Verdict with Ted Cruz - January 10, 2026


Venezuela looks to a New Horizon, Democrat Maduro Flip-Flop & Minnesota's very own Civil War Week In Review


Episode Stats


Length

31 minutes

Words per minute

170.24263

Word count

5,377

Sentence count

436

Harmful content

Misogyny

5

sentences flagged

Hate speech

12

sentences flagged


Summary

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

Ted Cruz talks about the arrest of one of the most wanted drug traffickers in the world, Delcy Rodriguez is sworn in as the new president of Venezuela and the Minnesota Gov. says he wants to go to civil war with the federal government.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.
00:00:02.660 Guaranteed human.
00:00:05.380 Welcome.
00:00:06.040 It is Verdict with Ted Cruz, the Weekend Review.
00:00:08.200 Ben Ferguson with you.
00:00:09.180 And here are the big stories that you may have missed that we talked about.
00:00:11.720 First up, what is next for Venezuela after Donald Trump went in to get one of the biggest
00:00:16.800 narco terrorists in the world? 0.98
00:00:18.600 We'll have the answer to that for you in just a moment.
00:00:21.360 Also, Democrats were actually in favor of getting Maduro and demanding it, even having
00:00:27.700 money on the line for those that would turn him in.
00:00:30.620 But now they hate Donald Trump because he got him.
00:00:33.740 What's behind all that?
00:00:35.360 And finally, the Minnesota government, including the governor now, says he wants to go to civil
00:00:41.540 war with the federal government.
00:00:43.720 It's the Weekend Review, and it starts right now.
00:00:46.980 What is next?
00:00:48.240 And let me just, I could look at my Twitter feed, and I was on CNN last night, and it was
00:00:54.100 the topic of conversation, and that is, there are a lot of people that believe that America
00:00:59.740 First policy that Donald Trump ran on was not invading countries and staying indefinitely
00:01:05.800 like Iraq, Afghanistan.
00:01:08.440 There is a lot of concern.
00:01:10.680 I heard it.
00:01:11.800 You probably saw the clip of Lindsey Graham on Air Force One with the president saying,
00:01:15.740 you know, this is a guy that loves to be in these forever wars.
00:01:18.100 And there was people that were really concerned with that image of if that's who's in his
00:01:22.300 fear, I don't want to get bogged down in Venezuela.
00:01:25.920 I don't want our men and women to be there and loss of life to mount and grow because
00:01:31.980 we decide to take over a country indefinitely.
00:01:34.560 There's a lot of people that voted for Trump.
00:01:36.420 They believe that's what he was never going to do.
00:01:38.840 And now they're like, well, hold on.
00:01:39.900 We're here.
00:01:40.400 I'm going to take it over.
00:01:41.500 There is a lot of concern.
00:01:42.800 So let's dive into that and talk about what this looks like next in Venezuela.
00:01:47.120 What is responsibility?
00:01:49.800 What responsibility do we have to do it the right way?
00:01:52.000 But also to not just sit there indefinitely.
00:01:54.920 Well, listen, first of all, let me be clear.
00:01:56.940 We are not at war with Venezuela.
00:02:00.500 This is not a forever war.
00:02:02.260 It's not even a war.
00:02:03.520 This was a military operation to execute an arrest warrant.
00:02:07.900 It was the military supporting the FBI and arresting indicted narco terrorists.
00:02:13.500 And it took a couple of hours and was over.
00:02:15.600 They went in, they got them and they left.
00:02:17.760 That was the conclusion of the military conflict.
00:02:20.220 It's not a war.
00:02:21.540 It's not, as I said, it's not a forever war.
00:02:23.580 It was not even a five-hour war.
00:02:25.220 It was about a two-hour war.
00:02:27.040 And I wouldn't even call it a war.
00:02:28.480 It was when you go and arrest someone.
00:02:31.080 It was an arrest with the military supporting and protecting the law enforcement officers carrying out the arrest.
00:02:37.300 What happens next?
00:02:40.200 So the day after Maduro was arrested, Delcy Rodriguez, who was the vice president, was sworn in as the interim president.
00:02:49.900 Now, listen, no American should be happy with Delcy Rodriguez as the president of Venezuela for any extended period of time.
00:02:58.040 And I'm going to go into a little bit of background in terms of who she is and then talk about what should happen next.
00:03:03.300 Now, Delcy Rodriguez is a communist.
00:03:05.760 Yes.
00:03:05.960 She was the vice president.
00:03:07.520 She hates America.
00:03:08.620 Let me give you some of her background.
00:03:11.900 She was the vice president.
00:03:13.620 Before that, she was the oil minister.
00:03:17.760 And she was she is a lawyer, too, like the first lady.
00:03:22.040 And she's been in in just about every post.
00:03:25.660 She was also she was foreign minister.
00:03:27.820 She was president of the constituent assembly, vice president and oil minister.
00:03:32.080 She was sworn in as the interim president.
00:03:35.180 You know who swore in?
00:03:36.280 Who's that?
00:03:37.600 Her brother, Jorge Rodriguez, who is the head of the national assembly.
00:03:41.300 So to understand this is is a corrupt, Marxist, communist, America hating woman. 0.99
00:03:49.580 And let me give you her background.
00:03:50.620 She was born in Caracas.
00:03:52.520 She is the daughter of a Marxist guerrilla leader named Jorge Antonio Rodriguez.
00:03:59.240 And and she is rather rather her dad was a co-founder of the Socialist League.
00:04:03.740 Her dad was arrested in connection with the 1976 kidnapping of American businessman William F.
00:04:12.580 Niehaus and died in police custody.
00:04:16.940 And and one source said the following that ordeal is the foundation and origin of Delcy's hatred of the West and of democracy.
00:04:28.720 Her whole background was Marxist.
00:04:33.540 And in fact, the source continued the guerrilla Marxist element kidnapped an American executive 1976.
00:04:39.920 He was held for three years until authorities located the group hiding in the Amazon jungle.
00:04:46.580 She is she she she was sanctioned by the Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Asset Control because of her senior role in the Maduro administration.
00:05:02.180 Those sanctions are still in place.
00:05:04.400 She was also caught transporting gold illegally into Spain.
00:05:09.740 She had 40 bags, four zero bags full of gold in a private jet as the vice president. 0.84
00:05:17.880 And they put the bags through the x-ray.
00:05:19.920 They said, wait, you got 40 bags full of gold.
00:05:22.440 And and and she was she's like, I'm from Venezuela.
00:05:25.180 This is normal.
00:05:25.820 This is how we operate there.
00:05:26.860 I'm the vice president.
00:05:27.680 Right.
00:05:28.100 That's no big deal.
00:05:29.280 Look, look, she is a communist leader.
00:05:32.440 And and she is not a friend of the West.
00:05:34.600 Now, I will say this right now, it appears she's cooperating with the Trump administration.
00:05:41.480 I'm sure it made an impression seeing Delta Force show up and arrest Maduro in the first lady.
00:05:46.960 Yeah, she could be next.
00:05:49.240 She's cooperating right now.
00:05:51.660 We'll see if she continues to cooperate.
00:05:53.820 By the way, there are multiple reports of violence on the ground.
00:05:56.780 There have been reports of potential coups from other leaders in the government.
00:06:00.120 There is some instability.
00:06:01.240 But I'll tell you what needs to happen.
00:06:02.880 No one should be happy.
00:06:05.000 Number one, what you said is exactly right.
00:06:08.140 We do not want to see an American occupation.
00:06:11.140 We don't want to see an extended American presence on the ground. 0.99
00:06:14.720 And we don't want to see this America hated hating communist essentially with the Maduro regime
00:06:22.020 continuing.
00:06:22.780 What should happen is free and fair elections and free and fair elections.
00:06:27.940 Look, the last election we talked about in the last podcast that Maduro was arrested because
00:06:34.520 he's a narco trafficker, but he was also arrested because he's illegitimate, because in the last
00:06:38.880 election he lost decisively to the opposition party.
00:06:42.300 And yet he stayed in power just as a thug and dictator.
00:06:45.000 And that was part of the legal basis for why we could do this, because he was no longer
00:06:49.840 legitimately a head of state.
00:06:51.220 And he was not recognized as the head of state by the United States, including the Biden administration
00:06:55.800 and much of the rest of the world.
00:06:59.580 There should be free and fair elections.
00:07:01.780 And I think it would be very, very good for Venezuela and very, very good for America if
00:07:07.240 they were to elect a leader who is a pro-America, pro-free market leader, and Venezuela were
00:07:16.580 to return to being a friend, particularly, look, one of the big things, they've got the
00:07:21.660 largest proven oil reserves of any country in the world.
00:07:25.320 And it really is amazing that if you think about the amount of oil they have and also gold,
00:07:30.520 that how quickly they could come out of this if they just didn't have communists running
00:07:34.820 the country like this is this would be one of the easiest is I was described today by
00:07:39.600 a banker and he was he was just trying to put it in perspective.
00:07:42.880 He's like when other countries fall, then they need the World Bank.
00:07:46.020 They need people to come in and give them cash and to help just stabilize at the bare
00:07:51.220 minimum of a total collapse of their economy.
00:07:53.040 He said, if you ask me right now, what country would I want to be able to take over based on
00:07:58.360 their resources to build them back up the fastest?
00:08:01.340 He was like Venezuela is like one of the easiest ones in the whole world.
00:08:04.820 To do because of how minutes they have to sell, they could get their economy up and
00:08:11.040 roaring and the people could have a great life.
00:08:13.580 And they used to have that, by the way, as well.
00:08:15.560 People forget that.
00:08:17.160 Yeah.
00:08:17.300 Remember, in 1950, Venezuela had the fourth highest GDP per capita in the world.
00:08:23.440 The United States was first, then Switzerland, then New Zealand and Venezuela was number
00:08:27.660 four.
00:08:28.140 That's what these communists screwed up.
00:08:30.120 And listen, President Trump has focused a great deal on trying to get U.S. oil companies
00:08:35.280 to go and invest in Venezuela.
00:08:37.500 Now, to produce the oil, even though they have proven reserves, their infrastructure has
00:08:41.960 collapsed.
00:08:42.920 It's the corruption of the communism.
00:08:45.820 They're not producing what they could.
00:08:49.140 And to be able to produce will take an investment of likely hundreds of billions of dollars.
00:08:55.320 It's not a cheap proposition.
00:08:57.520 Now, the oil that will be produced would generate more revenue than that.
00:09:02.120 But I'll tell you, I actually spent a good chunk of the day talking to people in the energy
00:09:06.960 industry and asking their views on Venezuela.
00:09:09.900 And a big question that if you're, let's say, you're the CEO of Chevron or the CEO of ExxonMobil
00:09:16.560 and you're trying to decide, do I invest tens of billions or hundreds of billions?
00:09:21.800 Your number one question is, what's the government there?
00:09:24.840 Are they stable?
00:09:25.820 Is there rule of law?
00:09:27.120 Are they going to protect me?
00:09:28.360 Are they going to seize?
00:09:29.300 Am I going to invest $100 billion and they come seize the assets like they did before?
00:09:33.160 If you don't trust the government there to protect your property rights, you're not
00:09:38.600 going to invest.
00:09:39.180 And it's why having free and fair elections and a stable government that is friends of
00:09:44.400 the United States, that is not communist, is critical to the success, not just of Venezuela,
00:09:53.040 but to the success of America's relationship with Venezuela.
00:09:57.340 And so I will say, you know, there are some folks you're seeing people who are saying,
00:10:02.460 well, no, no, no, this was not regime change because we just arrested Maduro, but the exact
00:10:07.460 same regime is in place.
00:10:08.800 And let me be clear, this, I very much hope, will be regime change at the ballot box, which
00:10:15.360 is a very different thing, that it will be the voters, that there will be a free and fair
00:10:19.840 elections and the voters will choose.
00:10:21.940 We don't want these corrupt Marxist narco traffickers. 0.86
00:10:26.180 We want a leader that we choose to represent us and to bring us back to prosperity.
00:10:32.040 And if you want prosperity in Venezuela, you want free enterprise, you want incentives for
00:10:38.640 investment to develop the massive natural resources and you want to trade with the United States of
00:10:43.480 America. And so that's the outcome all of us should be rooting for. And I believe that's the outcome 0.62
00:10:48.720 President Trump is working very hard to produce.
00:10:51.740 Now, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation, you can go back and listen to the full podcast from earlier this week.
00:10:58.380 Canadian women are looking for more, more out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them. 0.98
00:11:05.400 And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast.
00:11:09.140 I'm Jennifer Stewart.
00:11:10.300 And I'm Catherine Clark.
00:11:11.540 And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women.
00:11:15.320 Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey.
00:11:20.720 So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.
00:11:24.260 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:11:30.160 Now on to story number two.
00:11:32.180 I want to go back.
00:11:33.240 Can we go back to Chuck Schumer and just that way?
00:11:37.140 I think it was 2020 when he had something very interesting to say.
00:11:41.060 Can we play that for everybody real quick?
00:11:42.940 Yep.
00:11:43.320 All right.
00:11:43.540 Take a listen.
00:11:44.100 This is Chuck Schumer back in 2020.
00:11:47.320 Listen carefully to the words that he has to say.
00:11:49.500 You're going to get a kick out of this.
00:11:51.120 He brags about all these things he wants to do or is doing, but his actions belie his words.
00:11:56.740 Maybe the best metaphor was his claim to bring democracy to Venezuela.
00:12:03.300 There was a big policy there.
00:12:05.360 It flopped.
00:12:06.600 If the policy was working, Juan Guaido wouldn't be in the balcony here.
00:12:10.500 He'd be in Venezuela.
00:12:12.000 He'd be sitting in the president's palace or at least waging a fight to win.
00:12:16.860 He's here.
00:12:17.560 And the president brags about his Venezuela policy?
00:12:20.900 Give us a break.
00:12:22.140 He hasn't brought an end to the Maduro regime.
00:12:24.640 The Maduro regime is more powerful today and more entrenched today than it was when the president began.
00:12:29.940 So here's my part about this that makes me laugh.
00:12:33.320 Democrats, and there's a tweet that's very much like that, the same thing from Joe Biden.
00:12:37.780 Yep.
00:12:38.180 They were angry that Trump hadn't like taken out Maduro.
00:12:41.960 Now Trump takes out Maduro and now they're angry at Trump for taking out Maduro.
00:12:45.780 You cannot make it up.
00:12:46.860 Yeah, and listen carefully to what Schumer just said there.
00:12:50.940 Give us a break.
00:12:52.300 He hasn't ended the Maduro regime.
00:12:54.940 So he was on the floor of the Senate.
00:12:56.740 This is a speech where he was blasting Trump in 2020 for not having taken Maduro out.
00:13:02.940 And now, in the wake of President Trump having another enormously successful military operation, the last just a few hours in actual execution, and then it was over and then Maduro was gone and he was on his way to the United States, Schumer and Kamala Harris and just about every Democrat you find are freaking out.
00:13:24.440 And they're just being hypocrites.
00:13:25.840 They just hate Trump.
00:13:27.640 And just like they're defending every illegal immigrant, they're defending all of the gangbangers who are here. 0.97
00:13:34.180 In this case, the Democrats are becoming the chief defender of Nicolas Maduro.
00:13:41.120 But as I mentioned, on the legal front, if you look back to Noriega, front and center in terms of the litigation that will happen over this is that in 1989, Bill Barr was the assistant attorney general for the office of legal counsel.
00:14:01.360 Now, Bill Barr, you'll recall, ended up becoming George Herbert Walker Bush's attorney general, and then he was also AG for President Trump in the first term.
00:14:10.000 Bill Barr at the time was leading what's called OLC.
00:14:13.240 And OLC is charged under federal law with writing authoritative opinions on what is the Constitution, what is legal, what are the constraints on the executive branch.
00:14:25.240 And, by the way, there is a long history of incredibly important jurists and scholars being the heads of OLC, including Antonin Scalia.
00:14:35.960 He was the head of OLC, including William Rehnquist, for whom I clerked, the chief justice of the Supreme Court.
00:14:41.600 He was the head of OLC under Nixon, including Chuck Cooper, my first boss when I practiced law.
00:14:47.640 So OLC, they are typically, they are often U.S. Supreme Court clerks themselves.
00:14:53.460 They are constitutional experts.
00:14:55.660 And Barr issued a detailed opinion making clear that the U.S. government had the authority to go and apprehend Noriega.
00:15:05.980 And Barr said several things.
00:15:07.920 So it's a detailed opinion.
00:15:09.000 By the way, you can read the entire opinion.
00:15:10.600 The opinion is public.
00:15:11.360 But Barr concluded that, number one, the FBI's statutory arrest authority, quote, authorizes extraterritorial investigations and arrests.
00:15:24.180 So that's in the statute, existing U.S. law, the FBI can go abroad and arrest someone.
00:15:29.640 And Barr concluded the president can lawfully order that extraterritorial arrest.
00:15:36.420 And interestingly, Barr, so one of the main arguments that Democrats in the media, although that's redundant because they're one in the same, Democrats in the media.
00:15:47.060 And by the way, law professors fall into that same camp.
00:15:49.640 They're all clutching their pearls.
00:15:51.540 And their main argument deals with the United Nations Charter.
00:15:55.020 And Article 2.4 of the U.N. Charter prohibits the, quote, use of force against the territorial integrity of any state.
00:16:03.600 And so their main argument is this violates the U.N. Charter.
00:16:06.920 Well, what Barr concluded, and this is a quote, and by the way, it's not just Barr's opinion.
00:16:12.700 This is a binding decision from OLC that binds the executive unless and until it's overturned.
00:16:17.660 So it is like a judicial opinion but within the executive branch.
00:16:21.440 Barr said that Article 2.4 of the U.N. Charter does not, quote, prohibit the executive as a matter of domestic law from authorizing forcible abductions.
00:16:35.260 Put another way, quote, as a matter of domestic law, the executive has the power to authorize actions inconsistent with Article 2.4 of the U.N. Charter.
00:16:45.040 What does that mean?
00:16:46.300 The U.N. Charter is not independently binding on the United States government.
00:16:51.800 The Constitution is binding on the government.
00:16:54.180 You know, back before I was in the Senate, what I did for a living is argued U.S. Supreme Court cases.
00:17:00.180 And the most consequential case that I argued before the Supreme Court was a case called Medellin v. Texas.
00:17:06.320 I ended up winning 6-3.
00:17:07.960 It was an incredibly consequential case, but it dealt with the authority of the International Court of Justice, the World Court, the judicial arm of the U.N., to bind the U.S. justice system.
00:17:19.040 And I argued, representing the state of Texas successfully, the U.N. doesn't have the authority to do that.
00:17:24.760 The World Court doesn't have the authority to do it.
00:17:26.660 It is the U.S. Constitution, and it is U.S. laws.
00:17:29.640 And if Congress wants to pass a law, that can be binding, but Congress had not, in Medellin, passed a law relevant to the issue there.
00:17:38.600 Likewise here, the DOJ opinion was, even if the U.N. Charter says something different, as a matter of U.S. constitutional law, the president can order this.
00:17:49.080 And critically, the Barr opinion also concluded that a U.S. arrest abroad, quote, in violation of foreign law, does not violate the Fourth Amendment.
00:18:00.760 And to be clear, the Barr opinion was litigated in the Noriega case, and Noriega stayed in jail.
00:18:08.500 So he lost all of those claims.
00:18:10.900 That is really powerful legal precedent, and it is very closely on point.
00:18:16.040 You talk about the legal side of this.
00:18:18.020 I want to ask, just real quickly, are there other legal aspects and challenges in this case that could come up as well?
00:18:25.460 Well, yes, and look, there are distinctions that I would expect Maduro to argue between this case and the Noriega case.
00:18:33.780 In the Noriega case, the General Assembly in Panama had actually declared war on the United States.
00:18:42.520 Secondly, they had shot and killed a U.S. Marine.
00:18:45.740 And so those are both facts that leaned in favor of Noriega, the president being able to respond and respond militarily.
00:18:54.100 In this instance, the government of Venezuela has not formally declared war on the United States, and they have not killed a Marine or a service member.
00:19:05.840 Although Maduro's drug trafficking has killed countless Americans, thousands and hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions, a massive number of Americans Maduro is responsible for killing through drug trafficking.
00:19:19.760 I will say also, there is a second issue that will be litigated, which is what's called head of state immunity.
00:19:27.760 So Maduro will go and argue that the actions he carried out were as the leader of Venezuela, and as a general principle, U.S. government, U.S. courts don't impose criminal liability for the actions a head of state does.
00:19:43.900 And Noriega was the de facto leader of Panama, but he was not elected by the people.
00:19:51.860 In this case, the guy was recognized as a head of state, and so it's different from Noriega.
00:19:58.500 That will be litigated.
00:20:00.180 I think the response to that is fine.
00:20:03.680 That may have been, he may have enjoyed that immunity back in 2017, 2018.
00:20:09.560 But 2019, when he ignored the results of the election and seized power illegitimately, everyone agrees he was illegitimate.
00:20:18.740 The United States, by the way, the Biden administration agreed that.
00:20:21.420 The first Trump administration agreed that.
00:20:23.700 Most of the rest of the world has acknowledged that Maduro stayed in power illegitimately.
00:20:29.980 One exception from head of state immunity is if the government invites you in.
00:20:35.360 In this case, I think you would say there's not an operational government that is legitimate, that he was an illegitimate dictator.
00:20:44.560 But that will be a subject of litigation.
00:20:47.580 It would not surprise me to see that question go all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
00:20:52.080 All right, and finally, I know I'm going to laugh because I know you're going to have an answer for this.
00:20:55.840 Are there any other legal precedents that are going to come up in here as well as we wrap up the legal side of this?
00:21:00.860 There are, and there's a line of cases that's known as the Kerr Frisbee doctrine.
00:21:05.360 Which says that unlawful abductions of criminals on foreign soil does not stop the criminal prosecution of those individuals in U.S. courts.
00:21:19.340 And the lead case in this line of cases is a case called the United States v. Alvarez Machain.
00:21:25.820 It was a 1992 ruling, and the Supreme Court 6-3 concluded that a Mexican national who was forcibly abducted in Mexico from his home brought to the United States that he could be criminally prosecuted.
00:21:41.240 And it didn't matter if his being seized abroad was illegally.
00:21:45.040 And so that line of cases, if Maduro were just a run-of-the-mill drug dealer, it would be a very easy question that regardless of the circumstances of his capture, if he violated U.S. criminal laws, he could be prosecuted here.
00:21:59.820 And so that line of cases, I think, will be relevant.
00:22:03.280 And again, all the folks on TV claiming this is illegal are ignoring both the Constitution and Supreme Court precedent, not to mention the binding DOJ opinion from 1989.
00:22:15.960 As before, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation on this topic, you can go back and download the podcast from earlier this week to hear the entire thing.
00:22:25.420 Canadian women are looking for more. 1.00
00:22:27.700 More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them.
00:22:31.820 And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast.
00:22:35.560 I'm Jennifer Stewart.
00:22:36.720 And I'm Catherine Clark.
00:22:37.960 And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women.
00:22:41.640 Entrepreneurs, artists, athletes, politicians, and newsmakers.
00:22:45.000 All at different stages of their journey.
00:22:47.460 So, if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.
00:22:50.660 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
00:22:56.380 I want to get back to the big story, number three of the week you may have missed.
00:23:00.760 Senator, I want to go back to just the rhetoric here.
00:23:03.500 And we mentioned the governor earlier.
00:23:05.900 The governor, Tim Walz, is now a disgraced governor.
00:23:08.620 He had to drop out of his re-election campaign because of the fraud that is just continuing to grow.
00:23:14.500 And the dollar amount and the different sectors of the government.
00:23:17.580 I'm not sure there's any sector in Minnesota that wasn't involved in fraud and corruption at this point.
00:23:23.000 We're seeing it in transportation, child care.
00:23:25.300 The list goes on and on.
00:23:26.720 But the governor now seems to think this is like a moment to seize on.
00:23:30.560 And he's now wanting to go to war with the federal government.
00:23:33.740 It's very odd.
00:23:34.960 Yeah, look, the Democrat politicians in Minnesota are in crisis right now because this Somali fraud is the worst instance of fraud that has ever been uncovered in American history. 1.00
00:23:46.980 Nine billion dollars and counting.
00:23:49.160 Massive theft from the taxpayers.
00:23:50.900 It is so bad that Tim Walz, I mean, remember like 12 minutes ago, the Democrats said he was going to be vice president of the United States.
00:23:58.600 And now he's ended his campaign for re-election even as governor because, look, I think he's facing potentially very real criminal liability for the fraud that unfolded under his leadership.
00:24:11.780 And it is – and Waltz and the mayor in Minneapolis, they're not the only ones.
00:24:17.820 I think there's an entire array of Democrats who are responsible.
00:24:22.780 And one of the reasons why they are so eager to foment riots – I mean, look, they are rooting for a replay of the Black Lives Matter and the Antifa riots we saw all over the country.
00:24:37.040 They want people going to the streets.
00:24:38.880 They want them looting stores.
00:24:40.060 They want them firebombing police cars.
00:24:42.280 They are rooting for violence because they want to energize their voters and get everyone not talking about the fraud.
00:24:49.760 Here's Tim Walz, the governor, and here was his response calling for all-out war.
00:24:56.020 Well, I said this yesterday.
00:24:57.520 We've never been at war with our federal government.
00:25:01.480 I think in this case that the National Guard is their main mission.
00:25:06.100 They have a dual mission.
00:25:06.940 When he said that and it went viral, I'm like, let me get this straight.
00:25:11.780 You have a governor who is in a crisis situation.
00:25:14.640 I'm talking about the crisis on the ground.
00:25:16.200 Yeah.
00:25:16.640 Whose job is to back law enforcement and his job is also to ratchet down the rhetoric so we don't have a Civil War breakout.
00:25:23.920 And he's like, maybe this is an opportunity for a Civil War.
00:25:26.380 He's saying that Minnesota is at war with the United States federal government.
00:25:31.120 The governor just said that.
00:25:33.240 Yeah.
00:25:33.660 And listen, if you're an angry left-wing radical, you already hate ICE.
00:25:38.440 You already hate Donald Trump.
00:25:39.740 And then you hear the elected Democrat governor say, Minnesota is at war with the federal government.
00:25:50.340 That is a call to violence.
00:25:52.680 That is a call in war.
00:25:55.620 People get killed.
00:25:56.900 People get injured.
00:25:57.860 That is Democrats very deliberately calling to violence.
00:26:03.440 It is not we disagree over policy with the federal government.
00:26:07.620 It is we are at war.
00:26:09.300 And I think a huge part of this is a CYA instinct.
00:26:14.320 Yes.
00:26:14.800 Because the fraud is so bad.
00:26:16.560 And I want you to listen.
00:26:17.360 The House of Representatives had a hearing on the fraud in Minnesota.
00:26:20.860 By the way, I'm going to be chairing a hearing on the same topic in just a couple of weeks.
00:26:24.180 So we'll cover that in verdict when that happens.
00:26:27.640 But I want you to listen to Brandon Gill.
00:26:29.360 Brandon Gill is a good friend.
00:26:30.980 He is a congressman from Texas.
00:26:32.720 He's cross-examining this left-wing witness from Minnesota.
00:26:37.000 I want you to listen to this exchange.
00:26:39.000 It's really powerful.
00:26:40.460 Thank you for being here.
00:26:41.300 Let me ask you, does large-scale Somali immigration make Minnesota stronger or weaker? 1.00
00:26:47.760 Certainly stronger.
00:26:49.160 Certainly stronger.
00:26:50.060 Do you know what percentage of Somali-headed households in Minnesota are on food stamps?
00:26:55.040 No.
00:26:55.680 54 percent.
00:26:56.740 Do you know what that number is for native Minnesota-headed households?
00:27:00.760 Well, to be clear, a majority of the Somali...
00:27:02.840 It's 7 percent.
00:27:04.400 There's a big difference between 54 percent and 7 percent, is there not?
00:27:07.280 Excuse me, sir.
00:27:07.780 Could I answer the question?
00:27:09.040 Let me move on.
00:27:09.920 We've got a lot of questions here.
00:27:11.160 What percentage of Somali-headed households in Minnesota are on Medicaid?
00:27:15.260 I don't know.
00:27:16.080 It's 73 percent.
00:27:17.260 Do you know what that number is for Minnesota-native households?
00:27:21.160 Again, you're using the phrase Minnesota-native households, but the majority...
00:27:24.820 The number is 18 percent.
00:27:26.560 That's quite an astounding difference.
00:27:28.680 I think we would agree.
00:27:29.220 Can I answer the question, please?
00:27:30.420 Let me ask you one more, and then we can go on to that.
00:27:32.260 What percentage of Somali-headed households are on welfare in general?
00:27:36.000 I don't know.
00:27:36.700 It's 81 percent.
00:27:37.980 What about...
00:27:38.840 Let me just ask you, after 10 years of being in the United States, what percentage of Somali-immigrant
00:27:44.380 households continue to be on welfare?
00:27:47.060 I don't know.
00:27:48.820 The number is 78 percent.
00:27:50.820 So even after 10 years, 78 percent of Somali-immigrant households continue to be on welfare.
00:27:57.560 Do you know what that number is for native Minnesota-headed households?
00:28:01.380 Again, you're using the phrase...
00:28:02.060 Non-Somali-immigrant-headed households. 0.99
00:28:05.860 If I can just answer the question.
00:28:07.520 When you're using the phrase native Minnesotans, the majority of Somali-Minnesotans are as 0.99
00:28:12.820 Minnesotan as any of us.
00:28:13.820 They were born in the United States.
00:28:15.400 It's only 8,000 of the 108,000 Somalis-
00:28:19.100 And nevertheless, the welfare usage is astoundingly different.
00:28:23.300 Let me ask you again, does that make Minnesota stronger or weaker?
00:28:27.160 Again, I'd like the opportunity to answer the question here.
00:28:30.220 So again, the majority of Somali-Minnesotans are born in the United States, as I understand
00:28:35.420 it.
00:28:35.600 Okay, well, what percentage of working-age Somalians who have been in the U.S. for 10
00:28:40.580 years or more, 10 years or more, how many of them speak English very well?
00:28:45.900 I don't know.
00:28:46.620 About half.
00:28:48.460 The answer is about half.
00:28:49.400 That seems pretty low, doesn't it?
00:28:51.640 I love just the facts there, Senator.
00:28:53.840 Like, the way that he handled that, it's the reason why you're good friends with him,
00:28:57.400 it's the reason why we played it, because he's just laying out the reality of the situation
00:29:02.480 on the ground, and how we got to a point where virtually every government program in Minnesota
00:29:06.940 has been compromised by the Somali community in this way, where they could grab money and 1.00
00:29:11.740 create fraud with it.
00:29:12.840 But by the way, Brandon got elected, he had a rough primary, he had a bunch of primary
00:29:17.940 opponents, he had millions of dollars spent against him.
00:29:20.540 Brandon is a conservative, actually his father-in-law is Dinesh D'Souza, who's a good
00:29:25.140 friend.
00:29:26.100 And I endorsed Brandon early, went and campaigned with him, and he overcame a ton of money coming
00:29:32.460 against him.
00:29:33.140 And part of what I told the voters of Texas is, listen, if y'all elect Brandon, he's going
00:29:37.980 to go and fight for you and make you proud.
00:29:39.500 He's doing that.
00:29:40.940 You know, I want to make a point about the back and forth, because that weaselly Minnesota 1.00
00:29:46.520 lefty witness, he kept saying, well, the majority of Somalians are born in America.
00:29:53.200 Now, note what Brandon Gill was asking.
00:29:55.820 Somali immigrant-headed households, and the guy says, well, they have a bunch of anchor babies. 0.71
00:29:59.980 In other words, we bring over Somali immigrants.
00:30:01.820 They have tons of babies here, and because of birthright citizenship, which is a really
00:30:07.020 foolish policy, and my hope is that the Supreme Court will side with President Trump in ending
00:30:13.180 it, but the Somali immigrants come here, they have a lot of babies here, that guy's
00:30:20.380 focusing on the babies, and Brandon's saying, all right, how about the person who heads the
00:30:24.560 household?
00:30:25.060 And the person who heads the household are these Somali immigrants, and you've got 81% of
00:30:31.300 them on welfare.
00:30:32.360 And I tell you, the stat that was really powerful was 10 years later.
00:30:36.260 They've been here 10 years.
00:30:37.460 It's 78% still on welfare.
00:30:39.980 This is a scam.
00:30:41.540 The Democrats did it deliberately, and they did it to buy votes.
00:30:45.100 They were importing votes to vote for Democrats.
00:30:47.800 They allowed them to commit fraud, to steal $9 billion, and then to bundle those votes for
00:30:53.780 the Democrats, to bundle cash for the Democrats.
00:30:55.900 And the Democrats covered it up, and it's why Tim Walz and Jacob Frey and so many other Democrats
00:31:00.860 are trying to enrage the left about this shooting with ICE because they want to cover up from
00:31:07.500 the incredible theft and fraud they are responsible for.
00:31:11.680 As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you.
00:31:17.320 Don't forget to download my podcast, and you can listen to my podcast every other day you're
00:31:21.040 not listening to Verdict, or each day when you listen to Verdict afterwards.
00:31:24.340 I'd love to have you as a listener to, again, the Ben Ferguson podcast, and we will see you
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