Verdict with Ted Cruz - May 01, 2026


Landmark Supreme Court Decision Prohibiting Racial Gerrymandering plus Dems Go w the Nazi Communist in Maine & Out-of-Control DEI Homeless Policies


Episode Stats


Length

38 minutes

Words per minute

163.78

Word count

6,360

Sentence count

333

Harmful content

Misogyny

14

sentences flagged

Toxicity

23

sentences flagged

Hate speech

30

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Ben Fergus (D-Maine) discuss the ruling by the Supreme Court this week outlawing racial gerrymandering, and the Maine Governor's decision to drop out of the race to run for re-election.

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.
00:00:02.700 Guaranteed human.
00:00:04.840 Welcome.
00:00:05.460 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you as well.
00:00:09.000 It's nice to have you with us.
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00:00:32.660 Senator, we've got a lot to talk about, including the Supreme Court on Wednesday
00:00:36.200 in a pretty significant ruling, 6-3.
00:00:40.140 It made liberals' heads explode.
00:00:42.420 The Louisiana 2024 congressional map, it was redrawn to create a second majority black district,
00:00:49.580 constituted an illegal racial gerrymander.
00:00:52.920 That is what they've decided.
00:00:54.440 And of course, the left is furious right now over this,
00:00:56.920 saying that this is racism run amok.
00:00:59.220 the Supreme Court's illegitimate. I guess we should now pack the court again as soon as they
00:01:03.020 get back in power, right? Because that's what they're planning on doing anyway.
00:01:06.580 Well, the Supreme Court's decision this week outlawing racial gerrymandering was a landmark
00:01:13.320 decision. It was incredibly important. For decades, there has been a practice of drawing
00:01:18.780 congressional districts based on race, deliberately segregating people based on whether they're
00:01:24.560 African-American or white or Hispanic and putting them into districts segregated based on race. The
00:01:30.740 Constitution prohibits discrimination based on race, and the Supreme Court today in a landmark
00:01:36.300 decision said this racial gerrymandering has to stop. As you noted, the Democrats are losing their
00:01:42.260 mind over this because theirs is a party that is built on racial discrimination, and indeed
00:01:47.820 the fact that they are competitive, they are close to having a majority in the House of
00:01:53.980 representatives is driven in a big part by their blatant gerrymandering, both political gerrymandering
00:02:00.600 and racial gerrymandering. We're going to break down what that decision means, what precisely the
00:02:05.140 court held, and why it was correct. We're also going to talk about an amazing thing that happened
00:02:11.760 this week in Maine. The incumbent Democrat governor of Maine, Janet Mills, was running for
00:02:17.560 for Senate, and she dropped out. She dropped out because in today's Democrat Party, she was not 0.81
00:02:25.640 nearly crazy enough to win a primary. Instead, the Democrats want a self-declared communist 0.98
00:02:34.240 with a Nazi tattoo. That is now the beating heart of the Democrat Party. We're going to talk about
00:02:41.000 that and what that means for the country. And finally, we're going to talk about DEI programs
00:02:45.940 run amok in homeless services and portland oregon giving special priority if you happen to be lgbt
00:02:54.840 uh if you happen to be a racial minority services yeah you know if you're just some poor white 0.99
00:03:01.620 schlub who's starving and out on the street nope yeah you rank last uh in the left's hierarchy of 0.97
00:03:09.720 who deserves care we're going to give you the facts and bring the receipts on that one as well
00:03:14.600 It's like a PSA. If you're homeless, tell them you're the opposite sex of what you are. 0.99
00:03:18.720 You'll get fed really well and get some great benefits in the liberal cities.
00:03:22.480 It's truly incredible.
00:03:23.260 Ben, how is that not a joke?
00:03:25.820 Like what you just said there is actually accurate.
00:03:29.720 And it's so insane that a normal, rational person listening to it must be saying,
00:03:35.300 that makes no sense. That's the reality we're living in.
00:03:38.720 And we're going to break it down. It's an amazing story.
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00:05:38.320 All right, so let's get back to this Louisiana ruling.
00:05:41.260 You've got a lot to say on this, and you broke it down a little bit in the intro there,
00:05:45.660 but I want people to understand the core of this case, how it got all the way to the Supreme Court.
00:05:50.740 So can you kind of give it just a synopsis of what got us there so quickly?
00:05:54.600 So I can, but let me step back for a minute.
00:05:57.040 Let me give a little broader context.
00:05:59.020 So two decades ago, in 2003, I started as the Solicitor General of Texas, which is the chief
00:06:06.840 lawyer for the state in front of the U.S. Supreme Court. 2003 was the first time Republicans had won
00:06:13.180 a majority in the House of Representatives in decades. And so we now had a majority in both
00:06:18.660 the House and the Senate at the state legislature. And so Texas redistricted in 2003. It was a mid-decade
00:06:25.700 redistricting. At the time, that had not been done very often, and they did it because Texas at the
00:06:32.660 time, in 2003, Republicans were winning a significant majority of the statewide vote,
00:06:39.560 and yet the congressional delegation was majority Democrat. It was the most egregious
00:06:44.860 partisan gerrymander in the country. The Democrats had drawn it to elect Democrats,
00:06:52.280 even though the voters were voting for the opposite party.
00:06:56.520 And so the state legislature came in, redrew the map.
00:07:00.240 The result of it was it elected five additional Republicans.
00:07:04.060 But I was the lawyer who was charged with day one,
00:07:08.500 number one, with advising the legislature while they were drawing the map,
00:07:12.300 number two, with defending the map in the federal district court
00:07:16.420 when the Democrat plaintiffs challenged it,
00:07:18.520 And then number three, I argued the case before the U.S. Supreme Court defending the map and ended up winning a landmark 5-4 decision upholding that map.
00:07:28.560 And so there was a good two years of my life when I lived in the world of redistricting.
00:07:34.280 And I got to tell you, Ben, the case law at the time was so convoluted and internally contradictory that it made no sense.
00:07:43.860 So on one hand, the Supreme Court had said for a long time, the Fourth Amendment, the protection of equal protection under the laws, and the 15th Amendment, the protection that no one shall be denied the right to vote based on race, that that prohibited racial gerrymandering, drawing lines based on race.
00:08:03.040 and yet at the same time the prevailing supreme court precedent was that the voting rights act
00:08:09.200 a statute passed by congress essentially mandated redistricting based on race so you had these two
00:08:17.260 lines of cases that just made no sense because they contradicted each other and and i gotta say
00:08:22.700 having been part of the process and and at the time the legislature was drawing the lines
00:08:28.060 it was a very political process and i and i was instructed on behalf of the ag's office that i'd
00:08:33.680 come in and say look if you need legal advice i'll give you my best legal advice yeah if you
00:08:38.700 want to make a political determination do you want to take out this congressman or that congressman
00:08:43.140 you're entitled to make that determination you're an elected state legislator i'm not so if you're
00:08:49.780 going to engage in those political determinations i'm going to step outside and when you need me
00:08:53.860 for a legal opinion i will give it to you i will tell you ben after going through that process
00:08:58.660 after going through the litigation i wanted to take a shower because there was so much of the
00:09:04.640 litigation that was explicitly racial in a way that normal civilized people they don't talk about
00:09:11.280 the black seat the hispanic seat the white seat and yet it was all very explicitly all about race
00:09:18.460 that's what the court turned around we're going to explain more in just a minute 0.99
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00:09:51.620 all right senator so let's get back to it you were mentioning a moment ago uh you're in the room
00:09:57.980 you're seeing how the politics this worked in the past where they were they were literally
00:10:01.920 designing districts all over the country uh based on race uh if it's a white district a black
00:10:08.420 district a hispanic district the list goes on and on and now the supreme court has made it pretty
00:10:12.960 darn clear yeah that way of doing business is not going to work anymore but by the way i'll give you
00:10:18.100 little history as to how sordid racial gerrymandering has been, particularly by Democrats.
00:10:24.360 So when we were trying the Texas redistricting case in 2003, we had testimony on the stand from
00:10:31.160 Eddie Bernice Johnson. Eddie Bernice Johnson was an African-American woman, a member of Congress
00:10:36.460 from Dallas, and she had been a state senator when the 1991 redistricting map was drawn, which is
00:10:44.800 what really put in place the egregious Democrat gerrymander. And she testified about how Martin
00:10:51.280 Frost, Martin Frost was a Democrat congressman from Texas. He'd really driven the gerrymandered.
00:10:58.120 And she said, Democrats knew how to ensure that they elected white Democrats, 0.69
00:11:04.100 which is they would draw a district where they would put just enough African Americans, 0.70
00:11:09.720 but not too many, and just enough Hispanics but not too many. And she said the reason is in a
00:11:16.040 Democrat primary, if you had a black candidate run, the Hispanics and the white Democrats would
00:11:23.560 all vote against the black candidate. If you had an Hispanic candidate run, the African Americans 0.65
00:11:30.660 and the whites would all vote against the Hispanic candidate. And so Eddie Bernice Johnson testified
00:11:36.980 that the Democrats knew how to put just enough that neither a black candidate nor an Hispanic
00:11:42.400 candidate could win the primary. But then what would happen is when a white Democrat won,
00:11:50.100 all the Democrats would come together and support the white candidate, the general,
00:11:53.600 the white candidate would win. So we had a system where in Texas, a large majority of Texans were
00:12:03.220 voting Republican, and yet we were electing a congressional delegation that was majority
00:12:07.440 Democrat, and it was a bunch of white Democrats. And what the state legislature did in 2003
00:12:12.560 is they essentially obliterated the white Democrats. They ended that partisan gerrymander 0.68
00:12:18.100 and that racial gerrymander, and it ended up electing a number of more Republicans. 0.62
00:12:24.300 But I hated litigating this kind of case because I don't like talking about the black seat,
00:12:32.500 the white seat the hispanic seat look i i'm the first hispanic senator from texas but but i don't
00:12:38.860 consider myself i'm not a senator for hispanics i'm not a senator for whites i'm not a senator
00:12:43.820 for blacks i'm a senator for texans i'm elected by 32 million texans it's my job to represent
00:12:49.820 everyone and and the left is so bean countery that what happened in louisiana is you had a
00:12:57.300 court decision that ordered louisiana they had one black democrat seat in the congressional
00:13:03.900 delegation and the court said it is mathematically possible to draw a second black democrat seat now
00:13:10.980 the seat was ugly as can be it ran diagonally the entire length of the state it like reached out
00:13:17.820 you know you look at the origin of the word gerrymandered you know the origin of the word
00:13:22.880 gerrymander, don't you, Ben? Give me the history. So it was Elbridge Gerry, who was one of the
00:13:30.380 founding fathers, one of the original framers of our country, who was a congressman at the
00:13:38.040 beginning of the country. And he had a district that was so ugly it was drawn and it looked like
00:13:44.540 a salamander. And so gerrymander is a combination of his name, Gerry, and salamander. And it's a
00:13:51.660 long practice, but what the court had ordered, the lower court, had ordered the state of Louisiana
00:13:57.300 because it is mathematically possible to draw a line where you just look for every black Democrat,
00:14:02.260 you put them all in one district, and they could win two congressional seats. If it's possible to
00:14:07.480 do it, you must do it. That's what the court had ruled. That went up to the U.S. Supreme Court,
00:14:12.900 and the U.S. Supreme Court overturned that. And the technical legal question they were analyzing
00:14:18.740 is whether complying with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act
00:14:24.220 constitutes a compelling interest under the Constitution.
00:14:28.240 Now, what does that mean? That sounds like gobbledygook.
00:14:30.700 So the Supreme Court had long held that both the 14th Amendment,
00:14:34.580 the Equal Protection Clause, and the 15th Amendment,
00:14:37.260 the prohibition, the protection of the right to vote based on race,
00:14:41.220 that both of those made it illegal to draw lines based on race.
00:14:45.740 And in order to overcome that prohibition,
00:14:48.740 you had to clear what is called strict scrutiny. Strict scrutiny is a legal standard
00:14:53.160 that takes a compelling government interest that is as narrowly tailored as possible. That's the
00:15:01.300 only circumstance in which you can survive strict scrutiny. Well, the court had never
00:15:07.060 answered the question for 30 years whether complying with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act
00:15:12.980 constitutes a compelling state interest that lets you essentially ignore the Constitution's
00:15:20.420 prohibition on racial discrimination and gerrymandered based on race. And the court,
00:15:26.240 6-3, a decision by Justice Alito, said no. No, a statute from Congress. Look,
00:15:31.860 the Voting Rights Act was enacted to protect people's rights to vote. It was enacted to
00:15:37.560 vindicate the Constitution. It wasn't enacted to direct legislatures, you must discriminate based 0.98
00:15:44.980 on race. And I got to say, Ben, the reaction of Democrats to this decision, it has been hysterical.
00:15:52.800 They are losing their minds. They're basically saying that there's never going to be an African
00:15:56.160 American ever elected office again in Louisiana is how they're trying to play this right now,
00:16:00.800 which is also absurd. Well, you know, it's interesting because the way the Democrats are,
00:16:04.900 their view is the only way an African-American or Hispanic can get elected is in a district that is
00:16:11.380 drawn only to elect an Hispanic or African-American Democrat. How about winning statewide? Look,
00:16:16.900 I'm Hispanic. I'm elected statewide. Tim Scott is African-American. He's a Republican. He's
00:16:22.840 elected statewide. But you know what? When you're elected statewide, you have to appeal to people
00:16:28.300 more broadly. When you're in an egregiously gerrymandered congressional district,
00:16:32.160 you end up only appealing to the extremes. That's how you get a Maxine Waters. That's how you get an
00:16:39.160 AOC. That's how you get an Ilhan Omar, because their districts are drawn where the only voters
00:16:45.660 they're listening to are the radical zealots. The Ilhan Omar is listening to the Somali fraudsters 1.00
00:16:52.040 because that's who elects her. The result of this is states now will not be able to draw 1.00
00:16:58.080 districts based on race. They'll draw them based on political issues, based on geography, based on
00:17:03.660 history, and you will end up hopefully having members of Congress that represent the citizens
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00:18:42.640 ifcj.org. All right, there's a very interesting story I want to get to now, Senator, and it is
00:18:49.360 one that involves with how crazy do you have to be to get elected in the Democratic Party now? 0.82
00:18:57.540 There's a very good chance we're going to have a Mandani 2.0 running LA soon. And now if you're
00:19:03.480 just like a semi-crazy liberal, you may have to drop out because there's no way you can win,
00:19:09.220 apparently with a democratic mark to socialists and communist party well something really
00:19:14.540 significant happened this week which is in in the democrat primary in maine janet mills the
00:19:21.160 incumbent governor a democrat was running now janet mills had been recruited to run
00:19:25.380 by chuck schumer yeah she had a ton of money she was schumer said this is the best candidate for
00:19:33.100 we the democrats to beat susan collins who's the incumbent republican senator um janet mills let's 1.00
00:19:40.420 be clear janet mills is not a moderate she's a whack job lefty look janet mills how did she get 0.99
00:19:46.680 known nationally she got known nationally for fighting with donald trump at a gathering of 0.99
00:19:51.320 governors where she said damn it in maine we will fight to the death so that boys can compete in
00:19:57.580 girls sports and men can compete against women in women's sports that and that went viral by the 0.97
00:20:02.300 It was like a it was a shouting match in an awkward situation with the president.
00:20:05.900 And that was like her moment.
00:20:07.640 Yeah.
00:20:08.100 So so she is is a hardcore left wing Democrat supported by Chuck Schumer, the Democrat leader, the incumbent governor with a ton of money in a normal world that that's almost like designed in a lab.
00:20:22.100 The best candidate the Democrats could find to beat an incumbent Republican senator.
00:20:26.040 Yeah, you've literally won statewide.
00:20:27.680 You could win statewide again.
00:20:29.000 This is not hard.
00:20:29.800 Well, except for the fact that Bernie Sanders and the wacko left wing of the Democrat Party recruited this guy named Graham Plattner.
00:20:39.140 Now, Graham Plattner is being marketed as an oyster farmer, a blue collar guy.
00:20:44.980 Yeah.
00:20:46.080 Graham Plattner is a self-described communist.
00:20:51.340 That's what he says he is.
00:20:53.200 Yes.
00:20:53.460 Graham Plattner.
00:20:54.000 Believe them, by the way.
00:20:54.700 Believe them when they tell you who they are, because that's exactly who this guy is.
00:20:57.900 graham platner has a nazi tattoo on his chest he's a communist who is wearing a nazi tattoo he is 0.99
00:21:10.620 also viciously misogynist he has attacked women and said said said when if they get raped it's 0.97
00:21:18.320 it's women's fault that's who he is he was running against chuck schumer's choice and
00:21:24.860 janet mills just dropped out because the democrat party one of the most consequential things that
00:21:31.360 has happened in the last few years is the democrat party has become radicalized and extreme
00:21:35.600 and and it now i think it's a very good question can anyone win a democrat primary in maine
00:21:40.860 who doesn't have a nazi tattoo because that's the that's the standard they're holding and i want you
00:21:47.180 to listen to this is an ad that the nrsc the national republican senatorial committee put out
00:21:52.800 in response to this and it's simply someone reading graham plattner's reddit posts he's
00:21:59.080 posted on reddit i'm going to apologize what reddit is so people understand if maybe you're
00:22:03.640 not familiar with that i want you to understand exactly it's this sort of online chat room
00:22:08.460 uh that is used and it's used often by a lot of people who are very fringe and and so these are
00:22:13.780 actual things that graham plattner has typed in and i'm going to apologize a number of these
00:22:18.440 things are pretty graphic, but this is what the now almost certain to be Democrat nominee for
00:22:26.720 Senate in Maine, this is in his own words, word for word, what he said. Give a listen.
00:22:33.060 And now for a dramatic reading of Graham Plattner's Reddit comments. 0.99
00:22:38.100 Holy f***. How about people just take some responsibility for themselves and not get so 0.97
00:22:42.060 f***ed up they wind up having sex with someone they don't mean to? Rape is a real thing. If 0.99
00:22:47.060 so worried about it to buy kevlar underwear you think you might not get blacked out up around 0.97
00:22:52.100 people you aren't comfortable with why don't black people tip i work as a bartender and
00:22:57.620 always amazes me how solid this stereotype is living in white rural america i'm afraid to
00:23:03.380 tell you they actually are i got older and became a communist still got the guns though i don't trust
00:23:10.020 the fascists to act politely i did used to love america or at least the idea of it these days i'm 0.60
00:23:16.580 pretty disgusted by it all feel free to back it up with facts facts this was the gayest not in a 0.97
00:23:24.280 fun dick sucking way thing i've ever seen this has been a dramatic reading of graham plattner's 0.98
00:23:31.360 reddit comments now now that is all real he wrote all of that and that is the democratic party saying 0.96
00:23:38.340 this and by the way ben ben ben that may be the most we've had to bleep out anything on verdict
00:23:45.320 since we've been doing the show that's actually yeah probably very accurate yes like like every
00:23:50.620 post we have to bleep out because it's filled with profanity he's attacking women who are 0.79
00:23:55.360 victims of rape he's attacking african americans he's attacking homosexuals but understand there 0.87
00:24:02.140 is a hierarchy in the democrat party and at the top of the hierarchy are islamists and communists 0.98
00:24:10.760 And if you're an Islamist and communist, then you can hate, you know, Mondami has all these comments slamming homosexuals. 0.97
00:24:19.240 But that's OK. If you're an Islamist and communist, that is that that that is like the purest of the left wing. 0.95
00:24:25.480 I want you to listen for a party that likes to say that Donald Trump is Adolf Hitler. 0.76
00:24:30.820 I'm pretty sure this is the only guy that I know that's running for office right now on the Democrat or the Republican side that has a Nazi tattoo.
00:24:37.880 Just want to clarify there.
00:24:39.580 To the best of my knowledge, no member of the Senate has a Nazi tattoo.
00:24:43.440 And I'm not aware of any candidate for a Senate who has a Nazi tattoo.
00:24:47.400 I want you to listen to Chris Van Hollen, who's an incumbent Democrat senator from Maryland,
00:24:52.880 defending his Nazi tattoo and defending his saying that women should, quote, act like an adult to avoid rape.
00:25:03.820 Give a listen.
00:25:04.400 And this is an incumbent Democrat senator saying, oh, this is this is just fine with us.
00:25:09.320 The dude has not had a Nazi tattoo.
00:25:11.560 I mean, let's be clear about what's going on here.
00:25:13.420 I mean, is that how do you view that?
00:25:15.220 I mean, it seems it seems to be at least somewhat disqualifying and traditional.
00:25:20.660 Certainly historically.
00:25:21.440 I mean, let's take a couple issues, including the comments he's made in the past.
00:25:25.920 I mean, he's been very clear that he went into combat on behalf of the United States.
00:25:31.000 He went through a really rough period, PTSD-type period, and he has himself said there are lots of things he's done and said that he completely regrets.
00:25:42.980 And I do believe people should have second chances and that people can learn from their mistakes, and I think he's been doing that.
00:25:52.660 Senator, I love there how they're like, at the beginning, they're trying to be nice about it.
00:25:56.060 I mean, it used to be like a disqualifying thing in politics if you had a Nazi tattoo.
00:26:02.160 Used to be, but not right now. 0.62
00:26:03.800 Now it's up for grabs.
00:26:05.140 We'll flip a coin and see what happens.
00:26:07.340 And then you have the senator there going, well, you know, you got to understand him.
00:26:10.480 He went through a lot.
00:26:11.800 So therefore, we're going to get him a jail-free card because he went through a lot. 0.65
00:26:15.760 And, you know, when you go through a lot, Nazi tattoos are just one of the things you decide to put on your body.
00:26:20.960 Look, the Democrat defense of this is people make mistakes. 0.65
00:26:24.640 That was just a phase.
00:26:26.060 By the way, they're not defensive about him saying, I am a communist.
00:26:30.920 Like that, that represents where the Democrat Party is.
00:26:35.140 By the way, there's another image while he's on the campaign trail where he does what is a flat out Nazi salute.
00:26:41.920 I mean, arms straight up, Sig Heil.
00:26:44.720 You remember when the media went crazy, when Elon Musk was at a stadium and he beat his chest and waved and they said, oh, that's a Nazi salute.
00:26:53.820 and like every media outlet what this guy did i don't know how to describe it other than he held
00:27:01.380 his arm up in a full would have been proud that's the best way to put it and and of course elizabeth
00:27:06.880 warren was campaigning with him saying this is my kind of guy understand this is no longer fringe
00:27:14.380 in the democrat party someone who says they're a communist someone who says women effectively 0.98
00:27:19.600 deserved to be raped, someone who wears a Nazi tattoo and doesn't apologize for it, 0.98
00:27:26.940 that is now an unbeatable candidate in a Democrat primary. The incumbent Democrat governor with the 1.00
00:27:34.860 support of Chuck Schumer could not win and had to drop out. And that's a dangerous dynamic that
00:27:41.560 these people are no longer fringe in the Democrat party. And I'm not saying every Democrat agrees
00:27:48.600 with him but i don't know a single democrat other than john fetterman and again we keep saying john
00:27:54.900 fetterman is the the exception that proves the rule other than john fetterman that i don't know
00:28:00.820 a single democrat has said you know maybe he shouldn't have gotten a nazi nazi tattoo
00:28:06.040 like just they won't do that because all they care about is power
00:28:11.880 and the money the energy the volunteers the activists in the democrat party are all on the
00:28:22.500 extreme left and so every one of them is captive to them and i gotta say that's not healthy for
00:28:28.400 america ben i i worry i would like to see two functioning rational parties in our country
00:28:36.960 America's better.
00:28:38.020 Yeah, have a grand debate.
00:28:39.100 America's better when you have Democrats that are not so far left wing as to be like on the utter fringes.
00:28:49.160 And yet that's where they've gone.
00:28:51.160 And I don't see anyone in the Democrat Party trying to pull them back.
00:28:54.480 And that's ultimately that's very bad because these people, they're getting elected and they're driving the Democrat Party further and further into crazy town.
00:29:04.260 I want to take a quick moment and talk to you about an incredible organization, and
00:29:08.540 it is called Compassion International and how you can get involved.
00:29:13.080 I want to be honest with you for a second about how an act of compassion really feels.
00:29:18.220 A couple of years ago, I made the choice to partner with an amazing organization called
00:29:23.880 Compassion International.
00:29:25.620 Why?
00:29:26.240 Because I wanted to sponsor a child in need.
00:29:29.060 It was a nice idea, sure, but I had no idea just how much that simple act would change
00:29:35.620 my life as well.
00:29:37.300 I sponsored Nadia and got to watch her life change right in front of my eyes, going from 1.00
00:29:42.940 starving literally alone on the streets to getting the health care and education she 1.00
00:29:48.420 needs to reach her God-given full potential.
00:29:52.180 I got to be a part of that change, and the light of that compassion not only illuminates
00:29:57.380 in her. It illuminates now in me. That is the power of compassion. The light of Christ shines
00:30:04.960 on all of us. Feel it for yourself and change literally a child's life. Change the world and
00:30:12.160 you also change yourself. You can sponsor a child today. Visit Compassion.com. That's
00:30:18.980 Compassion.com. Senator, this might be one of the most entertaining stories that I've seen in a long
00:30:25.520 time. If you want to know how bigoted the Democratic Party is, look no further than how
00:30:31.620 they treat homeless people. They've got a scoring mechanism now. You get bonus points for certain
00:30:40.660 things while being homeless in America, and then you get services, aka rewarded, based on your race
00:30:48.780 and your sexual identity. Now, this is like English is a second language. Gets you two points.
00:30:55.280 So just think of that as a jumper. 1.00
00:30:56.820 If you're pregnant, that's a three-pointer. 1.00
00:30:59.260 We give you more points if you're pregnant. 0.98
00:31:01.920 If you're a child under five, you get three points. 0.98
00:31:04.700 If you're a child under 18, you only get one point.
00:31:07.360 So in other words, and if you're head of household and you're under 18, we give you bonus points,
00:31:11.940 two points for that.
00:31:13.020 There's an actual quota list of points you receive depending on how you describe yourself.
00:31:18.700 And if you say that you know you're gay or lesbian or transgender, that's bonus points
00:31:23.320 as well.
00:31:23.780 So look, we talked a minute ago about the hierarchy of victim groups in the Democrat
00:31:30.620 Party.
00:31:31.160 It's a notion that's called intersectionality.
00:31:34.220 And in the Democrat Party, being LGBT or being a racial minority is more privileged
00:31:43.040 than simply being poor and being homeless.
00:31:46.740 And let's talk, we're going to talk about Portland, Oregon, because Portland, Oregon
00:31:50.200 it is almost like a deranged faculty lounge experiment gone awry. I'm going to read from
00:31:58.500 an article in ProPublica. To be clear, ProPublica is not a right-wing outlet. It is a left-wing
00:32:03.140 outlet. But here's what they described. Quote, as the city of Portland, Oregon clawed its way
00:32:08.720 out of the pandemic, it faced a new set of crises. The city's homeless population was growing.
00:32:15.160 Tents lined some city blocks.
00:32:18.140 High-powered business associations held press conferences demanding the city remove homeless people
00:32:22.720 and touted self-funded surveys saying that without action, businesses and residents would flee the city.
00:32:29.120 By late spring 2021, the city committed to a new strategy that then-Mayor Ted Wheeler said would
00:32:36.980 reprioritize public health and safety among homeless Portlanders, ultimately allocating
00:32:44.500 $1.3 billion by the end of 2024. Now, let's see what the results were.
00:32:54.820 Although the city spent roughly $200,000 per homeless resident, now let's stop and think,
00:33:02.940 200 grand per homeless resident you could house them and feed them 200 grand is a lot of money
00:33:08.700 that's what they spent what do you think it did what what do you think massively spending and
00:33:14.700 saying we're prioritizing the safety of homeless people what do you think it produced i'm gonna
00:33:19.000 guess close to nothing because it's a government program and liberals are in charge sorry call me
00:33:23.240 a cynic uh you're not cynical enough nothing would be better close to nothing would be better
00:33:29.800 the death rate among homeless people in portland quadrupled went up 400 the death rate
00:33:40.280 went up from 113 in 2019 to more than 450 in 2023 so when liberals say we are going to focus
00:33:54.320 on the homeless if you're homeless god help you because at at least in in portland what that meant
00:34:02.900 was the death rate quadrupled now they also put in place as you referenced an elaborate point system
00:34:10.320 i mean and this is not a joke like it's literally and they even tell you like hey
00:34:14.680 you can't get double points if you get points in one category compared to another category so if
00:34:19.780 you're pregnant and under 18 that's bonus points but only if you haven't already gotten points for
00:34:24.160 being pregnant on another piece of paper for another point system. It's just, it's unbelievable 0.84
00:34:30.080 how well organized it is. So look, and I'll say actually, pregnant makes some sense. Prioritizing 0.97
00:34:36.540 pregnant women, that has a reasonable basis. You are more vulnerable. But English as a second 0.96
00:34:43.340 language, that was worth two points. Head of a household under 18, that was worth two points. 0.79
00:34:50.940 interest in lgbtq services that was worth one point just interest so just make sure you say
00:34:59.260 i i i think i've thought about being gay or transgendered or a lesbian and then you get
00:35:04.120 one bonus point so total disabilities impacting entire household ability to secure housing i
00:35:11.060 don't even know what that means but it's worth three points yeah there you go um interest
00:35:16.580 in culturally specific services.
00:35:20.860 That's two points.
00:35:21.880 Again, I don't know what that means.
00:35:22.900 By the way, comparing that,
00:35:23.840 just so you understand how woke this is,
00:35:26.440 if you are over the age of 55,
00:35:29.080 55 plus, which is a higher vulnerable category,
00:35:31.680 I think we can all agree on that for homelessness,
00:35:34.340 you get two points for that.
00:35:36.240 You get the same number of points
00:35:38.020 if you're interested in culturally specific services.
00:35:41.020 You can just catch up to somebody that's 55, 60, 70, 80,
00:35:44.800 85 90 years old yeah and also worth two points is being a domestic violence survivor
00:35:53.700 now that actually is rational and makes sense that you would prioritize domestic violence
00:35:58.180 survivors but in the portland world interest in a culturally specific service is equally
00:36:05.940 prioritized to being a domestic violence server survivor now how about this
00:36:12.060 um what do you think being poor is like like having let's say something crazy zero income
00:36:20.940 like if you're trying to help homeless people having zero income you would you would think
00:36:26.060 that would be one of the top scoring things on a sheet because that would get you obviously to
00:36:30.920 be homeless so you would think like that would be worth something right guess what it's not
00:36:35.700 one point one point one point and if you're homeless for a year or more you only get one
00:36:40.440 point. But if you are currently homeless, this is what's weird. Currently homeless gets you two
00:36:46.440 points. Wouldn't that also mean you get one point for being homeless for like 12 months or more or
00:36:52.760 no income? I don't know. Like, this is DEI on a whole nother level of stupid.
00:36:59.580 Look, here's what they said they've done. So Multnomah County, Oregon, which is home of 1.00
00:37:06.100 deep blue portland where deaths of homeless people quadrupled between 2019 and 2023 the county's
00:37:12.900 screening tool for housing services is designed and this is a quote from the county to quote
00:37:17.560 prioritize bipoc households lgbtqia2s plus yep and people with disabilities yes again
00:37:31.420 And this is not – they're spending $200,000 per homeless person.
00:37:38.420 With $200,000 –
00:37:39.840 You can buy somebody a house.
00:37:41.440 You can buy someone a house.
00:37:43.060 But that would make too much sense.
00:37:46.280 You could pay rent for a long time.
00:37:47.820 You could get someone a hotel room.
00:37:49.200 You could feed them.
00:37:50.300 You could get the medical care.
00:37:51.780 And yet the death rate quadrupled because they were more interested in LGBTQ, LMNOP, like the number of letters there.
00:38:00.200 I can't even. It reminds me of that crazy Canadian who got up and gave this incredibly long stream that I'm pretty sure was her Wi-Fi password. 0.93
00:38:10.400 But they're more interested in their woke policies than they are actually in helping someone who needs help. 0.72
00:38:17.500 And that's tragic.
00:38:18.680 You mentioned $200,000 a person. Just to put it in perspective with everything we know, you've got to ask yourself the question how much fraud is involved here.
00:38:25.800 Massive. Massive.
00:38:26.740 Yeah, it's hard to spend that much money, $200,000.
00:38:30.300 It's going to be interesting to watch, see where this goes.
00:38:31.960 Somebody's driving a Ferrari, somebody's driving a Lamborghini.
00:38:35.620 Yeah, you're absolutely right about that one.
00:38:39.120 Don't forget, we do this show Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
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00:38:43.980 You've been listening to Verdict with Ted Cruz.
00:38:45.540 We will see you on the podcast this week and back on this radio station next weekend.