Verdict with Ted Cruz - March 28, 2026


Choosing Illegal Immigrants over Americans, a Surveillance Scandal Bigger than Watergate & The Great Voter ID Reversal Week In Review


Episode Stats


Length

33 minutes

Words per minute

171.75618

Word count

5,707

Sentence count

269

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Toxicity

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

3

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Ted Cruz and Ben Fetterman discuss the Democratic strategy to shut down the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and why they think it s a good idea. They also discuss the latest on the Save America Act, and an update on the situation with TSA.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.560 Guaranteed human.
00:00:05.280 Welcome, it is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
00:00:07.460 Week in Review, Ben Ferguson with you,
00:00:09.480 and these are the stories that you may have missed
00:00:11.300 that we talked about this week.
00:00:13.080 First up, Chuck Schumer and the Democrats,
00:00:15.560 they wanted the Department of Homeland Security
00:00:17.280 shut down, and why?
00:00:19.240 To hurt as much as possible.
00:00:21.740 We've got all of their reasoning behind it
00:00:23.900 and what they're still trying to do.
00:00:26.200 Also, Jack Smith and Arctic Frost,
00:00:29.160 The Democrats went all in to destroy Donald Trump and the people around him.
00:00:33.860 It didn't work.
00:00:35.620 And now what we're witnessing is truly shocking.
00:00:38.860 We have the latest details of what's been exposed on that as well.
00:00:42.660 And finally, an update on the Save America Act, where we are now, and are we going to
00:00:48.300 get it done?
00:00:49.560 It's the Week in Review, and it starts right now.
00:00:53.060 Go over the list of what has already been given as you're being, how I say as you, as
00:00:58.420 the american people as the travelers are being held hostage well and and let's take more 0.98
00:01:03.540 fundamentally the dhs appropriations bill was a bipartisan bill negotiated between republicans
00:01:11.480 and democrats that came out of the appropriations committee with bipartisan support so the democrats
00:01:18.200 had all of these different reforms that they put into dhs that republicans agreed to by the way none
00:01:24.520 of those reforms have happened because they won't allow it to be funded yeah the white house has
00:01:30.320 been trying to negotiate with democrats although as i said for more than two weeks the democrats
00:01:35.220 wouldn't even meet they had nothing to say this was while tsa was not getting paid while dhs was
00:01:39.900 not getting paid the democrats position was nope we won't even sit and talk and and it's why i said
00:01:45.540 and that's that's how you know it's premeditated the point that you made earlier like this is
00:01:49.640 clearly they decided this is the issue, we're going to go on, and we are premeditating this,
00:01:55.860 and we want it to hurt. Yeah, it's actually even different from premeditated. I think to some
00:02:02.320 extent they're in a box. Their base hates ICE. If you're a Democrat senator, look, here, I'm going
00:02:08.840 to tell you what John Fetterman tweeted this weekend. Elon Musk stepped in and said, I would
00:02:16.040 like to offer to pay the salaries of TSA personnel during this funding impasse that is so negatively
00:02:21.540 affecting the lives of so many Americans. It was incredibly generous. Elon is a patriot.
00:02:27.800 Here's what John Fetterman said. This is incredibly generous. TSA agents across the
00:02:33.480 country are relying on food pantries and community donations just to get by. I remain the lone
00:02:40.500 democrat to vote with my republican colleagues to fully fund dhs and get people paid it should
00:02:47.200 never come to this point so fetterman's speaking the truth yeah here's the problem most of the
00:02:54.080 rest of the democrat senators they're in a situation where they feel if they vote to fund
00:02:58.640 ice their angry open border activists will never forgive them and and i think a lot of them are
00:03:05.880 are engaged in political cowardice.
00:03:08.120 They're unwilling to vote to fund ICE.
00:03:09.920 Mind you, that literally means
00:03:12.220 that they don't want murderers arrested,
00:03:15.160 they don't want child rapists arrested,
00:03:16.940 they don't want gangbangers arrested.
00:03:18.720 Drug dealers, the list goes on and on.
00:03:21.160 Narco-terrorists, I mean, 1.00
00:03:22.980 ICE is who is arresting criminals
00:03:25.860 in the interior of the United States.
00:03:28.500 Yeah.
00:03:29.260 The Democrat political reality
00:03:31.020 is their angry base hates them so much.
00:03:33.600 Look, these are the same people
00:03:34.920 that are abolish the police. These are the same people that are abolish ICE.
00:03:40.640 And so I'll tell you this week, Republican senators, when we're in session, we have lunch
00:03:46.540 together every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. And then actually we were here throughout the
00:03:49.980 weekend. We were in D.C. So we had lunch Friday, Saturday, and Sunday as well. And what I'm
00:03:56.340 arguing to my colleagues, I said, listen, I think the Democrats are so wildly unreasonable
00:04:03.180 that they may be content to leave dhs defunded for the entire year really they don't care about
00:04:11.620 the consequences of what they're doing they don't care about the fact that every tsa agent
00:04:16.480 would have to quit and you would literally shut down every airport in the country like it's
00:04:21.120 they're they believe we can blame it on trump and the republicans and and and that they are
00:04:28.660 there's not a common ground of reasonableness well let me ask you sean sean duffy said on on
00:04:34.820 i think it was face the nation sunday morning that he said if you if you think it's bad now
00:04:39.400 wait till this coming week when you miss another paycheck it's going to be worse and his point was
00:04:45.980 you will have so many people quit that now you've got a problem that you don't have a big enough
00:04:51.460 workforce even when you get back to being funded how concerned are you about that is that part of
00:04:56.520 the Democrats' plan, like, yeah, it's kind of the way that they did with defund the police. Well,
00:05:01.760 if we can't directly do it, we'll just drive them so crazy they quit their jobs, they don't want to
00:05:05.600 be police anymore. Yeah, look, I think plan is giving them too much credit. They don't have a
00:05:10.900 plan. They're just obeying their angry activists who are just screaming. They're just engaged in
00:05:16.340 a primal scream. And so what I told my colleagues is, listen, if we're working with people who are
00:05:21.500 objectively unreasonable yeah and who may well say we will never vote to fund ice again here's
00:05:28.060 what i've suggested all right fine if if that's the reality we should get the democrats to fund
00:05:36.320 all of dhs except ice carve ice out now you might say okay that's a terrible idea because then ice
00:05:42.240 doesn't get funded remember we've already funded ice for four years yeah so agree to fund everything
00:05:47.020 except ICE. And then what I urge my colleagues is if they force us to do that, we should
00:05:52.660 immediately take up a reconciliation bill and fund ICE for the next 10 years. And what I advocated
00:05:59.900 for, and we should increase ICE's budget by 10%. So if that's going to be their price, we Democrats
00:06:05.660 will never again vote for border security. We will never again vote for ICE. Then at the end of the
00:06:13.040 day the only way i see to solve this problem reconciliation remember we've talked about this
00:06:17.800 before it is the one procedural mechanism the senate can use that does not require 60 votes
00:06:25.420 yeah that just republicans can pass it and so if the democrats would agree we'll fund all of dhs
00:06:32.620 except ice the next week we should come back and do a reconciliation and fund ice for a decade
00:06:37.840 because I'm not convinced that these loons are going to change their mind in the next 10 years.
00:06:44.300 Yeah, it's a great point.
00:06:45.320 For people that are going to be traveling this week, what is your gut?
00:06:47.920 Do you think there's—what are the chances that we could actually get something done here
00:06:51.920 where then things could start to go back to normal instead of going in the direction they're going now,
00:06:55.780 which is these two, three, and four-hour-plus waits?
00:06:59.000 Look, I don't know.
00:07:00.500 I think there is a real urgency in the Senate to try to get this resolved before the Easter holiday.
00:07:07.840 yeah um the question is are the democrats going to budge that there are a few of the uh kind of
00:07:14.780 the democrats who who occasionally will reach a deal who are making noises like they want to
00:07:21.960 but chuck schumer doesn't care chuck schumer is terrified of being primaried from the left and
00:07:28.720 in fact i i want to i want to read a little bit from a story in in the walk in the wall street
00:07:35.360 journal about chuck schumer so he has been wildly left-wing yeah um so much so that he's now done
00:07:42.780 the longest shutdown in government history and then he's turned around and uh turned turned
00:07:48.140 around and and has shut the tsa down and refused to pay them here's a story that just came out in
00:07:53.780 the wall street journal growing frustration with chuck schumer spurs talk of replacing him and you
00:08:00.180 might say oh thank god maybe some democrats are saying this is too obstructionist you're too
00:08:05.800 unreasonable nope nope you know who wants to replace him the left wing because he's not
00:08:12.860 burn it down enough yeah and and let me read the beginning of this article senator chris murphy
00:08:18.860 was dining with progressive activists at a french restaurant in washington's georgetown neighborhood
00:08:23.220 could you be more cliche as a democrat than that i suppose you know maybe a vegan uh french
00:08:30.040 restaurant would make it even better, when their conversation about how to advance their
00:08:34.620 legislative priorities turned to a thorny question, what to do about Senate Minority
00:08:40.280 Leader Chuck Schumer. To the surprise of some attendees, the Connecticut Democrat, a rising star
00:08:46.060 in the party's left flank, responded that some lawmakers had been doing informal counts
00:08:51.520 to see whether enough votes existed to remove the New York Democrat from his leadership position,
00:08:57.060 according to people familiar with the mid-February dinner. Murphy explained that Schumer had enough
00:09:02.760 backing to remain as leader, but the disclosure stood out nonetheless because it revealed the
00:09:07.800 frustration inside the Senate had reached a high enough level that some Democrats were actively
00:09:13.880 contemplating how to oust Schumer. Wow. Murphy is among a group of senators and top advisors who
00:09:19.720 have grown increasingly dissatisfied with Schumer's leadership, according to people familiar with the
00:09:24.580 conversation. Who else? That group includes Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts,
00:09:30.020 who has been initiated conversations with other senators to gauge frustrations with Schumer,
00:09:34.920 some of the people said. Senator Tina Smith of Minnesota has also been active in discussions
00:09:39.900 with her frustration with Schumer. In an interview, Murphy said he's frequently asked
00:09:45.560 about Senate leadership, but he doesn't have a count of who would vote to remove Schumer and
00:09:50.300 doesn't recall mentioning one in more than four dozen interviews with democrat senators and others
00:09:56.980 many said the concern about schumer's leadership was widespread um but what are they mad at and
00:10:05.140 this is where it's amazing murphy warren and smith are part of a batch of senators dubbed
00:10:12.200 Fight Club, who are particularly incensed by Schumer's approach to the midterms.
00:10:19.540 This group of progressives believes that Schumer favors centrist candidates in some key races.
00:10:25.840 So their whole argument, even though Schumer is just saying, let it burn, I mean, it reminds me
00:10:31.700 of Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight as Batman, just saying, let it burn. Who cares what happens?
00:10:36.960 If there are terror attacks, not Chuck Schumer's problem. If every airport is shut down, not Chuck
00:10:41.580 Schumer's problem. If people can't pay their rent or mortgage, not Chuck Schumer's problem.
00:10:47.240 And yet the Elizabeth Warrens of the party say not enough. You need to do more. I don't even
00:10:53.200 know what more would look like. But that is the reality of where Democrats are. And as long as
00:11:01.320 the media does what Greta did and what so many other CNN does and MSNBC does, as long as they 1.00
00:11:08.800 keep covering it up and pretending, no, no, no, it's not the Democrats who are shutting it down,
00:11:14.160 they'll keep doing the exact same thing. Yeah, they really will. I got to ask you an
00:11:17.900 audible question real quick, because you mentioned you're in D.C. over the weekend.
00:11:20.900 Give us a 30-second update on where we are with the SAVE Act.
00:11:25.520 We are continuing to debate it, but right now, every Democrat votes no. And we are not doing
00:11:33.100 a talking filibuster. We are not requiring the Democrats do a talking filibuster. So
00:11:37.680 I think the expectation is we're going to vote on it this week and and if nothing changes the
00:11:43.480 vote is going to go down. President Trump is deeply frustrated as you know as I talked about
00:11:48.920 and we did an earlier podcast which if folks want a deep dive on the Save America Act you could have
00:11:53.620 we have an entire podcast last week devoted to explaining what was going on. I think we should
00:11:59.980 use the procedural rules to force the Democrats to stand and talk and talk and talk and do a full
00:12:05.120 talking filibuster, but we're not right now. So has Trump weighed in on that idea, by the way?
00:12:09.980 I mean, what does he say? He's vocally in favor of it. But in order to do it, we have to have 50
00:12:17.760 Republicans stand together and we don't have 50 that that's the fundamental problem. How close
00:12:24.140 are we? Is it two or three or more? It's hard to tell. We have 53 Republicans, which means we can
00:12:30.600 lose at most three um they're at least four and potentially more that are no's and and and the
00:12:37.060 problem is you have in particular republicans who are retiring so they're not going to be on the
00:12:41.380 ballot uh that makes it very hard for the white house to pressure them if they're not they're not
00:12:46.560 up for re-election there's not a whole lot there's not a whole lot of leverage there now if you want
00:12:51.240 to hear the rest of this conversation you can go back and listen to the full podcast from earlier
00:12:56.220 this week. Canadian women are looking for more. More out of themselves, their businesses, their 1.00
00:13:01.820 elected leaders, and the world around them. And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest
00:13:06.220 Talk podcast. I'm Jennifer Stewart. And I'm Catherine Clark. And in this podcast, we interview
00:13:11.600 Canada's most inspiring women. Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers,
00:13:17.320 all at different stages of their journey. So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll
00:13:21.920 Join us.
00:13:22.720 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:13:28.460 Now on to story number two.
00:13:31.020 Senator, I want to finish the show with a really important subject.
00:13:35.680 And you've described it as bigger than Watergate.
00:13:38.940 It's a modern day Watergate, certainly. 0.58
00:13:40.740 But we now have a dive into the bombshell Senate Judiciary hearing on Arctic Frost.
00:13:48.380 And you had a great statement, Senator, and I want to play it for everybody.
00:13:52.700 This is how you kind of described what's happening.
00:13:55.500 Watergate was about a handful of files in a single office.
00:13:59.420 This reached into tens of thousands of private communications, emails, records, and personal data.
00:14:06.380 Toll records, bank records, donor lists, law firm records,
00:14:11.340 and other personal files relating to every major conservative organization were subpoenaed.
00:14:18.380 Senator, that sums it up. This was a 100 percent weaponization of our Department of Justice to go
00:14:25.880 after Donald Trump and anyone they thought was important to him that could help him win the
00:14:30.540 White House again. Well, that clip was from a hearing I chaired this week of the Senate Judiciary
00:14:35.980 Committee that was examining Arctic Frost. It was releasing yet more documents that showed the
00:14:41.460 massive scope of the abuse of power. Look, Watergate at the end of the day was a handful
00:14:47.680 of Cuban burglars who broke into an office of the DNC. And it was a failed burglar. They didn't
00:14:52.960 even succeed. And it resulted in the president of the United States resigning in disgrace. It
00:14:58.200 resulted in more than 40 people being criminally prosecuted, many of them going to jail.
00:15:03.940 By any measure, Arctic Frost was orders of magnitude worse. You had nearly 200 subpoenas.
00:15:11.940 You had more than 400 individuals and groups that were targeted. The Biden Department of Justice
00:15:17.100 issued subpoenas to get the phone records for more than 20 percent of the republicans in the
00:15:23.720 senate including yours truly yeah it was a massive abuse of power and the amazing thing is the
00:15:32.020 democrats don't care at all uh and and one of the points i made at the hearing there are a bunch of
00:15:37.400 democrat senators sitting there at the hearing and i pointed out not a one of them is going to
00:15:42.520 say a word. They don't care about abuse of power. For them, partisanship and partisan control is
00:15:48.280 all that matter. And I contrasted it with what happened in Watergate. Here, listen to what I had
00:15:52.800 to say. Fifty years ago, this nation was confronted with an abuse of power. And it responded not with
00:15:58.920 indifference, but with accountability. I'll tell you one of the big differences of Watergate versus
00:16:04.260 Arctic Frost. When Richard Nixon and his corrupt attorney general and his corrupt administration
00:16:10.100 should abuse their law enforcement powers to go after their political opponents.
00:16:15.140 Republican senators stood up to the president of their own party and defended the rule of law.
00:16:20.900 Where is even a single Democrat senator who has said one word about this abuse of power?
00:16:26.980 You're right, by the way.
00:16:28.180 They're all silent on it because they don't care as long as it was spying on you, literally.
00:16:32.940 Yeah, and look, I will say what happened in Watergate,
00:16:35.700 What actually ended it when Richard Nixon resigned is it was a group of senior Republican senators that drove the 16 blocks up Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House and sat in the Oval Office.
00:16:47.140 And they said, Mr. President, you have a choice.
00:16:50.220 You either resign or we will impeach you, convict you, and remove you from office.
00:16:56.240 And it was a moment of real political courage for those senators to do that.
00:17:00.460 I'm not a Richard Nixon fan. 0.71
00:17:01.980 I think he was utterly corrupt.
00:17:03.860 um as you know ben i've written four books one the third book i wrote was called justice corrupted
00:17:11.400 how the left has weaponized the legal system and the opening chapter of that book is a deep dive
00:17:16.580 into watergate and it details the just absolute corruption and abuse of power what richard nixon
00:17:23.580 tried to do barack obama and now joe biden succeeded in doing and one of the real differences is
00:17:33.120 Republicans were willing to stand up and say no this goes too far there are no Democrats willing
00:17:39.580 to do so and and all right so there was a witness that the Democrats had called who was a former
00:17:45.340 senior agent of the FBI and he gave this whole testimony about how the FBI is utterly beyond
00:17:52.580 politics and it's impartial and it has no partisan agenda at all and I actually cross-examined him
00:17:58.940 quite a bit and I said look I agree with what you're saying that's what the FBI is supposed
00:18:02.760 to be. And that's what DOJ is supposed to be. And I'm an alumnus of the Department of Justice. I
00:18:08.480 served in the George W. Bush Department of Justice. And it has a more than century-long tradition of
00:18:15.000 being outside of politics, not partisan at all. And I said one of the worst things that Barack
00:18:22.080 Obama and especially Joe Biden did is they corrupted it and turned DOJ and the FBI into
00:18:27.980 partisan tools. And this witness didn't want to admit it. But here's one question I asked him.
00:18:33.700 Give a listen. Menendez is currently incarcerated in prison for corruption. And if you've got
00:18:39.340 evidence of criminal conduct of one individual, the Department of Justice has an obligation to
00:18:44.820 investigate that. Would you agree that's qualitatively different than a fishing
00:18:50.820 expedition targeting 20 percent of the Republicans in the Senate? Would you agree that's qualitatively
00:18:56.140 different. I'm not familiar with the details of either investigation, so I wouldn't want to
00:19:00.540 speculate. Well, let me ask you this. Would you be troubled if tomorrow the Trump Department of
00:19:06.720 Justice issued a subpoena for the phone records of every Democrat that sits on the Judiciary
00:19:11.240 Committee? Not if it was based on factual evidence, specific and articulable facts.
00:19:16.220 Well, let me be clear. I'd be damned troubled. And that would be an abuse of power. And I'm
00:19:20.740 going to predict not a single Democrat is going to say even a word about the abuse of power on
00:19:27.440 their side, and that double standard is troubling. Senator Lee. Senator, you're absolutely right
00:19:32.600 there in the point that you were making. Yeah, it really is amazing that nobody, and by the way,
00:19:40.400 the entire hearing, the Democrats were completely silent. Like when it came their turn to question,
00:19:45.660 they just said orange man bad they just said we hate donald trump they didn't acknowledge it look
00:19:51.400 one of the things that happened in arctic frost is not only did you have jack smith
00:19:55.000 getting subpoenas for the phone records of of 20 percent of the republicans in the senate and by
00:20:01.940 the way also getting subpoenas and and wiretapping uh cash patel who was then a private citizen now
00:20:09.020 the director of the FBI. They tapped the phones of Susie Wiles, who was then the campaign manager.
00:20:16.800 She was running Donald Trump's campaign. I mean, this was a political opposition effort. And by
00:20:23.140 the way, they taped her conversations with her lawyer, which is illegal on any level.
00:20:29.860 If you look at the subpoenas they issued for the senators, they also went to Judge
00:20:34.660 Boesberg, who is an extraordinarily partisan left-wing judge. He's the favorite judge for
00:20:41.300 these radical groups that have been getting nationwide injunctions against various Trump
00:20:44.860 policies. I chaired a hearing several months ago calling for Judge Boesberg to be impeached and
00:20:50.500 removed from office because he is so extreme. In Arctic Frost, for every single senator that
00:20:57.160 Jack Smith subpoenaed, he signed an order ordering the phone companies not to disclose to us
00:21:02.860 that they were subpoenaing our phone record, and in that order, he concluded the court finds
00:21:09.040 that we will destroy evidence if we know about it. Now, there is zero basis in fact
00:21:15.180 to make that finding. Look, I'm a member of the bar. My integrity matters a great deal to me.
00:21:22.460 I'm not going to destroy evidence, and there are no facts that could be introduced that would
00:21:25.780 suggest I could. There's also a federal statute prohibiting nondisclosure orders for Senate
00:21:32.080 records, and yet Judge Boesberg violated the law, that was the kind of abuse of power we saw in
00:21:37.580 Arctic Frost. And it was truly unprecedented. It makes Watergate seem mild by comparison.
00:21:43.340 No doubt. We're going to keep covering this. Don't forget, download Verdict with Ted Cruz
00:21:46.620 wherever you get your podcasts. And if you're listening to this radio show, we do it Monday,
00:21:50.860 Wednesday, Friday. If you're listening on the radio right now, thank you for joining us. And
00:21:54.060 we'll see you back here on this station as well next week. It is Verdict with Ted Cruz. We'll see
00:21:59.080 on the podcast all week long as before if you want to hear the rest of this conversation on this
00:22:04.780 topic you can go back and download the podcast from early this week to hear the entire thing
00:22:09.480 canadian women are looking for more more to themselves their businesses their elected 1.00
00:22:14.860 leaders and the world around them and that's why we're thrilled to introduce the honest talk
00:22:19.280 podcast i'm jennifer stewart and i'm katherine clark and in this podcast we interview canada's
00:22:24.880 most inspiring women entrepreneurs artists athletes politicians and newsmakers all at
00:22:30.480 different stages of their journey so if you're looking to connect then we hope you'll join us
00:22:35.260 listen to the honest talk podcast on iheart radio or wherever you listen to your podcasts
00:22:39.580 i want to get back to the big story number three of the week you may have missed
00:22:45.280 let's give an update on the latest of the save act and chuck schumer the democrats they said
00:22:51.120 they supported voter ID, but then they immediately blocked you guys and your amendment to require it.
00:22:57.040 Welcome to Democrats. You know, do as I say, not as I do. Well, that's exactly right. So I'm an
00:23:02.980 original sponsor of the Save America Act. I've been helping lead the fight to pass the Save
00:23:07.300 America Act. We should be passing it. The only way to get it passed is we need to stand together
00:23:13.320 and force the Democrats to do a talking filibuster. Unfortunately, to do that, we need 50 Republicans
00:23:19.640 who are willing to stand and fight and be all unified together.
00:23:22.920 We don't have those votes right now.
00:23:24.240 I have been making that case for weeks on ends to my colleagues.
00:23:28.860 We're not there yet, and it is frustrating.
00:23:31.480 By the way, we did a podcast two weeks ago where we broke down the details of exactly
00:23:35.960 how a talking filibuster would work, how using the existing Senate rules to force the Democrats
00:23:41.380 to do like Jimmy Stewart and Mr. Smith goes to Washington, to force the Democrats to do
00:23:46.320 like I did when I filibustered for 21 hours talking continuously against Obamacare in 2013.
00:23:53.640 We have not done that yet. But I will say, so the Save America Act has two major elements.
00:24:00.720 Number one, it requires people to show proof of American citizenship to register to vote,
00:24:06.720 a basic common sense step. Number two, it requires photo ID to vote. Well, the Democrats' defense,
00:24:13.500 that they really hate provision one showing proof of citizenship and they argued oh some people
00:24:18.680 can't do it some people can't do it it's nonsense but that's what they argued and in the course of
00:24:23.960 it a whole lot of them said we're okay with photo id which at some level is not surprising because
00:24:29.740 photo id 83 percent of americans support photo id to vote 81 percent of hispanics support photo
00:24:36.960 id to vote 81 percent of democrats support photo id to vote 75 percent of african americans support
00:24:43.240 photo ID to vote. It's overwhelmingly popular. So the Democrats all said they supported it,
00:24:48.160 but they didn't like the other elements of the SAVE Act. So one thing we did this week is we
00:24:52.300 said, okay, we'll call your bluff. And we put up just a very simple bill that required photo ID
00:24:58.260 to vote. It's what they all said they supported. Now, let me tell you, I want to read you some
00:25:03.540 quotes from Democrats. Here's Chuck Schumer, quote, Democrats support voter ID. Here's Chuck
00:25:12.340 Schumer again. Our objection as Democrats is not to photo ID. Here's Dick Durbin. Quote,
00:25:20.740 they say it's show a voter ID. I'm not opposed to that. They ask you for an ID at the airport,
00:25:25.920 don't they? That's reasonable. All right, here's Caitlin Collins at CNN asking Cory Booker.
00:25:32.960 Quote, if it was just a clean vote on voter ID specifically, is that something you would support?
00:25:37.940 Cory Booker. Yes, and New Jersey has voter ID laws. I've got to show my driver's license.
00:25:44.940 Chris Coons, Democrat from Delaware, quote, who could be against requiring ID to vote?
00:25:51.460 Raphael Warnock, Democrat from Georgia, quote, I think you should have to prove that you are who
00:25:57.380 you say you are before you vote. I support voter ID. Alyssa Slotkin from Michigan, quote,
00:26:03.540 quote, voter ID, which hopefully all Americans are in agreement about. Kirsten Gillibrand from New
00:26:09.840 York, quote, the IDs that we all have in our wallets should be good enough to vote. They always
00:26:15.260 have been. Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat from Rhode Island, quote, well, the voter ID part is probably
00:26:21.320 fine. We have voter ID here in Rhode Island. Ruben Gallego, Democrat from Arizona, quote,
00:26:27.240 if people want to adopt the Arizona way, which is strict voter ID, I think that would be fine.
00:26:33.040 Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, both Democrats from Virginia, quote, we support reasonable steps that help maintain trust in our elections, including the voter identification requirements we already have in Virginia.
00:26:45.740 Jack Reed, Democrat from Rhode Island, quote, if the polls simply required every American to show an ID at the polls, then I would not be ringing such a loud alarm.
00:26:58.300 So that's what they all said.
00:26:59.840 Yeah.
00:26:59.980 So Republicans said, all right, we'll call your bluff.
00:27:01.920 And we put a vote on just photo ID to vote.
00:27:05.480 You know what happened?
00:27:07.620 What happened?
00:27:09.220 I know the answer, but it makes me laugh.
00:27:11.840 Every single Democrat voted no.
00:27:18.220 All of them.
00:27:19.500 Every one of them.
00:27:20.080 Everyone that I just read those quotes from, all the ones that say, oh, I support voter ID, they all voted no.
00:27:24.880 i i mean it is a flat up it's just a flat up lie and part of the reason part of the reasons they
00:27:35.420 do that is because they know the media won't call them on it yeah that they know that that they can
00:27:42.780 lie over and over and over again and and there will be no consequences now i will say an exception
00:27:48.860 to that. So CBS News, David Ellison bought CBS News, and so now suddenly CBS News is owned by
00:27:57.460 someone who says he has a commitment to making it balanced and not having it be a partisan left-wing
00:28:02.000 network. I'll tell you what CBS News tweeted out earlier today. Quote, an amendment that would
00:28:09.680 require voters to show photo identification to cast a ballot failed to advance in the Senate
00:28:14.680 on thursday despite senate minority leader chuck schumer saying last week that democrats were not
00:28:20.340 opposed to such a requirement so cbs actually reported straight out i i i actually had some
00:28:29.000 fun with that and tweeted and said you mean schumer lied and there's a reason there right
00:28:34.700 there's a reason you have a pinocchio emoji uh and and i used it but but part of the reason
00:28:41.980 they're willing to lie so brazenly, is what CBS did there is the exception. CNN, MSNBC, ABC,
00:28:51.800 NBC, they don't call them to account. The Washington Post, the New York Times,
00:28:56.180 they don't call them to account. And so the Democrats all lie. And then when you say,
00:29:00.280 oh, you support that, do you? All right. Well, do you want to vote for it? They all say no.
00:29:05.320 They get almost no accountability for doing so.
00:29:08.180 It really is incredible
00:29:11.440 And look, I do think
00:29:13.240 This is going to be very interesting
00:29:15.540 Going into the midterms
00:29:17.700 And I want to get your reaction to this
00:29:19.240 Because I actually think the American people
00:29:21.820 Are paying attention
00:29:22.660 They were very frustrated by the Democrats
00:29:25.660 Constantly making their life harder
00:29:27.620 On these basic type issues
00:29:29.540 Just like the airport
00:29:30.860 I think those are things
00:29:33.400 When you combine these issues together
00:29:35.720 The SAVE Act, which is overwhelming
00:29:37.920 American support. Like, it's probably one of the most bipartisan things you're polling right now
00:29:43.080 in this country, if not the very top one. And yet you have this type of divide. I actually think
00:29:49.760 this plays in the hands of Republicans if we do it the right way. Your thoughts? Yeah, look, I think
00:29:54.380 that's right. And I think calling out Democrats for hypocrisy and lying and for just really
00:30:00.700 aggressive partisanship. You know, I will say there are people who say both sides are too
00:30:08.160 extreme, and I got to say that that feels very reasonable and even-handed. Gosh, one side's too
00:30:15.140 extreme, so is the other. I just don't think it's accurate. If you look at where we are now,
00:30:21.040 the policy positions of the Democratic Party objectively are extreme on immigration. They're
00:30:28.740 an open border party they just refused to fund even a penny for immigration enforcement uh and
00:30:35.580 and they slashed funding for customs and border patrol they are an open border party that that
00:30:41.660 opposes arresting murderers and gangbangers and and and and child rapists um on on issues of
00:30:49.980 sexuality every democrat all of them support boys and girls sports men and women's sports they 0.83
00:30:56.020 support sterilization and surgical mutilation of kids. Those are extreme positions. Those are 0.85
00:31:05.000 on the 10 side of 90-10 issues. They support abolishing the police. They all just voted to
00:31:12.100 effectively abolish the police in the immigration context. What are the Republicans supporting?
00:31:17.720 Policy-wise, the Republicans are supporting common sense principles, low taxes, low regulations,
00:31:24.340 lots and lots of jobs small businesses doing well securing the border supporting law enforcement
00:31:29.860 protecting our families those are common sense position look the democrats on foreign policy
00:31:35.320 are embrace hamas there is a real pro-hamas contingent in the democrat party that is
00:31:42.540 objectively extreme and so i think saying the two sides are kind of both too extreme
00:31:47.820 i don't think that describes where the policy debate is now i will concede this
00:31:52.300 On the rhetoric, there is a fair point to be made that both sides can use overheated rhetoric.
00:32:00.120 I think the Democrats do so routinely when they call ICE, for example, Nazis and Gestapo,
00:32:06.780 and they call for doxing and going after the families of law enforcement officers.
00:32:11.260 I mean, I think that's grotesque.
00:32:13.100 But there are Republicans who use overheated rhetoric as well, and I wish they did not.
00:32:18.600 uh you know i get that question a lot as i travel around texas and around the country and i say
00:32:23.360 listen i i don't have the ability to change the language other people use i can control what i say
00:32:29.580 uh you know ben you you and me and verdict i i try not to demonize people personally
00:32:34.560 but i do try to talk about policies and say it is an objectively unreasonable policy to support
00:32:41.680 open borders and to just take away the paychecks of law enforcement officers forever and that is
00:32:47.520 the position of the Democrat Party. I think that's the way we ought to have political discussions on
00:32:52.360 substance and merits rather than making it personal. As always, thank you for listening
00:32:57.500 to Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. Don't forget to download my podcast
00:33:02.140 and you can listen to my podcast every other day you're not listening to Verdict or each day when
00:33:05.960 you listen to Verdict afterwards. I'd love to have you as a listener to, again, the Ben Ferguson
00:33:10.520 podcast, and we will see you back here on Monday morning.