Speaker 1: Welcome.
Speaker 2: It is Verdic with Center, Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with
Speaker 2: you in this episode will be a dual episode. Nice
Speaker 2: show in Center Cruise as well here because we're trying
Speaker 2: to figure out what the hell's going on, just like
Speaker 2: every other American when it comes to is the government open?
Speaker 1: Is it closed? Center?
Speaker 2: As we are doing this ten o'clock Eastern, we're recording
Speaker 2: on Sunday night. You've just left the Senate for so
Speaker 2: where the hell are we now? Because there were some
Speaker 2: reports like the government's reopened, then it's not reopen. We're
Speaker 2: heading towards reopening.
Speaker 1: What is right? What's wrong?
Speaker 3: Well, we have really good news, which is the government
Speaker 3: is in the process of reopening. It's not going to
Speaker 3: be reopened on Monday, but we got the votes tonight
Speaker 3: that will start the process of reopening it. We're going
Speaker 3: to explain exactly what that means, what the deal, what
Speaker 3: the deal was, and what the timing is going to
Speaker 3: be and how that's likely to impact you, whether it
Speaker 3: is going to a national park or going to the
Speaker 3: Smithsonian or flying on an airplane, what the timing is
Speaker 3: likely to be. We're also going to talk to you
Speaker 3: about a bill that I introduced this past week, the
Speaker 3: Deporting Fraudster's Bill that is going after illegal immigrants who
Speaker 3: are fraudulently getting welfare benefits. And right now, fraudulently taking
Speaker 3: welfare benefits is not a statutory ground for deportation. I'm
Speaker 3: introducing legislation to change that. We'll explain that all to you.
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Speaker 2: All right, So center, there was a lot of excitement
Speaker 2: earlier Sunday evening. My phone blew up. I'm assuming you
Speaker 2: were getting the text me. It's like, oh great, the
Speaker 2: government's wide open again. It's gonna go back to normal.
Speaker 2: I wish that was true. You just described it as
Speaker 2: we've got the votes to move forward. Explain the process,
Speaker 2: because I mean, even on social media it was like
Speaker 2: the government's reopen.
Speaker 1: I'm like, not so so fast. That's not how this
Speaker 1: can work.
Speaker 2: In fact, they could take almost another week and totally
Speaker 2: get this thing back to where it needs to be.
Speaker 3: So look, the good news is we finally have a
Speaker 3: deal and we got the votes that are necessary to
Speaker 3: reopen the government. So we've had a shutdown, the Schumer shutdown.
Speaker 4: For forty days. Yeah, fourteen different times.
Speaker 3: Fourteen times Republicans have voted to open the government, fourteen
Speaker 3: times Democrats have voted no, have voted to keep the
Speaker 3: government shut down. Now, remember, the entire reason that we
Speaker 3: have a shutdown is because under the Senate rules, you
Speaker 3: need sixty votes to move to proceed to legislation funding
Speaker 3: the government. We only have fifty three Republicans. That means
Speaker 3: we need at least seven Democrats, and unfortunately ran votes
Speaker 3: no on all of these, So we have fifty two
Speaker 3: Republicans to fund the government.
Speaker 4: So we need eight Democrats.
Speaker 3: The fourteen times we've voted over the last forty days,
Speaker 3: over and over and over again, we've gotten at most
Speaker 3: two or three Democrats. Tonight Sunday, it's just a few
Speaker 3: minutes after ten pm Sunday night, we finally got the
Speaker 3: eight Democrats we needed. So the Democrats who voted to
Speaker 3: reopen the government are Durbin, Hassen, King, Cortes, Masto, Cain, Shaheen, Rosen,
Speaker 3: and Fetterman. Those are the eight we got exactly what
Speaker 3: we needed. We ended up with sixty votes, not sixty one,
Speaker 3: so that not in a sink. Every other Democrat voted no.
Speaker 3: Keep it shut down. But getting eight is important, and
Speaker 3: there was a substantive deal. But the substantive deal has
Speaker 3: several pieces. Number one, there's a continuing resolution that runs
Speaker 3: through January thirtieth. So one thing that was really important
Speaker 3: to me and to a lot of conservatives was that
Speaker 3: we not have government funding expire right before Christmas. Often
Speaker 3: government fundings expires right before Christmas, and they use the
Speaker 3: desire everyone has to go home to their families for
Speaker 3: the holidays to twist our arms into passing a really
Speaker 3: bad bill. So this does not end right before Christmas.
Speaker 3: The CR instead, the continuing Resolution continues until the end
Speaker 3: of January. That was significant. We also included three appropriation
Speaker 3: bills in the deals. Now, these are appropriation bills. There
Speaker 3: are two ways you can fund the government. You can
Speaker 3: fund the government through an appropriation bill. There are thirteen
Speaker 3: different appropriation bills that fund different cabinet agencies in different
Speaker 3: major programs. Those take sixty votes. That's what's called regular order.
Speaker 3: That's the way the system is supposed to work. And
Speaker 3: then you can also fund the government through a continuing
Speaker 3: resolution also called a CR, that just keeps everything the
Speaker 3: way it was before and maintains the status quo. We
Speaker 3: ended up doing a combination of both. So in this
Speaker 3: deal we have number one the ag approach, So that's
Speaker 3: the agriculture appropriation that includes the funds that farmers rely on,
Speaker 3: but it also importantly includes snap It includes food food stamps.
Speaker 3: So yeah, one of the consequences of the shutdown was
Speaker 3: the funding for food stamps went away. With this appropriation bill,
Speaker 3: we will fund the food stamps for an entire year,
Speaker 3: so that will be taken off the table.
Speaker 2: And by the way, let's be very clear about that,
Speaker 2: Republicans tried to make sure that even with the government shutdown,
Speaker 2: that snap benefits were continuing and were not stopped. Democrats
Speaker 2: made damn sure that people did not get their food
Speaker 2: stamp benefits during the forty day the longest shut down
Speaker 2: in American history. They did that because they thought it
Speaker 2: was leveraged to hurt the poorest among us in America,
Speaker 2: and that would then give them leverage to get more
Speaker 2: of the port rail things they wanted for the Democratic
Speaker 2: programs and initiatives, and they didn't care if you couldn't
Speaker 2: feed your kids over the last forty days.
Speaker 3: So understand that was the entire Democrat strategy is maximize
Speaker 3: the pain on the American people, because the more pain
Speaker 3: that they could inflict, they were counting on the media
Speaker 3: to be dishonest and blame it all on Trump. And
Speaker 3: so repeatedly this past week, I went back and forth
Speaker 3: with Democrats repeatedly, and their talking points were very simple.
Speaker 3: They would say, well, you have a Republican president, Republican Senate,
Speaker 3: Republican House. The shutdown is their fault, and that was it.
Speaker 3: And they were counting on the dishonest corporate media to
Speaker 3: tell that lie what they omitted. And actually I talked
Speaker 3: about this just this weekend. I spoke on the Senate Florida.
Speaker 3: I said, look, whenever anyone takes an oath to testify
Speaker 3: in court, that they put their hand on the Bible
Speaker 3: and they pledged to tell the truth, the whole truth,
Speaker 3: and nothing but the truth. Well, the Democrats saying that
Speaker 3: they're failing part number two, the whole truth, because it
Speaker 3: is true we have a Republican president, House and Senate.
Speaker 3: What they're ignoring is the fact that it requires sixty
Speaker 3: votes and it is the Democrats who forced the shut
Speaker 3: down because they're the ones that are not voting to
Speaker 3: keep the government open. This package, we took three appropriations bills,
Speaker 3: the AG Appropriation Bill which is farmers, ranchers and food stamps,
Speaker 3: the Military Construction and the VA Bill so that funds
Speaker 3: funds our veterans and also gives funds for military construction
Speaker 3: projects across the country. And then the Legislature Bill, which,
Speaker 3: among other things, we increase the funding for security for
Speaker 3: members of Congress. Given the political violence we see, I
Speaker 3: think that's very important to have more funds to increase
Speaker 3: security on both sides of the aisle.
Speaker 4: So that package.
Speaker 3: Those are three appropriation bills that were bipartisan. The Democrats
Speaker 3: had a party in that were passed along with the
Speaker 3: thirty day CR or not thirty day the CR to
Speaker 3: January thirtieth.
Speaker 1: Three, Henry thirtieth.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so all of that is what we got sixty
Speaker 3: votes for tonight. Now what does that mean tomorrow morning?
Speaker 3: Does that mean the government is opened Monday morning? Unfortunately no.
Speaker 2: FINT people are frustrated because they think, well, you guys
Speaker 2: shut it down quickly, then why can't you just reopen
Speaker 2: it quickly?
Speaker 1: And this is how the sausage is made.
Speaker 2: And that's why I think there's some misc communication on
Speaker 2: Sunday night about oh, the government's like open up. I
Speaker 2: mean there was major news out it's like government opening up,
Speaker 2: the votes to have it, and they're thinking, all right, well,
Speaker 2: if I'm flying out Monday or Monday afternoon or Tuesday, yeah,
Speaker 2: there should be no problems at the airport. That's also
Speaker 2: not true. I want to be very clear about that.
Speaker 3: Look, if the Democrats want to be full obstructionist, they
Speaker 3: could delay opening the government as late as Friday of
Speaker 3: this week. Because there are a series of votes we
Speaker 3: have to take in. Under the Senate rules, they can
Speaker 3: delay thing. They have a right to an intervening day
Speaker 3: between one voter and another. They can delay things for
Speaker 3: thirty hours, and so they could drag it out even
Speaker 3: though we have the sixty votes. They could drag it
Speaker 3: out as late as Friday. My guess is they'll drag
Speaker 3: it out till Monday or Tuesday. My best guess is
Speaker 3: the government will open up Tuesday or Wednesday. But we
Speaker 3: really are dealing with Look the Bernie Sanders is of
Speaker 3: the world. By the way, Chuck Schumer voted no, because
Speaker 3: the whole point of this was for him to tell
Speaker 3: the crazy left he still hates Donald Trump. Now, I
Speaker 3: don't think these eight Democrats would have voted yes without
Speaker 3: Schumer blessing their voting yes. So this was always going
Speaker 3: to end this one.
Speaker 2: I was going to ask you, so getting to the
Speaker 2: perfect number of eight, and again, this is how the
Speaker 2: sausage is made. So let's talk about behind the scenes.
Speaker 2: You guys, the Republicans have been meeting right behind the scenes.
Speaker 2: You have your normal lunches that you have in your
Speaker 2: other meetings, And I see you guys on the four
Speaker 2: of the Senate talking and you're outside the Senate. I
Speaker 2: mean Democrats are doing the same thing when they decide
Speaker 2: who is in the eight to vote yes? Is that
Speaker 2: strategic based on who needs cover when they're running for office?
Speaker 1: Is that? I mean?
Speaker 2: There's some like Fetterman that clearly were leaders on this,
Speaker 2: just saying I think it's wrong to hold the American
Speaker 2: be a hostage.
Speaker 1: I'm voting to open this thing up.
Speaker 2: How do they decide on the exact eight And is
Speaker 2: it literally to the point where they're like, all right,
Speaker 2: we're gonna only give eight, and you got to make
Speaker 2: your arm to us why you should be in the
Speaker 2: eight and we'll give you that blessing.
Speaker 1: How does that work?
Speaker 4: So I don't know for sure.
Speaker 3: I will say there were a number of Republicans who
Speaker 3: were surprised we did not get more than eight. So
Speaker 3: there were other Democrats who were telling Republicans privately they
Speaker 3: were going to vote yes to open the government. People
Speaker 3: like John Ossoff who's got He's the most vulnerable Democrat
Speaker 3: running for reelection in Georgia. He just voted the fifteenth
Speaker 3: time to keep the government shut down, you know Georgia.
Speaker 3: By the way, Raphael Warnock, the other Georgia senator, did
Speaker 3: as well. We actually thought there was a real possibility
Speaker 3: they would both vote tonight to open the government. I
Speaker 3: don't know what Osof's calculus was. Warnock will often vote
Speaker 3: with Osof to give him some political coverage, so we
Speaker 3: figured that they would go They would go either both
Speaker 3: yes or both no. They both voted to keep the
Speaker 3: government shut down.
Speaker 2: What is the chances to guys like that on Tuesday
Speaker 2: Wednesday vote yes? After they say all right, well fine,
Speaker 2: we're already going to be there. Does that change you
Speaker 2: think that eight number? Could that change attends over or
Speaker 2: is it pretty much as eight no?
Speaker 3: I could easily see on a subsequent vote some additional Democrats,
Speaker 3: Patty Murray, who is the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee,
Speaker 3: a number of Republicans believe she was going to vote yes.
Speaker 3: I mentioned we just were going to pass three appropriation bills.
Speaker 3: She played a major hand in drafting those three appropriation bills,
Speaker 3: and so for appropriators. Look, when Chuck Schumer and the
Speaker 3: Democrats had the majority, do you know how many appropriation
Speaker 3: bills they passed into law?
Speaker 1: How many?
Speaker 4: Zero?
Speaker 3: The process was broken, They didn't do appropriations. It's our
Speaker 3: hope to actually go through the process, to have amendments,
Speaker 3: to negotiate it. And that's what these three bills are doing.
Speaker 3: And yet the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee voted no.
Speaker 3: Chris Coons, who is widely seen as one of the
Speaker 3: more moderate Democrats, he voted to keep the government shut down.
Speaker 3: Alyssa Slotkin from Michigan. Look, Michigan's a purple state. She
Speaker 3: voted to keep the government shut down. Gary Peters, also
Speaker 3: from Michigan, retiring, he voted to keep the government to
Speaker 3: shut down. So there were another half dozen or so
Speaker 3: that a lot of folks thought we would have a
Speaker 3: chance at getting their votes, and we did not.
Speaker 2: So when you don't get those votes, we move forward.
Speaker 2: You said this thing could end up to Friday. You're
Speaker 2: guessing probably Tuesday, Wednesday the government reopens.
Speaker 1: How many more votes after tonight?
Speaker 2: Again, for people that are listening, we're doing this Sunday
Speaker 2: night at ten to fifteen right now in DC. How
Speaker 2: many people are how many votes will it take starting
Speaker 2: now to get the government actually reopened.
Speaker 3: We need to continue to hold sixty, but we're going
Speaker 3: to the underlying terms of the deal have been cut.
Speaker 3: So I don't expect any of the eight who just
Speaker 3: voted yes to flip. So I think we've got our sixty.
Speaker 3: But the remaining Democrats can just drag things out and
Speaker 3: make it painful. I hope they don't. I actually pulled
Speaker 3: Dick Durbin aside. Durbin is retiring, and I mentioned I
Speaker 3: always thought this was going to end with retiring Democrats
Speaker 3: voting to open the government. Durbin did so. Now, look
Speaker 3: he's the number two in leadership among the Democrats. He's
Speaker 3: Chuck Schumer's right hand buddy's retiring. I told Dick tonight,
Speaker 3: I said, look, we've got sixty now. It sure would
Speaker 3: be nice if like you guys, didn't drag this out
Speaker 3: unnecessarily till Friday, and just the identical outcome will happen,
Speaker 3: and it just is more painful for everybody. I think
Speaker 3: there are a lot of Democrats who feel that way.
Speaker 3: It's why I think we'll end Tuesday or Wednesday.
Speaker 4: But who the heck knows.
Speaker 3: Now, there's another element of this deal that's getting some
Speaker 3: attention online, which is a commitment to reverse the riffs,
Speaker 3: the reductions and forces that happened during the shutdown. And
Speaker 3: there's some folks online saying, you guys, cave, this is terrible.
Speaker 3: That was was an off that President Trump made, I
Speaker 3: think like two weeks ago to the Democrats. That has
Speaker 3: been on the table for them a long long time,
Speaker 3: and the White House made the decision, Okay, if you
Speaker 3: guys open the government, we agree, we'll offer you that
Speaker 3: will reverse those rifts. So that was in the deal,
Speaker 3: but it was a deal that came from the White
Speaker 3: House that we just agreed. Okay, if that's if those
Speaker 3: are the terms that the President wants to cut, we'll
Speaker 3: we'll back up the president.
Speaker 2: So you go into Monday, you're going to have more
Speaker 2: meetings throughout the day, or explain to me Monday what
Speaker 2: that looks like.
Speaker 3: We're anticipating the first vote probably around noon. And as
Speaker 3: I said that, there could be we could have done
Speaker 3: it all tonight if the Democrats had agreed to In
Speaker 3: the Senate, you can do anything by unanimous consent, and
Speaker 3: so if they wanted to open the government tonight. They
Speaker 3: could have just consented to do one vote and then
Speaker 3: do the other one next to the other one next,
Speaker 3: the other one next, and we'd be done.
Speaker 2: Like you can do that, you know, literally, instead of
Speaker 2: us recording right now, you guys could actually be voting
Speaker 2: and this could have all been Monday morning. The government
Speaker 2: is open for business. All the fa guys are back
Speaker 2: to normal, everybody's getting paid, and they're like, now, SCREWT,
Speaker 2: will just wait a few more days. So there's the
Speaker 2: flying home, right, I mean, you're not flying home tonight,
Speaker 2: are you.
Speaker 4: Nope?
Speaker 3: No, I'm in DC. I didn't see my family this weekend.
Speaker 3: I would have loved to have seen my kids. I didn't.
Speaker 3: I've spent most of the time just sitting here waiting
Speaker 3: for Democrats to finally agree to cut a deal. But
Speaker 3: it was striking. We could have done it tonight. But
Speaker 3: to do that you need unanimous consent. That means you
Speaker 3: don't need sixty you need one hundred. That means one
Speaker 3: person can object and say no, drag it out. I
Speaker 3: want to burn more time. I want to burn more time.
Speaker 3: And you have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all
Speaker 3: the Democrats who are running for president that want to
Speaker 3: want a spectacle, and so that if they really decide
Speaker 3: to be just just fully obstructionist, they could drag it
Speaker 3: as late as Friday.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 2: So one other question is this is unfolding when the
Speaker 2: government opens back up, and let's just use a hypothetical
Speaker 2: of Wednesday, all right, Wednesday the government opens up, does
Speaker 2: that mean that instantly the system is going to go
Speaker 2: back to normal. I'm saying this to people traveling. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you and I've traveled a lot. We've started to see
Speaker 2: the breakdown of of air traffic control and of having
Speaker 2: to cancel flights. I've witnessed it traveling internationally and domestically
Speaker 2: over the last couple of days. You've done it as well.
Speaker 2: And so when it opens back up, is that like
Speaker 2: an instant fix or is that going to take a
Speaker 2: couple of days to cycle through the system as well?
Speaker 2: What does travel look like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
Speaker 3: Look at least travel Monday and Monday and Tuesday, I
Speaker 3: would expect still really significant delays and really significant cancelations.
Speaker 3: The reason for those delays and those cancelations. We have
Speaker 3: roughly fifty thousand TSA agents all across the country.
Speaker 4: Many of them are going into work. None of them
Speaker 4: are being paid.
Speaker 3: They all missed their last paycheck, didn't get their last paycheck.
Speaker 3: We have roughly fourteen thousand air traffic controllers. Many of
Speaker 3: them are going into work, none of them are getting paid.
Speaker 3: They all missed their last paycheck. Listen if you're a
Speaker 3: TSA agent, if you're an air traffic controller, typical TSA
Speaker 3: agent or air traffic controller doesn't have a deep reservoir
Speaker 3: of savings. I mean, they're under real stress right now.
Speaker 3: How do I pay my mortgage, how do I pay
Speaker 3: my rent? How do I pay my bills? And so
Speaker 3: what is happening with both TSA agents and controllers. They're
Speaker 3: calling in sick, they're just not showing up, say summer,
Speaker 3: coming into work. The problem is in New York City
Speaker 3: on Halloween Day, roughly eighty percent of the controllers called
Speaker 3: in sick and didn't show up to work. That's Chuck
Speaker 3: Schumer's hometown, by the way. And so we're seeing with TSA.
Speaker 3: You had Monday a week ago, the lines in the
Speaker 3: Houston Bush Airport were two and a half to three
Speaker 3: hours line long to get through security because they were
Speaker 3: so short staffed on TSA agents, they didn't have enough
Speaker 3: to move people through security. So even if the government
Speaker 3: opens up tomorrow, you're dealing with the independent decisions of
Speaker 3: fifty thousand TSA agents and fourteen thousand controllers when they
Speaker 3: come back to work. And the reason that the FAA
Speaker 3: has mandated ten percent of flights be canceled is they're
Speaker 3: looking at the data and seeing that these short staffed
Speaker 3: air traffic controllers there's an increased risk to safety. So
Speaker 3: they're saying, all right, if we don't have full staffing,
Speaker 3: we got to reduce the number of flights. So in
Speaker 3: a week, do I expect things to go back to normal? Yes,
Speaker 3: a week after things open up, but it could easily
Speaker 3: take several days for people to say, Okay, I'm going
Speaker 3: to come back into work now. That doesn't happen automatically
Speaker 3: just by flipping a switch.
Speaker 2: So what you're basically telling me is this week, when
Speaker 2: I'm flying, and when you're flying, and so many others
Speaker 2: that listen to this show flying, we're gonna be dealing
Speaker 2: with this type of chaos because the Democrats decided not
Speaker 2: to do their job, even while doing their job on
Speaker 2: Sunday night, Right now, yes.
Speaker 3: And by the way, they could have agreed to open
Speaker 3: it all up tonight, that they could have given consent,
Speaker 3: said okay, you've got a deal, let's move ahead. And
Speaker 3: it's now just the obstructionist who you know, if your
Speaker 3: flight is canceled tomorrow, you can thank Chuck Schumer and
Speaker 3: every Democrat senator running for president who's trying to show
Speaker 3: off to the crazy left. But we will get it
Speaker 3: open now, but it will take It'll take a few
Speaker 3: more days at a minimum.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 2: So let's move to another issue in this shutdown, and
Speaker 2: there's been some confusion over it. There's been a lot
Speaker 2: of fighting over it. It deals with Obamacare. Also knows
Speaker 2: the Affordable Care Act. Democrats decided, and this is some
Speaker 2: of the history that I do think we need to
Speaker 2: now explain because there's been so much of a political
Speaker 2: football on this one. That they purposely designed for the
Speaker 2: subsidies which make Obamacare seem cheaper than it is, even
Speaker 2: though your tax dollars are paying for the subsidies to
Speaker 2: subsidize people's health insurance. They designed it purposely to expire now,
Speaker 2: and that was something that was done by design. I'm
Speaker 2: assuming for this type of fight is am I wrong
Speaker 2: and explain what's happening with Obamacare now and moving forward.
Speaker 3: Well, look, the other thing Democrats talked about and they
Speaker 3: claimed they were fighting the shutdown for, was to extend Obamacare.
Speaker 4: And in particular during.
Speaker 3: COVID, when the Democrats had control of the House and
Speaker 3: the Senate. In the White House, they passed massive subsidies
Speaker 3: that went straight to giant insurance companies, went to the
Speaker 3: didn't go to the people, didn't go to you, but
Speaker 3: went to insurance companies, roughly fifty billion dollars worth of subsidies,
Speaker 3: just huge corporate welfare. And that corporate welfare to the
Speaker 3: insurance companies expires the end of December. And so part
Speaker 3: of this deal is Republicans agreed we will have a
Speaker 3: vote on those subsidies the first week of December. Now,
Speaker 3: by the way, Republicans offered them that we would schedule
Speaker 3: that vote forty days ago, so they've had that on
Speaker 3: the table for forty days. But we said at the beginning, sure,
Speaker 3: we'll give you a vote. They're going to lose that vote.
Speaker 3: They know they're going to lose that vote, but we said,
Speaker 3: we'll give you that vote.
Speaker 4: And so we agreed to have that vote. Now what's
Speaker 4: the answer?
Speaker 3: And this is where I want to take folks a
Speaker 3: little bit behind the scenes to some of the sausage making.
Speaker 4: So most of the Senate was in DC all weekend.
Speaker 3: We'd all planned to be back home and had many
Speaker 3: people had fundraisers at political events or family events, and
Speaker 3: we missed most of them just staying here. So Friday
Speaker 3: night I invited a dozen senators out to dinner, and
Speaker 3: so we went to a local restaurant and got a
Speaker 3: room together and had a great dinner. And we're laughing
Speaker 3: and talking and strategizing and saying, look are the Democrats
Speaker 3: going to move? So in that dinner, we decided to
Speaker 3: call President Trump. So we called President Trump, got him
Speaker 3: on the cell phone, and the president he was in
Speaker 3: a good mood, but he was he was expressing his
Speaker 3: views emphatically as he always does.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And by the way, for people I've ever done a
Speaker 2: phone call, like if you've never gotten to do this,
Speaker 2: he does not ever hold back when you're talking about
Speaker 2: the phone. I'm not a single phone call. You've had
Speaker 2: a lot more than I have. But when I've had
Speaker 2: phone calls with him, whether it was in sixteen to
Speaker 2: twenty or now forward like he does not hold back
Speaker 2: at all. When you're on the cell phone on speakerphone as.
Speaker 4: Well, he does not.
Speaker 3: So one of the things we asked of him Friday night,
Speaker 3: we said, listen, in this battle with the Democrats over Obamacare,
Speaker 3: Obamacare's failing. It's a bad program. And if you go back,
Speaker 3: go back to twenty thirteen. Twenty thirteen, when I did
Speaker 3: a filibuster against Obamacare, I said, at the time, if
Speaker 3: you remember, you remember, Barack Obama promised the American people
Speaker 3: Obamacare would would cut the average families premiums by twenty
Speaker 3: five year.
Speaker 4: Ye, that was a lie, And in.
Speaker 3: Fact they skyrocketed at the time, five thousand a year.
Speaker 3: They've skyrocketed a lot more than that. Even the Washington
Speaker 3: Post has now admitted the editorial page the Affordable Care Act,
Speaker 3: which is the misleading name of Obamacare, did not make
Speaker 3: healthcare more affordable. It caused premiums to skyrocket. So when
Speaker 3: we had Trump on the phone, we said, look, it
Speaker 3: would really help if you made the case that what
Speaker 3: Democrats are fighting for is these massive multi billion dollar
Speaker 3: corporate welfare payoffs to the health insurance companies. Instead of
Speaker 3: empowering consumers, and look, we want a lower prices. And
Speaker 3: so we said, in particular, it would really help if
Speaker 3: you would send a truth and Trump said, great, come
Speaker 3: up with something. And so I will tell you what
Speaker 3: the President sent. I had a lot of input in this,
Speaker 3: and here's what he put out. President Trump said, Democrats
Speaker 3: claimed to be working for quote the little guy driving
Speaker 3: down your health insurance. But the and the rest of
Speaker 3: this is in all caps. Obamacare scam goes straight to
Speaker 3: their best friends in the insurance industry. They are making
Speaker 3: a killing while health coverage only gets worse. If Democrats
Speaker 3: get their way again, they're in for another huge payday
Speaker 3: at the expense of the American people.
Speaker 4: No deal. In all caps.
Speaker 3: Republicans should give money directly to your personal health savings
Speaker 3: accounts all in caps that I expanded in our great, big,
Speaker 3: beautiful bill. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Now,
Speaker 3: this is really important because if you want a really strong,
Speaker 3: principled conservative reform to health insurance, expanding health savings accounts
Speaker 3: so that you give you the consumer, you the patient,
Speaker 3: more control and instead of sending money to the insurance companies,
Speaker 3: send it straight to people's health savings accounts, so you
Speaker 3: can spend it on premiums.
Speaker 4: You can spend it on deductibles.
Speaker 3: You can spend it on healthcare that expands competition and
Speaker 3: empowers patients that at lowers prices. The President leaning in
Speaker 3: with this tweet really helps in this political battle we'll
Speaker 3: have over the next six weeks because the outcome he's
Speaker 3: advocating for is something I've advocated for a long time,
Speaker 3: and that was a direct result of that dinner on
Speaker 3: Friday night where we got him on the phone.
Speaker 2: You know, there's one interesting thing that's coming out this
Speaker 2: first year of Trump being back in office. It is
Speaker 2: really empowering the American people, whether it is the accounts
Speaker 2: you've talked about, whether it's the Trump accounts that are
Speaker 2: going to be coming in this next year that you
Speaker 2: guys pass to give kids the opportunity to save money
Speaker 2: and to be able to grow accounts and to build
Speaker 2: wealth over their lifetime. Like, there is a lot of
Speaker 2: personal growth and personal excitement that it's Trump is get
Speaker 2: the government out of your life.
Speaker 1: You can do better without it. We want to help
Speaker 1: you do that. And then the.
Speaker 2: Democrats like no, no, no, no, no, Mandani's and others usually
Speaker 2: have no control of your life. We want to run
Speaker 2: the whole damn show from birth to death. Just trust
Speaker 2: the US government to be your daddy or your mommy,
Speaker 2: are both. And that's exactly the difference between the Republicans
Speaker 2: and Democrats right now.
Speaker 3: Look at it's a fundamental divide. As you noted, we
Speaker 3: passed the Trump accounts. As you know well, I wrote
Speaker 3: that legislation. This has been a major theme that I've
Speaker 3: been fighting for since the first day I got elected
Speaker 3: to the Senate. And whether you're talking about hell savings accounts,
Speaker 3: whether you're talking about Trump accounts that are essentially four
Speaker 3: A one CA savings accounts for kids, or whether you're
Speaker 3: talking about school choice and getting tax credits, the unifying
Speaker 3: theme of all of those is individual choice, empowering you
Speaker 3: the individual rather than government competition and and giving you control.
Speaker 3: That is the fundamental difference between left and right. And
Speaker 3: President Trump has been a great partner in this, and
Speaker 3: I'll tell you as a part of his tweet, he
Speaker 3: sent out a chart, a chart which which I had
Speaker 3: sent him, but I want you to see the chart.
Speaker 3: We're going to put it up on YouTube for anyone
Speaker 3: that's watching on YouTube. But it goes through the major
Speaker 3: healthcare companies their stock performance since Obamacare pass I'm going
Speaker 3: to walk through them.
Speaker 4: Etna.
Speaker 3: Obamacare March twenty ten is when it passed. Etna's stock
Speaker 3: stock price was thirty dollars and fifty cents. Today it's
Speaker 3: two hundred and twelve dollars, so it's increased five hundred
Speaker 3: and ninety five percent. Since Obamacare passed. Senteen Its stock
Speaker 3: has increased six hundred and four percent, Molina its stock
Speaker 3: has increased eight hundred and fifty nine percent, Humana Its
Speaker 3: stock has increased four hundred and ninety percent. Ends Anthem
Speaker 3: Elevance Health Its stock has increased four hundred and fourteen percent,
Speaker 3: Signa Its stock has increased eight eight hundred and twenty
Speaker 3: two percent, and United Health Group. When Obamacare passed, United
Speaker 3: health stock was twenty five dollars and sixty six cents.
Speaker 3: Today November twenty twenty five, it is three hundred and
Speaker 3: twenty seven dollars and seventy four cents. That is at
Speaker 3: one thousand, one hundred and seventy seven percent increase.
Speaker 4: That's what Obamacare did.
Speaker 3: It massively increased the profits of the health insurance companies.
Speaker 3: By the way, those health insurance companies overwhelmingly give to Democrats.
Speaker 3: They give to Chuck Schumer, they give to Keing, Jeffries
Speaker 3: and the Democrats because they recognize when Democrats are in power,
Speaker 3: their profits go through the roof and the American people's
Speaker 3: premium skyrocket. What are the Democrats say they wanted to
Speaker 3: do in this shutdown? Give fifty billion dollars to those
Speaker 3: same health insurance companies who profits have skyrocket. And it's
Speaker 3: why with the pre residents said is so important. No,
Speaker 3: we're not going to give money to health insurance companies. Instead,
Speaker 3: we're going to expand health savings accounts so you, the
Speaker 3: individual has control over your own healthcare.
Speaker 2: For the last several weeks, you've heard me talk with
Speaker 2: Josherrard at Berna and tell stories about people just like
Speaker 2: you and I and how they've used their burn A
Speaker 2: launcher protect themselves and their families. Now, if you don't
Speaker 2: know what a burna is, it is a handheld pistol
Speaker 2: that fires both kinetic rounds and chemical irritants to separate
Speaker 2: you from an attacker.
Speaker 1: And it's truly amazing. Now Josh is back today to.
Speaker 2: Share a story about a store owner and how a
Speaker 2: Berner launcher could have really come in handy.
Speaker 5: Yes, So in Seattle, the owner of local small business
Speaker 5: decided to have a sidewalk sale to engage more directly
Speaker 5: with her community. Well, today was going great when a
Speaker 5: male walking down the middle of the street could be
Speaker 5: seen yelling, streaming, and hitting passing cars. This man was
Speaker 5: clearly suffering from an acute mental episode when he then
Speaker 5: approached the store owner began threatening her. After several failed
Speaker 5: attempts at escalating the situation, the woman ultimately tried to
Speaker 5: go back into the store to try to get to safety,
Speaker 5: and it was then that the deranged man yelled that
Speaker 5: he was going to gouge out her eyes and then
Speaker 5: grabbed her, slammed her to the ground, and begin choking her.
Speaker 5: It was only due to several good Samaritans that jumped
Speaker 5: in to pull him off of her that probably saved
Speaker 5: your life.
Speaker 2: You know, this is a growing trend. Unfortunately, mental health
Speaker 2: is a serious issue and in areas where the larger
Speaker 2: homeless populations, these individuals affected by this can really get violent.
Speaker 2: Could BURNI still be effective in this case?
Speaker 5: Absolutely? You know, mental health is striking populations all over America,
Speaker 5: and those with mental health issues that also have substance
Speaker 5: of abuse issues are over eleven hundred times more likely
Speaker 5: to commit violent crime. And the problem is you never
Speaker 5: know when that may happen. Berna, especially used with our
Speaker 5: chemical agent projectiles, will incapacitate even those suffering from those
Speaker 5: acute mental episodes. So Burne is a great tool to
Speaker 5: use when you absolutely have no idea that you may
Speaker 5: need it.
Speaker 2: If you want to find out more about burna can
Speaker 2: help you or your family members. It's a great gift
Speaker 2: for the holidays coming for someone you want to help protect.
Speaker 2: Go to Burna by RNA dot com. That's Burnaby RNA
Speaker 2: dot com, burna dot com. Senator, I also want to
Speaker 2: get a little preview of something that you're working on.
Speaker 2: We're going to do a more expansive show on this,
Speaker 2: but it's important that people know that even while the
Speaker 2: government has been shut down, you have been working very
Speaker 2: hard on other things. One of those things is you've
Speaker 2: now introduced the Quote Deporting Fraudsters Act of twenty twenty five,
Speaker 2: and it deals with snap and public benefits abuses that
Speaker 2: is costing the American people millions and millions of dollars.
Speaker 2: Give us a little preview of this so people know
Speaker 2: what's been going on.
Speaker 4: Look, this is a very simple bill.
Speaker 3: It is an astonishing fact that right now welfare fraud,
Speaker 3: fraudulently taking government assistance benefits is not a deportable effe
Speaker 3: events under the immigration laws. This law will change that
Speaker 3: and make it a deportable offense. Let me give you
Speaker 3: some basic statistics. Forty eight percent of households headed by
Speaker 3: illegal immigrants received food related welfare benefits forty eight percent
Speaker 3: nearly half specifically SNAP. A CIS analysis found that thirty
Speaker 3: one percent of illegal alien households with children draw SNAP benefits.
Speaker 3: One in five households getting WICIC Women's Infants and Children
Speaker 3: or SNAP is headed by a non citizen, and ninety
Speaker 3: six percent of the children in those households are US
Speaker 3: but born, showing how illegal aliens exploit child based eligibility
Speaker 3: to access benefits indirectly.
Speaker 4: The US Department of Agriculture reports.
Speaker 3: One point seventy six million non citizens on SNAP in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty three. That is roughly three hundred and twelve
Speaker 3: million dollars in ten pair funds. In twenty twelve or
Speaker 3: not twenty twelve, rather twenty twenty two, it was one
Speaker 3: point five million recipients that cost two hundred and twenty
Speaker 3: two million.
Speaker 4: Fraud is rampant.
Speaker 3: For example, in twenty twenty four, one hundred and twenty
Speaker 3: six point eight million dollars was stolen from EBT cards.
Speaker 3: In Texas, three point seven million people, about eleven percent
Speaker 3: of the state relies on SNAP. Every stolen or unlawfully
Speaker 3: claimed dollar robs a citizen family in genuine need. And
Speaker 3: according to the CBO, about two hundred thousand illegal aliens
Speaker 3: from the surge of alien asylum seekers from twenty twenty
Speaker 3: three to twenty twenty four already received SNAP, growing to
Speaker 3: eight hundred thousand by twenty thirty four, assuming no deportations.
Speaker 3: A ten year cost. You said this cost millions. Yeah,
Speaker 3: the ten year cost is fifteen billion dollars. And so
Speaker 3: this bill is to target that and say, if you're
Speaker 3: here illegally, you do not have any entitlement to public welfare.
Speaker 3: And if you access fraudulently access public welfare, that is
Speaker 3: yet another ground to deport you.
Speaker 1: Now, Chuck Schumer is a co sponsor this bill.
Speaker 3: Right, no, And I feel confident that Schumer is not
Speaker 3: just to know he's a hell no, because today's Democrat party,
Speaker 3: it is all for giant health insurance corporations. It is
Speaker 3: all for illegal immigrants, it is all for violent criminals,
Speaker 3: it is all for men and women's sports. It's all
Speaker 3: for everyone except the average American citizen trying to work
Speaker 3: hard and provide for his or her family.
Speaker 4: And that's exactly backwards.
Speaker 1: It's incredible.
Speaker 2: Well, as we're doing the show right now at ten
Speaker 2: forty at night on Sunday evening, the government's still shut down,
Speaker 2: you're still being held hostage. We're moving in the right direction.
Speaker 2: Democrats could drag this out even till Friday, just to
Speaker 2: hurt you. If you're traveling this week, you're not alone,
Speaker 2: Sender Kruz and I are traveling with you.
Speaker 1: It's gonna suck. That's just the best way I can
Speaker 1: describe it.
Speaker 2: But at least hopefully will be safe while doing it
Speaker 2: Center and I will see you back here when the
Speaker 2: government hopefully reopens. So we'll be doing a show on Wednesday,
Speaker 2: So hit that subscriber auto download button and grab my podcast,
Speaker 2: the Ben Ferguson Podcasts on those in between days. I
Speaker 2: will keep you up to date with whatever is happening.
Speaker 2: I can promise you that, and we'll see you back here.
Speaker 1: In a couple of days