Latest / The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson / Massive Bipartisan WIN to Save College Sports

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Massive Bipartisan WIN to Save College Sports · The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome, it's Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. Senator,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: we get to be together finally in the same studio
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: in Washington, D.C. on a really fun week where college
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: sports got a say. That's the best way I can
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: describe it. It was fun to watch the battle. It
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: was fun to see so many coaches in the country involved.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: I was laughing because I was last night as everything
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: was going down. Coaches were calling different people. They were
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: asking what's happening, where we are in the vote. You
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: were down there making deals, as they say, making sure
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: it gets passed.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: And it worked.
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: We had a spectacular win last night. By the way,
• 0:34
  Speaker 3: welcome to the Swamp, Ben. That's right. We got a
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: massive vote on the floor of the Senate in support
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: of the Protect College Sports Act. And we have a guest.
• 0:43
  Speaker 3: We have a guest, a repeat guest. He's a recidivist.
• 0:47
  Speaker 3: There's a very short list of repeat guests on Verdict.
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: I think you're one of– Mike Lee.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Mike Lee.
• 0:55
  Speaker 3: Have we had any other repeat– you may be in–
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: you're in a camp of two or three.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: I was going to say– I'm trying to think if
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: there's anybody else.
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: I think it may be you and Mike are the
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: only two repeats.
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: I'll take it. I will take that.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Because Lindsey was once, right?
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: Lindsey was the first guest.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: But it was one appearance.
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: And Lindsey did, it was right at the outset, and
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: Lindsey started it by going, what in the hell is
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: a podcast?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: He told me the first time we played golf, when
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: I first got up here, we played golf together. And
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: he goes, do you like pro wrestling?
• 1:29
  Speaker 3: Pro-wrestling.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And I said, I do. He goes, you're going
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: to like the Senate. It's a combination of policy and pro-wrestling.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, I'm going to love this place. You're
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: going to like this place.
• 1:39
  Speaker 3: I do miss that guy. You and I were both
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: good friends with him.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: The best guy to go to dinner with.
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: He had the best sense of humor. He was hands
• 1:50
  Speaker 3: down my favorite dinner companion in the Senate because your
• 1:54
  Speaker 3: ribs would hurt. You'd just be laughing. You never knew
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: what the hell he'd say.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: It was just situational. Like, some people are good at
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: telling jokes.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, he's witty.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: He was witty, situational. He was very funny.
• 2:05
  Speaker 3: So I used to piss off Lindsay and John Kennedy
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: because I'd ask them both who's funnier, and they both
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: would sort of bow up.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Oh, bow up, yeah.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: But I think the answer is- Is the joke now
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: John Kennedy's funnier? So John Kennedy's won. But look, John
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: Kennedy is a better stand-up comedian. Like, John Kennedy could
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: literally do the comedy circuits. Yeah. But- He preps his stuff.
• 2:26
  Speaker 3: Like it's not entirely off the cuff, but he thinks
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: about it and he delivers it well. Look, Jeff Foxworthy's
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: got nothing on John Kennedy. Yeah. Lindsay was wittier. He'd
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: just sit there and like just pop things off the
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: top of his head that were just funny.
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: You know, maybe we ought to consider like a roast.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: We ought to do like a fundraiser or something that's
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: a roast and we get five or six of our
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: best people up there.
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: Did I ever tell you that I had John Kennedy
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: to a donor retreat of mine? And he spoke at
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: lunch and he just did a roast of me.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: Don't give this guy money. And here's 10 reasons why.
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: I like stood up and like, wait, I paid to
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: fly you here. What the hell are you doing? It
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: was funny as hell. And every one of my donors
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: loved it. They thought it was hysterical.
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: All right.
• 3:13
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• 3:14
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• 3:16
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• 3:21
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• 3:33
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• 4:02
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• 4:55
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• 5:01
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• 5:08
  Speaker 1: and make that switch today. So you guys had a
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: big week.
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Let's talk about the beginning. When did this become a thing?
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Because I think people don't realize I love talking about
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: when this started. You knew there was an issue in
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: college sports. You decided to do something about it, which
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: is even harder, and not just complain about it. So
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: where did this begin and how did we get all
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: the way to where we are now?
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: Well, for me... I'm just a fan. Actually, when I'm
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: back home in Missouri, the people that I hang around,
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: they talk about sports. We go to St. Louis Cardinal games.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: We go to Mizzou football.
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: By the way, I'm feeling like a wuss because both
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: of you guys were college athletes. And I was a
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: college debater. They're not the same. They're not the same.
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: There's a totally different. By the way, I'm just going
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: to stop. In between your last podcast appearance and this
• 5:57
  Speaker 3: podcast appearance, something very important has happened. which is Senator
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: Eric Schmidt has appeared on SportsCenter.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: This is true.
• 6:05
  Speaker 3: And he had a diving catch that was– so it's amazing.
• 6:11
  Speaker 3: So Major League Baseball, I think they calculated originally that
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: like 92% of Major League outfielders would catch it, and
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: then it became– 85% that it became 72%.
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: It was 18%.
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: It was 18%. No, it was.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: 18% catch probability, but it has made its way down
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: to 15%. So it's like a fish story, like the
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: one you caught. By the time I'm 80 years old,
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: it'll be like a 1% catch probability.
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: It was a badass diving catch, and he cut his nose.
• 6:40
  Speaker 1: I was going to say there was blood involved.
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: And I'm convinced, all right, All right. Can you look
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: in the camera and say you didn't rub some dirt
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: in your nose and make the blood?
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: I did not do it. Although some of my friends
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: who've known me for a long time, speaking of pro wrestling,
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: accused me of having a ketchup packet in my back
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: pocket and putting it on my nose or something. No,
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: I didn't know. First of all, I didn't think I
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: was going to get to the ball and I got
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: to the ball and it's the warning track when I
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: dove and it's just gravel. And I guess I hit
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: my nose. I didn't really feel it. Somebody told me
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: I was bleeding. And about the second swipe of the
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: nose and blood going on my pants, I realized I
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: this is going to look really good on television.
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: All right, Ben, I will bet you $ 100 right now.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: I'm ready for this.
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: That Schmidt runs pictures or even better, video of that
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: catch in his re-elections.
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: 100%.
• 7:23
  Speaker 3: I won't even, don't even take your money.
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: I'll lay out for you. I can write the article.
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: I'm all in for Missouri.
• 7:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I can write.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm all in.
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: I can write. Were you number five on SportsCenter?
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was the number five play of the day.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: So top plays. So people understand like the game you're
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: talking about.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: And by the way, you weren't an Ole Miss tennis player.
• 7:41
  Speaker 3: Did you ever make SportsCenter?
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: No, no, I did not make SportsCenter.
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: I mean, that's like.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: No, it was not on my bingo card.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: But this is a congressional baseball game. So people understand
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: the context of this. It's a big game.
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: And it was genuinely. So the congressional baseball game. Look,
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: it's actually surprising because these are a bunch of guys
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: in like their 40s and 50s and even 60s.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 8:01
  Speaker 3: Who actually play like real, look, it's not Major League Baseball,
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: but it's surprisingly good given the age that these are
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: members of Congress.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: How many practices do y'all have? Because that's what you
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: don't understand.
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: It's like five in the morning.
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: Roger Williams from Texas, the great state of Texas, a
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: TCU star, is our manager. And we're out there 445
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: or 545 in the morning DC time, 445 in the
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: morning Missouri time. Yeah, where you live. Where I live.
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: And we're out there from April basically to mid-June in
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: the mornings that we're here because then we're done.
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: Is it every day that you're here?
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: Yes. Really?
• 8:35
  Speaker 3: Yes. I didn't know that. I knew it was early.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday for the three mornings that we're typically here.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: And it's mostly BP. The irony of that catch was
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: I don't judge fly balls for a living. Like I
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: haven't done that really for 30 years. And it's the
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: most intimidating part of the game because you have the lights,
• 8:53
  Speaker 2: you have multiple levels, people wearing different shirts. You just don't,
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: my depth perception is not the same when I was
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: 20 years old. And so the idea that like you
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: would make a play in the outfield and like catch
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: a ball, like full speed was just, I would have
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: never guessed that, but it was cool. It was, but no, it's,
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: it's competitive and we want to win. Like Roger Williams
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: tells the team, he's like, listen, for all the people
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: who are out here, unless you're one of our best nine,
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: you're not going to play. Unless we have a huge lead.
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Then you might get into the game. And they still
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: show up.
• 9:23
  Speaker 3: By the way, the congressional baseball game is about to
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: get ridiculous.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: Because Mark Teixeira from Texas is going to play. So
• 9:31
  Speaker 3: you've got a New York Yankee who's going to play.
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: Is he going to use an aluminum bat? What do
• 9:35
  Speaker 3: you think? Have you asked him that?
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: He should. I'm all for us winning 100 to nothing.
• 9:40
  Speaker 3: I'm actually wondering if they just intentionally walk.
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: Him every time. They probably will, which is why I'm either–
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: I'm lobbying to either be hit directly in front of
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: Teixeira or directly behind Teixeira. That's already happening, that lobbying effort.
• 9:52
  Speaker 3: And by the way, Tano Tijerina. who is running in
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: Texas against Henry Cuellar, was a pitcher in college. And
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: I'll tell you, Steve Scalise, who's a buddy of ours,
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: and Steve cares a lot about the game.
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: Yes, he does.
• 10:06
  Speaker 3: So Steve sat down with Tano. He said, all right,
• 10:09
  Speaker 3: if you can pitch 80 miles an hour, I'll give
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: you 100 grand right now for your campaign.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: No way.
• 10:14
  Speaker 3: If you can pitch 85, I'll give you 200 grand.
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: And Tano's wife, and Tano's a big stripping dude. Tano's
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: wife leans in and goes, how much if he can
• 10:24
  Speaker 3: pitch 90?
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: Really? Like, I.
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: Don't know if Tano will win. That's going to be
• 10:30
  Speaker 3: a close race, but he could win. If Tano and
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: Teixeira win, it may be like a 50-0 game. A beatdown, yeah.
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: Like that.
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: Is there a suicide limit, like runs?
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: No.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: So you guys are, it's not like eight runs and
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: then you switch it up.
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: It's seven innings. And so- we had scored 30 plus
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: a couple of years ago. Um, and it's, I guess
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: it's a six year winning streak now.
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: So what'd your kids say about the catch by the way?
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: You got kids.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: You know what's funny is I have, I have, um,
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: I have two daughters who were at the game at
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: the time, what, 17 and 15. And they don't. All right.
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: Were they impressed?
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I was going to say, they don't care about, like,
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: they don't ask, hey, dad, how's the banking bill going
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: in Washington?
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: But impressing teenage daughters is hard.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: But they were at the game. And after the game,
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: it was just wild. Like, people wanted, like, me to
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: sign a baseball. Yeah. Anyway. And my daughters were actually
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: genuinely impressed. And my wife, too. And we've been married
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: for 27 years. It's hard to impress my wife.
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: It's hard to impress me, yeah.
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: But they thought that was pretty cool that Dad made
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: a diving catch.
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: And they were there for a moment.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was a fun night.
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: I promise you, when Eric is 95, and by the way,
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: Chuck Grassley turned 93 just the other week, and he
• 11:39
  Speaker 3: has teeth falling out and no hair, he's going to
• 11:41
  Speaker 3: be like, and then I dove and catched that ball.
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: And it was like. I flew into the air. That
• 11:48
  Speaker 3: might be.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: Grandpa was kind of cool. That might be what they say.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: Amazing.
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: No, it was cool. So the college sports bill, because. Yes.
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: I recognize. Look.
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: By the way, I hope this is appropriate. We're talking sports.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: Tonight's sponsored by Ultras.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: I have cracked open a beer. I hope this is acceptable.
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: You represent Missouri.
• 12:10
  Speaker 2: We drink beer and eat pork steaks, barbecue. This is
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: what we do.
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: You had me at barbecue. Listen, that's probably worth two
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: points in your next re-election.
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: That's right. It won't hurt me at home.
• 12:21
  Speaker 3: By the way, I will say an interesting sports thing.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: I go to a lot of football games, baseball games,
• 12:27
  Speaker 3: basketball games. Astros game, it used to be a few
• 12:31
  Speaker 3: years ago. Every person in the stadium is drinking a
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: Bud Light.
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: They no longer carry Bud Light in the stadium. Like
• 12:40
  Speaker 3: it's that bad.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: Ultras probably. Ultras now. I've always been– it's a little
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: more parochial. I've always been a Bush Light guy. So
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: in St. Louis, Bush and Bush Light is big. That's
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: what I've– my dad worked there. My uncle worked there.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: You beat a Bush Air in your race. I did.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: The irony of that. How about that? My dad worked
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: midnights and I gave tours and took out the trash
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: at the mansion that she– No way. It's called Grant's Farm.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: She grew up. And so that was a, the liberal
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: media hated that. Like I was doing these ads about
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: how it came from a working class family and took
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: out the trash at the mansion she grew up. They
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: didn't know how to process this whole thing. So anyway, yes,
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: it worked out just fine. But yeah, no, we're, I
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: like to say Budweiser was in my bottle growing up.
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: That's kind of the way it works in St. Louis.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: So there is a fabulous meme that I shared with
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: Mike Lee and Marco Rubio. And Mike and Marco Are
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: both six months younger than I am. So we're almost
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: the identical age. It's a meme that has, it has
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: a picture of a dad feeding his two-year-old a beer.
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: And it says, Gen X, the last great generation before
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: all you sissies were born.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm Gen X too. I'm a little younger, but
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: I'm still Gen X. How old are you? I'm 51 now.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: 51.
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: So I'm 55. So we're not far.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: Gen X is like, it is like this bridge generation
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: that knew what life was like, like researching on microfiche.
• 14:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: You know what I mean? Like when I was in college,
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: if you did like, you would go to the library.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: You would go to the library.
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: And microfiche.
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: And by the way, we were latchkey kids. Like you'd
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: go home and you'd be on your own. And like, you'd,
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: you look at things. All right. You're a dad with
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: young kids. Yeah. You look at car seats. We strap
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: our kins in like they're launching on the Apollo mission
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: to the moon.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, right. To 17.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: It's a 17-point harness.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: Remember that station wagon? You had a friend that had
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: a station wagon.
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: There were no seatbelts.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: You look backwards or sideways.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Right, right.
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: Because that was safe.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: I may or may not have had a grandfather that
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: had a pickup that had one of the, like, the whatever,
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: the shields over it. And there were no. We were
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: just hanging out.
• 14:40
  Speaker 3: All right. So my dad, we had a wood-paneled station wagon.
• 14:46
  Speaker 3: And my dad would have me sit on the armrest
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: with his arm around me. No seatbelt. I'm like seven.
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: And it's just the windshield is this death-like map. And
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: it was fine. My dad was not trying to murder me.
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: It was just a different era where you're like, you know,
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: most of the kids survive.
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: You know what's amazing about that, though? One of the
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: things that there's very few things that actually kind of
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: changed pretty quickly that probably is a good development. Do
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: you remember like when we were going, people would just
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: throw trash out the window.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: Out the window.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: Like literally.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: The whole bag for McDonald's. Just like McDonald's, just throw
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: it out the window.
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: And I'm actually glad that's changed. Can I tell you
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: a fun story about that? Do you know the phrase,
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: don't mess with Texas?
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah. You told us at a lunch. Yes.
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: So I have boots that have don't mess with Texas
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: on it. Do you know where that came from?
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: I'm assuming from trashed.
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: TxDOT, the Texas Department of Transportation, has the trademark because
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: it was an anti-litter campaign in the 70s. This is
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: a great story. Okay, so Ben is like 40, how
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: old are you? 45 now. 45.
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: Getting old.
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: So the difference of 10 years is interesting. You may
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: not remember what Eric and I do, which is in
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: the 70s, literally people would drive down the road and
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: just throw crap out the window. Like it was normal.
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: And the highways, you just have garbage everywhere. And it's
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: an amazing.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: And my dad said in Tennessee, the reason why there
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: was so much trash.
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: Do you remember that? Yeah, I do.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: Because he said the reason why people did it is
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: it was a way to punish people. the guys that
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: had to pick up the trash that were the prisoners
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: on the side.
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: Of the road. Like the chain gangs.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but it was like, that'll teach them to not
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: rob or steal or cheat. So it was like, you're
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: keeping them employed. Go ahead, pick up my trash.
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: Can you imagine how you would react today if you're
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: driving down the road and someone like.
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: Threw a bag at you?
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: Oh, he would honk and it would be like, what
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: the hell.
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: Is wrong with you?
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: It is actually societally like one of the most remarkable
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: changes that happened in like a 10 year period. Like
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: it just, the flip, the switch flipped.
• 16:40
  Speaker 3: Do you ever watch the episode– the series Mad Men? Yeah.
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: So there's a– and Mad Men is great. I've watched
• 16:45
  Speaker 3: every episode. But there's an episode where there's a pregnant
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: woman in a bar– Drinking martinis and smoking. And you're like, ah!
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: And that was normal. Smoking on airplanes.
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: That's still the one that blows my mind.
• 16:56
  Speaker 3: And by the way, let me be clear. My mother
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: drank and smoked when she was pregnant with me. That
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: may not explain a lot.
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: That explains an awful lot.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: I'm just saying. And I bet your mom did, too.
• 17:05
  Speaker 3: I'm just saying. It was a different era where nobody, like,
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: it wasn't a thing.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: No, yeah. There wasn't a lot of, like, you just
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: went out. We played wiffle ball. We played baseball. We
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: played hot box, or some people call it pickle.
• 17:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: And you came home, like, when the lights went off.
• 17:18
  Speaker 3: When the lights went off.
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: And that was it.
• 17:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we'd play kick the can, and we'd, like, run around,
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: and we'd play other games whose names I won't repeat
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: because they're not politically correct. But, you know, it was
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: a different era.
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: That's what you did. And that is– let's bring this
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: all together. That is– we fell in love with sports.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: We fell in love with sports. And so I feel like–
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: and Ted and I have talked about this a lot.
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: If you would have asked me a few years ago
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: about whether or not Congress would be involved in this
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: or I would be involved in this, I would have
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: been very, very skeptical. But the truth is where it's
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: at now is just pretty wild. Like you have a
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: situation now where literally you can go pro. If you,
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: let's say you were in college for four years, go pro,
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: come back, be 27 years old and compete against a
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: 17 year old that might be on campus.
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: And by the way, you got pros that are leaving
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: because they can make more money in college. And it's
• 18:07
  Speaker 3: just the chaos is an utter mess. And for me,
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: like you asked, how did this start? So for me,
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: it started four years ago. So four years ago, I
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: became the ranking member of the Senate Commerce Committee. And
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: when I became the ranker, I began having initially Texas
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: colleges coming in and just saying, college sports is a disaster.
• 18:29
  Speaker 3: We need Congress to get involved. And I started having
• 18:32
  Speaker 3: conferences come in and the chaos. And some people have asked,
• 18:36
  Speaker 3: all right, why did Congress do this? Yeah. Why should
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: Congress get involved? And the answer is because Congress screwed
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: it up. I mean, there used to be rules. And
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: what happened is you had lawsuits that struck down virtually
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: every rule under the federal antitrust laws. Now, if it's
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: the federal antitrust laws that caused the problem, you got
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: to fix it. It's only Congress.
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: They're the only ones. Yeah. The only ones who can
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: do it.
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: And so the chaos right now, you've got athletes transferring
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: through the transfer portal two, three, four times. You get
• 19:07
  Speaker 3: to the end of a season and half or more
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: of your team can leave. You've got 27, 28 year
• 19:14
  Speaker 3: olds competing. You've got people competing seven, eight years. You've
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: got pros playing. And the spending spiral, almost every athletic
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: department in the country is losing millions of dollars. Many
• 19:25
  Speaker 3: of them are losing tens of millions of dollars. They
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: can't afford it. And so every week they're canceling different programs.
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: They're canceling women's sports. They're canceling Olympic sports. And if
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: we do nothing, I think in five years, there will
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: be 30 to 50 competitive football programs in the country,
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: basically a mini NFL. So let's take Texas. You and
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: I both live in Texas. In Texas, the University of Texas,
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: and A & M are going to survive regardless. Like
• 19:52
  Speaker 3: if chaos continues, they've got such a big donor network.
• 19:56
  Speaker 3: All right, if there are 30 schools that play, UT
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: and A & M will be among the 30, and
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: they've got enough donors, they can compete. It'll be a
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: mini NFL. I don't know that another school in Texas survives. Yeah.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: Like I look at TCU, SMU, Baylor, Texas Tech, Rice,
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: U of H. Like I think all of them could
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: go under. And I love, I love UT. I love
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: A & M representing the whole state. It's great fun
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: to cheer for them. But what, and by the way,
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: I don't know that Mizzou survives. I don't know that
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: you have a single school that survives in that chaos.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: Well, I think Mizzou does, but I don't know that
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: Missouri State probably doesn't.
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: I think there's no way Missouri State does it. And
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: even Mizzou is stretching to be able to compete at that,
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: like with the same level of donations that a UT
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: or a Michigan or Ohio State. LSU.
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: And LSU, by the way, is in debt. Did you
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: see that?
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: Like an $ 80 million budget.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not where they're at.
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's not where they're at.
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: They're probably middle of the road on budget in the SEC,
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: which is, by the way— A huge advantage versus most
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: other schools. But if you're going to, if you're going
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: to have this kind of, you know, trajectory that we've
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: seen with the spending and the debt and the deficits
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: that are happening, it's just a matter of time before
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: you whittle out because of the old model, of course,
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: was college football paid and subsidized all the non-revenue sports.
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: But what happens when you're losing money on football or
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: all your money is going towards football? You're just necessarily
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: going to get rid of all those non-revenue sports.
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: And that's an important thing to understand is the economics
• 21:29
  Speaker 3: of college sports, which is football generates virtually 100% of
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: the revenue. Occasionally men's basketball, but it's rare.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: You've got to have a Duke.
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: You've got to have a Gonzaga. There are only a
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: handful of programs where men's basketball generates money. But every
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: other sport loses money. And if you have football go
• 21:49
  Speaker 3: away from all but 30 to 50 schools, they don't
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: have the funding, so they lose every other sport. They lose.
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: And then it's not just losing sports. But a lot
• 22:02
  Speaker 3: of schools, I think you could see a lot of
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: universities go under because a successful athletic program, you get
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: alumni to give. You get students to apply.
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, look at any school that wins a national championship.
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: What happens next five years? They have record enrollment.
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: Let me ask you a serious question. You were mildly, slightly,
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: a tiny bit excited when Ole Miss beat LSU.
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: I've never seen this guy more like— There's.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: The birth of your children, and there's Ole Miss beating LSU,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: and it's pretty— Okay, it's.
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: Not even close. I mean, you love your boys, so
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: you're going to tell them, but it's not close.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, I'm just saying it was— my aura ring that
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: day was just peaking and solid.
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: I want to know, but I'm going to predict that
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: Ole Miss's applications went up— thousands yeah like the number
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: of people who will apply to Ole Miss because of
• 22:53
  Speaker 3: that one game and they suddenly go I want to
• 22:55
  Speaker 3: be a part of that yeah like like that's an
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: amazing and so that dynamic.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: Look at Johnny Manziel and what it did for A &
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: M I I mean look at Florida Gators they're still talking.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: About I can tell you when when a couple years
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: ago I when I went to the game down in
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: Dallas when Mizzou beat Ohio State in the Cotton Bowl
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: they're the they will track the views on their websites
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: And the applications that come within a week. And it's dramatic. People, like,
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: they see the exposure. They love it. And that's just
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: a reality of the situation.
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: People want to go to school where they can, like,
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: cheer on their team and it's fun and there's school spirit.
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: But that dynamic, the challenge we were facing was massive.
• 23:33
  Speaker 3: And so it was four years ago that I started
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: working on this and started negotiating with Democrats and to
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: try to get bipartisan legislation. Try to get bipartisan legislation
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: on anything.
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: It's really hard.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Really hard.
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah. But this in particular, for at least two years
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: when I was ranking member, I was just banging my
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: head against a wall like the Democrats would not budge.
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: I was trying. We did meeting after meeting. We're going nowhere.
• 23:59
  Speaker 3: When I became chairman, I said, look, this is a
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: real priority. This matters. And part of why it matters,
• 24:07
  Speaker 3: I'd never focused on this. I don't know if you
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: ever thought about this. College sports is unique to America.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: And I've been a fan my whole life, but I
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: hadn't really thought about it. There are more than 500,000
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: college athletes in America right now. Yeah. Nobody else has that.
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: Europe doesn't have that. Asia doesn't have that. Latin America, Africa,
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: like it doesn't exist. And if we don't act, hundreds
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: of thousands of those scholarship positions and roster slots will
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: go away.
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: Disappear.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: But the NCAA ad that I love, the best ad
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: they've ever had about student athletes was, And 99% will
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: go pro in something else.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: Referring to you go to college, you may get a scholarship,
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: you may be full ride, you may be amazing.
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: By the way, repeat that stat. More than 99% of
• 24:54
  Speaker 3: college athletes will never go to the NBA or the NFL.
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: They won't play pro ball. They go pro in something else.
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: And Eric and I did this at one Senate lunch.
• 25:03
  Speaker 3: We asked around the table, 53 Republicans, how many of
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: y'all played college sports? And it was what, maybe 15, 20%?
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: It was an impressive number.
• 25:13
  Speaker 2: I think what's fascinating about it, the more you talk
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: about this with people, there's so many lessons, right? It's discipline,
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: showing up on time.
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: I don't know about you, but I hire a lot
• 25:23
  Speaker 3: of college athletes.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. Because you kind of know that I learned a
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: lot of grit from it.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: They show up.
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: You show up. There's a lot of like that wind
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: sprint you don't want to do that you do. You
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: mentally tough.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: Excuses are usually not in the same.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: And you also realize like, I don't, this person's next
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: to me. They're black. They're Hispanic. I don't give a,
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: I don't care at all. They're my teammate and I
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: want to go win.
• 25:40
  Speaker 3: And look, I didn't have the skill to play college sports,
• 25:42
  Speaker 3: but I was a high school athlete. And like, you know, when,
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: I mean, our high school basketball coach would have us
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: run sprints till we puked. And like that experience of
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: like being there and the grit, I mean, it's important.
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. Absolutely.
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: Now you're 6'6. So I, by the way, okay, you've
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: heard this, but I haven't talked with Eric on the pod.
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, this is.
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: As you know, I challenged Pete Hegseth to play hoops
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: and Pete played varsity basketball at Princeton. And he made
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: the tournament. He played in March Madness only a minute.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: It's still playing.
• 26:16
  Speaker 3: But hell, that's a minute more than I played.
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you still play. You're in the dance.
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: And so I challenged him to play and he came
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: and he brought three guys from the Department of War
• 26:25
  Speaker 3: to come with him. And so I put together a
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: senator's team and it was Eric and it was John
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: Husted who played college football. He was not a basketball player,
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: but he's a good athlete. And then I got a
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: guy from my staff, actually two guys from Sam Cooper,
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: who played D2 basketball, and then Gray Harker, who played
• 26:43
  Speaker 3: football at Arkansas.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: Who, by the way, tore his ACL.
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: And his meniscus, both.
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: Like the first game we played.
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: So we played, and I got to say, I think
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: Pete thought it was a joke. Like, we're going up
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: against a bunch of old fat senators. This is going
• 26:57
  Speaker 3: to be fun. And we played two games, scoring by 1-15,
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: and we beat them both times.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: No way.
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: And... I went and told the press afterwards. I said, look,
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: Pete was engaged in some really good ledge affairs. He
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: threw the games. It was smart. He was kissing up
• 27:13
  Speaker 3: to the Senate. I'm here to tell you, look, I
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: don't believe in lying. I was lying. I was flat
• 27:18
  Speaker 3: out lying to the press. Pete wanted to win.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: He's competitive.
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: And the second game, like when he lost the first,
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: I am certain he chewed the ass of his Pentagon guys.
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: Well, let me tell you something. You remember the first
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: game early on, you were feeding me the ball down low,
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: and I was kind of scoring at Will early. Now,
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: these are guys playing with Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of War,
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: who wanted to impress their boss. Yeah. they did not
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: want to be scored upon like that.
• 27:43
  Speaker 3: They were fouling the hell out of it.
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: It was, I was, you know, it was a, like,
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: it was.
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: What was the score the first game? It was like 15-13.
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: It was close.
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: It got very physical.
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: And they were, look, Eric 6-6. And frankly, I wrote
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: him like a red mule. Like, I'm like, he knew
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: how to post up. And I played point guard.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: He just feed the ball.
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: And so I could feed the ball. But they were,
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: every play they would foul. You had bruises because they
• 28:09
  Speaker 3: were hitting you hard. And you're not, 22 anymore.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: No, no, no. We went, we were, I don't know
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: if you remember this. We had an all Senator briefing
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: like the next day in the skiff. And I saw
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: those guys. I'm like, you guys beat the shit out
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: of me.
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: You know, I'm sore.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: I was walking. I took some Advil. Yeah.
• 28:22
  Speaker 3: I mean, you wake up in the morning.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: You're like, what car?
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: What am I doing? I will say this. Hegseth stole
• 28:30
  Speaker 3: the ball from me and we play, you've been up there.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: We play it. It's in the Senate office building. There's
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: actually an indoor tennis court that has a backboard to
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: hoop on it.
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: Mm.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: Mm. And so it's a tennis court surface.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: It's a terrible basketball surface.
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: It's bad for your knees. It's terrible, but it's what
• 28:45
  Speaker 3: we got. Yeah. So Pete dove on the tennis court
• 28:51
  Speaker 3: to steal the ball. And he ripped up his knee.
• 28:53
  Speaker 3: His knee was bleeding. Yeah. And he got the ball
• 28:56
  Speaker 3: because I sure as hell wanted to dive on a
• 28:58
  Speaker 3: tennis court. And I told him afterwards, I said, Pete,
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: I am proud. I want our secretary.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Of war to dive and be bleeding.
• 29:07
  Speaker 3: I feel safer.
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: Agreed. And to Pete's credit, remember, he rattled off two
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: or three or four threes in a row. They got
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: back in that second game. Now, we still won.
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: He's a good ball player.
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: How close is the second game?
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: They were both within a point. So it was down
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: to the wire. They were hard fought, and I was
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: covering Pete, and he's a much better ball player than
• 29:26
  Speaker 3: I am.
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: Has he asked for the rematch?
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: No. Oh, okay.
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: But I can tell you this, and you played ball
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: with me. Yeah. What I can do is lay a
• 29:33
  Speaker 3: little bit of wood on you. I get on defense.
• 29:36
  Speaker 3: I'm not a small man.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: Translation, he can foul you.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: I fouled him.
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: That's what I mean. They were beating up Eric, but
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: I was beating up Pete. And it was like, all right.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: And by the way, he also drew a charge.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: He did.
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: I've never seen that.
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: Questionable call. for it to actually be a charge.
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we gave it to him.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: We kind of gave it to him.
• 29:56
  Speaker 3: But it was a little bit, it was on the area.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: You know, St. Louis just recently got the F-47 and
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: the F-A-X-X. So, you know, I was judicious with my.
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: Several billion dollars. And you're like, yeah, that's a charge.
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: Like, okay, that's a charge for this one.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: I do want to talk to you about an organization
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: that is near and dear to my heart. It is
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: called Compassion International. Right now, somewhere in the world, there's
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: a child waiting, not waiting for a birthday, not waiting
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: for Christmas, waiting for someone to choose them. That's what
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: Compassion International does every single day. They connect children living
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: in poverty with someone who will know their name, pray
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: for them, encourage them, and help provide the food, medical care, education,
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: and hope they need through a local church. This year,
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: Compassion is expanding into four new countries, Malawi, Zambia, Cambodia,
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: and Myanmar, meaning thousands of children are being reached for
• 30:54
  Speaker 1: the very first time, which is amazing. Now, you can
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: do what I've done, and you can sponsor a child
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: for just $ 43 a month. That's it. You can be
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: the reason one child stops waiting. It's so easy to
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: get involved. Sponsor a child today at Compassion.com. That's Compassion.com.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: All right, so I want to ask you guys back
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: to the bill. You get it passed, and the big
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: question that so many people are going to ask now is,
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: what happens next?
• 31:23
  Speaker 3: Yes.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: This is a huge victory. The House is gone. They've
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: got their reelect. They're back home campaigning. And now people
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: are like, well, is it law? Well, it's passed the Senate.
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: What happens next? Let's explain where that goes from now
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: so people understand.
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: So where we are right now, we had it passed,
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: 77 votes in favor. We actually have 78 because Dan
• 31:40
  Speaker 3: Sullivan supports it, but he was still in Alaska, so
• 31:42
  Speaker 3: he didn't vote. So we had 78 senators support it.
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: We got every Republican but two. So it was a
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: massive vote on the Republican side. We got more than
• 31:51
  Speaker 3: half the Democrats. We got a majority of the Democrat caucus.
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: Which is insane.
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that never happens.
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: You can't get 77 votes to congratulate Santa Claus at Christmastime.
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: Well, he's a socialist. Like, he's giving away stuff for free. Like,
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: I'm a no on that, Dan.
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: See, to my point, we can't get 77 votes for
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: Santa Claus.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: He's like, you just made my point. Even Santa Claus
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: can't get these kind of votes. So it goes to
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: the House now.
• 32:20
  Speaker 3: So now it goes to the House. Look, here's what
• 32:22
  Speaker 3: I think will happen when I want to. I want
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: the Speaker to call the House back. And you think
• 32:28
  Speaker 3: they will? I think there's a real possibility of it.
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: So they're gone. Right now, the House is scheduled to
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: be gone until Election Day. And they're out campaigning because, look,
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: the House is up every two years. They're campaigning. This
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: is a rough election season. That's no secret. So they're
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: out campaigning. I sat down. We had the Republican convention
• 32:46
  Speaker 3: a few weeks ago in Dallas. And so I spent
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: a half hour with the Speaker there. And I made
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: the case to him, look, if we get this done
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: and I think we're going to get a big bipartisan bill,
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: I said, and Mike is a close friend. He's a
• 32:58
  Speaker 3: great American. I love the man. He's principled. He's a
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: great human being. I said, look, if we get it done,
• 33:05
  Speaker 3: you ought to call the house back. And by the way,
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: the house can move fast. It's not long. Unlike the Senate,
• 33:09
  Speaker 3: the house can pass that in a day. Yeah. And
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: I said, look, there's nothing more productive you can do.
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: All your members are running for reelect. Then come back,
• 33:20
  Speaker 3: pass this bill. In 24 hours. It polls north of 80-20. Yeah.
• 33:26
  Speaker 3: And by the way, there are millions of people who
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: are college sports fans who don't pay attention to politics.
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: It'll go, I'll be damned. Like Congress can do something. Yeah.
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: That matters. That actually.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: That actually pertains to my Saturday in my life.
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: Look, I said this is good politics. And what I
• 33:43
  Speaker 3: want to see happen. And I've suggested this to President Trump.
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: I want to see him sign it.
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: On college game day.
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: On the set of college game day. And I actually
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: have suggested a game. I actually think A & M
• 33:53
  Speaker 3: Alabama would be a great game. It's kind of mid-October.
• 33:56
  Speaker 3: It's the right time. Although I will say A &
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: M' s last game.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: Well, I got another game for you. I got another
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: game for you in early November. Texas at Missouri. that
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: would be a good game to do.
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: Is it before or after election day?
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: It's Saturday after the election.
• 34:10
  Speaker 3: So Cassidy was pitching Texas LSU, which I liked, but it's,
• 34:14
  Speaker 3: it's the week after election day. And so I'm like, no,
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: we need, we need it before election day.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I'm fine with that. If we, if it gets
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: it done, I'm all for it. But if it somehow slips,
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: then we'll do the Texas.
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: I wanted Texas, Ohio state, but we didn't get it
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: done in time. Cause that would have been amazing to
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: have it. Um, But I'll say this, Bill, I believe
• 34:31
  Speaker 3: we will get it done. Look, does it happen before
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: Election Day or not? I don't know for sure. I
• 34:36
  Speaker 3: will say last night I spoke with the president. He
• 34:39
  Speaker 3: was elated.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 34:41
  Speaker 3: And President Trump wants the House to come back.
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: And let me tell you something. I talked to him, too.
• 34:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: He is not. he is a real sports fan. Like
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: I think some presidents are kind of phony. He loves
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: all people. Like he loves this. He's followed it his
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: whole life. He wants, this is a, he wants this done.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: I think that will matter with them. I hope it
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: matters with them. And like Ted said, it's like, this
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: is something that they can do like in a day,
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: day and a half.
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: And it'd be a big win. It's a cultural thing.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: This is not political. People don't want this.
• 35:09
  Speaker 3: To be political.
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: They want this to be like, Hey, that's their team.
• 35:12
  Speaker 2: It's their region. It's their conference. It's their school. That
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: matters a lot more than like red jersey, blue jersey
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: on this, which is I think the secret sauce for
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: all this. That's how we approached it was here are problems.
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: Let's go try to solve the problem. Let's take our
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: passion that we have for sports and let's turn it
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: into legislation that can matter. And we did it. Like
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: we did it in the Senate. It's not easy to do,
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: but we were able to pull it off.
• 35:33
  Speaker 3: So, Ben, at every stage, the critics thought we had
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: no prayer. Before we introduced it, the critics said there's
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: no chance. You can't get bipartisan agreement. We introduced it.
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: When we introduced it initially, we had two Democrats, two Republicans.
• 35:46
  Speaker 3: So it was Eric and me on the Republican side.
• 35:47
  Speaker 3: We had Maria Cantwell, who's the ranking member on the
• 35:49
  Speaker 3: Commerce Committee, Democrat from Washington State, and Maria put an
• 35:53
  Speaker 3: enormous amount of time and energy to this. And then
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: Chris Coons, Democrat from Delaware. So initially it was the
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: four of us, two Ds, two Rs. Yeah. People were shocked.
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: Like when we introduced it, they're like, wait, these guys
• 36:03
  Speaker 3: came together and did this? Then we had the markup
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: in the Commerce Committee. And early on, The SEC and
• 36:10
  Speaker 3: Big Ten were opposed to this. And they were actively
• 36:12
  Speaker 3: and vigorously lobbying against it. And they're the two most
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: powerful conferences. They get 70% of the eyeballs. Both Eric
• 36:19
  Speaker 3: and I care deeply about the SEC because they matter
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: a lot to our state. So it took some courage
• 36:24
  Speaker 3: for us to stand up and like– Say, hold on
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: a second. Yeah. And all the critics said, okay, SEC
• 36:29
  Speaker 3: and Big Ten are lobbying against this.
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: You're done.
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: This is going nowhere. It fails in the Commerce Committee
• 36:34
  Speaker 3: or maybe it's a party line vote. We end up
• 36:37
  Speaker 3: voting it out 19 to 9. Yeah. 70% of the
• 36:41
  Speaker 3: committee votes.
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: That was the pay attention moment.
• 36:43
  Speaker 3: That was a moment. And it ended up, I mean,
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: we negotiated with the SEC and Big Ten and we
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: brought them on board. So they're supporting it now. And look,
• 36:51
  Speaker 3: Greg Sankey, Tony Petitti, the commissioners, they're good guys. I
• 36:54
  Speaker 3: know them well. Both Eric and I spent a ton
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: of time with them. We made some concessions. We got
• 36:59
  Speaker 3: them on board. The whole process of this bill was
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: growing the coalition, growing and expanding it. When we went
• 37:07
  Speaker 3: to the Senate floor this week, I mean, there were
• 37:09
  Speaker 3: a lot of skeptics. And to see the votes– and
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: we had, by the way, a bunch of amendments. And
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: we ended up building and building the coalition. That is
• 37:19
  Speaker 3: a powerful thing.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: And I would say for most people, they probably think–
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: That's how the Senate operates all the time.
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: That is not... It almost never does.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: It doesn't happen.
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: Most of it's Kabuki theater. Most of it's whatever.
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: It was like, wouldn't it be nice if it happened
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: like this?
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: Right. But it was actually legislating because you didn't have
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: some of the same constraints that you would normally have
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: on something. You listened to people, we did, and you
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: figured out.
• 37:44
  Speaker 3: Adopted amendments that got people on board.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: And that's kind of how it's supposed to work on
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: something like this.
• 37:49
  Speaker 3: And I will tell you something, Ben. Eric was hugely helpful.
• 37:52
  Speaker 3: It was interesting. Eric and, and Maria and Chris kind of,
• 37:56
  Speaker 3: everyone was lobbying different people and we had sort of
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: a team and look with a hundred senators, you got
• 38:00
  Speaker 3: a lot of people. So Eric spent a lot of
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: time and we had this vote that was unhappy. This
• 38:04
  Speaker 3: vote was unhappy. And so he was out negotiating. We did,
• 38:08
  Speaker 3: I hosted a party for, for the four senators who
• 38:11
  Speaker 3: led this and for the staff. And I gave bottles
• 38:14
  Speaker 3: of scotch to everyone.
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 38:15
  Speaker 3: I mean, it was a celebration of like, I will say.
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: It's your dream of coming to the Senate and how
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: it's supposed to work.
• 38:22
  Speaker 3: And this was the most complicated thing I've ever negotiated. Listen,
• 38:27
  Speaker 3: this makes Middle East peace seem simple. And by the way,
• 38:30
  Speaker 3: people care less about Middle East peace than they care
• 38:32
  Speaker 3: about college football.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: Well, let me say two things. One, congrats. What a
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: fun week. Two, it was fun to watch. Three, we
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: get to now see what happens on the House side.
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: And it's going to be really fun. And for everybody
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: that's watching right now, don't forget.
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: Ben, close by telling the story of when the baseball
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: team and the tennis team at Ole Miss went to,
• 38:51
  Speaker 3: was it batting practice?
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: We went to batting practice. So when I was at
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: Ole Miss, the teams would trade off and you would play.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: We played the baseball team and then smoked them in tennis.
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: They were terrible. And then they went and said, well,
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: you're going to come to batting practice. Well, we all
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: had eye-hand coordination. We had balls hitting at 120 on
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: concrete and you're hitting it back. And we were just
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: hitting dingers off the machine because it was just pure straight.
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: And then one of the guys on the team, the coach,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: tried to actually recruit. And our coach was in his face.
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: You're not touching my tennis guys. You're not touching them.
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: But it was so much fun because they're like, how
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: do you guys do that? I'm like, guys, when are
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: you standing a ball.
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: That's bouncing 120?
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: It's coming straight every time in the same place. You
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: can get bad on ball really fast.
• 39:25
  Speaker 3: It was fun.
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: That's cool.
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we beat those guys well.
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: You told a more pro tennis story. this time than
• 39:30
  Speaker 3: last time. Well, I mean... I'm saying it's like Eric
• 39:33
  Speaker 3: Stout's story. It's getting better, Ben. It's getting better, yeah.
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: The last time I heard the story, you said, wow,
• 39:40
  Speaker 3: a fastball comes fast. Did I tell you the catch
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: probability in that game is 5%?
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: 5%, by golly.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: There's the fish. Don't forget we do this podcast Monday, Wednesday,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: and Friday. Hit that subscribe or auto-download button. You can
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: also watch this episode on YouTube as well. From the Swamp,
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: it's always great having you guys with us, and we'll
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: see you back here on Friday morning.