Verdict with Ted Cruz - Speaker Battle -11 Votes & Counting

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.540 Guaranteed human.

00:00:04.880 Welcome, it is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you.

00:00:09.040 Senator, the House has adjourned until Friday after an 11th failed vote to come up with a speaker.

00:00:17.360 Deals are being made, they're saying, or trying to get done behind the scenes.

00:00:21.740 And then there's some people that are deciding to call people in their own party terrorists.

00:00:26.460 Representative Dan Crenshaw said this.

00:00:28.820 Get another scalp and another scalp, whether it's Boehner or Paul Ryan or then McCarthy.

00:00:35.120 Scalise would just be next and we all know it.

00:00:37.240 We just can't allow that to happen.

00:00:39.220 That's why those of us are saying, like, look, you pushed us into this corner.

00:00:42.480 So now we're saying we won't vote for anyone but McCarthy.

00:00:45.900 That's why we're saying it, because we cannot let the terrorists win.

00:00:49.780 That's basically what's happening.

00:00:51.740 Since you and I talked last time, Senator, I didn't think any of this could actually happen.

00:00:56.780 I didn't think we'd get to vote 11.

00:00:58.720 Here we are.

00:00:59.800 We're going into Friday.

00:01:01.480 It could be into the weekend.

00:01:03.660 There are people now claiming that this is an embarrassment.

00:01:07.920 I'm still not there yet.

00:01:09.480 I'd love to know what you think.

00:01:11.440 I think this is just part of the great process.

00:01:14.480 Yeah, look, my view is settle down.

00:01:17.400 This will work out and it'll be fine.

00:01:19.280 That kind of overheated rhetoric, calling people terrorists, is not terribly conducive to anything resembling Republican unity.

00:01:27.740 It's not conducive to having strong leadership for the next two years in the House, engaging in vitriol and personal attacks.

00:01:38.240 Listen, I think a lot of the caterwauling we're hearing is from the media and it's from the Democrats.

00:01:46.040 And to be honest, the media and the Democrats are one in the same.

00:01:48.880 And they have an agenda.

00:01:50.640 Their agenda is to say the Republicans are a failure. 1.00

00:01:53.820 The Republicans are terrible. 1.00

00:01:55.080 The Republicans are disaster. 1.00

00:01:56.420 That's what they're going to say no matter what. 0.99

00:01:57.840 No matter what is happening, that's going to be their talking points.

00:02:00.560 And so all of the screaming of the media, I think, is is overwrought.

00:02:06.220 This is the Democratic process.

00:02:08.220 And and it is true that we haven't had a contested speaker race like this in 100 years.

00:02:14.480 But it's also part of the way the process operates.

00:02:18.720 We've had at this point 11 different votes and it's just it's run a couple of days.

00:02:24.280 The votes, there's been some movement.

00:02:26.260 So for the first round, all the Democrats voted together.

00:02:29.780 First round, Hakeem Jeffries, who's the new Democrat leader, got 212 votes.

00:02:34.940 It takes 218 to be speaker.

00:02:36.960 Hakeem Jeffries is not going to be speaker.

00:02:38.660 It's going to be a Republican speaker.

00:02:40.900 Kevin McCarthy got 203.

00:02:43.740 And there were a collection of people.

00:02:46.400 Ten Republicans voted for Andy Biggs from Arizona.

00:02:49.420 Six for Jim Jordan.

00:02:50.960 One for Jim Banks from Indiana.

00:02:53.060 One for former Representative Lee Zeldin.

00:02:56.320 And one for Byron Donald.

00:02:57.680 So there were initially 19.

00:02:58.940 That was the first round.

00:03:00.800 The second round, the numbers didn't change, but they shifted who they voted for.

00:03:06.320 In the second round, again, McCarthy got 203.

00:03:10.040 But the second round, Jim Jordan got all 19 of the defectors.

00:03:14.580 And so the votes for Biggs, the votes for Banks, Zeldins, Byron Donalds, all of them went behind Jim Jordan.

00:03:22.120 He got 19.

00:03:23.440 How about the third round?

00:03:24.680 Well, the third round, McCarthy lost a vote.

00:03:29.060 McCarthy dropped to 202.

00:03:30.620 And Jim Jordan got 20 votes.

00:03:33.520 And the vote that shifted was Byron Donalds, who had committed to McCarthy that he would vote for him for two rounds, but not the third.

00:03:43.800 And what he publicly said is he shifted his vote because he thought he thought Kevin was not going to get to 218.

00:03:49.560 I don't know if that's right or not.

00:03:51.640 The fourth round, it continues.

00:03:54.620 But then we had, as just a little bit more of a complication, we had one more Republican, Victoria Sparks, who voted present. 0.99

00:04:08.340 So McCarthy lost a vote.

00:04:10.560 He went down from 202 to 201.

00:04:13.660 And in the fourth round, also, Byron Donalds is who the dissenters voted for.

00:04:21.480 So Donalds got 20.

00:04:22.680 So Jim Jordan had gotten 20 votes.

00:04:24.500 Then Byron Donalds got 20 votes.

00:04:26.800 And then you had the fifth round.

00:04:28.920 The numbers are the same.

00:04:30.460 Sixth round.

00:04:31.780 The numbers are the same.

00:04:33.580 Seventh round.

00:04:34.560 The numbers are the same except for one tweak, which is that Matt Gaetz voted for Donald Trump.

00:04:38.800 So can we just pause there for a second and talk about?

00:04:44.760 Sure.

00:04:44.980 That was a funny moment.

00:04:46.780 And I say this because Donald Trump had been tweeting out on his or true socially on his platform.

00:04:53.660 I'm supporting Kevin McCarthy.

00:04:55.700 Let's move on.

00:04:56.960 Let's make him the guy.

00:04:58.620 And then Matt Gaetz, who it was one of the same with Donald Trump through basically the entire time he's in the White House, nominates him.

00:05:06.920 And he's saying, no, no.

00:05:08.020 I don't want this job, obviously.

00:05:10.980 I'm telling you to go Kevin McCarthy.

00:05:12.860 That was one, if you just want to sit back and pop some popcorn and eat it, that was one of those moments for me like, wait, what is happening right now?

00:05:20.960 Well, and to be fair, that's the same thing that happened with Jim Jordan.

00:05:24.040 You know, Jim Jordan was nominated.

00:05:25.840 The first time Jim Jordan was nominated was immediately after he had nominated Kevin McCarthy.

00:05:31.560 Yeah.

00:05:31.960 And so he's likewise said that he doesn't want the job, but they're nominating and voting for him anyway.

00:05:38.880 Look, the Speaker of the House does not have to be a member of the House.

00:05:43.020 So theoretically, Donald Trump could be Speaker of the House.

00:05:46.020 Now, that's not going to happen.

00:05:47.480 Don't hold your breath.

00:05:48.340 There was one vote cast for that, and that was you're not going to see 218 votes cast for Trump as Speaker.

00:05:55.460 It's going to be a House member.

00:05:57.080 What played out in the eighth and ninth rounds, we had Kevin Hearn from Oklahoma who got three votes initially and then got seven votes, and then on the 11th round got seven votes.

00:06:14.660 And so where we are right now is McCarthy is at 200, so he's 18 votes short.

00:06:23.620 The last round of balloting, Akeem Jeffries had 212.

00:06:27.260 He's had it the whole time, so all the Democrats are just voting for him.

00:06:31.260 McCarthy's down to 200.

00:06:32.760 Byron Donalds got 12.

00:06:35.640 Kevin Hearn from Oklahoma got seven.

00:06:38.260 Former President Trump the last round again got one vote, and then there was a present vote.

00:06:43.540 So that's where the votes are now.

00:06:45.140 You know, my reaction to all the histrionics is this is going to shake out, and it's going to shake out one of two ways.

00:06:55.500 One, and this may well be the most likely outcome, which is they negotiate an agreement where McCarthy has been making concessions to the dissenters, making concessions based on rules,

00:07:09.760 making concessions based on how the House operates, making concessions, making it easier for members to offer amendments, easier for members to fight for conservative principles.

00:07:21.360 It may be that McCarthy makes enough concessions that he gets the votes he needs.

00:07:27.840 He needs to pick up 18 more votes, but if he does that, then we could have an agreement.

00:07:39.760 And I will say, so probably the ringleader of the dissenters has been Chip Roy from Texas.

00:07:46.360 Who, by the way, if you're teaching a master class on speaker votes and bringing people together or at least making people understand where you're coming from,

00:07:58.720 Chip Roy, I think, has played this perfectly, and I mean that sincerely,

00:08:03.060 in the fact that he let people understand why he was not voting for McCarthy,

00:08:10.740 and he also explained very clearly what it would take for him to vote for Kevin McCarthy and the rules changes that he wanted.

00:08:19.980 I think there are so many Americans that go, okay, this is a guy I understand, I respect him,

00:08:27.880 and if you're teaching a master class, if there's anything to learn from this,

00:08:31.500 don't keep moving the goalposts when you're objecting to someone.

00:08:37.120 And if it's as simple as, I just don't like him, then stick with that, but don't keep changing it.

00:08:43.640 I think he has done the best job of articulating some of the concerns and the things that he wanted to change.

00:08:51.340 I would give him an A-plus in class.

00:08:54.140 Well, look, there's no doubt Chip has been effective and he's been articulate,

00:08:57.740 and he's been focused on substance.

00:08:59.660 I mean, part of, you know, what makes this complicated is you've got 20 players

00:09:05.660 and the 20 folks who have been the dissenters, many of them are operating for different reasons.

00:09:15.380 Chip, at least, has not focused his opposition on a personal animosity to Kevin McCarthy.

00:09:22.060 He hasn't been focused on demonizing or attacking him personally.

00:09:27.020 Rather, he's been focused on the rules.

00:09:29.820 He's been focused on the procedures.

00:09:31.420 He's been focused on how the House operates.

00:09:35.720 One very significant concession that McCarthy made on Wednesday night

00:09:44.160 is that Kevin made a public commitment that going forward he would not engage in Republican primaries.

00:09:53.200 There were a number of primaries this past cycle where Kevin McCarthy's PAC supported the much more moderate Republican

00:10:01.220 and attacked the more conservative Republican, even in bright red seats where whoever wins was going to be the nominee.

00:10:10.400 And quite a few of the House conservatives were unhappy that Kevin was raising significant amounts of money

00:10:16.540 and spending that money against conservatives in primaries. 0.93

00:10:20.420 Well, McCarthy made a public commitment, and interestingly enough, he made a commitment in the Club for Growth,

00:10:25.120 which often fights against, at least in past cycles, McCarthy in these primaries,

00:10:30.640 in turn expressed their willingness to support McCarthy if he would stay out of primaries.

00:10:38.240 That's a big deal, that commitment.

00:10:41.220 When you say that's a big deal, explain scenarios where this could have changed outcome of House races,

00:10:48.480 because I don't think people understand how much the money can really decide who's going to win these things in primaries.

00:10:54.880 Money plays a massive role in a lot of elections.

00:10:58.460 It doesn't necessarily decide them.

00:11:01.300 But there were multiple elections across the country where McCarthy's PAC got involved in the primary,

00:11:10.960 not in the general, not trying to support the Republican against the Democrat.

00:11:13.880 Now, they did that, to be clear, Kevin's PAC spent hundreds of millions of dollars supporting Republicans in the general.

00:11:20.180 So I don't want to diminish, he worked very hard trying to elect Republicans across the country,

00:11:25.640 but there are a number of House conservatives who were angry that he was playing in primaries.

00:11:33.860 And by the way, that's reprising a battle that happened in the Senate over a decade ago.

00:11:40.360 You know, if you remember back to the 2010 cycle, where Senate leadership engaged in a bunch of primaries,

00:11:48.520 and so, for example, Senate leadership came in the primary against Rand Paul in Kentucky.

00:11:56.380 They came in the primary against Mike Lee in Utah.

00:11:59.100 They came in the primary against Pat Toomey in Pennsylvania.

00:12:02.340 They came in the primary against Marco Rubio in Florida.

00:12:06.020 And Senate leadership just screwed it up.

00:12:08.160 I mean, all four of those, they got clobbered and they got a black eye.

00:12:13.020 And I will say, actually, as a bit of interesting trivia, I may have been a beneficiary because 2010 Senate leadership got such a black eye

00:12:23.540 for making the wrong call in race after race after race and losing that in 2012,

00:12:30.860 which is that with the year I got elected to the Senate, Senate leadership stayed out of primaries.

00:12:35.440 And, look, I got to say, in hindsight, that that probably is a good thing for me because they would not have been supporting me in that primary.

00:12:43.160 No, no way at all.

00:12:44.040 They would have definitely been supporting your opponent, who is the safe Republican establishment candidate that you were clearly up against.

00:12:53.700 And he had tons of funding as well.

00:12:56.880 Well, and he had his he had a every lobbyist in the state of Texas was with him because he was sitting lieutenant governor.

00:13:02.220 And B, he was worth over 200 million dollars.

00:13:04.360 So he wrote a 35 million dollar check.

00:13:06.120 But the point was Senate Republican leadership kind of stepped in it in 2010 and has been much more wary of getting in primaries since then.

00:13:20.020 This last cycle, McCarthy was pretty vocal, engaging in primaries.

00:13:24.720 And I think that's one of the concerns that is animating these dissenters.

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00:14:02.480 Let me ask you this.

00:14:03.840 One of the things you look at these 20 and I think it's clear that some of the 20, it's just personal.

00:14:12.200 And and I I know there has to be moments in your career center where there's certain people in the Senate on your side that you just don't click with.

00:14:23.160 You just don't like maybe they they flat out lied to your face.

00:14:27.540 Maybe they've lied to you about something they were going to work with you on or support or a bill.

00:14:31.960 But you do have to remind yourself I'm this isn't me personally.

00:14:38.740 I'm here to represent the interests of the people of the state or the community right where you are from.

00:14:44.880 If you're a congressman, for example, how much how many blunders could be happening here?

00:14:50.620 Because people are making this too much about them personally, not enough about maybe their constituents.

00:14:56.880 Look, emotions matter and and and people have personal sentiments and hurt feelings.

00:15:01.700 And and and I certainly don't know what what what went on behind closed doors.

00:15:09.320 But what makes this complicated complicated to to reach a negotiated settlement is each of these 20 are operating on their own.

00:15:21.160 So if if, for example, if Chip Roy had the authority to commit for all 20 of them, if they all essentially gave that gave him their proxy and said, if you cut a deal, we'll stick with you.

00:15:33.300 I think I think the odds are pretty good that that that Chip and McCarthy could reach a deal, because I do think Chip has done a good job of focusing on procedural issues to to expand debate, expand the ability to offer amendments, expand leverage conservatives would have in the House.

00:15:54.360 And and I think they could probably get to the same page.

00:15:57.380 What may make it impossible is I don't know how many of these players are just emotional and have hurt feelings.

00:16:08.120 I don't know for how many of them it's personal with Kevin or not.

00:16:12.460 Look, you know, when you've got when you've got folks using rhetoric, like calling them terrorists, you know, if you call someone a terrorist, that's not terribly conducive to getting them to come along and play nice.

00:16:25.060 Yeah, I mean, that goes back to what I was saying earlier about if you're teaching a master class here, the do's and don'ts are it don't go and make it even more personal and think, oh, well, that's going to get the 20 to really come around when that type of rhetoric is being used.

00:16:40.240 While you desperately need their votes to give yourself and some of your guys are going out there as surrogates and saying things like that, that's not going to help you get the 20 to come over.

00:16:51.340 It's not like that's going to get them to see the light of day.

00:16:53.140 That's going to make them, I would assume, just by human nature, dig in.

00:16:58.620 You know, as a general matter, relying on insults to try to bludgeon your opposition is is it's a perilous path unless you have all the leverage.

00:17:12.920 And at this point, with with just a four vote majority, I'm not sure anyone has all the leverage.

00:17:18.380 That is a very perilous path.

00:17:21.580 And so I think we will either see some negotiated settlement that involves procedural concessions from McCarthy or at some point, if the votes don't move and the votes don't move and the votes don't move.

00:17:37.100 So presumably there will be some other candidate who becomes a consensus candidate.

00:17:40.900 Now, I don't think that would happen unless McCarthy decided, OK, the votes aren't here for me, because Kevin would certainly have the votes to stop anybody else.

00:17:49.820 So so it would take it would take Kevin making the decision this isn't going to happen.

00:17:56.040 And I think I have not spoken I haven't spoken to any of the players actually during this.

00:18:01.080 So I haven't I haven't spoken to Kevin during this.

00:18:03.620 I haven't spoken to Chip.

00:18:04.360 I haven't spoken to any of the folks there.

00:18:05.560 So I'm I'm watching it on TV.

00:18:07.800 I'm watching it on Twitter like everybody else.

00:18:09.960 And I know most of the players quite well.

00:18:12.640 I mean, these these members of Congress, almost all of them are close friends of mine.

00:18:16.560 So, I mean, I know know who they are as people.

00:18:21.440 And and, you know, these folks are principled and they believe in what they're trying to do.

00:18:29.500 But you'll either see a negotiated settlement.

00:18:38.880 I don't know what the terms are, if there are there, there is one or presumably at some point, someone else becomes a consensus candidate.

00:18:45.200 And I don't know who that would be.

00:18:49.420 And I suspect an enormous amount of that would depend on on Kevin McCarthy and the decision making he made.

00:18:55.280 Let's talk about another aspect of this, and that is the media.

00:18:59.340 Obviously, they're trying to grab on and find headlines to fear monger people.

00:19:05.720 Earlier today, they had a big, long discussion.

00:19:08.280 I think it was on CNN where they were saying, well, this could become a national security issue because they can't get briefings.

00:19:16.660 And there's people that aren't even elected that are going to get better briefings than the people that haven't been sworn in yet with this new Congress on the House side.

00:19:24.940 And this is going to be an issue.

00:19:26.740 I mean, they're trying to give us a doomsday scenario here.

00:19:31.160 How long can this go and everything really is just fine?

00:19:36.220 Oh, look, I think the national security argument is just gobbledygook.

00:19:40.680 This is going to get resolved, and I think it'll get resolved fairly quickly.

00:19:44.480 It could get resolved today.

00:19:46.580 It could get resolved in a few days.

00:19:49.380 I imagine there are scenarios where it could take a couple of weeks.

00:19:53.040 I don't envision any world where it takes longer than that, and I don't even think it'll take a couple of weeks.

00:19:59.420 I think it's going to end up one way or the other.

00:20:05.020 This is going to be resolved.

00:20:06.820 So the idea that it is this horrible affront to the republic for the House to spend a couple of days debating their leadership, that's just a weird idea.

00:20:18.480 As we talked about in the last podcast, there's a reason I led the fight in the Senate for us to have several weeks of debate on Senate leadership.

00:20:29.120 And we had that debate, at least the beginnings of the debate, which we haven't had in a long time.

00:20:33.720 Now, because the Senate doesn't have a procedure like this where the leader is elected on the floor, it wasn't done on C-SPAN.

00:20:43.860 Yeah.

00:20:44.320 And it wasn't done in a context that holds up the House for a period of time.

00:20:51.420 It was it was done behind closed door with the Senate.

00:20:54.040 But I think in both houses, having a debate about what leadership is going to do, how they're going to approach it, what their priorities are, what fights they're willing to fight.

00:21:04.980 Look, the question that I asked Mitch McConnell repeatedly, what are you willing to fight for?

00:21:11.600 Give me one thing, anything.

00:21:13.400 And tragically, it appeared the only thing that that so far Republican leadership was willing to fight for was the disaster of a one point seven trillion dollar omnibus bill, the Pelosi-Schumer spending bill.

00:21:24.380 So the the reason for the frustration that I think a lot of voters have is is evident.

00:21:33.340 But but my overarching message also is is, you know, folks need to relax a little bit.

00:21:41.100 This will get resolved.

00:21:43.500 We're going to have a House majority.

00:21:45.420 We're going to have a Republican speaker.

00:21:47.100 We're going to have Republican chairman in the committees.

00:21:48.900 We're going to have oversight hearings.

00:21:50.760 We're going to have subpoenas.

00:21:51.940 We're going to have legislation moving forward.

00:21:53.620 All of that is going to happen.

00:21:55.700 And at the end of the day, the cosmos is not dramatically different if it happens in a week or two days ago.

00:22:08.060 Yeah. And I laugh because Democrats, it was like they were throwing Jell-O at the wall on TV and the commentators because Jeffries came out.

00:22:18.100 The first one they basically tried early in the day on Thursday, Senator, was, oh, this could become a national security issue.

00:22:25.840 By mid-afternoon, they had switched from that and represented Jeffries.

00:22:29.800 By the way, on national security, look, we've got a Senate in the Senate.

00:22:33.860 We all have have our security clearances and the ability to be read it read into things.

00:22:39.580 And, you know, we also have when it really comes to national security, what you know, you've got a president and a secretary of state and a secretary of defense and a chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

00:22:50.420 Now, you and I aren't very happy with the job they're doing when you actually talk about national security.

00:22:55.020 I think the people in the Biden administration are affirmatively harmful for that.

00:22:59.980 But the idea that it would somehow impact national security to have a few days debate over leadership is is is a weird argument.

00:23:11.700 Well, and I laugh because they went from that earlier in the day and then it was like, all right, well, we need something else to throw out there.

00:23:18.860 And then Representative Jeffries comes out and he says this national security vulnerabilities.

00:23:24.400 This is a dangerous moment for Americans and for the world.

00:23:29.100 It's one of the reasons why the Congress needs to organize.

00:23:31.780 There are public health vulnerabilities.

00:23:34.760 It's one of the reasons why the Congress needs to organize and Republicans need to get their act together.

00:23:42.460 So they threw that on there.

00:23:44.000 It became well now it's also it's not just national security.

00:23:47.180 Now it's public health.

00:23:48.280 I'm laughing because the Senate's in recess right now.

00:23:52.260 If if they had picked the speaker, wouldn't most of these people be home by now?

00:23:58.180 They'd all be home.

00:23:59.360 Right.

00:23:59.820 Every one of them would have gone home.

00:24:01.220 Nothing would have changed, right?

00:24:02.200 Actually, they're in D.C. now.

00:24:05.180 The irony is that the reason the House is there is because of this.

00:24:10.140 If they picked the speaker, they would they would have gone home.

00:24:14.420 And look, I I don't fault Hakeem Jeffries for doing what he's doing.

00:24:18.920 That's what you do.

00:24:20.040 Look, if you're the opposing party and the other side is is having an internal food fight,

00:24:25.860 you stand there and laugh and eat popcorn and and, you know, you throw rocks in the cheap seats.

00:24:31.280 So, of course, that's what he's doing.

00:24:34.160 And to be clear, if if the shoe were on the other foot, we'd be Democrats were having if it was AOC challenging Nancy Pelosi.

00:24:44.260 You and I'd be sitting there going, man, they can't get their act together.

00:24:47.220 And we would be doing exactly what Jeffries is doing.

00:24:49.700 So I don't fault him for that.

00:24:51.320 I'll tell you what I do fault, though, is there are some who are engaged in nasty rhetoric on the Republican side, but also the Democrat side.

00:24:59.560 Cori Bush.

00:25:00.760 That's what I was going to say to you was you just said the laughing and you'd sit back.

00:25:05.940 How hard is it not to screw this moment up?

00:25:09.300 You're a Democrat.

00:25:10.200 You make you laugh at some of this.

00:25:12.720 You say some of this.

00:25:14.380 But if there's anything that the Democratic Party should have figured out was just kind of sit back, 1.00

00:25:20.880 take a moment and let and don't steal a headline away by doing something stupid. 0.99

00:25:27.280 Insert Cori Bush and where you're going with this right now. 0.99

00:25:30.580 Now, one of the biggest racist blunders that never had to even get close to where they took it.

00:25:36.920 And all of a sudden the story changes.

00:25:39.340 And I'm sure people on the Democrat side are like, really, you had to do this right now?

00:25:44.520 Well, look, Cori Bush is is one of the most radical members of the Democrat Party of the House. 0.59

00:25:52.040 She is on the extreme left.

00:25:54.400 She's one of the biggest advocates of abolishing the police.

00:25:57.320 It's ironically, she spends massive amounts on private security while arguing for abolishing the police. 1.00

00:26:02.900 So it's it's rules for the and not for me.

00:26:05.820 And and unfortunately, she's been willing to to really engage in in racist rhetoric. 0.99

00:26:11.860 So she sent a tweet that reads for what it's worth.

00:26:16.800 Byron Donalds is not an historic candidate for speaker.

00:26:21.320 He is a prop. 0.93

00:26:22.960 Despite being black, he supports a policy agenda intent on upholding and perpetuating white supremacy. 0.97

00:26:33.860 His name being in the mix is not progress. 1.00

00:26:37.400 It's pathetic. 0.99

00:26:39.300 And I got to say that is that is nasty. 1.00

00:26:42.980 That is racist.

00:26:44.600 By the way, it echoes what what Dick Durbin said in the Senate when Tim Scott, the Republican from South Carolina, African-American,

00:26:57.040 was standing up and trying to lead legislation on on police and and and both preventing preventing violence to those who are being arrested,

00:27:12.740 but also protecting police at the same time.

00:27:15.580 And Durbin ridiculed Tim Scott as a token.

00:27:20.400 And it's the same leftists have I retweeted Cori Bush.

00:27:27.860 And what I said, as I said, open racism is normalized on the radical left.

00:27:32.820 Now the Dems are calling Byron Donalds, who's a black man, who's a conservative, who's strong, articulate.

00:27:39.400 They're calling him effectively a white supremacist. 0.98

00:27:43.360 That's just nuts. 0.98

00:27:45.460 That's but look, whether it's Cori Bush or Dick Durbin, when they see a black Republican, there is a level of of anger, of animus, of of bile. 0.86

00:27:58.040 It's why they come out with things like token and prop.

00:28:02.400 Same thing Clarence Thomas faces, because that they view them.

00:28:07.280 And by the way, I'll say this as as an Hispanic.

00:28:10.180 There is some of that. 0.80

00:28:11.360 It's not nearly as nasty being an Hispanic Republican as it as it is, how the left treats black Republicans.

00:28:17.600 But but, you know, I had Jorge Ramos on on national television called me a traitor to my race because I believe in securing the border. 0.53

00:28:27.200 I mean, it's there's a nastiness.

00:28:30.060 And unfortunately, when you have someone, you know, when Byron Donalds was was nominated and actually Chip Roy was nominating him,

00:28:38.680 he pointed out Akeem Jeffries had been nominated.

00:28:41.880 He said this is the first time in the history of our country that to to black black people, African-Americans, have been nominated to be speaker of the House.

00:28:51.340 And there was significant applause in the House at that. 0.94

00:28:54.400 I mean, that is meaningful and positive, but it drives the Democrats crazy.

00:28:59.600 They cannot acknowledge to the leftists. 0.77

00:29:04.540 Byron Donalds is not black.

00:29:06.080 Clarence Thomas is not black. 0.63

00:29:07.460 Tim Scott is not black.

00:29:09.080 I'm not Hispanic.

00:29:10.280 Marco Rubio is not Hispanic.

00:29:11.960 You must be a leftist to count in in in their in their bean counting world.

00:29:17.360 How is it that not a single member of the media gets this tweet and immediately goes and demands a comment from the Democratic leadership?

00:29:25.480 Because it is racist.

00:29:26.780 It's very clearly racist and they act like it doesn't even happen.

00:29:31.160 I mean, even and I would say the Washington, D.C., Capitol Hill Press Corps is a little bit more formal than maybe some of the other press members outside in the world where there's a little bit more dignity in their group.

00:29:47.520 And yet they just completely look the other direction when a member of Congress says something this racist in this moment about an African-American man who is who's been nominated in a historic way in a moment that has 100 plus years of history involved in it.

00:30:05.640 Well, look, part of it is the media agrees with those same radical senses.

00:30:11.360 You remember back when when Larry Elder was running for governor of California and the Los Angeles Times published an op ed, the title of which was Larry Elder is the black face of white supremacy. 0.78

00:30:29.680 I mean, this is nasty and they do it over and over and over again. 0.66

00:30:35.040 It is particularly the hard left.

00:30:38.180 They they they they not only revel in racism, they know they won't get called out on it from the press because the press agrees with them or too many of them do, at least.

00:30:52.860 Yeah, it's it's total silence on this one.

00:30:55.420 And it's one of those moments when you see the Democrats and it reminds you of what you're up against across the aisle.

00:31:02.100 And they allow this to fester within the Democratic Party.

00:31:07.080 Any time a minority stands up that is a conservative, they immediately lose their race and their minority status and they do whatever they can to absolutely destroy them.

00:31:16.960 Senator, it's this has been a fun moment.

00:31:20.920 As I said earlier, a master class ask on all of this.

00:31:24.820 There's a lot of history involved.

00:31:26.260 I know people wanted to hear what you thought about this.

00:31:30.160 And I think the big takeaway from you is this is OK.

00:31:34.560 This is going to play out and things are going to end well for us.

00:31:38.780 And don't take the bait for the media, implying this is a national security risk or a health crisis risk.

00:31:45.420 This is totally fine.

00:31:47.280 Look, my message is simple.

00:31:49.400 Keep calm and carry on.

00:31:52.160 This is debate.

00:31:53.640 This is democracy.

00:31:54.620 It will play out.

00:31:56.320 It will resolve itself.

00:31:57.640 I think it will resolve itself in a matter of days or at most weeks.

00:32:03.400 And I don't know how it will resolve it.

00:32:05.560 I have genuinely no idea what the resolution will be.

00:32:09.660 But I do think the process of elected members debating amongst themselves.

00:32:15.440 Their agenda, their rules, their policies, how they're going to conduct themselves.

00:32:23.860 I think that debate is a healthy thing in either House of Congress.

00:32:28.380 It's going to be interesting.

00:32:29.620 It's going to be fun to watch.

00:32:30.700 Grab some more popcorn, my friends.

00:32:32.760 We will be back with you on Monday.

00:32:35.220 There may be a chance if we get a speaker before then.

00:32:37.300 You might get something else from us, so make sure you hit that subscribe button, auto download button wherever you're listening to this podcast.

00:32:44.620 Make sure you rise to the Five Star Review Center.

00:32:46.880 It's a pleasure as always, and we'll see all you guys back here on Monday.

00:32:50.740 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:32:54.040 Guaranteed Human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - January 06, 2023

Speaker Battle -11 Votes & Counting

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