Latest / The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson / What's Next After Mayorkas and Senate Immigration Bill, Press Corps Turns on Joe Biden, & Americans WANT a Secure Border Week In Review

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What's Next After Mayorkas and Senate Immigration Bill, Press Corps Turns on Joe Biden, & Americans WANT a Secure Border Week In Review · The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome in his verdict with Center Ted Cruz, The Week
0:02
Speaker 1: in Review, Ben Ferguson with you, and these are the
0:05
Speaker 1: top stories that you may have missed that we talked
0:07
Speaker 1: about this week. First up, it was a very big
0:10
Speaker 1: week in Washington, d C. Especially after my ORC has
0:13
Speaker 1: failed to be impeached by the GOP.
0:16
Speaker 2: Will they try again and what could that look like?
0:19
Speaker 1: Also, the Senate immigration bill fails as well, so what
0:23
Speaker 1: will be next for the White House? Plus the DOJ
0:27
Speaker 1: comes out with a shocking report saying that Joe Biden
0:30
Speaker 1: is basically incompetent and couldn't be charged of crimes because
0:34
Speaker 1: he's just too old and can't remember anything. The fallout
0:38
Speaker 1: from that will be massive, So what does the White
0:40
Speaker 1: House do in response? And finally, polling shows that the
0:44
Speaker 1: American people are desperate for a secure border and this
0:49
Speaker 1: includes Democrats. It's the Weekend Review and it starts right now.
0:54
Speaker 1: Not only is it a lie, Donald Trump's not the
0:56
Speaker 1: president right now? And you look at the numbers to
0:58
Speaker 1: also back up why in twenty twenty illegal border encounters
1:03
Speaker 1: for four hundred thousand twenty twenty one, it jumped to
1:06
Speaker 1: one million, seven hundred and thirty five thousand. Then in
1:09
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two under Biden, get it jumped to two million,
1:12
Speaker 1: three hundred and seventy nine thousand, twenty twenty three, two million,
1:15
Speaker 1: four hundred and seventy six thousand, and yet he wants
1:18
Speaker 1: to say the only reason the border is not secure
1:20
Speaker 1: is because of Donald Trump.
1:21
Speaker 2: It's a lie. They're the facts to back it up.
1:23
Speaker 2: But what's next.
1:24
Speaker 3: Now, because well, and let me explain more why it's
1:27
Speaker 3: a lie. Listen, what Biden is saying, what Schumer is saying,
1:31
Speaker 3: is that we had a fabulous bipartisan agreement that would
1:33
Speaker 3: have solved this problem. But then crazy Donald Trump and
1:37
Speaker 3: they're telling, decided he didn't want to solve this problem,
1:41
Speaker 3: and he threw a fit and said, don't pass anything
1:43
Speaker 3: because I want a campaign on this. And then their
1:46
Speaker 3: narrative continues to be and all the Republicans are sheep
1:49
Speaker 3: and they just obeyed Donald Trump. And the reason this
1:52
Speaker 3: failed is because because Trump ordered Republicans to oppose this.
1:56
Speaker 3: That is Joe Biden's story. It is also Chuck Schumer's story.
1:59
Speaker 3: It is also the story of every single Senate Democrat.
2:03
Speaker 3: I'm reading the clips and it's word for word, every
2:05
Speaker 3: Senate Democrat, And you know what, it's also Mitch McConnell's story,
2:09
Speaker 3: and it's the story of several other Republicans who are
2:12
Speaker 3: going out and they're saying, oh, you're just following Trump's orders. Well, listen,
2:15
Speaker 3: I talked to Trump frequently, but I can tell you
2:17
Speaker 3: I haven't had a single conversation with Trump about this
2:20
Speaker 3: issue at all. I've been leading the fight against this
2:23
Speaker 3: issue from the beginning. We haven't talked about this supplemental bill,
2:27
Speaker 3: but it was obvious on the merits. I looked to
2:29
Speaker 3: the merits and said, does this bill solve the problem?
2:32
Speaker 3: And it doesn't, but it is incredibly harmful when Republican senators,
2:39
Speaker 3: many of them just they don't like Trump and they're
2:44
Speaker 3: frustrated now and so they're lashing out, but they're lashing
2:46
Speaker 3: out in a way that helps Democrats.
2:49
Speaker 1: So where do we go from here? I mean, there's
2:51
Speaker 1: also another defeat. People are frustrating the House side and
2:54
Speaker 1: impeaching my orchist that failed. Granted it could come up
2:57
Speaker 1: for another vote, but as of now it seems like
3:00
Speaker 1: that's a failure. We have an open border that seems
3:02
Speaker 1: like another failure. Is this now just going to be
3:05
Speaker 1: a wide open border till election day. And that's what
3:08
Speaker 1: this next election is going to be about. Hey, you
3:11
Speaker 1: vote for Republicans and you'll get a secure border only.
3:14
Speaker 2: If we have the House, Senate in the White House.
3:16
Speaker 3: Look, in all likelihood, yes, Joe Biden caused this open border.
3:22
Speaker 3: Joe Biden could secure it tomorrow. He did it unilaterally.
3:26
Speaker 3: He didn't pass any new legislation. He didn't change the
3:28
Speaker 3: law to cause this crisis. He simply defied the law.
3:31
Speaker 3: He made three decisions that caused this crisis. He stopped
3:34
Speaker 3: building the border wall, he reinstated the disastrous policy of
3:38
Speaker 3: catch and release, and he ended the incredibly successful policy.
3:42
Speaker 3: The agreement remained in Mexico. That's what caused this crisis.
3:45
Speaker 3: Biden could change that tomorrow. He doesn't want to. He's
3:48
Speaker 3: not going to now. Actually to fix this, we don't
3:52
Speaker 3: necessarily need a Republican president, Republican House, and Republican Senate.
3:56
Speaker 3: We just need a Republican president. If Trump were president again,
4:00
Speaker 3: we would secure the border again. Why because he would
4:02
Speaker 3: vigorously enforce the law. Biden is defying the law. Winning
4:06
Speaker 3: the White House as the key to securing the border.
4:08
Speaker 3: Now with a Republican Senate in House, we can do more,
4:11
Speaker 3: we can be more effective. But you ask what's next, Well, listen,
4:16
Speaker 3: what's next. Tomorrow We're going to vote on this supplemental
4:22
Speaker 3: with the bad border provisions that's going to fail. What
4:25
Speaker 3: we're anticipating will happen next is Schumer is going to
4:29
Speaker 3: go back to the supplemental that has Ukraine and has
4:32
Speaker 3: Israel and has Taiwan and does nothing on the border.
4:35
Speaker 3: That's what he tried initially that we blocked in the fall,
4:39
Speaker 3: and I don't know what will happen. I'm going to
4:42
Speaker 3: oppose it because what I said before, I still believe
4:45
Speaker 3: I'm not going to vote for this bill until we
4:48
Speaker 3: actually secure our border. When I said it, unlike Republican leadership,
4:53
Speaker 3: I wasn't just reading talking points. I actually believe that
4:56
Speaker 3: securing the border is the existential national security threat facing
4:59
Speaker 3: the UNI States right now, and we should use the
5:02
Speaker 3: leverage that the Democrats desperately want on Ukraine to try
5:06
Speaker 3: to get it done. So I think our view should be,
5:09
Speaker 3: if you want Ukraine funding, attach it to HR two
5:12
Speaker 3: and you'll get your funding. But Schumer's going to take
5:16
Speaker 3: up Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, he's probably going to begin tomorrow,
5:20
Speaker 3: and I don't know what will happen, but I think
5:23
Speaker 3: there is a very real possibility that a significant number
5:27
Speaker 3: of Republicans vote for that, that they care so much
5:29
Speaker 3: about the Ukraine funding, they're going to say, we try
5:31
Speaker 3: it on the border, we failed, Now let's fund Ukraine.
5:35
Speaker 3: If they get nine votes, which I think is probably
5:38
Speaker 3: pretty likely, they'll get sixty, which is what it takes
5:42
Speaker 3: to pass the Senate. And so I think there's a
5:43
Speaker 3: reasonable prospect that a supplemental bill that funds Ukraine and
5:47
Speaker 3: Israel and Taiwan will pass out of the Senate. But
5:50
Speaker 3: then I think it's very likely to fail in the House.
5:53
Speaker 3: I don't think the House will take it up. And
5:55
Speaker 3: that means that McConnell and Schumer and Biden still have
5:59
Speaker 3: a problem if they want Ukraine funding. Passing a clean
6:03
Speaker 3: funding bill out of the Senate is not going to
6:05
Speaker 3: get the job done. And so what I would urge
6:08
Speaker 3: the House to do is take the Ukraine funding bill,
6:11
Speaker 3: attach HR two to it, and send it back to
6:13
Speaker 3: the Senate and keep fighting. Use the leverage we have
6:18
Speaker 3: to say, hey, you can have this funding if you
6:20
Speaker 3: want secure the border first, Because that matters more and
6:24
Speaker 3: use that leverage. Look, that will not come from McConnell
6:28
Speaker 3: and Senate Republican leadership, but I'm hopeful the Speaker and
6:31
Speaker 3: House Republicans will hold the line. And I hope that's
6:34
Speaker 3: what's next.
6:35
Speaker 1: Now, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation,
6:38
Speaker 1: you can go back and listen to the full podcast
6:41
Speaker 1: from earlier this week. Now onto story number two. Let's
6:45
Speaker 1: talk about the politics now of this, because you and
6:48
Speaker 1: I witnessed it for the first time in history. We've
6:50
Speaker 1: played it for everybody listening. The White House Press Corps
6:54
Speaker 1: turning on him, this is something he's never experienced. In fact,
6:59
Speaker 1: I want to play for you just an example of
7:01
Speaker 1: how quick CNN turned on him. You would have thought
7:04
Speaker 1: they were talking about Donald Trump, except they were talking
7:06
Speaker 1: about Joe Biden.
7:07
Speaker 2: Take a listen to this from CNN.
7:10
Speaker 4: Ultimately, what Robert Hurt says in this report is essentially
7:14
Speaker 4: the technical elements of a crime. It appears Robert Hurst
7:17
Speaker 4: saying we're met. But what he ends up doing is
7:21
Speaker 4: looking at the soft factors. And you're allowed to do that.
7:23
Speaker 4: You have to do that as a prosecutor. And he
7:25
Speaker 4: takes into consideration things like what he says, and maybe
7:28
Speaker 4: this is overstated, maybe not on leave that to the
7:30
Speaker 4: political folks, but he says, essentially, Joe Biden would have
7:32
Speaker 4: created a sympathetic picture in front of a jury. He
7:35
Speaker 4: had memory issues, he had age issues, and that goes
7:38
Speaker 4: into did he was he able to form the mental
7:41
Speaker 4: intent here?
7:42
Speaker 1: That's CNN and they weren't done there. They also then
7:46
Speaker 1: went on to say that Joe Biden was an essence
7:48
Speaker 1: a liar at his press conference.
7:51
Speaker 2: Here's this.
7:52
Speaker 4: That is what blew my mind about Joe Biden's statement SEP.
7:57
Speaker 4: Two major things he just out right contradicts or is
8:02
Speaker 4: contradicted by. However you look at this this report, there
8:04
Speaker 4: are two things he said that are completely the opposite
8:07
Speaker 4: of what Robert Hurr found. And who do you believe
8:10
Speaker 4: is up to? I guess the individual consumer. First, Joe
8:13
Speaker 4: Biden says, I did not act wilfully. Wilfully just means
8:15
Speaker 4: voluntarily intentionally. Well, the second sentence of this whole summary
8:19
Speaker 4: says President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials. The
8:23
Speaker 4: facts in here show it was wilful. He knew, he
8:25
Speaker 4: talked about it. And the second thing he says is
8:28
Speaker 4: I did not disclose classified documents to my ghostwriter.
8:31
Speaker 2: Page three says that he did that.
8:33
Speaker 4: He says, mister Biden shared information, including some classified information
8:37
Speaker 4: from those notebooks.
8:39
Speaker 1: Senator I watched that on CNN and I said, holy crap.
8:45
Speaker 1: They're turning on him, and this is the end of
8:48
Speaker 1: Joe Biden's presidency as we know it. They're trying to
8:51
Speaker 1: offload him in real time because of this report, saying
8:55
Speaker 1: here it is, let's take him out.
8:58
Speaker 3: Yeah. Look, this is a mass problem, and it's not
9:00
Speaker 3: a problem that goes away in a day or two,
9:02
Speaker 3: or a week or a month. This is a problem
9:05
Speaker 3: that continues every day Joe Biden remains in the presidency.
9:09
Speaker 3: I'll also point out something else, which is this report
9:15
Speaker 3: implicitly exonerates Donald Trump, which is an enormous problem for
9:21
Speaker 3: Biden as well, because look, one of their big marquee
9:24
Speaker 3: cases against Trump. Now they're prosecuting him for damn near everything,
9:27
Speaker 3: including late library books, but one of their marquee cases
9:31
Speaker 3: is that Trump possessed classified documents in mar Laga. And
9:35
Speaker 3: let me read again from the report. This is what
9:38
Speaker 3: they say about Biden. Quote. Contemporary evidence suggests that when
9:42
Speaker 3: mister Biden left office in twenty seventeen, he believed he
9:45
Speaker 3: was allowed to keep the notebooks in his home. In
9:47
Speaker 3: a recorded conversation with his ghostwriter in April twenty seventeen,
9:50
Speaker 3: mister Biden explained that, despite his staff views to the contrary,
9:55
Speaker 3: he did not think he was required to turn in
9:57
Speaker 3: his note cards to the National Archives, where they were
9:59
Speaker 3: stored a skiff, and he had not wanted to do so.
10:03
Speaker 3: At trial, he would argue plausibly that he thought the
10:06
Speaker 3: same thing about his notebooks. If this is what mister
10:10
Speaker 3: Biden thought, we believe he was mistaken about what the
10:13
Speaker 3: law permits. But this view finds some support in historical practice.
10:19
Speaker 3: The clearest example is President Reagan, who left the White
10:22
Speaker 3: House in nineteen eighty nine with eight years worth of
10:25
Speaker 3: handwritten diaries, which he appears to have kept in his
10:28
Speaker 3: California home, even though they contained top secret information. During
10:33
Speaker 3: criminal litigation involving a former Reagan administration official in nineteen
10:36
Speaker 3: eighty nine and ninety, the Department of Justice stated in
10:39
Speaker 3: public court filings that the quote currently classified diaries were
10:45
Speaker 3: mister Reagan's quote, personal records. Yet we know of no
10:49
Speaker 3: steps that apartment or other agencies took to investigate mister
10:53
Speaker 3: Reagan for handling, mishandling classified information or to retrieve or
10:57
Speaker 3: secure his diaries. Most juror errors would likely find evidence
11:02
Speaker 3: of this precedent and mister Biden's claimed reliance on it,
11:07
Speaker 3: which we expect would be admitted at trial, to be
11:10
Speaker 3: compelling evidence that mister Biden did not act wilfully, as
11:16
Speaker 3: with the marked classified documents. Because the evidence is not
11:21
Speaker 3: sufficient to convict mister Biden for wilfully retaining the notebooks,
11:26
Speaker 3: we decline prosecution. Now that entire passage, you could write
11:30
Speaker 3: word for word and simply replace the word Biden with Trump,
11:37
Speaker 3: and it would be a major defense for Trump. And
11:41
Speaker 3: this incoherence, the Department of Justice is going to have
11:45
Speaker 3: a nightmare because I promise you Trump's defense lawyers are
11:49
Speaker 3: going to quote that back at them and say, you
11:51
Speaker 3: know what, the Department of Justice was right and if
11:55
Speaker 3: they were right about Biden. By the way, on this podcast,
11:58
Speaker 3: we walk through had the oracle president was president after
12:02
Speaker 3: president after president had kept documents, including President Reagan, including
12:07
Speaker 3: President Obama, including President Clinton. We walked through the history.
12:11
Speaker 3: That's what the Department of Justice just concluded is their
12:14
Speaker 3: reason not to prosecute Biden, and the obvious screaming question is, well,
12:20
Speaker 3: then why do you go after the opposing party other
12:23
Speaker 3: than because you are politically trying to stop the voters
12:27
Speaker 3: from voting for the other guy.
12:30
Speaker 1: You go back to politics of this for a second.
12:32
Speaker 1: And I can only imagine how stressed out White House
12:36
Speaker 1: staff is tonight. I'm sure you agree with me. At
12:39
Speaker 1: one o'clock in the morning right now as.
12:41
Speaker 3: You are, they're all awake.
12:42
Speaker 2: Nobody is at all awake.
12:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, and they're probably at the White House still. They
12:47
Speaker 1: lost Democrats today, and they lost the media today, and
12:52
Speaker 1: now it's got to feel like you're either inside the
12:55
Speaker 1: inner circle of Team Biden to prop him up and
12:58
Speaker 1: protect him, and now the Democrats seem to be circling
13:01
Speaker 1: the wagon. In your opinion, is this the beginning of
13:06
Speaker 1: the end of the Biden presidency? Do you think he
13:08
Speaker 1: actually makes it to election day because he's going to
13:12
Speaker 1: dig in That was clear from the press conference tonight.
13:14
Speaker 2: But it looks like and this could change.
13:17
Speaker 1: But as of one am right now, it looks like
13:19
Speaker 1: Democrats are saying it's official, we are not going to
13:22
Speaker 1: support Joe Biden in this president to run any longer.
13:25
Speaker 2: We got to figure out how to offload him.
13:28
Speaker 3: Look, I think the odds remain very low that he
13:31
Speaker 3: steps down before the end of his term. I think
13:35
Speaker 3: as long as he is able to stand vertically and
13:38
Speaker 3: not fall over, he is going to finish out this year.
13:42
Speaker 3: That being said, as I said at the beginning of
13:45
Speaker 3: this pod, I think the odds that the Democrats push
13:49
Speaker 3: him aside and replace it with Michelle Obama about sixty
13:52
Speaker 3: five to thirty five. Or put it in another way,
13:54
Speaker 3: it's about two to one. Now more likely than not
13:58
Speaker 3: that the Democrats decide this guy cannot be our nominee
14:04
Speaker 3: in November.
14:05
Speaker 1: One other question I do want to ask you, does
14:08
Speaker 1: this change the way that Republicans investigate Joe Biden knowing
14:13
Speaker 1: that the DOJ is now basically said, you can't charge
14:16
Speaker 1: this guy with anything, or we're not going to charge
14:19
Speaker 1: this guy with anything. If they wouldn't do it now,
14:21
Speaker 1: why would they change that logic moving forward? How does
14:24
Speaker 1: that change the way that James Comer and Jim Jordan
14:26
Speaker 1: are doing their investigations And should it change the way
14:28
Speaker 1: they're doing their investigations at all?
14:32
Speaker 3: It shouldn't, and I don't think it will, And as
14:34
Speaker 3: we've discussed at great length on this podcast, the evidence
14:37
Speaker 3: of Joe Biden's corruption, of his deliberately selling favors from
14:43
Speaker 3: the Vice President of the United States to foreign oligarchs,
14:46
Speaker 3: to Russian oligarch's, Ukrainian oligarchs, Chinese communists for millions and
14:51
Speaker 3: millions of dollars, that evidence is very significant, and it
14:56
Speaker 3: is repeated evidence not only of doing so, but doing
15:00
Speaker 3: so willfully, doing so deliberately, and then aggressively covering it
15:04
Speaker 3: up and lying about it. And I think we will
15:06
Speaker 3: see the House continue to lay out that evidence and
15:09
Speaker 3: to lay it out at great length. And I would
15:11
Speaker 3: point out Number one, an immediate step for that potentially
15:16
Speaker 3: is impeaching Joe Biden, and the Department of Justice doesn't
15:19
Speaker 3: get a vote on whether or not to impeach Joe Biden.
15:23
Speaker 3: But number two, whether or not whether or not Biden
15:27
Speaker 3: gets prosecuted for bribery is ultimately not going to be
15:32
Speaker 3: a question decided by this Department of Justice. The chances
15:35
Speaker 3: that Merrick Garland brings charges are zero points zero zero percent.
15:40
Speaker 3: He is acting, and he has acted his entire tenure
15:44
Speaker 3: like a political operative who works for the DNC so
15:47
Speaker 3: Merrick Garland's not going to do it. And indeed, there
15:50
Speaker 3: is considerable evidence underscored by two irs whistleblowers who are
15:55
Speaker 3: career employees and Democrats, that Merrick Garland actively lied to
16:01
Speaker 3: Congress under oath, committed felonies, and obstructed justice. So with
16:05
Speaker 3: or without this report, this DOJ was never going to
16:08
Speaker 3: prosecute Joe Biden. That being said, if the House continues
16:12
Speaker 3: to lay out the evidence and we have an Apartment
16:14
Speaker 3: of Justice that is not controlled by Joe Biden, if
16:17
Speaker 3: there's a Trump Department of Justice, and there is real
16:22
Speaker 3: evidence a bribery and corruption of Joe Biden and Hunter
16:26
Speaker 3: Biden and the extended Biden family, I think the possibility
16:30
Speaker 3: of a prosecution is real and significant.
16:33
Speaker 1: One other question, and this is something that I think
16:36
Speaker 1: so many Americans want to know. When you see this
16:39
Speaker 1: report that just came out, and you see the cognitive
16:42
Speaker 1: decline and what they're stating in this report there, you
16:45
Speaker 1: got to ask this question, who is running this country
16:48
Speaker 1: right now? Because if it is as bad as this
16:51
Speaker 1: special prosecutor is saying, it is behind closed doors, and
16:54
Speaker 1: we know how this media has propped him up and
16:56
Speaker 1: protected him, and we know how the White House is
16:59
Speaker 1: limited as schedule. He sleeps in the morning. He works
17:02
Speaker 1: usually between I think they said what noon and four.
17:04
Speaker 1: He's not doing big events. He's getting the name of
17:07
Speaker 1: leaders wrong now and when there who's alive and who's
17:10
Speaker 1: dead now on a regular basis. That's happened three times
17:13
Speaker 1: in the last three days. Who is running the country?
17:16
Speaker 2: Senator? And does that concern you as well?
17:19
Speaker 3: So I can tell you I get asked that question regularly.
17:23
Speaker 3: I got asked that question tonight. Every week someone asks
17:26
Speaker 3: me who's running the White House? Who's running the government?
17:29
Speaker 3: The honest answer, and this is really scary.
17:32
Speaker 2: I don't know.
17:33
Speaker 3: I genuinely don't know. I have a theory. I think
17:36
Speaker 3: it is Barack Obama, but I can't prove that. I
17:39
Speaker 3: don't know that to be a fact. It's just that
17:41
Speaker 3: that there are various data points, including the fact that
17:44
Speaker 3: Obama remained in DC, something no president in modern times
17:48
Speaker 3: is done. He's regularly in d C. He's regularly holding court,
17:52
Speaker 3: he's meeting with Democrats, he's meeting with members of the
17:55
Speaker 3: administration at his house. And so I think it is
17:58
Speaker 3: likely Obama, but I can't prove that. I just know
18:00
Speaker 3: it's not Joe Biden. So it is some combination of
18:03
Speaker 3: Obama and other senior White House officials and people like
18:07
Speaker 3: Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and AOC. But the candid
18:11
Speaker 3: answer is I have no idea.
18:13
Speaker 1: As before, if you want to hear the rest of
18:15
Speaker 1: this conversation on this topic, you can go back and
18:18
Speaker 1: down the podcast from earlier this week to hear the
18:21
Speaker 1: entire thing. I want to get back to the big
18:24
Speaker 1: story number three of the week you may have missed.
18:27
Speaker 2: So then, how did leadership get this so wrong?
18:30
Speaker 1: Because the American people in the polling specifically on the
18:34
Speaker 1: border crisis was overwhelmingly in the side of conservatives and
18:41
Speaker 1: what we've been calling for, what we've been advocating for
18:44
Speaker 1: and for genuinely securing the border.
18:47
Speaker 2: In fact, it played even more.
18:49
Speaker 1: Into the Hans the Republican Party after you had this
18:52
Speaker 1: fight between Texas and cutting the razor wire and the
18:56
Speaker 1: boarder and the myiorchists and what's happening with the Biden administry,
19:00
Speaker 1: and the polling shows that the American people are not
19:04
Speaker 1: with Joe Biden on this issue. Yea, how could they
19:06
Speaker 1: not see that? How could Mitch McConnell not see.
19:09
Speaker 3: That because Mitch McConnell. What he cares about is Ukraine funding.
19:14
Speaker 3: He has said repeatedly it is the most important thing
19:17
Speaker 3: in the country to fund the war in Ukraine.
19:20
Speaker 1: And so does he believe that or is there something
19:22
Speaker 1: behind the scenes politically?
19:24
Speaker 3: I think he believes it. I have no reason to
19:27
Speaker 3: doubt his sincerity in saying that. But he is passionate
19:30
Speaker 3: about it. And when it comes to the border, look,
19:32
Speaker 3: would he like to secure the border shore? Would he
19:35
Speaker 3: vote for something to secure the border shore? But it's
19:39
Speaker 3: not a driving priority for him. If it doesn't happen, well, okay,
19:42
Speaker 3: that's unfortunate, but it's not. It wasn't his objective in
19:46
Speaker 3: this whole thing. And so here's the fundamental challenge. And listen,
19:50
Speaker 3: this bill was negotiated by James Langford, Republican from Oklahoma,
19:55
Speaker 3: by Chris Murphy, an extremely liberal left wing Democrat from Connecticut,
20:00
Speaker 3: and by Kirsten Cinema, a liberal to somewhat moderate Democrat
20:06
Speaker 3: slash independent from Arizona. And Lankford. Langford's a really good
20:12
Speaker 3: guy and Langford has been just just gone through a
20:14
Speaker 3: buzzsaw on this And basically what happened is leadership pushed
20:19
Speaker 3: him out on a limb and then saw the limb
20:22
Speaker 3: off behind him, and he's been getting pounded. But here
20:26
Speaker 3: was the problem for Langford, and Langford was just followed
20:29
Speaker 3: orders and did what leadership asked him to do. And
20:31
Speaker 3: here was the problem. There were two mandates that were
20:34
Speaker 3: non negotiable. Chuck Schumer's mandate effectively was we will not
20:38
Speaker 3: secure the border. We won't agree to anything that is
20:41
Speaker 3: effective securing the border. That was Chuck Schumer's non negotiable.
20:45
Speaker 3: Mitch McConnell's mandate, his non negotiable was we must must
20:50
Speaker 3: get a deal because what he cares about is Ukraine funding.
20:53
Speaker 3: So Langford was essentially told do whatever you can to
20:57
Speaker 3: get a deal from Schumer. But no, oh is not
21:00
Speaker 3: an answer. You must agree to what Schumer wants. And
21:04
Speaker 3: so Langford spent hundreds thousands of hours negotiating with Chris Murphy,
21:09
Speaker 3: which I do not envy the guy. That was not fun.
21:13
Speaker 3: But he was operating from a position that McConnell wouldn't
21:17
Speaker 3: let him say no. McConnell's instructions were get a deal.
21:20
Speaker 3: So when you ask James, well, why are these terms
21:23
Speaker 3: so bad? Why aren't there better. He says, well, that's
21:25
Speaker 3: all the Democrats would agree to. Yeah, like, it's real simple.
21:29
Speaker 3: If you want the Ukraine funding, pass HR two and
21:33
Speaker 3: you got to be prepared to walk away. Now. I
21:34
Speaker 3: don't know what they would have done if that happened,
21:36
Speaker 3: but we will never know because McConnell's immediate response when
21:40
Speaker 3: Schumer said no, no, no, we won't do HR two is well, okay,
21:43
Speaker 3: well then we'll do whatever you want. And it's even
21:48
Speaker 3: worse than that. This was an incredibly misguided strategy. But
21:51
Speaker 3: I want you to listen to McConnell at a press
21:54
Speaker 3: conference today after our lunch to give a listen.
22:01
Speaker 5: Leader McConnell, Leader mcconom You know, Senator Schumer says that
22:05
Speaker 5: he worked extensively with you on this package. What do
22:07
Speaker 5: you say to your colleagues who said that you miswrite
22:10
Speaker 5: your conference in helping to craft this border for this this.
22:13
Speaker 6: I followed the instructions of our conference who were insisting
22:16
Speaker 6: that we tackled this in October. I mean, it's actually
22:20
Speaker 6: our side that wanted to tackle the border issue. We
22:25
Speaker 6: started it obviously with a Democratic president and a Democratic senator.
22:33
Speaker 6: Our negotiators had to deal with them and James Langford
22:37
Speaker 6: under those situations, did a remarkable job to pick off
22:42
Speaker 6: the Border Council, which supported President Trump. Certainly underscores that
22:47
Speaker 6: it was a quality product that that particular union felt
22:50
Speaker 6: would make progress towards making things better. But as I
22:55
Speaker 6: said earlier, things had changed over the last month, and
23:02
Speaker 6: it's been made perfectly clear by the Speaker that he
23:06
Speaker 6: wouldn't take it up even if we sent it to him.
23:09
Speaker 6: And so I think that's probably why most of our
23:12
Speaker 6: members think we ought to have opposition. Tomorrow. We'll see
23:18
Speaker 6: and then move on with the rest of the supplement.
23:21
Speaker 1: I mean, that's a great story center, but does it
23:23
Speaker 1: seem to necessarily add up with reality?
23:25
Speaker 2: Does it well?
23:27
Speaker 3: And I want to underscore, So you're seeing half of
23:30
Speaker 3: what was the biggest fight at lunch today, and so
23:33
Speaker 3: I wanted you to listen to that because that's what
23:35
Speaker 3: Mitch said at lunch. And I have a policy at
23:37
Speaker 3: the lunches, which is I don't repeat what other senators
23:40
Speaker 3: say at the lunch. I think they're owed some expectation
23:43
Speaker 3: of privacy that we can have candid and really frank discussion.
23:47
Speaker 3: So I don't repeat what others say, but I repeat
23:49
Speaker 3: what I say, because if I said it, I have
23:51
Speaker 3: a right to repeat it and say it elsewhere. Given
23:53
Speaker 3: that Mitch went out and just said it to the reporters,
23:55
Speaker 3: I can tell you that's what he said in the
23:56
Speaker 3: room as well. And when he said it, I stood
24:01
Speaker 3: up and I said, by the way, and you listen
24:03
Speaker 3: to the words he just said that press conference. He said, well, gosh,
24:05
Speaker 3: it was the Republican conference that wanted to tackle this issue. Notice,
24:09
Speaker 3: tackle this issue. Yeah. No, we didn't want to quote
24:13
Speaker 3: tackle this issue. We wanted to solve this issue, fix
24:18
Speaker 3: the border. Notice he said, well, gosh, it's Democrats. So
24:21
Speaker 3: obviously we weren't going to succeed in solving the border.
24:24
Speaker 3: So we just had to tackle the issue and do
24:26
Speaker 3: what the Democrats want. That's his view. But when he
24:30
Speaker 3: made that argument, and you just listened to it, I
24:33
Speaker 3: stood up immediately after him and I said, I got
24:36
Speaker 3: to say, if Republican senators go out and repeat what
24:40
Speaker 3: Mitch just said, it would be spectacularly harmful and it
24:45
Speaker 3: would be a massive political favor to Chuck Schumer and
24:50
Speaker 3: every Democrat running. And let me explain to you why,
24:53
Speaker 3: because what Mitch argued, Notice he said, there, hey, you know,
24:56
Speaker 3: James did a fantastic job and this bill was a
24:58
Speaker 3: great work product. It was a terrific bill. And Mitch
25:02
Speaker 3: was like saying, well, just say, well, the House wouldn't
25:04
Speaker 3: pass it. I said, let me be clear. If a
25:06
Speaker 3: bunch of Republicans go out and say this is a
25:08
Speaker 3: terrific bill, but the House wouldn't pass it. Every Democrat
25:11
Speaker 3: John Tester this week has already said, look, I was
25:14
Speaker 3: ready to secure the border, but these crazy right wingers
25:18
Speaker 3: wouldn't pass it. And their story they want to tell
25:21
Speaker 3: is these knuckle dragging Trumpers don't actually want to secure
25:26
Speaker 3: the border because we had a great bill to secure
25:28
Speaker 3: the border, and they're so crazy they want so their
25:32
Speaker 3: argument is that Republicans want the issue, We want a
25:35
Speaker 3: campaign on the border rather than actually fix it. And
25:38
Speaker 3: I'll tell you I yelled at my colleagues last week
25:41
Speaker 3: when they were making this argument, and I said, listen
25:43
Speaker 3: for me, I've lived this border. There is nobody in
25:46
Speaker 3: this body who wants to solve this more than I do,
25:49
Speaker 3: because it is a travesty that is hammering and destroying
25:53
Speaker 3: Texas every day. But I said, listen, if a bunch
25:56
Speaker 3: of Republicans go out and tell the story. This was
25:59
Speaker 3: a great bill that would secure the border. But you know,
26:03
Speaker 3: Trump is so crazy, we couldn't do it. But the
26:05
Speaker 3: Speaker of the House and the House Republicans, they're so crazy,
26:08
Speaker 3: we couldn't do it, and so it's their fault. But
26:10
Speaker 3: we had a fabulous bill. I said, listen, you are
26:14
Speaker 3: literally repeating Schumer's talking points for every Senate Democrat incumbent.
26:20
Speaker 3: If you want John Tester to win, go say what
26:23
Speaker 3: you just said to the reporters. If you want Shared
26:25
Speaker 3: Brown to win, if you want every Democrat running to win,
26:28
Speaker 3: go say that. And I said, look what you ought
26:31
Speaker 3: to say. And I said, listen, you don't have to
26:33
Speaker 3: throw James Langford under the bus. He's a good man.
26:36
Speaker 3: But the reason this bill sucks is because the Democrats
26:41
Speaker 3: are radical zealos who don't want to secure the border,
26:44
Speaker 3: and so they wouldn't agree to a bill other than
26:47
Speaker 3: a bill that sucks. And that's not a complicated message.
26:50
Speaker 3: You don't have to say, you know, Langford is a
26:54
Speaker 3: horrible human being. You just have to say he was
26:56
Speaker 3: given an impossible task because it depends on the Democrats agreeing,
27:02
Speaker 3: and the Democrats want open borders as long as they
27:05
Speaker 3: want open borders, they won't agree to legislation that stops
27:08
Speaker 3: open borders. But the infuriating thing is Mitch walked right
27:12
Speaker 3: out and said it to the press. So he's perfectly
27:14
Speaker 3: happy to say, hey, great bill, just crazy Republicans won't
27:17
Speaker 3: pass it. And that's exactly what Schumer is saying as well.
27:21
Speaker 3: The two of them, this wasn't a Langford Murphy bill.
27:26
Speaker 3: This was a Schumer McConnell bill. This was the two
27:29
Speaker 3: of them. And why was it Because both of them
27:32
Speaker 3: desperately want to fund the Ukraine war and on immigration.
27:37
Speaker 3: They just wanted to throw whatever fig leaf was necessary
27:40
Speaker 3: on the table to give to give an excuse to
27:43
Speaker 3: try to get Ukraine funding passed.
27:46
Speaker 2: There's a lot of people that are gonna be listening.
27:47
Speaker 1: They're gonna say, all right, well, yes, this seems like
27:49
Speaker 1: this is a victory that we didn't have this bill
27:52
Speaker 1: become all But there also seems to be a lot
27:56
Speaker 1: of frustration of okay, what's next, I mean, Senator, we
27:59
Speaker 1: we can't secure the border. That is their leverage on everything.
28:04
Speaker 1: Biden sitting there saying, okay, fine, we'll just keep having
28:08
Speaker 1: record number of legal immigrants come across the southern border.
28:12
Speaker 1: You look at the numbers, uh there there that we're
28:15
Speaker 1: breaking record after record. I go back to the basics
28:18
Speaker 1: that Biden said in his press conference quote, the only
28:21
Speaker 1: reason the border is not secure is Donald Trump.
28:23
Speaker 2: We know that's a lie.
28:26
Speaker 3: I notice notice, by the way, that's Mitch McConnell's talking
28:28
Speaker 3: point too. If Joe Biden Mitch McConnel are saying the
28:31
Speaker 3: same thing, why is the Republican Senate leader repeating Biden
28:35
Speaker 3: and Schumer's talking point? That is a lie.
28:38
Speaker 1: Not only is it a lie, Donald Trump's not the
28:40
Speaker 1: president right now. And you look at the numbers to
28:43
Speaker 1: also back up why it's a lie. In twenty twenty
28:47
Speaker 1: illegal border encounters for four hundred thousand, twenty twenty one,
28:50
Speaker 1: it jumped to one million, seven hundred and thirty five thousand.
28:53
Speaker 1: Then in twenty twenty two under Biden again, it jumped
28:55
Speaker 1: to two million, three hundred and seventy nine thousand twenty
28:58
Speaker 1: twenty three, two million, four hundred in seventy six thousand,
29:01
Speaker 1: and yet he wants to say the only reason that
29:03
Speaker 1: border is not secure is because of Donald Trump. It's
29:06
Speaker 1: a lie. They're the facts to back it up. But
29:08
Speaker 1: what's next now, because.
29:10
Speaker 3: Well, and let me explain more why it's a lie. Listen,
29:12
Speaker 3: what Biden is saying, what Schumer is saying, is that
29:15
Speaker 3: we had a fabulous bipartisan agreement that would have solved
29:18
Speaker 3: this problem. But then crazy Donald Trump and they're telling,
29:24
Speaker 3: decided he didn't want to solve this problem, and he
29:26
Speaker 3: threw a fit and said, don't pass anything because I
29:28
Speaker 3: want to campaign on this. And then their narrative continues
29:31
Speaker 3: to be and all the Republicans are sheep and they
29:34
Speaker 3: just obeyed Donald Trump. And the reason this failed is
29:37
Speaker 3: because Trump ordered Republicans to oppose this. That is Joe
29:41
Speaker 3: Biden's story. It is also Chuck Schumer's story. It is
29:44
Speaker 3: also the story of every single Senate Democrat. I'm reading
29:48
Speaker 3: the clips and it's word for word every Senate Democrat.
29:51
Speaker 3: And you know what, it's also Mitch McConnell's story, and
29:54
Speaker 3: it's the story of several other Republicans who are going
29:56
Speaker 3: out and they're saying, oh, you're just following Trump's orders. Well, listen,
30:00
Speaker 3: I talked to Trump frequently, but I can tell you
30:02
Speaker 3: I haven't had a single conversation with Trump about this
30:05
Speaker 3: issue at all. I've been leading the fight against this
30:08
Speaker 3: issue from the beginning. We haven't talked about this supplemental bill,
30:12
Speaker 3: but it was obvious on the merits. I looked to
30:14
Speaker 3: the merits and said, does this bill solve the problem?
30:16
Speaker 3: And it doesn't, but it is incredibly harmful when Republican senators,
30:23
Speaker 3: many of them just they don't like Trump and they're
30:28
Speaker 3: frustrated now and so they're lashing out, but they're lashing
30:31
Speaker 3: out in a way that helps Democrats.
30:33
Speaker 1: As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Sentner,
30:36
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Speaker 1: and we will see you back here on Monday morning.