.400 How do they do that?

00:29:25.440 How does the president or his staff exert pressure on, say, Facebook or Google or Twitter?

00:29:31.960 So they had direct lines of communication.

00:29:33.640 They had a secret portal where executives from these social media companies could communicate directly with high-ranking White House officials.

00:29:40.100 Rob Faraday, who was the deputy communications guy in the Biden White House, was in constant communication berating these people, telling them that's not good enough.

00:29:50.280 You need to do more.

00:29:51.000 Let me assure you, this is coming from the highest levels of the administration.

00:29:54.840 Those sorts of things were constantly streaming at the social media companies.

00:30:00.320 And then you also had, as we took the deposition in that case, of people from the CDC, they literally, the CDC, were just giving them lines that they should censor.

00:30:10.620 So the government is saying, censor these exact phrases, right?

00:30:16.700 That is exactly what they're giving this off to the social media companies.

00:30:20.420 If this is uttered, we want you to silence these people.

00:30:24.060 You want to de-platform these people.

00:30:25.280 You want me to downgrade, throttle these sort of posts.

00:30:29.260 We had the deposition of-

00:30:31.520 Is that illegal?

00:30:32.200 No, it's not legal.

00:30:33.380 So if it's illegal, then that by definition means it's a crime.

00:30:37.660 And aren't crimes supposed to be punished?

00:30:39.180 Yes, they should be.

00:30:40.400 Absolutely.

00:30:40.800 But we sued the government to show censorship.

00:30:45.720 A lot of social media companies had been sued before in other cases.

00:30:49.680 But those ended up in the Northern District of California, never to be seen again.

00:30:53.280 What was unique about our case, the Missouri versus Biden case, we sued White House officials.

00:30:58.200 We named them, you know, personally.

00:31:00.380 We named all these agencies.

00:31:03.940 And we got to take their depositions.

00:31:06.200 CISA, which is an agency I know you're familiar with, but maybe in your audience, probably of all audiences would know,

00:31:11.680 is the Cybersecurity Infrastructure Administration, Security Administration.

00:31:20.380 Their job, purportedly, was to make sure that, you know, cyber, you know, our infrastructure is, you know, resilient against cyber attacks.

00:31:29.000 They were very much involved in something called the Election Integrity Project,

00:31:33.100 where they outsourced their censorship to Stanford and the University of Washington

00:31:36.940 to flag certain posts that would then be given to social media companies to censor.

00:31:43.780 The CDC was involved with it.

00:31:45.440 CISA was involved with it.

00:31:46.480 The FBI, of course, played a role with the pre-bunking of the Hunter Biden laptop,

00:31:50.560 which they knew was actually real.

00:31:52.900 They knew it was real.

00:31:53.700 They had it in their possession.

00:31:55.200 And then they pre-bunked it.

00:31:56.520 And then when it came out, they never actually said, when people were asking, is this legitimate?

00:32:00.320 They never actually said, no, we have it.

00:32:02.020 So they were very much a part of this operation to silence millions of American voices.

00:32:09.440 And I think, for me, the First Amendment...

00:32:12.100 How many people have been fired at the FBI for that?

00:32:15.060 I don't know the answer to that.

00:32:16.540 Right around zero.

00:32:17.520 Yeah.

00:32:18.080 And this is the kind of accountability...

00:32:19.440 Like, what the hell is that?

00:32:20.340 Yeah.

00:32:20.660 And that's something that, as we talked to, you know, Cash Patel and his confirmation hearings,

00:32:24.800 it's certainly something that we talked about.

00:32:26.140 He's very well aware.

00:32:26.900 I think having somebody like that who was on the other side of it is a good thing.

00:32:31.220 But we certainly need to have more accountability.

00:32:34.500 But these people...

00:32:36.480 It's just the scale of it was immense.

00:32:40.400 And it really wasn't exposed until we filed the lawsuit again.

00:32:44.280 And then when Elon Musk buys Twitter, now X, they did the Twitter files.

00:32:49.040 And you saw even more of it, right?

00:32:50.700 Like, how these people were in charge of this stuff is insane.

00:32:53.360 What's interesting, from just like a corporate governance point of view,

00:32:56.580 like, let's say I'm Mark Zuckerberg, seems pretty liberal, but not maybe a liberal activist.

00:33:02.580 But you spend four years getting attacked for censorship when...

00:33:08.600 And you never say, actually, well, he did ultimately say, but he didn't say for years,

00:33:12.980 I'm only doing this because the Biden people are pushing me to do it.

00:33:15.740 Like, these companies were hurt by this, weren't they?

00:33:19.940 Yeah.

00:33:20.220 I think the Zuckerberg and the Facebook example is really interesting.

00:33:24.900 Because if you go back in time, if you get in the DeLorean here, a lot of people blamed Facebook for President Trump's election.

00:33:35.760 Remember this?

00:33:36.400 Yes.

00:33:37.200 And I think then in the next election cycle, whether that was sort of internalized or not,

00:33:43.140 Zuckerberg materializes.

00:33:45.180 So, Zuckerberg is funding a lot of the voter turnout, privately funding election operations, which is kind of crazy, in 2020.

00:33:55.340 And then gets sort of, you know, whether completely voluntary or steamrolled by threat of investigation is part of then Facebook,

00:34:03.440 very much a part of this censorship regime that existed.

00:34:06.760 And now, Zuckerberg seems to be, like, red-pilled, I guess.

00:34:11.880 I don't know.

00:34:12.660 I don't know how much of this is sincere from these big tech companies, or it's just because President Trump won.

00:34:18.920 Time will tell.

00:34:20.320 But it does feel like, my hope is, that censorship is in retreat a little bit now,

00:34:25.400 and that this renaissance you're seeing that you talk about a lot in your show,

00:34:29.320 the First Amendment and free speech and how important that is to the fabric of this country,

00:34:33.140 it really is the beating heart of our Constitution, the ability to say things that you find,

00:34:37.960 that you might find incredibly offensive or even dangerous.

00:34:41.280 Your ability to defend someone else's right to do that is really at the core of this American experiment.

00:34:46.680 And we have to fight for that every, you know, tooth and nail.

00:34:49.620 And so, that lawsuit, I mean, you just think of the time.

00:34:52.140 I was blessed to have a good team.

00:34:53.400 John Sauer was my Solicitor General in Missouri.

00:34:56.300 He's now the Solicitor General of the United States.

00:34:59.020 Four, the first four district judges that have been nominated in Missouri all worked in my office.

00:35:07.700 There's another guy who worked in my office who's now...

00:35:10.840 First four, the first four all worked in your office?

00:35:13.840 Mm-hmm, yeah.

00:35:14.980 So, I think, again, why that time period was instructive,

00:35:21.260 I think there's a forging that happens in that time of crisis.

00:35:24.080 And when you come together and you fight the good fight and you come out on the other side,

00:35:29.340 there's a lot of important work to do.

00:35:31.200 Interestingly, also, I think RFK Jr. is a part of that.

00:35:34.280 I mean, he was one of the guys originally censored.

00:35:37.300 Now he's on the inside.

00:35:40.260 And then another guy who was actually a plaintiff in Missouri versus Biden,

00:35:43.940 Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, who's now the head of NIH.

00:35:47.600 He's on the inside now.

00:35:48.900 So, again, I think the Democrats are just...

00:35:51.420 They can't believe this is actually what happened.

00:35:53.260 But the rebels are now kind of doing some good things, I think, on the inside.

00:35:58.440 Dr. Bhattacharya was one of the authors of the Great Barrington Declaration,

00:36:03.420 which essentially said something so controversial,

00:36:05.820 like there is a thing like natural immunity that can exist for COVID.

00:36:09.400 They tried to wreck their careers.

00:36:11.040 Anthony Fauci himself tried to wreck their careers.

00:36:14.060 He was a well-accomplished Stanford professor,

00:36:18.180 and now he's running NIH.

00:36:20.580 I think there's a lot of great symmetry to all that, but...

00:36:23.820 It's just, I mean, I believe in forgiveness and mercy.

00:36:28.400 I think they're essential to our humanity, and we should pursue them.

00:36:32.600 But also justice is important, too.

00:36:34.760 Yeah.

00:36:35.600 And why not treat all of these guys like Biden treated the J6 defendants? 1.00

00:36:39.400 I don't understand.

00:36:40.240 Like, how is Fauci wandering around Washington still?

00:36:44.540 Yeah.

00:36:44.980 And working at Georgetown and taking the biggest federal pension,

00:36:48.740 and I don't understand that.

00:36:50.140 Yeah, the Fauci candles, the light has dimmed.

00:36:53.040 The light has dimmed, but...

00:36:54.300 But he's still around.

00:36:55.480 And I will tell you that that day,

00:36:58.040 it's one of the last things I did as attorney general,

00:37:00.360 because I was just elected to the Senate,

00:37:01.880 and we had this deposition of Anthony Fauci scheduled

00:37:04.140 at the NIH headquarters

00:37:05.980 and took the deposition of Anthony Fauci.

00:37:08.640 The security in there was, I mean,

00:37:09.880 only in the White House has I seen security like that.

00:37:12.120 So Fauci walks in, you know, shake hands.

00:37:16.420 Jeff Landry, who was the attorney general from Louisiana,

00:37:19.340 now governor, had a copy of RFK Jr.'s,

00:37:22.240 the real Anthony Fauci, out on the table,

00:37:24.780 which I'm sure he did not appreciate.

00:37:26.900 But...

00:37:27.300 And probably hadn't read.

00:37:28.420 Probably had not read.

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00:38:52.620 That deposition took all day long.

00:38:55.080 And you get, in that kind of setting,

00:38:56.980 you get a real sense of a person.

00:38:59.020 And he said, I don't remember,

00:39:00.460 recall like 174 times,

00:39:02.420 which says a lot for a guy

00:39:04.280 who proclaimed to be the science

00:39:05.940 and knew everything.

00:39:07.120 Suddenly he couldn't remember much at all.

00:39:10.160 But when he was confronted with

00:39:11.680 some of the actions early on in COVID,

00:39:14.040 again, I think people,

00:39:14.920 you know, there's a,

00:39:15.240 there's a,

00:39:16.660 the Czech writer,

00:39:19.140 Milan Koderre writes,

00:39:20.240 the struggle of man against power

00:39:21.860 is the struggle of memory

00:39:23.280 versus forgetting, right?

00:39:25.220 And so I think it's important

00:39:26.080 to remember these things.

00:39:27.300 Very early on,

00:39:28.240 when it was pretty obvious

00:39:30.920 that this came from a Chinese lab

00:39:33.840 called the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

00:39:37.520 Right.

00:39:38.340 Like what was the Jon Stewart thing

00:39:39.680 when he,

00:39:39.980 when he confronted Colbert?

00:39:42.220 I mean, it's one of the maybe smart,

00:39:43.380 a few smart things he's ever said.

00:39:44.540 It's like, maybe it wasn't a bat

00:39:45.980 who made it with a penguin.

00:39:47.180 Maybe it was this virology lab

00:39:48.640 with the name on it in Wuhan.

00:39:50.800 But, but anyway,

00:39:52.320 it was very obvious early on

00:39:55.100 because of the sort of secretive funding

00:39:58.220 and basically,

00:39:59.620 let's take a step back in 2014,

00:40:01.400 the United States basically said,

00:40:03.000 we're not going to participate

00:40:03.900 in game to function research anymore.

00:40:05.240 It's very dangerous.

00:40:05.980 Basically, hypercharging viruses

00:40:08.280 that can sweep through the world

00:40:10.240 just to find,

00:40:11.280 you know,

00:40:12.820 a vaccine that might,

00:40:14.280 that might stop it.

00:40:15.460 Seems like a bad idea.

00:40:16.820 It sure does.

00:40:17.580 Okay.

00:40:17.840 So we don't do that anymore

00:40:18.680 in this country,

00:40:19.180 but through the EcoHealth Alliance,

00:40:20.900 it's funded

00:40:21.480 and it's being done in Wuhan,

00:40:23.780 which did not have,

00:40:24.940 by the way,

00:40:25.220 the safety protocols necessary

00:40:26.580 to do this kind of work.

00:40:27.780 Apparently not.

00:40:28.220 Apparently not.

00:40:29.460 So unleashed on the world.

00:40:30.500 China lies about it.

00:40:31.400 The World Health Organization,

00:40:32.360 which is bought and paid for

00:40:33.200 by the communists in China,

00:40:34.900 they lie about it.

00:40:35.660 And then,

00:40:35.880 then all of a sudden

00:40:36.560 you have this global pandemic.

00:40:38.880 Fauci knows immediately

00:40:40.460 the problem here

00:40:42.060 and it could come back to him.

00:40:44.540 And so in the deposition,

00:40:45.820 he sent,

00:40:46.320 we find out,

00:40:47.020 he sends his deputy,

00:40:47.980 his chief deputy over to China

00:40:49.480 to see what they're doing

00:40:51.220 with the,

00:40:51.960 with the Chinese government.

00:40:53.060 And there,

00:40:53.460 he's a big fan

00:40:54.180 of these lockdowns.

00:40:55.080 big fan,

00:40:55.960 comes back

00:40:56.580 and reports back to Fauci.

00:40:57.720 All these lockdowns

00:40:58.600 are really working.

00:40:59.420 And so Fauci then has this idea

00:41:01.760 that that's what he's going to create

00:41:02.900 in the United States.

00:41:03.620 It's also interesting

00:41:04.460 when he was asked

00:41:05.460 about the efficacy of masks,

00:41:07.080 you know,

00:41:07.200 he was such a proponent

00:41:08.080 that everybody should wear a mask

00:41:09.420 all day long,

00:41:10.040 even when you're outside.

00:41:12.020 A friend of his emails him

00:41:13.700 and says,

00:41:14.260 this is like in April of 2020.

00:41:16.640 Hey,

00:41:16.860 I'm getting on a flight.

00:41:18.840 This COVID thing is a thing.

00:41:20.420 Do I need to wear a mask?

00:41:21.300 He's like,

00:41:21.540 of course not.

00:41:22.240 Masks are totally ineffective.

00:41:23.340 You don't need to wear a mask.

00:41:24.740 So like masks off,

00:41:26.180 right?

00:41:27.720 But it's very telling.

00:41:29.060 And so he,

00:41:29.540 and he meant to undermine

00:41:31.060 anybody who disagreed with him,

00:41:32.940 participated in studies.

00:41:35.040 He pretend,

00:41:35.600 or he authorized studies.

00:41:36.880 He pretended to have nothing to do with

00:41:38.400 that.

00:41:39.080 This was from a wet market

00:41:40.340 and not from a lab

00:41:41.580 that he knew was a lie.

00:41:43.280 And you just think of the damage

00:41:44.680 that was done.

00:41:47.020 There's actually the first time

00:41:48.520 that I ever met RFK Jr.

00:41:49.720 I was at a conference in Utah.

00:41:51.000 This is in probably

00:41:52.540 the summer of 2021.

00:41:54.200 And he was familiar

00:41:54.820 with some of the work

00:41:55.460 that I've been doing

00:41:56.040 to push back on COVID tyranny

00:41:58.340 and these excessive regulations.

00:42:01.320 So we had a conversation,

00:42:02.380 he was talking to a few of us,

00:42:03.140 and he reminded me of something

00:42:04.180 that this has been years

00:42:05.280 since I've even thought about

00:42:06.060 something called

00:42:06.440 the Milgram experiment,

00:42:08.300 which was done at Yale

00:42:10.760 in the 1950s or the 1960s,

00:42:13.000 where essentially people

00:42:14.380 are brought into this room

00:42:15.820 and there's a guy

00:42:16.560 in a lab coat

00:42:17.620 and a clipboard

00:42:18.360 and tells them

00:42:19.580 that there's somebody

00:42:20.060 on the other side of the wall.

00:42:21.060 When they get an answer wrong,

00:42:22.560 we need you to flip the switch

00:42:24.200 to give a little pain.

00:42:26.420 And the number of people

00:42:27.480 that would do that,

00:42:28.320 even when there were cries

00:42:29.920 in the other room

00:42:30.580 and maybe even someone dying

00:42:33.680 on the other side,

00:42:34.660 the willingness of some people

00:42:35.700 to continue to do that

00:42:36.640 because of this authority figure

00:42:38.120 in the white coat.

00:42:39.440 It haunted me.

00:42:40.100 When he told me that story,

00:42:40.980 I hadn't thought about it.

00:42:41.640 It haunted me throughout all of this

00:42:42.920 and kind of strengthened

00:42:43.880 my resolve to really push back

00:42:46.100 because in those moments,

00:42:46.920 you need people

00:42:47.460 who are willing

00:42:47.900 to stand up

00:42:49.380 and fight back, right?

00:42:51.580 But yeah,

00:42:52.260 Fauci was sort of,

00:42:54.520 he was heralded as literally

00:42:56.640 some sort of saint-like figure.

00:42:58.240 He had candles.

00:42:59.440 And I think some of it was

00:43:00.660 they wanted to make Trump,

00:43:02.580 people were really obsessed

00:43:03.620 with making Trump look bad.

00:43:05.220 The Democrats want to capitalize

00:43:06.560 on this crisis,

00:43:07.380 make him pay

00:43:07.760 because you also forget

00:43:08.640 Trump was cruising

00:43:09.800 going into that COVID.

00:43:11.660 I mean,

00:43:11.760 he was on his way

00:43:12.960 to winning,

00:43:13.940 I think decisively

00:43:14.900 in the fall of that year

00:43:16.840 and they used COVID

00:43:17.720 for everything it was.

00:43:18.700 Fauci was sort of this,

00:43:19.640 who undermined President Trump,

00:43:21.480 used this as alternative figure.

00:43:23.260 This whole weird

00:43:24.180 trust the science thing happened.

00:43:25.580 Then of course you have

00:43:26.520 the summer of 2020,

00:43:27.780 the summer of love

00:43:28.740 and you see all these

00:43:30.440 sort of Marxist organizations

00:43:32.300 rally to create

00:43:33.720 ultimate disruption.

00:43:35.260 And then you have the election

00:43:36.200 and you have Mark Elias

00:43:37.120 out there trying to undermine

00:43:38.280 all these election integrity measures

00:43:41.080 that have been put in place

00:43:41.760 even in blue states forever.

00:43:42.880 I mean,

00:43:43.980 just think of the level,

00:43:45.100 all this stuff happening

00:43:46.300 at one time.

00:43:47.060 It was a crazy time.

00:43:48.380 Like that whole period of time

00:43:49.380 was a crazy time.

00:43:51.160 And so that's what,

00:43:51.780 you sort of document

00:43:52.440 some of these things

00:43:53.140 that in Missouri,

00:43:54.300 for example,

00:43:54.640 we beat back all three

00:43:55.740 of Mark Elias' lawsuits

00:43:56.940 to weaken our election

00:43:59.100 integrity laws,

00:43:59.820 but he was successful

00:44:00.580 other places.

00:44:01.700 And so you just had

00:44:02.620 the whole of kind of

00:44:03.520 the left coming

00:44:04.260 for all the things

00:44:05.800 that we care about.

00:44:07.360 Borders,

00:44:08.520 free speech,

00:44:10.400 freedom of movement,

00:44:12.120 you know,

00:44:12.280 all these sorts of things

00:44:13.120 that you kind of

00:44:13.460 take for granted

00:44:14.000 were up for grabs.

00:44:16.020 When you talked to Fauci,

00:44:17.260 when you deposed him

00:44:18.300 for eight hours,

00:44:19.060 you said?

00:44:19.480 Yeah.

00:44:20.740 Did you get the feeling

00:44:21.600 he was lying?

00:44:22.540 Is he a good liar?

00:44:23.680 He's pretty,

00:44:24.240 yeah,

00:44:24.480 and he's a good witness.

00:44:25.700 I'll give him that.

00:44:26.500 He was a good,

00:44:26.900 I mean,

00:44:27.040 this isn't his first rodeo.

00:44:28.200 He's been in front of Congress.

00:44:28.940 Oh, I know, yeah.

00:44:29.660 He's very smooth,

00:44:31.240 but there's just

00:44:32.160 too many inconsistencies.

00:44:33.680 Did he seem,

00:44:34.760 I mean, 0.66

00:44:35.400 short of like a sociopath,

00:44:37.380 most people

00:44:37.940 when confronted

00:44:38.540 with inconsistencies

00:44:39.460 and their story

00:44:40.180 get uncomfortable

00:44:40.980 and a deposition

00:44:42.420 is a place

00:44:42.920 where you definitely

00:44:43.700 confront people.

00:44:44.040 The only time,

00:44:44.480 yeah,

00:44:44.660 the only time

00:44:44.980 he got really uncomfortable,

00:44:45.780 I would say,

00:44:46.400 is when we continued

00:44:47.280 to question him,

00:44:48.400 his authority.

00:44:49.560 He didn't like that.

00:44:50.820 Yeah.

00:44:50.940 Well, you said this.

00:44:51.740 Now, wait a minute.

00:44:52.300 Did you change your mind

00:44:53.180 on this, doctor?

00:44:53.800 You know,

00:44:53.940 you get to that kind

00:44:54.640 of line of questioning.

00:44:55.320 He didn't like people.

00:44:56.220 He's not used to that.

00:44:57.420 He wasn't used to that at all.

00:44:58.320 And by the way,

00:44:58.760 I also think another telling moment

00:45:00.040 of that deposition

00:45:00.660 was after the lunch break,

00:45:02.460 we came back

00:45:03.140 and the court reporter sneezed

00:45:04.660 and he looked at her

00:45:06.900 and asked her

00:45:07.680 to put a mask on,

00:45:08.580 asked her if she had

00:45:09.020 an upper respiratory virus.

00:45:10.600 If she had COVID,

00:45:11.160 will you put a mask on?

00:45:12.340 She put a mask on.

00:45:13.980 I mean,

00:45:14.540 this is,

00:45:15.480 by the way,

00:45:16.400 November of 2022.

00:45:18.340 This isn't like

00:45:19.080 March of 2020

00:45:20.460 and this is the guy

00:45:22.100 that was in charge

00:45:22.800 of our nation's health.

00:45:24.740 Like,

00:45:25.240 so,

00:45:25.860 but I think

00:45:27.380 COVID became a time

00:45:29.240 where these weird

00:45:30.560 like masks

00:45:31.360 became like a,

00:45:32.300 it was the ultimate

00:45:32.980 virtue signal,

00:45:33.760 almost like having 1.00

00:45:34.400 the stupid sign 1.00

00:45:35.360 in this house, 1.00

00:45:35.980 we believe out

00:45:36.700 in your front lawn thing,

00:45:38.160 right?

00:45:38.300 It became like a,

00:45:39.240 a way of distinguishing people

00:45:41.960 who were,

00:45:42.820 who were a problem.

00:45:44.620 The othering

00:45:45.380 that happened

00:45:46.260 in our society

00:45:47.120 is really dangerous.

00:45:49.140 And I think,

00:45:49.700 you know,

00:45:49.940 families and friendships

00:45:50.980 were destroyed

00:45:51.660 over all this.

00:45:52.900 That's the kind of power

00:45:53.960 this little guy wielded

00:45:55.540 and he's not been held

00:45:57.220 to account yet.

00:45:57.940 What do you think

00:45:58.400 the real story was?

00:46:00.580 Like,

00:46:00.820 where did COVID come from?

00:46:02.860 We assume

00:46:03.580 it came from the lab?

00:46:05.260 Do we think

00:46:05.740 it was intentional

00:46:07.000 or unintentional

00:46:08.040 in its release?

00:46:08.980 When do we think

00:46:09.700 the Chinese knew

00:46:10.620 it was circulating

00:46:12.260 among the population?

00:46:13.800 And to what extent

00:46:14.920 was it a joint creation

00:46:16.200 of the U.S.

00:46:16.740 and China?

00:46:17.540 Well,

00:46:17.920 it's in the book,

00:46:19.800 actually.

00:46:20.240 Yes.

00:46:20.260 The Last Line of Defense.

00:46:21.940 I feel a little awkward

00:46:22.680 doing that.

00:46:23.100 I've never actually done it.

00:46:24.020 But it's actually,

00:46:25.200 so the first chapters

00:46:26.480 really kind of go back in time

00:46:28.200 because I think

00:46:29.080 to give context

00:46:29.860 for all the other crazy things

00:46:31.300 we had to push back against,

00:46:32.760 it was really important

00:46:33.780 to go back to that moment

00:46:35.520 of when this thing

00:46:36.760 first happened

00:46:37.560 and remember

00:46:38.780 that there was like

00:46:39.460 police tape

00:46:40.320 around kids' playgrounds.

00:46:41.820 They were bulldozing

00:46:42.740 skate parks

00:46:43.900 with,

00:46:44.260 you know,

00:46:44.480 on beaches.

00:46:45.080 like the level

00:46:46.600 of insanity

00:46:48.100 that took hold.

00:46:49.220 True craziness.

00:46:49.640 It really is wild.

00:46:51.320 And hopefully

00:46:52.020 we never experienced

00:46:52.780 that again,

00:46:53.180 but I think it's important

00:46:53.820 to document those excesses

00:46:55.220 and what people

00:46:55.680 were willing to do

00:46:56.480 to hold on

00:46:57.060 and aggregate

00:46:57.580 and exercise power.

00:46:58.980 I mean,

00:46:59.120 people who literally

00:46:59.840 would,

00:47:00.880 county executives

00:47:01.440 and mayors

00:47:02.120 were telling people

00:47:03.040 that you could live

00:47:03.620 your life today or not.

00:47:04.600 Like it's insane

00:47:05.720 what was going on,

00:47:07.220 but really my first,

00:47:09.920 and actually on your show

00:47:11.420 announced the lawsuit,

00:47:12.420 we sued China.

00:47:13.260 We sued China 1.00

00:47:14.160 in April of 2020.

00:47:15.080 for unleashing

00:47:15.840 this pandemic

00:47:16.380 on the world.

00:47:17.100 And I think,

00:47:17.860 and ultimately,

00:47:18.700 there's a judgment

00:47:19.480 out there

00:47:19.860 for $24 billion

00:47:20.860 that Missouri has

00:47:22.020 that can go,

00:47:22.660 by the way,

00:47:23.000 seize farmland now.

00:47:24.100 So my successor,

00:47:25.660 Andrew Bailey,

00:47:26.080 is going to have

00:47:26.400 that opportunity

00:47:26.980 and I think he'll do it.

00:47:28.360 But anyway,

00:47:29.300 I think through our research

00:47:31.600 through public

00:47:32.520 and then of course

00:47:33.060 we wanted to get

00:47:33.520 to discovery,

00:47:34.180 which is why

00:47:34.460 we filed the lawsuit,

00:47:35.240 was that in November

00:47:37.040 and December of 2019,

00:47:41.180 patient zero

00:47:42.100 enters the hospital.

00:47:43.820 This is how I see it.

00:47:45.080 And patient zero

00:47:46.020 likely came from that lab.

00:47:48.540 So that,

00:47:50.240 and of course,

00:47:51.140 you know,

00:47:51.400 you get to,

00:47:52.260 you know,

00:47:52.600 different strains

00:47:53.360 down the line,

00:47:54.560 it's less lethal

00:47:55.680 as any virus is.

00:47:57.640 But initially,

00:47:58.840 that's where it happened.

00:48:00.920 It happened in Wuhan

00:48:02.020 and it came from the lab.

00:48:06.040 China,

00:48:07.100 a very closed society

00:48:08.700 with communist dictators

00:48:10.220 who have concentration camps,

00:48:11.800 wanted to deny its existence

00:48:15.160 for a while.

00:48:17.060 But within,

00:48:19.340 you know,

00:48:19.540 by December,

00:48:21.520 Dr. Lee,

00:48:22.720 I think is his name,

00:48:23.480 Dr. Lee,

00:48:24.500 was on WeChat

00:48:25.960 and said,

00:48:26.960 this is what's happening.

00:48:28.560 Like,

00:48:29.080 this is a virus

00:48:29.900 that came out of a lab

00:48:31.480 and people are dying.

00:48:34.180 He had to recant that,

00:48:35.520 of course,

00:48:35.920 and then mysteriously died

00:48:37.140 a couple months later.

00:48:38.200 But it was kind of

00:48:38.780 this whistleblower.

00:48:39.980 And the Chinese people

00:48:41.080 actually celebrated this guy

00:48:42.300 for blowing the whistle.

00:48:43.740 So anyway,

00:48:44.520 so China discovers

00:48:45.980 that this is a thing.

00:48:47.020 It's a very lethal

00:48:48.900 and widespread virus.

00:48:49.980 Do you believe

00:48:50.600 the release was accidental?

00:48:52.240 I don't,

00:48:52.960 I don't believe

00:48:53.900 it was on purpose.

00:48:55.380 I mean,

00:48:55.580 it could be,

00:48:56.080 but I don't think so.

00:48:56.760 I think it got out accidentally.

00:48:58.620 But the cover-up then

00:48:59.600 is almost worse

00:49:00.380 than the crime,

00:49:01.280 of course, right?

00:49:02.040 Because then,

00:49:03.180 and one of the problems

00:49:03.980 with China

00:49:04.400 is they want to be considered

00:49:05.400 one of these countries

00:49:06.260 on the world stage,

00:49:07.140 but then doesn't do

00:49:07.840 the things that,

00:49:08.900 like a country would do

00:49:09.680 to kind of notify everybody.

00:49:11.520 So what they do then

00:49:12.480 is they close

00:49:13.420 all the flights,

00:49:15.540 internal flights in China

00:49:16.600 in and out of Wuhan,

00:49:17.420 but they don't stop

00:49:18.020 the international flights,

00:49:19.180 interestingly.

00:49:20.740 So you can still fly

00:49:21.760 internationally in and out of Wuhan,

00:49:22.920 but you can't fly

00:49:23.480 within China out of Wuhan.

00:49:25.700 They immediately become not,

00:49:27.240 they were the largest

00:49:28.460 net exporter of PPE,

00:49:30.860 personal protective equipment.

00:49:32.980 They immediately become

00:49:34.200 the biggest net importer of PPE.

00:49:37.040 So they know something's going down

00:49:38.640 and this is in like January-ish.

00:49:41.280 And then finally,

00:49:41.960 they kind of have to,

00:49:43.340 with the World Health Organization

00:49:44.760 sort of holding their hand,

00:49:45.820 let the world know

00:49:46.740 that this is out there.

00:49:48.280 And then the story of course is,

00:49:49.520 well, this wasn't something

00:49:50.360 we created.

00:49:51.380 This came from a bat

00:49:52.720 mating with a penguin

00:49:53.580 or whatever the example was

00:49:54.620 or some wet market theory.

00:49:57.200 And then what's really interesting

00:49:58.500 is President Trump

00:50:00.720 takes the action

00:50:02.920 you would want him to take.

00:50:04.860 He closes flights

00:50:05.720 coming in and out of China.

00:50:07.660 Right?

00:50:08.300 I remember that.

00:50:09.040 Remember that?

00:50:09.520 That outbreak of racism.

00:50:11.040 Yeah.

00:50:11.340 Like all of a sudden,

00:50:12.080 that was a xenophobic act.

00:50:14.040 You know what I mean?

00:50:14.680 And then Nancy Pelosi

00:50:16.920 is on the streets

00:50:17.880 of San Francisco

00:50:19.380 in Chinatown

00:50:22.220 saying everything's fine here.

00:50:23.520 Come here.

00:50:24.040 This is fine.

00:50:24.760 Like it was this

00:50:25.740 Trump derangement syndrome

00:50:28.800 where even if it was

00:50:29.880 the right thing to do,

00:50:30.700 people would take

00:50:31.260 the opposite point of view.

00:50:33.300 Right?

00:50:33.600 So he shuts down the flights

00:50:35.480 because he understands

00:50:39.420 that there's a problem.

00:50:41.480 But by this point,

00:50:42.660 you said Fauci knows

00:50:44.260 that the virus came

00:50:45.420 from that lab.

00:50:46.460 Yeah.

00:50:47.360 To what extent

00:50:48.040 was Fauci implicated

00:50:49.100 in the creation of the virus?

00:50:50.340 Do we know?

00:50:51.380 Well, by all accounts,

00:50:53.300 he wanted the gain-of-function

00:50:55.720 research to continue

00:50:56.940 and it was funded

00:50:58.140 through a NGO,

00:51:00.140 imagine that,

00:51:01.040 the EcoHealth Alliance.

00:51:02.400 Yes.

00:51:02.700 So the money still flowed,

00:51:04.200 but no one would ever

00:51:05.420 be able to really track it.

00:51:06.740 Can we say definitively

00:51:08.160 that U.S. tax dollars

00:51:09.660 helped create COVID?

00:51:10.660 I believe that.

00:51:12.080 I mean,

00:51:12.780 whatever you think of COVID,

00:51:15.060 a lot of people

00:51:15.720 did die of it.

00:51:16.840 Yeah.

00:51:17.900 Millions of people

00:51:18.640 died of it, I think.

00:51:19.920 Yeah, one of the great

00:51:20.560 sense, Tucker,

00:51:21.080 is that there was never

00:51:22.320 any distinguishing

00:51:23.180 between a super vulnerable,

00:51:25.400 elderly person

00:51:26.060 with comorbidities.

00:51:28.920 There's a different way

00:51:29.960 of dealing with that scenario

00:51:31.240 than a five-year-old

00:51:32.220 healthy kid.

00:51:33.100 Of course.

00:51:33.480 No, of course.

00:51:34.140 And it's also,

00:51:34.780 it would be good

00:51:35.340 during a pandemic

00:51:35.980 to have treatment

00:51:36.760 for your population.

00:51:37.840 Right.

00:51:38.280 Not discouraged treatment.

00:51:39.300 Of course, all true.

00:51:40.660 I guess I just want

00:51:41.760 to linger on the fact,

00:51:43.020 you just endorsed it,

00:51:44.420 that U.S. tax dollars

00:51:45.960 were used

00:51:46.560 to help create

00:51:47.340 this virus

00:51:48.000 that killed millions

00:51:48.780 of people.

00:51:50.240 And I feel like

00:51:51.240 the fact that no one's

00:51:52.180 been held accountable

00:51:52.980 there is a,

00:51:55.520 I mean,

00:51:56.140 I don't know why.

00:51:58.140 That's a good question.

00:51:58.900 I think that there ought

00:52:00.620 to be.

00:52:01.920 I think that there

00:52:02.980 ought to be hearings.

00:52:04.620 I think Fauci

00:52:05.320 should be at least,

00:52:07.220 at least brought

00:52:07.960 before Congress

00:52:08.600 at this point, right?

00:52:09.600 At least.

00:52:10.940 Why hasn't he been?

00:52:12.100 I don't know.

00:52:13.560 Yeah, I don't,

00:52:15.060 not on the committee.

00:52:15.740 I certainly would love

00:52:16.760 to see that happen.

00:52:18.080 And I think that there

00:52:18.920 ought to be accountability.

00:52:20.980 And this shouldn't go away.

00:52:23.240 Do you think that

00:52:23.820 too many people

00:52:24.540 are implicated in it?

00:52:25.480 Maybe.

00:52:26.460 It feels to me

00:52:28.280 like this was

00:52:28.920 very much

00:52:29.440 a sort of

00:52:29.940 an inside

00:52:32.660 operation

00:52:34.160 because

00:52:34.660 the government,

00:52:35.740 well,

00:52:35.880 in fairness,

00:52:37.360 the United States

00:52:38.340 government said

00:52:39.000 we don't want to do

00:52:39.940 gain-of-function

00:52:41.160 research anymore.

00:52:42.940 But we did

00:52:44.320 through the funding

00:52:45.820 that flowed

00:52:46.520 through the EcoHealth Alliance,

00:52:47.380 right?

00:52:47.960 That's how everything works.

00:52:49.160 They can't do censorship,

00:52:50.760 so they outsource it.

00:52:51.800 Correct.

00:52:52.160 They can't assassinate people,

00:52:53.880 so they outsource it.

00:52:54.720 I mean,

00:52:54.920 everything.

00:52:55.520 Well,

00:52:55.700 and think about

00:52:56.160 what we just went through

00:52:56.880 and I don't want to

00:52:58.220 we go back to this,

00:52:59.180 but look at this USAID stuff.

00:53:01.900 Yeah.

00:53:02.100 Right?

00:53:02.300 Like,

00:53:02.760 I just led the rescissions package

00:53:04.060 to claw back

00:53:05.500 eight billion plus of that,

00:53:07.880 which is like 0.72

00:53:08.380 the ridiculous stuff 0.99

00:53:09.320 like trans, 0.99

00:53:10.580 you know, 0.89

00:53:11.580 gender sex surgeries

00:53:12.740 in Guatemala

00:53:13.960 and DEI trainings

00:53:15.480 in Burma

00:53:16.100 and Sesame Street

00:53:17.080 in Iraq. 0.95

00:53:17.580 All this ridiculous stuff 0.83

00:53:18.660 that the American people 0.98

00:53:19.300 are rightly pissed off about.

00:53:22.000 There's no line item

00:53:23.000 in the budget for that.

00:53:23.820 Like,

00:53:23.900 there's no line item for that.

00:53:25.240 It's just the money goes

00:53:26.120 to this Institute for Peace

00:53:27.820 or all these BS names

00:53:29.460 that exist out there

00:53:30.320 and they do a bunch

00:53:31.060 of crazy stuff

00:53:31.860 and then you have to

00:53:32.420 kind of go on the back end

00:53:33.540 and pull it back

00:53:34.580 and there's,

00:53:35.340 my hope is that

00:53:36.160 when you have an administration

00:53:36.980 like the one we have now,

00:53:38.860 and I do think

00:53:39.500 they're kind of

00:53:40.020 getting a handle on this.

00:53:41.460 They paused a lot

00:53:42.140 of the funding.

00:53:43.160 They've eliminated

00:53:43.840 USAID altogether.

00:53:45.320 They're bringing it

00:53:45.820 into the State Department.

00:53:46.620 That's a good,

00:53:47.180 that's progress.

00:53:47.820 Like,

00:53:48.080 that's a good thing to do.

00:53:49.160 But you've got to

00:53:49.720 stay vigilant on this

00:53:50.520 because there's a lot of people

00:53:51.660 in the administrative state

00:53:52.640 that think they know better.

00:53:53.900 They're the expert

00:53:54.560 and they don't care

00:53:55.620 what a senator

00:53:56.120 or congressman

00:53:56.720 or even what the people

00:53:57.500 believe or think.

00:53:58.840 They know better.

00:54:00.120 And that's the kind of thing

00:54:01.280 that has to be ultimately

00:54:02.320 like disrupted

00:54:03.700 and dismantled completely.

00:54:05.340 And that's

00:54:05.840 one of the reasons

00:54:07.180 why I think

00:54:07.860 my experience as AG

00:54:08.820 now in the Senate.

00:54:09.520 that's my focus.

00:54:12.220 Like,

00:54:12.460 I don't,

00:54:13.420 you know,

00:54:13.780 that's what I want to do.

00:54:15.040 I want to get rid

00:54:15.760 of all that stuff

00:54:16.360 that people hate back home.

00:54:18.700 So,

00:54:19.060 but anyway,

00:54:19.980 yeah,

00:54:20.300 I think that,

00:54:21.220 so,

00:54:21.960 so he sends his deputy

00:54:23.040 over there.

00:54:23.460 He's a big fan

00:54:23.920 of lockdowns,

00:54:25.620 comes back

00:54:26.580 and begins

00:54:28.220 to undermine

00:54:28.820 President Trump.

00:54:31.020 You know,

00:54:31.620 when President Trump

00:54:32.640 talks about this

00:54:33.480 having come from a lab,

00:54:35.340 you know,

00:54:36.040 he's already a xenophobe

00:54:37.180 because he's restricted travel.

00:54:38.720 Now he says

00:54:39.100 it's from a lab. 0.97

00:54:39.820 That's ridiculous. 0.97

00:54:40.580 Everybody piles on about that. 0.95

00:54:41.840 And by the way,

00:54:42.300 it's true.

00:54:43.460 So,

00:54:44.040 I think that

00:54:45.100 this combination

00:54:47.380 of Trump derangement syndrome

00:54:48.680 and this obsession

00:54:49.600 with power

00:54:50.280 and the left,

00:54:51.900 I mean,

00:54:52.460 they couldn't have believed

00:54:53.260 their luck

00:54:53.660 to have a pandemic

00:54:54.740 that they could

00:54:55.320 move all the things

00:54:56.820 that they wanted to move on.

00:54:57.620 Sure.

00:54:58.060 And I mean,

00:54:58.460 it certainly reduced

00:54:59.600 the United States

00:55:00.420 relative to China

00:55:02.260 on many levels,

00:55:04.300 but economically,

00:55:05.000 most obviously,

00:55:05.980 it really gravely

00:55:07.400 damaged the U.S. economy

00:55:08.240 and, you know,

00:55:09.320 we're still dealing with it.

00:55:11.160 But I guess

00:55:11.840 I just can't get past

00:55:14.100 this question

00:55:15.780 of how did the virus

00:55:17.640 come to be

00:55:18.560 and who paid for it

00:55:19.960 and the downstream effects

00:55:22.020 are history-changing

00:55:23.160 and terrible

00:55:23.700 for the United States

00:55:24.740 and terrible

00:55:25.060 for the families

00:55:25.580 of those who were killed,

00:55:26.620 et cetera, et cetera.

00:55:27.380 But like,

00:55:27.840 somebody did that.

00:55:28.840 Yeah.

00:55:28.960 And I don't understand

00:55:30.120 how Republicans

00:55:30.700 can control

00:55:31.320 all three branches

00:55:32.100 and we don't have

00:55:33.420 an answer.

00:55:34.120 Yeah.

00:55:34.420 I think ultimately

00:55:35.320 the Department of Justice

00:55:38.780 should take a look

00:55:40.600 at this stuff

00:55:41.200 as they should

00:55:42.580 on the Russia hoax.

00:55:43.580 I think there's a lot of,

00:55:44.480 there's a lot,

00:55:45.020 it's a target-rich environment.

00:55:46.340 Let's just put it that way.

00:55:47.360 I think of the places

00:55:49.140 that they could go.

00:55:51.320 Yeah.

00:55:51.680 Yeah, sorry.

00:55:54.480 It's just,

00:55:55.000 it's just,

00:55:55.640 it feels like

00:55:56.840 since it's been five years

00:55:57.940 that we're going to get

00:55:58.540 to a point where it's like,

00:55:59.720 we're never going to.

00:56:00.920 No, I know.

00:56:02.160 Right.

00:56:02.620 Which is, by the way,

00:56:03.740 one of the reasons

00:56:04.520 we filed that lawsuit

00:56:05.340 was it felt like

00:56:06.040 if you could get

00:56:06.880 into discovery phase,

00:56:07.980 which again,

00:56:08.480 you're suing a foreign country,

00:56:10.000 we were able to slide

00:56:11.060 into one of the exceptions.

00:56:12.280 You know,

00:56:12.420 there's the Foreign

00:56:13.020 Sovereign Immunities Act,

00:56:14.080 which generally means

00:56:14.900 you can't sue

00:56:15.580 foreign countries.

00:56:17.340 But we,

00:56:18.100 I think one of the clever things

00:56:19.220 we did here is

00:56:19.900 we said,

00:56:20.500 no, this falls into

00:56:21.100 the commercial

00:56:21.620 activity exception to that.

00:56:22.940 Meaning if you're going

00:56:24.180 to be controlling

00:56:24.900 hospital systems over there

00:56:26.060 and you're going to be

00:56:26.820 controlling PPE,

00:56:28.400 the flow of it,

00:56:29.200 you fall into

00:56:30.920 one of these exceptions

00:56:31.600 and the judge agreed.

00:56:33.200 But I think

00:56:33.900 the other thing for me

00:56:35.020 that became clear

00:56:36.260 is

00:56:37.700 the epicenter

00:56:39.660 of the global supply chain

00:56:40.980 network runs through China.

00:56:42.400 Right.

00:56:42.600 That became very obvious.

00:56:43.860 Yeah.

00:56:44.420 Right.

00:56:44.760 And so like for me,

00:56:46.200 my son

00:56:47.260 has epilepsy.

00:56:48.980 Right.

00:56:49.220 He relies on

00:56:50.300 multiple seizure

00:56:51.300 medications every day

00:56:52.380 to stay alive.

00:56:53.620 And it occurred to me,

00:56:54.700 well,

00:56:56.120 you know,

00:56:56.660 90% of our

00:56:58.660 pharmaceuticals,

00:56:59.660 80% of our

00:57:00.340 pharmaceuticals

00:57:01.080 come from somewhere else, 0.86

00:57:02.120 mostly China.

00:57:03.380 The raw materials for it.

00:57:05.040 Including the seizure meds?

00:57:06.240 Uh-huh.

00:57:06.700 Yeah.

00:57:06.840 Oh, wow.

00:57:07.280 So think about it.

00:57:08.180 What if China just decides

00:57:10.100 to stop

00:57:11.100 producing that stuff

00:57:12.980 or poison

00:57:14.020 that stuff?

00:57:16.920 One of the reasons

00:57:17.800 why I'm a big proponent

00:57:18.960 and believe,

00:57:19.460 I think it's good

00:57:20.020 for our economy

00:57:20.520 because we got onshore

00:57:21.440 a lot of the stuff

00:57:22.120 that was

00:57:22.580 30 years ago

00:57:23.940 sent to be done

00:57:24.520 somewhere else.

00:57:24.840 To take that

00:57:25.500 specific example,

00:57:27.380 so the seizure

00:57:28.600 medications for epilepsy,

00:57:29.840 including the ones

00:57:30.680 your son takes,

00:57:31.760 they're not made

00:57:32.300 in the United States?

00:57:33.000 No,

00:57:33.180 they're sourced.

00:57:33.840 I mean,

00:57:33.980 all the source materials

00:57:35.260 for the most part

00:57:36.040 of not just

00:57:36.760 anti-epileptic

00:57:38.080 seizure meds,

00:57:39.380 but most things

00:57:40.100 that people take

00:57:41.260 on a daily basis

00:57:42.100 are derived from China.

00:57:44.040 Yeah,

00:57:44.440 but not just vitamin C

00:57:45.680 or even,

00:57:46.800 you know,

00:57:47.080 but drugs that

00:57:47.860 where you will literally

00:57:48.460 die if you don't have them.

00:57:49.960 Those would seem 0.86

00:57:50.600 like priorities.

00:57:51.380 How hard would it be

00:57:52.040 to have those drugs

00:57:53.280 specifically made

00:57:54.100 in the U.S.?

00:57:54.840 Well,

00:57:55.540 I think President Trump

00:57:56.740 has identified this

00:57:57.460 as a priority.

00:57:58.240 It's certainly something

00:57:58.700 we've talked about.

00:57:59.900 I think for whatever reason

00:58:02.000 that stuff went somewhere else

00:58:03.120 like so many other things,

00:58:05.080 but that has to be

00:58:06.540 brought back home.

00:58:07.780 At a minimum,

00:58:09.080 like countries

00:58:10.520 that aren't

00:58:11.000 communist regimes

00:58:12.540 that want to,

00:58:13.440 you know,

00:58:14.600 throw people

00:58:15.040 in concentration camps

00:58:16.120 and have global dominance,

00:58:17.620 right?

00:58:19.060 So,

00:58:19.540 but we should do

00:58:20.160 that stuff here.

00:58:20.620 It's a national security issue.

00:58:21.600 Like,

00:58:21.860 by the way,

00:58:22.340 the critical minerals

00:58:24.400 that we rely on

00:58:25.120 to make fighter jets

00:58:26.140 and iPhones,

00:58:26.960 like this stuff,

00:58:28.380 we got to bring

00:58:29.380 that stuff back home.

00:58:30.780 And I think you're seeing

00:58:32.440 that play out

00:58:32.920 in some of the trade deals

00:58:33.800 and the investment

00:58:34.480 that's happening now.

00:58:35.340 But yeah,

00:58:36.400 but that occurred to me.

00:58:37.620 And I also think

00:58:38.200 one of the wake-up calls here,

00:58:40.940 which everybody kind of

00:58:41.760 had a breaking point

00:58:42.680 with all this,

00:58:44.240 mine was probably

00:58:44.920 the realization

00:58:45.520 of how reliant

00:58:46.360 we were on China

00:58:47.140 for things

00:58:47.640 and one of the reasons

00:58:48.440 why we moved forward

00:58:49.160 on the lawsuit.

00:58:49.640 But also,

00:58:50.960 if you recall,

00:58:51.600 Tucker,

00:58:52.580 this letter

00:58:53.340 that over a thousand

00:58:54.540 public health officials

00:58:55.520 signed

00:58:56.160 during the George Floyd protests.

00:59:00.040 Remember this?

00:59:00.500 They're saying

00:59:00.900 everybody had to stay home.

00:59:02.620 Remember this was,

00:59:03.160 you couldn't,

00:59:03.760 people were protesting

00:59:04.400 anything else.

00:59:04.820 They had to stay home.

00:59:06.000 But if you're going to attend

00:59:07.540 a Black Lives Matter protest,

00:59:09.760 the rules didn't apply

00:59:10.700 to you anymore.

00:59:11.600 I think...

00:59:12.280 For members

00:59:12.580 of the Democratic Party's militia.

00:59:14.100 Yeah.

00:59:14.280 The youth wing.

00:59:15.260 Yeah.

00:59:15.740 Like that was like,

00:59:16.580 I think for a lot of people

00:59:17.540 that I've talked to

00:59:18.200 who weren't like

00:59:18.740 in the thick of it,

00:59:19.500 they actually have lives

00:59:20.400 and families

00:59:20.980 that are outside

00:59:21.500 of this stuff.

00:59:22.700 When they saw that,

00:59:24.680 that you got a license

00:59:25.700 to go out and protest

00:59:27.200 quote unquote

00:59:28.600 systemic racism,

00:59:29.660 you could go do that,

00:59:30.760 but you couldn't protest

00:59:31.660 something else.

00:59:33.300 That,

00:59:33.600 like at that point,

00:59:34.480 it was very obvious

00:59:35.220 what this whole thing

00:59:35.880 was about.

00:59:36.920 And you saw,

00:59:38.040 I think,

00:59:38.420 the entire apparatus

00:59:39.580 of the Democrat Party,

00:59:41.920 these NGOs,

00:59:43.460 bricks are being delivered

00:59:45.240 mysteriously by,

00:59:46.780 you know,

00:59:47.320 organizations

00:59:47.920 when the sun set.

00:59:48.960 I mean,

00:59:49.160 all this stuff

00:59:49.960 was meant to sort of

00:59:50.940 create the kind of

00:59:52.980 untethering

00:59:54.480 that's necessary

00:59:55.160 for something much bigger.

00:59:56.580 And they were all in on that.

00:59:58.640 I just worry that

00:59:59.720 people are losing

01:00:01.020 all confidence

01:00:01.660 in the system.

01:00:03.060 And when people I know

01:00:04.540 who are moderate

01:00:05.120 and sensible,

01:00:05.980 well-educated,

01:00:06.780 smart,

01:00:07.580 you know,

01:00:07.960 will believe anything

01:00:08.940 at this point,

01:00:09.660 just absolutely anything.

01:00:11.060 And the reason

01:00:12.400 they'll believe anything

01:00:13.100 is because

01:00:13.860 so many things

01:00:14.760 they believed in

01:00:15.460 turned out not to be true.

01:00:16.580 And there was

01:00:18.040 zero accountability

01:00:18.820 and has been

01:00:19.420 zero accountability

01:00:20.520 for really anything

01:00:21.800 other than January 6th

01:00:23.320 that I'm aware of.

01:00:24.760 And I just wonder

01:00:25.820 if the people

01:00:26.640 in,

01:00:27.260 you know,

01:00:27.540 making the laws

01:00:28.160 and crafting the regulation

01:00:30.260 in Washington

01:00:30.720 understand that

01:00:31.580 the whole system

01:00:32.280 at some point

01:00:32.860 becomes at risk

01:00:33.860 because the population

01:00:35.020 is like,

01:00:35.360 I don't believe anything.

01:00:36.540 Right.

01:00:37.000 Well,

01:00:37.460 I agree with you.

01:00:38.860 And one of the reasons

01:00:40.060 why

01:00:40.540 when

01:00:42.320 President Trump

01:00:44.660 was creating

01:00:46.320 his cabinet

01:00:47.040 and going through

01:00:47.680 the confirmation process,

01:00:50.100 he has put together

01:00:51.480 a team.

01:00:52.480 And by the way,

01:00:52.880 this isn't going to happen

01:00:53.480 overnight.

01:00:54.280 I don't,

01:00:54.460 I don't,

01:00:54.740 I think this confidence

01:00:55.800 that you're talking about,

01:00:56.700 this lack,

01:00:57.200 lost confidence,

01:00:58.240 lack of confidence

01:00:58.880 in institutions

01:00:59.520 is a real thing.

01:01:00.760 And by the way,

01:01:01.240 in many ways,

01:01:01.660 rightfully so,

01:01:02.580 right?

01:01:03.020 When you have

01:01:03.980 law enforcement agencies

01:01:05.280 that are weaponized,

01:01:06.240 not just against

01:01:07.260 their chief political rival,

01:01:08.740 but against the American people,

01:01:10.300 we ought to,

01:01:10.860 there should be

01:01:11.680 a loss of confidence.

01:01:13.060 But what comes next is

01:01:14.240 how do you regain

01:01:15.020 the confidence?

01:01:15.620 Right.

01:01:15.860 That's right.

01:01:16.640 It has to be accountability,

01:01:17.860 right?

01:01:18.140 And so that's what

01:01:19.520 needs to happen.

01:01:20.200 Not vengeance or revenge.

01:01:21.380 I don't think that's

01:01:22.400 Agreed.

01:01:23.140 A good thing at all.

01:01:23.780 And by the way,

01:01:24.260 not to do the same thing

01:01:25.200 that they did

01:01:25.920 to target a political opponent

01:01:27.700 because of a political opponent,

01:01:28.940 but rather to say,

01:01:30.380 you did something

01:01:31.380 that was terrible

01:01:32.060 for our country,

01:01:32.920 which basically relies

01:01:34.720 on self-governance

01:01:35.760 and accountability.

01:01:37.720 I mean,

01:01:37.940 at the end of the day,

01:01:38.840 right,

01:01:39.020 that's the ultimate thing.

01:01:39.860 People in Missouri

01:01:40.480 can send me there,

01:01:41.580 they can send me home,

01:01:42.420 they can send me back.

01:01:43.260 There's some level

01:01:43.900 of accountability

01:01:44.420 that comes with our,

01:01:45.460 with the way

01:01:46.340 our constitutional republic.

01:01:47.860 But when you get

01:01:48.400 to all this other stuff

01:01:49.460 that's below that,

01:01:50.320 which is why

01:01:50.620 the administrative state

01:01:51.440 is so dangerous

01:01:52.360 because they're not

01:01:53.140 accountable to anybody.

01:01:54.260 They know it.

01:01:55.500 And you have to

01:01:56.440 rein that in

01:01:57.040 and disrupt it

01:01:57.800 and dismantle it

01:01:58.620 in many ways.

01:02:00.340 And again,

01:02:00.860 I think part of

01:02:01.820 what drove me

01:02:02.780 to uncover

01:02:03.720 a lot of the things

01:02:04.340 as AG was that

01:02:05.480 and now in this new role,

01:02:06.940 it's to help finish that job.

01:02:08.980 But you really do need

01:02:09.980 an administration

01:02:10.480 that believes that too.

01:02:12.040 And I don't think

01:02:12.720 we've had,

01:02:13.500 I can't think of

01:02:14.260 any administration

01:02:14.920 in the last hundred years

01:02:16.960 that has invested

01:02:17.760 in rooting that out

01:02:18.640 as this one.

01:02:19.180 I agree.

01:02:20.240 I just,

01:02:21.080 you know,

01:02:22.720 there's a lot of emphasis

01:02:23.620 on, you know,

01:02:24.620 people who are

01:02:25.620 criticizing BB

01:02:27.000 on college campuses

01:02:28.000 and everything,

01:02:28.760 which is fine.

01:02:29.640 But I'm getting

01:02:31.860 to the point

01:02:32.320 and I know

01:02:32.900 a lot of the people,

01:02:33.940 you know,

01:02:34.240 I run DOJ

01:02:35.360 and I really like them

01:02:36.560 and think they're

01:02:37.520 decent people

01:02:38.140 and I agree with them

01:02:39.220 on most things.

01:02:40.560 However,

01:02:42.040 like the BLM riots,

01:02:44.400 COVID,

01:02:45.380 censorship,

01:02:45.920 like you got

01:02:48.140 to get to the bottom

01:02:49.320 of this stuff.

01:02:49.960 Epstein,

01:02:50.440 sorry to say it.

01:02:51.100 Yeah.

01:02:51.260 I know no one wants

01:02:51.980 to hear it,

01:02:52.360 but it's just not

01:02:53.200 because I care

01:02:53.980 that much about Epstein.

01:02:55.040 It's like the perception,

01:02:57.100 however,

01:02:57.460 that some people

01:02:58.340 are above the law

01:02:59.200 is the most corrosive

01:03:00.420 possible perception

01:03:01.320 in any society.

01:03:02.620 Yeah.

01:03:02.920 No, I agree.

01:03:03.660 And I think,

01:03:04.280 I think you just take

01:03:06.900 this Russia gate stuff.

01:03:09.060 Here's another great example.

01:03:10.180 I think,

01:03:10.940 you know,

01:03:13.200 it's so corrosive

01:03:14.600 is the right word

01:03:15.380 of how it infected

01:03:16.640 so many aspects

01:03:17.860 of law enforcement.

01:03:19.860 I mean,

01:03:20.220 think about it.

01:03:20.700 All the time

01:03:21.600 that the FBI

01:03:22.820 is spending

01:03:23.480 trying to protect

01:03:24.440 Hunter Biden

01:03:25.100 and, you know,

01:03:26.820 get Trump out of office

01:03:28.080 or going after parents

01:03:29.960 or Catholics,

01:03:31.120 like the FBI

01:03:31.800 is supposed to like

01:03:32.580 go after the bad guys,

01:03:34.140 right?

01:03:34.300 Like help clean up

01:03:35.120 the streets

01:03:35.660 in Washington, D.C.

01:03:37.020 or in St. Louis

01:03:37.880 or in New York

01:03:40.020 or wherever.

01:03:40.740 Like think of all

01:03:41.340 the resources

01:03:42.020 pulled away

01:03:42.780 to go do 1.00

01:03:43.880 all this other bullshit 0.99

01:03:44.900 that they, 1.00

01:03:46.500 Biden administration

01:03:47.020 wanted to do.

01:03:48.060 It really is a tragedy.

01:03:49.820 And so I do think

01:03:50.920 that there's some

01:03:52.140 opportunities coming up

01:03:53.440 for the Justice Department

01:03:54.880 to go do that.

01:03:55.680 And the Russia gate thing

01:03:56.600 is front and center.

01:03:57.340 And just think of the idea

01:03:58.520 that Hillary Clinton, 0.99

01:04:00.380 who, by the way,

01:04:01.540 was working with

01:04:03.020 the George Soros

01:04:04.800 organization

01:04:05.540 to come up 0.97

01:04:06.440 with this ridiculous theory 0.98

01:04:07.860 to deflect 0.57

01:04:08.560 from her emails,

01:04:10.040 right?

01:04:10.240 That her email scandal,

01:04:11.120 they needed something

01:04:11.740 on Trump

01:04:12.300 and they concocted

01:04:13.700 this thing

01:04:14.080 out of thin air

01:04:14.960 that he was some

01:04:16.080 Russian asset

01:04:16.760 or had some,

01:04:17.720 was in bed with Putin

01:04:18.720 on stuff.

01:04:19.820 And then they sold

01:04:20.980 that to the intelligence

01:04:22.120 agencies that bought it

01:04:23.360 and then convinced

01:04:24.080 the president

01:04:24.600 of the United States,

01:04:25.700 Barack Obama,

01:04:26.280 to spy on

01:04:27.480 the guy who was

01:04:29.080 running for president

01:04:29.740 who happened

01:04:30.020 to be a Republican.

01:04:31.620 And then they

01:04:31.980 continued to lie about it

01:04:33.080 and still,

01:04:33.600 by the way,

01:04:33.960 continue to lie about it

01:04:35.020 to this day

01:04:35.980 about their role

01:04:37.440 in undermining,

01:04:38.620 not just like our system

01:04:40.140 of like that two people

01:04:41.380 are running against each other

01:04:42.240 and the American people

01:04:42.760 get to decide.

01:04:43.680 They did everything

01:04:44.380 for a five-year period

01:04:45.720 to undermine his,

01:04:47.560 not just his agenda,

01:04:48.540 but his presidency.

01:04:50.300 And then the same group

01:04:51.780 of people then

01:04:52.540 are weaponized

01:04:53.680 and they go get

01:04:54.360 Jack Smith

01:04:55.320 who's like,

01:04:56.140 everybody knows

01:04:57.060 in the prosecutor world

01:04:58.160 is just like a hired gun.

01:05:00.020 Like you go,

01:05:00.900 you put,

01:05:01.460 you make him special counsel

01:05:02.880 when it's like,

01:05:03.940 show me the man,

01:05:04.740 I'll show you the crime.

01:05:05.840 Yeah.

01:05:06.080 Soviet style justice.

01:05:07.440 That's exactly what that was

01:05:08.760 and it was happening

01:05:09.400 in this country.

01:05:10.140 And they're down

01:05:10.800 in Mar-a-Lago

01:05:11.440 going through

01:05:12.260 the first lady's,

01:05:13.680 you know,

01:05:14.080 underwear drawer

01:05:15.000 trying to find

01:05:16.320 probably stuff

01:05:17.620 related to

01:05:18.300 Crossfire Hurricane,

01:05:19.620 probably,

01:05:20.200 and maybe some other stuff.

01:05:21.320 But it was just about

01:05:22.680 settling political scores.

01:05:23.980 With guns.

01:05:24.420 With guns.

01:05:26.120 And then you have,

01:05:27.240 you know,

01:05:28.200 Fannie Willis' deputy

01:05:29.500 meeting with

01:05:30.240 the White House counsel.

01:05:31.100 Why is a state,

01:05:31.800 why is a state prosecutor

01:05:34.240 in Georgia

01:05:36.020 meeting with

01:05:37.100 the White House

01:05:37.800 counsel's office?

01:05:39.060 Why would they be doing that?

01:05:40.140 Why would the number three person

01:05:41.680 from DOJ

01:05:42.520 go to the New York

01:05:43.940 District Attorney's Office

01:05:45.220 to help out

01:05:45.820 with the prosecution

01:05:46.580 of President Trump?

01:05:47.460 Why is all this happening?

01:05:49.420 The minute,

01:05:50.120 President Trump's

01:05:50.680 original sin to them

01:05:51.800 was that he ran at all,

01:05:53.920 that he came down

01:05:54.480 the escalator.

01:05:55.280 Yes.

01:05:55.620 And he was such

01:05:56.240 a disruptive force

01:05:57.320 that they were willing

01:05:58.380 to throw,

01:05:59.040 to save democracy,

01:06:00.160 they were willing

01:06:00.520 to destroy democracy.

01:06:02.680 And so now,

01:06:04.340 and the reason why

01:06:05.000 I feel committed

01:06:06.080 with the job I had,

01:06:07.000 getting back to

01:06:07.480 what job would you

01:06:08.420 rather have,

01:06:09.100 I think it's important

01:06:09.920 to have people

01:06:10.460 in the United States Senate

01:06:11.360 and Congress

01:06:12.160 who want to see

01:06:13.200 this project through,

01:06:14.500 that they want

01:06:15.160 accountability restored,

01:06:16.580 they want people

01:06:17.380 to actually

01:06:18.400 not believe

01:06:19.580 their government

01:06:20.120 is weaponized

01:06:20.860 against them.

01:06:21.800 Like,

01:06:22.200 it's a tall task

01:06:22.920 given the sins

01:06:23.740 of the last

01:06:24.640 eight years,

01:06:25.780 but it's important

01:06:26.880 for this republic

01:06:27.600 to last

01:06:28.340 and to stand

01:06:28.940 and for our kids

01:06:29.520 and grandkids.

01:06:30.000 I wouldn't agree more.

01:06:31.180 I mean,

01:06:31.960 you know,

01:06:33.180 you've got more

01:06:33.760 relevant law enforcement

01:06:35.200 experience than a lot

01:06:35.940 of people running DOJ,

01:06:36.900 sorry to say that,

01:06:37.540 but it's true.

01:06:39.760 I hope that you're

01:06:40.740 in contact,

01:06:41.200 I won't even ask you,

01:06:42.200 put you in uncomfortable

01:06:42.840 position,

01:06:43.300 but I hope that you're

01:06:43.980 in contact with them

01:06:44.740 and I hope that you

01:06:45.480 will convey the

01:06:46.200 following message.

01:06:46.980 To the extent

01:06:47.360 that you don't

01:06:48.980 bring to light

01:06:49.820 the truth

01:06:50.640 and affect justice,

01:06:52.820 people start to think,

01:06:53.780 well, maybe you're

01:06:54.240 in league with

01:06:55.140 the bad guys too.

01:06:56.220 I mean,

01:06:56.440 I don't,

01:06:56.880 you know,

01:06:57.220 which I think is unfair

01:06:58.000 and I like the attorney

01:06:58.820 general and I like

01:06:59.560 the FBI director

01:07:00.400 and LaBungino

01:07:01.780 and all that,

01:07:02.500 but like,

01:07:03.520 I think it's fair

01:07:04.320 to ask at a certain

01:07:05.280 point,

01:07:05.660 like,

01:07:05.940 why aren't you

01:07:06.560 prosecuting anybody

01:07:07.600 for any of this stuff

01:07:09.080 and what's the answer?

01:07:11.060 Well,

01:07:11.300 we're really busy.

01:07:11.980 Really?

01:07:12.240 Are you really that busy?

01:07:13.060 You know what I mean?

01:07:13.960 And maybe you're

01:07:14.620 in on it too

01:07:15.400 and I don't think

01:07:16.700 they are in on it.

01:07:17.600 I don't think

01:07:17.920 they're bad people.

01:07:18.780 I'm not alleging that,

01:07:20.400 but a lot of people

01:07:21.500 will start to think

01:07:22.240 that very soon

01:07:23.380 unless they act

01:07:24.160 and I hope you will

01:07:24.700 pass on that message.

01:07:25.780 I will and I think

01:07:26.380 what people are looking

01:07:27.380 for is action.

01:07:28.820 There's no doubt.

01:07:29.340 Yeah.

01:07:29.780 Yeah.

01:07:30.420 Is it hard to,

01:07:32.320 I mean,

01:07:32.600 you would know

01:07:33.260 since you've been

01:07:33.860 involved in it all,

01:07:34.580 but just as a process matter,

01:07:36.580 is it hard to say,

01:07:38.540 you know,

01:07:38.740 we know that Clapper

01:07:39.720 and Brennan

01:07:40.240 were involved

01:07:40.780 in illegal activities.

01:07:41.820 Let's get an indictment.

01:07:43.180 Like,

01:07:43.460 how hard is that?

01:07:44.480 Well,

01:07:44.760 yeah,

01:07:45.220 I mean,

01:07:45.400 I think the issue

01:07:46.740 is that it's possible

01:07:48.080 some of the statute

01:07:48.880 of limitations

01:07:49.460 may have run

01:07:50.940 on a lot of the crimes.

01:07:52.120 However,

01:07:53.320 not necessarily

01:07:54.120 on a conspiracy,

01:07:55.280 on an ongoing conspiracy.

01:07:57.260 And there's also

01:07:57.920 no presidential

01:07:59.460 candidate immunity.

01:08:01.240 Hillary Clinton

01:08:01.600 doesn't have immunity.

01:08:03.140 Now,

01:08:03.300 Barack Obama

01:08:03.920 likely does,

01:08:04.820 ironically,

01:08:05.460 because of the

01:08:06.300 U.S.

01:08:06.640 versus Trump case

01:08:07.600 where John Sauer,

01:08:09.140 who's now the

01:08:09.560 solicitor general,

01:08:10.140 who's my solicitor general,

01:08:11.740 argued successfully

01:08:12.580 before the Supreme Court

01:08:13.360 that official acts,

01:08:14.320 you know,

01:08:14.560 you can't have ongoing,

01:08:16.280 you know,

01:08:16.760 so there is such a thing

01:08:18.120 as presidential immunity

01:08:19.020 that was established.

01:08:19.820 So Barack Obama

01:08:20.860 may have presidential immunity

01:08:22.040 while he was in office.

01:08:22.980 I don't know

01:08:23.700 if he,

01:08:24.120 you know,

01:08:24.440 engaged in activities

01:08:25.240 after he was out of office.

01:08:26.740 Who knows?

01:08:28.300 Certainly,

01:08:28.980 James Comey

01:08:29.700 doesn't have immunity.

01:08:32.020 Clapper doesn't have immunity.

01:08:33.940 Brennan doesn't have immunity.

01:08:35.540 So I think,

01:08:36.160 you know,

01:08:36.520 this is going to go

01:08:37.200 where the facts lead

01:08:38.380 and I think that

01:08:39.060 the most likely,

01:08:40.240 if there was something

01:08:41.760 to pursue,

01:08:42.440 it's likely

01:08:42.820 an ongoing conspiracy

01:08:43.840 to defraud

01:08:45.400 the American people.

01:08:46.500 And that is a crime.

01:08:48.300 So we'll see.

01:08:49.680 But,

01:08:49.880 but there,

01:08:50.700 there can

01:08:51.540 and probably should be

01:08:53.060 let me say

01:08:54.380 definitely should be

01:08:55.220 indictments.

01:08:56.360 Dan Bongino,

01:08:57.360 who's taking 0.99

01:08:58.020 a lot of crap 0.92

01:08:59.220 for the Epstein thing, 0.99

01:09:00.480 but I can verify

01:09:01.800 since I know him well

01:09:02.800 is a good man,

01:09:03.760 decent man.

01:09:04.600 But he said in public

01:09:05.840 and also in private

01:09:06.780 that the FBI

01:09:07.640 is way more corrupt

01:09:09.340 than he had any, 0.56

01:09:10.100 any sense of it.

01:09:11.080 He didn't know.

01:09:12.380 He said that.

01:09:13.480 And,

01:09:13.860 um,

01:09:14.340 how hard is it?

01:09:15.760 Why is it so hard

01:09:16.820 to clean up the FBI?

01:09:18.740 Um,

01:09:19.200 well,

01:09:19.620 I guess you could say,

01:09:20.520 um,

01:09:20.840 you kind of need

01:09:22.800 to know

01:09:23.160 what is the

01:09:23.800 known knowns,

01:09:24.780 known unknowns,

01:09:25.420 and unknown.

01:09:26.260 Yeah.

01:09:26.420 That's from

01:09:26.900 ironically Roosevelt.

01:09:28.600 Uh,

01:09:28.980 I think you gotta figure out

01:09:29.880 who the people are.

01:09:31.060 Um,

01:09:31.500 but nobody's got a right

01:09:32.420 to be,

01:09:32.960 uh,

01:09:33.620 uh,

01:09:34.300 insubordinate

01:09:35.060 FBI,

01:09:36.600 uh,

01:09:37.660 agent.

01:09:38.320 Like,

01:09:38.620 you don't,

01:09:39.060 like.

01:09:39.400 They have no authority

01:09:40.220 apart from the

01:09:40.780 president's authority

01:09:41.460 and the president's

01:09:42.120 authority derives

01:09:42.840 from elections.

01:09:43.980 Right.

01:09:44.640 Because it's authority

01:09:45.420 conferred by the people

01:09:46.860 as expressed by voting.

01:09:48.240 It's also interesting too.

01:09:49.360 They have no authority

01:09:50.780 at all.

01:09:51.600 Right.

01:09:51.800 Well,

01:09:51.980 you take,

01:09:52.320 take the civil rights 0.71

01:09:53.040 division.

01:09:53.680 Uh,

01:09:54.320 I mean,

01:09:54.900 uh,

01:09:55.200 Dylan,

01:09:55.640 I think is doing

01:09:56.360 a great job.

01:09:57.780 Um,

01:09:58.940 she,

01:09:59.660 a number of those

01:10:00.560 and that perhaps

01:10:01.320 was maybe the most

01:10:02.060 corrupt division

01:10:03.100 out there,

01:10:03.660 the civil rights

01:10:04.140 division,

01:10:04.480 right?

01:10:04.880 She's my former lawyer

01:10:05.820 and I can say she's

01:10:06.600 tough.

01:10:06.980 Yeah,

01:10:07.080 she's tough.

01:10:07.600 Um,

01:10:08.280 and I think there's

01:10:09.380 a lot that we're

01:10:10.140 going to see from,

01:10:11.000 I,

01:10:11.060 I just had a hearing.

01:10:11.900 I,

01:10:12.000 I chair the subcommittee

01:10:12.820 on the constitution

01:10:13.540 of the judiciary committee.

01:10:14.460 We just had her come in 0.99

01:10:15.320 and say,

01:10:15.620 Hey,

01:10:15.700 what are you thinking

01:10:16.280 about doing?

01:10:16.820 Like,

01:10:17.140 what,

01:10:17.520 what are the things

01:10:18.160 that are on your,

01:10:18.760 on your things,

01:10:19.540 on list of things to do?

01:10:21.460 I think she's,

01:10:22.480 um,

01:10:23.120 uh,

01:10:23.600 obviously universities

01:10:24.440 have been a topic

01:10:25.420 of conversation,

01:10:26.100 but I also think

01:10:26.920 in corporate America,

01:10:27.600 they ought to be,

01:10:28.200 um,

01:10:28.500 ready because this

01:10:30.280 discriminatory DEI

01:10:31.620 stuff flies in the face

01:10:32.840 of federal law.

01:10:34.140 The civil rights acts

01:10:35.160 of the 1960s

01:10:36.020 were meant to protect

01:10:36.600 people from racial

01:10:37.280 discrimination.

01:10:38.120 Everyone.

01:10:38.720 Everyone.

01:10:39.620 And there are people

01:10:40.880 being racially discriminated

01:10:41.940 against right now.

01:10:42.960 And,

01:10:43.580 and by the way,

01:10:44.680 these struggle sessions

01:10:45.880 that exist,

01:10:47.520 like Coca-Cola,

01:10:48.720 you know,

01:10:49.000 would have a seminar,

01:10:50.320 you know,

01:10:51.420 saying basically

01:10:52.580 from the moderator,

01:10:53.560 how can you be less white? 0.96

01:10:55.660 I mean, 0.99

01:10:55.840 this is insanity. 0.99

01:10:57.320 How can you be less black? 1.00

01:10:58.420 How can you be less Jewish? 0.96

01:10:59.140 How can you be less Hispanic? 1.00

01:11:00.840 Like what the hell 0.99

01:11:01.840 is going on?

01:11:02.680 And it,

01:11:03.020 by the way,

01:11:03.380 our military,

01:11:04.020 I think I'm on the

01:11:05.040 armed services committee.

01:11:05.840 We would ask,

01:11:06.300 I would ask questions

01:11:07.280 all the time.

01:11:08.380 We would try to,

01:11:08.920 and that's went a little

01:11:09.460 underground once it was exposed.

01:11:11.180 But this idea of dividing

01:11:12.660 the room,

01:11:13.000 our military is this great,

01:11:14.200 supposed to be this great

01:11:15.100 meritocracy.

01:11:15.780 Anybody from any background

01:11:16.700 can go serve.

01:11:17.420 You can have a ticker tape

01:11:18.160 parade in New York City

01:11:20.060 as being a war hero.

01:11:20.980 It doesn't matter where you

01:11:21.680 came from,

01:11:22.160 what your race is.

01:11:23.060 We celebrate that.

01:11:24.140 This idea of dividing

01:11:25.380 the room by race

01:11:26.440 and who's the oppressor

01:11:27.340 and who's the oppressed 0.92

01:11:28.000 is insane.

01:11:28.900 But,

01:11:29.200 but I think that

01:11:29.780 civil rights division

01:11:30.520 is a good example.

01:11:31.380 I think they're going to,

01:11:32.460 they're going to pursue

01:11:33.120 some things that,

01:11:33.900 that prior regimes

01:11:35.040 didn't pursue.

01:11:36.020 And I think that

01:11:36.620 will have a,

01:11:37.880 an important effect

01:11:38.860 on behavior as well.

01:11:40.240 You do think that?

01:11:40.980 I do.

01:11:44.080 Do you have confidence

01:11:44.900 to the attorney general?

01:11:45.880 Yeah.

01:11:46.240 Listen,

01:11:46.800 I think President Trump

01:11:47.940 has put a good team

01:11:48.620 around him

01:11:49.280 and I have a ton of respect

01:11:50.480 for Pam Bondi.

01:11:51.340 I do.

01:11:51.700 What do you make

01:11:52.040 of the Epstein thing?

01:11:52.780 I think that they,

01:11:55.940 more needs to be done

01:11:56.860 on transparency.

01:11:57.720 There's no doubt about it.

01:11:58.520 I think any of the

01:11:59.020 credible information

01:11:59.760 that can come out

01:12:00.340 should come out.

01:12:01.420 I will also say,

01:12:02.640 the Southern District

01:12:06.620 of New York

01:12:07.320 had those files.

01:12:09.520 James Comey's daughter

01:12:10.680 was the lawyer

01:12:12.000 handling this

01:12:14.060 in the Southern District

01:12:14.780 of New York.

01:12:15.260 Weird how that works.

01:12:16.200 Yeah.

01:12:16.580 So I don't know

01:12:17.260 what that means,

01:12:18.240 but I do think

01:12:19.620 that more transparency

01:12:22.260 would be a good thing.

01:12:24.680 You often hear,

01:12:25.780 I mean,

01:12:26.000 now you're in a position

01:12:26.920 to receive

01:12:27.640 classified information.

01:12:29.140 I'm sure you have meetings

01:12:30.160 in the fabled SCIF

01:12:31.180 from time to time.

01:12:34.440 We often hear,

01:12:35.380 you know,

01:12:35.520 we can't tell you that

01:12:37.100 for reasons

01:12:37.820 of national security,

01:12:38.940 reasons of privacy,

01:12:40.460 whatever,

01:12:41.000 all these different reasons.

01:12:42.540 We have more than

01:12:43.400 a billion classified

01:12:44.400 federal documents.

01:12:45.700 Like,

01:12:46.780 why?

01:12:48.460 Yeah.

01:12:48.740 There should be a,

01:12:49.660 I agree with you

01:12:50.420 and I've heard you

01:12:51.080 talk about this before.

01:12:51.800 There's just way

01:12:52.280 too much stuff

01:12:52.880 that's hidden

01:12:53.340 behind what's

01:12:54.060 so-called classified.

01:12:55.680 A lot of that stuff

01:12:56.620 should never be classified

01:12:57.420 in the first place.

01:12:58.180 It's sort of a great way

01:12:59.140 to never have to have

01:13:00.940 transparency

01:13:02.160 with the American people.

01:13:04.460 And by the way,

01:13:05.360 contributes to this

01:13:06.100 lack of trust

01:13:06.640 that you're talking about.

01:13:07.860 I think the more information

01:13:09.260 you can get out there,

01:13:10.180 the better.

01:13:11.140 And by the way,

01:13:11.580 I do find it hilarious.

01:13:13.240 We have these,

01:13:13.880 sometimes we have

01:13:14.320 these all-senator

01:13:15.220 briefings.

01:13:17.040 Yeah.

01:13:17.220 and it's all,

01:13:21.500 nothing comes of it.

01:13:23.260 Like,

01:13:23.400 there's nothing new

01:13:24.000 that wasn't already leaked

01:13:25.180 by somebody in the Pentagon

01:13:27.120 to the New York Times

01:13:27.900 the day before.

01:13:28.960 Now,

01:13:29.200 some of these

01:13:29.760 you can get in there

01:13:30.500 and ask on a one,

01:13:31.380 by the way,

01:13:31.860 not necessarily

01:13:32.480 the top level person,

01:13:34.080 but somebody that's actually

01:13:34.980 doing the work.

01:13:35.940 You can ask them

01:13:36.560 some questions

01:13:37.700 in a much more private setting,

01:13:39.180 but some of this stuff

01:13:40.380 is just a way

01:13:40.900 to hide behind.

01:13:41.620 Interestingly,

01:13:42.820 Chris Wray

01:13:43.900 once mentioned

01:13:44.960 that we can't gather

01:13:46.300 information

01:13:46.840 the same way we did

01:13:47.820 prior to the lawsuit.

01:13:49.820 He was referencing

01:13:50.780 Missouri versus Biden

01:13:51.860 because the FBI

01:13:52.640 was very much a part

01:13:54.220 of this censorship regime

01:13:55.300 where they were flagging stuff

01:13:56.500 and calling it

01:13:57.340 Russian disinformation

01:13:58.220 and working with

01:13:58.860 the big tech companies.

01:13:59.960 And he was sort of annoyed

01:14:00.840 that his,

01:14:02.160 you know,

01:14:02.860 practices were being curtailed

01:14:04.340 because the court said

01:14:05.260 you can't do that anymore.

01:14:06.280 He's very,

01:14:07.880 you know,

01:14:08.180 for me,

01:14:08.560 having been the guy

01:14:09.200 that filed it

01:14:09.780 and then now sitting,

01:14:10.700 you know,

01:14:11.100 when he said that

01:14:12.340 was really an interesting

01:14:13.660 turn of events.

01:14:14.640 How many senators

01:14:15.560 are former AGs?

01:14:17.540 There are

01:14:18.460 probably five

01:14:20.680 on the Republican side.

01:14:23.440 There's maybe four.

01:14:24.100 There's probably about the same

01:14:25.160 on the,

01:14:25.760 maybe on the Democrats.

01:14:26.540 How much is spent

01:14:27.240 on your average Senate race?

01:14:29.480 Oh,

01:14:30.080 I mean,

01:14:32.000 I would imagine

01:14:32.580 it ranges from

01:14:33.620 20 million

01:14:36.960 to

01:14:37.300 then you get into

01:14:39.000 Yeah.

01:14:39.760 Right.

01:14:40.220 Hundreds.

01:14:40.620 Like $200 million

01:14:41.680 in Montana

01:14:42.660 where there's like

01:14:43.600 literally

01:14:44.100 one of the least

01:14:46.740 populated states.

01:14:47.840 A very important state

01:14:48.660 but was important

01:14:49.380 for them

01:14:49.720 to take the majority.

01:14:50.680 How about just pay off

01:14:51.280 everyone's mortgage

01:14:51.880 and call it a day?

01:14:53.060 It might have been cheaper.

01:14:54.600 So,

01:14:55.120 and then,

01:14:55.780 but the AG race is,

01:14:58.280 I mean,

01:14:58.500 this is a long way

01:14:59.100 of making a short point

01:15:00.040 which is,

01:15:01.540 an AG seems like

01:15:02.600 every bit

01:15:03.400 as important a job

01:15:04.460 as being a U.S. senator.

01:15:05.280 It's a very important job.

01:15:06.440 For sure.

01:15:07.180 Yeah.

01:15:07.320 And I think

01:15:07.800 the rest of us

01:15:08.240 are just waking up

01:15:08.860 to that kind of,

01:15:09.920 how much is spent

01:15:10.500 on those races?

01:15:11.440 Oh,

01:15:11.940 a fraction of that.

01:15:12.760 Right.

01:15:13.400 A fraction of that.

01:15:14.000 And then you get

01:15:14.720 into races

01:15:15.240 where,

01:15:15.640 you know,

01:15:15.900 you've got,

01:15:16.540 you know,

01:15:17.520 red states

01:15:18.300 or blue states

01:15:18.980 but red states

01:15:19.640 and it's really

01:15:20.100 about the primary

01:15:20.780 and that's even

01:15:21.360 less expensive,

01:15:22.740 right?

01:15:23.160 And someone like

01:15:23.680 Dana Nessel

01:15:24.340 in Michigan,

01:15:26.020 I think,

01:15:26.400 did more damage

01:15:27.580 to the state

01:15:28.200 than that kind

01:15:28.920 of the Botox governor

01:15:29.840 ever thought about doing.

01:15:31.720 Like,

01:15:31.860 Dana Nessel's like

01:15:32.400 a truly poisonous 0.97

01:15:34.580 anti-Christian 1.00

01:15:35.440 dangerous person. 0.72

01:15:37.760 That's my read on her anyway. 0.96

01:15:38.760 I don't know her.

01:15:40.520 And she kind of gets ignored

01:15:42.240 and everyone beats up

01:15:43.200 on the governor,

01:15:43.860 the hapless governor.

01:15:44.640 Well,

01:15:44.800 what's interesting about that

01:15:45.640 is we kind of took a page.

01:15:47.700 So during COVID,

01:15:49.120 you know,

01:15:49.500 Cuomo had instituted

01:15:51.440 a,

01:15:51.840 like a tip line

01:15:52.600 essentially to tell

01:15:53.720 on your neighbors.

01:15:54.400 And I think Tim Walls

01:15:55.160 did this actually too.

01:15:55.900 Oh,

01:15:56.100 for sure.

01:15:57.700 They had this tip line

01:15:58.780 where you'd snitch.

01:15:59.780 They're all tattletales.

01:16:00.740 Yeah.

01:16:01.000 Like you're outside

01:16:01.620 barbecuing without a mask on

01:16:02.980 and all of a sudden

01:16:03.780 the police shows up.

01:16:04.700 I mean,

01:16:04.820 I think this happened

01:16:05.360 in Minnesota.

01:16:06.700 So we kind of turned it

01:16:07.640 on its face

01:16:08.240 when we sued

01:16:09.520 the 65 school districts

01:16:11.980 in Missouri.

01:16:12.360 We said,

01:16:12.820 we're going to have a tip line

01:16:13.680 not for the suppression

01:16:14.480 of rights,

01:16:14.980 but to vindicate

01:16:15.760 people's rights.

01:16:16.820 We had a tip line

01:16:17.340 of parents reach out to us

01:16:18.500 of what schools

01:16:19.120 were still forcing

01:16:20.240 their kids to wear masks

01:16:21.280 all day long.

01:16:22.380 And I'll tell you,

01:16:22.940 Tucker,

01:16:23.340 in some of the dark,

01:16:24.500 lonely moments

01:16:25.140 of this fight

01:16:25.740 when,

01:16:26.200 you know,

01:16:26.620 now it seems very settled

01:16:27.960 like that was a terrible

01:16:28.840 thing to be doing to kids.

01:16:30.080 But back then,

01:16:31.280 not everybody,

01:16:31.920 I would get interviewed

01:16:32.460 by reporters locally

01:16:34.220 in Missouri

01:16:34.780 who were still in their cars

01:16:36.000 because they couldn't go

01:16:36.600 in the studio

01:16:37.160 with masks on

01:16:38.220 asking me questions

01:16:39.280 about you're trying to,

01:16:40.680 you know,

01:16:41.060 sue a school district

01:16:41.760 for not.

01:16:42.240 Why do you want 0.99

01:16:42.620 to kill the kids? 1.00

01:16:43.240 Right. 1.00

01:16:43.480 Exactly.

01:16:43.920 Those are the questions

01:16:44.500 that they would be asking.

01:16:45.400 So many kids died of COVID.

01:16:46.360 Right.

01:16:46.600 So the stories we got

01:16:47.900 coming in

01:16:48.800 were just devastating.

01:16:50.060 There was a kid

01:16:50.840 in one school district

01:16:51.660 who,

01:16:52.300 because she refused

01:16:56.340 to take her mask off,

01:16:57.900 was meant to

01:16:58.720 sat on a stage

01:17:00.380 by herself

01:17:01.740 in the cafeteria

01:17:03.160 to eat lunch

01:17:04.480 by herself

01:17:05.420 away from the other kids.

01:17:07.440 We got emails

01:17:08.980 from a parent

01:17:10.980 of a deaf child.

01:17:12.800 So this is just killing my kid.

01:17:14.140 My kid can't see any,

01:17:16.000 you know,

01:17:16.200 can't pick up language

01:17:17.480 the way that normally

01:17:18.380 picks up language.

01:17:19.060 the extent to which

01:17:21.060 these adults

01:17:22.440 who should have known better

01:17:23.500 were just willing

01:17:24.640 to do all this.

01:17:25.920 It's just,

01:17:26.580 it's terrible.

01:17:27.620 Like,

01:17:27.880 it's terrible.

01:17:28.500 And so I think,

01:17:29.320 again,

01:17:29.740 you just never

01:17:30.300 let that happen again.

01:17:31.740 And by the way,

01:17:32.980 these are the same people

01:17:33.700 that say,

01:17:33.940 well,

01:17:34.040 once we have a vaccine

01:17:35.120 that things will change.

01:17:36.140 That didn't change anything.

01:17:37.160 And by the way,

01:17:37.680 it didn't affect

01:17:38.220 transmissibility,

01:17:39.620 of course,

01:17:40.120 but then you were censored

01:17:41.060 for saying that

01:17:41.840 even though it was true.

01:17:43.580 So,

01:17:44.520 again,

01:17:45.100 the sins of that era

01:17:46.900 should,

01:17:47.740 you know,

01:17:47.980 not be forgotten.

01:17:49.060 Because we can't

01:17:49.620 let it happen again.

01:17:50.320 Well,

01:17:50.500 they also were the basis

01:17:51.820 of the society

01:17:52.560 we're living in now.

01:17:53.520 It changed everything.

01:17:54.580 It changed people's attitudes

01:17:55.540 toward each other,

01:17:56.300 toward the state,

01:17:57.080 changed the economy,

01:17:58.260 changed the culture

01:17:59.280 up and down,

01:18:00.960 spiked the suicide rate,

01:18:02.600 shortened the life expectancy,

01:18:04.740 increased drug

01:18:05.660 and alcohol addiction

01:18:06.640 exponentially.

01:18:07.940 I mean,

01:18:08.180 like,

01:18:09.380 things fell apart.

01:18:10.560 Yeah.

01:18:10.880 Now,

01:18:11.060 I think the one thing,

01:18:12.440 particularly from there,

01:18:13.520 I think you're seeing this

01:18:14.300 with a lot of younger,

01:18:15.980 especially males

01:18:17.060 who came up

01:18:18.980 during that era

01:18:19.780 and by the way,

01:18:20.960 writ large,

01:18:21.760 kids of that generation

01:18:23.400 now that grew up

01:18:24.220 with that

01:18:24.440 are much more conservative

01:18:25.340 than any generation

01:18:26.740 that preceded them

01:18:27.620 because I think

01:18:28.280 they saw some of the,

01:18:29.220 they saw what was happening

01:18:30.400 to their social networks,

01:18:32.840 their schooling

01:18:33.620 and I think it's part

01:18:34.840 of the reason

01:18:35.140 why you're seeing

01:18:35.780 kind of a,

01:18:37.380 especially young men

01:18:38.220 who are also being told

01:18:39.200 that you're the reason

01:18:40.220 why everything is terrible.

01:18:42.360 I would disagree.

01:18:43.100 I don't think they're conservative

01:18:44.120 as much as they're radical.

01:18:45.640 I think they're way more radical

01:18:46.760 than Republicans understand.

01:18:48.380 I think they're really radical.

01:18:50.100 I don't think they're going to vote

01:18:51.200 for Democrats anytime soon

01:18:52.620 but I mean,

01:18:53.080 I think that their views

01:18:54.040 are so different

01:18:56.020 from your average

01:18:57.300 75-year-old Republican senator.

01:18:59.700 Yeah.

01:19:00.020 Oh, I would agree with that.

01:19:01.220 100%.

01:19:01.800 Is there an appreciation of that?

01:19:04.440 I don't know that everybody

01:19:05.280 sees that, Tucker.

01:19:06.820 I feel like I try to be

01:19:08.680 a voice for that

01:19:09.460 because, you know,

01:19:11.240 and I ran-

01:19:11.660 Thank you.

01:19:12.120 I ran statewide three times

01:19:13.720 in six years in that era.

01:19:15.820 In Missouri,

01:19:16.320 you get a real sense

01:19:17.340 of kind of what's really going on

01:19:18.880 if you spend the time

01:19:19.580 getting around talking to people

01:19:20.540 and that's my sense of it too.

01:19:23.340 So you've been,

01:19:24.860 you've held three elected offices?

01:19:26.640 Yeah.

01:19:28.220 Treasurer, AG, Senator.

01:19:30.020 Well, I was in the State Senate

01:19:30.840 before that actually.

01:19:31.580 State Senate.

01:19:31.800 Oh, gosh.

01:19:32.360 Yeah.

01:19:33.000 When I was 31 years old

01:19:34.940 or whatever that was.

01:19:36.100 Wow.

01:19:36.660 Yeah.

01:19:38.020 Yeah, I got into,

01:19:39.140 it's interesting.

01:19:40.340 Everybody has their own path.

01:19:42.540 For me,

01:19:43.440 it wasn't anything

01:19:44.500 I was thinking about.

01:19:46.300 And then

01:19:47.000 my son, Stephen,

01:19:49.120 was born.

01:19:49.760 Yes.

01:19:50.420 In 2004

01:19:51.860 and was diagnosed

01:19:52.920 with a rare genetic condition

01:19:54.140 called tuberous sclerosis,

01:19:55.360 which there's tubers

01:19:56.620 that form in different organs,

01:19:58.080 including his brain,

01:19:59.060 which has affected his development.

01:20:00.900 And he has epilepsy seizures

01:20:02.520 nearly every day.

01:20:03.680 Ah.

01:20:04.780 He's nonverbal.

01:20:05.960 Stephen will be 21 here in a few days.

01:20:08.660 But seeing him go through that,

01:20:10.240 including a four-hour seizure

01:20:11.400 and being in the ICU for over a week,

01:20:14.240 I kind of went through this process.

01:20:15.540 As a child?

01:20:16.660 Oh, yeah.

01:20:17.240 As a two, three-year-old.

01:20:18.560 And he would have them every few months

01:20:20.120 that we would be in the hospital.

01:20:21.740 And in the four-hour seizure,

01:20:23.020 they were on the last medication

01:20:25.680 they could give him.

01:20:26.260 You had to wait 20 minutes.

01:20:27.440 And I remember

01:20:27.860 there was like a red digital clock

01:20:30.100 on the wall

01:20:30.580 that had the seconds,

01:20:32.280 you know,

01:20:32.580 ticking by

01:20:33.080 and had to wait 20 minutes

01:20:34.180 before they could try a new med.

01:20:35.180 And he's seizing the whole time.

01:20:36.420 And all I could do

01:20:37.040 was be there with him and pray.

01:20:38.720 Jamie had to,

01:20:39.720 my wife had to leave the room 1.00

01:20:40.880 and I would just pray the whole time.

01:20:43.820 And the last one worked.

01:20:46.220 They were about ready

01:20:46.640 to induce a coma.

01:20:47.660 So we almost lost Stephen that day.

01:20:49.760 Oh, my gosh.

01:20:49.940 But it's something.

01:20:50.960 But anyway,

01:20:51.260 you go through,

01:20:51.900 for me.

01:20:52.680 How did you keep your family together?

01:20:54.620 Like, how do you,

01:20:55.460 you have other children.

01:20:56.900 Two, yeah.

01:20:57.380 Then we,

01:20:57.860 two,

01:20:58.160 two,

01:20:58.460 we later had two daughters.

01:21:00.360 Sophia and Olivia were great.

01:21:01.700 But we did,

01:21:02.860 you know,

01:21:03.080 we wanted to have more kids.

01:21:04.920 I think those things,

01:21:05.920 Tucker,

01:21:06.200 you go one of two ways

01:21:07.380 with your faith and your family.

01:21:08.700 And for us,

01:21:09.340 it strengthened our family,

01:21:11.180 my wife and I.

01:21:12.860 And even my faith,

01:21:14.180 I went through a process of discernment.

01:21:18.240 I'm Catholic,

01:21:18.920 was educated by,

01:21:19.920 by the Jesuits.

01:21:21.440 And there's this process of sort of like

01:21:22.760 trying to figure out what you want to do

01:21:24.060 with your life.

01:21:24.580 And that was an inflection point for me.

01:21:26.440 And I wanted to do more than what I was doing.

01:21:28.500 I made partner in a law firm.

01:21:29.860 That was great.

01:21:30.380 I was building a career and a family,

01:21:31.900 but I felt like there was something more to do.

01:21:34.400 So I was called to-

01:21:34.900 Why would that strengthen your faith?

01:21:36.300 It doesn't seem like an obvious response.

01:21:38.280 If you,

01:21:38.560 you grew up Catholic,

01:21:39.800 you go to Catholic schools,

01:21:40.820 and then the tough,

01:21:42.940 really the toughest thing

01:21:43.940 that can ever happen to a man

01:21:45.700 happens to you.

01:21:46.560 And so why wouldn't you say,

01:21:49.600 well,

01:21:50.020 you know,

01:21:50.300 God has abandoned me.

01:21:51.160 There is no God.

01:21:51.860 This is too horrible.

01:21:52.920 Like,

01:21:53.040 why would that strengthen your faith?

01:21:56.440 I think it,

01:21:57.260 it certainly gives you a perspective

01:21:58.560 on what the things you can control

01:22:00.060 and what you can't control.

01:22:01.580 Yes.

01:22:01.860 And so much of,

01:22:03.360 of,

01:22:03.860 I mean,

01:22:04.080 think of the original sin,

01:22:05.240 really,

01:22:05.440 it's just trying to become God

01:22:07.520 in the Garden of Eden.

01:22:09.720 And,

01:22:09.840 and,

01:22:10.760 and I think that it does,

01:22:11.780 it,

01:22:12.240 look,

01:22:13.920 there's a,

01:22:14.240 there's a mourning that is never,

01:22:15.800 it's never,

01:22:16.560 totally goes away.

01:22:18.100 When I go to a baseball game

01:22:19.700 or something like that

01:22:20.600 and see a dad with a son

01:22:22.680 that's about Stephen's age

01:22:23.640 or kids go off to college

01:22:24.700 and do those sorts of things

01:22:25.600 that Stephen will never get to do.

01:22:26.640 Stephen will never be married

01:22:27.740 and have kids.

01:22:29.240 And that's,

01:22:29.660 that's tough as a dad.

01:22:30.820 That's really tough.

01:22:32.020 But I would say that from that,

01:22:33.780 I've gained a much greater perspective

01:22:35.540 on the things that are important,

01:22:37.400 the things that are real.

01:22:39.800 Um,

01:22:40.320 and he's a happy kid.

01:22:42.160 And,

01:22:42.360 and there's,

01:22:44.700 when you see him,

01:22:45.860 when he sees you

01:22:46.600 or sees me,

01:22:48.000 if he were here right now,

01:22:48.860 he'd be walking around,

01:22:49.760 he'd give you a big hug

01:22:50.640 and that kind of thing.

01:22:51.480 But the minute that I see him

01:22:52.920 or wake him up in the morning,

01:22:54.080 he's just got this,

01:22:54.980 just look of joy

01:22:57.080 on his face.

01:22:58.320 Really?

01:22:58.600 And I,

01:22:59.680 um,

01:23:00.260 people have asked me,

01:23:01.580 you know,

01:23:02.160 what do you think heaven is like?

01:23:06.120 Heaven is that,

01:23:07.260 to me,

01:23:08.320 that second or two

01:23:09.900 where I feel that just intense,

01:23:12.000 unadulterated,

01:23:13.240 unconditional love for my boy

01:23:14.760 times eternity.

01:23:17.040 That's,

01:23:17.420 that's,

01:23:17.700 that must be what it's like.

01:23:19.260 Where all this other stuff is,

01:23:21.840 is not,

01:23:22.300 that's not important,

01:23:23.200 isn't important.

01:23:24.020 And that's the closeness you have with God,

01:23:26.920 your creator forever.

01:23:28.920 And so Stephen has taught me

01:23:30.400 a lot of things

01:23:31.120 and,

01:23:31.780 um,

01:23:32.120 it was my inspiration

01:23:33.040 to enter all of this

01:23:34.200 and still is.

01:23:35.000 What,

01:23:35.220 I've heard,

01:23:36.200 um,

01:23:36.500 I have known parents with,

01:23:38.300 a child with Down syndrome

01:23:39.420 say something similar

01:23:40.820 that for all of the,

01:23:43.180 you know,

01:23:43.400 obviously the tragedy

01:23:44.360 and the sadness

01:23:45.040 and the difficulty

01:23:45.980 that there's something

01:23:47.760 about the child

01:23:48.480 that like,

01:23:49.260 just emanates,

01:23:50.280 radiates joy.

01:23:52.160 What?

01:23:52.780 I think he's our,

01:23:53.600 Demi and I have talked about,

01:23:54.220 I think he's our little angel

01:23:55.100 that,

01:23:55.880 that teaches us all the time.

01:23:57.380 And I think,

01:23:57.800 there's a,

01:23:59.180 um,

01:24:00.340 there's an innocence

01:24:01.100 there,

01:24:02.620 um,

01:24:03.760 with Stephen

01:24:04.300 and,

01:24:04.620 and,

01:24:04.940 um,

01:24:06.100 our job is to,

01:24:07.020 to love him

01:24:07.580 and protect him.

01:24:08.760 And,

01:24:09.300 uh,

01:24:09.560 there's,

01:24:10.120 there's something,

01:24:10.720 you know,

01:24:11.000 kind of unique about that.

01:24:12.060 Um,

01:24:13.040 so I think for,

01:24:15.420 for me,

01:24:15.940 it's,

01:24:16.260 um,

01:24:16.880 this is going to be,

01:24:17.640 sorry,

01:24:18.280 um,

01:24:18.640 this is like the,

01:24:19.260 what is it?

01:24:19.560 The,

01:24:19.740 uh,

01:24:20.380 Jerry Maguire movie,

01:24:21.320 the Rod Tidwell,

01:24:22.300 Roy Firestone moment

01:24:23.260 where I cry or something.

01:24:24.940 It's all right.

01:24:26.180 No,

01:24:26.660 but I,

01:24:27.120 um,

01:24:27.880 it's hard to explain,

01:24:28.760 Tucker.

01:24:29.020 It's,

01:24:29.280 it's such a touch,

01:24:30.260 touchstone for me

01:24:31.660 that,

01:24:32.980 um,

01:24:34.160 it's what's really important.

01:24:35.740 And so I,

01:24:37.700 um,

01:24:38.720 there's a,

01:24:39.320 there's something that,

01:24:40.060 uh,

01:24:40.260 also that I try to think about

01:24:41.600 is this,

01:24:42.080 um,

01:24:43.020 indifference.

01:24:44.620 And,

01:24:45.100 and when I mean my indifference

01:24:46.280 is it's not,

01:24:47.240 you don't care about something.

01:24:49.520 It's that whatever,

01:24:52.540 and St. Ignatius Loyola

01:24:53.560 talks about this,

01:24:54.660 whatever comes your way,

01:24:56.680 um,

01:24:57.900 you make the most of it.

01:24:59.320 And there's a certain,

01:25:00.400 um,

01:25:01.420 freedom that can come from that.

01:25:03.200 Again,

01:25:03.680 that I think Stephen has taught me,

01:25:05.320 but for,

01:25:05.820 but for this experience with,

01:25:06.860 with Stephen,

01:25:07.620 I don't know that that's how

01:25:08.940 I would view things.

01:25:09.780 And so in,

01:25:10.760 in that way,

01:25:11.320 it's a blessing,

01:25:11.920 even though it's hard,

01:25:13.400 you know,

01:25:14.560 that you,

01:25:15.100 that,

01:25:15.400 that sometimes like,

01:25:16.280 you know,

01:25:16.520 when we went to the inauguration,

01:25:18.000 when I got sworn in as a,

01:25:19.160 as the 2000th U.S.

01:25:20.480 Senator,

01:25:21.540 um,

01:25:22.180 uh,

01:25:22.540 my whole family went,

01:25:23.420 my parents had never been to the Capitol.

01:25:25.520 Um,

01:25:25.900 I had only been there a couple of times.

01:25:27.300 I mean,

01:25:27.440 I was in Missouri and we,

01:25:29.820 Stephen,

01:25:30.080 we don't fly.

01:25:30.820 So we drove,

01:25:31.940 we drove from St.

01:25:32.660 Louis to Washington.

01:25:34.860 And looking back on that,

01:25:36.820 I keep thinking,

01:25:37.240 Oh man,

01:25:37.500 that's a lot.

01:25:38.420 The ride there with my kids in the backseat and my wife and I listening to music that we listened to in college for the 12 hour drive.

01:25:47.480 That,

01:25:48.020 that was an experience I wouldn't have had,

01:25:49.700 right?

01:25:50.100 Without Stephen having the condition that he has.

01:25:53.420 So there's a lot of blessings that I take from it.

01:25:55.660 I think.

01:25:56.420 So you drove 12 hours across the country with three kids and you,

01:26:00.180 you found that a blessing.

01:26:01.200 Yeah. 0.96

01:26:01.420 So it does sound ridiculous. 0.92

01:26:07.460 Doesn't it? 0.90

01:26:07.860 No,

01:26:08.040 it sounds wonderful.

01:26:09.000 It sounds,

01:26:09.620 no,

01:26:10.120 it sounds wonderful.

01:26:11.120 So you count it as a blessing and that says something about you.

01:26:13.800 So it's perspective,

01:26:14.660 I guess.

01:26:15.000 But anyway,

01:26:15.420 that's a long way of me getting to the answer question,

01:26:17.880 which is yes.

01:26:18.380 Then I,

01:26:18.780 I ran for office and then I felt like there was more to do.

01:26:21.640 And then,

01:26:22.060 um,

01:26:23.040 and,

01:26:23.480 and so here I am.

01:26:24.360 So what'd you think?

01:26:26.640 So you said you'd only been when you were sworn into the Capitol a few times,

01:26:29.680 then you're in this famously cohesive,

01:26:32.780 not to say clannish body of a hundred,

01:26:36.320 um,

01:26:37.600 senators.

01:26:38.340 Like,

01:26:38.520 what did you think of it?

01:26:39.960 Um,

01:26:40.980 what's the old line?

01:26:42.360 You get there and the first few months you say,

01:26:44.020 how did I get here?

01:26:44.640 And then after that you say,

01:26:45.560 how did these people get there?

01:26:46.780 Right now?

01:26:47.280 No,

01:26:47.820 um,

01:26:48.220 I have,

01:26:48.640 I have immense respect.

01:26:49.680 I mean,

01:26:49.840 I think I've always,

01:26:50.780 um,

01:26:51.700 I look,

01:26:52.020 I love America and I think our founders were,

01:26:54.820 were genius and inspired,

01:26:56.720 divinely inspired by the system that was created to,

01:26:59.180 that ultimately this checks and balances separation of powers,

01:27:01.860 all that was meant to protect individual liberty,

01:27:03.700 right?

01:27:03.900 They saw the excesses of government.

01:27:05.380 Ironically,

01:27:05.680 a lot of things we're talking about,

01:27:06.660 we fight back against,

01:27:08.380 um,

01:27:09.620 that the best way to guard it was you had faction versus faction,

01:27:12.540 right?

01:27:12.640 You had all these things sort of playing off.

01:27:14.080 So I think.

01:27:14.340 Guard it.

01:27:14.680 Not bestow it.

01:27:15.320 Correct.

01:27:15.760 And our rights don't come from government.

01:27:17.780 They come from God.

01:27:18.620 And the government's job is to protect those rights that we're born with.

01:27:21.480 The ability to speak your mind,

01:27:22.600 the ability to defend yourself,

01:27:23.660 the ability to petition,

01:27:24.780 all these things.

01:27:25.660 So I come at it from that perspective.

01:27:28.860 So I,

01:27:29.460 I,

01:27:29.760 I treat it as such.

01:27:30.780 Like,

01:27:30.980 I think it's a very important role that you play.

01:27:33.180 And I think our system is,

01:27:34.300 is important and designed to protect,

01:27:36.320 um,

01:27:37.500 you know,

01:27:38.200 this very important experiment,

01:27:39.400 but ultimately human dignity and flourishing.

01:27:41.460 And so that's how I come at it.

01:27:43.000 Look,

01:27:43.220 are there,

01:27:43.620 are there things about it,

01:27:44.620 that are,

01:27:45.080 that are frustrating?

01:27:46.000 Absolutely.

01:27:46.400 Like my first two years there,

01:27:48.500 um,

01:27:49.280 when Chuck Schumer was in charge,

01:27:50.800 you hear about this,

01:27:52.980 uh,

01:27:53.660 world's most deliberative body.

01:27:55.500 There was the,

01:27:56.340 the,

01:27:56.540 the worst thing that I learned is that there isn't as much,

01:27:59.300 like people think Mr.

01:28:00.500 Smith goes to Washington and you're on the floor.

01:28:02.460 There's just,

01:28:02.740 there wasn't a lot of opportunity to be on the floor to offer amendments,

01:28:06.060 to find unique coalitions that might exist there that people wouldn't expect.

01:28:11.480 That was,

01:28:12.440 that didn't happen.

01:28:13.420 And that was,

01:28:14.060 that was frustrating.

01:28:14.820 And I think,

01:28:15.520 you know,

01:28:16.260 what,

01:28:16.620 what is important now that we have the majority is that we have those,

01:28:20.300 more of those opportunities.

01:28:21.300 When I was,

01:28:22.120 you know,

01:28:22.620 I'm very thankful to handle,

01:28:23.640 handle president Trump's rescissions package.

01:28:26.520 I didn't put any limits on amendments.

01:28:28.440 I didn't tell anybody don't offer the amendment or we're going to box you out,

01:28:31.080 offer the amendment.

01:28:31.860 Let's vote on it.

01:28:32.580 Let's see where people kind of land.

01:28:35.020 So I think that was one observation.

01:28:36.760 The other one is that,

01:28:37.520 uh,

01:28:37.760 interestingly in my class that came in,

01:28:40.260 in 20,

01:28:40.780 we were elected in 2022.

01:28:42.780 It was very much a generational turnover from the people that we were,

01:28:46.840 um,

01:28:47.860 following in those offices.

01:28:50.300 And,

01:28:50.780 uh,

01:28:51.440 there's a bit of a bonding.

01:28:52.420 I mean,

01:28:52.780 JD and I,

01:28:53.880 vice,

01:28:54.100 vice president Vance,

01:28:55.000 uh,

01:28:55.400 and I,

01:28:56.200 um,

01:28:56.580 became very good friends.

01:28:58.500 Um,

01:28:58.900 we shared a lot of common experiences in life and viewed the world similarly.

01:29:02.580 And other people in the class,

01:29:03.840 um,

01:29:04.420 you know,

01:29:04.800 Ted Budd and,

01:29:05.420 and Katie Britt and Pete Ricketts and all,

01:29:07.660 there's a,

01:29:08.040 you don't get to share that life experience with many people.

01:29:10.600 Yeah.

01:29:10.980 So we go to,

01:29:11.660 go to dinner once a month and talk about like,

01:29:13.720 not legislation you're working on,

01:29:16.100 but like real life stuff about our kids and the things that are important.

01:29:19.520 And so I was lucky.

01:29:20.820 I think that I came in with a group that,

01:29:22.640 that was about the same age and,

01:29:24.380 and had seen cultural references and things like that.

01:29:27.320 But the average age of the Senate is,

01:29:29.680 you know,

01:29:30.280 several hundred,

01:29:31.040 60,

01:29:31.400 uh,

01:29:34.240 um,

01:29:34.620 yes,

01:29:35.280 67 and a half or something like that.

01:29:37.740 Yes.

01:29:38.100 So,

01:29:38.480 um,

01:29:39.040 you know,

01:29:39.340 and like I play on the congressional baseball team.

01:29:41.280 I'm,

01:29:41.660 you know,

01:29:41.800 the one Senator that,

01:29:42.900 that starts because,

01:29:44.420 you know,

01:29:44.740 for whatever reason,

01:29:45.860 um,

01:29:46.660 which by the way,

01:29:47.400 that I got to,

01:29:48.380 you know,

01:29:48.720 meet a lot of house members that I would never have met.

01:29:51.020 Um,

01:29:51.920 otherwise,

01:29:52.440 I mean,

01:29:52.640 I think people think the house and the Senator,

01:29:54.120 like working together on all this stuff.

01:29:56.060 I mean,

01:29:56.180 you have relationships,

01:29:56.840 but being at a baseball practice at five 45 in the morning,

01:30:00.780 four 45 Missouri time,

01:30:02.940 there's a bit of a bonding that can happen with that.

01:30:05.240 So you get to know people.

01:30:06.220 And so I just try to meet people where they're at.

01:30:09.140 Um,

01:30:09.540 and I think if you,

01:30:11.040 you know,

01:30:11.360 you,

01:30:11.660 you work hard,

01:30:12.340 I have deeply held beliefs that I'm going to fight for,

01:30:14.980 as we've talked about, 1.00

01:30:15.920 but that doesn't mean you have to be an asshole, 1.00

01:30:17.380 uh, 1.00

01:30:17.820 along the way to everybody.

01:30:18.540 And that's,

01:30:19.420 that's not me.

01:30:20.220 So,

01:30:20.600 um,

01:30:21.000 so I'm just trying to be as effective as I can for the cause.

01:30:25.480 Is the Republican party changing under Trump?

01:30:28.020 Yeah,

01:30:28.300 I believe so.

01:30:29.080 I mean,

01:30:29.220 I think you look at the people who've been elected since say,

01:30:32.180 2018 ish.

01:30:34.020 Right.

01:30:34.560 Um,

01:30:35.220 the Senate is meant to be,

01:30:36.600 uh,

01:30:36.900 you know,

01:30:37.180 it's,

01:30:37.440 it's a third of the Senate is up every two years in the house.

01:30:40.540 The entire house of representatives can turn over in two years,

01:30:43.400 theoretically.

01:30:44.000 Right.

01:30:44.780 The Senate is designed to be that way.

01:30:46.420 But I do think,

01:30:46.980 I do think it's changing.

01:30:48.720 I think,

01:30:49.100 um,

01:30:49.740 president Trump,

01:30:51.100 I,

01:30:52.100 I think one of his great contributions to the Republican party is that,

01:30:55.020 um,

01:30:55.440 it has given people the confidence to fight.

01:31:01.940 I think that that's a good thing.

01:31:04.180 I think that's right.

01:31:04.980 Right.

01:31:05.560 Uh,

01:31:06.000 because I think that no longer can we deny that we're up against some benign force out there.

01:31:10.840 I mean,

01:31:11.060 there are people on the other side that have a very different vision of this country than we do.

01:31:16.460 And you better stand up and fight for it.

01:31:18.640 And I think he's given us great cause to do it.

01:31:20.780 I mean,

01:31:20.880 you just look at this comeback and it's just sort of like,

01:31:22.920 it's historically,

01:31:24.600 I mean,

01:31:24.740 we're living in a very historic moment.

01:31:26.380 We're talking about it in real time,

01:31:27.720 but when people look back,

01:31:29.140 I mean,

01:31:29.280 he was in office,

01:31:30.020 out of office,

01:31:30.640 came back.

01:31:31.280 That's only happened one time.

01:31:32.300 Nobody alive now has ever seen that.

01:31:34.380 Came back.

01:31:34.880 And against a backdrop of people trying to throw him in jail,

01:31:37.820 bankrupt him and assassinate him.

01:31:39.620 And he's back. 0.97

01:31:40.720 And I think the difference now,

01:31:42.360 I wasn't there in the first term,

01:31:43.680 but there is a definite recognition and recognition,

01:31:47.100 even of some who don't,

01:31:48.820 who aren't as aligned as I am with president Trump,

01:31:51.380 that he earned it.

01:31:53.680 And that his policy agenda and his nominees should get a fair shake.

01:31:57.240 I don't know if that was true the first time.

01:31:58.600 I don't think it was true the first time.

01:32:00.000 No,

01:32:00.740 but the Senate is changing.

01:32:02.040 And I think there's an,

01:32:02.880 I,

01:32:03.100 you know,

01:32:03.460 take foreign policy perspective.

01:32:04.880 I think there's an ascending view that I subscribe to,

01:32:07.040 which is sort of American realism.

01:32:09.640 It's much more restrained diplomacy.

01:32:12.020 If you have to move on something that's a legitimate threat to your core

01:32:14.900 national interest,

01:32:15.440 you do it swiftly,

01:32:16.620 decisively.

01:32:18.060 But this kind of meandering foreign policy where you can be everywhere all at

01:32:21.740 once,

01:32:22.000 all the time that sort of predated the last decade.

01:32:25.860 I think that's a,

01:32:27.580 that's not the future,

01:32:29.020 but it's,

01:32:30.260 it's still an ascending view,

01:32:31.400 but I do think the Senate is changing.

01:32:32.700 And I think President Trump has sort of led the way on that.

01:32:36.620 And I think just look,

01:32:37.360 look at the conversation we're having now about trade.

01:32:40.400 A lot of these things that were,

01:32:42.760 you know,

01:32:43.100 after the cold war ended and Soviet communism was,

01:32:47.040 was defeated in that way,

01:32:48.440 there was never really an adjustment.

01:32:50.320 Like in many ways,

01:32:52.460 Europe and Japan,

01:32:53.980 we allowed them to get back up on their feet,

01:32:55.640 whether it was protection through NATO or these disastrous trade deals,

01:33:00.200 but they had a purpose at the time was for them to get up and be able to

01:33:03.320 stand up on their own two feet.

01:33:04.860 Well,

01:33:05.200 that time is over.

01:33:06.520 I mean,

01:33:06.780 in many ways,

01:33:07.400 right?

01:33:07.540 Like we shouldn't have ridiculous trade deals.

01:33:09.920 So president Trump wielding tariffs to get a better deal.

01:33:12.280 That's working.

01:33:12.940 We're getting record investment,

01:33:14.040 trillions of dollars in this country.

01:33:15.020 And then also,

01:33:16.240 you know,

01:33:16.440 look at NATO now,

01:33:17.500 like they're actually like,

01:33:18.780 we'll see if they actually do it.

01:33:20.680 But one of the reasons why I went to the Munich security conference,

01:33:24.040 I don't have the same foreign policy view of most people that go there,

01:33:28.340 but I wanted to tell them the truth,

01:33:29.880 not what they wanted to hear.

01:33:30.980 I think so many like the adulation and the red carpet that gets rolled out and

01:33:34.920 you're treated as American,

01:33:36.220 whatever,

01:33:36.640 over there,

01:33:37.020 hero to some like that.

01:33:38.600 That wasn't my purpose.

01:33:39.560 I wanted them to understand that there's a shift happening.

01:33:41.580 We are pivoting.

01:33:42.220 We're going to protect the homeland.

01:33:43.400 We understand China,

01:33:44.600 the 21st century is going to be defined by this great competition with

01:33:47.320 communist China.

01:33:48.020 We have to win that fight and you need to stand up on your own two feet and

01:33:50.900 much more than you ever have before.

01:33:52.780 And I think it's important that more people deliver that message.

01:33:55.380 So I do think that's part of the transformation of the Republican party

01:33:59.200 right now.

01:33:59.600 And also rooted,

01:34:01.060 and I'm very comfortable in this place now because I grew up in a blue

01:34:03.780 collar neighborhood.

01:34:04.580 My dad worked seven days a week in the midnight shift.

01:34:06.920 This ability to connect with working people,

01:34:10.080 to fight for them,

01:34:11.700 not the corporate interests,

01:34:12.920 but the people who are working hard,

01:34:14.640 who just want their kids to have a better life than them.

01:34:16.900 They've been vilified for so long.

01:34:18.360 They've been looked over in so-called flyover country for too long.

01:34:22.180 Their time is now.

01:34:23.060 And I think president Trump has a very unique way of connecting.

01:34:26.080 And as I said earlier,

01:34:26.720 I think what people want right now more than anything is authentic leadership.

01:34:30.220 And so it's incredible time to be there.

01:34:33.060 And I think this is where it's headed.

01:34:36.380 And I'm just grateful to be a part of it.

01:34:38.720 As honestly or sort of impartially or non-emotionally as you can,

01:34:43.820 can you describe where you think the Democratic party is going?

01:34:46.800 I don't think they've hit rock bottom yet.

01:34:48.880 Okay.

01:34:49.220 Actually,

01:34:49.640 I think that you look at the people that are filling up the arenas.

01:34:54.060 It's Bernie Sanders.

01:34:55.040 It's AOC.

01:34:56.200 It's this Mondami guy who's literally a communist running. 0.88

01:34:59.080 He's going to be the mayor of New York probably.

01:35:01.300 Looks that way.

01:35:01.840 Um, so I think they're still searching.

01:35:05.180 They don't have a message.

01:35:06.200 They don't have a messenger.

01:35:07.360 They're still obsessed with president Trump,

01:35:09.000 with Trump, Trump arrangement syndrome.

01:35:10.580 They've sort of learned nothing from the last go around with all this.

01:35:16.220 Um, and you know, just things that used to be, I mean, uh,

01:35:21.780 there used to be kind of a, um, by the way,

01:35:24.800 a Washington consensus isn't always, it's usually a bad thing.

01:35:27.760 Um, you, you, but there used to be kind of a belief that borders were,

01:35:31.840 yeah, I don't think they believe that anymore.

01:35:34.700 I think if you really press the rank and file Democrat in Congress,

01:35:38.080 it's, it's, it's, um, they believe in mass migration.

01:35:41.840 They don't think that, that lines on a map,

01:35:44.300 they think that lines on a map are arbitrary.

01:35:46.200 They'll never win with that.

01:35:47.240 Right.

01:35:47.520 I know.

01:35:47.920 And I don't think they'll get away from it.

01:35:49.080 So I think you saw some self-reflection after the election,

01:35:51.620 but they're falling back into the same.

01:35:53.820 Mass migration has made everyone's life worse. 1.00

01:35:55.700 Yeah, it has.

01:35:56.640 And, uh, and I think that you look at the Overton window on that now versus 10

01:36:02.220 years ago when president Trump came down the escalator.

01:36:04.700 Yeah.

01:36:04.920 It's pretty dramatic.

01:36:05.740 It is traumatic.

01:36:06.580 In a good way.

01:36:06.980 Right.

01:36:07.200 So I think that oftentimes we get caught up in the, the daily news cycle.

01:36:12.880 What is the thing of the day?

01:36:14.800 But if we take a step back and we look at how the Republican party has been

01:36:18.320 transformed, how the country has sort of woken up from this fever dream.

01:36:21.840 I talk a lot about in the book.

01:36:23.060 Like, I think that's all positive.

01:36:24.640 Yes.

01:36:24.960 There's more work to do, but I'm optimistic.

01:36:27.000 I think that's wise.

01:36:28.220 You're taking a bigger view of it.

01:36:30.420 And a lot has changed a lot and it's good.

01:36:35.060 Here's my warm.

01:36:36.620 And by the way, real quick, the other thing that's different when I was growing

01:36:40.040 up, um, it was in college in the nineties, this political correctness thing was

01:36:44.400 sort of beginning and I saw it.

01:36:46.560 And sometimes I would take classes knowing that I would, uh, I was even a

01:36:49.880 contrarian back then, um, because I loved a good debate and, um, I've always

01:36:54.940 been pretty conservative.

01:36:55.740 I always was a little jealous of liberals in that they kind of had the high ground

01:37:02.540 on free speech.

01:37:03.920 Oh yeah.

01:37:04.240 You know, they were right.

01:37:05.660 And I'm glad now and particularly proud of the work as you know, we're talking

01:37:11.240 about in the book of, I think we have taken that mantle now.

01:37:14.240 They've, they've abandoned it.

01:37:15.300 They don't believe in it anymore.

01:37:16.920 It's all about power and control.

01:37:19.180 And, um, I think if we maintain this path of fighting for people's right to say

01:37:25.060 things, even if you don't agree with them, it's a very important thing for us to

01:37:28.460 maintain the connection with this new coalition that's been created in the

01:37:31.600 Republican party.

01:37:32.440 I agree.

01:37:32.660 So the number of people who believe that on either side is really small because

01:37:36.640 speech is of course a threat to the people in power, no matter what side

01:37:40.300 they're on.

01:37:40.660 That's why liberals went from being, you know, big donors to the ACLU to, to, you

01:37:46.380 know, controlling Facebook.

01:37:47.360 So, because they took power.

01:37:49.780 So like nobody, nobody wants to be challenged.

01:37:51.600 I think only the truly principled, I think you're in the group are willing to accept

01:37:55.720 challenge to their power, you know, without, uh, trying to shut people up.

01:38:01.820 My concern is that Momdani, who I think is a, you know, I don't think much of him.

01:38:07.560 However, I think his main appeal may be quality of life worries that people have.

01:38:14.080 And I'm, do you think, I know this has been a big issue for you, but there aren't

01:38:19.840 that many of you actually in the Senate talking about people's lives, like

01:38:23.400 somebody in power needs to address declining quality of life in the, in this

01:38:28.440 country or else there'll be a lot more Momdani's.

01:38:31.840 Yeah, I agree with that.

01:38:32.760 Um, and you know, I think especially for young people, um, who are, you know,

01:38:39.980 they're coming out of college with a lot of debt.

01:38:41.760 But they don't, you know, they may not be able to afford a house or have a family,

01:38:46.420 you know, the way things are tracking until they're in their thirties somehow.

01:38:49.320 That's a very different America.

01:38:51.400 Not a better one.

01:38:52.240 Not a, no, I agree with that.

01:38:53.560 And I think part of it is understanding the moment that we're in and, um, you think about,

01:38:58.520 you know, the ability to have a one income family and, and like that very difficult to

01:39:04.620 imagine now and for a lot of people and, uh, and people can choose to do it or not do it,

01:39:08.940 but you ought to have, be able to have the option. I think a lot of opportunity hopefully

01:39:12.540 will come for bringing manufacturing back. There are twice as many people that work in

01:39:16.980 government than have manufacturing jobs in this country. Um, I think the number was 90,000

01:39:22.600 factories have left the United States since NAFTA. Yeah.

01:39:27.160 Like that's dramatic. And I think that Perot was right. There was a giant.

01:39:31.640 Uh-huh. And by the way, what's interesting about Missouri, um, you know, I'm in Maine with you,

01:39:37.560 uh, Maine and Missouri have a connection because the Missouri compromise, of course,

01:39:41.200 Missouri and Maine came in at the same time, although Missouri took a little bit longer

01:39:44.500 and on the state seal, there's a belt buckle that holds the seal together. And it was, uh,

01:39:50.380 basically telling the federal government that we, we were retain our independence and we may leave

01:39:54.960 because you're screwing us over. So like we would unbuckle the buckle and, uh, not that I'm,

01:40:00.200 I'm not advocating for that. I'm just saying even back then, 40 years later, they found out no one's

01:40:03.640 allowed to learn. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. But like, no, but the point is it's like this,

01:40:08.000 even back then, Missourians were skeptical of a government telling them how to live their lives

01:40:12.440 a thousand miles away. So, um, I think that, um, that it's an, it's important for us to, to kind of

01:40:20.020 forge this path where we are providing more opportunity for people. But Missouri's always had this

01:40:24.040 kind of independent streak. If you look at the States where Perot did particularly well,

01:40:27.440 it was in place like Missouri, Pap Buchanan was somebody that I listened to growing up. And

01:40:32.100 when I was, my dad, it said my dad worked seven days a week in the midnight shift. It also meant

01:40:36.100 that he was home like after school. So he could like go to my games and played a lot of sports

01:40:41.240 or we would watch crossfire on the one television when you had one television living room. And I

01:40:46.600 would watch Jack Kemp and Pap Buchanan kind of thundering away and they were fighting for the little

01:40:51.080 guy. Oh yeah. They were fighting for the little guy and he had Ronald Reagan, you know, of course,

01:40:54.720 then trying to build this coalition too. So anyway, the punchline is, um, Perot was right.

01:41:01.220 This giant sucking sound was real. Letting China into the world trade organization was a huge disaster. 0.60

01:41:08.600 Um, but it doesn't need to be that way. And I think that's the hope with advanced manufacturing

01:41:12.380 that we can bring those jobs home. It won't look the same as the 1960s. It won't be an assembly line

01:41:18.440 in Detroit in that way. But you just think of, I just think people are looking for, for more

01:41:23.360 opportunities. And, uh, I think the people that I grew up around, you know, their parents were,

01:41:28.700 were truck drivers or cops or factory workers. And I didn't know any lawyers growing up, not one.

01:41:34.340 And, um, but I thought the law gave structure, which kind of, and people, real people, normal

01:41:39.580 people to pursue their dreams, whatever that was, which is why that's what I pursued. But the people

01:41:43.680 I grew up around, they, they got dealt this double whammy, which was their jobs went overseas.

01:41:50.920 And then as they're looking for new jobs, those wages get undercut through illegal immigration and

01:41:55.700 mass migration. So it's no wonder people are looking for something different. And, uh, we better be the

01:42:01.320 ones that provide that. And I think that we're on the right track, but it, you know, there are,

01:42:04.920 there are warning signals out there, um, that, uh, we better be the ones with the solutions.

01:42:10.380 Cause Mondami is kind of a kook and a commie, but you know, maybe there'll be somebody smarter than 0.56

01:42:15.400 him. Yeah. It's the biggest city in the country. Uh, so last question about that. Um, I know you're 0.92

01:42:21.280 probably not going to drinks with Democrats every night or anything, but are there any democratic

01:42:25.900 members of the house or Senate who you're pretty sure are going to run for president? Cause of course

01:42:31.140 wide open on the other side. Oh yeah. You can look at the theatrics right now. The ones that are

01:42:35.960 stomping on the floor a little bit more, I think, you know, Cory Booker is making some moves.

01:42:41.900 Actually? I think, I mean, if you're, uh, Chris Murphy.

01:42:46.140 Really? Yeah. So, and look, I think in many ways.

01:42:49.760 So we're safe.

01:42:51.360 Right. I think in many ways though, it, it is a competition to be the greatest resistor.

01:42:58.680 That's what's going on right now. Yeah. And I don't think that's right, but they think,

01:43:02.080 I know, but they think it is. And it's also why, like, you know, some of these nominations,

01:43:07.800 which are, you know, I think the last time we had to vote like roll call vote on the ambassador

01:43:12.500 to Uruguay was like 50 years ago, but we're doing all that now because the Democrats view this sort

01:43:18.180 of obstruction as the path. And I don't think that Uruguay is like a more important ally than

01:43:22.160 it was 50 years ago. No, that's not why we're voting.

01:43:23.800 The stakes aren't higher in Uruguay. Right. Yeah. So I think that there's, uh, and Chuck

01:43:28.520 Schumer, by the way, I don't know that he runs again, uh, in two years. Um, but he hears

01:43:36.040 the footsteps of AOC. Oh, of AOC. So that's, that's where the party's going. They're terrified

01:43:42.400 of that. They're terrified of it because where the energy is, um, on their side. And, and

01:43:47.460 by the way, that's, that's good news for us because it's just crazy stuff. It's the same

01:43:51.580 old, you know, you know, race essentialism and control. And it just, you know, this green 0.96

01:43:59.260 new deal nonsense that would last forever. If you had a modern Democrat, which is to say

01:44:04.520 an old fashioned Democrat. Harry Truman, maybe. Yeah. No, but that's exactly right. Or the

01:44:08.040 earlier version of Dick Gephardt from your state. Yeah, sure. Um, the, you know, pro-life,

01:44:13.480 pro-labor, like that guy could win, I think. They've all been run out. This is a good example

01:44:18.260 actually in Missouri. So Missouri was this ultimate bellwether state for a hundred years

01:44:22.280 and pick the right or the, pick the winner, I should say, every time but once. Yes. Adlai

01:44:26.920 Stevens and the only exception. Um, it was a great bellwether. There were rural Democrats

01:44:31.900 everywhere, everywhere. In fact, most of outstate Missouri was blue with pro-life, pro-gun Democrats.

01:44:38.060 They're all gone. They're literally all gone. Pro-gun, pro-labor. Yeah, that too. Um, and, uh,

01:44:44.180 you can't find them anywhere in Missouri. They're just in St. Louis and Kansas City and they're

01:44:47.160 pretty radical. They're competing to be the most, like during COVID, like you had the mayor

01:44:50.580 of St. Louis, the mayor of Kansas City competing to be the most woke COVID restrictor in the

01:44:55.780 country. Like that was the competition, right? Yeah. So the incentive structure is really

01:44:59.380 messed up for them right now because the only way you do it is if you're one of the lefties.

01:45:04.220 Everyone hates that stuff. Yeah. But in their circle, um, again, I think this is the, you

01:45:09.700 know, the Trump derangement syndrome stuff. It's so hard for them to get rid of.

01:45:13.200 Do donors push that on them? Do you think? Oh yeah. I think that they're, I think,

01:45:16.480 I mean, Soros, what Soros has funded, they chase that. Look at the prosecutors that did

01:45:21.220 all the damage across the country. Yeah. You know, you talk about an arbitrage of the system,

01:45:25.100 very little money went to disrupting a lot of our lives. So, um, yeah, but I, I think,

01:45:30.740 but now in Missouri, there's literally no Democrat representing, uh, rural Missouri and, um, the margins

01:45:37.180 like in my last race and some of the counties say in the boot heels, like 80 and 86% of the vote. 0.85

01:45:41.240 Really? What, what were your numbers in St. Louis and Kansas city?

01:45:45.300 Well, I'm from the St. Louis area. So like in St. Louis County, which is where I live was able,

01:45:49.820 you know, I've been more effective of kind of holding the line, but you, you know, in St. Louis

01:45:53.740 city it's, you know, 80, 20, you're going to lose, but it's in the city itself is 300,000.

01:45:59.460 The metro area is 3 million, but, um, St. Louis County has a million people. Um, and you just

01:46:04.360 basically hold on as much as you can appeal to people. And then you, you know, you're running up the

01:46:08.700 score everywhere else in a dramatic way. It used to be the dynamic was they did much better in

01:46:13.820 rural Missouri and then they get into the cities and then that's what we get them over the top at

01:46:18.200 midnight by, you know, a certain number of votes. So that, that pattern you're, you just described

01:46:24.140 is everywhere. Yeah. Does that stay the same for a while? I think so for a while. Um, I, I tell people,

01:46:31.520 I warn people all the time that nothing is static. I think that's the dynamic that we're in at least

01:46:36.380 for right now. Um, and like I said, I don't think, I don't know how to gauge the midterms

01:46:41.060 Tucker. Like I don't know the house races as much in the redistricting thing is going to have a play.

01:46:45.000 But the one thing that's true is the Democrats have gerrymandered these seats for a long time.

01:46:48.460 They've got nowhere else to go. So like, and by the way, the idea that we, that, that you don't

01:46:54.000 have to be a citizen to be counted in the census is insane. California would lose seats, no doubt.

01:47:01.000 Um, can that be fixed? Yeah, it could be. You could ask the question on the census. Um, uh,

01:47:05.660 and only that would be counted then in the next census cycle. Now there would be legal challenges

01:47:10.200 to that, but I think you're, I think you can do that. And by the way, it has enormous impact on

01:47:15.240 like federal dollars and how they're doled out. But I think if the redistricting will affect the

01:47:19.700 numbers. So I don't know about the midterms. I have confidence that, that, that will hold the

01:47:24.000 house. The Senate will remain in Republican hands. There's just not that many seats that are in like

01:47:28.820 battleground territory, but longer term. Um, I think we're in a strong position, but we're also

01:47:34.840 going to have to be very mindful, which I love that. We've got this new coalition. That's kind

01:47:38.420 of, I joked when I spoke at the convention last year that you had kid rock Hulk Hogan and normal

01:47:45.540 people on the stage. This is exactly the party that I've been waiting for my whole life and we've

01:47:49.720 got it. And so I want to work as hard as I can to help. You just don't want the party of Bill Gates

01:47:54.360 to steal economic populism from you. Correct. That's when you lose. Yeah, no. And they'll,

01:47:59.260 some people will be smart enough to understand it. I think again, they're, they're, um, you notice how,

01:48:03.660 like Beto O'Rourke and all these guys are like cussing more often. It's like, it's like if you

01:48:10.060 can be like, it's like faking authenticity. I know it's ridiculous. I'd love to talk to Beto's wife. 0.97

01:48:15.900 I haven't never met her, but I wonder if she's impressed. Cause I bet she's not. I bet she thinks

01:48:20.240 it's phony as hell. I bet she really does. I bet nobody has more. I'm just guessing. I do. I've

01:48:25.340 never talked to Mrs. O'Rourke and I doubt her name is Mrs. O'Rourke, but she's got another name

01:48:29.400 cause she's so embarrassed, but, um, I bet she's more contemptuous of him than anything.

01:48:34.100 Yeah. So I think they, they've, again, I don't think they've fleshed all this out yet. And I,

01:48:38.520 I think they're in a real troublesome spot, right? You've got this kind of star Wars bar

01:48:44.420 of leftists that they can't get out of the room and it's pushing everybody to the left.

01:48:51.480 And I think people will reject that. So there was no moment. Cause remember for the month after the

01:48:56.540 election, there were Democrats including Gavin Newsom who were like, really, this isn't working

01:49:00.640 for us and we should try something new that never went anywhere. No, I mean, Rob Emanuel is kind of

01:49:06.080 talking that way as a diagnosis, but I don't, but in order to get the nomination that like post-mortem

01:49:14.360 assessment will get you nowhere because I don't think their base wants to hear that. I think that's

01:49:19.600 right. Their base wants them to fight over everything right now. That's not where the

01:49:24.860 American people are. That's the good news, right? Cause Trump got a mandate. He got the,

01:49:28.520 And do you see that in the Senate? Yeah. Ooh. Yeah. It's in, in, in for that place,

01:49:33.580 you know, for that place to operate with 60 votes, that's a, that's a different environment,

01:49:38.920 right? Like we're, we're dealing with, and by the way, been very successful, I think of the three

01:49:45.480 stages so far, which is getting Trump's team in place, his cabinet, batted a thousand on that.

01:49:51.360 Yep. Reconciliation, which by the way, not a lot of people have talked, they talked about the one

01:49:55.520 big, beautiful bill, the name, but like you've got for the first time school, um, um, school

01:50:01.280 choice provisions in there, more for working families with 529s to save. You've got, um, no tax

01:50:07.280 on tips, no tax on overtime for the, for the truck driver that's working overtime or the waitress

01:50:11.720 that's working two shifts. Like that's a big deal. Like that's, that is now there's other stuff in

01:50:15.760 there, but you front loaded money for border, like for deportations, more ice agents in beds,

01:50:20.520 like that's all in there. You front loaded a lot of that. So there's a lot of wins there.

01:50:23.200 And then we get to rescissions, which, which I handled. And that was, you know, probably more

01:50:26.960 difficult than it should have been, but we got it done. Those are the three big things so far.

01:50:31.840 So there's more to do, but I think we could do all that with 51 votes, right? Because of just the way

01:50:37.440 the statutes are drafted. Um, but if the Democrats are really in this mode of, of resistance, it's

01:50:43.960 going to be, you know, who knows how this all plays out because right now Chuck Schumer doesn't

01:50:48.360 see an incentive of, of working with Republicans on anything. And I think that ultimately burns

01:50:52.300 them. I mean, Trump after the midterm is, you know, can't run again. So at that point, if the

01:51:00.580 Democrats message is, we hate Trump, does that get you the presidency? No, I think it's a, I think

01:51:06.420 you're right. It's a midterm play, but they have longterm problems because that is defined

01:51:13.180 their party. And in many ways, this lawfare that was exhibited was all just a symptom of

01:51:18.360 the same problem, right? Is there singularly obsessed with president Trump and every policy

01:51:24.720 position he takes, they take the opposite. Again, tried to throw them in jail, censor anybody

01:51:29.260 who believes, believes the same thing that he believes. So they got to, they have a real

01:51:33.480 problem. It's a structural problem that I don't, it's easy to diagnose. I don't know

01:51:37.420 how they fix it because there are no Dick Gephardt's walking around.

01:51:40.800 Right. Or Bill Clinton.

01:51:42.020 Yeah.

01:51:42.480 You know.

01:51:43.220 Right.

01:51:44.560 Senator, thank you very much for spending all this time. The book is The Last Line of Defense,

01:51:49.140 How to Beat the Left in Court, which you have done.

01:51:51.520 Thank you. Thanks for having me.

01:51:52.800 We want to thank you for watching us on Spotify, a company that we use every day. We know the

01:52:01.180 people who run it, good people. While you're here, do us a favor, hit follow and tap the bell

01:52:07.040 so you never miss an episode. We have real conversations, news, things that actually matter,

01:52:12.040 telling the truth always. You will not miss it if you follow us on Spotify and hit the bell.

01:52:16.660 We appreciate it. Thanks for watching.

The Tucker Carlson Show - August 13, 2025

Sen. Eric Schmitt： FBI and DOJ Corruption, and How Politicized Judges Are Undermining America

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