Latest / The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson / Behind the Gates with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows

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Behind the Gates with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows · The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson

0:00
Speaker 1: The White House chief of Staff has traditionally been known
0:03
Speaker 1: as the gatekeeper. Well, we have gone behind the gates
0:07
Speaker 1: with Mark Meadows live from the White House. This is
0:11
Speaker 1: Verdict with Ted Cruise. Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz.
0:19
Speaker 1: I'm Michael Knowls, little change of scenery today, joined as
0:22
Speaker 1: always by the Senator and Mark Meadows. Great to be
0:25
Speaker 1: with you, mister Meadows. I'm noticing now it is seven
0:28
Speaker 1: o'clock here. This is probably the earliest you have gotten
0:31
Speaker 1: off work since you've taken As soon as we get
0:34
Speaker 1: off work, I'll let you know whether that's a case
0:37
Speaker 1: or not fair enough. Obviously it's it's a twenty four
0:40
Speaker 1: to seven kind of kind of job. But you know,
0:43
Speaker 1: our nation is in a critical time where we've got
0:47
Speaker 1: to actually make sure that people like Ted and I
0:50
Speaker 1: worked together on behalf of all the freedom loving forgotten
0:54
Speaker 1: men and women in this country. And really the impact
0:59
Speaker 1: is well beyond this is Ted and I have articulated
1:03
Speaker 1: a number of times. Well, because I know, Senator you
1:06
Speaker 1: and mister Meadows go back a lot farther than just
1:09
Speaker 1: you taking this job as the White House chief of staff. Yeah,
1:12
Speaker 1: he actually would talk to me before I actually was
1:14
Speaker 1: the chief of staff, you know, so I could count
1:18
Speaker 1: him on one hand. But well, Mark and I go
1:21
Speaker 1: back a long time. We were actually both elected to
1:23
Speaker 1: Congress in the same day November twenty twelve. We showed
1:25
Speaker 1: up here in January twenty thirteen, looked around and said,
1:28
Speaker 1: what the hell are we doing here? And it was
1:32
Speaker 1: Barack Obama had just been reelected. It was a messed
1:35
Speaker 1: up time. But one of the things we found, we're
1:39
Speaker 1: both brand new, is there were really only a handful
1:42
Speaker 1: of people willing to stand up and fight for anything.
1:45
Speaker 1: And so we became fast friends. We became fast friends
1:49
Speaker 1: fighting against Obamacare, where we're standing up, going wait a second,
1:52
Speaker 1: We got elected to fight this damn thing, and too
1:55
Speaker 1: many Republicans just wanted to give in. And and it
2:00
Speaker 1: it's interesting in Washington, like anywhere else, courage is contagious.
2:04
Speaker 1: So so before it was chief of staff, Mark led
2:07
Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus of the House and and marketing you know,
2:11
Speaker 1: maybe helpful. Look, the folks that watch and listen to
2:13
Speaker 1: this podcast are a savvy, educated group. But explain to
2:18
Speaker 1: folks what the Freedom Caucus is and WHYATT, WHYATT matters? Well,
2:23
Speaker 1: I can tell you you're right. We came in together,
2:25
Speaker 1: and what I found, Michael, was is that most members
2:28
Speaker 1: of Congress, on both the Senate side and the House side,
2:31
Speaker 1: actually had the backbone of a banana, you know, had
2:34
Speaker 1: great shape until it was peel back and it got
2:37
Speaker 1: real mushy. Ted Cruise was not one of those. And
2:41
Speaker 1: immediately we formed this friendship. But what I found was is,
2:46
Speaker 1: unlike Ted, who was willing to stand on courage and
2:50
Speaker 1: I might add a great personal cost where you know,
2:53
Speaker 1: if you stand for the people back home, you don't
2:57
Speaker 1: get invited to dinners in Washington, DC. And and it's
3:00
Speaker 1: a real cost. There's not a benefit package of being
3:03
Speaker 1: a real true conservative. But that being said, I think
3:07
Speaker 1: what I saw was what Ted was able to do
3:10
Speaker 1: in the Senate. I said, well, we got to create
3:12
Speaker 1: that same kind of leverage over in the House. And
3:14
Speaker 1: the problem is the key number in the House was
3:17
Speaker 1: two eighteen. Yeah, we had the majority, and I said, well, gosh,
3:20
Speaker 1: you know, if a few of the Conservatives would stay together,
3:25
Speaker 1: we could actually make some policy differences because they would
3:28
Speaker 1: need our vote to be able to do it. And
3:30
Speaker 1: Obamacare was the first fight we made Ted an honorary
3:34
Speaker 1: member of the Freedom Caucus. He was welcome in our
3:36
Speaker 1: meeting anytime. But it was all about leverage, and for us,
3:39
Speaker 1: it was about making sure that we didn't just go
3:42
Speaker 1: along to get along, but we actually stood for something.
3:46
Speaker 1: And one of the amendments on the Obamacare was what
3:50
Speaker 1: I call the Crew's Freedom Amendment. It was all about
3:54
Speaker 1: making sure that people had choices. Because I think this
3:56
Speaker 1: is actually pretty important. The House Freedom Caucus, especially when
4:00
Speaker 1: it first came around, was the real deal. You know,
4:03
Speaker 1: these are the real conservative Some people are a little
4:05
Speaker 1: bit less conservative. They talk a good game, maybe they
4:08
Speaker 1: don't vote that way. And the Freedom Caucus really stood
4:10
Speaker 1: for something. So the very fact that the White House
4:13
Speaker 1: Chief of Staff is a Freedom Caucus guy, I mean
4:16
Speaker 1: that that does tell you something. And I know that
4:18
Speaker 1: this Obamacare fight, it didn't just end in two thousand
4:22
Speaker 1: nine or twenty thirteen, or it kept going on and on,
4:24
Speaker 1: and I know you two worked on that together well,
4:27
Speaker 1: and it was interesting. You fast forward to twenty seventeen,
4:30
Speaker 1: President Trump's been elected and there's an energy, a real
4:34
Speaker 1: passion to take on the Washington swamp. And you remember
4:38
Speaker 1: the first thing that came up, it was Obamacare repeal,
4:41
Speaker 1: and first White House Chief of Staff was Ryan's previous right.
4:44
Speaker 1: Ryance is a good guy, but Ryan was very very
4:49
Speaker 1: close with Paul Ryan, the Speaker of the House. They're
4:51
Speaker 1: both from Wisconsin. And if you remember, the first draft
4:55
Speaker 1: of Obamacare repeal in the House was terrible. It was
4:58
Speaker 1: drafted by insurance company lobbyists. It was garbage. But when
5:02
Speaker 1: it was drafted, you remember early on the House leadership
5:09
Speaker 1: was trying to really weaponize the president to attack the
5:13
Speaker 1: Freedom Caucus, to attack conservatives, and you know, you go
5:16
Speaker 1: back to the first few months where the President was
5:17
Speaker 1: blasting them. And I still remember spring of twenty seventeen,
5:21
Speaker 1: Marcus in the House, he's leading the Freedom Caucus, I'm
5:23
Speaker 1: in the Senate, and we both would go to Mara
5:26
Speaker 1: Lagos and basically just drop in on the President unannounced.
5:30
Speaker 1: We basically called over and said this President, we need
5:33
Speaker 1: to see it. That's exactly right. That's how you're saying.
5:35
Speaker 1: That's how urgent this was. This wasn't some prescheduled White
5:38
Speaker 1: House meeting. You go down to the president's beach resort
5:40
Speaker 1: in Florida and we sat there and said, listen, if
5:43
Speaker 1: you go down the road of this House bill, insurance
5:46
Speaker 1: premiums will go up. And yeah, did you hear what
5:49
Speaker 1: he just said, insurance premiums go up? I mean yeah,
5:53
Speaker 1: it just it was crazy. Now, the insurance lobbyists loved it.
5:57
Speaker 1: They want premiums to go up. But but we're both saying,
6:00
Speaker 1: listen to people who elected you, who elected us, didn't
6:03
Speaker 1: want us jack enough premiums. And it was a really
6:06
Speaker 1: important It started to shift that bill away from that
6:10
Speaker 1: first VET version and it ended up getting significantly better. Yeah, okay,
6:14
Speaker 1: you never heard that story before. But something I've noticed
6:17
Speaker 1: just on these shows is you hear so much about
6:20
Speaker 1: how personal relationships and these sort of unplanned moments can
6:24
Speaker 1: really shift the path of policy in the country. Well,
6:27
Speaker 1: it does, but I think the other thing is the
6:29
Speaker 1: interesting thing. So so Ted goes, come on, I'm going
6:32
Speaker 1: over to see the president. You need to come with me.
6:34
Speaker 1: We need to talk to him about Obamacare. And I'm going, okay,
6:37
Speaker 1: well you got in a point. No, no, we're just
6:39
Speaker 1: going I mean, and so so you get this and
6:41
Speaker 1: you go, okay, we're going to drop in on the
6:43
Speaker 1: President of the United States and talk policy on a Saturday.
6:46
Speaker 1: By the way, we literally oopered over. I mean, it
6:48
Speaker 1: was it's a miracle Secret Service didn't shoot us and
6:53
Speaker 1: we're there. I don't know about that, but it's all
6:58
Speaker 1: about one relationship ships. You're exactly right, Michael. But the
7:01
Speaker 1: other part of that is is about tenacity. It's making
7:05
Speaker 1: sure you're tenacious about what you know is good for
7:08
Speaker 1: the American people and you're willing to fight that fight.
7:12
Speaker 1: And Ted obviously has not only a career of doing that,
7:16
Speaker 1: but when when you look for profiles and courage, uh,
7:20
Speaker 1: you know, it's got his picture right there. And so
7:22
Speaker 1: for us in the Freedom Caucus, we just said we
7:25
Speaker 1: want to give you a partner in the House, and
7:28
Speaker 1: it came, you know, at great personal costs. I mean
7:31
Speaker 1: there were times when well we missed a few dinners
7:35
Speaker 1: as well. That you know something that I noticed. You
7:41
Speaker 1: obviously had this very public role before in Congress running
7:44
Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus. Senator, you still have a very public role.
7:46
Speaker 1: But your job now, mister Meadows, is a little bit
7:49
Speaker 1: more of a behind the scenes job. Could you maybe
7:52
Speaker 1: take us behind the scenes a little bit into what
7:55
Speaker 1: that day looks like. Well, obviously they've got cameras rolling here,
7:57
Speaker 1: so I don't know that it'll be too much behind
7:59
Speaker 1: the scenes, but I will say this, Uh. You know,
8:02
Speaker 1: since I've come over and we're we're almost at a
8:05
Speaker 1: day eighty five on this job, I've done no press,
8:09
Speaker 1: so it's it's it is a behind the scene, so
8:12
Speaker 1: to bring everybody behind the scenes. I think that the
8:14
Speaker 1: real key is, I see, the job is to serve
8:17
Speaker 1: the President of the United States, who serves the American people.
8:22
Speaker 1: But it's also to make sure that every good idea
8:25
Speaker 1: that is in the Senate gets the visibility with the
8:28
Speaker 1: President of the United States, uh, in a nanosecond. And
8:32
Speaker 1: so one of the things that people don't realize is
8:34
Speaker 1: that I can get a phone call from Senator Cruz
8:36
Speaker 1: or Senator Blunt or Lindsey Graham and they're saying, you know, listen,
8:41
Speaker 1: we've we've got this, uh, this issue. We need you
8:44
Speaker 1: to take care of it. Sometimes it's just as simple
8:48
Speaker 1: as we've got some constituents that have raised this concern.
8:52
Speaker 1: We want to make sure the President of the United
8:53
Speaker 1: States knows about it, and Ted, Ted can vouch for this.
8:56
Speaker 1: It's a phone call and within minute, the President of
9:00
Speaker 1: the United States is weighing in on that particular issue.
9:04
Speaker 1: Nothing like anything I've ever seen. And it's trying to
9:08
Speaker 1: be the gatekeeper behind the scenes that maybe is not
9:12
Speaker 1: as much of a gatekeeper is their megaphone within the
9:16
Speaker 1: West wing. And so senators have better access, I think,
9:21
Speaker 1: to this president than historically has been the case. I
9:25
Speaker 1: think that's a good thing. The closer the president is
9:28
Speaker 1: to the American people, the more he hears from from
9:31
Speaker 1: the people of Texas through through Ted or the people
9:35
Speaker 1: of South Carolina through Tim Scott or Lindsey Graham or
9:39
Speaker 1: whichever senator it might be, the better off it is.
9:42
Speaker 1: And so but it's also the power of the executive branch.
9:47
Speaker 1: You know, when when I was in Congress is saying, boy,
9:50
Speaker 1: all I wanted to do is make sure that Congress
9:53
Speaker 1: was empowered. But it's a little bit different role now.
9:55
Speaker 1: But if we work hand in glove, I think what
9:58
Speaker 1: we can do. This president is willing to do things
10:00
Speaker 1: that most presidents are not willing to do and take
10:04
Speaker 1: political risk. You know, we have an embassy that in
10:08
Speaker 1: Jerusalem is something that Ted and I share passionately together.
10:13
Speaker 1: That would It's been promised before, you know, and it
10:17
Speaker 1: never happened. And so the Republican and Democratic presidents have
10:20
Speaker 1: broken that promise. Trump is the first one to follow through.
10:23
Speaker 1: I have to make a confession. When President Trump, when
10:26
Speaker 1: he was running and he said I'm gonna move the
10:28
Speaker 1: embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, I just didn't believe him.
10:31
Speaker 1: I said, that's the sort of thing people say, but
10:33
Speaker 1: then they don't actually do it. And I think a
10:35
Speaker 1: lot of people in Washington thought that, and then when
10:36
Speaker 1: it actually happened, everybody was so surprised. One thing that's
10:40
Speaker 1: really unusual in this administration is the kind of lead
10:43
Speaker 1: person on Israel policy has been the US Ambassador Israel,
10:47
Speaker 1: David Friedman, who's great guy, has become a close friend,
10:50
Speaker 1: and it's unusual. I don't know of any instance where
10:53
Speaker 1: an ambassadors had that kind of influence, and it's because
10:56
Speaker 1: the President knows and trust him, and David is passionate
11:00
Speaker 1: committed the strengthening the US IS relationship. But I worked
11:03
Speaker 1: very closely with David after the President made the announcement
11:06
Speaker 1: because look the nature of Washington, the swamp, the State Department,
11:10
Speaker 1: foggy bottom, did not want this to happen. So here's
11:13
Speaker 1: how they would normally kill it. They would just slow
11:16
Speaker 1: roll it. We need to study for a year the feasibility.
11:18
Speaker 1: We need to do a security assessment, we need to
11:20
Speaker 1: we need to do this and that, and their plan
11:22
Speaker 1: it was clear what their plan was going to be,
11:24
Speaker 1: delay it four years. They were hoping Trump loses reelection
11:28
Speaker 1: and then the next the Democrat who comes in will
11:31
Speaker 1: cancel the announcement. And what the Trump administration did, and
11:34
Speaker 1: David was the point person. I said, David, the only
11:37
Speaker 1: way this happens is if you opened the damn embassy.
11:39
Speaker 1: You don't announce it, you open it. And they found
11:43
Speaker 1: a facility. There was a consular facility in Jerusalem and
11:47
Speaker 1: within a year open the damn thing. I've never seen
11:50
Speaker 1: anything like it. And it was tenacity and the bureaucracy
11:55
Speaker 1: at State was shocked. But that the scene like the
12:00
Speaker 1: urgency of understanding. Oh and and so true. And you
12:03
Speaker 1: talk about behind the scene. So one story that I
12:06
Speaker 1: don't think is out there is so the State Department
12:09
Speaker 1: pushing back, you know, continuing to push back. I think
12:12
Speaker 1: they gave a list of the pros and cons. And
12:14
Speaker 1: so there were a whole long list of all these
12:18
Speaker 1: cons zero pros for moving. Yeah, no, no, I'm telling
12:22
Speaker 1: you that. And so that's something that doesn't get reported.
12:26
Speaker 1: So it literally was you got all these reasons not
12:28
Speaker 1: to do it, and no reasons to do it, and
12:31
Speaker 1: yet this president stayed true to his campaign promise. And
12:35
Speaker 1: but but it takes the encouragement. Sometimes it's a phone
12:40
Speaker 1: call from Ted Cruz in the middle of the night saying,
12:42
Speaker 1: you know, CALLI, it's the right thing to do. And
12:46
Speaker 1: in that affirmation makes a big difference. Well, this is
12:48
Speaker 1: what you said earlier is very interesting to me. This
12:50
Speaker 1: idea that the chief of staff is the gatekeeper. But
12:54
Speaker 1: the flip side is it means you're the megaphone for
12:57
Speaker 1: good ideas. You're the megaphone for ideas that you're hearing people.
13:00
Speaker 1: Let me give it. Let me give a real time example.
13:02
Speaker 1: So Mark's been in office a couple of months. Yeah,
13:07
Speaker 1: you remember a couple of months ago the president was
13:09
Speaker 1: meeting with CEOs a bunch of big oil companies and
13:12
Speaker 1: I was really worried that at the time, and when
13:14
Speaker 1: the meeting was initially announced it was just the CEOs
13:17
Speaker 1: of the giant companies, and so I called Mark and
13:19
Speaker 1: I said, this is a real problem because the way
13:23
Speaker 1: energy works. Yeah, there are a bunch of small independent producers,
13:26
Speaker 1: a lot of guys in Texas that aren't the you know,
13:29
Speaker 1: giant super majors that have the GDP of a country,
13:32
Speaker 1: but they're the innovators. They're the ones that drive the
13:35
Speaker 1: domestic production. And early on they were not on the
13:38
Speaker 1: meeting invite list. And so I called Mark said, look,
13:40
Speaker 1: this is a real problem. We need to make sure
13:43
Speaker 1: we've got an independent producer there. Mark not only got
13:46
Speaker 1: it done, but but said, look, you need to be there.
13:49
Speaker 1: And I got on a plane the next day. In fact,
13:50
Speaker 1: it was funny when I walked in. There are a
13:51
Speaker 1: couple of other senators there. They said, what the hell
13:53
Speaker 1: are you doing here? I said, well, you know, funny,
13:56
Speaker 1: you should ask. And it was because Mark said, come
13:59
Speaker 1: to the meeting. And at that meeting, you want to
14:02
Speaker 1: talk about real action. We pressed a couple of things. Remember,
14:05
Speaker 1: price of oil was collapsing, millions of jobs where in jeopardy.
14:09
Speaker 1: And two things came out of that meeting. Number one,
14:11
Speaker 1: the President leaned in hard against the Saudis and the
14:14
Speaker 1: Russians and got them to back off their economic warfare
14:17
Speaker 1: against the US. But number two, the President directed. I
14:21
Speaker 1: suggested to the President it was a real problem of
14:23
Speaker 1: capital being cut off from energy, right. And I suggested,
14:26
Speaker 1: as the President, if you would, you would instruct the
14:30
Speaker 1: Secretary of Energy danbre Yet it was there and the
14:32
Speaker 1: Secretary of the Treasury, Stephen Manuchin to make sure that
14:37
Speaker 1: Wall Street doesn't discriminate against energy and bankrupt every US
14:41
Speaker 1: energy producer. And the President right there said do it.
14:45
Speaker 1: He looked at Dan and said make it happen. And
14:48
Speaker 1: that made a real, real difference in terms of capital
14:51
Speaker 1: being available and literally saving millions of jobs in this country. Yeah,
14:56
Speaker 1: and so in less than forty eight hours, a phone
14:58
Speaker 1: call from a center to the chiefest Staff and he's
15:00
Speaker 1: sitting in the cabinet room of the White House with
15:05
Speaker 1: another invited guest who was not on the list, advocating
15:08
Speaker 1: for what is important to the people back home in Texas.
15:11
Speaker 1: And and and so that happens a lot. The other
15:14
Speaker 1: thing that I think that is critical is you've got
15:16
Speaker 1: this massive bureaucracy with agencies, and you think, well, there's
15:20
Speaker 1: a Republican administration, so you but there is the swamp
15:24
Speaker 1: that continues to go on whether it's a Democrat or
15:27
Speaker 1: Republican in the overwhel elected people come and go yeah,
15:32
Speaker 1: and I just kind of wighed them out, is exactly
15:34
Speaker 1: what Ted was saying. They waited them out. And so
15:36
Speaker 1: one of the great things is is that if Ted
15:40
Speaker 1: or one of his colleagues they're getting you know, the
15:42
Speaker 1: stiff arm. I call it the legislative heisman. You know,
15:45
Speaker 1: if they're getting that, it's really easy for me to
15:48
Speaker 1: pick up and say, you know, why am I getting
15:50
Speaker 1: this phone call from this senator on you not responding
15:54
Speaker 1: to their phone call? Oh, well, we're busy. Well I
15:58
Speaker 1: was busy too, and I took his I mean, why
16:00
Speaker 1: aren't you take it? And so sometimes it's just making
16:03
Speaker 1: them aware that there's somebody else willing to hold them
16:06
Speaker 1: make and two branches there. I mean, this is actually
16:08
Speaker 1: something at center. I knew you've talked a lot about.
16:10
Speaker 1: Is you've been talking out for years about social media censorship,
16:14
Speaker 1: censorship of conservatives. Well, just recently we got out out
16:18
Speaker 1: of the executive branch, this executive order on social media censorship.
16:22
Speaker 1: We still don't know a whole lot about that, at
16:23
Speaker 1: least I don't know a lot about that. Maybe could
16:25
Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit about how that came
16:26
Speaker 1: to be. Well, I think Ted and I know that
16:29
Speaker 1: as conservatives, sometimes our conservative voice doesn't reach the audience
16:34
Speaker 1: as quickly or as effectively as it is normally intense
16:38
Speaker 1: diplomatic way to put. Yeah, well, I can tell you
16:40
Speaker 1: I was one of the few members of Congress back
16:42
Speaker 1: when I was in Congress that was actually shadow band
16:44
Speaker 1: by Twitter. Yeah, And so we ought to put that
16:47
Speaker 1: out on a tweet and see if they take that down,
16:49
Speaker 1: they'll say it wasn't shadow band that we were, but
16:51
Speaker 1: it only happened to be four conservative members of Congress myself,
16:56
Speaker 1: Matt Gates, Devin Nunis, and Jim Jordan. So you're saying
16:59
Speaker 1: didn't follow that, she didn't make it into that. So
17:03
Speaker 1: one of the things that that's important is that we
17:06
Speaker 1: need to make sure that the free press is really
17:09
Speaker 1: the free press and it's not censored. And what Twitter
17:13
Speaker 1: has done, probably more so than some of the other
17:16
Speaker 1: social media platforms, but YouTube is doing it as well,
17:20
Speaker 1: is that they come in and they start to actually
17:23
Speaker 1: monitor content and so it's not this free open what
17:28
Speaker 1: I call the wild wild West of social media. That's
17:30
Speaker 1: the way, and as freedom loving individuals, we want the
17:34
Speaker 1: free market to work. But when the free market starts
17:37
Speaker 1: to get monopolized by content police, then it's important for
17:43
Speaker 1: us to step in. So we did an EO that
17:45
Speaker 1: actually has the potential of taking away their protection from litigation.
17:50
Speaker 1: So if we can't fix it, or if Congress can't
17:53
Speaker 1: fix it, let the trial attorneys fix it, it'll happen requally.
17:56
Speaker 1: Unleashing the trial attorneys is a really powerful up And
18:00
Speaker 1: I got to say, this is an issue where a
18:01
Speaker 1: White House leadership was so needed, and it's so important
18:05
Speaker 1: because you and I've talked about this before. One of
18:07
Speaker 1: the challenges on the issue of a big tech censorship
18:11
Speaker 1: is all the federal agencies are siloed, and it's a
18:14
Speaker 1: hard issue where the Anitrust Division of Department of Justice
18:17
Speaker 1: doesn't quite fit into what they think they want to
18:19
Speaker 1: do the FTC, it doesn't quite fit in with do
18:21
Speaker 1: they want to do the FCC. Everyone has is sort
18:24
Speaker 1: of looking at their own slice of the problem. And
18:26
Speaker 1: the President's Executive Order on this was important to say,
18:30
Speaker 1: damn it, this matters. I think it's the biggest threat
18:32
Speaker 1: to democracy in the whole country. But we needed the
18:36
Speaker 1: President and the White House to lead to get the
18:39
Speaker 1: rest of the executive focused on protecting free speech altogether. Right. Well,
18:45
Speaker 1: the interesting thing, and so I'll always try to give
18:47
Speaker 1: you a little bit of a backstory that no one
18:49
Speaker 1: else knows. So that EO, as it relates to Section
18:53
Speaker 1: two thirty, we started putting it around for a little
18:56
Speaker 1: bit of comment on a very limited basis. All of
18:59
Speaker 1: a sudden, this proposed EO shows up in the New
19:02
Speaker 1: York Times, and it really was fed to the New
19:07
Speaker 1: York Times by a federal worker that didn't agree with
19:12
Speaker 1: this administration, or at least it appears that they didn't,
19:15
Speaker 1: and they didn't agree with the EO, and so they
19:18
Speaker 1: took it and fed it to hum outside sources. And
19:23
Speaker 1: I'm glad to say that we were able to track
19:25
Speaker 1: that person down. They no longer work for the federal government.
19:29
Speaker 1: That's let me ask a question here. That's a great
19:32
Speaker 1: I hadn't heard that story, and that's that's a great story.
19:34
Speaker 1: Let me take it a slightly different direction. So the
19:38
Speaker 1: job marquess, now, I think it may well be the
19:41
Speaker 1: hardest job at all of Washington. So Marcus chief of
19:43
Speaker 1: staff as a cabinet member, but but he's charged with
19:47
Speaker 1: basically wrestling alligators all day, fall, and and and trying
19:51
Speaker 1: to get some semblance of order and decision making process
19:57
Speaker 1: in this And you look at some of the chiefs
19:59
Speaker 1: of staff that have come for they have been you know,
20:01
Speaker 1: you've had Howard Baker was a Senate majority leader, You've
20:03
Speaker 1: had Johnson Una who was a governor. I mean, you've
20:06
Speaker 1: had major, major, and and I think one of the
20:10
Speaker 1: greatest chiefs of staff ever was James Baker. And there's
20:13
Speaker 1: a legendary discussion. So Baker was Reagan's chief of staff
20:17
Speaker 1: and the head of omb was David Stockman, and Stockman
20:21
Speaker 1: had done an interview in The Atlantic crapping all over
20:25
Speaker 1: the president. It's a terrible interview, basically saying the president's
20:28
Speaker 1: economics is all wrong. There was a horrible interview, and
20:31
Speaker 1: there's a great story a Baker calling calling Stockman and
20:35
Speaker 1: a Stockhan was gonna gonna meet with Reagan, and Bakers
20:38
Speaker 1: quoted and I'm not I'm gonna keep this PG rated
20:43
Speaker 1: what Baker said, but they'll look it up where Baker said, David,
20:47
Speaker 1: you're having lunch with the president and the menu is humble,
20:51
Speaker 1: blank and pipe and would you walk out of that room?
20:56
Speaker 1: You're sorry, blankety blank blank better be dragging on the ground.
21:03
Speaker 1: And look, Stockman was not, shall we say, timid or shy,
21:08
Speaker 1: And you've got to be enough of a principle, enough
21:11
Speaker 1: of a leader, strong enough to stand up to cabinet members,
21:16
Speaker 1: to stand up to congressional leadership, to stand up to whoever.
21:20
Speaker 1: And I got to say, I'm thrilled marks in this job.
21:23
Speaker 1: So all of that is a setup to just just
21:25
Speaker 1: ask a question, what is a day in the life
21:28
Speaker 1: of the chief of staff? Just, you know, a typical day, like, well, like,
21:31
Speaker 1: what do you do each day? You know, that's that's interesting.
21:35
Speaker 1: My wife asked me that question. I said nothing, I
21:38
Speaker 1: met with nobody, so she may tune in just to
21:42
Speaker 1: figure out exactly what you know. It starts normally pretty early,
21:46
Speaker 1: so I'll normally come in around seven fifteen. I get
21:52
Speaker 1: my daily briefing, which is an intel briefing at seven
21:55
Speaker 1: thirty that will scare anybody of all the threats that
21:59
Speaker 1: we get. It goes from there. We have a fifteen
22:01
Speaker 1: minute meeting on what we call our our senior meeting
22:06
Speaker 1: on the comms of the day, so we'll look at
22:08
Speaker 1: what stories are out there. We go from from there
22:12
Speaker 1: to a number of policy meetings. All of this is
22:15
Speaker 1: happening before before eleven o'clock, so you try to get
22:19
Speaker 1: in a full day's work before eleven o'clock, um. And
22:23
Speaker 1: and as we look at that, the big thing then becomes,
22:27
Speaker 1: all right, what are we going to do with the
22:29
Speaker 1: policy in the in the calendar? Because all you have
22:32
Speaker 1: is a full day, and it is always full. There's
22:37
Speaker 1: there's always more to do than what you could ever
22:39
Speaker 1: fit in, and so are we advancing it? And the
22:43
Speaker 1: big thing that you're saying, Ted, is we start to
22:46
Speaker 1: put time frames on if we've got this policy, when
22:50
Speaker 1: is the president going to be able to make a
22:52
Speaker 1: decision on it? Because he didn't care about the rhetoric.
22:55
Speaker 1: Now he does like creative chaos. So if you want
22:57
Speaker 1: to come in so normally in the afternoon and you
23:00
Speaker 1: have at least one creative chaos moment where you have
23:02
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of people come in from the West wing,
23:05
Speaker 1: they're arguing back and forth, and he will purposefully, you know,
23:08
Speaker 1: he would look at you, Michael and say, well what
23:10
Speaker 1: do you think, knowing that you have an opposing view
23:13
Speaker 1: from Ted, and then he'll go, well, Ted, don't you
23:15
Speaker 1: disagree with that? And then sit back and watch you fight,
23:18
Speaker 1: Watch you fight. And you've been in those meetings many times,
23:21
Speaker 1: and so you know, so a lot of times. What
23:24
Speaker 1: will happen is is those will continue on and then
23:28
Speaker 1: around five o'clock or so, you're normally getting back to
23:31
Speaker 1: some of the emails and so forth that you have,
23:34
Speaker 1: trying to set up the follow up because I've got
23:37
Speaker 1: to I try to make sure that I'm calling everybody
23:40
Speaker 1: back before I go to bed. Now that sometimes sometimes
23:44
Speaker 1: that means that I'm calling them back at eleven thirty
23:48
Speaker 1: at night from well, so I'll normally get home between
23:53
Speaker 1: eight and nine thirty. And uh, and and you're doing
23:57
Speaker 1: all your emails because a lot of times you have
23:59
Speaker 1: your your phone and it goes in a secure setting
24:02
Speaker 1: because you're actually in a skiff, So you're getting secure
24:05
Speaker 1: phone calls throughout the day. Uh. You'll talk to cabinet members.
24:09
Speaker 1: You mentioned cabinet members, So you'll normally I'll normally have
24:12
Speaker 1: four or five calls with different cabinet members every day. Uh.
24:16
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's those candid conversations where you said, you said
24:20
Speaker 1: what uh and uh and and who thought that that
24:24
Speaker 1: was a good idea? Uh? But but in that I
24:28
Speaker 1: think the real key it's all about results. And the
24:31
Speaker 1: key with results is that if you produce, uh, you
24:36
Speaker 1: start to restore the confidence that comes back and and
24:39
Speaker 1: it's why people hate politicians. You know. I used to
24:41
Speaker 1: say that members of Congress had an approval rating lower
24:44
Speaker 1: than a cockroach. Uh and uh, and that's saying something.
24:48
Speaker 1: And I didn't know it was quite that high. But
24:50
Speaker 1: but as we look at this, UM, it's it's about, uh,
24:54
Speaker 1: you know, making sure that we work with the National
24:57
Speaker 1: security team, the mic Pompeios and et cetera. You know,
25:00
Speaker 1: I think probably the biggest thing is is for Ted
25:04
Speaker 1: and I. Fighting for freedom is a twenty four to seven,
25:10
Speaker 1: three hundred and sixty five day a year job. And
25:14
Speaker 1: it is calling. It's a calling. And you know, whether
25:17
Speaker 1: I'm here tomorrow or gone tomorrow, you know, you've got
25:21
Speaker 1: to give it your utmost while you're there. The president
25:24
Speaker 1: comes under unbelievable attacks and and what it's it's doing
25:30
Speaker 1: is preparing him to make the best decisions. He's a
25:32
Speaker 1: quick decision maker. And just like when he called out
25:36
Speaker 1: to Ted, he says, Ted, I want to make sure
25:38
Speaker 1: that gets done. That's a good idea, and he expects
25:41
Speaker 1: it to get done. And you think he will forget.
25:44
Speaker 1: He never doesn't forget. Never forget. You know. It's very
25:46
Speaker 1: interesting on this point of the unexpected and chaos. I
25:50
Speaker 1: don't know if our microphones are able to pick it up.
25:52
Speaker 1: But right now we're here at the White House. Outside
25:55
Speaker 1: you can hear the protests that have been raging for weeks.
25:58
Speaker 1: We know there have been riots around the country, cities
26:00
Speaker 1: burning down. What is the opinion here in Washington and
26:05
Speaker 1: in the White House on this protect You can hear
26:08
Speaker 1: real time they're outside screaming. We've obviously seen horrific violence,
26:11
Speaker 1: We've seen rioting, We've seen police officers murdered, and it
26:16
Speaker 1: all started with a grotesque act of police brutality of
26:21
Speaker 1: George Floyd. What happened to him was wrong. It is
26:24
Speaker 1: It is the exactly the right thing that the officers
26:27
Speaker 1: who did that are being prosecuted, and and that's the
26:32
Speaker 1: way the system's supposed to operate. But you know, I
26:34
Speaker 1: got to tell you, Mark was talking about the challenges
26:38
Speaker 1: any president faces, but particularly this president faces, and this
26:41
Speaker 1: very polarizing divided time. Last week, last Thursday night, Heidi
26:45
Speaker 1: and I are doing date night in Houston. We're heading
26:47
Speaker 1: home from from the restaurant. President calls me on my
26:50
Speaker 1: cell phone, which which happened regularly, and we talked about
26:55
Speaker 1: a couple of things. But I told him, I said,
26:57
Speaker 1: miss President, Heidi's here, you mind if I put put
26:59
Speaker 1: you on speaker? And he chatted with Heidi. But it
27:02
Speaker 1: was interesting, Heidi said. She said, mister President, it is
27:06
Speaker 1: really really important for you to speak out to the
27:11
Speaker 1: racial injustice in this country and for you to speak
27:14
Speaker 1: for unity. And she was really heartfelt and emotional about it,
27:18
Speaker 1: said she. You know, Heidi said, look, I can't think
27:20
Speaker 1: of anything more important for you to do. And it
27:22
Speaker 1: was interesting. Afterwards, I told her, I said, you know, Heidi,
27:25
Speaker 1: he actually has and he has repeatedly and you haven't
27:29
Speaker 1: heard it because the media won't cover it. So when
27:32
Speaker 1: he stands up and says, don't commit commit rioting and
27:36
Speaker 1: burn churches down and and murder police officers, they'll cover
27:40
Speaker 1: that sort of yeah. But when he speaks out and
27:43
Speaker 1: says what happened to George Floyd was wrong and racist
27:46
Speaker 1: and bigoted, and the officers who did that need to
27:49
Speaker 1: be prosecuted, they don't cover that part of it. And
27:52
Speaker 1: that's got to be frustrating. Well, it is frustrating. He
27:55
Speaker 1: gave an unbelievable speech when we saw SpaceX elon us
28:00
Speaker 1: rocket go uh into orbit, and he gave a great speech,
28:05
Speaker 1: and the first part of that speech was literally about
28:08
Speaker 1: what you were talking about didn't get covered. I mean,
28:11
Speaker 1: in fact, you you said, well, he gave a great speech,
28:13
Speaker 1: and no one could find it. They couldn't see it.
28:15
Speaker 1: It wasn't you know, CNN, MSNBC, none of them covered it.
28:20
Speaker 1: Even I who I am living this stuff. I'm a
28:23
Speaker 1: political I didn't see it. Yeah, And so so you
28:26
Speaker 1: have all of that in social media censorship on top
28:29
Speaker 1: of that's right, well, and that's the key. That's why
28:31
Speaker 1: the EO on the social media platforms is so key,
28:35
Speaker 1: because it is the workaround and the very fact that
28:38
Speaker 1: people are viewing this right now, are hearing this is
28:41
Speaker 1: a critical thing that we have to preserve and protect.
28:44
Speaker 1: But I say, the other other aspect of that is
28:47
Speaker 1: this when when you look at what this president faces, um,
28:53
Speaker 1: it is the voice of millions of people across this
28:57
Speaker 1: country and actually get to him that he sees it
29:01
Speaker 1: in real time, He hears about it from from senators
29:04
Speaker 1: who are constantly calling out another story that no one
29:07
Speaker 1: knows about. You know, so we have a church that
29:10
Speaker 1: was burning. I'm getting text messages and and everybody saying
29:15
Speaker 1: the President has got to do something. Washington, DC, literally
29:18
Speaker 1: was burning at the Lafayette Park. It was a Sunday night.
29:23
Speaker 1: I'm on the phone with the President of the United
29:25
Speaker 1: States after midnight, and uh, he says, you know, Mark,
29:29
Speaker 1: we've got to get control of it. So what happens
29:31
Speaker 1: is is the next morning we put things in motion
29:35
Speaker 1: with Attorney General bar and and bring in National Guard
29:38
Speaker 1: troops and all of that to actually say that we're
29:42
Speaker 1: going to restore law and order. And you know what happened.
29:45
Speaker 1: We restored law and order. Right now, it's it's But
29:49
Speaker 1: that wasn't the first midnight call. The first midnight call
29:52
Speaker 1: was in Minneapolis, where he calls the governor of Minnesota
29:58
Speaker 1: and says, Governor, and I was on the phone with
30:00
Speaker 1: General Millie with the President. The President calls the governor
30:04
Speaker 1: of Minnesota, says, listen, I'm watching in real time. What's
30:07
Speaker 1: happening in your cities there in Minnesota. He says, yeah,
30:11
Speaker 1: the police have abandoned things. He says, we're gonna send
30:15
Speaker 1: the National Guard, will help you. And that was a
30:17
Speaker 1: president at almost one am talking to a governor in Minnesota.
30:21
Speaker 1: Nobody ever sees that nobody even knows that other than
30:25
Speaker 1: the three of us that we're on the phone call right. Well,
30:27
Speaker 1: this so we have to get to a couple of
30:29
Speaker 1: mail bad questions. Okay, I think the audience will kill
30:31
Speaker 1: us if we don't do it. The first question is
30:36
Speaker 1: directly about your job, mister Meadows. What is the least
30:41
Speaker 1: expected thing that you found about your job when you
30:44
Speaker 1: started it? You know, I thought I had it all
30:46
Speaker 1: figured out the minute I got here. And it's kind
30:49
Speaker 1: of like a minor league player getting called up to
30:53
Speaker 1: the big leagues. The pitches are faster, they do brushback pitches.
30:58
Speaker 1: I thought I had had everything said and done to
31:01
Speaker 1: me in Congress they could have been said or done,
31:04
Speaker 1: and that was not the case. And so so I
31:07
Speaker 1: think probably the biggest thing was that. The other big
31:11
Speaker 1: surprise is how much the president wants to hear from
31:15
Speaker 1: the American people. I knew he wanted to hear from
31:18
Speaker 1: Ted and I, but he really he keeps saying, well,
31:21
Speaker 1: what are the American people saying? What are they wanting?
31:23
Speaker 1: And that was the it was really eye opening. Well,
31:27
Speaker 1: the next question is for both of you. This question
31:30
Speaker 1: came in we're in an election year. If all the
31:33
Speaker 1: protests and all the craziness that we've been seeing didn't
31:35
Speaker 1: remind us of that we're in an election year. Assuming
31:38
Speaker 1: everything goes well, what's priority number one looking ahead into
31:43
Speaker 1: twenty twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, restart the economy
31:47
Speaker 1: and bring back jobs. A man, three four months ago,
31:50
Speaker 1: we had pluming economic growth. We had the lowest unemployment
31:54
Speaker 1: in fifty years. And by the way you want to talk,
31:56
Speaker 1: you want to talk racial equality, we had the lowest
31:58
Speaker 1: African American unemployment ever recorded. Now, tragically that that that
32:03
Speaker 1: got derailed by by a global pandemic from Wuhan, China.
32:09
Speaker 1: That that that that that that ended up. We had
32:12
Speaker 1: a lockdown across the country and we destroyed forty million jobs.
32:15
Speaker 1: And coming out of that is not going to be easy.
32:18
Speaker 1: But I'll tell you this, If, if God forbid, we
32:21
Speaker 1: go down a socialist road of the far left um
32:27
Speaker 1: jacking up taxes, destroying small businesses, that's going to kill jobs.
32:31
Speaker 1: And by the way, if they follow through on their
32:33
Speaker 1: promise to abolish police departments, a whole lot more people
32:36
Speaker 1: are going to die. And and so my top priority,
32:40
Speaker 1: and I think yours and the presidents is get get
32:44
Speaker 1: this economy, moving back and bring back up. It has
32:46
Speaker 1: to be. I mean, that's the number one priority. It's
32:49
Speaker 1: also the thing that the president is best at. Right,
32:51
Speaker 1: he's already done it, he can do it again, he's
32:53
Speaker 1: already starting to do it again. And then along with
32:56
Speaker 1: that is preserving freedoms. I think we're getting to a
32:59
Speaker 1: place where we see defund the police, we see you know,
33:03
Speaker 1: abolish ice. We see what so many on the left
33:07
Speaker 1: or wanting to do is basically say we don't want
33:10
Speaker 1: any rules, but more importantly, we don't want anybody to
33:13
Speaker 1: even enforce the rules that should be enforced. And so
33:17
Speaker 1: we need to make sure that we preserve freedom, but
33:19
Speaker 1: also understand that we need to uphold the rule of law.
33:22
Speaker 1: But certainly the economy is number one, because we are
33:25
Speaker 1: a nation of law, not a nation of men. Though
33:27
Speaker 1: there are men that need to help us maintain those
33:30
Speaker 1: laws and maintain those freedoms, and women and women and women.
33:34
Speaker 1: I know, I now we're going to be canceled. We
33:36
Speaker 1: are certainly going to be censored for that. But we
33:38
Speaker 1: have taken enough of your time, mister Meadows. I'm sure
33:40
Speaker 1: you've got another several hours of work to do, so
33:43
Speaker 1: thank you so much. Thank you, it's been great to
33:45
Speaker 1: be with you and Senator We'll see you on the
33:47
Speaker 1: next episode. I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
34:01
Speaker 1: This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is being brought
34:04
Speaker 1: to you by Jobs, Freedom and Security Pack, a political
34:08
Speaker 1: action committee dedicated to supporting conservative causes, organizations, and candidates
34:13
Speaker 1: across the country. In twenty twenty two, Jobs Freedom and
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Speaker 1: Security Pack plans to donate to conservative candidates running for
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Speaker 1: Congress and help the Republican Party across the nation.