WEBVTT - The Prosecution Rests 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:04.920 The Democrat House impeachment managers have concluded their case against 0:00:05.160 --> 0:00:09.719 former President Trump. The second impeachment trial in one year 0:00:09.800 --> 0:00:13.320 of Donald Trump, seems to be heading for a conclusion, 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:16.000 and we are going to speak with a man who 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:18.560 is watching it all, is going to be a juror 0:00:18.600 --> 0:00:21.280 on the case, and has spent most of today speaking 0:00:21.280 --> 0:00:24.120 with the Trump legal team. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. 0:00:30.480 --> 0:00:33.720 Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz. I am Michael Knowles. 0:00:34.320 --> 0:00:37.280 It's funny that we're in the midst of this impeachment 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:39.839 trial of the former president and the bigger news of 0:00:39.880 --> 0:00:42.640 the day would seem to be Disney firing one of 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:46.360 their big TV stars, Gina Krano, other news cancel culture, 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:50.480 not just affecting the former president, but affecting conservative journalists 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:52.479 as well. We will get to all of that, but 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:56.240 I do have to ask you, Senator, what is going 0:00:56.320 --> 0:00:59.880 on today. I know that the Democrats concluded their case, 0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:04.360 but unlike last year, it seems like there's just not 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:06.400 a lot being reported. It seems like kind of an 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:08.640 opaque process. We don't even know how long this thing 0:01:08.720 --> 0:01:11.760 is going to go, So could you just briefly tell 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:14.319 us about how that case concluded, and then what the 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:16.720 Trump legal team is thinking? Well, sure, I think the 0:01:17.720 --> 0:01:20.440 kind of quick bottom line is that the Democrats failed 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:22.600 to get the job done and they've run out of steam. 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:25.280 So they were given sixteen hours, they were given eight 0:01:25.280 --> 0:01:28.440 hours both days. They ended up finishing four or five 0:01:28.440 --> 0:01:32.680 hours early today, so they quit early. And I think 0:01:32.720 --> 0:01:36.960 it was because they had been number one, unbelievably repetitive, 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:38.840 making the same points over and over again. In fact, 0:01:38.880 --> 0:01:41.679 I had fun today. Claire McCaskill, you remember, the former 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:46.560 Democratic senator from Missouri, tweeted out that she thought the 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:49.880 House manager's case was getting really repetitive and redundant and 0:01:49.960 --> 0:01:54.080 kept repeating itself. She didn't quite do that, but I 0:01:54.080 --> 0:01:58.520 thought you would appreciate that. And I saw that and 0:01:58.680 --> 0:02:02.440 just hit retweet like with no commentary whatsoever. I'm just 0:02:02.520 --> 0:02:04.880 I'm sure Claire love that I was retweeting her. But 0:02:05.040 --> 0:02:07.440 she was right on that, you know, I mean even 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:11.360 a stop plus she's right, She's right. So they ran 0:02:11.440 --> 0:02:14.440 out of steam, and the bottom line is they didn't 0:02:14.440 --> 0:02:17.120 get the job done, and so where are we now? 0:02:17.160 --> 0:02:21.760 Tomorrow the President's defense lawyers will present their case. They 0:02:21.840 --> 0:02:25.520 have a total of sixteen hours over two days. They 0:02:25.520 --> 0:02:28.040 will not take all that time. They will take substantially 0:02:28.160 --> 0:02:31.600 less time than that. And so after we finished today, 0:02:32.639 --> 0:02:34.840 I went and sat down with the lawyers. I actually 0:02:34.840 --> 0:02:38.160 grabbed Lindsey Graham and I grabbed Mike Lee and said, hey, 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:40.760 let's go sit down and just talk through with the 0:02:40.840 --> 0:02:43.280 lawyers what they're planning and give our thoughts. And so 0:02:43.320 --> 0:02:47.600 the three of us went in President's defense team. They're 0:02:47.680 --> 0:02:52.000 they're meeting in the LBJ room, which is actually the 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:56.880 room where in non COVID times, the Senate minority has lunch. 0:02:57.000 --> 0:02:59.440 So they're in what will be our lunch room. Sadly, 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:02.320 we weren't in the LBJ room for the last six years, 0:03:02.320 --> 0:03:04.600 but we will have moved back to the LBJ room 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:07.720 once COVID is over. With this sort of sort of 0:03:07.760 --> 0:03:10.200 smirking portrait of LBJ looking down on you, and it's 0:03:10.280 --> 0:03:16.480 it's right off the side of the Senate floor. And 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:21.079 so what happened. Lindsay shared his thoughts, Mike shared his thoughts. Um, 0:03:21.560 --> 0:03:25.720 I I'm going to refrain from saying what they had 0:03:25.760 --> 0:03:27.880 to say, but I'm happy to tell you and and 0:03:28.280 --> 0:03:30.920 verdict listeners what I had to say. Well, I would 0:03:30.919 --> 0:03:33.240 like to know sort of your your advice for the 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:36.320 legal team, because I know, on the one hand, people 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:39.400 are thinking, look, this case is over. As you made 0:03:39.440 --> 0:03:42.520 I think very clear last night, it ain't gone anywhere. 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:45.320 They're they're not going to convict Trump. And so as 0:03:45.320 --> 0:03:47.680 a practical matter, they're obviously not going to remove him 0:03:47.720 --> 0:03:49.840 from office because that's not possible, and they're not going 0:03:49.880 --> 0:03:53.560 to convict him anyway. But as a historical matter, this 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:57.320 really does matter. I mean, this is setting a new precedent. 0:03:57.440 --> 0:04:00.520 I guess that you know, this could have a huge 0:04:00.560 --> 0:04:03.720 political effects into the future. So the arguments they make 0:04:04.520 --> 0:04:08.200 are going to redound throughout history, There's no doubt. And 0:04:08.200 --> 0:04:11.280 and we've had two days of the Democrats pounding their narrative, 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:13.880 and so there needs to be a counter story. What 0:04:13.960 --> 0:04:16.000 I started out saying is actually what you just said. 0:04:16.000 --> 0:04:17.839 As I said, look, you got you got to remember 0:04:17.880 --> 0:04:21.560 you've already won. There are not sixty seven votes to convict. There. 0:04:21.760 --> 0:04:27.120 There are fifty five votes to convict plus minus two. 0:04:27.360 --> 0:04:29.240 I think there's a low of fifty three. I think 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:32.200 there's a high of fifty seven. And that's really the 0:04:32.640 --> 0:04:37.080 band that's in play. So my opening advice was don't 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:40.119 do anything to screw it up, don't you know, don't 0:04:40.160 --> 0:04:44.680 piss anyone off. You know. Related to that, my advice 0:04:44.760 --> 0:04:49.960 was be calm. I thought the jurisdictional argument, Uh, for 0:04:50.279 --> 0:04:53.080 President Trump's lawyers, at times, they got a little hot, 0:04:53.120 --> 0:04:57.320 they got a little angry, and I encourage them be calm, 0:04:58.160 --> 0:05:00.960 be reasonable, be rash and all. The way I put 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:03.640 it is I said, think more like an appellate argument, 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:07.600 like you're arguing to Supreme Court justices, and less like 0:05:07.640 --> 0:05:12.080 a jury argument. So we'll see if they follow through 0:05:12.120 --> 0:05:16.120 on that. The most important advice I had, I said, look, 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:19.440 we've had two days of the Democrat House managers arguments, 0:05:19.520 --> 0:05:24.640 and ninety percent of what they've done has focused on 0:05:25.440 --> 0:05:30.000 being emotional and powerful and telling the story of what 0:05:30.080 --> 0:05:32.919 happened on January sixth, telling the story of the assault, 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:35.479 the attack on the Capitol, telling the story of the 0:05:35.480 --> 0:05:39.000 police officers who are physically assaulted, telling the story of 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:43.800 Officer sick Nick who was murdered that day. And I 0:05:43.880 --> 0:05:47.279 gotta say they did it powerfully, the Democrats. They have 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:50.680 some good trial lawyers, they have some good storytellers, and 0:05:51.160 --> 0:05:53.920 so as they told that story over and over again. 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.560 It was powerful and effective, and that was ninety percent 0:05:57.560 --> 0:06:00.000 of their argument. And my advice to the Trump lawyers 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:04.320 disagree with none of it. Look, yes, we agree everyone 0:06:04.360 --> 0:06:06.719 in this jury, all the senators were here that day. 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:11.640 It was a horrific terrorist attack. It was despicable, and 0:06:11.760 --> 0:06:14.200 anyone who committed crimes of violence that day should be 0:06:14.200 --> 0:06:17.560 fully prosecuted and locked up a long long time. And 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:20.520 so don't argue with them on that. That is indisputably true. 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:26.880 Everyone in the Senate understands that, believes that, and everyone 0:06:26.880 --> 0:06:31.159 agrees on it. The only question before the Senate is 0:06:31.200 --> 0:06:35.360 whether President Trump committed high crimes or misdemeanors. And there's 0:06:35.360 --> 0:06:38.080 only one that is charged, and that is incitement, incitement 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.400 of violence. And I pointed out in the entire sixteen 0:06:41.440 --> 0:06:47.000 hours they had allocated, the Democratic House managers devoted about 0:06:47.040 --> 0:06:50.599 fifteen minutes to that question. And it was the second 0:06:50.600 --> 0:06:54.880 to last speech that the House managers gave. It was 0:06:54.960 --> 0:06:59.640 Congressman from Colorado is actually a talented trial lawyer, who 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:02.080 got up and he spent about fifteen minutes laying out 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:06.760 the legal argument why they believe this constitute's incitement and 0:07:07.120 --> 0:07:09.960 to be honest, it's the only relevant moment. In fact, 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:12.240 I said, in the entire time, it's the only time 0:07:12.280 --> 0:07:14.000 I pulled out a notepad and made any notes, because 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:16.080 it was the only time they actually said anything relevant 0:07:16.120 --> 0:07:19.120 to the question before the body. What the House managers 0:07:19.240 --> 0:07:25.280 articulated was a three part standard for incitement. They said, 0:07:25.360 --> 0:07:29.840 number one was violence foreseeable, Number two did President Trump 0:07:29.920 --> 0:07:34.040 encourage the violence? And number three was the president's conduct willful? 0:07:34.440 --> 0:07:38.200 So I wrote those three down, and the point I 0:07:38.280 --> 0:07:40.720 made to the Trump lawyers, I said, first of all, 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:49.360 you'll notice those three elements are not found anywhere in 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:54.400 a statute. They're not elements of a crime that they're 0:07:54.480 --> 0:07:58.520 not actually the elements of incitement. They're not found in Brandenburg, 0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:02.400 the Supreme Court case that talks about incitement and lays 0:08:02.400 --> 0:08:06.240 out the constitutional standard. They literally just made them up. Yeah, 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:10.680 that's a very strange way to prosecute a crime. As 0:08:10.720 --> 0:08:12.440 I said, look, you know, a lot of the lawyers 0:08:12.440 --> 0:08:15.200 on the defense team have been either prosecutors or criminal 0:08:15.240 --> 0:08:18.560 defense lawyers. The way a prosecutor proceeds if they are 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:22.320 charging you with a crime, there are statutory elements of 0:08:22.360 --> 0:08:24.720 the crime. Here's what constitutes the crime, and the prosecutor 0:08:24.760 --> 0:08:27.560 sets out to prove each of the elements of the crime. 0:08:28.680 --> 0:08:31.080 That's not, in fact, how the house managers proceeded here 0:08:31.120 --> 0:08:34.319 because they can't meet the statutory elements for incitement. So 0:08:34.360 --> 0:08:37.880 they just made these three up. Okay, those are the 0:08:37.920 --> 0:08:39.640 three they made up. I said, look, I'd start by 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:41.560 pointing out where did these come from? They literally just 0:08:41.679 --> 0:08:44.520 pulled them out of whole cloth. But then here's the 0:08:44.559 --> 0:08:47.600 critical point. I'd say, look, on any standard, the question 0:08:47.640 --> 0:08:51.920 for the Senate to assess, is there any coherent way 0:08:52.080 --> 0:08:56.200 this test can distinguish between the conduct of Donald Trump 0:08:56.960 --> 0:09:01.360 versus the conduct of countless other political figures, including a 0:09:01.360 --> 0:09:04.960 whole bunch of Democrats, Right, And and I said, look, 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:09.800 I think you should walk through in particular Bernie Sanders, 0:09:10.240 --> 0:09:17.080 Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Maxine Waters, Kamala Harris, Nancy Pelosi. 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:22.320 She referred to police officers as stormtroopers, compared him to Nazis. 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:26.000 You know, there's some rich irony that suddenly the Democrats 0:09:26.000 --> 0:09:28.960 are the defenders of cops, of course, where for a 0:09:29.120 --> 0:09:34.800 year they've been vilifying, demonizing police officers. They've been marching 0:09:34.840 --> 0:09:37.880 against cops, they've been saying abolish the police. They've been 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:44.320 saying abolish ice. They've been embracing ACAB as a slogan, 0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:48.800 and Michael, you know what ACAB means if all cap 0:09:48.960 --> 0:09:56.000 cops are that's and that has been the Democratic base 0:09:56.080 --> 0:09:58.640 that they've been snuggling up with. They don't get to 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:02.240 suddenly be the great and defenders of police officers. Yeah, 0:10:02.360 --> 0:10:05.880 you know, I love this, Senator this. I guess two 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:09.080 points here in this advice that a lot of Republicans 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:13.560 have not recognized, which is one, don't always be on 0:10:13.600 --> 0:10:15.480 the defensive. You can go on the offensive, or you 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:18.520 can point out inconsistencies, you can use the Democrats words 0:10:18.520 --> 0:10:21.959 against them. But but maybe even more importantly, you don't 0:10:22.000 --> 0:10:26.080 have to accept their ridiculous premises. You know that the 0:10:26.200 --> 0:10:28.959 early premise that exactly that the Democrats are trying to 0:10:29.000 --> 0:10:33.360 get these Republicans to buy into is that somehow Republicans 0:10:33.400 --> 0:10:36.320 support riots at the Capitol. I don't know any serious 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:38.920 Republicans who say, yeah, I loved when the guy and 0:10:38.960 --> 0:10:42.000 the bullhorns walked in there. He's my guy. Where can 0:10:42.040 --> 0:10:45.560 I vote for him? And likewise, I mean, you've just 0:10:45.600 --> 0:10:49.160 spelled it out so perfectly on the question of incitement. 0:10:50.000 --> 0:10:52.920 If look, I'm not a constitutional law scholar. I'm not 0:10:53.000 --> 0:10:56.360 a lawyer of any sort. If if I were just listening, 0:10:56.559 --> 0:10:58.280 but you did stay at a holiday in last night, 0:10:58.320 --> 0:11:02.360 but I did stay at the right You know, if 0:11:02.400 --> 0:11:04.880 I were just listening to them lay out this standard 0:11:04.880 --> 0:11:06.920 for incitement, I guess I would say, Okay, that sounds 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:08.360 about right. I mean, I don't know what the real 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:10.400 standard is. So if the legal team can go in 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.960 there and say, wait a second, just so you all know, 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:15.720 they completely made that up out of whole cloth, that 0:11:15.880 --> 0:11:18.600 is not the actual standard for incitement. There is no 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:21.800 reason for us to accept premises that have been crafted 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:24.920 purely to put us at a disadvantage. We're going to 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:27.439 talk about the law. We're going to talk about what 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:31.440 is always been true. You know what the long standing 0:11:31.880 --> 0:11:35.440 standard here for incitement. That seems much more effective than 0:11:35.480 --> 0:11:38.360 just going along with what the Democrats are trying to 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:41.920 lead them. I think that's exactly right. And what I 0:11:42.040 --> 0:11:43.959 encourage the Trump lawyers to do is say, all right, 0:11:43.960 --> 0:11:47.280 take their standard and apply it to the conduct of Democrats. 0:11:47.320 --> 0:11:50.080 Let's take, for example, Bernie Sanders. Bernie Sanders uses all 0:11:50.200 --> 0:11:55.400 sorts of hot incendiary rhetoric. And you'll recall we had 0:11:55.440 --> 0:12:00.280 a crazed lunatic, a leftist who was an enthusiasm stick 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:04.320 Bernie Sanders supporter, who came to Washington, d C. With 0:12:04.400 --> 0:12:08.680 an AAR fifteen, went and sought out the Congressional baseball 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:13.040 game practice asked are they Democrats or Republicans? The Republicans, 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:16.120 so he went to kill Republican members of Congress. There 0:12:16.120 --> 0:12:19.040 were two senators there, Rand Paul and Jeff Flake that 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:22.360 there were a dozen or so House members there, and 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:26.520 he opened fire on them. And it was only the 0:12:26.720 --> 0:12:30.280 coincidence that Steve Scalise happened to be there. So Steve 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:33.760 Scalise is a member of House Leadership, so his detail 0:12:33.840 --> 0:12:36.960 was there, and there were Capitol police officers who engaged 0:12:37.040 --> 0:12:40.280 with this crazed lunatic and stopped him, but they didn't 0:12:40.280 --> 0:12:44.240 stop him before he had shot Steve Scalise and nearly 0:12:44.320 --> 0:12:48.040 killed him. I mean, Steve spent months in the hospital. 0:12:48.080 --> 0:12:51.400 I mean it was a serious wound. Steve for many 0:12:51.440 --> 0:12:54.679 months after that couldn't walk, was on crutches. He's doing 0:12:54.760 --> 0:12:59.880 much better now, but it was a life threatening injury. 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:05.040 And all right, let's take their three standards. Was violence 0:13:05.120 --> 0:13:08.120 for seeable? Well, given the rhetoric Bernie was using, and 0:13:08.160 --> 0:13:09.920 I encourage them, and you know, play videos show that 0:13:10.000 --> 0:13:12.120 rhetoric Bernie was using. He said, they're trying to take 0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:14.920 your health healthcare away and want you to die. Okay? 0:13:15.160 --> 0:13:18.920 Is violence foreseeable from that? Did Burnie encourage it? I? 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:22.040 You know, I guarantee you. Bernie has the rhetoric saying go, fight, 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:25.360 stop it, go, has exactly the kind of rhetoric Donald 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:31.839 Trump used. And then was it willful under that standard? 0:13:32.960 --> 0:13:36.400 Bernie's conduct apparently as incitement? I guess we're going to 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:40.160 start the removal proceedings for Bernie Sanders. Maxine Waters who 0:13:40.200 --> 0:13:42.120 told her supporters, if you see a Republican and go 0:13:42.200 --> 0:13:45.480 harass them, engage them, yell at them, surround them. I 0:13:45.480 --> 0:13:48.440 mean that is inviting violence. By the way, Corey Booker 0:13:48.480 --> 0:13:53.520 did the same thing, and the most compelling Chuck Schumer 0:13:53.600 --> 0:13:56.559 on the steps of the Supreme Court calling out to 0:13:56.720 --> 0:14:01.360 Supreme Court justices by name and saying, you unleash the whirlwind. 0:14:01.400 --> 0:14:05.600 You're going to pay the price. But the central example 0:14:05.600 --> 0:14:09.880 and what I encouraged them to make it exactly side 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:13.760 by side as Kamala Harris. So, Kamala Harris did a 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:17.800 couple of things. Number one, as we had Black Lives 0:14:17.840 --> 0:14:20.360 Matter and Antifa riots all over the country, and we 0:14:20.400 --> 0:14:24.400 had violence going on. We had police cars being fire bombed, 0:14:24.440 --> 0:14:29.040 we had police police officers being murdered. Kamala Harris went 0:14:29.080 --> 0:14:32.080 on Stephen Colbert and was asked about it. Said, this 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:34.840 is a movement. It's powerful, and she said, and it 0:14:34.920 --> 0:14:37.760 needs to keep going, right, it won't end, and it 0:14:37.800 --> 0:14:42.840 shouldn't end, and it shouldn't end. She explicitly encouraged that it. 0:14:43.000 --> 0:14:45.400 And this was, by the way, after the violence, after 0:14:45.440 --> 0:14:49.560 the riots. Not only that, but she raised money for 0:14:49.760 --> 0:14:52.880 bail money to bail out and by the way, it 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:55.200 wasn't bailing out the peaceful protesters. The people who were 0:14:55.280 --> 0:14:57.920 arrested were the people committing acts of violence. So she 0:14:58.040 --> 0:15:04.000 literally raised al money to support the violent criminals. And 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:05.960 all right, let's look at the three standards. This is 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:09.080 apparently the standard for incitement was violence foreseeable? It was 0:15:09.160 --> 0:15:13.360 going on right then. It was not only foreseeable, it 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:16.840 was blazingly obvious and indisputable because it was happening as 0:15:16.840 --> 0:15:21.400 she was speaking. She knew full well did she encourage it. 0:15:21.480 --> 0:15:24.200 She explicitly said, yes, it needs to go on. Was 0:15:24.240 --> 0:15:30.240 it willful? She raised money supporting the violent criminals? And 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:35.240 there's no coherent way that the standard the House Democrats 0:15:35.240 --> 0:15:38.480 had put forward can conclude that Trump committed incitement and 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:43.840 Kamala Harris didn't. You can conclude rightly that neither committed 0:15:43.880 --> 0:15:48.000 the crime of incitement. That's actually the right answer, or 0:15:48.040 --> 0:15:50.520 you can use their made up standard, in which case, 0:15:51.240 --> 0:15:53.360 right after we finished with Donald Trump, I guess we're 0:15:53.360 --> 0:15:56.200 going to start an impeachment proceeding of Vice President Kamala Harris. 0:15:56.320 --> 0:15:59.400 Right right, But you don't get both and by the way, 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:03.480 under their standards, in a lot of ways, Kamala's behavior 0:16:03.560 --> 0:16:07.360 was worse. Yeah, as I told him to ask, I said, listen, 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:10.120 last I checked, Donald Trump isn't raising bail money for 0:16:10.160 --> 0:16:12.840 the violent criminals. There are whole bunch people who have 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:15.080 been arrested. He's not raising bail money for them. She 0:16:15.240 --> 0:16:19.360 raised money for them. So if it is, and this 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:23.440 is another important point I made, Michael, So the House 0:16:23.480 --> 0:16:28.040 managers put a lot of emphasis on did President Trump 0:16:28.520 --> 0:16:31.680 do enough to stop the riot once it's happened? Did 0:16:31.720 --> 0:16:35.760 he denounce it? To tell him to stand down, and 0:16:35.840 --> 0:16:38.760 I said, look, you guys got to decide as president's lawyer, 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:42.160 what you think about that. Frankly, I wish he'd done more. 0:16:42.800 --> 0:16:44.840 When I look back at what he said that day, 0:16:44.840 --> 0:16:47.800 I wish he had been clearer, more unequivocal, saying stop 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:50.680 this right now, immediately go home and leave. There were 0:16:50.720 --> 0:16:52.400 a lot of Republicans calling on him to do that. 0:16:52.480 --> 0:16:58.560 I wish he had been clear, But within an hour 0:16:58.720 --> 0:17:00.400 or two he sent out a tweet tolling him to 0:17:00.440 --> 0:17:02.880 stand down. He put out a video calling on him 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:05.719 to stand down. So he did, in fact tell him 0:17:05.760 --> 0:17:07.280 to stand down. I wish it had been clear and 0:17:07.280 --> 0:17:09.920 more unequivocal, but he didn't fact do it. Come Harris 0:17:09.920 --> 0:17:13.120 still hasn't done it? Yeah, right right. We had this 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:17.520 week Antifa and Black Lives Matter protesters marching in DC 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:22.520 saying burn the place down. She still hasn't told them 0:17:22.560 --> 0:17:27.640 to stand down. And so if that's the test, did 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:30.240 you tell him to stand down after the violence erupted, 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:34.840 Look what we had in the chaz autonomous zones. We 0:17:34.920 --> 0:17:38.440 had Democrats defending it, calling it the summer of love. 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:42.560 Remember that it's just harmless. Yes, people are being murdered, 0:17:42.600 --> 0:17:46.480 but it's harmless because we agree politically with those guys. Yeah, 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:51.320 and so what I urge the Trump legal team is 0:17:51.320 --> 0:17:57.680 to calmly, without emotion, just compare the conduct of Democrats 0:17:57.920 --> 0:18:00.520 to what the conduct of the president, and under the 0:18:00.560 --> 0:18:04.359 standard they're laying out, either we're going to start impeaching 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:08.080 dozens of people, or ain't nobody guilty of this because 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:11.119 this is a made up political persecution, which is again 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:13.360 the right answer to what's happening. You know, I think 0:18:13.400 --> 0:18:16.119 this is great advice, not just for the impeachment trial, 0:18:16.200 --> 0:18:20.479 though it is, but just generally speaking, reject their false 0:18:20.520 --> 0:18:24.600 premises and hold them to their own standards because this 0:18:24.680 --> 0:18:27.760 is so much bigger than impeachment. Frankly, I think impeachment 0:18:27.840 --> 0:18:30.560 isn't even the biggest news story right now. It'll have 0:18:30.640 --> 0:18:33.679 historical implications, so we really have to focus on it. 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:38.480 But the bigger stories right now involve cancel culture more broadly, 0:18:38.560 --> 0:18:42.439 not just canceling the former president, but canceling TV stars, 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:47.040 canceling journalists. And we've seen this with Gina Krano, who 0:18:47.119 --> 0:18:51.040 is in the Star Wars show The Mandalorian. Disney has 0:18:51.080 --> 0:18:54.760 fired her because of their accusing her of making anti 0:18:54.760 --> 0:18:57.439 Semitic comments. I've read all the comments. I can't find 0:18:57.840 --> 0:19:00.600 even a hint of anti Semitism in any of them. Really, 0:19:00.640 --> 0:19:03.200 I think they're going after her because broadly speaking, she's 0:19:03.200 --> 0:19:05.320 been a little more conservative, she's been a little more 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:08.640 right wing, and they can't tolerate that, so they're going 0:19:08.680 --> 0:19:11.800 after her. We've just found out that James O'Keefe, the 0:19:11.880 --> 0:19:15.199 investigative journalist, a real thorn in the side of the 0:19:15.240 --> 0:19:18.880 liberal establishment. He's been permanently kicked off of Twitter because 0:19:19.359 --> 0:19:23.400 it turns out he's now running investigations on big tech companies. 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:28.080 What these people have been ostracized for and censored for 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:32.760 would absolutely fall apart if you held the left to 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:35.160 that same standard. It seems there's one set of rules 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:39.040 for conservatives another one for liberals. But that's the world 0:19:39.119 --> 0:19:41.440 we live in. What are we supposed to do about it? Look, 0:19:41.480 --> 0:19:44.080 I think you're exactly right. What happened with Gina Krano 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:47.119 is nuts. I mean, number one, you have a strong, 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:51.879 kick ass character on The Mandalorian, which which lots of kids, 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:55.879 especially little girls, are are inspired by, and and you 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.880 know made you know, helped made Star Wars more fun 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:01.480 it's always been fine, and I would look. I grew 0:20:01.520 --> 0:20:04.520 up on Star Wars. I still remember standing in line 0:20:04.600 --> 0:20:07.880 with my dad on opening day of Empire Strikes Back, 0:20:07.960 --> 0:20:10.000 and we stood in line for two hours to see 0:20:10.119 --> 0:20:15.639 Empire the first day it opened up. Disney. Disney is 0:20:15.680 --> 0:20:20.440 not the company it used to be. Disney is a giant, corporate, 0:20:22.520 --> 0:20:29.880 politically correct propaganda outfit. And you look at here. So 0:20:30.040 --> 0:20:32.919 I haven't read all of the blog posts that that 0:20:32.920 --> 0:20:36.000 that Jinnakrona put up. I've I've seen. I actually looked 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:38.840 for it online and it was hard to find, but 0:20:38.880 --> 0:20:41.280 I read stories quoting excerpts up it. So I read 0:20:41.280 --> 0:20:43.840 the excerpts that were quoted in stories, and what I 0:20:43.880 --> 0:20:46.160 read that she posted is she was saying, look, if 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:49.920 you looked at the rise of the Nazis in Germany 0:20:50.800 --> 0:20:54.159 and all of the horrific things that that happened to 0:20:54.200 --> 0:20:57.280 the Jewish people that culminated in six million Jews being 0:20:57.320 --> 0:21:02.840 being murdered in concentration camps. That began because the Nazis 0:21:03.160 --> 0:21:07.360 demonize the Jews, they dehumanize the Jews. They they they 0:21:07.840 --> 0:21:13.479 used rhetoric that caused ordinary Germans, not SS stormtroopers, but 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:18.679 a baker or you know, a storekeeper, to view the 0:21:18.800 --> 0:21:23.680 Jews as as subhuman, as not human, to inculcate hatred. 0:21:24.359 --> 0:21:28.840 And her point was that hatred, yes, it erupted in 0:21:29.240 --> 0:21:34.320 the horrific, grotesquely evil genocide that was carried out by 0:21:34.320 --> 0:21:37.120 the Nazis, but it also manifested in day to day 0:21:38.280 --> 0:21:44.240 barbaric inhumanity because they had been dehumanized. And from what 0:21:44.280 --> 0:21:46.359 I read of her blog post, she was saying, you 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:51.200 know what, we're seeing that same dehumanizing happening in America 0:21:51.240 --> 0:21:55.680 where people are demonizing their other, rising their political opponents, 0:21:55.720 --> 0:22:01.240 that that if you disagree you you are not it's 0:22:01.280 --> 0:22:04.840 not valid for you to have a different point of view. Now, 0:22:05.080 --> 0:22:07.359 from what I read, she didn't say that we've become 0:22:07.480 --> 0:22:11.959 Nazi Germany. She didn't say we're erecting concentration camps. But 0:22:12.119 --> 0:22:15.080 because she simply made the point that spreading a culture 0:22:15.119 --> 0:22:18.439 of hate and dehumanizing is really dangerous and leads in 0:22:18.520 --> 0:22:24.600 bad directions, Disney described her comments as abhorrent, and I 0:22:24.680 --> 0:22:28.400 was like, saying, we shouldn't hate each other and dehumanize 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:31.359 each other. What am I missing? Unless they're portions of 0:22:31.400 --> 0:22:33.560 the blog posts that weren't quoted in the stories, and 0:22:33.760 --> 0:22:36.800 given that the stories are critical, I'm assuming they included 0:22:36.840 --> 0:22:43.920 whatever the worst portions were. This is there's an irony 0:22:43.960 --> 0:22:49.199 that she's complaining, we're becoming hateful and intolerant of differences 0:22:49.200 --> 0:22:52.200 and opinions. And what does Disney say, we hate your opinion, 0:22:52.280 --> 0:22:55.520 You're fired. It would seem to me there's this even 0:22:55.600 --> 0:23:00.159 deeper irony here, which is maybe the best way I 0:23:00.200 --> 0:23:04.360 can read Disney's statement is they're saying that any comments 0:23:04.400 --> 0:23:08.400 that makes any comparison to Nazi Germany is unacceptable. It's abhorrant. 0:23:08.440 --> 0:23:11.439 We can't we can't tolerate that sort of thing. And okay, 0:23:11.560 --> 0:23:14.480 let's just take that standard for what it is. Am 0:23:14.520 --> 0:23:16.680 I wrong? Or has the left not spent the past 0:23:16.720 --> 0:23:20.239 five years calling Donald Trump literally hitler? Right? They call 0:23:20.359 --> 0:23:24.240 him hitler. They refer to to seventy five million Americans 0:23:24.240 --> 0:23:28.520 as Nazis neo Nazis regularly, so they make the exact 0:23:28.600 --> 0:23:33.119 same analogy. And before Trump, they called George W. Bush hitler. 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:37.040 That's their standard. Any Republican they dislike they call hitler. Now, 0:23:37.080 --> 0:23:40.520 my view is you shouldn't actually call people hitler unless 0:23:40.520 --> 0:23:43.520 they are in fact genocientomdiacs that are murdering millions of people. 0:23:43.560 --> 0:23:48.400 But there is a unique like in Dante's circles of Hell, 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:52.040 there is a unique hell. The Nazis are the most 0:23:52.040 --> 0:23:58.840 grotesque example of evil in certainly modern times. And maybe ever, look, 0:23:58.880 --> 0:24:03.840 there is a reason why never Forget has such power. 0:24:04.080 --> 0:24:08.840 There's a reason why Holocaust museums are important, because it's 0:24:08.880 --> 0:24:12.760 worth reflecting on the absolute inhumanity. You know, you look 0:24:12.800 --> 0:24:16.320 at uh Hannah rant who who you know, wrote on 0:24:17.119 --> 0:24:21.560 what led to the to the evil that is the Nazis, 0:24:21.600 --> 0:24:24.040