Verdict with Ted Cruz - October 12, 2022


Shocking Audio Shows Hunter Biden BEGGING For Money From Family, plus Gas Prices Soaring Under Govt. Regulations.


Episode Stats

Length

52 minutes

Words per Minute

186.31126

Word Count

9,874

Sentence Count

664

Misogynist Sentences

12

Hate Speech Sentences

7


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.580 Guaranteed human.
00:00:04.700 Big breaking news in the Hunter Biden fiasco with the Biden family.
00:00:11.260 We're going to have that for you in just a moment.
00:00:13.940 Welcome.
00:00:14.480 It is Verdict with Ted Cruz and I am the new co-host, Ben Ferguson, here with you today.
00:00:20.800 We have a lot to talk about, Senator, obviously, in the news world, but this is a moment that
00:00:26.340 is an honor for me.
00:00:27.480 I am beyond excited to get to co-host your podcast with you and do this with Premier
00:00:34.780 Networks, with iHeart.
00:00:36.900 We're going to be expanding for everyone listening to three days a week, which is going to be
00:00:42.160 so much fun, I think, for the Verdict audience here and something that's been important to
00:00:47.860 you to be able to get to expand this and reach more people.
00:00:51.260 Well, Ben, that's exactly right.
00:00:52.560 And the expansion is going to change the format a little bit in that two of the three are
00:00:57.300 going to be audio podcasts.
00:00:58.420 So we're going to do video where the objective is going to be to continue to do video once
00:01:03.100 a week.
00:01:03.560 But two of the three, including obviously this one, are going to be audio only.
00:01:07.860 And that's one of the ways we're going to expand the coverage and hopefully connect with a
00:01:13.380 lot more folks that are looking for the inside scoop, looking to understand what actually is
00:01:18.400 happening and what it means.
00:01:19.880 You know, it's so, I think, important now for us to be able to go around the media and
00:01:24.840 go directly to the audience, which is, I think, one of the reasons why your podcast has exploded
00:01:29.860 and why it made sense to expand it to three days a week.
00:01:33.800 And you and I are so much aligned, I think, with our goal and our objective.
00:01:39.380 I started in radio for people that don't know me when I was 12 years old.
00:01:44.640 It was my mission field.
00:01:46.020 I started in TV on Bill O'Reilly's show on Fox when I was 17 years old and have been
00:01:52.460 doing TV and radio ever since.
00:01:54.660 And I have my own podcast, my own national syndicated show.
00:01:58.280 And it's you and I have that same mission, which is, I think, to change hearts and minds
00:02:03.320 of Americans with facts and the real story behind some of these, the ridiculous headlines
00:02:10.280 and the propaganda of the left.
00:02:11.900 I jokingly say that, you know, my job is to make liberals go insane with facts and figures
00:02:17.320 each and every day.
00:02:18.340 And I love my job because, for me, this is my mission field, very much the same way I
00:02:23.440 think you believe God put you on earth, to stand up for values, traditional values, for
00:02:28.300 the sanctity of life, for the Constitution, for the Second Amendment, part of the reason
00:02:31.920 why you obviously went to law school.
00:02:34.160 Well, I will say the only problem with that mission there, Ben, is I think liberals start
00:02:38.780 out insane.
00:02:39.660 And so really, the only thing you're doing is exposing their mental illness.
00:02:44.620 I don't know if you happened to see yesterday on Twitter the video of this crazy lady who
00:02:51.660 had stolen money from two little kids in their lemonade stand.
00:02:56.200 And she's wearing a mask.
00:02:57.940 And the father is asking her, please give back the money to my children.
00:03:03.780 And this crazy lady is just berating him that you are endangering us because these children
00:03:08.620 are selling, selling lemonade and you shouldn't be allowed to sell lemonade and you need masks.
00:03:13.340 And it was a level of COVID paranoia that was just, you watched it and it was interesting.
00:03:19.680 A, she wasn't faking it.
00:03:21.180 This was not, she believed this in the core.
00:03:25.600 You know, if they had been injecting Ebola into the neighborhood cats, she would not be
00:03:30.780 more worked up.
00:03:31.940 But B, she felt an absolute entitlement.
00:03:34.360 I'm going to take these children's lemonade stand money.
00:03:36.740 And at the end of it, she gives the money back because he very calmly demands that she
00:03:40.680 do so.
00:03:41.220 And then she knocks the whole stand over and knocks the lemonade over.
00:03:44.500 And it's a mental illness at that point when you think as a busy body that you have the
00:03:51.320 right to control somebody else.
00:03:53.140 And if they don't comply with your paranoia, that then you can use force to force them to
00:03:58.600 comply.
00:03:59.440 You've done this and seen this on college campuses.
00:04:02.000 You do a ton of college campus speaking.
00:04:03.820 I do some as well.
00:04:05.020 And even in the college campus world, we've seen these massive, I think, changes with just
00:04:10.560 personalities where it used to be you could go in and you could have a grand debate and
00:04:15.820 there would be people that would prepare, right?
00:04:18.560 Look forward to the opportunity to question you or to question me on a certain topic or
00:04:22.820 issue.
00:04:23.420 And now there is no longer a grand debate with many on the left.
00:04:27.280 It's just scream at you and tell you and name call.
00:04:30.060 You're a bigot, racist, homophobe, xenophobe.
00:04:31.840 The list goes on and on and on and on and on.
00:04:33.800 And they just go, you know, now we're domestic terrorists.
00:04:36.400 Now we are a cult.
00:04:38.380 We're a domestic terrorist organization that is a threat to democracy.
00:04:42.980 We see Democrats running on that, doubling down in many of these places we saw in the
00:04:47.080 Senate race in Ohio, where they're doubling down.
00:04:50.500 The Democrats, they're saying that they believe that if you support conservatives, people like
00:04:55.140 the MAGA movement, that you are a threat to our nation and should be treated like you
00:05:00.480 are a domestic terrorist organization, no different than Al Qaeda.
00:05:03.600 Well, look, the president called half the country fascist or semi-fascist.
00:05:07.480 I will say, though, that this podcast so far has managed to cut through some of that.
00:05:12.660 And at the campus tours we've done, you know, we've seen a number of liberal students come
00:05:17.820 and show up and they come to the front of the line and they ask their questions.
00:05:21.340 And we've had very little.
00:05:23.440 We had at University of Wisconsin-Madison, one leftist kind of run up and scream,
00:05:28.300 F you, and then scamper off.
00:05:30.560 And I kind of chuckled, ah, the courage of your convictions.
00:05:34.120 But, you know, beyond that, we have not had the rudeness of the incivility.
00:05:38.960 That's a good thing.
00:05:39.960 So, but, all right, there's a lot of breaking news.
00:05:42.320 But before we do that, I want to drill down a little bit.
00:05:45.560 A lot of the verdict listeners, I assume, know who you are, have seen you on TV, have listened
00:05:50.200 to you on radio or your podcast.
00:05:51.940 But there are some of the verdict listeners who don't know you.
00:05:56.220 You and I go back a decade from when I first ran for Senate.
00:05:59.940 I think we met back in 2011, and your story is pretty remarkable.
00:06:04.380 And so I just want to take a minute to kind of walk folks through your history.
00:06:09.160 Now, you kind of casually mentioned that you started on radio when you were 12, which is
00:06:15.120 a pretty crazy and wild thing.
00:06:18.140 Yeah.
00:06:18.460 Ben, maybe tell the story of, like, how the heck that happened, because most 12-year-olds
00:06:23.340 don't get on the radio.
00:06:24.720 You know, my life took an interesting turn, and I'll talk a little bit about myself so
00:06:31.600 people know kind of what got me to do what I'm doing now.
00:06:36.300 We were hit when I was very young by a drunk driver, and that drunk driver died, and thank
00:06:42.320 goodness we lived.
00:06:44.180 I grew up in a family that was law enforcement.
00:06:47.400 My dad was a police officer.
00:06:49.200 When actually we were hit by that drunk driver, he wasn't with us.
00:06:52.420 It was my mom and my sister and I, and that gave me, I think, an instant kind of life purpose
00:06:57.920 at a very young age, because I realized how quick life could be taken away, and I paid
00:07:03.220 attention to stuff.
00:07:04.880 I was homeschooled.
00:07:05.420 And how old were you when that car accident was?
00:07:08.100 I was like five years old.
00:07:09.960 I was five, but it was my first vivid memory, because I remember the impact.
00:07:16.180 I remember my mom, you know, we all had our seatbelts on, but we had the lap seatbelts.
00:07:20.840 They didn't, in the back seat, have yet those shoulder straps, and the whiplash broke my sister's
00:07:26.340 collarbone from the snapback of the impact of the wreck.
00:07:28.980 He hit us going over 100, and he didn't have his seatbelt on.
00:07:32.460 He went through the passenger window of his car as he turned sideways at the very last moment.
00:07:38.420 We hit his passenger door, and he hit our windshield.
00:07:40.720 And I remember getting out of the car, and my mom's head had hit the windshield, and
00:07:45.080 there was blood coming down her face, and I just wanted to get to my mom.
00:07:48.540 And I remember running out of the back door, and I couldn't, I had to walk over his body,
00:07:52.760 and I couldn't get her door open.
00:07:55.360 And a man came along to this day.
00:07:58.500 I still think it was God's intervention, and he said, he grabbed me and took me to the back
00:08:04.420 of the car, and he said, I've got this.
00:08:06.180 And he got my sister out, and he got my mom out, and then they rushed us all to the hospitals
00:08:09.880 and even separate us.
00:08:11.000 And we, you know, my sister and I went to the children's hospital, and she went to the
00:08:15.240 adult, the med, the trauma center.
00:08:17.300 And that moment was a moment where I think I realized and didn't take for granted life.
00:08:24.880 And having that moment was a blessing in disguise, because it made me at a very young age realize
00:08:30.780 how important it was to stand up against right and wrong.
00:08:33.440 My dad laughs to this day that when I was a little kid after that, he was a police officer,
00:08:37.200 and we would be in Kroger, and I would see somebody, Senator, buying beer, and I would
00:08:41.660 tell my dad, like, I need you to, Dad, arrest him.
00:08:44.200 Because I was very literal.
00:08:45.540 I didn't understand, you know, I saw beer and thought that guy's going to drink it, and
00:08:48.380 they're going to hit my car, and I'm going to die.
00:08:50.080 And my dad was, he had to explain to me, like, laws.
00:08:55.620 Son, I can't arrest him for buying beer.
00:08:57.440 It's okay to buy beer.
00:08:58.500 And he talked about consumption.
00:08:59.980 He talked about what the law says and how you can't get behind the wheel if you've been
00:09:04.020 drinking in this blood alcohol level, which back then was a 1.0 before they changed it
00:09:08.440 to 0.8.
00:09:09.260 And so that had that impact where I was paying attention, I think, to more things, because
00:09:15.740 I wanted to understand how this country worked and how laws worked.
00:09:18.940 So you fast forward to 11, 12 years old.
00:09:21.540 I'm sitting in the back of the blue Ford Aero-starred van, and that was one ugly van,
00:09:27.120 by the way, that Ford made.
00:09:28.480 And my mom was listening to talk radio.
00:09:31.740 Now, this was before talk radio became more conservative.
00:09:34.240 This was before Hannity or Beck, right, where it was Limbaugh had just kind of come onto
00:09:39.260 the scene.
00:09:40.340 But a lot of news talk stations had liberal shows and conservative shows, and there was
00:09:44.580 a liberal host, a city council member in my hometown of Memphis, Tennessee.
00:09:48.840 And in that, in my hometown, she was screaming about the school lunch program and the contract
00:09:54.920 with America in 1994.
00:09:57.980 And this contract, there was, part of it was a school lunch program, and you may remember
00:10:02.440 this, Richard Gephardt held up a bottle of ketchup, and he said, is this what conservatives
00:10:10.280 are going to call a vegetable?
00:10:12.620 And she continued to say that Republicans were going to starve kids and it was going to
00:10:15.940 be their only hot meal a day that they were...
00:10:17.920 And did Gephardt mean the ketchup or himself?
00:10:21.320 Yeah, right.
00:10:21.840 Exactly.
00:10:22.400 Yeah.
00:10:22.740 Bingo.
00:10:23.260 Yeah.
00:10:24.480 Exactly.
00:10:25.920 Exactly.
00:10:26.640 And so I'm in the back seat.
00:10:28.420 My mom's school teacher, right?
00:10:29.640 And then she's teaching us homeschooling, and I said, Mom, there's no way that anyone would
00:10:34.160 do that to children.
00:10:35.580 And she immediately perked up, right?
00:10:37.800 This is a school mom's dream.
00:10:40.560 She's like, well, honey, how do you know that?
00:10:42.260 I'm like, Mom, I can't think that any adult would take away a child's lunch.
00:10:47.080 And she said, well, why don't you call our congressman and get a copy of the bill and
00:10:51.960 you can read it?
00:10:52.700 I'll help you read it and you can see if you're right.
00:10:55.360 So I did.
00:10:56.220 I called Ed Bryant, who was our congressman at the time.
00:10:59.540 He faxed the bill to my dad's fax machine with that old roller fax paper, right?
00:11:04.220 That falls on the ground.
00:11:05.200 You have to put it back in order.
00:11:06.600 And I read the bill.
00:11:08.020 And sure enough, she lied to her audience.
00:11:10.720 And I found out that the Republicans wanted to increase school lunch funding by 3.7 percent.
00:11:17.180 And Republicans wanted to increase it by like 4.3 percent.
00:11:20.140 And the Democrats were calling the difference in their two numbers the cut, even though
00:11:25.640 both were clearly increasing school lunch funding.
00:11:28.640 And I called her and we got into this big debate.
00:11:32.000 And I said to her, she was yelling at me.
00:11:34.240 And I said, ma'am, I said, have you read the bill?
00:11:36.540 And she said, well, no one reads the bills.
00:11:38.240 And I said, well, I did.
00:11:39.560 And maybe you should before you go on the radio and lie to people.
00:11:43.040 And it just blew up.
00:11:44.880 Another show.
00:11:46.100 It was one of those moments.
00:11:47.460 It just happened.
00:11:48.380 And I read her the bill on the air and told her why she was wrong.
00:11:51.200 And I was great.
00:11:52.040 At one point does she say, wait a second, are you 12?
00:11:55.820 Like, how does that come out?
00:11:57.900 My voice had not changed yet.
00:12:00.060 It was pretty clear that I would, you know, I had not yet hit the full puberty yet.
00:12:05.900 And so it was, you know, the high little squeaky kid voice.
00:12:09.140 And she was like, how old are you?
00:12:10.640 I mean, she's yelling at me.
00:12:11.700 And I'm like 12 years old.
00:12:12.760 I said, ma'am, I'm 12.
00:12:14.300 And so this other show that came on the afternoons heard this call.
00:12:18.860 And they went on the radio in drive time at like 5 o'clock.
00:12:22.000 And they played the phone call.
00:12:23.800 And they said, whoever this kid is, if anyone knows who Ben is,
00:12:27.800 please tell him we're talking about it.
00:12:29.260 We want to talk to him on the radio.
00:12:30.480 So my mom and dad's home phone starts ringing from friends that are listening.
00:12:34.540 They're like, they're talking about Benjamin on the radio.
00:12:37.360 And so I called in.
00:12:38.760 And they put me on the air.
00:12:39.780 And they're like asking me about the bill and reading the bill.
00:12:42.520 And just they were kind of enamored with this idea of a young person getting involved.
00:12:46.320 And they're like, have you ever seen a radio studio?
00:12:48.320 And I was like, no, ma'am, no, sir.
00:12:50.000 And they were like, well, put your mom on the phone.
00:12:52.260 And this is all live on the air.
00:12:54.100 And I hand the phone back to my mom.
00:12:56.080 They're like, can you bring your son down here tomorrow and let him see a studio?
00:12:58.700 My mom's like, sure.
00:12:59.580 So I go down there.
00:13:00.400 They're going to have me as a guest for 10 minutes.
00:13:02.280 And the first break we went to, one of the hosts looks at me and she goes, you're dying
00:13:06.200 to talk, aren't you?
00:13:07.040 I said, yes, ma'am.
00:13:07.740 And she goes, next time you have something important to say, raise your hand.
00:13:10.200 So I did.
00:13:11.240 And I was on for an hour and a half.
00:13:13.520 The phone lines were jammed.
00:13:15.500 And they were like, this is weird.
00:13:16.820 Can you come back tomorrow?
00:13:17.820 I was like, I have to ask my parents.
00:13:19.060 So my parents drive me back down the next day.
00:13:21.400 I'm on for another hour.
00:13:23.120 They had me come back a week later.
00:13:24.420 And then literally they hired me a week after that at $4.25 an hour, minimum wage at the
00:13:29.560 time.
00:13:30.640 And I've been doing radio ever since, fell in love with it because radio for a younger
00:13:35.940 person, people didn't judge you based on what they saw, right?
00:13:39.940 Your age.
00:13:40.540 They didn't look at you and think you don't, you can't have an opinion because you could
00:13:43.980 hide behind the microphone and they would listen to what you said.
00:13:47.720 And it was a great equalizer.
00:13:49.140 And once I realized that I could be judged by the content of what I was saying and not
00:13:54.480 because of how baby face I looked, I knew this was what I was going to do probably for the
00:13:59.280 rest of my life.
00:14:00.360 And so you went from there to going on TV.
00:14:04.040 Yeah, I was.
00:14:05.500 I was.
00:14:05.920 And how did that happen?
00:14:07.040 I was.
00:14:07.600 So I was.
00:14:08.360 I did a hit that was like a news piece that happened to show up.
00:14:13.320 I think it was on CNN and it was about getting out the vote and young people voting.
00:14:18.360 And that was right when MTV was doing rock the vote.
00:14:21.680 And Bill O'Reilly had just come over to Fox News channel, just launched.
00:14:26.200 And there was a guy from Memphis, Tennessee, who was, I think, his producer at the time
00:14:32.340 and and called me and said, hey, he wants to have you on.
00:14:37.440 There's this new channel called Fox News now on cable in Memphis.
00:14:41.320 Fox News wasn't even available yet.
00:14:43.120 So their pitch to me and Bill O'Reilly and I laugh about this every time we see each
00:14:47.300 other when he comes out with a new book and, you know, come on my show.
00:14:50.180 And we always laugh because the pitch senator was was, hey, we have this host who's the former
00:14:56.780 host of Inside Edition and he'd really like to have you on a show.
00:15:01.540 And so I did the show.
00:15:03.600 We sparred.
00:15:04.420 We fought.
00:15:05.080 It went it went really well.
00:15:06.680 And then that was the hit.
00:15:08.020 That was it.
00:15:08.500 They started having me back on a regular basis.
00:15:10.520 And I started doing other shows at Fox and Shepard Smith and a Gibson show back when he
00:15:15.640 was there.
00:15:15.920 I mean, we're talking about the old lineup, Neil Cavuto.
00:15:18.500 And it took that one hit with the guy who used to host Inside Edition, as they described
00:15:22.960 it.
00:15:23.120 And I remember doing the show and no one could watch it.
00:15:26.180 Right.
00:15:26.320 Your parents are proud of you.
00:15:27.420 You're 17.
00:15:28.180 They want to see it because no one could see it.
00:15:29.840 And so they FedEx me a VHS, no, a beta tape.
00:15:33.880 It was a beta tape of the appearance.
00:15:35.580 So we had to find a friend who had a beta machine so we could even watch it.
00:15:40.300 Wow.
00:15:40.560 And by the way, for a lot of our podcast listeners, you may not know what a beta tape is.
00:15:45.860 You know, when the very beginning of being able to play movies at home, you had two different
00:15:52.900 types.
00:15:53.320 You had a VHS cassette and you had beta, which was Sony Betamax.
00:15:58.380 And they were competing size and beta was a little bit smaller and VHS won out.
00:16:02.940 It was a battle to see who would be the market dominant and beta got crushed and went away.
00:16:07.200 So it's you have to be of a certain age to know what the heck a Betamax or a beta is.
00:16:12.480 And then that later became DVDs and then that later became Blu-rays.
00:16:16.280 And now, you know, our kids probably won't know what DVDs or Blu-rays are because it'll
00:16:20.620 all be streaming and who knows, it'll be virtual in about 10 minutes.
00:16:24.220 Oh, exactly.
00:16:25.220 It's the world has changed and the ability to reach people has changed drastically over
00:16:30.440 the last time.
00:16:31.120 I remember when I started radio, we had the eight tracks and you would hit the button
00:16:35.440 and the eight track would play during the commercial breaks.
00:16:38.320 When I started, I mean, I was 12 and then they gave you a big magnet that you would demagnetize
00:16:43.280 the tape so you could re-record over it.
00:16:46.560 That's how long I've been in this business.
00:16:49.000 Okay.
00:16:49.420 So you're doing radio, you're doing TV, you're a teenager.
00:16:53.060 You go off to college at Ole Miss on a tennis scholarship.
00:16:56.560 Now, I guess you're a pretty hardcore tennis player.
00:16:59.160 Yeah, I started playing tennis.
00:17:00.820 My aunt was a racquetball player and so she was sponsored and she used to send Ectalon racquetball
00:17:09.400 racquets to me for holidays and I would go play and this tennis coach walked up to me
00:17:14.740 as he saw me hitting on a racquetball court and he's like, hey man, why don't you play
00:17:18.420 a sport that other people actually play?
00:17:21.660 And he goes, why don't you try tennis?
00:17:23.660 And I was like, okay.
00:17:24.680 And so I went out and hit a few balls with him and he saw that I had, I guess, you know,
00:17:30.140 some talent and he was like, all right.
00:17:32.000 He was like, you need to probably get in a tennis clinic.
00:17:35.800 And so I started, fell in love with the game, understood very quickly, my parents didn't
00:17:41.500 have a lot of resources and I knew I needed a scholarship to go to college and tennis was
00:17:46.700 going to be my way to pull that off.
00:17:48.660 And I played in college and absolutely fell in love with the game, got to see the world
00:17:53.860 and play overseas and meet really interesting and cool people.
00:17:57.820 And you know this, playing, you put your basketball guy, obviously, and I got to play
00:18:01.660 in high school and just having that team sport and taking a little bit of a break from the
00:18:08.240 politics and the radio and TV.
00:18:09.640 And I would still drive back and forth from Ole Miss.
00:18:11.800 I'd still fill in on radio for guys like Michael Reagan, Ronald's son, and G Gordon Liddy,
00:18:16.760 Oliver North and some others like that.
00:18:19.280 So I was able to keep my hand in the political world, but having that break and just to be
00:18:24.620 a college student and a college athlete is something I tell kids all the time.
00:18:29.200 If you're passionate about sport and you get to play, play it to the highest level.
00:18:34.140 I've never talked to anybody that regretted playing in college.
00:18:37.920 I have a lot of friends that regretted not playing in college because maybe they didn't
00:18:43.840 get a scholarship to the university they wanted to go to.
00:18:46.480 So they're like, all right, well, I'll just give up on the dream.
00:18:48.680 And almost, I mean, I don't know anybody that's ever told me that, you know, if you have that
00:18:52.800 ability to play, I think at that level, you run with it and you do it because you'll never
00:18:58.040 forget those moments with those teammates.
00:19:00.580 And I think there's also something cool about sports.
00:19:02.740 Like there's a very small window, Senator, you know this, where you can get to play it
00:19:07.440 and it's based on age at the highest level.
00:19:10.800 It's so fun to keep playing later in life.
00:19:13.040 But when you get to play at peak physical condition, at that age where you can maximize
00:19:19.560 your potential, it's a very small window.
00:19:21.880 And getting to play at that level was something, if I could go back and do it again, I'd do it
00:19:26.380 all over again.
00:19:27.040 Well, and Ben and you had size and speed and strength and talent, all things, sadly, I
00:19:34.400 was lacking.
00:19:35.320 So, you know, you very kindly threw me a bone of, oh, you're a basketball player.
00:19:39.940 I was a mediocre high school player and I still play today and I'd say I'm still right about
00:19:45.320 the level of a mediocre high school player.
00:19:47.860 So, you know, it was a very different experience from being a varsity athlete at a major university
00:19:56.480 and competing at the top level.
00:19:58.740 But one of the things I think is interesting.
00:20:00.640 So you're a varsity athlete, you're in a fraternity, you're a big man on campus, but then you're
00:20:06.780 also jumping on airplanes and flying to New York City and going on TV and on Fox at the
00:20:12.500 same time.
00:20:13.020 What was that like?
00:20:14.260 It was, you know, back then when I was in college.
00:20:17.460 So it was college 2000, 2004.
00:20:20.880 Satellite, you know, how we do TV now, you just grab that, you know, they do it by satellite.
00:20:25.540 The cost is very inexpensive now compared to what it was in 2000.
00:20:29.800 So if you were going to do TV, you got on a plane and I would literally run, you know,
00:20:34.640 haul it from Oxford, Mississippi to Memphis, get on a plane, fly to New York to do TV and
00:20:40.780 then come back.
00:20:41.580 And then, you know, people around campus figured it out, right?
00:20:44.760 Like, this is weird.
00:20:46.060 You're doing TV, but you're also, you know, hanging out at lunch.
00:20:50.060 And it was it was pretty funny.
00:20:52.360 You know, it was it was hilarious to see their reaction of like, hold on a second.
00:20:56.960 You're the same guy that's screaming on Saturdays at the football game and Sunday morning.
00:21:02.660 You're doing the Sunday morning talk shows.
00:21:05.480 This is weird.
00:21:06.720 And I was I was lucky.
00:21:08.680 I got to experience both at the exact same time.
00:21:11.080 And I also it turned into me seeing bias at the first first level I've ever seen bias
00:21:20.040 bias from adults, you know, from people in positions of power against young people.
00:21:27.600 And that was the most shocking.
00:21:29.500 I almost failed a class.
00:21:31.580 And you're going to laugh when I tell you which class I failed.
00:21:34.320 It was a 400 level class.
00:21:38.120 And it was literally entitled editorial and opinion writing.
00:21:42.780 If there is any class editor that I should pass, it would be editorial and opinion writing.
00:21:52.800 And I had this professor, those who can do those who can't teach.
00:21:58.540 Oh, so tell me, I assume the professor was some wild eyed leftist.
00:22:02.980 Oh, hardcore leftist.
00:22:04.620 And I walked in the first day.
00:22:07.140 He knew exactly who I was.
00:22:09.820 He knew exactly what I did.
00:22:12.580 And it was my senior year.
00:22:14.500 And I would had just signed a book deal with with William Morrow, Harper Collins to write
00:22:19.420 a book.
00:22:20.340 And so it had been written about.
00:22:22.240 It was, you know, is obviously a big deal writing your first, you know, big book.
00:22:26.380 And I was doing a ton of TV then.
00:22:29.140 And I walked in and it was game on.
00:22:31.380 And he would do entire lectures basically yelling directly at me in the class.
00:22:36.060 Well, this class had three papers that you wrote that were a third, a third, a third
00:22:42.020 of your grade.
00:22:42.900 Well, if you fail one of them, do the math.
00:22:45.100 It's not good.
00:22:46.320 You're going to it's going to be bad.
00:22:48.080 And so I did my first again editorial and opinion writing.
00:22:52.320 I did my first piece and he gave me an F and I went to the head of the department and
00:22:58.080 I said, now was your was your first piece?
00:23:01.100 Was it an editorial or was it writing about editorial writing?
00:23:04.420 No, it was like literally write an editorial, like an opinion piece.
00:23:08.000 So I think I wrote about the Second Amendment and he failed me and it looked like he got
00:23:13.660 hammered and then spilled the red ink.
00:23:16.140 I've never seen more red ink and writing on a paper.
00:23:20.460 And so I went to the head of the department and I was like, look, like, it's obvious this
00:23:24.520 dude has it out for me.
00:23:25.760 And they're like, well, he's tenured and he's senior.
00:23:27.420 He's been here.
00:23:27.860 He's premier.
00:23:28.620 He's written for all of these magazines and newspapers.
00:23:31.420 And, you know, I can't overrule him.
00:23:33.760 And I'm like, all right, fine.
00:23:35.360 And I know what's going to come.
00:23:36.640 I'm going to write the second one.
00:23:37.700 He's going to fail me.
00:23:38.540 Second one comes.
00:23:39.500 Sure enough, he gives me a D.
00:23:41.240 And I went back and I'm like to the head of the department.
00:23:44.420 I said, OK, I said, now now you're really screwing with my life.
00:23:48.280 Like, I have to have this class to graduate.
00:23:50.280 Um, it's if this grade stands, I'm going to fail the class, which means I'd have to come
00:23:57.880 back and take this class in another semester.
00:24:00.040 I'm going to be gone.
00:24:01.140 I'm going to Bush campaign like I'm out of here.
00:24:03.780 And this could really screw up my life.
00:24:05.900 And they're like, I'm sorry.
00:24:06.880 So I ended up going to the chancellor of the university and he said there was nothing he
00:24:12.560 could do.
00:24:13.340 And I said, all right, well, I just want to give you a heads up.
00:24:15.640 I'm going to go on.
00:24:16.620 I think it was on Fox.
00:24:17.980 And I said, I'm going to tell my story.
00:24:19.440 And then the whole thing changed, Senator.
00:24:22.140 Well, hold on a second.
00:24:23.440 Let's see if we can come to compromise.
00:24:24.920 Well, you just told me you just told me a second ago you can't compromise and that you're
00:24:31.120 just got to stand with this decision as well.
00:24:32.840 What are you proposing?
00:24:33.660 I said, take my name off the papers, give them to three different professors in three
00:24:37.940 different departments and let them grade it.
00:24:41.120 And if they fail me, I'll accept the grades.
00:24:43.420 And they all came back with A's and that changed it.
00:24:46.360 But that was the moment that I really was, I became angry and I was like, I've got to
00:24:51.740 keep doing this because what if you didn't have that threat of being able to expose them
00:24:56.300 on national TV?
00:24:57.620 If otherwise this, and this is what's happened, I think on college campuses is so many kids
00:25:02.040 now are held hostage.
00:25:03.600 They can't speak out.
00:25:05.060 They stay quiet.
00:25:06.060 They sit on their hands.
00:25:07.400 They write what they think these professors want them to say instead of having a grand debate.
00:25:12.420 And that's where we've, I think how we've gotten to the point where we are in this country
00:25:15.680 right now, where it's basically indoctrination, no longer a grand debate.
00:25:20.620 That's exactly right.
00:25:21.900 And that's why verdict is something very, very different.
00:25:25.060 Look, I think we are going to have a fun and amazing time doing this show together, doing
00:25:30.800 it three, three days a week now doing it regularly.
00:25:33.960 So, so that folks can count on it to come out.
00:25:37.240 And I think it's going to be, it's going to be a different vibe than, than Michael and
00:25:41.720 I had.
00:25:42.340 Michael is a sort of Yale academic brought, brought a very kind of conservative Catholic
00:25:49.220 vibe that was fun.
00:25:50.380 And I think you and I have a very different vibe that it's going to be interesting and
00:25:54.340 engaging and help, help get really to the bottom of the issues that are happening right
00:25:58.060 now.
00:25:58.700 And I'm going to give people updates.
00:26:00.080 I'm going to try to work on your tennis game.
00:26:01.660 People don't know this yet, but we're going to, we're going to secretly prepare you for
00:26:04.960 greatness in the tennis world.
00:26:06.980 That's, that's part of that's part of my new mission field, Senator.
00:26:10.420 We got to get that elbow right.
00:26:12.040 And then, and then I promise we're not going to lose if we play doubles together.
00:26:16.240 So I actually, I have tennis elbow, which Ben knows.
00:26:19.560 And, and given how lousy my tennis game is, I don't even deserve to have tennis elbow.
00:26:23.740 Like, like that suggests you have some modicum of skill or maybe my skill is so bad.
00:26:29.080 That's why I have tennis elbow.
00:26:30.280 So, but, but anyway, Ben gave me this, this like basically little electro shock thing
00:26:35.960 that you strap on your forearm and it shocks it.
00:26:39.080 And, and I'm not sure if it actually helps or if he's just screwing with me and wants
00:26:43.100 to see how frequently I'll shock myself, but I'm doing it regularly and I will confess
00:26:47.580 it is actually helping.
00:26:48.680 So, so that is, that's been an interesting experience as well.
00:26:54.380 I stated a Holiday Inn Express last night, Senator, you know, give you an electrode shock
00:26:58.300 afterwards and there's going to be some physical therapist out there.
00:27:01.160 Isn't going to be yelling at the, at their phone right now.
00:27:03.260 Go do it, Senator.
00:27:04.560 It's a TENS machine.
00:27:05.620 Do it.
00:27:05.940 It'll work.
00:27:06.520 So yeah, you're going to, now you're going to get filled with tweets coming to you on
00:27:10.200 advice on how to do it.
00:27:13.000 Well, I will confess it.
00:27:14.440 It has made it, made it feel a little bit better.
00:27:17.180 Good.
00:27:17.560 And that's what I, that's what I like to hear.
00:27:20.280 Canadian women are looking for more, more out of themselves, their businesses, their elected
00:27:24.700 leaders, and the world around them.
00:27:26.460 And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast.
00:27:30.180 I'm Jennifer Stewart.
00:27:31.360 And I'm Catherine Clark.
00:27:32.600 And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women, entrepreneurs, artists,
00:27:37.720 athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey.
00:27:42.080 So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.
00:27:45.320 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:27:49.360 I want to ask you about some of the big news of the day that, that I, that I think is shocking.
00:27:57.860 There is some new audio that has been released on Hunter Biden, and it is shocking audio of
00:28:06.180 Hunter begging for cash to go claiming it's for rehab.
00:28:10.400 He is begging his, his brother's widow, who he ended up dating, hooking up with, whatever, after his brother died,
00:28:22.960 begging her for points, reward points from a credit card, as he's claiming he's going to check into rehab.
00:28:30.800 And Senator, when I listened to this, and this just came out, there was two things that shocked me.
00:28:35.680 One, I genuinely have compassion and feel bad for Hunter Biden, because it's obvious he's an addict, he's addicted.
00:28:43.180 And this is right around the time, just weeks before his gun purchase.
00:28:47.240 But there was something else in this audio that I think was so disturbing to me.
00:28:51.680 And that is, at one point, well, he's begging her for these points, and she's like,
00:28:57.500 No, I'll send you to rehab. I'll do it. I'll book your ticket.
00:29:01.680 But I'm not giving this to you, because she knows it's going to be used, I think, for drugs.
00:29:06.140 Drug abuse. He says, Well, give it to my uncle.
00:29:09.580 And then she says no to that. And then he says, Well, give it to my dad.
00:29:15.640 And it was such an eye-opening moment for me that I think just tells you about Joe Biden and James Biden.
00:29:22.260 And the fact that they knew that he was a struggling addict, and they exploited it.
00:29:27.760 They sobered him up for the moments they needed him to get the deals done and the corruption and keep the money flowing to their family.
00:29:35.280 Hey, I want to play this for you and get your reaction.
00:29:38.180 And I'll do it.
00:29:39.340 No, honey. I don't want you to know where I'm going. It's very important to me.
00:29:43.700 You won't give me my money, Hallie.
00:29:45.940 Hallie, please give me the money.
00:29:47.840 I mean, it's just points, honey. It's points.
00:29:49.580 I'm not even asking you for points. I'm asking you for my points.
00:29:51.640 I don't care.
00:29:53.040 You don't care about my points?
00:29:53.800 I will do it all for you.
00:29:55.240 I will do it all for you.
00:29:56.820 Okay, here. How about this?
00:29:58.120 Not you, okay?
00:29:59.500 You give it to...
00:30:00.860 No.
00:30:01.160 No.
00:30:01.640 Give it to my Uncle Jimmy.
00:30:03.720 No.
00:30:04.360 Give it to my Uncle Jimmy.
00:30:05.340 What's the difference?
00:30:05.900 No.
00:30:06.320 Why?
00:30:06.800 I don't care. I'll do it if you want it.
00:30:08.000 Give it to my dad.
00:30:08.680 If not, you're not using it.
00:30:09.640 Give it to my dad.
00:30:10.140 I said no.
00:30:10.880 It's really important to me that you don't know.
00:30:12.180 Give it to my dad.
00:30:12.720 I don't care.
00:30:13.500 I can't pay for the place otherwise.
00:30:16.180 Don't ask me again. I'm hanging up and I'm not going to talk to you again.
00:30:18.080 I can't pay for the place otherwise. You're killing me.
00:30:20.760 Why are you doing this?
00:30:21.560 No.
00:30:22.580 Senator, you hear that and I have...
00:30:24.920 It made me sad.
00:30:26.080 If you've ever known somebody that's become addicted to drugs,
00:30:29.740 whether it's illegal drugs like this or prescription drugs,
00:30:33.500 I have compassion for people that are struggling.
00:30:36.040 And I hear that.
00:30:37.500 And he basically is saying,
00:30:39.400 send it to my uncle.
00:30:40.940 And she says no because she obviously doesn't trust the uncle.
00:30:44.560 And then he says, give it to my dad.
00:30:45.780 And she doesn't even trust her own father-in-law to do the right thing
00:30:49.640 and to actually make him go back to rehab instead of just giving him access to
00:30:53.340 what, you know, his next fix here.
00:30:55.940 I've never felt more compassion for him as a human being than this tape that just came out.
00:31:02.420 Yeah.
00:31:03.020 Look, that's really hard to listen to.
00:31:05.180 That's someone who is clearly hurting,
00:31:07.460 clearly is led and is living a very troubled life.
00:31:11.800 He's an addict.
00:31:14.300 And all of us have known addicts in our lives.
00:31:18.140 My older sister, Marion, tragically died of an overdose.
00:31:22.140 And addiction is a cruel and horrific disease.
00:31:29.100 And he's clearly in the throes of it.
00:31:31.580 The desperation in his voice,
00:31:34.780 anyone who's had loved ones dealing with this has heard that desperation before.
00:31:40.120 I'll tell you, listening to it, what it reminded me of was Ray Liotta's character in Goodfellas.
00:31:46.240 Yeah.
00:31:46.740 When he was an addict and he's begging his wife again.
00:31:49.800 It was the same back and forth of begging his wife and the panic.
00:31:55.240 But you're right that it also illustrates that his wife believes that neither his uncle nor his father
00:32:02.140 are going to do anything about it.
00:32:04.620 That you couldn't trust giving the points or giving the money to dad,
00:32:09.120 that they wouldn't just turn around.
00:32:10.980 And presumably, at least, you know, you infer from listening to that,
00:32:14.920 that she thinks they're going to give it to him and let him buy drugs with it
00:32:19.200 rather than ensure that he gets in rehab.
00:32:20.960 And that, you know, look, if Hunter Biden were Hunter Jones or Hunter Smith,
00:32:30.520 he would be someone who had a very troubled life and you would want to see him get help.
00:32:35.940 But it wouldn't be news.
00:32:37.660 His conversation, conversations like this wouldn't be talked about.
00:32:43.000 What's different is his father's president of the United States.
00:32:46.720 And the evidence that has come out of, number one, his father's official position
00:32:56.140 being used essentially to immunize him from the crimes that he's committing.
00:33:02.640 But number two, the very significant evidence of his father being directly involved in corruption
00:33:09.720 makes it a matter not just of a private son who is struggling with addiction,
00:33:16.520 but of a question of public corruption.
00:33:20.140 That at the end of the day, this has never been about Hunter Biden.
00:33:23.420 This is about Joe Biden.
00:33:24.500 This is about the president and what he's willing to do.
00:33:28.820 And those questions, you know, I think that recording only amplify those questions.
00:33:36.180 You know, it's amazing how they're trying to act like Hunter Biden's business dealings
00:33:41.220 can be separated from his father and his uncle and the big guy getting 10 percent.
00:33:47.620 You know, I part of my background, I own a gun range and a gun store and a barbecue restaurant.
00:33:52.920 And if my dad was, you know, giving a massive government contract to my gun range, right,
00:33:58.900 for for law enforcement, that's a conflict of interest.
00:34:02.620 And that obviously would be a massive problem.
00:34:05.600 I know that right at the basic level.
00:34:08.940 Yet NBC News today came out and said, well, there's nothing wrong, nothing illegal with
00:34:15.500 Hunter Biden taking money from foreign governments acting like immediately that that's a closed
00:34:21.300 case.
00:34:21.920 I want you to hear this.
00:34:22.920 This was on MSNBC.
00:34:24.380 Their NBC reporter saying this earlier.
00:34:27.600 There's a lot of people who evade taxes or never prosecuted criminally.
00:34:31.460 So that's going to be a big issue in this case.
00:34:33.140 In terms of like corruption, conflict of interest, we've never heard a hint that that was that
00:34:38.260 there were potential criminal charges there because Hunter Biden wasn't an office holder.
00:34:43.500 It was perfectly legal for him to take money from foreign governments as long as it wasn't
00:34:48.720 he wasn't inappropriately giving them information from his family or something.
00:34:52.320 There's no hint of that.
00:34:53.200 There's no hint of that.
00:34:55.120 I mean, NBC News looks at you with a straight face and you've seen it.
00:34:59.040 You've seen all the data that's come out.
00:35:01.560 You've seen just all the suspicious activity reports on their bank accounts.
00:35:06.160 And they say in their actual words, there's nothing here.
00:35:11.700 There's nothing that says that this was nefarious.
00:35:14.340 And they say it with a straight face.
00:35:16.100 And I think that's what worries so many Americans is they truly believe, oh, my gosh, they're
00:35:20.660 going to get away with this.
00:35:21.680 I mean, if they just nail Hunter Biden with tax issues and they just nail him with a gun
00:35:26.280 issue, those are technically the two issues, Senator, that you probably cannot connect to
00:35:32.520 his father and all the other stuff that they actually did is that they should be charging
00:35:37.860 him with.
00:35:38.180 If they don't, then he's going to basically walk away with a slap on the wrist with the
00:35:41.360 alibi.
00:35:42.280 And I think it's clear his family knew it.
00:35:44.360 Well, we can say he's a drug addict, so you shouldn't be hard on him.
00:35:48.120 Yeah, look, the obviously DOJ is leaking like a sieve right now and projecting that they
00:35:55.920 are going to indict Hunter Biden on a tax claim and a gun claim charge.
00:36:01.180 Those are I'm glad to see it on one side and that the law should be blind.
00:36:08.440 And the fact that his daddy happens to live in government housing on Pennsylvania Avenue
00:36:12.940 should not give him a get out of jail free card that nobody else has.
00:36:17.680 But it's it's disturbing for the same reason, which is that what they're leaking suggests
00:36:24.560 they're not looking at the corruption.
00:36:26.180 They're not looking at whether the corruption from Ukraine or the corruption from China.
00:36:30.100 And in particular, that they're not looking at the connections to his dad.
00:36:34.360 The reason anyone should care is because of his father.
00:36:39.520 And, you know, the the clip you just played for a minute from NBC is truly absurd because
00:36:45.520 take something like Burisma.
00:36:47.580 And every time we talk Burisma, that brings us back to the very beginning of verdict launched
00:36:52.200 on the first day of impeachment.
00:36:53.520 We talked about Burisma a lot.
00:36:55.020 Hunter Biden was given a job at Burisma where they paid him eighty three thousand dollars
00:37:02.040 every single month.
00:37:05.700 Now, what expertise does he have?
00:37:07.380 He doesn't speak Ukrainian.
00:37:09.360 He doesn't know anything about oil and gas.
00:37:12.260 He has no relevant expertise.
00:37:14.500 He had one qualification and one qualification only, which is that he carried the DNA of being
00:37:20.500 the son of the sitting vice president at the time.
00:37:23.420 And so NBC, well, there's no question of corruption or anything.
00:37:27.000 Really, why does the Ukrainian gas company pay him that money?
00:37:31.020 What are they getting?
00:37:32.120 And by the way, Hunter Biden's father, Joe Biden, then the vice president, was the point
00:37:37.560 person for the Obama administration on Ukraine.
00:37:40.520 So it was literally bribing essentially the family of the lead U.S. policy person.
00:37:48.120 And I'll tell you one thing to understand.
00:37:50.420 OK, look, if you're a foreign government, let's say you're the Ukrainian government, let's
00:37:53.860 say you're communist China and you're trying to influence a U.S. decision maker.
00:37:58.920 Now, if you just show up and hand Joe Biden a paper bag full of cash, you could try to do
00:38:05.760 that.
00:38:05.940 But that's a little clunky and a little obvious and transparent.
00:38:08.840 Even the shills at MSNBC might have a hard time explaining that one away.
00:38:15.660 But there's a second way you do it, which is, listen, the video you played or the audio
00:38:20.580 you played of Hunter talking to his wife, it is clear that Hunter Biden was a financial
00:38:26.480 burden to his entire family.
00:38:28.540 He was a financial burden to his dad.
00:38:30.260 His dad, I am sure, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars, trying
00:38:38.560 to take care of his very troubled son.
00:38:41.160 And look, we all respect that you should do what you can to help help your children, especially
00:38:46.540 when they're troubled.
00:38:47.300 But by Burisma, giving Hunter Biden $83,000 a month, what they did is they took that obligation
00:38:56.040 off of Joe Biden's balance sheet.
00:38:57.900 In other words, he didn't have to support Hunter Biden because, lo and behold, the Ukrainians
00:39:03.400 are doing it for him.
00:39:04.400 And then later on in China, the private equity deals that he did in China, multi-billion dollar
00:39:12.200 deals, you've got indications there, including, as you noted, the 10% for the big guy.
00:39:19.700 Let's be clear.
00:39:20.360 The big guy is not talking about someone who's fat.
00:39:24.480 It's talking about Joe Biden.
00:39:26.980 And once again, it is highly disturbing that DOJ, it doesn't seem, has even the slightest
00:39:34.360 interest in looking into anything that could implicate Joe Biden.
00:39:37.820 And this is all about finding a fall guy and I with an alibi, with an alibi, a fill.
00:39:45.520 And I mean, look, you and I both have compassion for Hunter when you listen to that tape.
00:39:49.800 Don't think that tape's not going to be played if they're in a court when people are on a jury
00:39:54.700 are going to say, this guy, this poor guy's an addict.
00:39:57.400 He's addicted to drugs.
00:39:58.500 OK, yeah, he broke the law, but maybe we'll give him a little compassion here.
00:40:01.880 That's been their game plan the whole time.
00:40:03.680 Even when they brought out Joe's sister, when she did the morning show, Sunday morning
00:40:08.620 show, CBS This Morning or whatever it was, several months back, she clearly laid out the
00:40:14.660 plan for the family.
00:40:16.180 And that was, he may have done something wrong back in the day, but he was an addict, so
00:40:20.500 it's not his fault.
00:40:22.020 And that's always been the alibi, which meant they could exploit him and get even to do more
00:40:26.700 insane deals.
00:40:28.100 And I think you and I, and this is something the American people have to ask themselves.
00:40:31.400 Does Hunter Biden exist as a businessman in any of these capacities, whether it's with,
00:40:35.920 you know, Chinese Communist Party and the oil and gas deals, with Bob Alinsky, the whistleblower
00:40:41.560 about their deals, with Russian oligarchs and the former mayor of Russia's wife giving him
00:40:47.040 millions of dollars, with him being a defense attorney for more than a million dollars for
00:40:51.020 a guy that's going to prison and missing in China, or Burisma.
00:40:55.180 Does any of that happen?
00:40:57.080 Forget his last name, Hunter Biden.
00:40:59.220 Does any of that happen without his father being involved in those deals?
00:41:03.680 I would argue it's impossible to separate Joe Biden and James Biden from any of this.
00:41:09.100 Look, I think that's right.
00:41:10.820 And I think DOJ is once again being partisan and political.
00:41:15.180 And what I fear is that this is also being done for a very explicitly partisan purpose,
00:41:20.140 which is that Merrick Garland has decided if we indict Hunter Biden, then he can turn around
00:41:27.460 and indict Donald J. Trump.
00:41:29.160 And I think that is his objective at this point is to say, gosh, we're not political.
00:41:33.700 Look, we we indicted the guy who who is so plainly guilty and recorded videos of it and
00:41:38.820 put it out to the world.
00:41:39.700 And we could only not indict him if we ignored it.
00:41:43.160 But it's all about having the look how even handed we are.
00:41:46.380 We're doing both sides for people that are angry.
00:41:50.180 And and I would be in this category, Senator.
00:41:53.620 You hear this.
00:41:54.600 And if the DOJ doesn't do a special prosecutor, if we don't get real indictments, just these
00:42:01.780 two kind of slap on the wrist indictments and insulate the president.
00:42:05.660 What is justice look like if you guys take control of the Senate?
00:42:10.740 If Comer takes control, you know, in the leadership role there in the House to investigate, you know,
00:42:16.060 Congressman Comer said that Hunter Biden, quote, is a national security threat who may be
00:42:20.600 compromised, who may have compromised the president.
00:42:23.960 And that's what he says they're going to look at in the House side.
00:42:26.580 But what is justice look like if we don't get these indictments?
00:42:30.680 Can you guys, you know, get a special prosecutor or is that no, because the president is is Joe
00:42:36.380 Biden?
00:42:36.980 Is there anything that you guys can actually do when you're investigating him to go back and
00:42:41.560 force the DOJ or the FBI or law enforcement do their job if they don't do it the first time around?
00:42:46.320 Well, I think the election matters powerfully because having a majority gives you the ability
00:42:51.960 to then convene hearings and those hearings.
00:42:55.880 There has been essentially zero oversight of the Biden administration with Democrats in
00:43:00.800 charge of Congress.
00:43:01.680 They put partisan politics above everything else.
00:43:04.320 So they don't want to know the answers to any of these things.
00:43:06.520 I think we are extremely likely to see a Republican House.
00:43:10.120 And I think there's a good chance we'll see a Republican Senate if and when that happens.
00:43:14.040 I think we will see, I hope and believe, vigorous hearings examining all sorts of issues, the
00:43:22.500 corruption, the corruption going straight to the top, Joe Biden, his involvement in it, Dr.
00:43:28.640 Fauci, the origins of COVID, the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the funding from the NIH for data
00:43:37.040 function research, all of that, the involvement with with big pharma in the administration's
00:43:43.720 policies, the involvement with the teachers unions in the administration's indefensible
00:43:48.140 policies.
00:43:49.100 There are so many topics that are screaming for oversight.
00:43:53.000 I think we will see hearings on every one of those topics.
00:43:56.260 Those hearings may involve subpoenas.
00:43:58.340 If witnesses refuse to attend, having the majority means you can issue subpoenas and and and use
00:44:04.720 legal compulsion to make witnesses attend.
00:44:07.220 You can have lawyers who engage in investigations.
00:44:09.980 But you asked, can Congress appoint a special prosecutor?
00:44:13.900 And the answer to that is no.
00:44:16.020 Under our Constitution, we have separation of powers and only the executive can execute the
00:44:22.800 laws.
00:44:23.140 So the questions of prosecution, it is only Article two, the president, the attorney general that
00:44:30.340 have the authority to indict anyone, to prosecute anyone, to bring a case.
00:44:34.880 Congress, the legislature can pass laws that need the president's signature to become law
00:44:42.240 and Congress can hold hearings and shine a light.
00:44:45.680 So I have been calling for two years for a special prosecutor to look at Hunter Biden, for
00:44:50.480 a special prosecutor to look at Anthony Fauci.
00:44:53.500 This administration laughs that off.
00:44:55.660 They don't care that they are going to be corrupt and political and they do not care with the
00:45:01.820 majority.
00:45:03.220 What the hearings can do is shine a light and put pressure.
00:45:06.920 But at the end of the day, the only person with the authority to appoint a special prosecutor
00:45:14.140 is the attorney general of the United States.
00:45:16.500 And so that's one of the reasons why I believe one of the first orders of business should be
00:45:21.300 impeaching Merrick Garland, the degree to which he has turned DOJ into a partisan nest of hornets
00:45:30.540 working on behalf of the White House, working on behalf of the DNC, I think has profoundly
00:45:37.980 compromised the integrity of the Department of Justice and the FBI.
00:45:41.560 And as an alumnus, I worked at the DOJ in 2001.
00:45:45.300 That is both very sad, but it's also incredibly dangerous.
00:45:52.040 I want to switch gears real quick before we run out of time today to gas prices.
00:45:56.220 Senator JP Morgan, CEO, came out earlier today in an interview and he said this about American
00:46:05.360 oil production, as he also said, we're headed into a recession if we're not already there.
00:46:09.740 That obviously made Wall Street perk up.
00:46:12.700 But I want you to hear what he had to say about America with oil production.
00:46:17.040 America needs to play a real leadership role.
00:46:19.160 America is the swing producer, not Saudi Arabia.
00:46:22.320 And we should have gotten that right during March.
00:46:25.180 It's almost too late to get it right because obviously these are longer term investments.
00:46:29.480 America needs to play a real leadership role.
00:46:32.000 You rarely see CEOs come out in this way.
00:46:35.080 And this happens, and you tweeted this out, Valero has now fired back with facts after
00:46:41.480 the California government is wanting to investigate oil and gas companies for the gas price spikes
00:46:48.400 there that are hitting $7, $8 a gallon in some parts of California because the California
00:46:53.880 Energy Commission, and obviously this is political right before the elections, wrote executives
00:46:59.480 at five oil and gas companies that are demanding answers for sharp price increases.
00:47:05.640 And basically, the vice president for state government affairs at Valero said, OK, you want
00:47:11.300 to know what's happening?
00:47:12.320 Fine.
00:47:13.040 We'll tell everybody.
00:47:14.640 He said California for Valero is the most expensive operating environment in the country
00:47:19.980 and, quote, a very hostile regulatory environment for refining.
00:47:23.920 He also said California policymakers have knowingly adopted policies with the express intent of
00:47:32.340 eliminating the refinery sector.
00:47:35.440 Valero said California requires refiners to pay very high carbon cap and trade fees and
00:47:42.040 burden gasoline with a cost of low carbon fuel standards, saying, quote, with the backdrop
00:47:46.840 of these policies.
00:47:47.980 Not surprisingly, California has seen refineries completely close or shut down major units.
00:47:55.540 And he said, when you shut down refinery operations, you limit the resilience of the supply chain,
00:48:00.620 saying, don't blame us for this.
00:48:03.220 You guys have isolated this market.
00:48:05.440 You guys have destroyed this market.
00:48:07.460 You guys have made us produce a unique blend of gasoline.
00:48:10.100 And now you want to investigate us while you set up this entire thing?
00:48:14.940 You're I'm glad finally some companies are speaking out like this.
00:48:19.180 I think it's really important to see companies pushing back.
00:48:22.440 You know, the letter continues and it goes right at the California regulators.
00:48:26.020 It's a letter from Valero says, quote, from the perspective of a refiner and fuel supplier,
00:48:31.200 California is the most challenging market to serve in the United States for several additional
00:48:35.920 reasons.
00:48:37.100 California regulators have mandated a unique blend of gasoline that is not readily available
00:48:42.520 outside of the West Coast.
00:48:43.780 California is largely isolated from fuel markets of the central and eastern United States.
00:48:50.340 California has imposed some of the most aggressive and thus expensive and limiting environmental
00:48:55.860 regulatory requirements in the world.
00:48:58.240 California policies have made it difficult to increase refining capacity and it prevented
00:49:04.180 supply projects to lower operating costs of refineries.
00:49:08.160 It is a great example of just responding with facts.
00:49:12.720 And this is we're seeing this nationally with with with with the radicals, the Green New
00:49:18.340 Deal radicals in the Biden administration.
00:49:20.320 And California is is the the Wuhan virus epicenter of the craziness that is in the Biden administration.
00:49:31.220 All of these nutty ideas originated in California with the crazies there.
00:49:37.080 It is the reason people are fleeing California in droves.
00:49:41.340 But when it comes to energy, the reason gas prices are so high nationally, five dollars, six dollars, even seven dollars a gallon is because Joe Biden and the people he appointed want gas prices to be high.
00:49:55.360 They promised Joe Biden on the campaign trail promised that he would end drilling on federal lands, both onshore and offshore.
00:50:03.720 And they have bent over backwards trying to do that.
00:50:06.480 They have put in place dozens of rules and regulations and policy designed to make it harder to to to develop oil and gas in the United States.
00:50:16.580 They shut down the Keystone Pipeline, they shut down exploration in Anwar, the incredibly resource rich, very small section of Alaska.
00:50:24.320 They shut down new leases in offshore drilling with the vast reserves in the Gulf of Mexico.
00:50:30.140 They're not giving new leases there.
00:50:32.040 They are not granting permits for pipelines.
00:50:34.540 They're not granting permits for refineries.
00:50:37.080 And not only that, they're cutting off the funds to pay for exploration.
00:50:43.040 There are two avenues to fund a new exploration project.
00:50:47.380 You'd neither have debt or equity.
00:50:49.400 The Biden banking regulators are hammering banks not to lend oil and gas projects.
00:50:56.100 And on the equity side, the Biden appointees to the SEC are hammering, hammering efforts to raise equity to fund that.
00:51:07.220 Also, if you have no capital, you can't drill.
00:51:09.800 And so what's happening?
00:51:11.260 The bad guys are getting rich.
00:51:12.640 Russia's getting rich.
00:51:13.700 Iran's getting rich.
00:51:15.040 Venezuela's getting rich because they're producing.
00:51:17.400 And by the way, they pollute a lot more than America does.
00:51:20.940 So so the Biden zealots are shutting down, are hurting the environment at the same time.
00:51:25.740 And as bad as all of that is, California takes all of that and does it on steroids.
00:51:30.440 So when you pay seven bucks a gallon in California, I guess you can be grateful because in a year they want you to pay 10 bucks a gallon.
00:51:38.920 And this is the direct result of policies passed by people who don't give a damn about your life.
00:51:48.860 They don't care about your kids.
00:51:50.120 They don't care about working people being unable to afford to get to work or get to school.
00:51:54.720 This is a religion for them and the consequences of their policy.
00:52:00.540 That's for little people to worry about.
00:52:02.540 It doesn't trouble their pretty little heads.
00:52:05.620 Senator, we're off and running with verdict.
00:52:07.620 As I said earlier, I'm looking really forward to doing this with you three days a week.
00:52:12.280 It's going to be fun for everybody listening.
00:52:14.960 I will say it every time.
00:52:16.820 Make sure you hit that little forward arrow on your phone and share this on your social media.
00:52:22.760 Whatever social media you're on, please write us a five star review that helps us reach more people and change hearts and minds when you write us a review.
00:52:31.860 And Senator, it's going to be a lot of fun.
00:52:33.860 It's an honor to get to spend time with you talking about these issues.
00:52:37.180 And this is going to be, as I said, a exciting expansion with Premier, with iHeart, an exciting expansion to do this three days a week.
00:52:46.300 And I can't tell you how excited I am personally.
00:52:49.080 We're going to have a lot of fun.
00:52:50.500 It's going to be a blast.
00:52:51.620 That's it for this edition of Verdict with Ted Cruz.
00:52:54.060 We'll see you back here literally in a couple of days.
00:52:56.560 This is an iHeart podcast.
00:52:59.200 Guaranteed human.