WEBVTT - Predictions Come True 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:05.480 It is the official two year anniversary A Verdict with 0:00:05.559 --> 0:00:09.720 Ted Cruz. We've just gotten a major win in the 0:00:09.760 --> 0:00:13.800 Supreme Court. We've gotten a major win in the United 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:17.400 States Senate. There's a new, very important First Amendment case 0:00:17.440 --> 0:00:20.079 going to the Supreme Court that Senator Ted Cruise is 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:24.759 actually bringing himself, and we are in the mood to celebrate. 0:00:25.280 --> 0:00:34.440 This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. This episode A Verdict 0:00:34.440 --> 0:00:36.640 of Ted Cruise is brought to you by American Hartford Gold. 0:00:36.880 --> 0:00:38.839 I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed everything 0:00:38.920 --> 0:00:41.680 is getting expensive. 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Just go to stamps dot com, click 0:03:12.200 --> 0:03:13.920 on the microphone at the top of the homepage and 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:17.360 type in Verdict. That's stamps dot Com promo code Verdict. 0:03:18.080 --> 0:03:21.960 Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz. I'm Michael Knowles, Senator. 0:03:23.120 --> 0:03:26.560 Nothing's ever perfect in politics. There are some losses, there 0:03:26.560 --> 0:03:29.760 are some dangers, there are some threats. This has been 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:32.120 a good week. It has been a damn good week. 0:03:33.040 --> 0:03:35.520 The biggest win before we get into the case that 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:38.760 you are actually bringing to the Supreme Court, before we 0:03:38.800 --> 0:03:41.160 get into that, before we get into the filibuster, which 0:03:41.200 --> 0:03:44.880 lives lives to see another day, the ocean man. Yeah, 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:48.560 the Occupational Safety and Health Administration was demanding that eighty 0:03:48.560 --> 0:03:51.320 four million Americans take the fauci auchie as some of 0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:55.440 us call it, the COVID vaccine. Employers were enforcing it. 0:03:56.640 --> 0:03:59.200 Some people brought a lawsuit. One of the groups was 0:03:59.200 --> 0:04:03.200 the Daily Wire, a lawsuit, and the Supreme Court strikes 0:04:03.200 --> 0:04:06.800 effectively strikes down the mandate. Yeah. No, it was a 0:04:06.880 --> 0:04:08.760 huge victory for the rule of law. It was a 0:04:08.880 --> 0:04:12.120 very important case. When the OSHA mandate came out. We 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:15.160 talked about a lot on this podcast. Your employer, the 0:04:15.240 --> 0:04:17.800 Daily Wire, filed a lawsuit, was a party in the suit. 0:04:17.920 --> 0:04:21.279 So so we're actually sitting here, both of us our 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:25.680 parties in Supreme Court cases this past week. The Osha 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:28.320 case was huge, and when it came out, we had 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:30.360 a podcast at the time where we walked through the 0:04:30.480 --> 0:04:34.680 legal standards for OSHA promulgating a rule like that, and 0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:37.040 you'll recall we we said on the pod we said, 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:40.000 number one, we said, the Supreme Court's going to strike 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:41.839 it down. And in fact, when you and I talked 0:04:41.839 --> 0:04:45.120 about it, but when the case was being argued, I said, 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:47.080 I think the decision will be six three. I think 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:49.719 there will be six votes to strike it down as 0:04:49.800 --> 0:04:54.320 beyond OSHA's statutory authority, beyond the authority of the federal government. 0:04:55.240 --> 0:04:58.320 And we also talked about Ron Klain, who was the 0:04:58.320 --> 0:05:00.960 White House is the White House Chief of STA who 0:05:01.279 --> 0:05:06.279 stupidly sent a tweet right when the ocean mandate issued 0:05:06.279 --> 0:05:09.600 where he retweeted that this was a workaround to get 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:13.000 around the law. And you'll recall I talked about I 0:05:13.040 --> 0:05:15.320 tweeted at the time and said this was really dumb. 0:05:16.080 --> 0:05:20.359 And I promise you number one, this edict is going 0:05:20.400 --> 0:05:22.720 to be challenged. Number two, I believe it's going to 0:05:22.800 --> 0:05:26.040 be struck down in court. At number three, this idiotic 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:28.520 tweet from ron Klain is going to be exhibit A 0:05:29.160 --> 0:05:32.640 in the lawsuit and the Supreme Court's decision six three 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:34.919 striking it down. What did they sit, among other things 0:05:35.160 --> 0:05:38.039 ron Klain's tweet, this seems to be a workaround, and 0:05:38.120 --> 0:05:41.760 that's not legit. So I read the opinion of the court, 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:47.719 I read the concurring opinion of the Court's conservatives three Thomas, Alito, 0:05:47.839 --> 0:05:53.760 and Gorsich, and I read the liberal dissent. This is 0:05:53.760 --> 0:05:56.039 obviously all great news, but it was a little confusing. 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:58.360 I'm not a lawyer, I have no So they were 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:02.520 they stay the mandate and then they sent the mandate 0:06:02.560 --> 0:06:05.440 back to the lower Okay, So what they did is 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:08.240 they upheld the injunction, So the mandate is enjoined. An 0:06:08.240 --> 0:06:10.920 injunction is an order from a court, either to do 0:06:11.000 --> 0:06:14.160 something or not to do something. So the injunction means 0:06:14.160 --> 0:06:17.760 the mandate has no legal force. Okay, But they remandered 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:20.440 it to the lower court to have a trial to 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:25.120 consider the claims challenging the mandate. But the reason why 0:06:25.160 --> 0:06:29.839 this is really good, one of the grounds for upholding 0:06:29.880 --> 0:06:33.400 the injunction is likelihood of success on the merits. So 0:06:33.440 --> 0:06:37.120 six Justices have said the plaintiffs are likely to succeed. 0:06:37.800 --> 0:06:41.159 They haven't conclusively said their claims are valid, but they've 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:44.919 said they're likely to succeed on the merits that that 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:51.880 the Ocean mandate, for all intents and purposes, it is dead. Unfortunately, 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:54.280 there was a second decision that came out the same day, 0:06:55.040 --> 0:07:00.320 and that second decision was five four upholding a different 0:07:00.360 --> 0:07:04.599 vaccine mandate, the vaccine mandate that the Biden administration put 0:07:04.600 --> 0:07:07.520 on healthcare workers, and it put on healthcare workers in 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:11.840 facilities that are receiving federal funds either through Medicare or Medicaid. 0:07:12.720 --> 0:07:16.600 And that was five to four. It consisted of the 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:21.360 three Liberals plus Chief Justice Roberts plus Brett Cavanaugh were 0:07:21.400 --> 0:07:25.520 the five. And you know, we talked about before the 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:28.840 Supreme Court's decision coming out of New York with healthcare workers, 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:32.200 where they had refused to stay the decision out of 0:07:32.200 --> 0:07:34.520 New York. I think that was a mistake. I think 0:07:34.560 --> 0:07:38.920 this was a mistake. But look, the three Libs, they 0:07:38.960 --> 0:07:42.240 like all these mandates. Apparently the Biden can mandate us 0:07:42.280 --> 0:07:44.880 to do whatever we want to dance on one leg 0:07:44.920 --> 0:07:48.240 in a pink two two while singing Yankee Doodle Dante. 0:07:48.360 --> 0:07:50.760 The Libs more or less say that in the descent, 0:07:50.920 --> 0:07:53.600 they say there's basically no limit to what the government 0:07:53.640 --> 0:07:59.280 can do in this regard Roberts and Kavanaugh on healthcare workers, 0:07:59.320 --> 0:08:02.320 they're pretty comfortable with the federal government or the state government. 0:08:02.360 --> 0:08:04.360 The New York case was a state government issue. Here 0:08:04.360 --> 0:08:06.520 it's the federal government. But they're pretty comfortable with the 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:10.880 federal government forcing state workers, state healthcare workers, or just 0:08:10.920 --> 0:08:14.680 healthcare workers generally who were receiving government money to have 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:19.320 to have to get vaccinated. I think that was a 0:08:19.400 --> 0:08:24.119 serious mistake. I think they're undervaluing the liberty interest of 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:27.560 these healthcare workers because I had this question when I 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:31.440 saw Kavanaugh squish and flipped to the other side, I thought, well, 0:08:31.600 --> 0:08:34.400 do healthcare workers not have the same rights as every 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:36.880 other employee. So you remember we talked about that. There 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:39.439 are four different mandates that came out. There's a mandate 0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:43.280 for military service men and women. There's a mandate for 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:46.040 civilian employees. There's a mandate for federal contractors. There's a 0:08:46.040 --> 0:08:48.800 mandate for private employers with a hundred and more employees 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:55.000 under OSHA, and I said, they're all in descending likelihood 0:08:55.320 --> 0:08:59.720 of surviving. Yeah, so the OSHA order was always the 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:03.760 most vulnerable legally because the Oceans Statute doesn't allow this. 0:09:03.880 --> 0:09:08.760 That this is really a far stretch from what Congress 0:09:08.800 --> 0:09:11.199 intended on in OSHA, which is why Ron Klaine called 0:09:11.200 --> 0:09:15.760 it a workaround. To be fair the healthcare workers, there's 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:19.200 a stronger statutory argument there. The statutory language is different, 0:09:19.240 --> 0:09:21.800 and so there is a stronger argument. I still think 0:09:22.040 --> 0:09:25.240 that mandate should have been struck down as well, but 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:31.720 there is a meaningful difference in terms of with OSHA, 0:09:31.800 --> 0:09:34.800 they had zero legs to stand on. With the healthcare workers, 0:09:34.880 --> 0:09:36.600 they didn't even have a leg, but maybe they had 0:09:36.600 --> 0:09:41.280 a toe. Fair enough, fair enough, and still still basically 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:44.920 a win. Even if it was unfortunate that the court 0:09:44.960 --> 0:09:48.280 wouldn't go all the way on this second case, still 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:50.640 a major win. Eighty four million Americans don't need to 0:09:50.640 --> 0:09:52.840 be vaccinated against their will. Well, and I gotta say 0:09:52.840 --> 0:09:56.440 I take particular pride because not only did we predict 0:09:56.559 --> 0:09:59.800 at every stage would happen in this case on the podcast, 0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:04.280 but the lawyer argued the case was my former chief Council. 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:07.240 So it's a fellow named Scott Keller's a great guy. 0:10:08.520 --> 0:10:11.600 Scott was actually a student of mine. So I met 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:13.959 Scott when I was teaching at University of Texas Law 0:10:13.960 --> 0:10:17.000 School and he was a law student there. I taught 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:22.120 a seminar on US Supreme Court litigation and he took 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:24.920 the class. He was excellent in the class, did extraordinary. 0:10:24.960 --> 0:10:26.800 I gave him an A plus, and then I didn't 0:10:26.800 --> 0:10:30.720 give very many a pluses. He graduated number one in 0:10:30.720 --> 0:10:33.000 his class at University of Texas Law School. He went 0:10:33.040 --> 0:10:36.040 and clerked on the Court of Appeals. He clerked for 0:10:36.120 --> 0:10:40.280 Justice Kennedy on the Supreme Court, and I recommended him 0:10:40.280 --> 0:10:43.200 for that. And then when I several years later, when 0:10:43.480 --> 0:10:46.280 I was elected to the Senate, I hired Scott as 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:48.720 my first chief council. So when I showed up a 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:52.040 decade ago in the Senate, Scott we were down in 0:10:52.080 --> 0:10:53.760 the basement. I just got in here. When you first 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:55.600 get here, you don't have a real office. You're sort 0:10:55.640 --> 0:10:59.000 of intemporary space, and you're just trying to figure out everything. 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:02.400 So Scott spent a couple of years with me as 0:11:02.440 --> 0:11:06.120 my chief counsel and then actually came and quit. And 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:10.200 here's why I quit, because he'd been appointed to be 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:13.040 the Solicitor General of Texas. Not a bad gig, and 0:11:13.120 --> 0:11:15.520 it's my old job. It's a job I loved. I 0:11:15.559 --> 0:11:18.400 did five and a half years. And when Scott gave 0:11:18.440 --> 0:11:20.760 his notice, I was really sad, like I didn't want 0:11:20.800 --> 0:11:23.199 to lose him because he's a really talented lawyer. But 0:11:23.520 --> 0:11:29.160 I couldn't complain because SG of Texas is an amazing job, 0:11:29.440 --> 0:11:32.160 and you get to argue cases. You get to argue cases. 0:11:32.240 --> 0:11:34.400 So Scott has now argued more cases than I did. 0:11:34.400 --> 0:11:38.600 I argued nine cases. When he argued his tenth case, 0:11:38.679 --> 0:11:40.720 I called in that morning and said, all right, screw you. 0:11:41.679 --> 0:11:43.360 I just had to say that as former boss, I 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:45.160 had to like throw that marker down. So now I 0:11:45.200 --> 0:11:46.760 have to ask you, Obviously you're not going to be 0:11:46.960 --> 0:11:49.880 arguing a case before the Supreme Court right now, but 0:11:50.360 --> 0:11:53.000 are you bringing this case before the Supreme Court just 0:11:53.160 --> 0:11:56.679 to beat your old general counsel? Well? No, but but 0:11:57.040 --> 0:11:59.240 there was a separate case. So we're sitting here, we're 0:11:59.280 --> 0:12:03.600 recording this. On Wednesday. This morning, the Supreme Court heard 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:07.400 oral argument. The very first case was Federal Election Commission 0:12:07.559 --> 0:12:11.120 versus Ted Cruz, and I am the plain iff. I 0:12:11.200 --> 0:12:15.480 have sued the Federal Election Commission seeking to strike down 0:12:15.640 --> 0:12:19.480 a provision of McCain Finegold. The Big campaign finance legislation's 0:12:19.640 --> 0:12:24.040 terrible piece of legislation has all sorts of problems, but 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:27.640 at the heart of it, McCain Finegold was all about 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:31.160 incumbent politicians wanting to make it harder for anyone to 0:12:31.240 --> 0:12:33.520 run against them and challenge them. It was about the 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:36.920 one thing Republicans and Democrats could agree on is nobody 0:12:36.960 --> 0:12:40.160 should beat us in an election. Mcain Finegold is throwing 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:42.480 barriers in the way of challenge. This doesn't make sense though, 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:44.440 because I was reading a lot of left wing news 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:46.400 sources today. They was telling me. They were all telling 0:12:46.440 --> 0:12:48.600 me about the case, and they say that Ted Cruz 0:12:49.000 --> 0:12:52.120 is bringing a lawsuit before the Supreme Court to make 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:56.760 it easier to bribe and corrupt politicians and to make 0:12:56.840 --> 0:13:00.320 this swamp land even swampier. Are you telling me that 0:13:00.320 --> 0:13:02.120 the left wing media got it wrong? You're right, that's 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:06.640 every headline as Cruise wants more bribery, and even for 0:13:06.679 --> 0:13:09.559 the media that's a little dishonest. So there were two 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:13.040 provisions of McCain fine Gold that were called the Millionaire's 0:13:13.040 --> 0:13:19.320 Amendment so incumbent politicians hate anyone that can challenge them. 0:13:19.360 --> 0:13:21.600 They particularly hate people who have money. So if you 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:23.920 get a really rich person that runs against you, that's 0:13:24.080 --> 0:13:26.560 really problematic because then they can run ads and communicate, 0:13:26.600 --> 0:13:29.280 and you get a problem. So the Millionaire's Amendment half 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:32.560 of it said that if someone self finances and puts 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:35.840 a whole bunch of money into his own campaign, that 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:39.320 the federal limits for the other guy are tripled. So 0:13:39.360 --> 0:13:42.320 instead of twenty nine hundred a person, it's nearly nine 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:48.400 grand a person, And that's entirely designed to benefit incumbents 0:13:48.840 --> 0:13:51.680 and to discourage rich people from running against them. Well, 0:13:51.720 --> 0:13:54.000 the Supreme Court a few years ago struck that half 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:56.440 of the Millionaire's Amendment down. Said, look, if someone decides 0:13:56.480 --> 0:13:58.200 to run for office, if they want to invest their 0:13:58.240 --> 0:14:01.040 own resources and speak, you have a right to speech. 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:03.760 And that means spending your own money to speak. If 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.200 you want to put a billboard on the freeway, if 0:14:06.240 --> 0:14:07.959 you want to run a radio add or a TV ad, 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:10.680 all of that is political speech. So that was half 0:14:10.720 --> 0:14:13.040 of the Millionaire's Amendment that was struck down several years ago. 0:14:13.960 --> 0:14:16.040 The other half of the Millionaire's Amendment is what this 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:19.640 case is all about, and it's a provision that limits 0:14:19.680 --> 0:14:22.600 the ability of a candidate who's running for office to 0:14:22.800 --> 0:14:25.280 loan money to his own campaign. So the way it works, 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:27.840 let's say Michael Knowles wakes up and says I'm going 0:14:27.880 --> 0:14:30.720 to run for Congress, and you'd say, get this man 0:14:30.760 --> 0:14:34.280 to a psychiatrist who's lost his mind. But you're incurable, 0:14:34.520 --> 0:14:37.400 and you say, I'm gonna run. I'm taken on AOC, 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:40.480 I'm moving to New York, my old district. We're going 0:14:40.560 --> 0:14:43.760 and I'm gonna win. Now, if you're starting, you know, 0:14:43.800 --> 0:14:46.320 you may not have a lot of supporters. You're not 0:14:46.360 --> 0:14:49.360 an incumbent politician. You don't have lobbyists probably supporting you, 0:14:49.360 --> 0:14:52.400 you don't have the infrastructure that an incumbent has. So 0:14:52.680 --> 0:14:54.520 what a lot of people do if they launch a 0:14:54.560 --> 0:14:58.160 campaign is they loan themselves some money. So they have 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:00.280 some money, some savings, and they put some money in 0:15:00.320 --> 0:15:04.320 to start the campaign. What McCain Feingold said is if 0:15:04.360 --> 0:15:06.440 you loan your if you loan your own money to 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:12.280 your campaign after the election, you can only pay yourself 0:15:12.320 --> 0:15:15.360 back up to two hundred and fifty thousand of it. Okay, 0:15:16.240 --> 0:15:19.120 anything above two hundred and fifty thousand with money that 0:15:19.240 --> 0:15:22.520 is raised after the campaign, you can't pay back and 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.600 you're just stuck. By the way, when when you talk 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:30.400 especially about competitive districts, these campaigns can cost millions and 0:15:30.480 --> 0:15:33.000 millions of dollars. So two hundred and fifty thousand is 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:35.280 not as much as it sounds like. So, and what 0:15:35.440 --> 0:15:40.440 this is designed to do is it's designed to disincentivelenge challengers. 0:15:40.440 --> 0:15:42.600 So look, if you're a gazillionaire, and by the way, 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:44.920 we're seeing more and more billionaires running for off as 0:15:44.960 --> 0:15:47.880 if you're a billionaire, you don't care. You can put five, ten, 0:15:48.080 --> 0:15:50.240 twenty million dollars into your campaign. You don't matter. You're 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:51.840 so rich it doesn't make a difference. You never need 0:15:51.840 --> 0:15:54.640 it back. So this is not a disincentive to the 0:15:54.720 --> 0:15:59.200 super rich. And we're actually seeing more and more billionaires 0:15:59.200 --> 0:16:01.800 who are running for office because they have the massive money. 0:16:02.400 --> 0:16:05.520 What this is an incentive too, is the small business owner. 0:16:05.560 --> 0:16:07.640 But this is an incentive too, is the doctor. This 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:10.200 is the somewhat rich. It's not the super rich. It's 0:16:10.240 --> 0:16:12.720 the someone who has enough money that you could invest 0:16:12.760 --> 0:16:16.480 a substantial amount of money. You could invest five hundred thousand. 0:16:16.560 --> 0:16:19.040 You can invest a million dollars you've saved. You put 0:16:19.080 --> 0:16:21.160 your money in the bank, you've saved, and you can 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:23.200 invest the money in a congressional race. If you could 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:25.720 put five hundred thousand or a million, that gives you 0:16:25.760 --> 0:16:29.080 a real shot at communicating. Yea, this is designed to 0:16:29.120 --> 0:16:31.240 punish that guy and say, well, you know what. Let's 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:34.600 let's say you worked hard, you're a physician, You've got 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:36.680 a million dollars in the bank, you loan it to 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.880 the campaign, you spend every penny of it on the campaign. 0:16:40.880 --> 0:16:42.720 You can pay back two hundred and fifty thousand and 0:16:42.720 --> 0:16:45.400 seven hundred and fifty thousand of it. Tough luck, Michael. 0:16:45.440 --> 0:16:48.320 You have given it to the United States of America. 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:51.520 You don't get it back. And so that's what the 0:16:51.560 --> 0:16:53.920 existing law is. And so what I did in twenty 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:58.520 eighteen is I loaned my campaign two hundred and sixty 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:02.440 thousand dollars. Now that's a specific number, Senator, it is 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:05.760 it's it's ten thousand more than the limit. So I 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:08.040 loaned my campaign to two hundred and sixty thousand right 0:17:08.080 --> 0:17:10.720 before the election, and then twenty days after the election, 0:17:11.200 --> 0:17:13.520 a little bit later than that, I repaid myself to 0:17:13.520 --> 0:17:15.679 a hundred fifty thousand, which what you're allowed to do. 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:19.280 So there's ten thousand that under the law, it's illegal 0:17:19.320 --> 0:17:22.480 for me to pay myself back, and I did that 0:17:22.600 --> 0:17:25.679 in order to file this lawsuit. As I was just 0:17:25.760 --> 0:17:27.879 reading it, obviously you can tell it better because you 0:17:27.880 --> 0:17:31.840 were there. The lawyer for the government is saying that 0:17:32.040 --> 0:17:34.040 this case should be dismissed, it should be thrown out 0:17:34.040 --> 0:17:37.439 because you obviously were doing something that you knew was 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:40.120 against law. You were just trying to trigger this court case. Yeah, 0:17:40.119 --> 0:17:42.880 that was an argument that the Biden Justice Department made 0:17:43.000 --> 0:17:45.560 that that's a really weak argument. So if you look 0:17:45.600 --> 0:17:47.880 at there are lots of cases that are test cases 0:17:48.320 --> 0:17:51.800 that if there's any legal or unconstitutional law, you're allowed 0:17:52.320 --> 0:17:57.560 to challenge it, and you're allowed to violate that law 0:17:57.800 --> 0:18:01.000 to challenge it. You're allowed to create the facts. And 0:18:01.800 --> 0:18:06.159 there are literally hundreds of test cases where people you know, 0:18:07.680 --> 0:18:13.400 if if the government makes it illegal for Michael Knowles 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:18.000 to defend the right to life, you know, the government said, well, 0:18:18.040 --> 0:18:20.480 you chose to say it, you chose to violate it. 0:18:20.520 --> 0:18:23.000 You could have just obeyed. Why didn't you. Yeah, So 0:18:23.160 --> 0:18:26.119 dismiss the case, and so that argument is not going 0:18:26.160 --> 0:18:29.560 to go anywhere. I'll say, the argument I think went well, 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:32.840 I hope. So the lawyer who argued it is a 0:18:32.880 --> 0:18:36.120 guy named Chuck Cooper who is a very close friend 0:18:36.119 --> 0:18:37.760 of mine. He was my first boss when I came 0:18:37.760 --> 0:18:41.960 out of my clerkship, and so I clerked for Chief 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:45.480 Justice William Rehnquist on the Supreme Court. I came out 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:47.840 of the clerkship in nineteen ninety seven and I joined 0:18:47.920 --> 0:18:50.400 Chuck at what was then a tiny little law firm 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:53.000 that was called Cooper and Carvin and it was Chuck 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:56.480 Cooper's Mike Carvin law firm had six lawyers in it. 0:18:56.480 --> 0:18:59.560 It was all of nine months old. And Chuck had 0:18:59.600 --> 0:19:01.600 been also a clerk for rink Quists, so he was 0:19:01.640 --> 0:19:04.080 a former renk Whist clerk. He's one of the top 0:19:04.119 --> 0:19:06.119 Supreme Court litigators in the country, and he was my 0:19:06.119 --> 0:19:08.680 first boss, and so I went to work for him 0:19:09.000 --> 0:19:11.840 to learn how to be a lawyer. He really taught 0:19:11.920 --> 0:19:16.040 me how to be a lawyer. And so he's representing 0:19:16.040 --> 0:19:18.479 me in this case, and he's a dear, dear friend. 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.240 He did a terrific job. And I will say, look, 0:19:22.240 --> 0:19:27.200 it's it's it's never absolutely clear how a case is 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:29.840 going to come out. I think on the merits, there 0:19:29.840 --> 0:19:33.159 are clearly a majority of justices who agree that this 0:19:33.359 --> 0:19:38.280 provisions on constitution. Okay, the Department of Justice is trying 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:41.840 to raise lots of procedural issues that basically are saying, 0:19:42.080 --> 0:19:45.280 don't get to the merits, don't address whether the laws constitutional, 0:19:45.800 --> 0:19:47.880 and and and so they're throwing a lot of muck 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:50.399 in the air, trying to say, avoid the actual question 0:19:50.440 --> 0:19:52.199 to the lawsuit. I hope the Court doesn't do that. 0:19:52.280 --> 0:19:56.600 I hope they actually answer the question, because this provision 0:19:58.400 --> 0:20:00.520 really is designed. And by the way, if you look 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:02.480 at the proponents of it, if you look at Harry Reid, 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:04.879 you look actually at Kay Bailey Hutchinson, my predecessor in 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:07.439 the Senate. They got up and said, this is to 0:20:07.520 --> 0:20:09.960 make it harder for people to challenge us. This is 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:15.960 all about protecting incumbents and protecting the super wealthy, the billionaires, 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:21.119 and it's about hurting the small business owner, the doctor, 0:20:21.160 --> 0:20:23.719 the entrepreneur, the person who wants to run for Congress 0:20:23.760 --> 0:20:26.080 because they want to be mister Smith going to Washington. 0:20:26.280 --> 0:20:28.600 They want to challenge the swamp. So what's the swamp 0:20:28.600 --> 0:20:30.959 want to do make it a lot harder to challenge 0:20:30.960 --> 0:20:34.119 the swamp. Now, speaking of incumbent senators who are desperately 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:37.400 trying to hold onto power, there has been a major 0:20:37.520 --> 0:20:41.280 push from the Biden administration and the Democrats senators and 0:20:41.359 --> 0:20:45.280 Chuck Schumer to get rid of the filibuster before they 0:20:45.520 --> 0:20:47.919 lose their elections, which increasingly it looks like is going 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:51.800 to happen in November. They are trying to get through 0:20:51.840 --> 0:20:53.880 any legislation and they can't do that right now because 0:20:53.840 --> 0:20:57.480 they don't have enough votes to get through the sixty 0:20:57.520 --> 0:21:02.040 vote threshold. And I think you know it more closely 0:21:02.080 --> 0:21:04.760 than I do. I think that the attempt to kill 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:07.840 the filibuster is just as dead as the ocean mandate? 0:21:07.880 --> 0:21:11.760 Am I right? Hopefully? Yes? And I think you are okay. 0:21:11.880 --> 0:21:15.200 So you and I were recording this Wednesday late afternoon. 0:21:16.080 --> 0:21:18.399 As soon as we finish recording this, I'm going to 0:21:18.440 --> 0:21:20.480 get up literally in a half hour, I'm going to 0:21:20.520 --> 0:21:22.720 be in the Senate floor and we're having the filibuster 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:25.479 fight tonight. So I have not yet had that battle, 0:21:25.840 --> 0:21:28.880 but at about half hour we will. What is going 0:21:28.920 --> 0:21:32.840 to happen is that Chuck Schumer is going to file 0:21:32.960 --> 0:21:39.600 cloture on their federal election takeover legislation. Cloture takes sixty votes, 0:21:40.560 --> 0:21:43.760 It's going to fail. He will probably get all the Democrats. 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:47.040 It'll probably be fifty fifty, but it will fail because 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:51.919