Verdict with Ted Cruz - BONUS POD： Rand Paul goes after Fauci on GoF Research & Pardon plus SCOTUS Greenlights Trump’s Plan to Dismantle DoE

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.600 Guaranteed Human.

00:00:05.840 The Oto Pen, I think, is maybe one of the biggest scandals

00:00:09.260 that we've had in 50 to 100 years.

00:00:12.080 This is a tremendous scandal.

00:00:13.920 The people on the other side of the Resolute desk, I know them.

00:00:17.660 Lisa, the whole group, and they're no good.

00:00:20.520 I guarantee he knew nothing about what he was signing.

00:00:23.300 I guarantee it.

00:00:24.900 You're listening to the 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson.

00:00:28.460 Good Tuesday morning.

00:00:29.480 It's nice to have you with us on the 47 Morning Update.

00:00:32.100 And here are the big stories that we're talking about.

00:00:34.600 First up, Senator Rand Paul has formally relaunched efforts

00:00:39.080 to bring criminal charges against Dr. Anthony Fauci,

00:00:43.080 connecting the initiative to the Oto Pen questions

00:00:46.340 around Biden's pardons that included Anthony Fauci.

00:00:50.420 This, all relating to gain-of-function research testimony

00:00:54.340 in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

00:00:56.860 We'll give you the latest on that in just a second.

00:00:59.480 Also, in a major move, the Supreme Court has stepped in,

00:01:04.000 okaying the president's plan to shut down the Department of Education,

00:01:09.500 returning educations back to the states.

00:01:12.520 And the left has gone completely unhinged.

00:01:15.740 It's the 47 Morning Update, and it starts right now.

00:01:19.480 Story number one.

00:01:20.600 It is a major move that many of you listening will be very excited about.

00:01:24.700 Senator Rand Paul, the Republican from Kentucky,

00:01:27.700 has now reissued a criminal referral to the Department of Justice

00:01:32.240 concerning Dr. Anthony Fauci.

00:01:34.960 And it was prompted by recent revelations about President Joe Biden's use

00:01:40.160 of an auto pen to sign pardon documents, including Dr. Anthony Fauci's.

00:01:46.660 What we know is that Senator Paul went to X and said this.

00:01:50.980 Today, I reissue my criminal referral of Dr. Anthony Fauci to Trump's DOJ.

00:01:56.940 Perjury is a crime, and Fauci must be held accountable.

00:02:01.180 Paul's argument is simple.

00:02:02.740 If Biden's auto pen pardon is invalid, then the DOJ can still pursue Fauci for perjury

00:02:10.060 relating to his May 2021 Senate testimony about U.S.-funded gain-of-function research in Wuhan.

00:02:19.660 Now, Fauci originally testified that the NIH never funded gain-of-function research

00:02:27.320 at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

00:02:30.260 However, later emails surfaced suggesting otherwise,

00:02:34.880 leading Senator Paul to accuse Fauci of lying to Congress and lying under oath.

00:02:40.780 So what are the legal implications?

00:02:43.140 Well, if a pardon is invalidated by courts due to auto pen concerns,

00:02:48.780 Fauci could theoretically be prosecuted.

00:02:51.340 Perjury before Congress carries penalties of up to five years in prison plus fines.

00:02:56.480 There's also another point here.

00:02:58.700 Paul originally referred Fauci to the DOJ in July of 2023.

00:03:04.600 That's how confident he was in the case after the House Coronavirus Committee

00:03:08.540 released the internal email suggesting Fauci knew about the risky virus research being done in Wuhan

00:03:15.780 and our dollars going to that institute.

00:03:19.000 Now, Biden issued what was described as a, quote,

00:03:22.600 preemptive pardon of Fauci and other officials at the end of his term,

00:03:27.860 a move potentially undermined if courts ruled that the auto pen signatures are, in fact, invalid.

00:03:34.700 So the bottom line is this.

00:03:36.620 Senator Paul has formally relaunched efforts to bring the criminal charges against Fauci,

00:03:41.820 connecting the initiative to the auto pen questions around Biden's pardons overall.

00:03:46.920 And the key is this, whether or not these auto pen signed pardons hold up legally, 0.69

00:03:52.760 Fauci's legal accountability now rests partially on potential court challenges to those pardons

00:03:59.420 and on interpretations of what gain-of-function definitions are.

00:04:04.560 Now, here's one other thing you need to know.

00:04:06.700 Senator Paul says it's nice that he actually is getting to work with the Trump administration

00:04:10.860 on this as the criminal referral over Fauci is ongoing.

00:04:15.900 Hey, Trump administration 2.0 is back in charge.

00:04:18.800 Are you hopeful that they actually get to the bottom of COVID-19?

00:04:21.620 You know, we're excited about the Trump administration actually helping.

00:04:25.180 We've been through several years of the Biden administration actually trying to hide the ball,

00:04:29.820 covering up what had happened, obscuring the truth,

00:04:32.700 and really refusing to give any records concerning this.

00:04:35.400 I've been trying for over three years to get non-classified records about the decision to fund

00:04:41.280 the research in Wuhan, and it's been denied.

00:04:44.140 But I can tell you under Secretary Kennedy, under Jay Bhattacharya, the records are beginning to flow.

00:04:49.700 And what we're discovering is, yes, they did debate over whether or not it was gain-of-function.

00:04:54.700 Fauci said everybody said it was not gain-of-function.

00:04:58.080 Well, we're going to get to the bottom of this,

00:05:00.100 and ultimately, Dr. Fauci is going to need to come back in and explain why he made this decision.

00:05:05.200 There ultimately will be an interview, either voluntarily or involuntarily, if he won't come.

00:05:10.920 He will have to come back and explain to the American people why he decided to fund this research in China.

00:05:16.080 This may be one of the greatest medical errors in modern history,

00:05:20.220 and he bears a large part of the responsibility for this.

00:05:24.560 Sure. And it doesn't stop with the DNI.

00:05:27.100 President Trump signing an executive order ending all the present and all future federal funding

00:05:33.360 of gain-of-function research in foreign nations like China, Iran.

00:05:39.240 What are your thoughts on this executive order signed by the president?

00:05:43.840 You know, I think it's a great idea.

00:05:45.380 It's going to ultimately need to be followed up by a change in the law.

00:05:49.100 I have a bipartisan bill that passed last session unanimously.

00:05:52.880 I'm going to pass it again out of committee as well.

00:05:55.540 And I'm hoping that we can make legislation occur.

00:05:58.780 The reason you need legislation is if one administration fixes it,

00:06:02.520 the next administration just come in and unfixes it or takes away the reform.

00:06:07.240 So really what we need to do is have law.

00:06:09.360 We actually have some bipartisan support for reform legislation.

00:06:13.760 My legislation would let President Trump create a commission or a council of scientists that would oversee this.

00:06:20.580 The reason you need a council to make active decisions is people divide gain-of-function in different ways.

00:06:27.040 Anthony Fauci said, well, the reason the research and we want didn't get extra scrutiny is he defined it as not being gain-of-function.

00:06:34.360 Now, almost everybody disagrees with him.

00:06:36.820 But that's what he did is he defined away the problem.

00:06:39.280 And that is exactly why he's saying he's going to have to come back before Congress.

00:06:44.400 It's also the reason why he's looking at the pardon and the auto-pin use.

00:06:48.660 And Senator Paul making it clear that reissuing his criminal referral to the Department of Justice for Dr. Anthony Fauci

00:06:54.560 after his pardon was confirmed to be issued by a late-night auto-pin

00:06:58.880 is going to be a very interesting story moving forward.

00:07:02.420 And we're going to cover it for you.

00:07:04.060 Now, story number two.

00:07:05.120 President Trump campaigned on getting education, public education, back to the states and back to local municipalities

00:07:12.380 and, most importantly, giving the power back to the parents to get their kids the best education possible.

00:07:18.680 He also said he was going to shut down the Department of Education.

00:07:22.760 Linda McMahon had the job of doing exactly that. 1.00

00:07:26.420 But the left decided to step in with injunctions to stop her from doing that job. 0.99

00:07:31.540 Well, now the Supreme Court has come down with their ruling.

00:07:35.120 It was a 6-3 ruling lifting a lower court injunction that had blocked the administration

00:07:41.180 from laying off about 1,400 employees, nearly one-third of the Department of Education workforce.

00:07:48.960 This ruling temporarily greenlights Donald Trump's March executive order,

00:07:53.980 directing the Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon,

00:07:57.060 to, quote, take all necessary steps to close the department to the fullest extent possible via administrative action.

00:08:05.800 Now, six conservative justices allowed the layoffs to proceed while litigation continues in the lower courts.

00:08:12.360 Justice Sotomayor joined Elena Kagan and Jackson, dissenting strongly,

00:08:18.060 warning that these decisions enable executive lawlessness, as they described it,

00:08:22.020 and erodes the separation of powers by allowing a de facto dismantling of a congressional agency

00:08:28.160 via unilateral staffing cuts.

00:08:31.660 Yes, the left is all in to try to stop Donald Trump from getting kids a better education.

00:08:37.460 Now, the high court paused this preliminary injunction that went into effect by the U.S. district judge,

00:08:43.760 a judge who was a Biden appointee in Boston, that ordered the employees be reinstated.

00:08:50.040 Quote,

00:08:50.400 The United States Supreme Court has handed a major victory to parents and students across the country

00:08:56.280 by declaring the Trump administration may proceed on returning the functions of the Department of Education

00:09:03.340 back to the states, is what Donald Trump wrote in a post on True Social.

00:09:08.580 He went on to say,

00:09:09.980 Now, with this great Supreme Court decision, our Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon,

00:09:15.760 may begin the very important process,

00:09:18.580 saying the federal government has been running our education system into the ground,

00:09:22.960 but we are going to turn it all around by giving the power back to the people.

00:09:27.360 Trump went on to say,

00:09:28.380 America's students will be the best, be the brightest, and be the most highly educated anywhere in the world.

00:09:34.960 Thank you to the United States Supreme Court.

00:09:37.360 Now, the Supreme Court 6-3 ruling came in that dispute that began shortly after.

00:09:42.200 The Education Department on March the 11th announced a reduction of force involving 1,378 employees.

00:09:49.500 McMahon said in a news release that the staff reductions reflected the Department of Education's commitment to,

00:09:55.580 quote, efficiency, accountability, and ensuring that resources are directed where they matter most,

00:10:01.320 to the students, to the parents, and to the teachers.

00:10:04.400 Trump issued that executive order nine days later that instructed McMahon to take all necessary steps

00:10:10.420 to facilitate the closure of the Department of Education.

00:10:13.840 And on March the 21st, he announced that the programs for students with special needs

00:10:18.960 and the federal student loan portfolio would be transferred from the Department of Education

00:10:23.460 to the Department of Health and Human Services and the Small Business Administration, respectively.

00:10:28.480 That is when a group of 20 states and the District of Columbia, two public school districts and teachers' unions

00:10:35.800 filed a federal lawsuit in Massachusetts, arguing the staff reductions violated the Constitution

00:10:41.980 and the federal laws governing administrative agencies, yet again putting the teachers' union ahead of the parents

00:10:50.420 and, most importantly, the students.

00:10:52.860 Now, Secretary of Education McMahon put this out on X, saying, quote,

00:10:58.320 Today, the Supreme Court again confirmed the obvious.

00:11:01.660 The President of the United States of America, as the head of the executive branch,

00:11:05.120 has the ultimate authority to make decisions about staffing levels, administrative organization,

00:11:10.740 and day-to-day operations of federal agencies.

00:11:14.020 While today's ruling is a significant win for students and families,

00:11:17.360 It is a shame that the highest court in the land had to step in to allow President Trump to advance the reforms

00:11:22.980 Americans elected him to deliver using the authorities granted to him by our U.S. Constitution.

00:11:29.400 She went on to say,

00:11:30.660 The U.S. Department of Education will now deliver on its mandate to restore excellence in American education.

00:11:37.500 We will carry out the reduction of force to promote efficiency and accountability

00:11:41.640 and to ensure resources are directed where they matter most, to students, parents, and teachers.

00:11:48.140 As we return education to the states, this administration will continue to perform all statutory duties

00:11:54.760 while empowering families and teachers by reducing education bureaucracy.

00:12:01.320 Yet again, the President of the United States of America not backing down

00:12:05.360 and making sure that American students have a chance to succeed

00:12:08.900 instead of being in a total failing system with a federal government

00:12:13.620 that has done anything but give them a great education.

00:12:17.060 Thank you for listening to the 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson.

00:12:21.200 Please make sure you hit subscribe wherever you're listening to this podcast right now.

00:12:26.100 And for more in-depth news, also subscribe to the Ben Ferguson Podcast,

00:12:30.940 and we will see you back here tomorrow.

00:12:32.740 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:12:37.140 Guaranteed Human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - July 15, 2025

BONUS POD： Rand Paul goes after Fauci on GoF Research & Pardon plus SCOTUS Greenlights Trump’s Plan to Dismantle DoE

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