Verdict with Ted Cruz - Trump Guilty Verdict Makes a Mockery of Rule of Law-What does it Mean & What's Next？

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.420 Guaranteed human.

00:00:05.480 Election interference.

00:00:07.820 Donald Trump found guilty on all 34 counts.

00:00:12.200 Welcome.

00:00:12.680 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz.

00:00:14.920 Ben Ferguson with you.

00:00:16.960 Senator, you are in the car right now.

00:00:19.380 I am in the studio.

00:00:20.780 It's about 1030 Central Time, 1130 Eastern.

00:00:25.400 Give me your quick thoughts on what America just witnessed.

00:00:30.540 Well, it's an absolute travesty what unfolded tonight.

00:00:34.520 As you noted, I am in a pickup truck driving south on the 45 freeway.

00:00:39.860 I spent all day in Dallas, Texas.

00:00:41.440 I'm driving home to Houston right now.

00:00:44.340 It is 1027 p.m.

00:00:46.060 I'll get home past 2 in the morning, but we're doing this podcast on the phone.

00:00:50.560 Let me apologize.

00:00:51.200 Guys, our audio is not going to be the same quality we normally do when we're using the audio equipment.

00:00:56.300 But we wanted to get this out fast to address the issues tonight.

00:01:00.240 Everyone on planet Earth knows what happened tonight.

00:01:03.440 The New York trial convicted Donald Trump of 34 counts.

00:01:07.760 Felony that if the sentences were consecutive, could put him in jail for more than 100 years.

00:01:14.420 That's not going to happen.

00:01:15.560 It was an absolute miscarriage of justice.

00:01:18.620 This was not law.

00:01:19.780 This was not criminal justice.

00:01:21.820 This was politics.

00:01:23.180 This was a political hit job.

00:01:25.160 This was a spare.

00:01:26.820 This was the worst instance of election interference our country's ever seen.

00:01:33.360 What we're going to do tonight is we're going to break down what it means.

00:01:36.300 We're going to talk about what happens next.

00:01:37.820 We're going to talk about the next steps, how it impacts the elections, how it impacts Donald Trump, how it impacts the American people.

00:01:44.400 All of that we're going to impact in this special issue.

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00:03:38.760 Senator, I want to talk first what happens next.

00:03:43.700 He was found guilty on all counts.

00:03:46.600 Some don't even know what they were even charging him with, including, I think, Donald Trump, because the rules changed at the last minute.

00:03:54.260 We talked about that in the last podcast.

00:03:56.860 But let's look at the immediate future.

00:04:00.560 There's a sentencing that is coming the same week as the Republican National Convention.

00:04:05.520 There is a legitimate chance that, A, Donald Trump could be in jail or, B, could be under house arrest.

00:04:12.660 And that means he wouldn't be able to go to his own convention.

00:04:15.840 How is that not a lone election?

00:04:18.400 Well, Ben, that's not going to happen. 0.86

00:04:21.680 But it is illustrative of just how ridiculous what's transpired is.

00:04:28.000 We saw Trump convicted on all 34 counts. 0.66

00:04:32.160 I have to admit, I am on one level furious.

00:04:35.680 This is an outrage.

00:04:36.600 It is a disgusting assault on democracy, on the rule of law.

00:04:44.780 But I'm also heartbroken.

00:04:46.220 I'm heartbroken.

00:04:47.460 I believe in the law.

00:04:48.460 I believe in our justice system.

00:04:50.080 Our justice system is supposed to provide equal justice under law.

00:04:54.500 And, you know, yesterday, and we talked about on Wednesday's podcast, we talked about the different possible outcomes.

00:05:02.540 We talked about the miracle that could happen, which would be an acquittal, which I would have loved to have seen.

00:05:08.440 And we talked about the possibility of a hung jury.

00:05:10.940 One juror out of 12 people, one jury will not be part of this sparse.

00:05:15.740 I will not be part of this charade.

00:05:18.080 I'm done.

00:05:18.980 No, no, no.

00:05:20.380 The justice system is not meant to attack your political opponent, and I won't play a part.

00:05:25.600 Sadly, that didn't happen.

00:05:27.060 12 New Yorkers decided they were Democrat partisans.

00:05:30.420 Now, I will say, a significant part of that was no doubt driven by the absurd jury instructions given by the judge.

00:05:39.640 This judge has made the New York justice system into a global laughingstock across the planet.

00:05:47.120 People know that the justice system in New York doesn't follow the rule of law.

00:05:51.580 It doesn't care about each other law.

00:05:54.200 Instead, it is a tool to attack your political enemy.

00:05:58.200 That makes me sad.

00:05:59.200 That's not the way our justice system is supposed to work. 0.89

00:06:02.880 Now, you asked, what's next?

00:06:04.640 Well, Trump has been released on his own recognizance.

00:06:07.260 The next step is sentencing.

00:06:09.540 Sentencing is going to happen four days before the Republican National Convention.

00:06:14.320 In the interim, there are a series of steps, including Trump has to go to a pre-sentence evaluation.

00:06:20.920 He may have to submit to a psychiatrist or psychologist.

00:06:24.200 They compare a report, all of the steps that are standard after someone is convicted, that a report gets presented to the judge to help the judge make a decision about sentencing.

00:06:37.060 We will find out about sentencing literally the week of the Republican National Convention.

00:06:41.480 I don't think that it's by accident.

00:06:43.200 This entire trial is designed to interfere with the election.

00:06:48.220 I'm going to make a prediction right now.

00:06:49.600 The chances that this conviction is overturned on appeal, I believe, are 100.0%.

00:06:59.780 It will be overturned on appeal.

00:07:03.240 I think the judge knows that.

00:07:04.600 I think the judge in this trial bent over backwards, did everything possible, gave jury instructions that just defied U.S. Supreme Court precedent, did not require the jury to be unanimous on all the elements of the trial, let the jury mix and match and pick different potential other crimes to elevate this from a misdemeanor to a felony.

00:07:27.420 All of that is reversible error.

00:07:29.300 The judge knows that.

00:07:30.240 But I don't think he cares.

00:07:32.380 I don't think the prosecutor cares.

00:07:34.380 Because the objective here is not to get a conviction that sticks.

00:07:37.820 The objective here is not to put Donald Trump in jail.

00:07:40.520 The objective is to smear him.

00:07:42.860 Within minutes of the verdict coming down, the Biden White House put out a statement referring to him as a, quote, convicted felon.

00:07:51.600 That was the entire point of all of this.

00:07:54.500 We will hear the words convicted felon referring to Donald Trump from Democrats and from the corporate media one billion times between now and Election Day.

00:08:08.020 Every other sentence they say will say felon, felon, felon, felon, felon.

00:08:12.440 That was the point.

00:08:14.020 And they know it will be reversed on appeal, but that will happen after Election Day.

00:08:18.700 And this is all their effort to try to stop the American people from re-election Trump.

00:08:23.420 All right.

00:08:23.960 Let me play devil's advocate with you.

00:08:26.520 If we're underestimating the Democrats again, I still go back to the real question.

00:08:34.640 This judge has gone rogue.

00:08:37.300 He went rogue on sentencing.

00:08:39.140 He went rogue from the beginning.

00:08:41.220 He's a donor to Biden.

00:08:42.700 If he knows, Senator, and we use what you just said, that he knows it's going to be overturned, why the hell wouldn't he throw Donald Trump in jail or under house arrest where he can't travel?

00:08:53.900 Look, he might, and I fully believe this judge is partisan enough.

00:08:59.600 He would love to throw Donald Trump in a deep pit, to throw him in the pit of despair, to use a Princess Bride analogy.

00:09:07.560 He would do everything and anything he could. 1.00

00:09:10.900 But I also, I don't have any indication that this judge is stupid. 1.00

00:09:14.420 I think he's a partisan. 1.00

00:09:15.420 I think he hates Trump.

00:09:16.600 And I think he's willing to abuse his power. 0.98

00:09:18.440 But assuming he's not stupid, and I don't know that, if he orders Donald Trump sent to jail, that will be subject to an immediate appeal. 0.93

00:09:28.500 And I think the immediate appeal would be successful. 0.97

00:09:31.200 I don't know if it would be the state courts of New York or if it would be the federal courts.

00:09:35.820 But I don't think the courts are going to allow the presumptive Republican nominee, and I think likely the next president of the United States, to be hauled away to Rikers Island. 0.99

00:09:46.340 By the way, New York State is also a state where you can assault a police officer, you can punch a little old lady in the face on the street, you can practically rape or murder someone, and these imbeciles won't send you to jail. 0.97

00:10:01.460 But if your crime is being a Republican who's the leading candidate for president, you're right. 0.99

00:10:06.440 This partisan judge just might send you to jail. 0.94

00:10:09.780 But I think he won't do it.

00:10:12.300 So you're saying that if Trump, and this is where I love your legal mind, you're saying that it's more valuable to not put him under house arrest or put him in jail because then he's the convicted felon through Election Day, then it's overturned after Election Day, and you interfere with the election results.

00:10:32.420 And if you actually put him in jail or under house arrest, then it would escalate the timeline rapidly, so then he may actually be found innocent?

00:10:43.720 Not innocent, but listen, I think the judge is not going to put Trump in jail because it would be bad politics.

00:10:50.880 This is not law. This is not criminal justice. It's politics.

00:10:53.520 It would be bad politics because it would force the appellate courts to act. 0.99

00:10:59.140 And I think neither the partisan judge nor the partisan DA want the appellate courts to give a victory for Donald Trump before November.

00:11:08.540 So they're not going to do anything, I think, to tee up a legal victory for Donald Trump before November.

00:11:15.340 They want any legal victory for Trump to be after November.

00:11:19.120 Now, I will say, I will give it one caveat.

00:11:22.420 I could see some scenario where the Trump issue issues some sort of house arrest order.

00:11:31.420 He says you've got to stay at Mar-a-Lago, you've got to wear an ankle bracelet.

00:11:35.740 I don't think the judge will do that, but it is conceivable.

00:11:40.860 But you're allowed to go to the convention and give the convention speech.

00:11:44.080 You're allowed to go to the debate and participate in the debate.

00:11:46.480 That house arrest, with enough exceptions, that it is not transparently election interference.

00:11:53.980 It's just obvious to anyone with an IQ above 12 that it's election interference.

00:11:59.860 That is not outside the realm of possibility.

00:12:03.400 I think that probably doesn't happen either. 0.81

00:12:05.440 But I do not think the judge would be foolish enough to order him sent to jail

00:12:11.440 because I think it would force a rapid appellate reversal, and that's terrible politics.

00:12:17.000 All right, so let me ask you this.

00:12:18.480 And people are going to say, this case was extraordinary.

00:12:22.320 It involves a former president of the United States of America running for office.

00:12:25.900 Why can Donald Trump not get his appeal heard very quickly?

00:12:30.460 Why is this going to drag on until after Election Day?

00:12:35.520 Shouldn't this move its way through and the appeal move through very, very quickly?

00:12:39.220 And is there anything he can do to force the hand for this case to move out and whatever

00:12:44.820 this judge decides to sentence out very quickly and say, okay, no, this isn't right?

00:12:50.620 Yeah, look, it's a good question.

00:12:53.880 I can tell you in any ordinary case, the answer would be no.

00:12:58.160 But typically, if you're facing a criminal conviction, particularly if you don't have an order to go to jail

00:13:03.060 and you're allowed to be out and free pending the appeal, the way criminal convictions and appeals typically work,

00:13:09.820 they can take years.

00:13:11.240 I mean, they can take their death penalty appeals that have taken decades.

00:13:14.620 Decades, like the wheels of justice move slowly moving through the appellate process.

00:13:21.320 So in any ordinary case, you would never get the appeal resolved between now and the end of the year.

00:13:28.060 It would just take longer than that.

00:13:30.020 And so that's – and the way it would work normally, from a trial court conviction in the New York state courts,

00:13:38.600 you would appeal it typically to the New York intermediate appellate courts.

00:13:42.360 And then you would appeal it to the New York Court of Appeals, which is the Supreme Court in New York.

00:13:47.820 It's the top court in New York.

00:13:50.440 So you would go through – you'd have two levels of appellate courts in the state court system.

00:13:56.040 And then after the top state court decided your appeal, you could then appeal it to the U.S. Supreme Court from that.

00:14:06.320 So that process could, in a normal criminal appeal, easily take one, two, even three years.

00:14:14.200 I mean, that process can be quite slow, depending on how long the judges take to issue an opinion.

00:14:20.300 You could try to file an emergency appeal, but in an ordinary criminal case, it would never succeed.

00:14:26.500 Now, there is another avenue that the Trump lawyers, I suspect, are debating tonight.

00:14:32.460 The Trump lawyers could try to file an emergency appeal straight from the trial court to the U.S. Supreme Court.

00:14:42.700 Now, that's not easy to do.

00:14:46.140 Why?

00:14:46.700 That's extraordinarily uncommon.

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00:15:18.260 This is extraordinarily uncommon, but so is trying to imprison a presidential candidate,

00:15:27.560 the leading candidate who's leading in all the polls, and a former president.

00:15:31.060 Wouldn't that be enough for the Supreme Court to raise their eyebrows going,

00:15:34.220 yeah, we might want to get involved?

00:15:35.820 So it might.

00:15:37.000 And the Supreme Court has a variety of jurisdiction to grant a series of risks.

00:15:44.820 And the Supreme Court, it wouldn't be a direct appeal, but you could craft an appeal that went straight from the state trial court to the U.S. Supreme Court.

00:15:53.920 As I said, it is extraordinarily rare, but it is theoretically possible.

00:15:58.740 And I'm sure the Trump legal team is debating that right now.

00:16:02.720 Now, if they did, the risk of that, in any ordinary circumstance, the Supreme Court would never, ever, ever take it.

00:16:10.600 If the court's general approach to appeals is let the process play out, let the timeline play out, maybe another court could resolve this.

00:16:19.760 So if this were not the leading candidate for president of the United States, the Supreme Court's approach would be,

00:16:28.280 even if this conviction is wrong, maybe the New York intermediate appellate court reverses it.

00:16:33.420 Maybe the New York top appellate court reverses it.

00:16:36.220 There are lots of ways this could get fixed without the Supreme Court getting involved.

00:16:39.800 So that's the overwhelming approach of the Supreme Court in almost every case.

00:16:45.220 Now, this is not almost every case.

00:16:47.900 And so if I were part of Trump's legal team, I would give very serious thought to filing an extraordinary writ at the U.S. Supreme Court.

00:16:56.640 Now, to grant that, you'd take four justices, and you'd have to have four justices that saw this as the outrage that it is,

00:17:05.440 and I think that's probably right, and who were willing to put the court in the middle of it.

00:17:11.240 And I'll tell you, the U.S. Supreme Court has a very, very strong self-protective instinct to keep the court out of political conflicts.

00:17:23.420 If you look back at 2020, 2020, when you had multiple election challenges, lawsuits all over the country,

00:17:31.600 I wish the U.S. Supreme Court had gotten involved, and I urged the Supreme Court to take the appeal from Pennsylvania.

00:17:39.480 There was a writ of certiorari that was filed.

00:17:41.900 A writ of certiorari made an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court that was filed from Pennsylvania.

00:17:47.140 I urged the court to take that.

00:17:48.940 In fact, if you remember, Donald Trump asked me if I would argue that appeal if the Supreme Court took the case from Pennsylvania,

00:17:58.060 and I said yes, I would.

00:17:59.360 The court ultimately did not take the case, so I never argued it.

00:18:05.260 I think the reason they didn't take the case is because of the self-protective instinct of the Supreme Court,

00:18:12.200 that their sort of institutional approach is keep us out of a political mess.

00:18:18.960 Now, let me give a countervailing argument.

00:18:20.380 So, 24 years ago, I was a baby lawyer, and I was part of the legal team that litigated Bush v. Gore.

00:18:30.840 Bush v. Gore, you'll remember, happened right after the 2000 election.

00:18:35.500 And in the state of Florida, there was a series of litigation challenges.

00:18:39.960 George W. Bush won Florida, but Al Gore challenged the election.

00:18:43.960 He filed multiple lawsuits.

00:18:45.860 In today's world, I guess they call out more an election denier, but he challenged the election.

00:18:51.440 And I was part of the legal team that defended George W. Bush's victory.

00:18:55.820 In Florida, the votes were counted four separate times, and Bush won all four times.

00:18:59.860 But the first time we went to the U.S. Supreme Court, and there was a legal team that came together for Bush v. Gore

00:19:08.720 that I still think is the finest legal team ever assembled.

00:19:12.420 It was an amazing team of the best Supreme Court litigators on the planet.

00:19:17.300 And I was, you know, 28, 29 years old.

00:19:19.680 I was a kid carrying their bags, but I got to be a very junior part of an extraordinary team.

00:19:25.060 And what was interesting is that we were writing the petition for Saoirse Rorick asking the Supreme Court to take the case.

00:19:33.200 And I was part of the team writing that brief.

00:19:35.980 There was a real debate among the lawyers about whether the Supreme Court would take that case in 2000.

00:19:42.360 And the divide, interestingly enough, was between those of us who had clerked at the Supreme Court and those of us who had not.

00:19:48.920 Almost all of the lawyers who had not clerked at the Supreme Court believed the court would not take the case.

00:19:55.300 They'd want to stay out of the fight.

00:19:56.800 They would not want to get in the middle of this political fight.

00:20:00.220 And I and most of the other lawyers who had clerked at the court believed the court would take the case.

00:20:06.100 I was adamant I thought the court would take the case.

00:20:08.740 And I agreed that the court would see risk.

00:20:12.080 They'd see political risk to itself as an institution.

00:20:15.440 But I believe the court would also feel a responsibility to step in and act.

00:20:22.140 And I personally believe I can't prove this.

00:20:24.680 I have no inside information.

00:20:26.480 But I personally believe that the chief justice, Chief Justice Rehnquist, which is the justice for whom I clerked.

00:20:32.600 And so I knew Chief Justice Rehnquist very, very well.

00:20:35.040 I think he in particular felt a great responsibility that when the country was all waiting on the resolution of the presidential race, that the court had an obligation to step in and engage.

00:20:48.500 Well, I think there's a chance the court will feel that same thing.

00:20:53.040 I think there are certainly justices who, watching this, are outraged at the lawlessness of the abuse of power.

00:21:00.260 I don't know where the chief justice will fall.

00:21:03.240 John Roberts was part of that legal team down in Bush v. Gore.

00:21:08.140 I worked side by side with John Roberts in writing the petition for certiorari.

00:21:13.880 He was part of the team that wrote that.

00:21:16.500 My recollection, although I don't have a distinct recollection, but I assume, I think he was among those of us who believed the court would take the case.

00:21:25.780 Now, fast forwarding, he obviously has a very different role because he's the chief justice, and I think he's very protective of the court's legitimacy.

00:21:34.760 And I will say, the Democrats are mounting a frontal assault on the court to delegitimize the court.

00:21:42.960 So I think there will be justices afraid of getting into this matter, all of which is to say, I don't know if the court would grant an extraordinary writ.

00:21:53.280 But I'm confident the Trump legal team is debating that, debating that extensively right now.

00:21:59.000 Yeah, great point.

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00:23:48.900 Senator, let me ask you another question.

00:23:51.520 And this is one that I've been asked a lot over the last 10 hours.

00:23:57.440 On social media, it's really been popping up.

00:24:00.120 And there is a divide when it comes to this court case.

00:24:06.280 And there's been a lot of anger by a lot of conservatives that said, see, I told you so.

00:24:11.220 We should have gone after one of the liberals out there that was committing crimes and gone

00:24:16.640 after them to say to the Democrats, if you do this to Donald Trump, we're going to come

00:24:22.000 back and do it to you.

00:24:23.280 And now there's people that say, well, there it is.

00:24:26.020 The cat's out of the bag.

00:24:27.660 This is lawfare.

00:24:29.240 And if we're not willing to do it back to them, they're going to keep doing it to us.

00:24:33.400 Give me your reaction to people that are extremely frustrated on that aspect of us, that we're

00:24:38.400 playing by the rules.

00:24:40.140 They're not.

00:24:41.000 And yet they're winning.

00:24:42.120 Look, I get that sentiment, and it's frustrating because the other side, the other side is

00:24:47.840 willing to destroy the rule of law.

00:24:50.600 They're willing to destroy the judiciary.

00:24:52.540 They're willing to destroy our country in pursuit of partisan power. 0.65

00:24:58.380 And it is.

00:24:59.480 It's why I'm so sad today.

00:25:01.520 You know, I was on Sean Hannity yesterday.

00:25:04.180 I was on Sean Hannity tonight.

00:25:06.500 Yesterday, Sean and I got a little bit of an argument because the jury was still pending.

00:25:10.280 And I said, look, I'm holding out hope that maybe one juror will say no and there'll be

00:25:17.300 a hung jury.

00:25:18.040 And I'll tell you, Sean laughed at me.

00:25:19.520 And he said, no, New York is too far gone.

00:25:22.560 It's not going to happen.

00:25:24.540 Donald Trump cannot get a fair trial in New York.

00:25:27.860 And I didn't want to believe him.

00:25:30.560 I got to say, Sean was right.

00:25:33.500 This justice system, the justice system, I don't know that it ever recovers from this.

00:25:38.540 It will always be known as a Democrat banana Republican.

00:25:43.720 If you're a Republican in New York, I think there are a lot of Republicans in New York who

00:25:48.600 are calling their real estate agents, who are looking to leave New York, but they say,

00:25:52.280 okay, you cannot count on the rule of law in this state.

00:25:59.220 I understand the sentiment.

00:26:01.140 If they're going to burn it down, we ought to burn it down and abuse our power.

00:26:04.680 I don't agree with that.

00:26:06.560 I, at the end of the day, I believe in the Constitution.

00:26:10.000 I believe in the rule of law.

00:26:11.460 I don't want power abused by either side.

00:26:14.580 Now, it doesn't mean that you give the other side a free pass.

00:26:18.660 My view, I've said many times, I don't want a Republican Department of Justice.

00:26:22.160 I don't want a Democrat Department of Justice.

00:26:24.240 I want a Department of Justice that follows the law and that prosecutes individuals who commit

00:26:30.460 crimes regardless of their party.

00:26:32.760 So, for example, I hope if we, in January, we have a new president, if Donald Trump is

00:26:39.700 reelected, which is what I hope will happen, and we have a new Department of Justice, I

00:26:44.980 hope right at the outset they open investigations into the funding of these anti-American and

00:26:50.800 anti-Israel and anti-Semitic protests on college campuses.

00:26:54.820 And they trace down, follow the money, and they find out are terrorists financing this,

00:27:00.120 are foreign countries financing this.

00:27:01.820 And I hope they use the full investigatory resources of the Department of Justice to

00:27:07.120 get to the bottom of that.

00:27:08.160 Now, note, I'm not saying that because I have a target I want to put in jail.

00:27:13.620 I'm saying that because I see the evidence of a crime, and I want the Justice Department

00:27:18.900 to investigate that crime and to prosecute whoever is guilty.

00:27:22.940 And sadly, I don't believe the Justice Department is prosecuting that crime right now because

00:27:28.580 the flip side of what they're doing is they will abuse power to target their enemies, and

00:27:34.680 they will also abuse power by protecting their friends.

00:27:38.280 And so I get the vindictive instinct, but I think it's the wrong answer.

00:27:42.700 I think we should demonstrate that the rule of law matters.

00:27:46.280 And by the way, there is plenty of real criminality that prosecutors can pursue without engaging in the blatant abuse of power

00:27:56.220 we've seen from Democrats in these cases against Donald Trump.

00:27:59.740 All right, let's talk about the politics of what we mentioned at the very beginning.

00:28:05.720 We know from the White House that the words that we're going to hear over and over again

00:28:10.200 between now and November the 5th are convicted felon, convicted felon, convicted felon.

00:28:17.540 There is a...

00:28:18.020 Well, don't forget convicted felon.

00:28:19.780 Yeah, right, exactly.

00:28:20.920 So how powerful is that going to be politically?

00:28:25.720 It is clearly engaged people today on Trump's side.

00:28:32.380 I had two people walk up to me today, this afternoon, and they said, 0.92

00:28:36.640 I've never given a political donation in my life, but damn it, tonight, when the website gets back up,

00:28:42.800 it crashed multiple times because some of you were going to donate. 0.95

00:28:46.200 They said, I'm going to write a big check.

00:28:48.120 And one of them said to me, you know how much I'm going to donate?

00:28:52.040 1776.

00:28:53.260 That's my number I'm donating.

00:28:55.380 And this is someone that had never donated, he said, in his entire life to any political campaign,

00:29:01.640 local, state, or national.

00:29:04.000 And he said, this is our country under siege, and I'm going to get involved.

00:29:08.860 Now, I think there's a lot of patriots out there and new patriots who are going to probably make that decision.

00:29:15.820 But there's also, Senator, the other side.

00:29:19.300 Democrats are going to be inspired by this.

00:29:21.980 It's no longer looking at an incompetent Joe Biden.

00:29:25.320 Their hatred for Donald Trump is now back front and center.

00:29:28.380 Yeah, look, this will inspire both sides.

00:29:31.880 I don't believe this decision will change the outcome of the election in November.

00:29:36.640 I think it's baked in the cake.

00:29:38.540 I think rabid partisan Democrats hate Trump so much they were going to vote against him in November.

00:29:45.400 They're still going to vote against him. 0.92

00:29:46.860 And this is revenge porn for them. 0.69

00:29:51.060 They're just living their fantasy.

00:29:53.700 In terms of Republicans, I think this energizes Republicans.

00:30:01.960 You're right, the Trump website collapsed.

00:30:04.960 WinRed, which is the portal to contribute to Trump, to Republican senators, that portal collapsed tonight.

00:30:11.620 So I think a lot of people went and said, I want to contribute to the Republicans who are running this cycle precisely because of that.

00:30:18.480 I think this will energize Republicans, and this may well energize people.

00:30:24.420 Let's say you're not a Donald Trump fan.

00:30:26.800 Let's say you don't particularly like it.

00:30:28.600 Maybe you're strongly a Republican.

00:30:30.760 If you care about the rule of law, you ought to be outraged about this.

00:30:34.240 If you care about actually a justice system that is not simply a tool to attack your enemies, you ought to be horrified by this.

00:30:42.760 Because, listen, if you go down to Latin America, you're down to Banana Republics.

00:30:47.000 My dad's from Cuba.

00:30:48.480 Cuba understands what happened tonight.

00:30:51.100 There are Banana Republics throughout this country that understand what happened tonight, 1.00

00:30:54.960 which is one party gets in power, and they use the justice system to try to lock up their predecessors.

00:31:00.280 They'll try to lock up their opponents.

00:31:03.160 If you don't want that to happen to America, even if you might even despise Donald Trump,

00:31:09.240 you should be very upset about what happened tonight.

00:31:12.160 The Democrats' calculus at the beginning of this is that there would be two to three to five percent of voters who are not very engaged,

00:31:21.960 who are not paying attention a lot, who will decide the last couple of weeks before Election Day,

00:31:27.660 and if they hear the word felon, felon, felon, repeated a gazillion times, will say,

00:31:32.320 oh, I can't vote for a felon, and so will vote for Biden.

00:31:35.920 I'm really skeptical.

00:31:37.220 I don't think it's played out that way.

00:31:38.500 I think most Americans, other than the rabid Democrat partisans, recognize this was a political persecution,

00:31:47.560 and so I don't see this changing votes.

00:31:51.400 And I think even some Democrats and some of the media have backed away from their fervor from this

00:31:59.580 because they see it backfire to some extent.

00:32:03.280 Now, not tonight they're not backing away because they're too jubilant.

00:32:07.720 This is too much.

00:32:09.340 This is cathartic, and this is ecstasy, and this is schadenfreude all unfolding at once.

00:32:16.040 But at the end of the day, I don't see this changing the outcome on Election Day.

00:32:21.300 You've been in a lot of debates, Senator, and you've been on the presidential debate stage.

00:32:26.800 You've debated Donald Trump.

00:32:27.960 But one of my things that I love is debate prep, and I was putting myself in the room tonight mentally.

00:32:37.520 All right, if I'm in the room before the debate with Joe Biden,

00:32:41.140 I know Joe Biden at some point is going to look over at Donald Trump and say,

00:32:45.600 well, you're a convicted felon.

00:32:48.360 How does Trump respond to that?

00:32:50.860 I mean, that's a pretty hardcore line that they have been obsessed with, and they've got it now.

00:33:00.380 How do you overcome that when there's people watching that I'm sure are going to watch this thing

00:33:05.700 and maybe just engage the very first time, weren't watching the trial, don't understand how corrupt it was,

00:33:11.500 don't understand how these charges shouldn't have ever been used,

00:33:14.780 how they changed things to get rid of the statute of limitations,

00:33:17.300 how the federal government didn't bring these charges eight years ago for a reason?

00:33:22.120 I mean, all of that they've missed.

00:33:24.380 And they look at a president, sitting president, look at Donald Trump and go, 0.96

00:33:28.140 you're a convicted felon.

00:33:29.780 What do you do with that?

00:33:32.880 Well, look, I think the Biden debate prep team is going to spend a lot of time trying to convince Biden

00:33:39.880 and try to help Biden, not to seem like a smug SOB.

00:33:44.020 His instinct is going to be smug and sanctimonious and to rub Trump's face in it.

00:33:51.260 I think that is a bad look for Biden if he does it.

00:33:54.240 My prediction is they'll fail, by the way, that Biden can't resist being smug and sanctimonious on them.

00:34:00.260 I think he probably just will.

00:34:02.860 But if his debate prep team is any good, they will try to get him to resist that.

00:34:08.540 But on Trump's side, on this whole topic, and more broadly on everything in the debate,

00:34:14.220 I think they're going to try to stop Trump from just being volcanically angry.

00:34:22.180 Look, Trump typically engages in very little debate prep.

00:34:27.120 He is not.

00:34:27.780 You're right.

00:34:28.160 I have debated Trump many, many, many times.

00:34:31.020 He doesn't engage in extensive debate prep.

00:34:33.180 To the extent they have debate prep, I think the team around him, if they're any good,

00:34:39.880 likely will try to get him to be calm and matter-of-fact and not angry and combative.

00:34:47.140 If you go back and look at the 2020 debates, the first debate, Trump was angry and combative.

00:34:52.860 And many observers believe that that hurt Trump because he was too angry and combative in the debate.

00:35:00.080 I think that will be an instinct here.

00:35:01.620 And Trump has reason to be pissed.

00:35:03.620 Look, he was just railroaded.

00:35:05.020 He was railroaded by a kangaroo court.

00:35:07.960 Any natural person, any person's natural reaction would be pissed.

00:35:12.560 And Trump is not someone who generally hides his emotions.

00:35:17.160 You know, I'm reminded of back in 2000.

00:35:21.000 So we were talking about Bush versus Gore earlier in the pod.

00:35:23.420 So after Bush won, after the Supreme Court resolved the case and after he came in, he appointed his attorney general, John Ascroft.

00:35:32.340 And I was part of the team that prepared John Ascroft for his confirmation hearings.

00:35:37.500 And so we mooted John Ascroft multiple times for his confirmation hearings as attorney general.

00:35:43.240 And, you know, I'm a young, at this point, 30-year-old lawyer, and there were several of us in the room.

00:35:51.780 But we would try to get obnoxious with Ascroft in the preparation for confirmation.

00:35:57.120 We'd try to piss him off.

00:35:58.480 We'd try to insult him.

00:35:59.600 And in the prep sessions, he would blow his top.

00:36:03.320 He'd yell at us.

00:36:04.160 He'd get mad.

00:36:05.600 And we were asking obnoxious questions.

00:36:08.640 And he would scream at us.

00:36:10.380 And then we'd say, OK, Senator, because he was a senator at the time, we'd say, Senator, I get what you're saying.

00:36:15.380 You're right.

00:36:16.100 That was a totally unfair question.

00:36:18.480 It was completely wrong.

00:36:20.120 You were perfectly justified yelling at us.

00:36:22.960 Here's the problem.

00:36:24.840 They don't have the votes to defeat you right now. 0.99

00:36:27.360 The only way they defeat your confirmation is if they provoke you to say something stupid at the hearing, and what you say tanks your nomination. 0.99

00:36:40.200 And so we worked with him. 0.99

00:36:41.640 We said, OK, yell at us.

00:36:42.780 Get all of your anger out at us.

00:36:45.400 But when you get in the hearing, don't yell at the senators.

00:36:50.560 Give them nothing, because they have nothing to defeat you, and they can only win as if you give it to them. 0.96

00:36:56.400 So you fast forward to the hearing, and you had Democrat senators that just made fools of themselves.

00:37:03.900 I remember Ted Kennedy at one point leaning forward.

00:37:07.740 He was reading something Ashcroft has read about the Second Amendment.

00:37:11.500 And he talked about the Second Amendment being, as the framers, as James Madison and other framers wrote about it, a check on tyranny.

00:37:19.620 And Ted Kennedy and his Boston Brahmin voice goes, tyranny in the United States?

00:37:26.960 What?

00:37:27.460 You know what that is?

00:37:28.580 That is treason, I tell you, treason!

00:37:30.820 And John Ashcroft, to his credit, he had Ted Kennedy screaming at him and calling him a traitor.

00:37:40.700 And John Ashcroft said, Senator, if confirmed as attorney general, I will follow the law.

00:37:46.980 And I don't know that his heartbeat got about 65, and he got confirmed.

00:37:51.260 You know John Ashcroft well.

00:37:52.500 You and here are good friends.

00:37:53.760 Yeah, he's one of my mentors.

00:37:56.760 Yes.

00:37:58.560 His confirmation hearing, he didn't take the bait.

00:38:02.380 I promise you, in the prep sessions, he did.

00:38:05.180 It got it out of his system.

00:38:07.220 I think the Trump debate prep sessions will be similar.

00:38:11.060 They will try to get that out of his system.

00:38:13.460 I don't know if it will succeed or not.

00:38:15.160 Final question for you on this, and it deals with the presidency and Joe Biden.

00:38:22.980 I don't know how you can separate what this judge did from the corruption of the Biden White House.

00:38:32.360 We know the attorneys that left the DOJ to go work on this case.

00:38:36.760 We know that Alvin Bragg ran on this.

00:38:39.000 We know he raised money off of it.

00:38:40.700 We know that this judge has a daughter that's heavily involved in fundraising in the Democratic Party.

00:38:47.980 And this all was orchestrated from the Biden administration down.

00:38:54.960 They're trying to act like now they're separate from it.

00:38:58.160 Like this is, we stood back.

00:38:59.900 We were just watching the wills of justice and a man be found accountable by a jury of his peers.

00:39:07.800 That is clearly going to be their line.

00:39:11.500 But make no mistake, none of this would have happened without the direction of Biden.

00:39:18.480 I said today, America has its own Vladimir Putin now.

00:39:23.060 His name is Biden.

00:39:25.060 Joe Biden is America's Putin right now, going after his political opponent and trying to lock them up.

00:39:30.660 You know, in law, if you look at something like antitrust law, there's a concept in law called conscious parallelism, which is people that all have similar incentives behaving similarly, but it's not a conspiracy.

00:39:46.400 They just all are acting according to the same incentives.

00:39:49.420 I don't know that Alvin Bragg is taking orders from the Biden White House.

00:39:56.660 I agree that Joe Biden has been dictatorial.

00:40:00.240 He's abused his power.

00:40:01.760 But I think Alvin Bragg is a petty dictator of his own.

00:40:05.800 He's a George Soros DA.

00:40:07.380 He ran on getting Joe Biden.

00:40:10.000 You know, when his was the first indictment, I think a lot of Democrats were kind of sheepish.

00:40:14.740 They said, OK, this one is really sketchy.

00:40:17.180 They didn't want this to be the lead case.

00:40:20.200 And look, ultimately, the Biden DOJ, they sent the number three lawyer at DOJ, who had been a Democrat donor before and a Democrat consultant.

00:40:30.240 They sent him to be part of the trial team.

00:40:32.560 So the Biden DOJ got in bed with this partisan prosecution.

00:40:37.160 But I'm not convinced that Alvin Bragg did so at the direction of the White House. 0.96

00:40:41.900 I just think he hates Trump's guts.

00:40:44.740 So does everyone in the Biden DOJ, the Biden White House.

00:40:49.240 So does Fannie Willis down in Georgia.

00:40:51.780 So does just about every wild-eyed partisan Democrat.

00:40:55.680 And so I wouldn't say it is as much a direction from the White House as that they're all suffering from the same Trump derangement syndrome,

00:41:06.200 where they're willing to burn it all down, to destroy the rule of law, to abuse the justice system because they hate Trump so much.

00:41:16.380 And they've convinced themselves if he is reelected, if he's president, it's the end of democracy.

00:41:22.580 I mean, we played on Wednesday's pod, Robert De Niro, going on and on.

00:41:27.160 That'll be the last election ever if Trump is elected, which is just, it's deranged. 0.92

00:41:31.480 It's unhinged.

00:41:32.960 But I don't think De Niro is lying in that I think he believes every word he says.

00:41:38.000 I suspect Alvin Bragg does, too.

00:41:39.840 And I suspect the Biden White House and DOJ does as well.

00:41:43.040 Final question.

00:41:44.900 You're a poll guy.

00:41:45.920 I love polls.

00:41:46.780 I want your prediction.

00:41:48.440 The first major polls that come out after this verdict has obviously come down, will they show that Donald Trump starts to lose momentum?

00:42:00.900 Do you think he'll go backwards in the polls nationally or in swing states?

00:42:05.260 Do you think this could even backfire more?

00:42:08.580 Because you did say, and I agreed with you, that if they indict him to make him more powerful, his poll numbers would go up.

00:42:14.700 That happened.

00:42:15.640 When the court case started, you said it's going to make people solidify their support behind Donald Trump.

00:42:20.520 But now that he has the, he's a convicted felon around his neck, and that will be what happens in the polls.

00:42:28.840 So when the indictment first came down, the first indictment, I said on this podcast,

00:42:33.600 this indictment will be worth 10 points for Donald Trump in the polls.

00:42:38.600 Now, that's in the primaries.

00:42:40.140 A week later, Trump was up 10.

00:42:41.920 That prediction proved exactly accurate. 0.97

00:42:44.700 Now, to be fair, that's a primary poll.

00:42:47.440 Primary polls are different than general election polls.

00:42:49.660 And so it caused Republicans to rally around Trump, even some Republicans who were not supporting Trump at that time.

00:42:56.800 The general election, it's a little harder.

00:42:58.880 I think most of the views on both sides are baked in.

00:43:02.120 But if you force me to make a prediction, my prediction right now is Trump.

00:43:06.660 I think it is mildly beneficial for Trump at the polls.

00:43:11.240 I don't think it is majorly, because I think most of the people on both sides are baked in.

00:43:16.740 And it almost doesn't matter at this point.

00:43:19.320 They're not moving.

00:43:20.180 But if you press me, I would say I don't think it's going to cause Trump in the polls.

00:43:26.220 And I would say I think it's likely to be a mild, positive benefit for Trump in the polls.

00:43:33.860 And he's already leading the polls right now.

00:43:35.520 Yeah, it is a shocking day.

00:43:38.640 It's a sad day for this country.

00:43:40.760 Senator, I love doing this show with you three days a week.

00:43:43.820 I really love it when we get to cover news that is so important to the American people like this one today.

00:43:50.140 Even if it means you're in the car on the way driving home in the middle of the night.

00:43:54.920 I say this, and I mean it sincerely from everybody listening.

00:43:59.000 Thank you for clarifying so much, explaining it, and also standing up for the rule of law, as you described it earlier.

00:44:08.300 Don't forget, we do this show Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays.

00:44:11.960 Hit that subscriber auto download button.

00:44:14.120 There's going to be a lot of breaking news.

00:44:15.680 So on those in-between days, grab my podcast, and I'll keep you up to date, Ben Ferguson Podcast.

00:44:20.780 The Senator and I will see you back here on Saturday for the Week in Review.

00:44:25.920 And make sure you share this podcast right now so other people will hear it,

00:44:29.240 especially your family and friends that may not have been into the case so they know what's actually going on.

00:44:34.920 And we'll see you back here Saturday morning.

00:44:37.620 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:44:40.520 Guaranteed Human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - May 31, 2024

Trump Guilty Verdict Makes a Mockery of Rule of Law-What does it Mean & What's Next？

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