Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here
Speaker 1: and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of
Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.
Speaker 2: We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade
Speaker 2: the studio ad staff, give you, guys, the best independent.
Speaker 3: Coverage that is possible.
Speaker 2: If you like what we're all about, it just means
Speaker 2: the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that,
Speaker 2: let's get to the show. Good morning, everybody, Happy Tuesday.
Speaker 2: We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do
Speaker 2: we have, Crystal.
Speaker 1: Indeed, we do a lot of interesting things that are
Speaker 1: unfolding today. So Joe Biden expected to sign an immigration
Speaker 1: executive order that could effectively end asylum as we know it,
Speaker 1: So we'll talk about that, both the policy and the
Speaker 1: politics surrounding it. Meanwhile, his son is in court today
Speaker 1: facing gun charges. Obviously extraordinary development there, so we'll take
Speaker 1: you inside the courtroom. Roaring Kitty is back, but many
Speaker 1: on Wall Street not very happy about it. And there
Speaker 1: are also was a whole stock market meltdown situation yesterday.
Speaker 4: A lot going on there.
Speaker 1: To get into Fauci was grilled yesterday. We've got a
Speaker 1: great guest on to breakdown some of the highlights and
Speaker 1: low lights there. The FBI actually doing something good for
Speaker 1: a change rating a corporate landlord over a major price
Speaker 1: fixing scandal. This is something we've been covering for a while.
Speaker 1: You guys probably remember this algorithmic price fixing situation, so
Speaker 1: this is related to that. We also have the very
Speaker 1: latest on that Biden sees fire proposal and indications of
Speaker 1: who exactly may be standing in the way of ending
Speaker 1: that war and.
Speaker 4: Returning the hostages.
Speaker 1: We also have Ben Smith on he's launching a new
Speaker 1: podcast focused on the media. We're going to talk to
Speaker 1: him about that and also about the vake Ramswami taking
Speaker 1: a significant stake in BuzzFeed, where Ben used to work.
Speaker 4: So lots to get into today.
Speaker 2: Yes, that's right, As Crystal said, Now, before we get
Speaker 2: to that, we just have almost everybody has actually made
Speaker 2: it across the local so thank you to all of
Speaker 2: our premium subscribers. We have a couple of stragglers who
Speaker 2: are out there who have been asking why they're spot
Speaker 2: playlist hasn't updated. It sounds like you haven't created your
Speaker 2: locals accounts, so just go ahead and email support at
Speaker 2: Locals dot com to get yourself squared away. As we
Speaker 2: said previously, we have a link to the Spotify show
Speaker 2: in the email of every show, as well as all
Speaker 2: of the other places that you're able to access the
Speaker 2: premium show. Everything is additive, folks, so don't worry about that.
Speaker 2: We will get you squared away. Just support at locals
Speaker 2: dot com and you can sign up to become a
Speaker 2: premium subscriber at Breakingpoints dot com.
Speaker 3: So we really appreciate you.
Speaker 2: As Crystal said, though some major news, President Biden expected
Speaker 2: this morning to sign an executive order on immigration. Let's
Speaker 2: go ahead and put this up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: The Wall Street Journal broke the news just yesterday, so
Speaker 2: going to go ahead and read some of the details.
Speaker 2: The details are pretty interesting. The executive order quote would
Speaker 2: ban migrants you cross the Southern border illegally from claiming asylum.
Speaker 2: It is a last resort effort to quell voter discontent
Speaker 2: with his handling of immigration ahead of the presidential election.
Speaker 2: So the details of the plan itself are expected to
Speaker 2: close the southern border after twenty five hundred migrants have
Speaker 2: crossed per day. This is similar to some of the
Speaker 2: policies that were proposed in the previous bipartisan immigration bill
Speaker 2: that we'll all recall that fell apart. Now, the interesting
Speaker 2: part here is some of both the politics and the
Speaker 2: policy immigration remains at the top of the polls for
Speaker 2: voter concern in some of the latest gallop in Pew research,
Speaker 2: which we'll get to in a little bit, and it
Speaker 2: also validates our Actually, I'm curious what you think, Cristel,
Speaker 2: there were a ton there was a ton of criticism
Speaker 2: at the time. A lot of Republicans said, we don't
Speaker 2: need to sign this bill because the president can just
Speaker 2: do it unilaterally. President Biden said no, I can't do
Speaker 2: it unilaterally, and now effectively validating that concern and saying no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I can do it unilaterally. So anyway, there's at the
Speaker 2: very least he certainly undercut many of the things that
Speaker 2: he said in the past. I don't think there's any
Speaker 2: mistaking that this is very obviously a poeolitical move and
Speaker 2: not in response to any sort of policy change or
Speaker 2: you know, some well considered process. There also, of course,
Speaker 2: comes on the heels of this new presidential election in Mexico.
Speaker 3: Ryan Grimm, by the way, we'll be.
Speaker 2: Doing a lot of segments about that, but I want
Speaker 2: to get your reaction specifically to that part because that
Speaker 2: does seem to be the most controversial part of.
Speaker 3: This decision here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, on those pieces, you and I definitely agree. It
Speaker 1: is a decision that comes directly out of political calculation
Speaker 1: and also, I would say political cowardice. It is unlikely
Speaker 1: to survive legal scrutiny, and you can only imagine, you know,
Speaker 1: not only is he a hypocrite, because five seconds ago
Speaker 1: he was saying he can't do this on his own,
Speaker 1: and then he's like, by the way, I'm going to
Speaker 1: do this on my own, to which you know, there
Speaker 1: actually was some truth to what he was saying before.
Speaker 1: Because on a practical level, they don't have the money
Speaker 1: to implement this executive order. So I'm opposed to it
Speaker 1: on moral grounds. But even if you support it, it's
Speaker 1: not like they're going to magically be able to snow
Speaker 1: their fingers and have enough enforcement capability and enough deportation
Speaker 1: capability to be able to actually implement the executive order.
Speaker 1: So on practical grounds, it fails, in my opinion, on
Speaker 1: moral grounds, it fails. On legal grounds. Trump tried to
Speaker 1: do something very similar and it was struck down in
Speaker 1: the courts. You know, in that article from the Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal, they even indicate Biden's own aids no, that
Speaker 1: it is likely illegal and unlikely to survive legal scrutiny.
Speaker 1: But they're doing it as a political ploy anyway. And
Speaker 1: as we've discussed before, and I think you agree with me,
Speaker 1: I think it's a political failure as well, because if
Speaker 1: your goal is to win over people whose number one
Speaker 1: issue is I want more hardline immigration policy, like you're
Speaker 1: never going to convince them that you're going to be
Speaker 1: more cruel and heartless and aggressive and hawkish towards the border.
Speaker 4: Than Donald Trump. And we'll show this later.
Speaker 1: I've mentioned the study a few times, but they did
Speaker 1: a bunch of research on there. Joe Biden is far
Speaker 1: from the first sort of like center left the liberal
Speaker 1: politician to try to make similar hardline immigration moves. And
Speaker 1: there was a comprehensive study done of similar moves that
Speaker 1: were done by European leaders, and they found that they
Speaker 1: didn't win over any of the immigration hardliners, and they
Speaker 1: demoralize their own base.
Speaker 4: So, you know, I think it's foolish.
Speaker 1: You can only imagine the freak out from Democrats it
Speaker 1: would be occurring right now. If it was Donald Trump
Speaker 1: implementing this order, I think it's illegal. I don't even
Speaker 1: think they can implement it. So to me, it's just
Speaker 1: a mess all the way around.
Speaker 3: Yeh, you're very right.
Speaker 2: It is very unlikely to survive legal scrutiny. President Trump
Speaker 2: tried this several times.
Speaker 3: When he was in office.
Speaker 2: This is part of the issue with a much of
Speaker 2: our immigration law. I mean, I do support the ideas
Speaker 2: in principle. I've long think our asylum system is incredibly
Speaker 2: stupid and that most of these people are just economic
Speaker 2: vibrants in particular.
Speaker 3: But as you said, this is a political move.
Speaker 2: I mean, the truth is is that if you really
Speaker 2: believed in the so called cap and why have you
Speaker 2: been doing it for three years straight? And there's some
Speaker 2: eight million people who have come here illegally and just
Speaker 2: in the under the Biden administration. That's not my numbers,
Speaker 2: that's according to the Biden administration's Department of Homeland Security.
Speaker 2: In terms of what that looks like with a multi
Speaker 2: year backlog, in terms of any of these people ever
Speaker 2: even possibly getting to asylum court, and what the hell
Speaker 2: that deportation process even looks like if that were to
Speaker 2: ever occur. Now to reference the polls that you talked about,
Speaker 2: let's put this up there on the screen, because this
Speaker 2: is the actual reason that this is all happening. The
Speaker 2: New York Times did a comprehensive review of all of
Speaker 2: the polling around immigration, and it shows that the current
Speaker 2: system is deeply unsustainable to a previous status quo where
Speaker 2: Americans both broadly support and comprehensive immigration reform and positive
Speaker 2: net migration with a largely upward trend direction. What they find, though,
Speaker 2: actually is quote. More recent surveys have found that the
Speaker 2: number of people who believe immigration is generally beneficial to
Speaker 2: the country's culture and economic growth has eroded from the
Speaker 2: recent high. A small but growing minority of Americans are
Speaker 2: increasingly learned about its impact on drugs, crime, taxes, and
Speaker 2: national identity. For example, on April thirtieth, they found that
Speaker 2: for the third straight month, most American site immigration is
Speaker 2: the most important problem facing the United States, and that
Speaker 2: is the longest stretch that the issue is top of
Speaker 2: the survey in twenty four years of Gallop history. Next,
Speaker 2: if we look actually, a Pew study in February found
Speaker 2: that seventy percent of Republicans described the challenges of the
Speaker 2: southern border as a crisis, with just twenty two percent
Speaker 2: of Democrats. Another poll found last year that seventy three
Speaker 2: percent of Republicans want immigration to be decreased, So that
Speaker 2: is a supermajority of the Republican party. But largely things
Speaker 2: are trending in a very different direction from where they
Speaker 2: were previously. Now that's not to say, though, that some
Speaker 2: of the status quo does not remain for years. A
Speaker 2: plurality of American voters still say that they want a
Speaker 2: compromise with lawmakers and equal priority to providing legal pathways
Speaker 2: to citizenship for undocumented or they say, on documented immigrants
Speaker 2: for the country, as well as border security and strong
Speaker 2: law enforcement measures. There is, you know, kind of a
Speaker 2: general consensus about what some sort of grand bargain would
Speaker 2: look like, but of course nobody really trusts each other.
Speaker 2: The Democrats largely want comprehensive immigration reform first, maybe some
Speaker 2: border security later. The Republicans are like, no, we want
Speaker 2: the border security, the deportation of the security now, and
Speaker 2: then maybe comprehensive immigration reform later. That's largely been the
Speaker 2: major sticking point also about who gets comprehensive immigration reform
Speaker 2: who qualifies, whether it's previous people were here.
Speaker 3: We could go on this all day.
Speaker 2: What we can, at the very least say is the
Speaker 2: hypocrisy of the Biden administration being flagged, Crystal, as you
Speaker 2: referenced by a lot of leftists.
Speaker 3: Let's put this up there.
Speaker 2: After years of decrying Trump era immigration policy, Biden is
Speaker 2: actually exploiting the same section of US Code two one
Speaker 2: two F that Trump used for the so called Muslim
Speaker 2: ban and now to do the Hispanic migrant ban. The
Speaker 2: order will announce we will use these section two one
Speaker 2: two F of the Immigration Nationality Act to dramatically limit
Speaker 2: the migrantability to seek asylum at the other and border
Speaker 2: once encounters reached a new threshold. Administrations have discussed four
Speaker 2: thousand border crossings over the course of a week as
Speaker 2: the metric, and given just the numbers, I believe the
Speaker 2: validated numbers from the Department of Homeland Security just a
Speaker 2: couple of days ago was over five thousand, not in
Speaker 2: a week, in a single day, then that would obviously
Speaker 2: result in an immediate closure.
Speaker 3: So there's quite a bit.
Speaker 2: Of crow that's happening, I think for the Biden administration here, Crystal,
Speaker 2: as you said, because they decried this as like a
Speaker 2: crime against humanity, and they exploited it, and they've raised
Speaker 2: all this money and you know, drug their foot. They
Speaker 2: reversed everything they possibly could. There's a new Time magazine
Speaker 2: piece out just this morning where President Biden says one
Speaker 2: of his only mistakes on immigration is that he didn't
Speaker 2: rescind or that he didn't implement more humanitarian measures enough
Speaker 2: earlier when he was in office. And then at the
Speaker 2: very same time, I mean, he's basically recopying Trump administration
Speaker 2: policy on top of also actually funding more border Okay,
Speaker 2: he won't call it a wall, but border security that
Speaker 2: happens to translate to a wall along the border. So
Speaker 2: there's just a lot of double speak that's happening right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, when it was Trump, this was fascism, and now
Speaker 1: Biden's like, I can do fascism too. I mean, you
Speaker 1: remember he even went to the borders. It was like, hey, Trump,
Speaker 1: let's like work together. How about we do your fascist
Speaker 1: border policy that five seconds ago I was decrying, And
Speaker 1: now here he is using the very same tactics, which
Speaker 1: again have already been deemed illegal. I mean, asylum policy
Speaker 1: is written into American law and international law, and so
Speaker 1: to just sort of like end it with an executive
Speaker 1: order very unlikely to survive legal scrup They know that
Speaker 1: this is purely a political move, a foolish one at that,
Speaker 1: and exposes them as complete and utter hypocrites.
Speaker 4: I mean to go back to the polling.
Speaker 1: There is no doubt about it that immigration has risen
Speaker 1: as a concern for American voters. And you and I
Speaker 1: don't even disagree that the current asylum process is broken,
Speaker 1: largely because what happens is you have people who have
Speaker 1: realized that you know, they can come across the border,
Speaker 1: they can claim asylum, and because the court system is
Speaker 1: so backlogged that it will likely be years before those
Speaker 1: claims are adjudicated. And you know what, the American people
Speaker 1: understand that too. That's why part of the polling that
Speaker 1: you reference there SORR, we have sixty percent, including forty
Speaker 1: percent of Republicans, who say, Hey, one thing that's like
Speaker 1: obvious that we should do here is increase the number
Speaker 1: of immigration judges and staff members so that process can
Speaker 1: work more effectively. You also have fifty six percent of
Speaker 1: Americans who actually think we need more legal pathways to citizenship,
Speaker 1: which I agree with because part of how you end
Speaker 1: up with a chaotic situation at the border and so
Speaker 1: many people coming over illegally is when there are effectively
Speaker 1: no legal pathways to citizenship. So there is well, Americans
Speaker 1: are mixed on immigration, their views are complicated, their views
Speaker 1: are ever changing. There is somewhat of a consensus out
Speaker 1: there in the public. But I wouldn't even say the
Speaker 1: problem between Democrats and Republicans is ideological. The problem, on
Speaker 1: a lot of levels is political Democrats. This last quote
Speaker 1: unquote bipartisan bill that was offered did not have any
Speaker 1: comprehensive immigration reform in it. It was all on the
Speaker 1: enforcement side, and Republicans wanted to keep it as an
Speaker 1: election issue, and Trump urged them to keep as an
Speaker 1: election issue. So you know, it was blocked. I'm glad
Speaker 1: it's blocked because I didn't support it. I think there
Speaker 1: should be more pathways decisienship. I think there should be
Speaker 1: an increase in legal immigration. You and I obviously starkly
Speaker 1: disagree on that. But on the politics of this, it's
Speaker 1: just a foolish move. It's an illegal move, it's an
Speaker 1: impractical move, it's not going to be effectively implemented, and
Speaker 1: it's also you know, as a leftist, I always note
Speaker 1: the fact that he's so the the Democrats and Biden
Speaker 1: in particular, so quick to completely turn on a dime
Speaker 1: and completely shift policy when the pressure is from the right,
Speaker 1: but when it's from the left, like as in you know,
Speaker 1: unconditional support for Israel, he will never ever, ever change.
Speaker 1: And I think it's both comes from an ideological place,
Speaker 1: like Joe Biden is, you know, a conservative Democrat. You
Speaker 1: can look at his history throughout his many many years
Speaker 1: in Washington and you see that. And it's also just
Speaker 1: this instinct within the Democratic Party that came up in
Speaker 1: the Clinton era of like always and forever, the right
Speaker 1: political move is to punch left. The right political move
Speaker 1: is to move to the right, move to the center.
Speaker 1: That's always their instinct, no matter what. And so that's
Speaker 1: how you end up with a situation where you remember
Speaker 1: they were on the debate stage, like speaking their high
Speaker 1: school Spanish and competing to say who could be more
Speaker 1: humane towards immigrants, And now you know, the minute that
Speaker 1: there's a little bit of political pressure, he just lips
Speaker 1: on a dime and is like, I'll be just like
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, don't worry about it, guys.
Speaker 2: Okay, as you said, we have multiple multi hour debates
Speaker 2: about immigration that I.
Speaker 3: Think people can go and watch.
Speaker 2: Now at this point, we're just going to quibble a
Speaker 2: little bit there about fascism, Crystal, because I don't think
Speaker 2: it's fascist to enforce the laws or to be concerned
Speaker 2: about the borders around the country. Okay, Well, that's again
Speaker 2: in terms of quote unquote the law and how it's
Speaker 2: interpreted and enforced. Is now no president has actually enforced
Speaker 2: quote unquote immigration law in the last forty five years,
Speaker 2: which whatever we can get to a very broader discussion
Speaker 2: about that, and also about the merits of so called
Speaker 2: legal immigration, especially the illegal immigration that is a part
Speaker 2: of this. I do think you can we can all
Speaker 2: very least admit here that the politics of this for
Speaker 2: President Biden have been bad from day one, the images
Speaker 2: from the southern border and in evidence that even this
Speaker 2: move now has come so far late for him. Let's
Speaker 2: put this on the screen because I found this fascinating.
Speaker 2: Even amidst his attempt to try and appear tough on
Speaker 2: the border, all of the swing state Democrats who are
Speaker 2: in tight races denied his request to appear next to
Speaker 2: him for this event. So I'm going to read everybody
Speaker 2: a list here. Senator John Tester, Tammy Baldwin, Jackie Rosen,
Speaker 2: and Bob Casey, all seeking reelection in battles ground states,
Speaker 2: will not attend because crystal of scheduling conflicts. You know,
Speaker 2: the calendar is a real bitch, isn't it. It's like
Speaker 2: who He's got to meet with Bob Casey and all
Speaker 2: these other people, even though they are in town, just
Speaker 2: so everybody understands they're here in Washington, They've got to
Speaker 2: meet with the Parkinson's delegation of Montana or some other
Speaker 2: fly in delegation from elsewhere, and they don't have time.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry for the President of the United States. That
Speaker 2: demonstrates to you too how toxic he actually is now,
Speaker 2: I think, both on this issue, but more so how
Speaker 2: they are all running far ahead of him.
Speaker 3: Let's not forget.
Speaker 2: I mean, for example, in the state of Nevada, Jackie
Speaker 2: Rosen has got some eighteen point swing between Donald Trump
Speaker 2: and between her support in the state. John Tester and
Speaker 2: Bob Casey are both running way ahead of Joe Biden,
Speaker 2: who I think by a margin at least in the
Speaker 2: state of Pennsylvania by seven or eight points. Tester, I mean,
Speaker 2: Tester is always an interesting case, but he remains at
Speaker 2: the very least a lot more popular than he is.
Speaker 2: So in every single case of the swing state Democrat,
Speaker 2: you have them absolutely shunning Joe Biden and rhetorically are
Speaker 2: likely going to be hitting him on this issue on
Speaker 2: the campaign trail like Mark Kelly did back in the
Speaker 2: midterm election. So there's a lot of lessons here, I
Speaker 2: think you know, on the Biden issue. But what we
Speaker 2: can see is that this is a last gasp at
Speaker 2: trying to hold on to the election, and at this point,
Speaker 2: I think the sun belt is gone for Joe Biden.
Speaker 2: His best best case is to stop the bleeding amongst
Speaker 2: the white boomers in the blue walls, so called old
Speaker 2: Blue Wall states Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. And what he's
Speaker 2: trying to do here is hold on to just another
Speaker 2: couple of percent that could possibly win in the White
Speaker 2: House and the absolute edge of the margin, because that's
Speaker 2: really the only way I think you can rationalize what's
Speaker 2: happening here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it would be convenient for me to try to
Speaker 1: make the point that I think these Senate Democrats realize
Speaker 1: that embracing Trump immigration policy is bad politics. But I
Speaker 1: think you're right that it's just about they see that
Speaker 1: Joe Biden is the toxic figure and they don't want
Speaker 1: to be at a photo op with him for this
Speaker 1: or any other issue. I don't think it's like a
Speaker 1: principal stand in favor of the previous positions that they
Speaker 1: stake down in favor of a humane immigration policy. But
Speaker 1: just I've mentioned the study a bunch of times. I
Speaker 1: just want to put it up so people can see
Speaker 1: this research that was done in Europe. We can put
Speaker 1: this up on the screen. They looked at eight different
Speaker 1: European countries, and again they showed no evidence that shifting
Speaker 1: to the right on immigration helped these sort of center
Speaker 1: left figures, because immigration hardliners were already in whatever the
Speaker 1: right wing party was in those states, just like your
Speaker 1: immigration hardliners are already in the Republican Party. The Democrats
Speaker 1: have a variety of coalitional issues at this point, and
Speaker 1: certainly they're not only those issues are not only coming
Speaker 1: from the left, but one of their coalitional issues is
Speaker 1: among progressives and young people and voters of color.
Speaker 4: And this does nothing to.
Speaker 1: Make those voters feel more affection for Joe Biden, So
Speaker 1: you know, on net, I don't think it helps him.
Speaker 1: It probably doesn't hurt him either, But I don't think
Speaker 1: that this is like the political magic trick that they
Speaker 1: seem to think it is, so much so that they're
Speaker 1: willing to even though they know that it's going to
Speaker 1: be struck down and is illegal, willing to go forward
Speaker 1: with it nonetheless. And the other thing I would say
Speaker 1: is there is a risk because part of successful campaigning
Speaker 1: is defining the issue landscape on which you're running. So
Speaker 1: the more that the political conversation is about abortion, the
Speaker 1: worst landscape that is for Republicans. And it really doesn't
Speaker 1: matter what Donald Trump says, or what issue position he
Speaker 1: puts it out, or if he was in office, what
Speaker 1: executive order he's signed. That's just a bad landscape for Republicans.
Speaker 1: The more Democrats are talking about the need for an
Speaker 1: addition a more restrictive immigration policy than where they're talking
Speaker 1: about immigration in general, the worst putting they are on
Speaker 1: for this election. So to the extent that this signing
Speaker 1: this executive order and doing this whole big push focuses
Speaker 1: the conversation on what is probably Joe Biden's worst issue set.
Speaker 1: I do think it is deallyterious to him politically sort of,
Speaker 1: no matter what the policy ultimately is.
Speaker 2: I agree absolutely Israel. Israel and immigration are as too worse.
Speaker 2: I think immigration might be slightly worse, but Israel is
Speaker 2: also up there. The Hunter Biden trial began yesterday. We
Speaker 2: have some video here that we can show everybody. This
Speaker 2: show's Hunter and his wife Melissa, arriving at the federal
Speaker 2: courthouse for the criminal firearm charges. Everyone will recall this
Speaker 2: trial was never actually supposed to happen because the prosecutors
Speaker 2: and Hunter had a sweetheart deal worked out which would
Speaker 2: vote him any charges. It would have helped him move
Speaker 2: past the two million dollars or so that he owed
Speaker 2: to the irs.
Speaker 3: We had the irs whistleblowers and all of that come out.
Speaker 2: But the judge actually ended up throwing that out at
Speaker 2: the court, saying that this is just simply an unacceptable
Speaker 2: deal and he'd never seen anything like it before. So
Speaker 2: let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: All of the jury members were actually chosen yesterday. A
Speaker 2: great headline here from the Wall Street Journal Hunter Biden's trial,
Speaker 2: crack Cocaine a cult Cobra Revolver and an alleged lie.
Speaker 2: So as they write here in what really could be
Speaker 2: a movie. In October twenty eighteen, on the Friday evening,
Speaker 2: Hunter Biden rolled up in a black Cadillac to star
Speaker 2: question Shoot and Survival supply in Delaware City. A salesman
Speaker 2: standing in the video didn't recognize him and would later
Speaker 2: recall declining a tip from the younger Biden as he
Speaker 2: purchased a thirty eight caliber Cult Revolver. There is no
Speaker 2: mistaking though, when he appeared in federal court on his
Speaker 2: charging stemming from that twenty eighteen purpose, where files and
Speaker 2: videos from the Hunter Biden laptop, which now have been
Speaker 2: validated and cited by the FBI and the Department of Justice,
Speaker 2: showed that he was using drugs at that time. Anybody
Speaker 2: who's bought a gun, including myself, understands that whenever you
Speaker 2: do so, you have to sign an attest that you
Speaker 2: are not under the influence of drugs and alcohol and
Speaker 2: you're not currently using those things or sorry, specifically with
Speaker 2: illegal drugs. And so you could see here that the charge,
Speaker 2: the gun charge in particular, on this trial, it's almost
Speaker 2: mystifying Crystal why he did not end up pleading guilty
Speaker 2: because it is so patently obvious as to that. It
Speaker 2: is so patently obvious that he did lie on this gun. Now,
Speaker 2: this is separate, as I said previously, from the tax charges,
Speaker 2: which will begin a little bit later. I think that
Speaker 2: is currently delayed to early September. But they are literally
Speaker 2: going to use the younger Biden's own words against him, Crystal,
Speaker 2: including in his memoir twenty twenty one called Beautiful Things,
Speaker 2: where he openly writes about quote, smoking drugs and making
Speaker 2: arrangements to buy drugs at the exact time that he
Speaker 2: was buying the gun. So he's on tape using drugs
Speaker 2: at the time of the gun purchase in his own
Speaker 2: memoir admidst using drugs at that time, and then yet
Speaker 2: is pleading not guilty here in the trial. So it
Speaker 2: would take, I think a miracle to see him get
Speaker 2: off in this particular case.
Speaker 1: I want to know where my principled Second Amendment defenders
Speaker 1: are who think this is an outrageous abusive of pastually
Speaker 1: that there shouldn't be these restrictions put on gun lawful
Speaker 1: gun owners.
Speaker 3: I will speak for them.
Speaker 2: I will speak for them, which is as you say,
Speaker 2: as us Second Amendment. People will always say, we all
Speaker 2: need to enforce the laws that are already on the books,
Speaker 2: and so this is what that looks like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, drug out there.
Speaker 4: You want to get rid of the laws that are
Speaker 4: on the books too, you have to do it.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, okay, so want that listen. Putting that aside,
Speaker 1: why does this matter? There's a few things that are
Speaker 1: relevant here. Number one, it is an extraordinary situation where
Speaker 1: this is Biden's own Justice department prosecuting his own son.
Speaker 1: So that is kind of a remarkable situation. None of
Speaker 1: this has anything to do you know, the allegations here
Speaker 1: a guns Hunter have nothing to do with Joe Biden.
Speaker 1: There's no you know, h the business dealings and whatever
Speaker 1: aren't tied up in this. It's just literally, we think
Speaker 1: that you bought a gun while you were using drugs, which,
Speaker 1: you know, if Hunter was telling the truth when he
Speaker 1: was writing his memoir, certainly appears to be the case.
Speaker 1: But could it be politically embarrassing for Joe Biden because
Speaker 1: whatever testimony comes out, you know about Hunter and his
Speaker 1: lifestyle and any potential entanglements with his father, Yes, potentially,
Speaker 1: you know, on the politics of it, people been knowing
Speaker 1: that Hunter is kind of a hot mess for a while.
Speaker 4: And I don't think that that is Joe Biden's biggest problem.
Speaker 1: I don't even think it's in the top one hundred
Speaker 1: list of Joe Biden's biggest problems at this point in
Speaker 1: terms of his reelect.
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, I didn't say necessarily. But you know, as
Speaker 2: you said, there are going to be some embarrassing things.
Speaker 2: For example, prosecutors planned to show videos and photographs of
Speaker 2: Biden's smoking crack that were backed up to his apple
Speaker 2: iCloud account and the now infamous laptop. Jill Biden was
Speaker 2: actually spotted leaving the trial yesterday at the time that
Speaker 2: some of these videos were playing. Let's Gohea and put
Speaker 2: this up there on the screen. This is from Kyle Griffin.
Speaker 2: This is a statement of President Biden at the beginning
Speaker 2: of the trial. He says, I am the President, but
Speaker 2: I am also a dad. Jill and I love our son.
Speaker 2: We are so proud of the man he is today.
Speaker 2: Hunter's resilience in the face of adversity and strength he
Speaker 2: has brought to his recovery are inspiring to us. A
Speaker 2: lot of families have loved ones who overcome addiction and
Speaker 2: know what we mean. As president, I don't and won't
Speaker 2: comment on the pending federal cases, but as a dad,
Speaker 2: I have boundless love for my son, confidence in him,
Speaker 2: and respect for his strength. Our family has been through
Speaker 2: a lot together, and Jill and I are going to
Speaker 2: continue to be there for Hunter and our family with
Speaker 2: our love and our support. So I will say, you know, politically,
Speaker 2: that is one of the ways that Biden has always
Speaker 2: been able to head this off is with kind of
Speaker 2: his radical empathy I guess towards his son, which you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of people who have family members who are
Speaker 2: drug addicts can probably sympathize with.
Speaker 3: Where a lot of people.
Speaker 2: See the hypocrisy is that, look, he has gotten away
Speaker 2: with so much simply because he is the president's son,
Speaker 2: perhaps no more so than the tax case where you
Speaker 2: literally had a Biden mega donor pay his entire tax
Speaker 2: bill of two million dollars, you know, with presumably nothing
Speaker 2: you know, really exchange, just so that he could avoid
Speaker 2: felony charges and try and plead down The case ended
Speaker 2: up not working, but the insight both into the amount
Speaker 2: of mine he's been able to profit off of his
Speaker 2: father's name is just outrageous. And we're not even talking about,
Speaker 2: you know, some of the China stuff and all that,
Speaker 2: which I certainly think is a problem for him. But
Speaker 2: the legalized corruption, you know, that has been displayed by
Speaker 2: Hunter throughout really his entire life is one which again
Speaker 2: I don't think it's in the top hundred problems for
Speaker 2: him per se. But the more that the public is
Speaker 2: reminded or sees that it will take a little bit
Speaker 2: away from President Biden and kind of the way that
Speaker 2: people think about what used to be one of his
Speaker 2: strongest assets, which was empathy talking about the loss of
Speaker 2: his son and family the whole, like cares about people
Speaker 2: like you. That was something that always related back to
Speaker 2: his experiences with his children.
Speaker 3: And so could you know, bring this to light in
Speaker 3: the same way.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not comparing necessarily too, but the Trump
Speaker 2: guilty verdict did genuinely bring in a lot of eyeballs
Speaker 2: and public consciousness around this. Will a Hunter guilty verdict
Speaker 2: do the same? No, not claiming that at all, but
Speaker 2: it will create problems at the very least, like it
Speaker 2: will put it on the front pages and on television
Speaker 2: screens for others whenever they see perhaps some of the
Speaker 2: details here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's a traudury situation, right, and you know,
Speaker 1: to the extent there's a claiming of a moral high ground.
Speaker 4: Perhaps there's an issue for him there. I don't know.
Speaker 1: On the other hand, I do think Republicans run the
Speaker 1: risk of, as they often do, overplaying their hand. We
Speaker 1: saw this directly with Trump and the way he talked
Speaker 1: about Hunter. And then immediately this was back in the debates,
Speaker 1: you know, last time they ran against each other. Immediately
Speaker 1: Joe Biden goes to like, you know, trying to display
Speaker 1: empathy not only for his son, but connecting to the
Speaker 1: millions of parents out there who have you know, a
Speaker 1: child or a loved one who is also struggling with addiction.
Speaker 1: So there there is a danger there. And Republicans, you know,
Speaker 1: are little tone deaf when it comes to this. They're
Speaker 1: you know, they're a little obsessed with like again, the
Speaker 1: Hunter Biden stories that most of the public, it really
Speaker 1: hasn't rated for them as one of their top concerns
Speaker 1: with Joe Biden. Obviously, their whole like in p effort
Speaker 1: to go after Joe Biden hasn't really gone anywhere. And
Speaker 1: you know, it has been such a sort of failure
Speaker 1: that even right wing media is like, come on, guys,
Speaker 1: what's going on here? Why is there no there there?
Speaker 1: Why aren't we seeing these smoking guns that you keep promising.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if I had to say, I
Speaker 1: think it's kind of inconsequential for the election, but you
Speaker 1: never know what can come out of it, and it's
Speaker 1: certainly an uncomfortable situation for Joe Biden.
Speaker 2: All right, let's move on to the stock situation. Though
Speaker 2: there was absolutely insane day yesterday on Wall Street. Let's
Speaker 2: go and put this up there on the screen. The
Speaker 2: New York Stock Exchange had to fix an issue that
Speaker 2: showed ninety nine percent drops and triggered trading halt on
Speaker 2: forty different stocks, including Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway. So there
Speaker 2: are a lot of memes that dropped about this one
Speaker 2: about how Berkshire Hathaway and Warren Buffett really were wrong
Speaker 2: all along showing a ninety nine percent the stock of
Speaker 2: the company. The disruption quote was resolved after forty five minutes,
Speaker 2: which is a pretty long time there in the life
Speaker 2: cycle of the New York Stocky Strange. The New York
Speaker 2: Stocky Shans is going to have to cancel all bad
Speaker 2: trades as a result of that, and also.
Speaker 3: Reviewing quote erroneous halts.
Speaker 2: So anytime something like this happens, it should really freak
Speaker 2: us out because obviously the integrity of our markets is
Speaker 2: one of the things that we like to tout all
Speaker 2: across the world, and a single glitch of forty five
Speaker 2: minutes can drop the value ninety nine percent of some
Speaker 2: of the world's most valuable companies. Yeah, that should freak
Speaker 2: you out as to how brittle the system actually is.
Speaker 2: At the same time, and part of the reason that
Speaker 2: we want to put all this stuff together there is
Speaker 2: the same like David and Goliath thing that is currently
Speaker 2: happening with Keith Gil aka Roaring Kitty on game Stop.
Speaker 2: So Keith gil as we've covered before, returned previously both
Speaker 2: to Twitter, tweeting out memes showing and rallying the game
Speaker 2: Stop stock. Well, recently he returned to Reddit actually and
Speaker 2: revealed a multi million dollar position in game Stop. Let's
Speaker 2: put this up there on the screen. You can see
Speaker 2: here a screenshot from Keith Kill's trading account from e Trade.
Speaker 2: Keep in mind e Trade, we're going to come back
Speaker 2: to that one, but a significant position there of some
Speaker 2: one hundred million dollars or.
Speaker 3: So if executed well.
Speaker 2: This has now spawned a major conversation on CNBC and
Speaker 2: elsewhere amongst the Wall Street elites who are like, hey,
Speaker 2: should this be allowed? Should it really be allowed that
Speaker 2: mister Gill can simply just post and then invite this
Speaker 2: major rally into GameStop stock. Here, for example, is a
Speaker 2: former SEC chairman who questions whether this is something that
Speaker 2: we should tolerate in our markets.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 5: It's not insider trading. That's that's that's clear less. He
Speaker 5: and he's trading on his own information. That's why it's
Speaker 5: not insider trading. But is this Is this something that
Speaker 5: we should be tolerating in our markets? You know, whether
Speaker 5: it's legal or I don't think so. And that's why
Speaker 5: I say, why does it?
Speaker 6: You know? What does that mean?
Speaker 3: To tell it to the idea?
Speaker 7: I would think as you look at this more in
Speaker 7: the context of market manipulation, right, and the question is
Speaker 7: are you allowed to manipulate the market?
Speaker 8: People, by the way, publish.
Speaker 7: Things all the time and they say, hey, I like
Speaker 7: this stock, and they, you know, hope that other folks
Speaker 7: follow them. Is that market manipulation generally not?
Speaker 9: Maybe?
Speaker 8: Maybe maybe not.
Speaker 7: So what is the distinction in your mind as somebody
Speaker 7: who ran this department and who's looking at and cares
Speaker 7: about the integrity of these markets.
Speaker 5: That's why that's why I'm saying, Okay, we can we
Speaker 5: can discuss what are exactly the facts and circumstances around
Speaker 5: the publication of this tweet and the like.
Speaker 3: But in the meantime, if you care.
Speaker 5: About the markets and you care about investing, come on
Speaker 5: this program right, tell people, Tell people why you did this.
Speaker 3: From your lips Chrystal to the SEC chairman.
Speaker 2: It's not market manipulation when you appear on CNBC, like
Speaker 2: let's say a guy named Bill Ackman, and you say
Speaker 2: terror is coming and it's going to be horror and
Speaker 2: there's going to be a huge crash, and then there's
Speaker 2: a huge market crash, and then it comes out a
Speaker 2: little bit later that actually you had bought a huge
Speaker 2: portion at the bottom that you helped spark and you
Speaker 2: made a multi billion dollar profit. You see, that's actually
Speaker 2: not market manipulation.
Speaker 3: That's normal.
Speaker 2: It's also normal when hedgstund managers and others pump their
Speaker 2: bullshit SPACs and investments on Twitter inviting other users and
Speaker 2: fans to buy something that is not market manipulation at
Speaker 2: all because they're managers. Whereas this guy is just some
Speaker 2: rando who happened to get very lucky on GameStop and
Speaker 2: invite you know, like a social movement of retail traders.
Speaker 2: When he does it, then now it needs to be investigated.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is this is complete bullshit. It's like
Speaker 2: I thought political elites were bad, but these wall stream
Speaker 2: people this is a whole other level.
Speaker 1: Well, they're the same. I mean, they're a pull in
Speaker 1: the strings. So yeah, the political behavior is downstream of
Speaker 1: what these assholes think. Listen, if if this was a
Speaker 1: person who had a genuine concern across the board about
Speaker 1: market manipulation, and if there was a consistent principle being
Speaker 1: held here, then you know you could hear him out. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's got listen. Roaring Kitty isn't a small fish anymore. Right,
Speaker 1: he's got one is one hundred and forty million dollars
Speaker 1: stake or I mean he's got a huge steak. Now
Speaker 1: he's got a whole lot of money. You could have
Speaker 1: a debate about, all right, should this be allowed but
Speaker 1: you can't take these people seriously when you know, when
Speaker 1: it's their buddies on Wall Street, when it's Bill Ackman,
Speaker 1: when it's test funders and whoever who do it. And
Speaker 1: that's perfectly fine as long as they have their little
Speaker 1: invite ticket to the green room at CNBC, which is
Speaker 1: like the cool kids club for Wall Street. You know,
Speaker 1: as long as they have that, then it's perfectly fine.
Speaker 1: It's only when it's an all insider who's benefiting from
Speaker 1: this mass grassroots meme stock movement, then we really need
Speaker 1: to drop the hammer. Then we need to look into
Speaker 1: it because he isn't officially sanctioned in the club and
Speaker 1: isn't cheating in the ways that we feel comfortable with.
Speaker 4: So that's why you just have to laugh.
Speaker 1: And you know the comment about he could come on CNBC,
Speaker 1: that really gives away the whole game, because if you
Speaker 1: aren't in the elite circle that's going to get invited
Speaker 1: into the green room on CNBC, then you're not allowed
Speaker 1: to cheat.
Speaker 4: Only that's only rigging the game.
Speaker 1: That's only for us, right, that's all I'm telling you
Speaker 1: what the upset is about.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're like, no, no, no, you can't do this. Man,
Speaker 3: you have to be on CNBC to pump your own book.
Speaker 3: Didn't you know that?
Speaker 2: And look, I mean we're not exaggerating here. This is
Speaker 2: a real problem. Now, let's put B five up on
Speaker 2: the screen. This is from the Wall Street Journal. E Trade,
Speaker 2: which is currently backstopped by Morgan Stanley, is considering kicking
Speaker 2: off Keith Gill from the platform. Keep in mind, as
Speaker 2: I said earlier, that Keith revealed his position some one
Speaker 2: hundred and forty million dollars at least the current value
Speaker 2: of what he currently has from an each trade account
Speaker 2: that he had just simply screenshot it. He wasn't marketing
Speaker 2: each trade, he wasn't using each trade. He wasn't even
Speaker 2: necessarily like doing anything except what any of us.
Speaker 3: Might do with our normal brokerage account.
Speaker 2: They are now considering literally kicking him off of the platform,
Speaker 2: despite the fact that he has not violated any securities laws.
Speaker 2: They say that he has quote discussed concerns about possible
Speaker 2: manipulation in game stop and would effectively take away his
Speaker 2: ability as a customer to trade on the platform. Their
Speaker 2: debate includes action whether his actions have amounted to manipulation,
Speaker 2: and whether or not the firm is not willing to
Speaker 2: risk drawing the attention of his meme army by removing him.
Speaker 2: So of course they should worry about that because a
Speaker 2: lot of retail traders might ditch e trade, you know,
Speaker 2: if that were to happen. But I mean, the reason
Speaker 2: why this is so shocking to me is that this
Speaker 2: is a Morgan. This is Morgan STANMP, this is a
Speaker 2: Wall Street institution. Think about how many filthy deals and
Speaker 2: trades that these people facilitate every single day in terms
Speaker 2: of settling. But when Keith Gill screenshots his brokerage account
Speaker 2: of his position in game, stop, Now they are concerned
Speaker 2: about market manipulation. As you said, when you audit all
Speaker 2: Bloomberg terminal messages and you start going after the fund
Speaker 2: managers on CNBC and after the people on Twitter who
Speaker 2: have literally pumped up stocks and SPACs that have lost
Speaker 2: over ninety percent of their value, resulting in massive loss
Speaker 2: to their customers, then maybe I will listen about, you know,
Speaker 2: restoring integrity to our markets, to our brokerage accounts and
Speaker 2: everything else. But this is just a straight up rigged game.
Speaker 2: And what's crazy is that they're just doing it again.
Speaker 2: You know, dumb money recently came out reminding everybody of
Speaker 2: the insanity of that entire situation. But you literally watch
Speaker 2: these trading platforms lock the ability to buy a certain stock.
Speaker 2: They could tell us all about their liquity or liquidity
Speaker 2: problems all they want, but you know, if you're a
Speaker 2: major trader who probably uses Morgan Stanley to settle many
Speaker 2: of your trades, you're not going to have or have
Speaker 2: that problem. If you're a hedge fund manager, It's just
Speaker 2: like whenever you try and play even remotely by any
Speaker 2: set of the rules that they do every single day,
Speaker 2: then now they call you a market manipulator and they'll
Speaker 2: literally shut down your ability to make any money.
Speaker 3: I think it's totally insane.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it does really harken back to when they stopped
Speaker 1: on Robinhood. They blocked the ability of people to continue
Speaker 1: buying the stock because they didn't like what was going
Speaker 1: on and there were financial entanglements there, et cetera. They
Speaker 1: deny it, et cetera, et cetera, but we all saw what.
Speaker 4: Was going on, and it has that same vibe.
Speaker 1: There is just a revulsion at the idea that this
Speaker 1: game could be played by anyone that isn't in their
Speaker 1: particular cocktail circuit. And yeah, I mean it's it's revealing,
Speaker 1: isn't it. It's really revealing the way this all happens.
Speaker 1: Market manipulation, like stock buy back our market manipulation that
Speaker 1: should be illegal. But I don't see any of these
Speaker 1: people getting upset and like go into Congress. Hey, we
Speaker 1: got to crack down. We got to ban these stock
Speaker 1: buybacks again. So spare me your oh the sanctity of
Speaker 1: the market moralizing, because we see how full of shit
Speaker 1: you ultimately are when it comes to you and your
Speaker 1: buddies and the people in your friend group that profit
Speaker 1: off of rigging the market, market manipulation, et cetera.
Speaker 3: Yeah exactly.
Speaker 2: I mean they write their own rules and then they
Speaker 2: claim that you know, if you if you try and
Speaker 2: play by them, if you actually try and emulate the
Speaker 2: exact same thing, then they either try to criminalize you
Speaker 2: or basically block you from the ability to trade. So
Speaker 2: this is like top tales old as time in terms
Speaker 2: of institutional corruption. And it's one of the ways that
Speaker 2: he really took I think he showed like to the
Speaker 2: wool out of everybody's eyes the first time around, but
Speaker 2: for them to just do it again I mean, it.
Speaker 3: Just shows again how how powerful they really are.
Speaker 2: They don't even care if they're caught openly manipulating things
Speaker 2: out in the open. As long as they're the only
Speaker 2: ones they get to do it, then that's it.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 2: We've got a great guest standing by Emily Copp to
Speaker 2: talk about that Fauci testimony. Let's get to it. Joining
Speaker 2: us now is Emily Kopp. She's a reporter at US
Speaker 2: Right to Know. Returning to the program, Emily, it's so
Speaker 2: good to see you again. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 8: Great to be here.
Speaker 3: Absolutely so.
Speaker 2: You were in the room yesterday with doctor Fauci while
Speaker 2: he's being grilled before Congress. There are some stunning moments,
Speaker 2: I guess, to say the least, we pulled one of
Speaker 2: them here to get your reaction.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 7: Do you agree that there was a push to downplay
Speaker 7: the lab leak theory?
Speaker 6: Not on my part?
Speaker 3: Really?
Speaker 4: Really?
Speaker 3: Wow?
Speaker 5: Well, I think I think most of the country will
Speaker 5: find that find that amazing, I said eleven seconds, but.
Speaker 6: Look at the facts. I've kept an open mind throughout
Speaker 6: the entire process.
Speaker 9: All right, I you back, you did not suppress the
Speaker 9: LAB leak theory. Yet in the past you have said, quote,
Speaker 9: it is a distortion of reality. Unquote, you've said, quote
Speaker 9: I've heard these conspiracy conspiracy theories, and like all conspiracy theories,
Speaker 9: they're just conspiracy theories. That's what you told the American people.
Speaker 9: And so would you like to clarify what science were
Speaker 9: you following?
Speaker 6: Denvers?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 6: No, I Actually I've also been very very clear and
Speaker 6: said multiple times that I don't think the concept of
Speaker 6: there being a lab leak is inherently a conspiracy theory.
Speaker 6: What is conspiracy is the kind of distortions of that
Speaker 6: particular subject, like it was a lab leak, and I
Speaker 6: was parachuted into the CIA like Jason Bourne and told
Speaker 6: the CIA that they should really not be talking about
Speaker 6: a lab leak.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 3: That's the conspiracciate that all right?
Speaker 2: So, Emily, you are, in my opinion, the pre eminent
Speaker 2: reporter on the lab leak situation. So what do we
Speaker 2: make about the veracity of doctor Fauci's claims there?
Speaker 10: Yeah, I mean to hear Fauci tell it, he had
Speaker 10: nothing to do with the fact that the lableek theory
Speaker 10: was maligned as a conspiracy theory for years and to
Speaker 10: be Frank continues to be maligned as a conspiracy theory
Speaker 10: by the hardcore Democratic partisans.
Speaker 8: In my Twitter mentions, yes, that's right.
Speaker 10: It just belies belief, and you can see it in
Speaker 10: the responses from the members of Congress there Fauji is
Speaker 10: the most influential scientists in America. And the idea that
Speaker 10: scientists who raised an alarm about the potential for a
Speaker 10: lab accident in Wuhan and who raised concerns about the
Speaker 10: papers in favor of zoonosis the wet market theory could
Speaker 10: have been maligned for years, and that this narrative could
Speaker 10: have persisted, that the zunosis theory was sacrosanct and not
Speaker 10: to be questioned, could have persisted if the most influential
Speaker 10: scientists in America had truly an open mind for years,
Speaker 10: is just really absurd.
Speaker 2: And so let's actually take a step back, because one
Speaker 2: of the best work that you have done is the
Speaker 2: Foyer and revelation a lot of these documents and the
Speaker 2: internal discussion. So definitively, how can we prove that doctor
Speaker 2: Fauji is saying is blatantly not true?
Speaker 3: Take us through the paper trail that you've been able
Speaker 3: to discover.
Speaker 8: Sure, yeah.
Speaker 10: I think at this point I've written like thirty thousand
Speaker 10: words is based on documents foyd by me, by another
Speaker 10: independent journalist, Jimmy Tobias, and through subpoenad records that the
Speaker 10: committee obtained showing emails and slack messages that show that
Speaker 10: the authors of that paper were saying very different things
Speaker 10: publicly and privately at the same time.
Speaker 8: And I actually mapped those statements over time.
Speaker 10: And there was no willingness by Fauci to consider that
Speaker 10: his participation in this paper and its prompting and in
Speaker 10: reading drafts, basically reading over the shoulders of these virologists
Speaker 10: who were writing about the possibility of a lab leakue
Speaker 10: early in the pandemic, there was no willingness on his
Speaker 10: part to consider that his influence, his power as the
Speaker 10: head of NIAID, which oversees billions of dollars in research grants,
Speaker 10: was inappropriate in itself, even if he didn't directly edit
Speaker 10: the paper.
Speaker 8: I think if you know, as the virologists who wrote that.
Speaker 10: Paper knew that NIAID Fauci's institute had funded gain of
Speaker 10: function research in Wuhan, and you know he was reading
Speaker 10: over your shoulder, you have an enormous incentive to only
Speaker 10: accumulate evidence in one direction, and that is what is
Speaker 10: borne out by the foud emails, by the slack messages
Speaker 10: that were subpoenaed by the Congressional committee. And the virologists
Speaker 10: even described one of the core concepts of their paper
Speaker 10: as crap, and it was in fact ghost written by
Speaker 10: one of the most infamous gain of function virologists of
Speaker 10: all time, Ron Fuchier, who they internally described as unbelievably conflicted.
Speaker 10: So they put out this paper, put their names on it,
Speaker 10: not really believing in one of its core concepts, and
Speaker 10: that happened after they participated in a teleconference with Fauci. This,
Speaker 10: I mean, giant in science and someone who never saw
Speaker 10: their funding. Wow, how do they make their livelihood?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so stunning.
Speaker 2: In One of the things that you've always done a
Speaker 2: great job of is that doctor Fauci and a lot
Speaker 2: of the scientific community and the media now at this
Speaker 2: point would rather call this a conspiracy theory and effectively
Speaker 2: cover up their own complicity in this question than actually
Speaker 2: answer to the one million or so people who in
Speaker 2: this country who died you know from this is or
Speaker 2: at least you know, whatever you can describe the debts
Speaker 2: in whatever you want. At the very least, we know
Speaker 2: it was what a couple hundred thousand and the very
Speaker 2: minimum of people who died from this disease, and from
Speaker 2: your reporting, as we know from last time around, it
Speaker 2: is almost certainly a lab leak. And yet you know,
Speaker 2: we see all of this effort in Congress to change,
Speaker 2: for example, the definition of gain of function research. So
Speaker 2: could you describe a little bit that does because Fauci,
Speaker 2: in the estimation of a lot of scientists, has committed
Speaker 2: perjury by trying to change the definition of gain of
Speaker 2: function research. Did he stick to that in his testimony
Speaker 2: when you were there, and what is exactly his excuse?
Speaker 10: He did double down on the false claim that ANIAID
Speaker 10: did not fund gain a function research in Wuhan. But
Speaker 10: I actually want to address your first point very briefly.
Speaker 10: I think the main takeaway from the hearing yesterday should
Speaker 10: have been that Fauci oversaw probably the most catastrophic.
Speaker 8: Policy failure in modern history.
Speaker 10: Which is the exportation of high risk virology to an
Speaker 10: adversarial country, a secretive country that did not have adequate
Speaker 10: protections against airborne viruses. But the main takeaway that I
Speaker 10: had sitting in that hearing room yesterday is that no
Speaker 10: bureaucrats should be the head of a federal agency overseeing
Speaker 10: billions of dollars for decades upon decades upon decades like
Speaker 10: Fauchi has, because his influence in Congress and the press
Speaker 10: and the scientific community really comes across because he keeps
Speaker 10: making these false statements with apparently no consequences. And so
Speaker 10: as you were saying, I believe committed perjury by continually
Speaker 10: conflating gain of function research and this other term called
Speaker 10: enhanced pandemic potential pathogen.
Speaker 8: So in order to conceal the fact that he lied to.
Speaker 10: Congress and his exchanges with Senator Ran Paul in twenty
Speaker 10: twenty one when he said his institute never funded gain
Speaker 10: of function research in Wuhan, he said, well, that's the
Speaker 10: general understanding, and my more technical, sophisticated understanding as a
Speaker 10: scientist is enhanced pandemic potential pathogens. So gain of function
Speaker 10: research refers to enhancing any pathogen in the lab, and
Speaker 10: enhanced pandemic potential pathogen refers to enhancing a virus that
Speaker 10: is already very dangerous, very deadly, and transmissible got it
Speaker 10: and the gain of function research that was occurring in
Speaker 10: Wuhan certainly meets that first definition. There was no general
Speaker 10: understanding of gain of function research when those exchanges with
Speaker 10: Senator Paul happened.
Speaker 8: No one had ever heard of.
Speaker 10: It, So the idea of that Fauci is now retrospectively
Speaker 10: applying this term that did not exist at the time
Speaker 10: the experiments were proved. It's like he thinks that he
Speaker 10: can bend space and time through his power as the
Speaker 10: former head of NIAID, which I think is sort of
Speaker 10: perverse because at the same time, he's not taking accountability
Speaker 10: for those projects having been approved despite his signature.
Speaker 8: Being on them.
Speaker 10: So on the one hand, he thinks he can redefine
Speaker 10: regulatory frameworks single handedly in order to cover up his perjury,
Speaker 10: but also take no accountability for what happened in Wuhan,
Speaker 10: and that's just inexcusable.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're right, because, as you said, it was probably
Speaker 2: one of the single greatest policy failures ever in modern history.
Speaker 2: To take your example of why beer crash didn't be
Speaker 2: their power. Ever, what do we all remember about j
Speaker 2: Edgar Hoover and about people who amass vast power in
Speaker 2: the federal bureaucracy with unaccountabilities, they commit atrocities, and then
Speaker 2: it's only after they're gone some thirty forty years later
Speaker 2: they we're gonna be like, oh yeah, that was.
Speaker 3: A real problem.
Speaker 2: By the way, the last time that we checked in
Speaker 2: it was basically a case closed. You know, we were
Speaker 2: checking in the zoonosis theory. There was they moved completely
Speaker 2: away from bats and now we were onto panglins. So
Speaker 2: I wanted to check in again. I think it's been
Speaker 2: like six seven months or whatever since we last spoke.
Speaker 2: Where are we currently now in terms of the zoonosis theory?
Speaker 2: What are they still grasping at or do they not
Speaker 2: even try now at this point to justify it.
Speaker 8: I think to.
Speaker 10: Some degree the attitude in the press and the scientific
Speaker 10: community is case closed, but in the other direction that
Speaker 10: the wet market theory is infallible, and in fact, that's
Speaker 10: been there the approach since February twenty twenty, before we
Speaker 10: had much information at all, with the publication of proximal origin,
Speaker 10: that paper I was referring to earlier. There have been
Speaker 10: criticisms of the two landmark papers and science that were
Speaker 10: championed by The New York Times as I'm sort of
Speaker 10: a case close for the natural origin theory. There have
Speaker 10: been critiques of that by people who are experts in
Speaker 10: spatial statistics that the idea that early case is cluster
Speaker 10: around the wet market is based on that analysis. We
Speaker 10: already kind of knew that the data was compromised because
Speaker 10: there was an early focus on the wet market that
Speaker 10: could have biased the data, and because there's so much
Speaker 10: censorship in China around that early pandemic period, So we
Speaker 10: already knew.
Speaker 8: That the data was pretty sketchy.
Speaker 10: But recently papers have come out in Peer review journal
Speaker 10: suggesting that the analysis applied to those data were also sketchy.
Speaker 3: Wow, that's amazing. So it's even more bunk than which
Speaker 3: you originally started out. Where can people find and support
Speaker 3: your work, Emily?
Speaker 10: You can find us at us Right to Know, or
Speaker 10: you can follow me on Twitter Emlia Coop.
Speaker 2: All right, we will have links down the description. As
Speaker 2: I said, the pre eminent reporter on this subject. In
Speaker 2: my opinion, she should have won on a Palitzer prize,
Speaker 2: but you know, it's the country that we live in.
Speaker 3: So Emily, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 8: Thanks so much,