Verdict with Ted Cruz - April 12, 2020


Easter In Isolation


Episode Stats


Length

26 minutes

Words per minute

182.56029

Word count

4,853

Sentence count

334

Harmful content

Misogyny

5

sentences flagged

Hate speech

7

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Ted Cruz and Michael Knowles discuss the impact of the government shutting down the Easter services in public for Christians and the implications for religious liberty in a country founded on religious liberty . Ted and Michael talk about how the government is trying to stifle freedom of worship.

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 .
00:00:00.000 For the first time in probably 1,700 years, Christians around the world will not be permitted 1.00
00:00:11.160 to celebrate Easter in public.
00:00:14.140 What is a country founded on religious liberty supposed to do when the government locks the
00:00:19.140 churches?
00:00:20.100 This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
00:00:21.600 Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz and Happy Easter.
00:00:31.820 I'm Michael Knowles, Senator.
00:00:33.560 Sorry we can't be celebrating today together.
00:00:36.280 We're at a safe social distance.
00:00:38.680 I think I am not exaggerating here when I say this might be the first time since the Diocletian
00:00:46.060 persecution that Christians have not been able to go to their churches on Easter.
00:00:50.580 Is that an exaggeration?
00:00:52.220 Well, you know, I got to say it is so commonplace to have podcasts talking about the Diocletian
00:00:57.260 persecution.
00:00:58.440 I mean, I mean, it really, I'm worried that we're going to run into the traffic online.
00:01:03.680 That's true.
00:01:04.320 The views spike through the roof, right?
00:01:06.540 We, you and I have never seen anything like this in our lifetimes.
00:01:09.880 And it's, you know, all of us, we're doing everything from home.
00:01:13.800 Yeah.
00:01:13.940 And whether that's church, whether that's work, whether that's time with a family, it
00:01:20.440 has good aspects to it.
00:01:21.740 And it, it also makes people pretty stir crazy.
00:01:25.500 This, I think, is the big issue for people.
00:01:27.660 I think for a while, people like taking a few days off work.
00:01:30.920 Obviously, that got real old, real fast when people lost their jobs.
00:01:33.920 I think people actually, for the first few days of this shutdown, were kind of excited.
00:01:38.560 It was something new.
00:01:39.480 It was dangerous.
00:01:40.220 Maybe we were all going to band together.
00:01:42.300 Again, that kind of got real old, real fast.
00:01:44.520 The one thing that I think was always a sticking point was the churches, the government closing
00:01:50.180 down the churches.
00:01:51.640 To my mind, that's unprecedented in the United States.
00:01:55.300 Is that what you're hearing and seeing as well?
00:01:57.800 I mean, is that just a different category?
00:01:59.820 Look, it's a hard challenge because if you have, as we do, a pandemic, a public health outbreak,
00:02:06.540 there is precedent for quarantining laws.
00:02:08.880 There's precedent for preventing large gatherings.
00:02:13.600 You know, I will say it, in this time of crisis, you know, people's real character comes out.
00:02:20.120 Who they are comes out.
00:02:21.620 And I got to say, some of these Democratic politicians are just jackbooted thugs.
00:02:28.360 I mean, they're authoritarians.
00:02:30.180 They believe in the power of the state.
00:02:32.700 So, you know, Bill de Blasio, mayor of New York.
00:02:36.220 Now, listen, New York has got it worse than anywhere else in the country.
00:02:39.400 It is horrific.
00:02:40.740 The deaths that have happened there, the infections, people are scared.
00:02:43.340 I get all of that.
00:02:44.900 But de Blasio said, listen, if any church or synagogue meets, we're going to come after
00:02:49.900 you and we will permanently shut you down.
00:02:53.480 Now, who the hell are you to permanently shut a church or synagogue down?
00:02:57.380 And I actually understand saying, okay, you can't have a public gathering.
00:03:00.600 You know, what my church is doing, we're meeting virtually.
00:03:02.960 Yeah.
00:03:03.080 I think that actually makes good sense.
00:03:06.280 But you see some of these political leaders just eager to strip away liberty.
00:03:15.920 And they seem to have a real, real animosity to faith.
00:03:19.120 That's right.
00:03:19.540 If you look at New York, I mean, that's exactly the right example where it's not de Blasio
00:03:24.280 saying, we're going to shut you down for the whole of this pandemic.
00:03:28.160 You are not going to be allowed back into your building, pastor, until afterward.
00:03:31.920 But that's not where they stopped it.
00:03:33.280 They actually said, we will permanently shut you down.
00:03:35.560 And he actually singled out churches and synagogues.
00:03:38.960 He didn't go after any other faith groups.
00:03:40.740 He just went after churches and synagogues.
00:03:42.900 How convenient, you know.
00:03:43.980 So it's not just de Blasio, though.
00:03:46.000 It's going on around the country.
00:03:47.680 And even for the people, I know a lot of conservatives, we want to keep our rights.
00:03:52.040 But we're obviously willing to entertain some quarantine.
00:03:56.060 In Pennsylvania, they arrested a woman for driving her car.
00:03:59.220 Oh, my gosh.
00:04:00.100 You know, driving your car, you're not violating social distancing.
00:04:03.560 You're sitting in your own damn car.
00:04:05.600 Like, this is not a police state.
00:04:07.360 Right.
00:04:07.780 Not yet.
00:04:08.060 And you're seeing, you know, North Carolina, they invested, arrested David Benham.
00:04:14.980 David and Jason Benham, the Benham brothers, are friends of mine.
00:04:18.020 They're great guys.
00:04:19.880 So the North Carolina governor, a Democrat, determined that elective abortions are essential. 1.00
00:04:26.260 And so that abortion clinics could gather.
00:04:27.860 They could all get together.
00:04:28.800 And so the Benham brothers went outside and wanted to provide pregnancy counseling, wanted
00:04:34.800 to peacefully tell moms that were coming in, that were considering abortions, you know,
00:04:40.180 there are alternatives.
00:04:40.760 If you want to pursue adoption, here are some of the resources available to you.
00:04:45.200 Right.
00:04:45.420 And they sent the police to arrest them.
00:04:48.640 And actually, the video, I tweeted out the video.
00:04:50.820 I'd encourage you to watch that video because, you know, David is, he said, look, we're being
00:04:57.740 peaceful.
00:04:58.220 He's very calm.
00:04:59.040 He's not angry.
00:04:59.860 He's not, they're not harassing anyone.
00:05:01.700 He said, we're six feet away.
00:05:02.960 We're not gathering.
00:05:03.900 We're not violating social distancing.
00:05:05.940 But if the governor is going to say that the abortion is essential, that the doctors and
00:05:11.640 all the staff can gather there, more than 10 people in public, then how can that be essential?
00:05:16.820 But yet the counseling of pregnancy alternatives is not equally essential to, and it's interesting,
00:05:24.740 the officers are arresting him and you can see the officers are reluctant.
00:05:28.680 And David, to his credit, he's praising the officers.
00:05:30.920 He said, listen, thank you for your service, particularly now.
00:05:34.000 I mean, he's polite.
00:05:35.360 He's praising them.
00:05:36.640 And it just shows, look, and I don't want to make this partisan.
00:05:43.060 And if there are Republicans doing it, I will happily call them out too.
00:05:46.480 It just seems to be, it's the Democratic governors and the Democratic mayors that, that in that
00:05:52.640 instance, you know, he's, he's hard pro-abortion and hard and anti-pro-life.
00:05:59.940 Yeah.
00:06:00.580 And, and, and so it's not, if you want to say neither of them are essential, fine.
00:06:04.680 That, I actually understand that determination, but you can't pick one side and silence those that
00:06:10.880 would try to give, give alternatives.
00:06:12.860 Well, it's so ironic and it totally gives away the game where they say, if you gather together
00:06:16.560 to procure an abortion, that will not endanger life.
00:06:20.200 And let me tell you something, abortion 100% of the time endangers life.
00:06:24.440 They say, no, that won't endanger life.
00:06:25.960 But if you go and offer some counseling, you also gather together that will endanger life.
00:06:30.180 It's so backwards.
00:06:31.260 It's such a power grab.
00:06:32.380 You know, certain states have made exceptions.
00:06:34.840 And, you know, in Colorado, they arrested a dad for playing tee ball with his kid.
00:06:38.940 Oh, geez.
00:06:40.520 I mean, that's nutty.
00:06:42.140 I spoke last night to a Nevada state legislator who was complaining the Nevada governor has shut
00:06:49.320 down golf courses.
00:06:50.800 Now, I got to say, Michael, it's hard to think of a sport more situated to social distancing.
00:06:57.240 Listen, if you're with it, if you're closer than six feet, you ain't doing it right.
00:07:00.660 Like, you ever, like, I'm all for acting sensibly to protect the public safety, but there's some
00:07:08.080 that are just eager to put on that jackboot and it's scary.
00:07:12.640 Now, what do you make of these different states?
00:07:14.220 I mean, some states, they've been arresting pastors if they try to hold services.
00:07:17.920 Other states have made an exception for religious services.
00:07:21.180 And, you know, it varies state by state.
00:07:22.920 Luckily, we haven't had one national, one size fits all policy for this.
00:07:26.800 I mean, how is that going to play out even after the pandemic's over?
00:07:31.660 Listen, our law has always respected religious liberty.
00:07:35.160 The First Amendment protects religious liberty.
00:07:37.140 I think we should do everything possible to protect people's right of faith.
00:07:43.300 At the same time, I think the responsible thing to do is to act to protect the community.
00:07:51.760 So my church, Heidi and I are members of First Baptist Church in Houston.
00:07:54.840 It's a big, big church.
00:07:57.080 We've been going to church virtually online.
00:08:00.680 Our pastor made the very, I think, very sensible decision to say, we're not going to bring people 0.99
00:08:05.040 together and have thousands of people in a sanctuary while there's a global pandemic going on.
00:08:09.760 And, you know, I will say as it's Easter, Easter, you know, Easter Sunday from, for as long as I can remember, we would always go to church on Easter Sunday.
00:08:22.760 That's the, and celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.
00:08:25.900 But it's worth also remembering, you know, for those of us who are Christians, the church is not a building.
00:08:35.900 The church is not bricks or mortar.
00:08:38.280 So I'm, I'm sad not to be there.
00:08:40.600 It's nice to be able to sing and have the music in person.
00:08:44.400 It's nice to be able to worship together, but it actually has been beautiful.
00:08:48.760 So what we do every Sunday morning is, is we, we come down, come down to the living room and we put, uh, we put the live stream of our church up, up on, uh, up on the TV.
00:08:58.500 Yep.
00:08:59.120 And, and Heidi and the girls and I, just the four of us in the living room and we'll watch and participate.
00:09:04.040 And, you know, we have to kind of drag the girls out of bed and, you know, it's nice.
00:09:07.860 I'll have a cup of coffee and I'll confess I've done church sometimes in my slippers, which I don't normally do.
00:09:13.640 Ditto, same here.
00:09:14.620 I'm ashamed to say, but I did.
00:09:16.360 But, you know, it's interesting.
00:09:17.700 Number one, I was talking to my pastor earlier this week.
00:09:19.760 He said that, that, that the viewership has gone through the roof, that, that a ton of people are logging on and watching it online who wouldn't necessarily come in person.
00:09:30.480 And, and it is interesting because we're ending up having much longer conversations with our girls about, about the sermon, about what's going on.
00:09:41.880 You know, if you're in church, you don't want to talk, talk in church and bother people.
00:09:44.920 If you're in your living room, you can talk to each other and you can say, Hey, what do you think about what he just said?
00:09:50.140 And, and, and, you know, you can have conversations that flow out of it that, that, that, that are, you know, what the Bible said is the, is the church is the body of believers is, is everyone who is a Christian that we're the church, not the building.
00:10:06.980 Right.
00:10:07.280 And, and, and, and so even though East Easter Sunday, most of us are not going to be in a physical church.
00:10:15.160 If, if, if we are giving thanks for Jesus's resurrection, then we're celebrating Easter and the church is celebrating. 0.53
00:10:23.760 And, and, and I hope also, listen, this is a time, you know, I remember back when Hurricane Harvey hit Texas and, and it was devastating in Texas.
00:10:32.580 It was second costliest natural disaster in U.S. history.
00:10:37.280 And it was really amazing to see the churches all throughout Texas, especially on the Gulf coast, coming out and helping people, helping people whose homes had been destroyed, who everything they had was lost.
00:10:47.140 And, and it was a time when the church was doing what the church should, the church should be helping people, people in need, people who are scared, people, you know, our church, we've had one, one member of a woman in her eighties who died of COVID-19.
00:11:01.620 And, and, and, and, you know, the ministry for seniors, it's, it's hard for seniors to be isolated.
00:11:08.600 And, and, and this is a time I hope, and I believe the church is doing more to help people who are scared, who are in need.
00:11:16.580 Even if we don't gather in person, it's much more important for the church to reflect the love of Jesus than to stand in, in one particular building.
00:11:25.160 Right. And I think there's something else going on here too, with regard to the pandemic, which is people always think about Easter, but you forget that you don't get Easter without Good Friday.
00:11:34.260 This is a reminder, this whole season of Lent, which by the way, has corresponded exactly with the coronavirus pandemic.
00:11:41.220 Lent begins and you get ashes on your head if you're a Catholic or, or certain other denominations.
00:11:45.720 And they say, remember, man, you are dust, to dust you shall return.
00:11:49.380 And it's very easy in modern life to forget that someday, eventually, we're all going to die.
00:11:54.800 We might not die from the coronavirus, let's hope, but we will die eventually.
00:11:59.480 And that reminder that, you know, I think it was Dr. Johnson said, hanging concentrates the mind.
00:12:04.600 You know, when you look death straight in the face, it focuses you on the bigger questions.
00:12:08.520 In a way, locking down the churches might have a pretty positive effect on religion in the country.
00:12:13.880 It also brings families together, whether you, whether you like it or not.
00:12:19.300 Look, Caroline said, you know, I can't stand it.
00:12:22.020 I've been in this house for a month.
00:12:23.460 And I mean, and she's 11 and I'm like, sweetheart, I know we all have, we're like ready to jump out the windows.
00:12:30.380 But there have also been, so every day, Heidi and I, we've had, had, had lunch with the girls.
00:12:37.540 We've had dinner with the girls.
00:12:39.620 That's never happened in the whole time.
00:12:41.480 Of course.
00:12:41.820 We've been a family.
00:12:42.560 We've never had, and, and, and I'll tell you one thing we've, so we've started doing a couple of things.
00:12:46.940 One, we go for walks every evening.
00:12:49.520 Sometimes family walks, we walk the dog.
00:12:51.620 Sometimes it's just Heidi and me, but like the whole neighborhood is out walking.
00:12:54.660 And, and, and it's like, like central Houston.
00:12:56.760 Now it's, we're six feet apart.
00:12:58.260 We stay, we stay at a distance, but it's like central Houston became Mayberry.
00:13:02.240 I mean, it's an amazing thing, but something else we've started doing that, that I wanted to do for a long time is, is every night we're, we're reading from the Bible.
00:13:11.980 And, and listen, I've wanted to do that regularly.
00:13:17.140 And we've done it sometimes.
00:13:18.240 We've done it sporadically, but not with, with real discipline.
00:13:21.260 And part of it is, you know, being in the Senate, typically I get up Monday mornings, I fly to DC and I'm gone for four days.
00:13:28.820 I come back Thursday night.
00:13:31.120 It's hard as a dad, if you're in town two, three days a week, it's hard to sort of have a family discipline of after dinner, we sit down and read the Bible.
00:13:40.900 And, and, and I've, I've been like guilty and thinking about it.
00:13:45.220 We need to do more of it.
00:13:46.380 And so with all this time at home, Heidi and I decided, all right, we're going to do this.
00:13:49.760 And our girls didn't like it. 1.00
00:13:51.280 I mean, it was a big battle.
00:13:52.640 It was not, this was not mild or easy.
00:13:55.720 And so we started with just Matthew chapter one and reading three chapters a night.
00:14:02.440 I think the first night it took us, I don't know, hour, hour and a half to get through three chapters.
00:14:06.540 The girls were acting up. 1.00
00:14:07.600 It was, it was a bit of a mess, but it's interesting.
00:14:12.280 We've gotten through, I think we're at like Matthew chapter 24.
00:14:15.880 So, so we haven't been doing it that long, but it's been, been each night and, and it has been really, and, and what's interesting is it just so happens we're right now moving into Good Friday and Easter.
00:14:29.000 Like, like just, just the timing worked out.
00:14:31.540 We didn't sit down and plan it like this, but, but, you know, last Sunday was, was Palm Sunday.
00:14:38.120 And, and we were, we were reading in Matthew where it talks about Palm Sunday and Jesus riding into Jerusalem.
00:14:45.880 On the back of a donkey.
00:14:47.620 And by the way, my pastor said something very interesting that I didn't know.
00:14:50.160 I don't know if you knew.
00:14:51.460 Did you know that Palm Sunday, the Sunday before Easter was the day traditionally in Judaism when they selected the lamb to be sacrificed? 0.79
00:15:01.960 I did not know that.
00:15:03.340 I had never heard that.
00:15:04.720 Our pastor said that this last Sunday, and I thought that was fascinating because a lot of what we've been talking about with the girls was, was the parallel with, with Passover.
00:15:14.600 And, and, and, and, and the entire story of Passover, which we kind of take digressions as we're reading the Bible to say, okay, the people of Israel were in captivity in Egypt and, and the 10 plagues.
00:15:25.480 And so Catherine sang a song on the 10 plagues, like that, that, that struck Egypt.
00:15:29.580 But, but, you know, we were talking about, you know, that for the angel of death to pass over your home, that you had to put the lamb's blood on the side of the door on the top.
00:15:38.980 And, and, and, and that, that, that, that is what Easter is all about, is that Jesus was the lamb sacrificed for us.
00:15:48.840 And the Passover lamb, Jesus was that same sacrifice.
00:15:54.180 And that story, having the opportunity to talk about it at this time where, where Easter's at home.
00:16:04.000 Right.
00:16:05.160 It has made it, I think in many ways, more meaningful than being in a big service with a bunch of others.
00:16:12.220 Of course, you know, this is something that my wife and I have been doing too in our little one bedroom apartment.
00:16:16.900 And I think probably my greatest risk of death right now is not any pandemic.
00:16:21.140 It's going to be murder when my wife finally snaps. 1.00
00:16:23.820 But if that doesn't happen, you know, in the meantime, what we've been doing, especially because we're Catholic.
00:16:29.100 So we have certain icons and religious images around.
00:16:32.200 And when we go to church, now the church is at the kitchen table and we live stream it in from our priest who's down in Southern California.
00:16:39.140 And it's just him on a live stream.
00:16:40.840 And it really focuses you on these images.
00:16:44.020 So then it's just my wife and I sitting in kitchen chairs.
00:16:47.400 You know, there's no smells and bells.
00:16:48.720 There's no beautiful music going on.
00:16:50.340 It's really just us contemplating some of these images, listening to these words, listening to these prayers.
00:16:55.880 And, you know, it does remind you when Jesus says, when you pray, go into your innermost closet, you know, do it in solitude and really make it about that connection to God.
00:17:06.140 And it just gives you another sense when you go and pray the rosary at night and it's just the two of you and everybody's quiet.
00:17:12.940 No one's outside.
00:17:14.020 In a way, it really amplifies your prayer and your spiritual connection to God, even when you can't go into your own church.
00:17:23.880 Well, and I'll say this, this also cuts across faith.
00:17:27.300 So some good friends of ours who are neighbors who are Jewish, and they celebrated this week their Passover Seder, which ordinarily they would do with the whole extended family.
00:17:38.280 And they were telling me, okay, so we're just doing it with, you know, mom and dad, and they have a daughter who's really close friends with Caroline, and they have a son who's a little bit younger.
00:17:46.700 And they said what they're doing is just their FaceTiming on, I think, iPads with their extended family.
00:17:52.620 So with parents and sisters, you know, they're not, you know, most of us are not seeing our parents.
00:17:58.300 My dad's 81.
00:17:59.200 My mom's 85.
00:17:59.920 I haven't seen either one of them in over a month because I'm not going to jeopardize their health.
00:18:05.140 But it is interesting, even a Passover Seder, you know, I've been to a lot, lot of Seders, and they're wonderful and fun.
00:18:11.560 But you think of them as, you know, big groups of multi-generational extended family.
00:18:16.940 And with technology, you can even do that if it's just a few of you and you're trying to socially distance.
00:18:22.720 You can still have a wonderful faith and family experience together.
00:18:30.820 And I suspect we'll look back at these.
00:18:36.260 It wouldn't surprise me if when our girls are grown, they look back to this time of spending day after day and week after week together as a family as some of their favorite time ever.
00:18:49.300 Now, they wouldn't admit that now.
00:18:50.640 Right.
00:18:51.320 Who would?
00:18:51.820 But it is, you know, Caroline is in our front yard right now building a little bit of a treehouse and a tree and, you know, coming and pulling me out of I'm on conference calls with work and doing all just I'm in the middle of basically a tele-tour across Texas, like meeting, talking with all different communities.
00:19:13.800 But, like, Caroline comes yesterday and says, you know, Dad, we need your help to cut the lumber.
00:19:19.100 I'm not very handy, but thankfully I have told her, okay, no power tools.
00:19:24.480 As an 11-year-old, I don't want severed digits.
00:19:26.700 So I got the jigsaw and managed to cut the board without, in fact, severing any of my digits.
00:19:32.520 So that was good.
00:19:33.440 That's a positive.
00:19:33.720 But it's kind of right in the middle of the day.
00:19:35.320 It's like, come to the garage and let's cut lumber to build the treehouse.
00:19:39.200 There's something really nice about that.
00:19:40.880 And I've noticed the same thing, as you mentioned, with your friends in the Passover Seder.
00:19:45.140 People, family members, old friends that I have not called in a long time.
00:19:49.020 Now we're just doing calls because that's what people are doing.
00:19:51.640 I mean, it's – and speaking of connecting with people virtually, I know we've only got a few minutes left, but I do want to get to some of the mailbag because we've got some very important questions here.
00:20:00.720 This is the most important one that I've read in weeks, Senator.
00:20:04.080 This is from Amber.
00:20:05.400 Does Ted think Joe Exotic should be pardoned?
00:20:08.780 I'm serious.
00:20:09.540 Yes, I want his opinion.
00:20:11.480 Michael can answer too.
00:20:12.620 Senator, what's your answer?
00:20:14.900 Well, I will say I cracked up laughing that this week at the White House press conference they asked if Joe Exotic should be pardoned.
00:20:24.400 And President Trump, I'm not sure he knew what was going on, but said, yeah, yeah, we'll have to look at that.
00:20:28.680 And that was pretty darn funny.
00:20:32.500 I've got a pet theory that the prospect of Joe Exotic being pardoned is why Obama delayed endorsing Joe Biden because, you know, look, apparently Joe Exotic ran for president in 2016 against me.
00:20:48.700 I didn't know it at the time against Trump.
00:20:50.560 So who knows?
00:20:51.480 Maybe Joe Exotic's on the ballot in 2020 and Obama's holding the endorsement back waiting for the Tiger King endorsement.
00:20:58.860 This is the most brilliant political insight I have seen in so long.
00:21:03.400 I am now – I don't know my feelings on Joe Exotic getting a pardon other than I endorse Barack Obama endorsing Joe Exotic.
00:21:11.760 So I guess that means we've got to spring him from the slammer.
00:21:14.200 Very good point, Senator.
00:21:15.200 Next question from Peter, is there any evidence that China purposely delayed and lied in their report in order to tank the world economy considering that theirs was already in shambles? 0.54
00:21:27.880 So that's an interesting question.
00:21:29.780 There is absolutely evidence that China purposely delayed and that they covered up, that when the Wuhan outbreak was ongoing, that they hid evidence of it, that they punished the scientists who were trying to blow the whistle, including the doctor who courageously did it anyway and has since died of COVID-19.
00:21:51.140 You know, I'm not aware of any evidence that they did it with the intent of tanking the global economy.
00:21:58.280 I think that's probably a stretch, although when it comes to ascribing malign intentions to the Chinese communists, you almost can't stretch too much.
00:22:08.600 There's no limit.
00:22:09.260 But, you know, I had an old boss who was a federal judge who used to say, never attribute to malice what you can attribute to incompetence.
00:22:19.960 And listen, I think the Chinese covered it up because they were embarrassed, because they didn't want people to know. 0.99
00:22:26.600 I think there's a very real possibility that this outbreak occurred from some sort of accidental transmission.
00:22:34.260 There were two facilities within miles of the Wuhan wet market where we think this started that were studying coronaviruses in bats.
00:22:44.380 And I haven't seen any evidence that this was, look, there's some Internet theories that this was manufactured and is like bioterrorism.
00:22:53.900 You know, look, I'm skeptical that the Chinese government would release a virus on their own people.
00:22:59.660 We've seen tyrannical governments torture and murder their people.
00:23:03.260 But doing it deliberately, I've seen no evidence of that.
00:23:08.320 What strikes me as entirely plausible is that it was a screw up from one of the labs that may have been studying this virus.
00:23:18.080 As I said, we know they were studying coronaviruses from bats.
00:23:21.060 And then the whole cover up was to to hide their embarrassment, to hide their and the reason that matters is if they hadn't covered it up, we could have gone in.
00:23:31.360 We could have contained this outbreak maybe and found the people who were infected and isolated them and done the contact tracing and potentially stopped this outbreak from becoming an epidemic.
00:23:42.800 And then a pandemic, that if you stop it at the origin, it is entirely possible that the deaths worldwide and the trillions of dollars of economic destruction could have been covered up if the Chinese had, it could have been stopped if the Chinese hadn't engaged in this cover up. 0.89
00:24:00.900 All right. Final question.
00:24:02.780 This is maybe the most important one of all.
00:24:05.440 What are you eating on Easter and who is doing the cooking?
00:24:08.780 You know, it's funny.
00:24:09.500 I don't know.
00:24:10.420 So yesterday, Heidi and I were taking our walk and Heidi's like, all right, what do we want to do for Easter?
00:24:16.460 And I'm like, well, what do you mean what do you want to do for Easter?
00:24:18.240 And she's like, well, no, we need to like do something for Easter.
00:24:20.820 I'm like, did your family do like big Easter things?
00:24:24.880 And like, I got to admit, my family, like we would go to church.
00:24:27.940 Yeah.
00:24:28.500 And then we just come home and hang out as a family.
00:24:30.160 It was a Sunday.
00:24:30.760 I mean, we didn't like it wasn't a.
00:24:32.900 Put on the suit and tie and formal.
00:24:36.400 It was, I mean, it was not.
00:24:38.880 And we had this big discussion because Heidi kept asking me, no, no, what do we want to do?
00:24:43.080 And I'm like, what do you mean do?
00:24:44.640 Like, same thing we do.
00:24:46.240 And she's like, all right, how about an Easter egg hunt?
00:24:48.660 I'm like, OK, if we've done those for our girls.
00:24:50.820 And I think Catherine, who's nine, she's more into it than Caroline, is probably a little too cool for an Easter egg hunt.
00:24:56.740 But I'm like, sure, if you want to get some plastic eggs and put candy or money in them, put in the backyard, we can do that.
00:25:02.480 But so I don't know what we're going to eat.
00:25:05.920 That's the short answer.
00:25:06.800 We'll probably Heidi and I are terrible cooks. 1.00
00:25:08.920 Yeah.
00:25:09.640 Although Caroline has begun begun cooking at home.
00:25:12.320 So we haven't figured it out as the short answer.
00:25:14.440 I think we'll do a nicer, nicer meal than just cold pizza.
00:25:18.620 Right.
00:25:18.760 But but I don't know what it'll be.
00:25:23.100 And and maybe we'll order out.
00:25:24.720 It's literally Heidi is pressing me saying we need to have a big sort of Easter meal.
00:25:29.520 You know, most Easter's I would have done like gone to church and then like gone and taken my mom out to dinner or something and done like a brunch at a restaurant.
00:25:37.960 So we're obviously not going to do that.
00:25:39.720 So that's that you could always have the mimosas, but you got to do it at home.
00:25:42.980 You know, it's funny because I think what most people are going to do is more like what you did growing up, which is it'll be the first Easter in the pajamas.
00:25:50.320 And frankly, that doesn't sound so bad.
00:25:52.100 Nice time to spend with family.
00:25:54.060 Obviously, Senator, happy Easter to you and happy Easter to everybody else who is listening.
00:26:00.160 I'm Michael Knowles.
00:26:00.880 This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
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