Verdict with Ted Cruz - May 22, 2023


Debt Ceiling Showdown, the 14th Amendment, plus a Beer Company Goes Woke & Markets to Kids？!？

Topics
debt ceiling showdown Augusta Precious Metals gold IRA work requirements for welfare Bud Light marketing to minors
Hosted by
Ted Cruz
Mentioned
Joe Biden Dylan Mulvaney Bud Light George Herbert Walker Bush C. Boyden Gray Barack Obama Donald Trump Clarence Thomas Janet Yellen George W. Bush Marsha Blackburn Bernie Sanders Dick Thornburg Hillary Clinton Earl Warren Joe Camel Dwight Eisenhower Freedom Initiative Jennifer Stewart Caitlin Clark and 11 more
FBI Caught Red-Handed Retaliating Against Whistleblowers plus Radical U.S. Attorney Resigns in Disgrace NAACP Boycotts Florida & AOC Steps in it on Race, plus Target Stores target Kids with Sexually Explicit Products, and an AM Radio Victory

Episode Stats


Length

44 minutes

Words per minute

161.94

Word count

7,242

Sentence count

526

Harmful content

Misogyny

4

sentences flagged

Hate speech

10

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Ben Fergus Fergus (D-New Jersey) discuss the debt ceiling, the 14th Amendment, and the passing of Republican Sen. John McCain. They also discuss the possibility of a default and what that means for the economy.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.580 Guaranteed human.
00:00:05.460 Welcome.
00:00:06.200 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you, and we have got a very important
00:00:11.560 show.
00:00:12.160 First, we're going to deal with the debt ceiling.
00:00:14.360 Then we're going to deal with what Barack Obama said back in 2011 about the 14th Amendment
00:00:19.260 that everyone seems to be really excited about right now in Washington.
00:00:23.460 And also, Bud Light, could they be in trouble for marketing themselves potentially to children?
00:00:29.360 We're going to deal with all of that, plus the passing of a great Republican leader who
00:00:35.240 passed away today.
00:00:36.140 We'll tell you about his story in life as well.
00:00:39.160 But, Senator, let's first start with this debt ceiling.
00:00:42.700 The debt ceiling issue is confusing to many, and there's a lot of Americans that say, I
00:00:48.460 just want to know what's going to happen, where we're going to be, what happens if we default,
00:00:54.360 and is that a real possibility?
00:00:56.240 Because we've seen this circus happen quite a few times.
00:01:00.160 You've been in Washington when this circus comes to town and leaves, and it's also used
00:01:04.460 as political leverage many times by the party that's in power in the White House.
00:01:08.660 So where are we on the debt ceiling before we get to the 14th Amendment?
00:01:12.880 Well, right now we're in a showdown, and we're in a showdown between Joe Biden and Republicans,
00:01:18.400 in particular House Republicans, who've passed a bill to raise the debt ceiling,
00:01:22.660 but they put meaningful spending cuts as an attachment to the debt ceiling.
00:01:27.520 And Joe Biden and the Democrats don't want to have any spending cuts.
00:01:32.040 You know, it's worth stepping back and saying, all right, what is the debt ceiling?
00:01:35.180 Because these are terms that get bandied about.
00:01:37.720 We usually hear about them once or twice a year.
00:01:40.500 And the debt ceiling is a cap on how much money the federal government can borrow.
00:01:45.560 And then Congress passes it periodically.
00:01:48.140 And then because we keep seeing budgets that are deficit spending, the debt grows and grows
00:01:53.500 and grows.
00:01:54.080 And when it hits the debt ceiling, in order for the federal government to borrow more money,
00:01:59.120 Congress has to raise the debt ceiling.
00:02:01.400 And so that's the battle that's happening right now.
00:02:04.500 The Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, estimates that what's called the X date, which is when
00:02:11.060 we will hit the debt ceiling, is on or around June 1st.
00:02:15.860 Now, it's on or around that because the Treasury Department has some what are called extraordinary
00:02:21.600 measures.
00:02:22.280 It has steps it can take where that date is typically not carved in stone but is a little
00:02:28.820 bit flexible, and they can delay it.
00:02:30.380 But what's happening right now, for months, Joe Biden in the White House has said he will
00:02:37.580 not negotiate at all.
00:02:39.440 He's not willing to cut any spending at all.
00:02:42.260 That the only thing he will take is a blank check to borrow unlimited money.
00:02:46.420 Now, that was always an unreasonable position.
00:02:48.700 That was always an extreme position.
00:02:50.800 And one of the best evidences of that is that Biden's been forced to back away from that.
00:02:55.840 That on April 26th, so several weeks ago, the House, by a vote of 217 to 215, passed their
00:03:05.660 bill to raise the debt ceiling and yet at the same time to cut $4.8 trillion from the
00:03:13.120 budget over 10 years.
00:03:14.960 And so the two were attached together.
00:03:17.980 Right now, the two sides appear to be very far apart.
00:03:20.840 Joe Biden is insisting, instead of cutting spending, he wants to do, guess what, raise
00:03:25.520 taxes.
00:03:26.660 And so they're fighting on a lot of different issues.
00:03:29.540 One of the big sticking points is work requirements for welfare.
00:03:35.200 The House Republicans are insisting that if you're going to get welfare, if you're an able-bodied
00:03:40.260 adult, you should have to look for work or go to work.
00:03:43.500 The Democrats don't want people to go to work.
00:03:45.760 They are adamantly opposed to work requirements.
00:03:47.980 So that's a sticking point.
00:03:50.580 And if the two sides reach an impasse, if they can't reach an agreement, I do think right
00:03:56.980 now the chances of a default are higher than they have been any time in recent memory.
00:04:02.860 And that's dangerous because a default would be very bad for the economy.
00:04:06.540 When you say it's bad for the economy, there's a lot of people that fear monger over this.
00:04:10.800 But the reality of a default, people say, all right, well, if it happened, what does that
00:04:15.960 really look like, and then how fast would you be able to undo it and fix it?
00:04:21.680 Is that even possible to fix it?
00:04:23.600 Or once you default, is the damage done and then there's a new normal?
00:04:28.180 Well, if the United States defaulted on our debt, what it would mean is that there would
00:04:32.660 be interest due on bonds that the Treasury Department had sold, that the Treasury Department
00:04:37.460 would fail to pay.
00:04:38.360 And that would be called a default.
00:04:41.440 And the reaction to that would be that the credit agencies would downgrade the credit
00:04:47.180 of the United States government.
00:04:49.300 And when you downgrade the credit, it would mean that going forward, the federal government
00:04:53.840 would have to pay a higher interest rate and potentially a significantly higher interest
00:04:58.260 rate to borrow money in the future.
00:05:00.800 Historically, the very best credit rating has been the government of the United States of
00:05:05.300 America.
00:05:05.640 And so shaking that gold standard is dangerous, and it potentially has lots of repercussions
00:05:13.540 throughout the economy.
00:05:15.420 Now, we should never default on the debt.
00:05:20.140 And this is an important thing to understand because there's a lot of scaremongering on this.
00:05:26.300 Even if the debt ceiling is not raised on June 1st, we should not default on the debt.
00:05:33.280 And do you know who could insure that, Ben?
00:05:36.000 Who's that?
00:05:37.720 Joe Biden.
00:05:38.880 Joe Biden could stand up.
00:05:40.360 Let me tell you what a responsible president would say.
00:05:43.720 A responsible president would say, the United States of America will never, ever, ever default
00:05:48.680 on our debt.
00:05:49.720 And no matter what happens, we will pay the interest on our debt.
00:05:53.540 Now, how could he do that?
00:05:54.440 Well, because every month, the revenue that the federal government takes in is significant
00:06:01.640 and is significantly larger than the interest on the debt.
00:06:07.120 So, through what's called prioritization, essentially, the president could say, we're
00:06:11.740 going to pay interest on the debt first.
00:06:13.760 That would ensure we didn't default.
00:06:16.700 Now, why doesn't Biden do this?
00:06:18.480 Because he wants to scare people.
00:06:20.780 He wants to threaten the stock market.
00:06:22.160 He wants to threaten the bond market.
00:06:23.800 He wants to get people scared that their 401k is going to drop in value, that there's
00:06:27.760 going to be damage to the economy.
00:06:30.020 And he's doing this because he's counting on the dishonest corporate media to blame any
00:06:38.200 risk of default on Republicans.
00:06:40.680 Right now, it seems to be backfiring.
00:06:42.760 If you look at the polling right now, a large majority of Americans believe that we should
00:06:49.160 rein in spending as part of any effort to raise the debt ceiling.
00:06:54.460 Amazingly enough, and here's polling numbers in particular that ought to worry the White 0.68
00:06:58.760 House.
00:07:00.220 Fifty-eight percent of Democrats believe we should rein in spending as part of any agreement to
00:07:07.880 raise the debt ceiling.
00:07:08.720 And so Biden is not just to the left of Republicans, not just to the left of independents.
00:07:13.760 He's to the left of a majority of Democrats in this country.
00:07:17.660 And I think that shows that his position is really irresponsible and unsustainable.
00:07:22.980 Senator, I want to ask you a question about the substance of what Republicans want to do
00:07:27.680 in the House.
00:07:28.780 The White House has tried to label this and get the media to label it as extreme.
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00:08:55.960 Senator, I go back to the media.
00:08:59.260 They've really tried to label Republicans and the Republicans' ideas plan as extreme,
00:09:07.940 imply that somehow they've gone rogue and they're going to destroy our economy,
00:09:12.960 and that they're the ones that would cause these failures to happen and take place.
00:09:17.920 Talk about the Republican plan and why it is not crazy.
00:09:21.820 It is not extreme.
00:09:22.560 It's actually fiscally responsible what they're advocating for.
00:09:26.480 Well, that is exactly right.
00:09:28.660 And let's put this into context.
00:09:31.220 Let's step back for a second and look at the overall numbers.
00:09:34.660 In 2017, total federal spending in the budget was $4 trillion.
00:09:41.540 That was the entire federal budget.
00:09:42.800 Total federal revenue was about $3.3 trillion.
00:09:49.280 So that means the deficit, doing some quick math, was about $700 billion.
00:09:53.280 That was in 2017.
00:09:54.960 Then we had the pandemic hit.
00:09:57.100 Then after the pandemic, we had the second pandemic, which was the pandemic of Democrats hit,
00:10:02.600 with Joe Biden and Schumer and Pelosi taking over Congress.
00:10:05.440 We went from total federal spending in 2017 of $4 trillion to today, total federal spending of $6.4 trillion.
00:10:20.160 So that's more than a 50% increase from 2017 to today.
00:10:26.320 On revenue.
00:10:27.760 So remember, 2017, revenue was $3.3 trillion.
00:10:31.060 The Trump tax cuts passed.
00:10:32.720 And remember, the Democrats and the media all says this is going to devastate federal revenues.
00:10:37.160 It's going to result in shortchanging the federal government.
00:10:39.500 It was $3.3 trillion in 2017.
00:10:42.040 What do you think federal revenues are this year?
00:10:43.580 I'm sure there are new records, and I'm sure we're going to waste every dime of it.
00:10:49.280 $4.8 trillion.
00:10:51.640 So after the tax cuts, the economy boom.
00:10:54.320 By the way, revenue increased every year since the tax cuts.
00:10:57.220 That didn't go down even for a year.
00:11:00.540 So federal revenues went from $3.3 trillion to $4.8 trillion.
00:11:04.560 But if you do the math, the difference between $4.8 trillion in revenue now and $6.4 trillion in spending means the deficit is $1.5 trillion.
00:11:15.580 Now, what's happened to the debt?
00:11:17.000 The debt in 2017 was just over $20 billion.
00:11:20.920 The debt now is $31.8 billion.
00:11:25.120 So it's increased more than 50%.
00:11:27.620 It is massive.
00:11:29.260 I mean, when you look at these numbers, they're shocking, which is why, thank God, House Republicans are standing together, and they passed, I think, a very reasonable bill.
00:11:40.380 They didn't try to solve the whole problem overnight, but rather they passed a bill that would result in saving $4.8 trillion over 10 years.
00:11:48.620 $4.2 trillion of that is in savings directly, and $547 billion is in savings on interest because when you save money, you also save on interest over the 10 years going forward.
00:12:01.240 Now, what does it include?
00:12:02.580 The single biggest piece of it is it reduces discretionary spending, which is everything that's not mandatory.
00:12:11.120 Mandatory is Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, but discretionary spending is most of the rest of the budget.
00:12:20.060 It rolls back spending levels from what they are today to what they were in December of 2022.
00:12:28.560 Now, last I checked, December of 2022 is five months ago.
00:12:32.540 Remember this when you see Democrats screaming about these horrible draconian cuts.
00:12:37.680 They're going to picture granny being thrown off a cliff.
00:12:41.040 They're going to picture people starving in the streets.
00:12:43.620 This budget cuts spending to what it was five months ago, what it was at Christmastime of last year.
00:12:51.060 And it's worth asking anyone, if you're at work, if you're talking to your Uncle Joe, if you're talking to your next-door neighbor,
00:12:58.940 and they say, gosh, these are big spending cuts, it's worth asking them, was it the apocalypse five months ago?
00:13:06.740 Would the world end if we spent as much in the federal government today as we spent five months ago?
00:13:13.240 That's what Joe Biden is freaking out about and calling extreme.
00:13:17.780 What this budget does is it cuts spending to what it was in December of 2022,
00:13:22.340 and then it allows spending to grow at 1% per year going forward.
00:13:27.100 Now, what else does it do?
00:13:28.980 It rescinds unspent COVID money.
00:13:32.500 So there's roughly about $30 billion that Congress appropriated to deal with COVID.
00:13:37.440 Now, look, even Joe Biden admits the COVID pandemic, the emergency's over.
00:13:41.900 So the Democrats are saying it is radical and extreme not to spend money on a pandemic that's over.
00:13:50.500 That doesn't make any sense.
00:13:52.020 What else does it do?
00:13:52.880 It cuts the spending for the 87,000 new IRS agents that the Democrats really want to harass the enemies of the White House,
00:14:03.740 to attack the middle class and the working class.
00:14:07.440 An overwhelming majority of Americans would love to see those 87,000 new IRS agents not materialize.
00:14:14.660 And then one of the biggest things that Democrats are freaking out about is the work requirements for welfare.
00:14:25.240 And this is just a real divide.
00:14:27.660 Look, you want to know what today's Democrats are all about?
00:14:30.820 They're all about paying people not to work.
00:14:33.240 And I got to say, I think not only is that bad policy, but it's cruel.
00:14:38.200 I think people want to work.
00:14:40.140 They want the dignity of work.
00:14:41.560 They want the self-respect.
00:14:42.800 One of the most amazing policy results we had when Trump was president, we had Republican majorities in both houses,
00:14:49.240 is 7 million Americans came off of food stamps, which meant 7 million people got to experience the joy of going to work and providing for their family.
00:15:01.120 And, you know, you think about it.
00:15:02.240 That meant like a single mom would be coming home in Dallas, Texas, and she'd be carrying two bags of groceries, 0.99
00:15:09.780 and she'd set the groceries on the kitchen table.
00:15:12.800 And her kids would look at her with a newfound respect because she'd worked, and she'd provided for the family,
00:15:20.580 and she'd look in the mirror and have a new self-respect.
00:15:24.920 I think everyone wants to work, and everyone who is able to do so should work.
00:15:33.540 And if you look at welfare reform, which when Bill Clinton was president, Republicans in the House forced Bill Clinton to sign,
00:15:40.640 and by the way, Joe Biden voted for, ironically enough, today he says work requirements for welfare are extreme and draconian.
00:15:47.880 He voted for them when he was in the Senate, and they were an incredible policy success.
00:15:52.800 In the 1990s, just like under Trump, they resulted in millions of people going back to work and people reentering the workforce, providing for their families.
00:16:03.720 That is unambiguously good, and it helps them in addition to helping everybody else.
00:16:10.520 No doubt about that.
00:16:11.700 I want to ask you also about the 14th Amendment because a lot of people have been hearing about that.
00:16:16.160 What does it actually mean?
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00:17:50.040 Senator, let's talk a little bit about the 14th Amendment.
00:17:53.140 Joe Biden's been talking about this, says he thinks he has the authority to use the 14th Amendment on the debt ceiling.
00:17:58.500 What's funny about that is Janet Yellen went on TV on Sunday morning and actually contradicted that, saying, no, I don't think that we can use that.
00:18:06.840 There's a lot of mixed signals coming out of this White House.
00:18:10.100 What is the 14th Amendment and why are Democrats all of a sudden obsessed with it?
00:18:14.760 Well, Democrats hate the debt ceiling.
00:18:16.740 They don't want anything that constrains spending or that constrains debt.
00:18:21.020 And so this is an extreme legal theory.
00:18:24.460 I think it's a frivolous legal theory, but it's something that the radical left is seizing upon right now.
00:18:30.720 Now, what does the 14th Amendment say?
00:18:32.520 In particular, this focuses on Section 4 of the 14th Amendment.
00:18:36.700 So the 14th Amendment was one of three amendments that was passed right after the Civil War.
00:18:42.940 The 13th Amendment ended slavery.
00:18:45.420 The 15th Amendment gave African-Americans the right to vote.
00:18:50.260 They're foundational landmark amendments.
00:18:53.280 The 14th Amendment was likewise absolutely foundational.
00:18:56.860 And its most important provisions ensure everyone gets the equal protection of the laws.
00:19:03.660 That's called the Equal Protection Clause.
00:19:05.780 And also protects the rights to due process, that you cannot have life, liberty, or property deprived from you by states without due process of law.
00:19:16.080 And that was incredibly important protection of rights, and especially rights for African-Americans who had been enslaved prior to the Civil War.
00:19:24.620 And the 14th Amendment was critical.
00:19:26.960 It was the first major step and constitutional step to protecting people's civil rights.
00:19:32.520 Now, Section 4 dealt with something different, which we'd just come through a Civil War.
00:19:37.040 It was very expensive.
00:19:37.800 And there were a bunch of debts that the United States had incurred fighting against the Confederacy.
00:19:43.920 And there were also a bunch of debts the Confederacy had incurred fighting against the Union.
00:19:50.080 And what the Congress wanted to do in the 14th Amendment is to say, we're going to pay all the debts of the Union, the debts that were incurred fighting to keep America whole, but we're not going to pay the debts of the Confederacy.
00:20:04.480 The money they borrowed to wage civil war, we're not going to charge the taxpayers for that.
00:20:09.800 We're not going to pay that.
00:20:11.060 You're out of luck if you loan money to fuel the rebellion.
00:20:14.020 So here's what Section 4 says, quote,
00:20:17.320 The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.
00:20:34.480 But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of an insurrection or rebellion against the United States or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave.
00:20:51.760 Now, notice part of that was saying, OK, there's no debt for the slaves who are liberated.
00:21:02.500 It's not like the prior slaveholders could bring a legal claim or say, pay us back.
00:21:07.040 It's like, no, slavery was horrible and evil, and it is ended and you ain't get nothing.
00:21:11.700 That's what Section 4 of the 14th Amendment said.
00:21:15.020 Now, what has happened is the far left has seized upon that, and in particular the language that says the validity of the public debt of the United States shall not be questioned.
00:21:30.280 And they say, well, that means the debt ceiling is unconstitutional and Biden can just borrow anything he wants.
00:21:36.180 That position is absurd.
00:21:39.300 It's not what it says.
00:21:40.820 What it says is that the United States was going to pay our debts from fighting the Civil War.
00:21:47.220 But and to be clear, two people who agree with that are Barack Obama and Joe Biden two days ago.
00:21:58.400 Back in the day in 2011, Barack Obama actually said this specifically about the 14th Amendment and the debt ceiling.
00:22:07.840 Listen to Obama back in 2011.
00:22:10.500 Now, the gentleman asked about the 14th Amendment.
00:22:14.200 There is there is a provision in our Constitution that speaks to making sure that the United States meets its obligations.
00:22:25.980 And there have been some suggestions that a president could use that language to basically ignore this debt ceiling rule, which is a statutory rule.
00:22:37.340 It's not a constitutional rule.
00:22:41.360 I have talked to my lawyers.
00:22:44.140 They don't they do not.
00:22:47.280 They are not persuaded that that is a winning argument.
00:22:50.180 I mean, that's the president of the United States of America, Joe Biden back in 2011, excuse me, Barack Obama, I should say, back in 2011, saying that.
00:23:00.280 Yeah, look, Obama, the same thing.
00:23:02.940 The left was pressing Obama to do this and Obama was willing to stand up to him and say, nope, we can't do it.
00:23:08.740 And just two, three days ago, the left was pressing Biden to to embrace this same wacky claim.
00:23:14.740 And he told progressives, nope, nope, can't do that.
00:23:17.740 And then what happened is Bernie Sanders gave a speech and said, use the 14th Amendment, ignore the debt ceiling, borrow, borrow, borrow, bankrupt the country.
00:23:25.860 That's not exactly what he said.
00:23:27.280 It's basically what he said.
00:23:28.880 And you know what Biden did?
00:23:30.420 The same thing he's done for two and a half years.
00:23:32.520 Every time Bernie Sanders and the socialists bark, he rolls over.
00:23:37.320 He does whatever they say.
00:23:39.500 And so he's was in Hiroshima, Japan at the G7.
00:23:44.160 He wasn't even here negotiating on the debt ceiling.
00:23:46.420 And he said, well, gosh, you know, I think maybe we can do something on the 14th Amendment.
00:23:50.380 But then he says, yeah, but it'd be challenging court.
00:23:53.280 It'd be a real problem.
00:23:54.760 So he showed some leg on the 14th Amendment.
00:23:58.660 But the claim would be laughed at a court.
00:24:02.260 And there's a reason Janet Yellen, Biden's Treasury Secretary, was on TV yesterday morning on a Sunday show saying, no, no, we can't do that.
00:24:13.120 It is it's it's the extreme left in the Democrat Party who want the debt ceiling eliminated for all time because they want to borrow us into oblivion.
00:24:24.900 And let me make another point about even if their argument were right, and it's not.
00:24:32.480 But if their argument were right, that something about Section 4 of the 14th Amendment constrained what the president did here, what that would mean is it would mandate that Joe Biden implement prioritization.
00:24:51.160 Do what I said.
00:24:52.020 In other words, it would mandate at most what the 14th Amendment would say is that when you hit the debt ceiling, Joe Biden must pay interest on the debt first.
00:25:02.480 There's nothing in the 14th Amendment that says Joe Biden has the ability to fund the IRS and the Department of Labor and every other agency without an appropriation from Congress.
00:25:16.100 The Constitution is absolutely clear.
00:25:18.360 The power of the purse is given to Congress, which means the executive cannot spend money that Congress doesn't appropriate.
00:25:25.500 And so Biden can meet the debt.
00:25:29.700 And so if he does that, his threat of default goes away.
00:25:34.440 But there is nothing there is no credible argument.
00:25:37.640 In fact, it it's absurd.
00:25:40.220 I haven't even heard anyone bother to make the argument that the 14th Amendment would let Biden do what the left really wants,
00:25:47.480 which is spend on the entirety of the federal government in perpetuity, even without Congress acting.
00:25:53.600 That is not the way the Constitution operates.
00:25:56.600 And it has not been the way the Constitution has ever operated in in over two centuries of our nation's existence.
00:26:03.080 Lastly, before we move on to this other big topic with Bud Light, if people are listening right now, they say, OK, Senator, what do I need to do this week?
00:26:13.020 Do they need it?
00:26:13.680 What do they need to be doing?
00:26:14.580 Do they need to call their senators, their congressmen, both?
00:26:17.500 And what should they be asking for?
00:26:20.080 Look, I think the best solution is support with the House bill.
00:26:24.320 The House bill is reasonable.
00:26:26.020 It is a good solution.
00:26:27.200 It is not extreme.
00:26:29.240 It is a modest incremental step that that takes makes real progress in reining in that the out of control spending and debt.
00:26:38.500 It is a very reasonable offer.
00:26:41.200 Now, at the end of the day, does anyone think that the House bill is exactly what we're going to end up with?
00:26:47.860 No, it's going to be a negotiated agreement somewhere between Congress and the White House.
00:26:53.260 But the White House is gambling that they can just say, hell no, jump in a lake, and the media will protect them.
00:27:01.940 And so everyone listening to this publicly speak out, call out the Democrats, call out the White House to stop gambling with our economy
00:27:11.960 and to accept the House's very reasonable offer to rein in spending and start to get our fiscal house in order.
00:27:26.380 Canadian women are looking for more. 1.00
00:27:28.420 More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them.
00:27:32.640 And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast.
00:27:36.280 I'm Jennifer Stewart.
00:27:37.480 And I'm Catherine Clark.
00:27:38.500 And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women, entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers,
00:27:46.100 all at different stages of their journey.
00:27:48.280 So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.
00:27:51.520 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:27:57.040 I want to move to another issue, and that is the issue of Bud Light, Senator.
00:28:01.120 You had a very interesting thing to say on Bud Light on Fox and Friends.
00:28:07.860 Talking about the partnership with Bud Light and with Dylan Mulvaney and the idea that this was
00:28:16.360 potentially marketing purposely to young people, kids, those under 21, which is something that you're
00:28:23.360 not supposed to do.
00:28:24.980 But if you look at Mulvaney and who her target audience is, it's very clear that a significant
00:28:30.980 portion of it is 21 and well below 21, why would Bud Light have wanted to do this?
00:28:37.760 Now, I want to play for everybody what you said, a portion of it on Fox and Friends.
00:28:43.080 Listen.
00:28:43.780 Now, you're also a member of the Congress Committee and Commerce Committee, I should say.
00:28:48.600 And you want to investigate what Bud Light was doing with Dylan Mulvaney.
00:28:52.360 It destroyed a brand that may not recover.
00:28:55.340 What's your focus?
00:28:56.200 Well, listen, I can't think of a company in modern times that has more alienated its customer
00:29:02.540 base and seem to have so little understanding of who it is that actually drinks Bud Light.
00:29:08.020 But this week, I sent a letter to the CEO of Anheuser-Busch along with Senator Marsha Blackburn
00:29:13.500 because the CEO of Anheuser-Busch is also the CEO or the chairman of the Beer Institute,
00:29:19.380 which is the regulatory body, the industry regulatory body that regulates itself.
00:29:23.640 And one of the rules that beer companies are supposed to follow is they're not supposed
00:29:27.860 to market to kids.
00:29:29.040 Remember the whole Joe the Camel thing?
00:29:31.540 This is the same thing here.
00:29:32.640 Well, you know what?
00:29:33.500 Dylan Mulvaney, a massive percentage of Dylan Mulvaney's audience are kids.
00:29:38.460 And Budweiser was trying, I believe, with this ill-fated marketing attempt to target teenagers.
00:29:44.160 If you look at things Dylan Mulvaney has online, it's things like Days of Girlhood.
00:29:48.820 But there's another video where Dylan Mulvaney is singing, my name is Eloise and I am six.
00:29:54.240 There's another one where Dylan Mulvaney is shopping for Barbie dolls.
00:29:57.720 These are clearly things aimed at teenagers and even children younger than teenagers, which
00:30:03.300 violates the rules.
00:30:04.340 And so we're calling on the Beer Institute to investigate the degree to which Anheuser-Busch
00:30:09.800 knowingly was marketing to children in going down this road.
00:30:14.200 Senator, you never stop.
00:30:15.100 Senator Ted Cruz, thanks so much.
00:30:16.560 Appreciate it.
00:30:17.240 Senator, the idea that they are policing themselves, in a sense, and would investigate themselves,
00:30:23.880 that just in itself seems like the whole system is rigged, that the people that may
00:30:30.340 have done the campaign are the ones that are regulating the campaigns.
00:30:33.840 Well, it's an unusual circumstance.
00:30:35.680 And it so happens that right now, the CEO of Anheuser-Busch is also the chairman of the
00:30:42.200 Beer Institute, which is the industry regulatory body.
00:30:44.640 It's a self-regulatory body that was agreed to.
00:30:47.640 But one of the things they've agreed to is fairly strict limitations prohibiting marketing
00:30:55.520 to minors, that they're supposed to market to adults, people 21 and over.
00:30:59.980 And, you know, I mentioned Joe Camel.
00:31:02.240 You remember there was a whole they stopped focusing on Joe Camel in the cigarette context.
00:31:08.220 The same principle applies to beer, that they're not supposed to, you know, Barney the dinosaur
00:31:12.920 should not be marketing beer.
00:31:15.280 That's fairly obvious.
00:31:17.200 The point that I raise, and this is a letter that I sent with Senator Marsha Blackburn, is
00:31:22.180 if you look at Dylan Mulvaney, and I'm setting aside the transgender issue, which is what's 0.82
00:31:27.200 dominated the media attention.
00:31:28.440 I'm just looking at what Dylan Mulvaney, who the audience is, and whether it's on TikTok
00:31:35.080 or Instagram, the audience is overwhelmingly kids.
00:31:39.060 A lot of them are teenagers.
00:31:40.960 A lot of them are teenage girls.
00:31:42.320 A lot of them are prepubescent girls. 1.00
00:31:45.000 You know, the song that Dylan Mulvaney sings, I am Eloise and I am six.
00:31:51.060 That's not even a 19 or 20 year old.
00:31:52.940 Six.
00:31:54.100 Shopping for Barbies.
00:31:55.200 The last I checked, 16 year olds don't shop for Barbies.
00:31:58.540 That's eight, nine, 10 year olds that are shopping for Barbies.
00:32:02.240 And what I am pressing on is to what extent did Bud Light deliberately market to teenagers
00:32:13.400 and even preteens?
00:32:15.760 And to what extent did they have any data that said, okay, if we get preteens and teenagers
00:32:21.060 drinking Bud Light, they might be a customer for the rest of their lives.
00:32:25.200 And if they did so, that is in direct violation of the rules governing the marketing of beer.
00:32:32.180 You know, there's one also, if you go back, the Bud Light VP of Marketing actually not only
00:32:39.560 doubled down on her extreme woke strategy, which was to completely radically change this
00:32:45.300 company.
00:32:45.720 But she mentioned declining sales when she took over and also mentioned young people.
00:32:54.760 I want people to hear this.
00:32:55.900 Now, this was before the Mulvaney controversy, but this is the Bud Light VP of Marketing in
00:33:01.500 her own words in a interview.
00:33:04.180 I'm a businesswoman.
00:33:04.980 I had a really clear job to do when I took over Bud Light.
00:33:08.580 And it was, this brand is in decline.
00:33:11.860 It's been in decline for a really long time.
00:33:13.980 And if we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand, there will be no
00:33:19.580 future for Bud Light.
00:33:20.720 Young drinkers to drink this brand, Senator.
00:33:23.660 I mean, that's pretty brazen to say.
00:33:26.680 Again, I'm going to read the transcript.
00:33:29.020 And if we do not attract young drinkers to come and drink this brand, there will be no
00:33:34.600 future for Bud Light.
00:33:36.040 Those are her words.
00:33:38.320 You know, it's funny, Ben.
00:33:40.980 In the couple of days since I sent this letter calling for this investigation, the left, both
00:33:47.820 Democrats and in particular left wing media outlets have been losing their mind.
00:33:51.700 MSNBC has been running these pieces saying, you know, Cruz is this radical filled with
00:33:57.480 hate.
00:33:58.140 And none of them actually address the substantive point that beer companies are bound by rules
00:34:04.820 not to market to kids.
00:34:06.680 And none of them are disputing what I think is indisputable is that Dylan Mulvaney is engaged
00:34:14.520 in an aggressive campaign marketing to kids.
00:34:18.340 Those are facts and those are facts that, look, when it comes to transgender issues, today's 0.78
00:34:24.380 left is so extreme that you're not allowed to question anything about it.
00:34:28.280 And so they're reflexively circling the wagon saying, how dare Cruz ask these questions?
00:34:36.360 Well, you know, I've got a job to do.
00:34:38.360 My job is to represent 30 million Texans.
00:34:40.480 And my job is also as the ranking member on the Commerce Committee.
00:34:43.780 We've got direct jurisdiction over beer companies marketing to kids.
00:34:48.340 And so we're going to press to get to the bottom of it.
00:34:51.360 And I'll tell you this, if Bud Light has marketing documents that say have projections of how
00:34:57.680 many teenagers they could get to drink Bud Light by marketing to them, that is going
00:35:04.300 to be a big, big problem if they deliberately went down this road to do what you just played
00:35:10.680 from the VP of marketing to try to get more young drinkers underage.
00:35:15.340 Yeah, well, in her words, we've got to get young drinkers.
00:35:19.360 That's pretty damning right there.
00:35:21.360 I want to also talk about a Republican and I would say icon, especially behind the scenes,
00:35:28.800 an individual who's we should take a moment and celebrate his life, who has passed away.
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00:37:02.440 Senator, there is a name.
00:37:04.020 Some may remember this name.
00:37:06.480 Others may not.
00:37:09.020 But nonetheless, C. Boyden Gray, who's a lawyer.
00:37:14.920 He has been in the establishment, conservative, passed away at the age of 80.
00:37:20.980 What I love about his story is he's a former Democrat.
00:37:23.740 He actually served as White House counsel under George Bush and aided presidents, including Ronald Reagan and Donald J. Trump.
00:37:31.260 He has passed away.
00:37:32.900 What an amazing man.
00:37:34.000 You've spent a lot of time with him.
00:37:35.540 Let's talk a little bit about what he did for this country.
00:37:38.600 Well, Boyden Gray passed away yesterday.
00:37:41.220 He was 80 years old.
00:37:42.780 He was someone who was a good friend.
00:37:43.840 I knew Boyden very well.
00:37:45.760 He lived a remarkable life.
00:37:47.180 He was born in 1943 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
00:37:52.600 And he came from a family who had been an extraordinary family.
00:37:57.160 His dad, a fellow named Gordon Gray, was the U.S. National Security Advisor to President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
00:38:06.100 So when it comes to government service, it was a tradition in the family.
00:38:09.440 His grandfather was president of the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.
00:38:13.700 So Boyden came from considerable wealth.
00:38:19.400 He went to Harvard University in 1964.
00:38:24.000 He wrote for the Harvard Crimson.
00:38:26.120 And then he enlisted the Marines.
00:38:28.560 And he was a sergeant in the Marines from 1965 to 1970.
00:38:31.800 He then went to the University of North Carolina Law School, and he was editor-in-chief of the North Carolina Law Review, and he was first in the class.
00:38:41.120 And from that, he became a law clerk to the Chief Justice of the United States, to Earl Warren, which is pretty extraordinary.
00:38:48.300 And he became a very prominent lawyer in private practice at the firm of Wilmer Cutler and Pickering, which is a big D.C. law firm.
00:39:00.440 And then in 1981, he went to work for the White House as legal counsel for the vice president, George Herbert Walker Bush.
00:39:10.400 When Bush became president, he came back and became the White House counsel for Bush 41.
00:39:17.500 And he was very close to Bush 41.
00:39:19.740 The two of them played tennis together.
00:39:21.360 They were close friends together.
00:39:23.400 Boyden was someone who – he was an unusual guy.
00:39:25.880 He was about six feet six.
00:39:27.760 He was tall, skinny, lanky, and he was brilliant.
00:39:32.120 I mean he had a mind that was a marvel to behold.
00:39:35.920 And he was passionate about freedom.
00:39:40.140 He'd been a Democrat.
00:39:41.260 He'd been a law clerk for Earl Warren, but he was in no way, shape, and form a liberal.
00:39:45.840 He believed in freedom and especially economic liberty.
00:39:49.840 When it came to regulatory reform, I don't know that there's been a more important person in the last 50 years fighting to rein in the regulatory state than Boyden Gray.
00:40:01.580 He was relentless.
00:40:02.980 He was very active with FreedomWorks, which played a big part in electing me.
00:40:08.260 Boyden was also an early supporter of mine.
00:40:12.580 And when I ran for the Senate, Boyden supported me right at the outset.
00:40:16.940 You know, when I first ran in 2012, when we started, I was at 2% in the polls.
00:40:21.660 And we refer to the folks that were with us from day one as the 2%ers. 1.00
00:40:26.420 You had to be really out of your mind.
00:40:28.160 Actually, Ben, you were a 2%er. 0.99
00:40:30.620 That's right.
00:40:31.160 And Boyden was a 2%er. 0.95
00:40:32.760 And he hosted fundraisers for me at his home in D.C.
00:40:38.240 He backed me early on.
00:40:40.740 And Boyden was brilliant.
00:40:42.640 He was also deeply involved in battles over the Supreme Court.
00:40:47.320 When Clarence Thomas, when Bush 41 nominated Clarence Thomas, Boyden was intimately involved in defending Clarence Thomas for the vigorous attack that came after him and getting Thomas through the Senate.
00:41:01.540 And, you know, Boyden was – I'll tell you something that actually a lot of people don't know.
00:41:06.960 One of the things Boyden was quite passionate about was people with disabilities.
00:41:12.160 And Boyden played a pivotal role in passing the Americans with Disabilities Act.
00:41:19.460 Wow.
00:41:19.660 Boyden Gray and Dick Thornburg, who was the attorney general under Bush 41, the two of them were the leading architects of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
00:41:27.860 And Bush 41 signed it.
00:41:29.160 And, you know, it's interesting.
00:41:30.740 A lot of Democrats pretend, oh, the ADA is their policy.
00:41:35.160 Well, no.
00:41:36.060 It was Republicans who wrote it.
00:41:37.440 It was Republicans who passed it.
00:41:39.220 It was Republicans who made it happen.
00:41:40.920 And I believe the Americans with Disabilities Act is a very conservative policy.
00:41:45.400 We started this podcast by talking about the dignity of work, that everyone wants to work, that everyone wants to provide for their own family.
00:41:55.260 And I think people with disabilities, that's especially true. 1.00
00:41:59.440 Look, if you're blind, if you use a wheelchair, if you have some other impairment, look, if you're blind, you probably can't be an airline pilot.
00:42:07.960 But there's a lot of good work you can do.
00:42:10.520 If you're, you know, if you use a wheelchair, you're probably not going to run track. 1.00
00:42:16.420 But there are lots of things you can do, including be the governor of the state of Texas.
00:42:20.460 The ADA was all about empowering people with disabilities to work to their maximum potential and to have their maximum independence.
00:42:32.340 And fast forward to 1999 and 2000.
00:42:36.800 I was a young lawyer.
00:42:37.680 I was working on George W. Bush's campaign and was domestic policy advisor and covered all sorts of legal areas.
00:42:44.460 But one of the areas I covered was disability policy.
00:42:47.780 And I worked very closely with both Boyden and Dick Thornburg in drafting what became George W. Bush's disability policy, which was the new Freedom Initiative, which he introduced and passed early in his presidency.
00:43:03.120 And it, again, made a real difference helping people with disability live with the maximum independence and engagement in the workforce.
00:43:14.300 All of that is an incredible legacy.
00:43:19.100 But I'll tell you, Ben, actually, my favorite memory of Boyden that has nothing to do with his impact in life.
00:43:25.860 But Boyden, I've spent time at his house.
00:43:28.500 He had a beautiful house in Georgetown.
00:43:31.820 And one of my favorite memories was was being at his house with with him and a couple of other folks playing bridge with him.
00:43:39.300 And he was brilliant and fun and smart.
00:43:42.680 And he had a dry sense of humor.
00:43:45.740 And I'm grateful for the legacy Boyden Gray left for our country.
00:43:52.760 And both Heidi and I were going to miss him.
00:43:54.920 He was an extraordinary man and an extraordinary patriot.
00:43:57.780 And I love the story.
00:43:59.880 And like you said, what a great legacy to leave behind in incredible work that he has done.
00:44:06.180 And again, a Boyden Gray lawyer for the Republican establishment, an amazing guy, passed away at the age of 80.
00:44:14.240 What an amazing life he had lived and an incredible legacy that he's left behind.
00:44:19.940 Don't forget, we do this show three days a week.
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