Verdict with Ted Cruz - The Cloakroom Preview： An Intentionally Anti-Democratic Voting System

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.520 Guaranteed human.

00:00:04.480 Hi, guys.

00:00:05.680 Liz Wheeler here.

00:00:07.020 So after we finish recording Verdict every week, Senator Cruz and I sit down and get

00:00:12.040 into the nitty gritty of it all on our Verdict Plus series called The Cloak Room, where we

00:00:17.280 look at political issues through a specifically legal lens.

00:00:22.160 And what I want to do today is offer you a sneak preview of the latest episode of The

00:00:27.020 Cloak Room on Verdict Plus.

00:00:28.040 You can also join us on a weekly basis by going to verdictwithtedcruise.com slash plus.

00:00:34.040 If you use my promo code, Cloak Room, then you can watch for free for the first month

00:00:38.020 of your annual subscription.

00:00:39.620 That is verdictwithtedcruise.com slash plus, promo code Cloak Room.

00:00:44.900 And without further ado, here's a sneak preview of The Cloak Room on Verdict Plus.

00:00:49.540 Hi, guys.

00:00:50.360 Welcome back to another episode of The Cloak Room.

00:00:52.320 I'm Liz Wheeler.

00:00:53.000 I'm sitting here with Senator Ted Cruz.

00:00:55.020 And Senator, I want to start today just by saying congratulations.

00:00:57.540 We did it again.

00:00:59.080 The left, the mainstream media, is up in arms over something we talked about right here

00:01:03.200 in The Cloak Room last week, the cancellation of student loan debt.

00:01:06.580 So I think we should start the show just by welcoming The Washington Post and Business Insider

00:01:10.760 who wrote an article about your comments, your legal analysis of whether what Biden did

00:01:16.360 with his executive order, canceling student loan debt, whether it's legal.

00:01:19.860 They joined the ranks of CNN and MSNBC who came to Verdict Plus last month when we were

00:01:25.860 talking about Obergefell because of what Clarence Thomas wrote in the Dobbs, in his Dobbs concurrence.

00:01:31.060 So before we get started on the rank choice voting, which is a fascinating topic that Verdict

00:01:36.120 Plus fans have been asking about, I want to ask you, why do you think that the mainstream

00:01:40.720 media is so up in arms about the legal analysis?

00:01:43.680 Because that's what we were talking about, right?

00:01:44.860 Not even the politics, the legality of the thing.

00:01:46.800 Do they know that it's illegal?

00:01:49.000 Well, they seem to.

00:01:50.260 You look at The Washington Post story.

00:01:51.860 They wrote about Cloak Room.

00:01:53.360 And they basically acknowledge that it's contrary to the law.

00:01:57.240 But we had an honest and candid discussion about the legal impediments there would be

00:02:03.100 to getting a court to reach the merits of the dispute.

00:02:06.080 And in particular, the problem of establishing standing.

00:02:09.960 And look, the press likes it when any Republican discusses any impediment to principled arguments

00:02:22.920 prevailing, that they like that, gosh, wait, this illegal student loan giveaway, maybe it

00:02:31.060 survives.

00:02:31.980 I will say, since we did the last Cloak Room, we talked about different scenarios of who might

00:02:36.580 have standing, and I actually reached out to one of the top Supreme Court litigators in

00:02:43.180 the country, who's a dear friend of mine.

00:02:45.300 And he and I were brainstorming a little bit more on standing after we did the Cloak Room

00:02:50.960 last week.

00:02:51.860 And he came up with one more scenario, one other group of people that would have standing.

00:02:57.420 And I think it's probably the strongest case for standing.

00:03:00.960 And that is a student loan processor.

00:03:03.940 So a company that is processing student loans, and the reason they would have standing is

00:03:09.780 the consequence of forgiving these loans, and particularly the loans that are forgiven

00:03:13.280 down to zero, is that those companies would face, as I understand it, a very significant

00:03:19.240 drop in revenue, that it is real money out of their pocket because of the illegal forgiveness

00:03:24.260 of the debts, that would almost surely clear the hurdle for standing.

00:03:34.920 The downside is, if you have someone that is processing student loans and administering

00:03:41.060 student loans, they're doing business with the federal government.

00:03:44.540 So they may not be willing to sue because they don't want to piss off the feds.

00:03:49.020 But legally, they would have a quite a strong argument for standing to be able to make the

00:03:56.740 legal argument.

00:03:57.860 And if it gets to the merits, I think the executive order gets struck down.

00:04:02.080 I think it goes to the Supreme Court and is probably struck down 6-3, the same margins we

00:04:07.960 saw on other lawless assertions of power by the Biden White House.

00:04:12.060 So there is one group of plaintiffs that likely has standing, but time will tell whether they

00:04:19.640 will have the courage to be willing to bring a lawsuit to press the claim.

00:04:25.300 Well, maybe it'll be courage paired with how hard their business is hit if they actually

00:04:29.500 are decimated and they don't really have a business left to risk if they challenge the

00:04:34.420 feds.

00:04:34.740 That's very interesting.

00:04:36.080 Maybe we should just pause right here and send this little update to the Washington Post

00:04:39.320 and this little update to Business Insider so they can update their articles to make

00:04:42.780 sure that it's fully accurate, exactly how we Republicans are going to challenge them.

00:04:47.840 So can we make sure that the Washington Post are paying subscribers?

00:04:51.220 I mean, I mean, they do need to pay to keep the lights on here.

00:04:54.300 Of course, of course they will.

00:04:55.620 I mean, they're here right now.

00:04:56.480 They watched last week.

00:04:57.440 So there you go.

00:04:58.680 OK, this week I have a really interesting topic.

00:05:00.700 So Republicans, unfortunately, lost a seat in the House of Representatives in Alaska.

00:05:05.540 Of all places, there was a special election in Alaska.

00:05:07.980 And the Democrat ended up winning, defeating Sarah Palin, former governor, former vice presidential 0.98

00:05:13.220 candidate Sarah Palin.

00:05:14.440 And this was a little bit of an anomaly in Alaska because of the structure of their voting

00:05:19.740 system.

00:05:20.160 They have ranked choice voting.

00:05:21.760 Actually, let me back up.

00:05:23.100 In their primary systems, they have jungle primaries, which means it's not sorted by party.

00:05:28.640 Republicans don't go vote for a Republican.

00:05:30.740 Democrats vote for a Democrat.

00:05:31.920 Everyone's in this primary together.

00:05:33.240 And then the top four people compete in the general election.

00:05:38.080 And it's ranked choice voting, meaning you have to have over 50 percent of the vote.

00:05:41.680 It's not just the person with the most.

00:05:43.220 You have to cross that threshold.

00:05:44.720 And if someone doesn't cross the threshold, which no one does when you have four people,

00:05:49.200 then you go to the ranked choice.

00:05:51.480 You pick a second and a third choice.

00:05:53.080 It's very messy.

00:05:54.160 It's very weird.

00:05:55.380 And it resulted in, even though the two Republican candidates combined had 60 percent of the votes

00:06:02.200 and the Democrats combined had 40 percent of the votes, the Democrat is going to Washington,

00:06:06.940 D.C.

00:06:07.280 Give me your top down, zoomed out analysis of, I guess, ranked choice voting.

00:06:13.380 Like what is what's going on here?

00:06:15.820 Well, ranked choice voting, I think, is a terrible design.

00:06:19.320 Uh, and it is, it is intentionally anti-democratic.

00:06:24.420 So you got to understand where these so-called reforms came from.

00:06:27.920 Uh, they come from enlightened good government folks that want one of two things to happen.

00:06:33.320 They either, A, want Democrats to win or B, at the very minimum, they want moderates to win.

00:06:40.580 What they don't want to win are conservatives.

00:06:43.440 All of this is designed to stop conservatives from winning.

00:06:47.260 And the reason you see these lefties pushing these reforms is that when you actually have

00:06:53.320 free and fair elections and the voters vote, with some regularity, they vote to elect conservatives.

00:07:00.820 And so this is all designed, uh, to rig the election, to make it incredibly difficult to

00:07:07.500 elect a conservative.

00:07:08.360 This is designed to change the rules.

00:07:10.920 It, it, it, it is, it is in the same general family as ballot harvesting, as universal mail-in

00:07:17.420 voting, all of these things are designed to make it harder for a Republican to win, harder

00:07:22.920 for, uh, a conservative to win.

00:07:26.380 And it, the reason they're implemented is the so-called reformers don't like what the voters

00:07:32.460 do when they're actually given a straight up choice.

00:07:35.020 So you look at this election, number one, you had the jungle primary.

00:07:38.680 You had all of the Republicans and Democrats on the ballot together.

00:07:41.540 If you had, like most states had a Republican primary and a Democratic primary, then Republican

00:07:47.920 prime, uh, voters could select their choice, their preferred candidate, Democrat voters could

00:07:53.720 select their choice and you would have one major party nominee from each party.

00:07:59.300 The reason that you see places like California do a jungle primary is they recognize, wait, conservative 0.94

00:08:05.500 Republicans win primaries, and then crap, when they win primaries, they turn around and win the general

00:08:09.680 election. 0.84

00:08:10.420 So let's do the jungle primary to make it harder for that conservative to win. 1.00

00:08:15.300 Alaska, though, did put the whole thing on steroids with ranked choice voting, because if you look at 0.73

00:08:21.400 the numbers, um, and here, let me pull up the, the numbers.

00:08:26.560 Uh, so 60% of the voters, uh, voted for Republicans, uh, however, the breakdown, this is taking me a second.

00:08:42.200 All right.

00:08:43.160 So the first round of voting, 40.2% voted for the Democrat.

00:08:50.460 Uh, 31.3% voted for Sarah Palin and 28.5% voted for Republican, Nick Begich.

00:08:59.800 So if you add up Palin and Begich's number together, uh, you, you get right at, uh, right at 60%.

00:09:06.860 So 60% of the voters voted Republican, 40% of the voters voted Democrat.

00:09:11.620 What's the outcome?

00:09:12.820 The Democrat gets elected.

00:09:14.040 Why is that?

00:09:14.680 Well, under ranked choice voting, the third place finisher, uh, who, who was, uh, Nick Begich.

00:09:25.700 He's third.

00:09:26.720 So he's eliminated.

00:09:28.160 And they look to the voters, put a second choice.

00:09:31.940 The Begich voters put a second choice and they allocate those second choices to whomever they put.

00:09:37.460 Well, as it so happens, 50.3% of the Begich voters put Sarah Palin as, as their second choice.

00:09:45.480 So that, so half of Begich's votes got allocated to Sarah Palin. 0.99

00:09:51.020 28.8% put Peltola, who is the, the Democrat as their second choice.

00:09:57.840 And then what really had a big impact, 20.9% didn't put a second choice.

00:10:04.940 They voted for Begich and they left it blank.

00:10:06.540 The consequence of this is even though 60% voted Republican, a Democrat gets elected.

00:10:13.520 And it, and it's, that, as I said, is by design.

00:10:17.720 The people who put this in place wanted either Democrats to win or at the very worst moderates

00:10:24.100 to win.

00:10:25.420 So you compared this to ballot harvesting or vote harvesting, which I find very interesting

00:10:30.940 because ballot harvesting and vote harvesting is something that has to be dealt with at the

00:10:35.840 state level.

00:10:36.360 And many states have outlawed that practice.

00:10:38.980 Is rank choice voting something that should be outlawed by states to protect against, well,

00:10:44.200 this outcome?

00:10:46.600 Absolutely.

00:10:47.440 Look, it's a bad way of doing elections.

00:10:49.580 It, it, it, people, it, it doesn't present an election as a binary choice.

00:10:54.180 At the end of the day, you're choosing between one person or another and only one person can

00:10:59.440 win.

00:11:00.180 And, and what happens with rank choice voting is you end up, you look at some of the game

00:11:04.640 theory and economics, you end up with people voting in ways that, that the outcome is perverse

00:11:10.740 and backwards, um, election should be about making choices.

00:11:16.020 Um, and the people who push these reforms know that they know that the outcome, the reason

00:11:26.600 they want to change the way elections are done is they don't like how the voters vote.

00:11:33.420 They're trying to prevent the voters from voting the way they would vote if they were given the

00:11:38.640 ability to do so in an ordinary election.

00:11:40.340 I will say, by the way, as an aside, um, on an infinitely less consequential stage, um,

00:11:49.900 I actually participated in a rank choice voting election in which I lost the election by one

00:11:59.600 vote.

00:12:01.540 And, and I'll tell you the story as I said, it was, it was infinitesimally less important,

00:12:07.440 but it was when I was in college, I was at Princeton and I was very active in the American

00:12:12.060 Whig Klyosophic Society, which is the world's oldest, uh, debating and political society.

00:12:18.000 Um, I was the chairman of the Klyosophic Party, which was the conservative party, uh, that was

00:12:22.960 founded by William Patterson.

00:12:24.380 It was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.

00:12:26.620 Uh, the American Whig Party was founded by James Madison, the father of the constitution.

00:12:32.140 Um, I ran for president of the American Whig Klyosophic Society, which is the entire debating

00:12:37.860 society.

00:12:38.420 Unfortunately, Whig Klyosophic Society used rank choice voting.

00:12:43.580 So at the end of the first round of voting, I was leading.

00:12:48.580 I had 52 votes.

00:12:50.980 The second place candidate had 44 votes.

00:12:54.820 So I had won by a sizable margin on the first round.

00:12:58.640 The third place candidate had 19 votes because the third place candidate was eliminated.

00:13:04.940 Those 19 votes were reallocated of those 19 votes.

00:13:10.220 Five had me in second.

00:13:11.860 So my 52 went to 57 and 14 had the second place finisher as their second choice.

00:13:19.640 And so his 44 went to 58 and I lost 58 to 57.

00:13:24.880 Uh, and I got to tell you at 20 years old, it sucked then. 0.99

00:13:29.520 Uh, and I got to say it sucks for Sarah Palin. 0.98

00:13:32.660 Sarah is a friend of mine. 0.95

00:13:33.720 I like Sarah, uh, I am sorry for the outcome that happened that, and it, and it sucks even

00:13:39.500 worse for the people of Alaska.

00:13:42.600 That's funny that you phrase it like that, because when you're telling this story about

00:13:45.380 losing by one point, that's the only thing that came into my head just, wow, that really

00:13:48.540 sucks to lose by one point. 0.53

00:13:50.180 Even if it's a college debate society, that really sucks to, to lose in this way. 0.94

00:13:54.440 How did Alaska specifically end up with a system like this?

00:13:57.480 Who, who is the they that are behind these reforms?

00:13:59.440 So there's some dispute about that.

00:14:03.200 Um, but there was a referendum effort to put it on the ballot and the voters voted for

00:14:08.080 it.

00:14:08.320 Now you could say, well, gosh, isn't that consistent with democracy?

00:14:11.820 Yes, in a sense, the voters put it in place, but I am not at all convinced the voters understood

00:14:18.960 what the consequences would be.

00:14:20.940 I'd be willing to bet people are astonished today that 60% of the voters in Alaska voted

00:14:27.580 for a Republican and the result is the Democrat wins.

00:14:30.040 Um, that this is designed to deceive voters.

00:14:35.520 Um, and, and, and I think election mechanisms that are designed to deceive voters are not

00:14:43.140 good mechanisms.

00:14:44.040 They, they frustrate the operation of democracy.

00:14:47.880 It seems like this is one of those things that conservatives and states across the country,

00:14:52.060 not just Alaska should check and make sure that this is not an effort that's being exerted

00:14:57.400 in their, in their localities, in their states to make sure to protect against this.

00:15:01.480 Because that's, that's the thing.

00:15:02.300 That's what we saw with Mark Elias, right?

00:15:04.060 In, in the summer of 2020, before the presidential election, when all of these, all of these changes

00:15:08.320 to election laws in different states, especially the swing states like Pennsylvania and Arizona

00:15:11.940 and Georgia and Wisconsin, people didn't really see it coming until it was too late.

00:15:16.200 This might, this might be a signal to people to make sure your state's not doing this.

00:15:19.280 So, so that it doesn't become too late.

00:15:20.860 Well, and, and, and Liz, the, these kinds of reform, jungle primaries and rank chase

00:15:25.320 choice voting, or in Alaska's case, both combined together, they are often supported by self-described

00:15:32.400 moderate Republicans because those moderates are frustrated that when they run in primaries

00:15:39.540 against conservatives, more often than not, they lose.

00:15:42.160 So like, all right, let's change the rules so that we don't lose.

00:15:45.980 So moderate Republicans sometimes support these reforms to prevent conservatives from

00:15:52.160 winning, but when the moderates are doing so, they're also rolling the dice because they're

00:15:56.320 increasing the chances that the Democrat wins also. 0.98

00:15:59.340 And they're willing to say, all right, in order to stop the voters from electing a damn 0.96

00:16:04.420 conservative, I'm willing to hand it over to the Democrats and, and the nuts, uh, that 0.94

00:16:11.060 Democrats, I don't think the voters want that outcome, but I do think there's some politicians

00:16:16.760 who are okay with that outcome.

00:16:18.500 Well, that's what happens when you're a, when, when politicians don't have principles, then

00:16:22.460 they're willing to hand it over.

00:16:23.960 Um, if they lose power themselves, they're, they're willing to hand it over to people with

00:16:26.800 even fewer principles.

00:16:27.860 Let's do a question from verdict plus, because this is a great question and I'm interested in

00:16:31.460 your answer as well.

00:16:32.360 It's from date date go forth who says, what are the chances that the new assault rifle ban bill

00:16:38.440 passes the Senate, if it passes, would it be constitutional?

00:16:42.600 What would it mean for everyday Americans trying to buy guns in the future?

00:16:45.860 He says, I've been listening since day one and love the podcast.

00:16:48.140 Keep up the good work.

00:16:50.600 Um, thank you.

00:16:52.100 Uh, so the chances that, that the assault, the so-called assault weapons ban passes the

00:16:57.640 Senate, at least right now are essentially zero.

00:17:00.520 Uh, it's not going to pass.

00:17:02.420 Uh, the reason it's not going to pass is as long as we have the filibuster, it would take

00:17:06.380 60 votes to pass.

00:17:07.520 Um, it's not going to get 60 votes.

00:17:10.900 Uh, the last time we voted on it was 2013.

00:17:15.840 Uh, Diane Feinstein was carrying it at the time.

00:17:19.380 It was her bill.

00:17:20.400 Uh, it was a democratic Senate.

00:17:22.060 There were, there were a majority of Democrats in the Senate.

00:17:24.840 We voted on it and it only got 44 votes on the floor of the Senate.

00:17:29.180 So even though Democrats had a majority on the floor, it got zero Republicans and it didn't

00:17:34.680 get all the Democrats.

00:17:35.520 There were several Democrats who voted against it.

00:17:38.460 Um, it does speak volumes that, that in, in the wake of the horrific school shooting in

00:17:43.640 Uvalde, the Democrats didn't even try to push it.

00:17:46.460 I think they recognize they don't have the votes.

00:17:48.880 They may, they may not even have the votes in their own conference, but there's no way

00:17:52.620 they have the votes on the floor of the Senate.

00:17:54.180 And it's why they, they pursued other gun control strategies instead of a so-called assault weapons

00:18:00.480 ban.

00:18:01.660 One of the reasons why it, it didn't get a lot of support.

00:18:05.540 So we had one in effect for 10 years and it expired.

00:18:09.880 And, and, and the justice department studied it, uh, you know, came out of bill Clinton

00:18:15.200 was in effect 10 years.

00:18:16.400 It expired.

00:18:17.000 The justice department studied it and concluded that it had no statistically significant effect

00:18:23.680 on violent crime.

00:18:24.580 That it didn't actually reduce violent crime in any measurable impact.

00:18:30.300 Um, and I'll tell you a story about that.

00:18:33.760 So 2013 on the judiciary committee, we're having hearings and, and Diane Feinstein is pitching

00:18:39.780 her bill and, and I'm arguing against it.

00:18:42.220 And I'm a brand new baby freshman.

00:18:43.640 I mean, I mean, I'm just there.

00:18:45.900 Um, and in fact, when she and I are arguing at one point, she loses her mind and says,

00:18:50.740 you know, I am not a fifth grader, um, or sixth grader.

00:18:53.920 I am not a sixth grader.

00:18:54.980 She gets very mad because I asked her a substantive question about the second amendment.

00:18:59.220 And apparently in the judiciary committee, you're not supposed to do that to another

00:19:02.260 senator.

00:19:03.280 Um, and subsequently I was debating with Al Franken, truly a, a charming soul.

00:19:12.040 And, uh, and, and that was tongue in cheek if, if that did not come across.

00:19:16.360 Um, and I pointed out that DOJ.

00:19:19.620 Well, we'll see from the Washington post headlines after this, whether, whether the humor came

00:19:23.940 across or not.

00:19:25.940 Well, I pointed out at the hearing that, that DOJ had studied the assault weapons ban that

00:19:31.920 was in effect for 10 years and included it had zero statistically significant, uh, effect

00:19:37.820 on violent crime.

00:19:38.900 And Al Franken came and argued, that's not true.

00:19:41.520 That's not true.

00:19:42.380 It had an enormous effect.

00:19:43.780 I remember what he said, but he was, he was quite worked up saying that, that what I said

00:19:46.900 was not right.

00:19:47.600 And, and, and I in turn responded that, you know, given this study, anyone who argues that

00:19:53.840 there is a measurable effect on violent crime is engaged in sophistry.

00:20:00.480 A couple hours later on the Senate floor, I'm standing on the Senate floor and Al Franken

00:20:04.360 runs up to me and said, you accused me of engaging in sophistry.

00:20:10.100 I didn't know what that meant, but I went and looked it up and now I'm really mad.

00:20:17.340 And I got to admit, I, I was genuinely speechless.

00:20:21.240 I'd like, I, I, yeah.

00:20:23.420 Okay.

00:20:25.000 Um, and, and Al later wrote a book, uh, in, in titled giant of the Senate.

00:20:33.300 Um, I joked at the time that, that it was a perfect title.

00:20:37.000 It was only missing one word.

00:20:39.260 Um, but he had an entire chapter in his book devoted to me, uh, that was called sophistry.

00:20:48.580 So, so it, uh, uh, I, I found it quite amusing that for lefties, they, they seem to, to, to

00:20:55.480 believe that if they, uh, his whole book tour, he basically just did a standup routine

00:21:00.460 insulting me, which apparently works to sell books to liberal Democrats.

00:21:04.740 Like, like, like it is, uh, I, I think he, he thought it was a good way to sell books.

00:21:09.700 Well, I mean, in a sense, you almost have to respect him for admitting that he didn't

00:21:12.720 know what the word meant.

00:21:13.700 That's really hilarious, but it's, it's also hilarious to see liberal Democrats who are

00:21:17.600 anti-free market, taking advantage of capitalism to sell books based on their insults against

00:21:22.760 you.

00:21:23.080 You got to love the whole thing.

00:21:24.540 Um, one last question.

00:21:25.680 So you say that the assault rifle ban has very little chance of passing in the Senate.

00:21:29.220 What about the gay marriage bill?

00:21:30.720 What are its chances?

00:21:33.920 I don't know.

00:21:35.360 Uh, that is actually a good question.

00:21:37.660 Uh, we, I think the odds are good.

00:21:40.500 We're going to vote on it in the next month.

00:21:41.980 Schumer has said he's going to bring it up for a vote.

00:21:43.540 He hasn't done it yet.

00:21:44.560 Uh, it could be as soon as next week.

00:21:46.080 He hasn't told us what we're voting on next.

00:21:47.860 And then Schumer controls the floor, um, for it to pass.

00:21:52.580 They've got to hold all the Democrats, uh, and they've got to get 10 Republicans.

00:21:57.520 Um, several Republicans have publicly said that they would vote for the bill.

00:22:04.900 Um, to get to 10, I can tell you, we are having vigorous arguments in the conference about it.

00:22:12.460 Um, I and several others are pushing for an amendment to the bill that would be a strong

00:22:19.300 protection of religious liberty because the bill as written would have enormously harmful consequences,

00:22:27.900 uh, for religious liberty.

00:22:30.320 It would result in, uh, 501c3 text status being denied to universities that embrace a biblical

00:22:41.140 definition of marriage, to churches that teach a biblical definition of marriage, to charities

00:22:47.800 that, that, that, that follow a biblical definition of marriage.

00:22:50.820 It, it, it, this bill without a religious liberty protection would have massive consequences across

00:22:58.080 our country, weaponizing the Biden administration to go and target universities, K through 12

00:23:08.060 schools, social service organizations, churches, and strip them all of their tax exempt status.

00:23:14.540 That is enormously consequential.

00:23:18.220 Um, I don't know if we'll succeed in getting the vote on that amendment and I don't know how

00:23:23.160 the vote will shake out, but I'm a no regardless, but this, what its prospects of success are on the

00:23:34.740 Senate floor.

00:23:35.440 I hope it doesn't pass, but I don't know what will happen.

00:23:40.000 And shame on any Republican who claims to be for limited government, but would support a bill that

00:23:44.700 targets people of faith.

00:23:46.840 I can tell you, I'm arguing vociferously to my colleagues.

00:23:50.080 Look, I get some of you, you know, are in purple States and you want to show how, how, you know, touchy

00:23:57.780 feely and you are.

00:23:59.320 Okay, great.

00:24:00.060 Put out a statement, but don't vote for a bill that will be used as a weapon.

00:24:05.720 To target and persecute churches and universities and, and, and religious schools and, and Catholic 0.98

00:24:12.220 charities.

00:24:13.440 Um, the harm from this bill would be massive.

00:24:16.980 It's, it's a shame to see it.

00:24:18.740 It really is sad to see it.

00:24:19.960 And the fact that Schumer is not telling you when you're going to vote on it, I think, um,

00:24:24.080 tells us what we need to know to the verdict plus community.

00:24:27.000 This is the second cloakroom in a row that we've used or that I've chosen to use your topics.

00:24:31.320 We did the convention of the States and then we did rank choice voting.

00:24:34.100 So keep those ideas coming.

00:24:35.700 I love to hear what you guys care about, what you're thinking about, what questions you

00:24:38.680 have.

00:24:39.280 I'm Liz Wheeler.

00:24:40.380 This is the cloakroom on verdict.

00:24:41.820 Plus this is an I heart podcast.

00:24:45.340 Guaranteed human.

00:24:46.080 Thank you.

00:24:46.520 Thank you.

00:24:50.520 Thank you.

00:24:51.780 Thank you.

00:24:52.700 Thank you.

00:24:53.820 Thank you.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - September 11, 2022

The Cloakroom Preview： An Intentionally Anti-Democratic Voting System

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