Verdict with Ted Cruz - March 18, 2026


The Save America Act — FINALLY on the Floor of the Senate

Topics
Operation Epic Fury
Hosted by
Ted Cruz
Mentioned
Jim Crow Glenn Beck Mike Lee John Paul Stevens Eric Holder Smith Goes Joe Biden Ron Paul Caroline Trump Lisa Murkowski Patrick Henry Jimmy Stewart Ben Ferguson Tom Tillis Jim Banks Catherine Verdict Occam
Bonus： Daily Review with Clay and Buck - Mar 17 2026 BONUS POD： Newsom’s Gun Grab Backfires plus Day Two of SAA Fight-Republicans Take the Offensive

Episode Stats


Length

36 minutes

Words per minute

158.0

Word count

5,797

Sentence count

406

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Toxicity

13

sentences flagged

Hate speech

12

sentences flagged


Summary

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

After months of battling, the Save America Act is finally on the floor of the Senate, and we re going to break down exactly what s happening this week on the Senate floor. Ted Cruz is leading the fight to get the bill passed.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Topics generated with Qwen2.5-3B-Instruct.
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.660 Guaranteed human.
00:00:04.340 Welcome. It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson.
00:00:07.820 With you, Senator, I can't believe it as we sit here.
00:00:10.060 It is official. The SAVE Act has actually made it to the floor of the Senate.
00:00:14.820 So what's going to happen next?
00:00:17.140 Well, after months of battling, the SAVE America Act is finally on the floor of the Senate.
00:00:21.820 The SAVE America Act is basic common sense legislation
00:00:24.540 that, number one, requires everyone registering to vote
00:00:27.740 to prove they're American citizen.
00:00:30.000 And number two, requires photo ID in order to be able to vote.
00:00:34.240 Vast majority, super majorities of Americans support both of those requirements.
00:00:38.980 And yet the Democrats are fighting against us with everything they got.
00:00:43.200 I'm leading the fight to get it passed.
00:00:45.120 We're going to break down exactly what is happening with the Save America Act this week, right now on the Senate floor.
00:00:51.400 Yeah, before we get to that, though, there are so many of you that listen to the show that are truly friends of Israel.
00:00:56.800 And right now in Israel, they need our help.
00:01:00.000 and our support more than ever.
00:01:02.080 And the IFCJ, the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews,
00:01:06.080 are doing amazing work, and you can have a difference right now.
00:01:10.500 Having just come back from Israel, I want to paint you a picture.
00:01:13.860 It's midnight, sirens are blaring,
00:01:16.000 and you have only seconds to grab your child and run.
00:01:20.420 Now imagine you're elderly.
00:01:22.380 Your legs don't work like they used to.
00:01:24.200 Getting downstairs feels impossible.
00:01:26.420 And after all of that, you end up in a bomb shelter for hours.
00:01:30.000 even days, because you can't make the trek again.
00:01:33.480 This is what's happening across Israel as Operation Epic Fury continues.
00:01:38.400 Children are being traumatized, families are just exhausted, and homes have been destroyed.
00:01:44.420 And that's why the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews is there.
00:01:48.380 On the ground, bringing food, emergency equipment, care for those children,
00:01:53.900 and help for the elderly, and supplying the bomb shelters and medical centers
00:01:58.560 for critically needed essentials.
00:02:00.440 If you've ever wondered what it looks like
00:02:02.640 to stand for Israel and stand for good against evil,
00:02:05.840 this is it.
00:02:06.980 And that's why I'm asking you to now please act.
00:02:09.160 Give $45 right now to rush life-saving essentials
00:02:13.700 to the vulnerables under fire.
00:02:16.400 You can also call 888-488-IFCJ.
00:02:21.240 That's 888-488-IFCJ.
00:02:25.480 Join me and give and make a real difference.
00:02:27.860 online at ifcj.org. That's ifcj.org. So Senator, let's talk about just first the lay of the land
00:02:37.360 and how we got to where we are today and the vote. There's a lot of people wondering what
00:02:41.580 the vote was to move this forward. So now there's debate. And so tell us who didn't vote for this
00:02:47.320 on the Republican side. It was a very tight vote. And also explain what's going to happen
00:02:51.840 over the rest of this week. Well, the vote on the Senate floor to take up the Save America Act was
00:02:57.600 51 to 47. So 51 Republicans voted to take it up. The only no vote was Lisa Murkowski out of Alaska. 0.89
00:03:05.580 And then Tom Tillis from North Carolina, who is retiring, did not vote. So he was not a no vote,
00:03:10.840 but he didn't vote. Other than that, every Republican voted to take it up. And we're now
00:03:15.560 in the midst of the battle. Now, we can anticipate the Democrats are a hard no. And so we're taking
00:03:21.920 the case to the American people and trying to build support for it. And so I went to the Senate
00:03:26.720 floor to lay out the case for why the Save America Act is so critical and why the opposition 0.84
00:03:32.880 for the Democrats is so ridiculous. And so here's what I had to say on the floor of the Senate this
00:03:38.860 week. Mr. President, later this year, American citizens across the country will exercise one
00:03:46.320 of their most valuable and sacred rights, the right to vote. A right that has been hard-earned
00:03:53.000 and fought for from the founding generation of our republic to today.
00:03:59.560 And how was the right to self-government, the right to vote, secured?
00:04:05.240 It was secured by American colonists who rejected the royal edict and hurtled tea into Boston Harbor,
00:04:13.660 declaring no taxation without representation.
00:04:16.780 It was secured by ordinary men who seized their muskets and fired the shot heard round the world at Lexington and Concord.
00:04:27.400 It was secured by Continental troops who marched to the fields of Saratoga and the coastline of Yorktown,
00:04:39.260 repeating those immortal words of Patrick Henry,
00:04:42.520 give me liberty or give me death.
00:04:46.020 For nearly 250 years, Americans have cast their votes for leaders at every level,
00:04:52.200 from local officials to state representatives to the President of the United States.
00:04:58.120 Every member of this body is here today because we were elected fairly and honestly
00:05:04.440 and given a mandate by our constituents to serve them here in Washington
00:05:09.300 and to protect the liberties and freedoms our founders fought to preserve.
00:05:16.060 The power of the ballot box determines the course of our nation,
00:05:21.060 the history we are writing, and the freedoms that we continue to defend.
00:05:25.780 And while no single ballot in isolation may seem decisive,
00:05:30.460 together, the votes of the American people shape the course of our nation
00:05:34.960 and the course of history.
00:05:38.000 But it is worth remembering that our voting system did not begin as it exists today.
00:05:43.780 When this nation was founded, the right to vote was limited, and over time, through debate, sacrifice, a bloody civil war, and constitutional amendment, the right to vote was quite properly expanded.
00:05:59.620 The 15th Amendment prohibited denying the vote based on race.
00:06:05.440 The 19th Amendment guaranteed women the right to vote.
00:06:09.520 And the 26th Amendment lowered the voting age to 18.
00:06:15.100 At every stage of our constitutional amendment process, the goal was the same.
00:06:20.440 To ensure that the right to vote belonged to American citizens and that it was exercised with integrity.
00:06:29.900 And while our system has evolved, one principle has remained constant.
00:06:36.180 Elections reflect the will of the American people.
00:06:39.520 for a right so sacred, for a privilege so hard-fought.
00:06:45.580 It is shocking, it is tragic,
00:06:49.800 how neglected and vulnerable the protection of our elections has become.
00:06:55.400 That is why I'm here today on this very floor,
00:06:58.980 urging the members of this body to pass the Save America Act.
00:07:04.740 It says that when you register to vote in a federal election, you must provide proof that you are a citizen of the United States, and you must provide photo ID to vote.
00:07:20.080 In simple terms, that's it.
00:07:23.780 This is not some radical, politicized, or weaponized piece of legislation designed to restrict Americans from voting.
00:07:32.420 It is a common-sense measure that protects the integrity of our elections
00:07:39.100 by ensuring that American citizens and only American citizens are voting in them.
00:07:48.340 Legitimacy in a democracy rests on two pillars.
00:07:51.780 First, the mechanical integrity of the system to produce a valid result.
00:07:56.040 And second, the public's confidence in that system.
00:07:59.920 If either one fails, the system falters.
00:08:04.100 If both fail, the system collapses.
00:08:08.480 A system that cannot be trusted is a system that cannot govern.
00:08:14.400 If you look around the world, between two-thirds and three-quarters of countries require some form of identification to vote.
00:08:22.740 Why?
00:08:23.420 Because it safeguards the integrity of their elections and reinforces public trust in their system.
00:08:31.720 So it begs the question, why hasn't the United States fully embraced this standard?
00:08:41.240 Well, for the last several months, we have heard claim after claim about how this legislation would somehow inhibit people from voting.
00:08:49.940 that requiring identification is discriminatory,
00:08:53.540 that the American people do not support voter ID.
00:08:56.040 Mr. President, our Democrat colleagues are fond of bellowing into the TV cameras
00:09:01.500 that photo ID to vote is Jim Crow.
00:09:08.180 They tell us with mock earnestness.
00:09:12.820 Now, I will admit, our Democrat colleagues should be experts in Jim Crow 1.00
00:09:18.380 because it was Democrat politicians who passed the Jim Crow laws. 0.86
00:09:24.660 It was Democrat politicians who founded the Ku Klux Klan.
00:09:28.720 It was Democrat politicians for decade after decade
00:09:33.000 who enforced discrimination, separate but equal,
00:09:39.640 poll taxes, and a host of other laws
00:09:42.920 designed to prevent African Americans from voting.
00:09:46.140 But do you know who has rejected their disingenuous claim that photo ID to vote is Jim Crow?
00:09:55.020 The Supreme Court of the United States.
00:09:57.980 The Supreme Court of the United States, the state of Indiana,
00:10:01.580 passed photo ID law requiring that you show a photo ID to vote.
00:10:06.780 A group of left-wing plaintiffs filed litigation challenging that.
00:10:11.200 The case went all the way to the United States Supreme Court.
00:10:14.980 At the time, I was the Solicitor General of the state of Texas.
00:10:17.600 I led a coalition of states before the Supreme Court defending photo ID to vote.
00:10:23.940 And the left-wing plaintiffs made the same argument that our Democrat colleagues make today,
00:10:29.300 that requiring photo ID to vote would somehow disenfranchise minorities.
00:10:33.660 The Supreme Court, by a vote of 6 to 3, rejected their argument.
00:10:40.540 The author of the majority opinion was John Paul Stevens.
00:10:43.560 John Paul Stevens was one of the great liberals on the court.
00:10:47.240 He was not a conservative.
00:10:48.520 He was not on the right wing.
00:10:49.920 He was the leading liberal for years on the U.S. Supreme Court.
00:10:53.800 He rejected that claim, and he pointed out that when someone votes illegally,
00:11:00.380 they are stealing the votes of legal voters.
00:11:05.080 They are stealing the votes of American citizens. 0.55
00:11:07.980 The Supreme Court explained that when photo ID laws have been implemented,
00:11:12.740 Minority participation in the election goes up, not down.
00:11:18.380 And the Supreme Court explained that requiring photo ID enhances the integrity of an election and the integrity of democracy.
00:11:27.080 Now, our Democrat colleagues don't want to acknowledge any of those facts.
00:11:31.400 And I guess it's understandable, because the American people have heard their specious arguments and they have rejected them.
00:11:39.960 Mr. President, 81% of Americans support requiring photo ID to vote.
00:11:49.020 But my Democrat colleagues might say, what about African Americans?
00:11:52.520 Well, about three-quarters of African Americans in the United States support requiring photo
00:11:58.780 ID to vote.
00:11:59.780 How about Hispanics?
00:12:01.720 More than 80% of Hispanics in America support requiring photo ID to vote.
00:12:06.100 How about Democrats?
00:12:09.560 Here's an astonishing statistic, if you get out of elected office, if you ask a Democrat
00:12:14.460 on the street, 70% of Democrats in America support requiring photo ID to vote.
00:12:21.820 The one group that doesn't are elected Democrats in the United States Senate and the United
00:12:27.500 States House.
00:12:31.400 And by the way, the premise of their argument that minorities, if you require photo ID to
00:12:38.200 to vote or not going to be able to vote is frankly insulting.
00:12:43.140 Mr. President, I'm proud to be an Hispanic American.
00:12:45.440 I've been an Hispanic all my life.
00:12:46.780 You know what I've got in my wallet?
00:12:49.820 I have a driver's license.
00:12:52.400 I look at my colleagues across the way,
00:12:54.880 I feel confident they have driver's licenses
00:12:57.120 in their wallets as well. 1.00
00:13:00.160 Hispanics are not morons. 1.00
00:13:02.120 African-Americans are not morons. 1.00
00:13:06.100 And when you claim, minorities can't figure out how to get a driver's license. 1.00
00:13:11.220 Well, gosh, what do you need a photo ID to vote, to do right now in America?
00:13:17.500 You need a photo ID to purchase alcohol or to purchase tobacco.
00:13:22.900 You need a photo ID to gamble or purchase lottery tickets.
00:13:27.380 You need a photo ID to go into a bar.
00:13:30.040 You need a photo ID to get on a plane.
00:13:33.000 You need a photo ID to rent a car.
00:13:35.740 You need a photo ID just to drive a car, not even rent a car, drive a car.
00:13:40.900 You need a photo ID to apply for government benefits.
00:13:45.180 You need a photo ID to enroll in college.
00:13:47.840 You need a photo ID to open a bank account.
00:13:52.340 You need a photo ID to check into a hotel.
00:13:55.980 And I got to admit, this is my personal favorite.
00:13:59.780 You need a photo ID, actually two photo IDs, to shovel snow in New York City.
00:14:08.800 These are routine, everyday activities.
00:14:11.720 The gallery is full.
00:14:12.660 I feel confident everyone in the gallery who is not a child has a driver's license.
00:14:18.860 And by the way, you wouldn't be admitted to the gallery if you didn't.
00:14:21.280 and I feel confident every member of this chamber
00:14:25.880 has done just about anything I listed well
00:14:29.560 except shoveling snow.
00:14:30.680 I'm not convinced many of my colleagues have snubbled show
00:14:32.900 or they do shovel other things.
00:14:37.800 The question is not whether Americans are bright enough 1.00
00:14:41.400 to obtain photo ID.
00:14:44.640 We know they can and we know they do.
00:14:47.900 The real question is, why would we not require the same level of verification for something as consequential and vital as voting?
00:15:00.760 Are our Democrat colleagues saying voting doesn't matter?
00:15:05.500 Or is it something else?
00:15:08.540 Voting is not just another everyday activity.
00:15:10.860 It rolls around every year, a few years.
00:15:13.240 and it is the vehicle that protects the principles of our republic
00:15:16.980 in safeguarding what matters.
00:15:20.420 This legislation is necessary because there are individuals and systems
00:15:24.020 that can undermine confidence in our elections
00:15:26.540 if proper safeguards are not in place.
00:15:30.780 And one of the most apparent ways that we've seen
00:15:33.600 is through the masses of illegal immigrants 1.00
00:15:37.080 that our Democrat colleagues let in through open borders over four years.
00:15:41.380 During the Biden administration, more than 12 million illegal immigrants flooded into this country.
00:15:47.480 The vast majority through my home state of Texas.
00:15:51.380 Now, Mr. President, understand, that was not an accident.
00:15:54.680 That was not something the Democrats could not stop.
00:15:58.520 That was their desired outcome.
00:16:00.900 How do we know that?
00:16:02.840 Because the instant President Trump was sworn into office for his second term,
00:16:09.020 illegal border crossings plummeted 99%.
00:16:18.180 Overnight.
00:16:21.880 The Democrats said, no, Joe Biden can't secure the border.
00:16:26.200 He needs new legislation.
00:16:27.780 We now know that was a lie.
00:16:32.140 It was objectively false.
00:16:34.160 And they knew it was false.
00:16:35.680 well
00:16:38.240 if they could have secured the border for four years
00:16:41.280 and they chose not to
00:16:42.220 they chose to let murderers into this country 0.99
00:16:45.380 they chose to let rapists into this country 0.79
00:16:47.340 they chose to let child molesters into this country 0.89
00:16:50.080 they chose to let gang bangers into this country 0.58
00:16:53.060 they chose to let terrorists into this country 0.53
00:16:55.760 we've had four radical Islamic terror attacks
00:17:00.560 in the last two weeks
00:17:01.660 Why, Mr. President, would the Democrats choose to allow more than 12 billion illegal aliens to invade this country?
00:17:13.520 And I'm going to suggest the obvious reason.
00:17:17.980 Because the Democrats look at those illegal aliens and they want them to cast vote for Democrats in federal elections. 0.95
00:17:23.560 Why are the Democrats lined up and say, no, no, no, under no circumstances should we test to see if you're an American citizen?
00:17:34.360 Under no circumstances should we require photo IDs?
00:17:40.740 You know, there was one activist a few years ago who filmed himself going into a D.C. polling place.
00:17:46.700 D.C. polling place said, sir, what's your name?
00:17:50.540 And he said, my name is Eric Holder.
00:17:52.180 Now, this activist was not the Attorney General of the United States at the time.
00:17:58.500 But yet D.C. handed him a ballot and said, Mr. Holder, please cast your vote.
00:18:06.120 The Democrats are lined up in this chamber because they want our elections to be insecure.
00:18:16.240 They want voter fraud to be rampant and to be easy.
00:18:23.480 Ask yourself, do the American people have a difficult time buying a beer?
00:18:28.240 Do they have a difficult time getting into an R-rated movie?
00:18:31.960 Do they have a difficult time getting on an airplane?
00:18:33.920 Well yes, because the Democrats have refuses to fund the TSA and so they're long lines
00:18:38.680 right now.
00:18:40.960 But the lack of a photo ID is not an impediment that stops people from flying.
00:18:46.240 This debate is about something very simple.
00:18:50.840 Do our elections matter?
00:18:51.980 Does our democracy matter?
00:18:54.600 And boy, Mr. President, I've got to say,
00:18:56.440 that is a phrase the Democrats love,
00:19:00.260 that they are defending democracy.
00:19:04.460 It's interesting, their voice usually drops an octave
00:19:06.560 when they say that.
00:19:08.620 They clutch their pearls.
00:19:11.940 And that's just the men.
00:19:13.160 Defending democracy
00:19:16.620 is what they say.
00:19:20.140 Ask yourself,
00:19:21.800 why are they not concerned at all
00:19:24.860 about 12 million illegals
00:19:28.080 who they let into this country voting illegally?
00:19:31.520 I'll submit.
00:19:34.180 Occam's razor provides
00:19:35.820 the simplest solution is usually the right one.
00:19:38.320 The simplest solution is very clear.
00:19:40.620 The Democrats in this body
00:19:41.920 want illegals to vote for. They want power enough that they are more than happy to undermine 0.99
00:19:48.880 democracy, to try to seize power. I get that from their personal self-interest, but it
00:19:58.380 is not in the interest of the men and women they represent. It is not in the interest
00:20:01.640 of the people of America. This bill is rightly called the Save America Act. And Mr. President,
00:20:11.920 If we were voting on the merits of what was good for America, what was good for democracy, what was good for American citizens, the vote would be 100 to nothing.
00:20:24.860 Although I would note on the other side of this building at the State of the Union address that you were at that I was at, we saw why our Democrat colleagues are so adamantly opposed to this bill.
00:20:35.020 President Trump turned to the Democrats on the right side of the floor of the House
00:20:41.780 and it gave him an opportunity to demonstrate with absolute clarity.
00:20:45.820 He said, if you agree, our first priority should be to fight for American citizens
00:20:52.440 and not for illegal aliens, please stand.
00:20:56.300 And every single Democrat in Congress remained seated.
00:21:04.320 Not a one of them.
00:21:06.640 I would note, as we're on the floor today, of the 47 Democrats in this body, only one is here on the floor.
00:21:14.160 But a whole lot more were on the floor during the State of the Union.
00:21:16.880 Every one of them chose to remain seated because they could not support the statement
00:21:21.540 that we need to support American citizens and not illegal aliens. 0.85
00:21:26.360 That's why they opposed the Save America Act.
00:21:29.240 because they want to be handed power over this country by the illegal aliens they let into this 1.00
00:21:35.360 country. That's why we need to save America. And it's why I urge every member of this body to pass
00:21:45.080 the Save America Act. Well said, Senator. And so now the big question is for everyone I know
00:21:52.960 that's listening or watching on YouTube, what's next and where does this move from here?
00:21:59.240 Look, what should happen is we should have Republicans stand together and we should force
00:22:04.980 the Democrats to do what's called a talking filibuster. So throughout most of the history
00:22:10.660 of the Senate, a filibuster involved the right of unlimited debate. It involved the right to stand
00:22:16.300 up and talk and talk and talk. Think about Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, where he
00:22:22.240 talks and he's pulling a tie and he's falling over and he's like standing there valiantly battling
00:22:27.960 against bad legislation, or for that matter, what I did in 2013, where I filibustered Obamacare
00:22:35.700 and talked for 21 hours and stood on the Senate floor. And by the way, when you're filibustering,
00:22:41.260 you cannot sit down, you cannot leave the floor, and you cannot use the bathroom,
00:22:45.140 which is the most frequent question I get. Trivia point, so before I did that filibuster,
00:22:52.060 Rand Paul had done a filibuster earlier in the year for 11 hours, and I was fixing to get ready to do it.
00:22:59.840 And so I asked Rand if he had any advice, and he had two bits of advice.
00:23:03.260 He said, number one, he said, wear comfortable shoes.
00:23:07.280 So I have to admit, I wear just about every day.
00:23:10.000 Solid advice, by the way.
00:23:11.400 Yeah.
00:23:11.920 Just about every day in the Senate, I wear boots, cowboy boots.
00:23:14.740 I went and bought a pair of black tennis shoes that I wore for my 21-hour filibuster,
00:23:19.560 And I confessed at about two in the morning to the people of Texas.
00:23:22.740 I said, look, I'm embarrassed.
00:23:24.780 I lacked the strength of character or the strength of foot to stand here 21 hours in my boots.
00:23:32.640 So I'm wearing tennis shoes.
00:23:33.780 And I said, I hope the people of Texas will give me forbearance and forgive me.
00:23:38.680 But then second, Rand said, he said what took him out at the end of the day was not his legs, but his bladder.
00:23:45.100 That after 11 hours, he just had to go.
00:23:47.920 And I don't know about you, but I'd never tried to go 21 hours without going to the bathroom.
00:23:52.780 I wasn't sure how that would go.
00:23:55.700 And in the entire course of the filibuster, I drank one tiny little glass of water.
00:24:01.140 And the basic principle, nothing in, nothing out.
00:24:04.160 I'd just take a tiny sip every hour or so and just kind of wet my throat.
00:24:08.800 But you had to stand there and talk and talk and talk.
00:24:10.980 That is exhausting.
00:24:11.920 when costs are high life can feel off balance but with benefits credits and housing programs
00:24:23.580 life can feel a bit more balanced and put more money back in your pocket find out what you may
00:24:30.620 qualify for like the canada child benefit at canada.ca slash every dollar counts
00:24:36.900 a message from the government of canada
00:24:41.920 By the way, you cannot lean on the lectern, right?
00:24:45.340 No, you're not allowed to lean.
00:24:47.060 And even if someone comes to give you or ask you a question,
00:24:50.640 there's a famous scene for people that are West Wing watchers
00:24:55.700 where they were trying to get a message to the guy that was doing a filibuster.
00:25:00.040 And the guy walked in and he said, may I ask a question?
00:25:02.880 In essence, it was some official way of doing that.
00:25:06.200 But you can't lean on the lectern because if you do, that's it, right?
00:25:09.680 You can take a question to rest your voice.
00:25:11.600 I mean, the chair can call it.
00:25:13.520 So you can do, so what will happen when you're doing a filibuster is other senators will come in and ask, will the senator yield for a question?
00:25:21.160 And you can say, I will yield for a question without yielding the floor.
00:25:25.800 And then if it's an ally of yours, so for example, Mike Lee was on the floor all 21 hours I was there.
00:25:30.660 He stayed with me the whole time.
00:25:32.580 So several times at two or three in the morning.
00:25:34.680 So you had an audience of one.
00:25:35.300 No wonder he's your best friend in the Senate.
00:25:37.180 Okay, now I understand.
00:25:37.700 And I had a number. I had about a dozen senators who came and spelled me for a period, because when you're talking for 21 hours, your voice starts to hurt.
00:25:45.240 So the thing you will do is Mike would ask, would you yield for a question?
00:25:49.920 And I say, well, yield for a question without yielding the floor.
00:25:52.800 And then he'd talk 30 minutes and he'd get up and he'd like give a, you know, and like like at three in the morning, we went through like 70s rock songs and horrible puns and jokes.
00:26:04.320 um and then after 30 minutes you know you can say wouldn't you agree and that's the question you ask
00:26:10.760 um and so it's a way to give some relief by the way many people remember during that he sat down
00:26:17.380 during the 21 hours right he can sit down you know anyone else can sit down it's just the person that
00:26:22.340 has the floor that can't sit down and and a lot of people remember that during that filibuster i
00:26:27.900 read green eggs and ham what they don't necessarily remember is why i read green eggs and ham
00:26:33.880 And the reason is, at the time, our daughters were three and five.
00:26:40.480 And when I was home, I would read them bedtime stories every night.
00:26:44.720 Bedtime stories, yeah.
00:26:45.800 Yeah.
00:26:46.360 And so as I was doing the filibuster, it was their bedtime.
00:26:50.200 And so we called home and told them, turn on the TV and turn on C-SPAN.
00:26:55.260 And I read them Green Eggs and Ham because it was their bedtime story.
00:26:58.360 And they were my favorite picture.
00:27:01.540 You've seen it.
00:27:02.040 It's in my it's in my office. Oh, yeah. It's a picture of the two little girls. They're in
00:27:06.400 matching pajamas. They're three and five. And Catherine, the three year old, she has her hand
00:27:13.720 on the TV and she's watching in wonderment as her daddy is reading her green eggs and ham on the
00:27:18.920 television set. And the look is just awesome. And then Caroline and, you know, Caroline, she's now 0.77
00:27:25.020 17. She was just five. And she is a strong-willed and spirited kid. My 14 years in the Senate,
00:27:33.520 nothing I've done in the Senate has impressed her except that. And she is in that picture
00:27:38.360 cracking up laughing. I mean, she thinks it's the funniest thing she's ever seen.
00:27:43.400 And when I came home that weekend, she looked at me, her arms were crossed, and she said,
00:27:47.360 okay, Dad, that was pretty cool. But that's all you needed. By the way, you want to fund?
00:27:53.780 That's a true filibuster.
00:27:55.220 Okay, you want a fun bit of color?
00:27:57.600 Yeah.
00:27:58.400 At like 19, 20 hours into it, Glenn Beck, who you and I are both friends with,
00:28:04.160 Glenn texts me and says, man, you look too damn good.
00:28:09.240 Your tie is all there.
00:28:10.620 Your hair is combed.
00:28:11.860 You don't look disheveled. 0.99
00:28:13.920 Damn it, you need to look more like Mr. Smith goes to Washington. 0.98
00:28:16.920 So I have to admit, I looked at it. 0.99
00:28:18.480 Glenn's got a good sense of, like, telling a story.
00:28:21.300 So I yanked my tie and I did. I don't think I messed up my hair, but I at least loosened the tie and tried to look a little more disheveled after 21 hours.
00:28:30.180 You know, you shouldn't look like you're just just popping out of bed.
00:28:35.060 That is exhausting.
00:28:36.540 By the way, I didn't realize that you could have your phone out during the filibuster.
00:28:40.300 That's actually interesting.
00:28:41.600 You're not supposed to. So technically, the Senate rules, you're not allowed to have electronics on the Senate floor.
00:28:47.480 Everyone violates that rule. So everyone has their phone.
00:28:49.940 And that's just a rule that is routinely ignored.
00:28:53.160 By the way...
00:28:54.880 Did you try to hide it, though?
00:28:56.200 Did you try to look down at your phone like it wasn't?
00:28:58.660 At that point, you didn't do it.
00:28:59.640 You don't visibly do it while you're speaking, but you can do it.
00:29:02.940 It may have been during one of the questions that I noticed,
00:29:05.160 like I was looking at the text and Glenn had sent me a text.
00:29:08.040 By the way, interestingly enough, during the speech that we just played,
00:29:13.520 so the Senate parliamentarian, Jim Banks, Republican from Indiana, was presiding.
00:29:18.600 The Senate parliamentarian tried to convince him to sanction me under Rule 19 of the Senate rules for impugning the integrity of another senator.
00:29:29.880 Really?
00:29:31.280 And thankfully, he just told her, go jump in a lake.
00:29:34.080 I'm not going to do it.
00:29:35.160 And apparently she was mad because I said, you know, it's not surprising that the Democrats are experts on Jim Crow because they wrote the Jim Crow laws and they founded the KKK.
00:29:44.960 And she thought that was terrible for me to point out what are undeniable historical facts.
00:29:51.260 She thought it was somehow a violation of the Senate rules to speak the truth.
00:29:56.460 I have to admit, the parliamentarian previously, years ago, tried to get me to Rule 19,
00:30:02.740 to rule that Mike Lee had done the same thing.
00:30:05.020 And I laughed at her and said, no, I'm not going to do that either.
00:30:10.140 You know, thankfully, it takes a stubborn thing.
00:30:12.760 There's history. It's a stubborn thing sometimes. So look, a standing and talking filibuster is
00:30:19.940 exhausting. It takes a lot of energy. It takes a lot out of you. Under the Senate rules,
00:30:26.780 each senator is limited to two speeches in a legislative day total. Now, the Senate can keep
00:30:34.900 a legislative day going for weeks. A legislative day goes until you adjourn the day. So if you look
00:30:42.360 at during the civil rights act multiple days yes it can be weeks if you look at the civil rights
00:30:48.020 act in 1964 the democrats filibustered against it they were opposed to it they wanted segregation
00:30:54.240 and the leadership there forced kept a legislative day open for weeks and kept forcing them to
00:31:02.980 filibuster and talk and talk and talk and talk and eventually it wore them down and that's how
00:31:08.160 the Civil Rights Act in 1964 got passed. So what I have been arguing to the conference at length,
00:31:13.980 we had to do the same thing. We had to force the Democrats explain why you think illegal aliens
00:31:19.000 should be voting, why you think that it's okay that you need an ID to buy a beer at a bar,
00:31:24.460 but not an ID to vote, and make them, drive them to the principle of exhaustion, drive them to the
00:31:31.420 point that they just can't fight anymore. Now, here's the rub. To do that, Ben, we need 50
00:31:38.220 Republicans willing to stand strong. To date, we haven't had that. We've been arguing about this
00:31:43.700 within the conference for several weeks. I have been making the case as impassioned as I can
00:31:48.140 to my colleagues, and we are likely just short of 50. So if that doesn't change, what's going to end
00:31:58.100 up happening this week is we're going to vote again on the Save America Act. 50 or 51 Republicans
00:32:06.280 will vote for it, but we'll need 60 unless we force them to do a talking filibuster. So it will
00:32:12.180 fail this week unless something changes significantly. That's infuriating. And so I'm
00:32:17.240 calling on my colleagues, come on, let's stand together and fight. And I'll tell you, one of the
00:32:22.140 arguments my colleagues have used with me. They've said, look, Ted, if we fight and at the end of the
00:32:28.600 day lose, people will be discouraged and demoralized and they'll stay home in November.
00:32:35.220 And my response is, well, and I do too. And my response was, look, okay, maybe we lose. It's
00:32:41.960 not guaranteed a hundred percent victory, but you know how you can guarantee a hundred percent
00:32:47.380 losing, don't fight. Like if we don't fight, it's 100% that we lose. So if we stand up and we fight
00:32:55.280 and we're all there all night and we're battling, we're battling, we're battling, and at the end
00:32:59.580 of the day we come up short, that gives people a lot more reason to vote than if we don't get 50
00:33:06.980 who are even willing to fight. So I think there's a lot of frustration right now.
00:33:10.560 To be very clear for everybody listening, to do what you're advocating for, which is to
00:33:15.340 for a sustaining filibuster.
00:33:16.740 How many votes do you have to have to get to that?
00:33:19.720 You've got to have 50 Republicans who will stand together
00:33:22.480 because the 50 Republicans have to, number one,
00:33:25.660 any time the Democrats want to,
00:33:27.960 they can suggest the absence of a quorum,
00:33:30.420 and we have to be able to produce 50 bodies.
00:33:32.900 Oh, everybody's got to be there.
00:33:34.340 Okay, so everybody's got to be there.
00:33:36.380 Yeah, you've got to physically be able to produce.
00:33:38.160 And that could go for, to be clear,
00:33:40.080 that could go, as you were saying, for days, right?
00:33:42.000 For days or weeks, yes.
00:33:43.260 and so in other words there's some senators in the republican party that just would rather
00:33:47.900 go home yeah would rather go home on thursdays like they always do they don't want to stay over
00:33:52.420 the weekend they don't want to fight for this for a week or two and secondly the democrats can tee up
00:33:58.320 amendments and try to force votes on amendments and we got to have 50 republicans that reject
00:34:03.280 their amendments that stand together and right now we have i don't know 47 48 but we don't have 50
00:34:10.340 And so we're having an arguments with a handful who are saying no, and I hope it changes.
00:34:16.920 But but right now, right now, we don't have 50 love, generosity and compassion.
00:34:24.080 We say those words all the time and they sound good.
00:34:27.420 They feel good.
00:34:28.440 But here's the truth.
00:34:30.000 Those words don't mean anything unless they turn into action.
00:34:33.920 And right now, not later today, not tomorrow, there's a child in the world who doesn't know
00:34:40.400 if they'll eat, if they'll have a chance to learn, or if there's any hope at all.
00:34:46.540 And while we're all busy, life keeps moving forward, but that child is waiting.
00:34:52.460 This is where you come in.
00:34:54.580 With Compassion International, you have the chance to change a child's future, not just
00:34:59.620 with words not with promises but with real help that provides food education and hope through
00:35:06.660 local churches and people already in their community put your words into action and join me
00:35:13.980 introduce a child to a loving heavenly father today at compassion.com that's compassion.com
00:35:22.640 final question on this one when will the american people know what day will you guys make this
00:35:28.580 decision on either trying to vote for that or just having a straight-up vote that you know
00:35:34.080 you're going to come up short on? Yeah. If nothing changes, we will likely vote, have the final vote
00:35:39.500 on Thursday of this week, and we will end up probably with 50, 51, 52 votes for the Save
00:35:46.200 America Act, but we'll need 60, and so the vote will fail. If nothing changes, that's where we're
00:35:51.740 headed. And then do you expect the president to weigh in heavy on the strategy here? Does he know
00:35:57.160 these two options and how much influence would it have if the president came out and said, 0.98
00:36:01.600 you know, damn it, men and women, stay in Washington, D.C. and fight this thing out 0.96
00:36:05.260 and let's see what happens. Yeah, the president has said that multiple times 0.99
00:36:08.860 and that has been a significant part of the argument, but we still
00:36:13.100 at the end of the day, you can't wave a magic wand and
00:36:17.060 produce the votes and we're still frustratingly short of 50.
00:36:22.360 It's very interesting and very frustrating for many
00:36:25.060 americans don't forget we do this show monday wednesday and friday hit that subscriber auto
00:36:29.420 download button we will keep you updated all week long on this and if something major happens
00:36:33.340 we'll probably do an emergency pod as well and the center and i will see you back here
00:36:36.560 in a couple of days this is an iheart podcast guaranteed human