Latest / The Ben Ferguson Podcast / Ayatollah Outta Controllah, 401 (K) for your Kids & 'Was' Biden POTUS for 4yrs? He Can't Remember Week In Review

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Ayatollah Outta Controllah, 401 (K) for your Kids & 'Was' Biden POTUS for 4yrs? He Can't Remember Week In Review · The Ben Ferguson Podcast

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome. It is Verdict with Ted Cruz. We can review
0:03
Speaker 1: Ben Ferguson with you. And here are the three big
0:05
Speaker 1: stories that you may have missed that we talked about
0:08
Speaker 1: this week. First up, major negotiations with Iran and it
0:12
Speaker 1: could be the difference between war and peace. So what
0:15
Speaker 1: it's Senator Cruz have to say about it. I'll have
0:17
Speaker 1: that for you in just a moment. Also, there is
0:20
Speaker 1: a program that has been introduced. Senator Ted Cruz is
0:23
Speaker 1: the brainchild behind it and it could change every newborn
0:26
Speaker 1: child's financial future in this country.
0:30
Speaker 2: We'll have that for you as well. And finally, who
0:33
Speaker 2: was running America?
0:34
Speaker 1: Now the media admitting that Joe Biden was not really
0:37
Speaker 1: the president of the United States of America, So who
0:40
Speaker 1: was calling the shots and who was using the auto pen?
0:43
Speaker 1: It's the weekend review and it starts right now. I
0:47
Speaker 1: want to talk about what we also some big news
0:50
Speaker 1: that deals with the issue of Iran. You went on
0:52
Speaker 1: Life livert in levent our good friend Mark Levin show,
0:56
Speaker 1: and we're talking about Iran right now and what they
0:59
Speaker 1: are actively trying to do.
1:01
Speaker 2: Fill us in on that for a second.
1:03
Speaker 3: Well, right now, they're ongoing negotiation going on with the
1:07
Speaker 3: nation of Iran and the Iyahtola is a theocratic lunatic.
1:14
Speaker 3: He regularly regularly leads mobs chanting death to America and
1:19
Speaker 3: death to Israel. And by the way, if history teaches
1:22
Speaker 3: us anything, it's that if somebody tells you they want
1:26
Speaker 3: to kill you, believe them. Yeah, And when it comes
1:30
Speaker 3: to Iran, I'll tell you there are some voices in
1:34
Speaker 3: Washington and the Administration that are pushing for another Iran deal.
1:38
Speaker 3: They really want an Iran deal. And basically they went
1:41
Speaker 3: on time.
1:42
Speaker 1: Why did I got to ask, Because there's some of
1:44
Speaker 1: you listening, They're gonna say the same thing I'm saying
1:46
Speaker 1: right now is why on earth would you want an
1:47
Speaker 1: i Ran deal if you know that they cheated on
1:50
Speaker 1: the last deal.
1:51
Speaker 3: So look, I don't know. I'm not Sigmund Freud. I'm
1:53
Speaker 3: not their psychoanalysts. I just know they're advocating for it.
1:56
Speaker 3: If you look at the Obama Iran nuclear Deal, the
2:00
Speaker 3: elements of it, it lifted international sanctions, it allowed Iran
2:05
Speaker 3: to sell oil on the global market, and it allowed
2:09
Speaker 3: Iran to have its nuclear program continue unmolested. There are
2:14
Speaker 3: voices within the administration, and by the way, I led
2:16
Speaker 3: the charge to pull out of that disastrous deal, and
2:20
Speaker 3: President Trump did exactly that. He did the right thing.
2:23
Speaker 3: It was the single most important decision, national security decision
2:27
Speaker 3: of his first term to pull out of the disastrous
2:31
Speaker 3: Obama Iran nuclear deal. And right now there's a battle
2:35
Speaker 3: within the administration. But I agree with the red line
2:37
Speaker 3: that President Trump has drawn, and he has said that
2:40
Speaker 3: any deal must include full dismantlement, dismantling the centrifuges, shutting
2:47
Speaker 3: them down, that anything short of that is unacceptable.
2:52
Speaker 2: When you look at that deal.
2:54
Speaker 1: And I want to play part of what you said
2:57
Speaker 1: on Marklevin's show because it is more background just on
3:01
Speaker 1: how crazy the ITOLI is in Iran and how big
3:04
Speaker 1: of a threat it is and why you shouldn't trust him.
3:06
Speaker 2: Take a listen.
3:07
Speaker 4: It's my understanding that the vast majority Republicans in the
3:10
Speaker 4: Senate in the House are saying Iran must dismantle its
3:16
Speaker 4: nuclear program. It's not a joke. You know what it
3:20
Speaker 4: means when people talk about a civil or civilian nuclear program,
3:24
Speaker 4: We're not going to be fooled. They must dismantle their program.
3:27
Speaker 5: Is that what you understand that that is exactly right
3:30
Speaker 5: and I got to say, Mark, there's a real contrast
3:33
Speaker 5: between the strength that President Trump has shown with respect
3:37
Speaker 5: to Iran and the weakness and appeasement that Joe Biden
3:40
Speaker 5: showed for four years the first term President Trump took
3:44
Speaker 5: on Iran directly pulled out of the disastrous Obama Iran
3:49
Speaker 5: nuclear Deal, He ended the civilian nuclear waivers, he ended
3:53
Speaker 5: the oil waivers, and the result maximum pressure put the
3:58
Speaker 5: Iranian economy into freefall. Their oil sales fell from a
4:03
Speaker 5: million barrels a day of oil down all the way
4:06
Speaker 5: down to three hundred thousand barrels of oil. When Joe
4:10
Speaker 5: Biden came into office, the Iranian economy was in shambles
4:13
Speaker 5: and the Iotola and the Mullahs were teetering and near collapse.
4:18
Speaker 5: But sadly, Biden reversed everything he did complete appeasement. He
4:22
Speaker 5: stopped enforcing the oil sanctions and as a result, the
4:27
Speaker 5: Iatola's oil sales skyrocketed from three hundred thousand barrels a
4:31
Speaker 5: day to two million barrels a day.
4:34
Speaker 3: That's one hundred billion dollars that.
4:36
Speaker 5: Joe Biden the Democrats gave the Iatola, and the Iatola
4:41
Speaker 5: is using it to fund the RGC to attack and
4:44
Speaker 5: kill Americans. The IATOLA is using that to fund Hamas
4:47
Speaker 5: and Hezbola in a very real sense. Joe Biden and
4:51
Speaker 5: the money he gave the Iyatola funded October seventh. Now
4:55
Speaker 5: that Donald Trump is back in office, he's drawn a
4:57
Speaker 5: clear red line it ran must dismantle their nuclear capacity.
5:03
Speaker 5: They must shut down their centrifuge, as it is the
5:06
Speaker 5: only thing that is verifiable is full dismantlement. And I
5:10
Speaker 5: have every confidence the president is going to hold that line.
5:13
Speaker 4: I do, But I don't have any confidence in the Iranians,
5:16
Speaker 4: who lie and cheat and still and murder. Yes, and
5:20
Speaker 4: so the question is, how can we expect a regime
5:27
Speaker 4: that does all those things? It is not abided by anything,
5:31
Speaker 4: it's agreed to anything it has promised over the course
5:33
Speaker 4: of the last fifteen years. So here we are at
5:35
Speaker 4: the eleventh hour. Here we are at the eleventh hour
5:38
Speaker 4: trying to deal with this. How can we trust them?
5:42
Speaker 4: Or better put, we're not going to trust them. How
5:45
Speaker 4: do we make sure that they do what we tell
5:48
Speaker 4: them they must do?
5:49
Speaker 5: Well, listen, we can't trust them because we know that
5:51
Speaker 5: they lie, and they lie over and over and over again.
5:54
Speaker 5: It's worth noting the IATOLA right now today is actively trying.
5:59
Speaker 2: To murder Donald J.
6:00
Speaker 5: Trump has hired hitmen trying to murder the President of
6:03
Speaker 5: the United States. The IYATOLA is also actively trying to
6:06
Speaker 5: murder the former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the
6:09
Speaker 5: former National Security Advisor John Bolton. They have hired hitmen
6:13
Speaker 5: that are targeting former senior US officials and the sitting
6:17
Speaker 5: president of the United States. These are not people who
6:20
Speaker 5: can be trusted, which is why the objective must be
6:24
Speaker 5: full dismantlement must be the centrifugeas disassembled, destroyed, taken out.
6:31
Speaker 5: And as President Trump said recently, we can do that
6:34
Speaker 5: either nicely or not so nicely. Nicely if they agree
6:38
Speaker 5: and we go in and dismantle them ourselves, or not
6:42
Speaker 5: so nicely is if Iran refuses to negotiate. We have
6:46
Speaker 5: the capability to take out these nuclear facilities. And I
6:50
Speaker 5: got to say, Mark, you and I have talked about this.
6:53
Speaker 6: Listen.
6:53
Speaker 5: There are some voices in the Trump administration that are
6:57
Speaker 5: on the isolationist wing of foreign policy that say, let's
7:01
Speaker 5: not worry about Iran, Let's not do anything about Iran.
7:06
Speaker 5: And listen, I am someone who is very reluctant to
7:09
Speaker 5: use military force. But Iran is trying to build nuclear
7:12
Speaker 5: weapons because Iran wants to be able to threaten to
7:15
Speaker 5: use nuclear weapons, and they might even use them. And
7:17
Speaker 5: I believe a nuclear Iran is an unacceptable threat of
7:23
Speaker 5: seeing an atomic bomb detonated in the skies of New
7:26
Speaker 5: York or the skies of Los Angeles, And so our
7:29
Speaker 5: commander in chief, President Trump, I don't think he is
7:32
Speaker 5: going to allow that risk. We are going to demand
7:35
Speaker 5: the centrifuges, the nuclear capability be dismantled, and they either
7:40
Speaker 5: do so willingly or they'll be dismantled unwillingly.
7:44
Speaker 1: It doesn't seem to be any gray area here from you,
7:48
Speaker 1: I willvin there and the President. It seems to be
7:51
Speaker 1: y'all are all in lockstep on the same thing here.
7:54
Speaker 1: You cannot trust Iran at all.
7:56
Speaker 3: Well, and you asked what by do people oppose this
7:59
Speaker 3: the rhetoric they use as they say, Well, if you're
8:02
Speaker 3: standing up to Iran, you're a warmonger. And let me
8:05
Speaker 3: be clear, as I mentioned to Mark Levin, I have
8:10
Speaker 3: consistently been very reluctant to use military force. You know,
8:14
Speaker 3: you go back to twenty sixteen the presidential race. You
8:17
Speaker 3: had seventeen Republicans running for president that year, set ran
8:21
Speaker 3: policide because Rand's views are unique.
8:24
Speaker 2: In the Senate.
8:26
Speaker 3: Of the remaining sixteen, there were only two of us
8:28
Speaker 3: on that stage who believed and said the Iraq War
8:33
Speaker 3: was a mistake. Donald Trump and me. Both of us
8:36
Speaker 3: said the Iraq War was absolutely a mistake. I believe
8:39
Speaker 3: it was a mistake because you had a dictator, a
8:43
Speaker 3: cruel dictator, Saddam Hussein, who was killing terrorists. We came
8:47
Speaker 3: in and we toppled that dictator, and the result was
8:50
Speaker 3: the terrorist took over and they began killing Americans. That
8:53
Speaker 3: did not help America. Toppling a dictator and putting the
8:57
Speaker 3: terrorists in charge was a mistake. By the way, made
9:00
Speaker 3: the same mistake in Libya, where you had Kadafi, another
9:04
Speaker 3: very cruel dictator, but he was killing terrorists. We came
9:07
Speaker 3: in and toppled him, and the terrorists took over and
9:09
Speaker 3: they began killing Americans. I think that's a bad trade off.
9:13
Speaker 3: So when I say that we need to focus on
9:19
Speaker 3: American national security, it doesn't mean we should invade other countries.
9:25
Speaker 3: It doesn't mean we should send the Marines. It means
9:27
Speaker 3: we should look at serious, real threats to our national security.
9:31
Speaker 3: And I think the single most acute threat we face,
9:35
Speaker 3: the urgent threat we face right now, is a nuclear
9:39
Speaker 3: Iran because you've got a theocratic lunatic who has said
9:45
Speaker 3: he wants to murder us and by the way, we
9:48
Speaker 3: know that he's willing to hire hitmen to try to
9:51
Speaker 3: murder the president already. And if he had nuclear weapons,
9:54
Speaker 3: I think the odds are unacceptably high he would use them.
9:58
Speaker 3: And so in the first term, what I advocate catered for,
10:00
Speaker 3: and what President Trump agreed with was maximum pressure, using sanctions,
10:05
Speaker 3: cut cutting off their financial system. Their economy went into
10:10
Speaker 3: free fall. Because President's Trump stood up against the iotolin
10:15
Speaker 3: it was incredibly effective until Joe Biden undermined it by
10:19
Speaker 3: embracing appeasement. That was a massive mistake, and I hope
10:23
Speaker 3: and believe President Trump is turning that around right now now.
10:26
Speaker 1: If you want to hear the rest of this conversation,
10:29
Speaker 1: you can go back and listen to the full podcast
10:31
Speaker 1: from earlier this week.
10:33
Speaker 2: Now onto story number two.
10:35
Speaker 3: So Ben, let me ask you something. Yeah, are you
10:38
Speaker 3: excited listening to this?
10:40
Speaker 1: I am because cause I am no, I am, and
10:42
Speaker 1: I think this is something that we've been missing. You know,
10:45
Speaker 1: you remember when I was working with the Bush administration,
10:48
Speaker 1: it was on Social Security Form because it was just
10:51
Speaker 1: a Ponzi scheme in essence, where I was like, what
10:54
Speaker 1: are we doing? How are we not giving people more
10:58
Speaker 1: with investing? And this is one of those things that
11:01
Speaker 1: for me, is about financial freedom, and it allows people
11:04
Speaker 1: a chance to succeed in the greatest country in the
11:07
Speaker 1: world and do it in a way that is just
11:09
Speaker 1: so smart. And I can't imagine what this is going
11:13
Speaker 1: to do for single moms, for people that are working
11:18
Speaker 1: nine to five jobs, two jobs, working hourly jobs. They say,
11:22
Speaker 1: now I feel like even I can give my kids
11:25
Speaker 1: a better life.
11:26
Speaker 2: Because that's ultimately I think what every parent wants.
11:28
Speaker 1: They want to give their chance, their kid a chance
11:31
Speaker 1: to a better life than they live. And this is
11:34
Speaker 1: an example of starting literally at day one of their
11:37
Speaker 1: birth saying we've got you and dagg, now let's go
11:40
Speaker 1: and build on it.
11:41
Speaker 3: So Ben, one of the things Brad was describing that
11:43
Speaker 3: has me really excited is the accelerator that is built
11:47
Speaker 3: into it. So seating every account with a thousand dollars
11:51
Speaker 3: is valuable. By the way, there are three point seven
11:53
Speaker 3: million babies born every year, and so one thousand dollars
11:58
Speaker 3: for three point seven million aby, he's a three point
12:00
Speaker 3: seven billion dollars a year.
12:02
Speaker 2: That means this.
12:03
Speaker 3: Will cost thirty seven billion dollars over ten years. This
12:07
Speaker 3: is a four to five trillion dollar tax cut. So
12:09
Speaker 3: thirty seven billion dollars is a relatively small piece. But
12:13
Speaker 3: you want to talk about how it transforms America. That
12:16
Speaker 3: seed money is important. Even more important is simply creating
12:20
Speaker 3: the account. As Brad noticed, you know, two thirds of
12:25
Speaker 3: Americans will not have an investment account, will not be
12:28
Speaker 3: invested in the market. And we're creating a world where
12:31
Speaker 3: every child, every single child, from gazillionaire kids to a
12:37
Speaker 3: homeless kid on the street is suddenly has an account
12:41
Speaker 3: invested the market. That is transformative. But then the accelerator.
12:45
Speaker 3: So what Brad has worked for several years is he's
12:47
Speaker 3: brought together world class ceo some of the most prominent
12:52
Speaker 3: CEOs in the country. He mentioned Michael Dell. That was
12:55
Speaker 3: not theoretical. Michael is Michael is a good friend of mine.
12:58
Speaker 3: He's a Texan, incredible entrepreneur worth over one hundred billion dollars.
13:02
Speaker 3: Michael is the chairman of the CEO Council for Invest America,
13:06
Speaker 3: so Michael is leaning in heart. He's committed Dell Computers.
13:10
Speaker 3: When this passes, Dell will help fund the accounts for
13:16
Speaker 3: the kids of their employees.
13:17
Speaker 2: That's powerful.
13:18
Speaker 3: But as Brad said, also Michael is quite interested on
13:21
Speaker 3: the philanthropic side in supporting not just the accounts for
13:26
Speaker 3: the children of his employees, but more broadly having a
13:28
Speaker 3: bigger impact. I think we will see think for a second,
13:32
Speaker 3: Ben about four oh one k's. Remember when we were kids,
13:35
Speaker 3: four O one k's didn't exist. Now, just about every
13:40
Speaker 3: every job at a big company, it's part of the plan.
13:43
Speaker 3: It's part of the plan, and the employer matches four
13:46
Speaker 3: A one K contributions makes their own contributions. It's a
13:51
Speaker 3: really attractive employee benefit. And what I like about this
13:54
Speaker 3: is the accelerator component that I think you will end
13:58
Speaker 3: up having re wealth creation that changes. Look an eighteen
14:03
Speaker 3: year old kid who's got a single mom, who's not
14:06
Speaker 3: coming from money, who's living in a rough environments suddenly
14:10
Speaker 3: got a couple one hundred thousand dollars invested in the
14:13
Speaker 3: stock market. That changes their whole life. This is this
14:19
Speaker 3: is life changing, and.
14:21
Speaker 1: Well this also seems I go back to the trickle
14:24
Speaker 1: down effect, and you know, it's like four to one k's.
14:27
Speaker 1: You remember when it was your grandparents and your parents
14:29
Speaker 1: when you go to get your first job, your first
14:31
Speaker 1: real job, Like, do they have a four to one k?
14:34
Speaker 1: It's not the twenty one to twenty three year old
14:37
Speaker 1: that's asking that question, it's the parents and grandparents. I
14:40
Speaker 1: remember when I got my first other. They do they match?
14:42
Speaker 1: Where do they match? They have a four to one k?
14:45
Speaker 1: Imagine if you get that started in the mindset at
14:49
Speaker 1: age literally zero, that can transform an entire nation.
14:53
Speaker 3: So, Brad, let me ask you something. How did you
14:55
Speaker 3: get involved in this to begin with? Because you were
14:58
Speaker 3: passionate and working on this. I got involved with you
15:02
Speaker 3: about a year ago, but you were passionate, involved in
15:04
Speaker 3: this long before that. What was the kernel of the
15:06
Speaker 3: idea that started this?
15:08
Speaker 7: Well, you know, you'll appreciate the senator as a dad yourself,
15:13
Speaker 7: but you know I have two boys, Lincoln and Jack,
15:17
Speaker 7: and they're sixteen and fourteen.
15:20
Speaker 6: And one of the things we talk about a lot
15:22
Speaker 6: when we sit around the dinner table is when we
15:25
Speaker 6: see problems don't complain about them, right, have a bias
15:29
Speaker 6: to action, have a bias to action, do something about it,
15:33
Speaker 6: don't just sit around and complain. And so, coming out
15:37
Speaker 6: of COVID, I was showing them the investment accounts I
15:42
Speaker 6: set up when they were born, yep. And we're talking
15:45
Speaker 6: about the power of compounding, and we were showing they
15:48
Speaker 6: were talking about the stocks that they owned, and I
15:51
Speaker 6: could see their excitement and they said, Dad, when are
15:53
Speaker 6: we going to be able to, you know, have some
15:56
Speaker 6: control over what we're investing in. We want to learn more.
16:00
Speaker 6: Will you set up a Robinhood account for course, et cetera.
16:03
Speaker 6: And then we started talking about the wealth gap and
16:07
Speaker 6: we started you know, my son Lincoln brought me something
16:10
Speaker 6: you know that was the headline and it said ninety
16:13
Speaker 6: three percent of stocks are owned by the wealthiest ten
16:15
Speaker 6: percent of Americans. Yeah, and he said, Dad, I feel
16:18
Speaker 6: I feel like, you know, I'm I'm glad you set
16:21
Speaker 6: this up for me when I was a kid, but
16:23
Speaker 6: I kind of feel guilty, like, what, why can't everybody
16:27
Speaker 6: you know have this this uh, you know, same benefit.
16:31
Speaker 6: And and I said, you know, we got to fix this.
16:34
Speaker 6: And so he said to me, what are you going
16:36
Speaker 6: to do about it? And I turned to him and
16:38
Speaker 6: I said, no, what are we going.
16:40
Speaker 8: To do about it?
16:41
Speaker 6: And we made a commitment as a family that we're
16:43
Speaker 6: going to do something about this. Yep. And you know,
16:45
Speaker 6: it's been been one of the best parts of the journey.
16:49
Speaker 6: We set up a five oh one c three uh
16:51
Speaker 6: calling Best America and we literally, you know, just started uh,
16:57
Speaker 6: you know, making the calls. And it was lining up
17:01
Speaker 6: light minded thinkers in the private sector and lining up
17:05
Speaker 6: light minded folks in Washington. And you and I have
17:09
Speaker 6: talked about this. You know. I had the good fortune
17:12
Speaker 6: when I was returning from studying overseas in nineteen ninety
17:15
Speaker 6: ninety one to show up in Washington and go work
17:19
Speaker 6: for the late and great Senator from Indiana, Richard Lueger.
17:23
Speaker 6: Luber was a Rhodes scholar. He was a mayor of Indianapolis,
17:28
Speaker 6: became a long serving senator, credible senator and at the
17:31
Speaker 6: time he was working on denuclearizing the nuclear stockpiles coming
17:36
Speaker 6: out of the Cold War with Sam Nunn. And let's
17:41
Speaker 6: just say later in life, I went on to have
17:43
Speaker 6: some success. And when I saw the Senator in those
17:47
Speaker 6: later years, he said to me you know, don't waste it.
17:50
Speaker 6: You know, remember those days, remember those runs around the
17:52
Speaker 6: wall in the mall in Washington, and make sure you
17:56
Speaker 6: do something that matters. And so as a family, we
17:58
Speaker 6: want to do something that mattered. And I will say
18:01
Speaker 6: in the House, in the Senate, you know, you know,
18:04
Speaker 6: in the White House, and in a broad bipartisan way,
18:08
Speaker 6: and that was something that was really important to me.
18:12
Speaker 6: We've had incredible support, and I said, I've never seen
18:16
Speaker 6: an idea with a better product market fit. Everybody I
18:19
Speaker 6: talked to in the private sector in Washington was intrigued
18:23
Speaker 6: by the idea. But I remember we were speaking with
18:27
Speaker 6: then Speaker McCarthy in the House. Lincoln was in the
18:30
Speaker 6: meeting with me. We had an incredible meeting with the
18:33
Speaker 6: Speaker and we walked out and I said to him,
18:35
Speaker 6: as we're looking at the rotunda in the House, I said,
18:39
Speaker 6: every single good idea in America has started with a
18:42
Speaker 6: conversation just like that. Right, as an entrepreneur in Silica Valley,
18:46
Speaker 6: nothing happened in Zilica Valley. Right, not Google, not open Ai,
18:51
Speaker 6: not Facebook. Right without a conversation on the back of
18:55
Speaker 6: a napkin that starts as an idea and so I
18:57
Speaker 6: had started a few companies in the valley. I knew
19:00
Speaker 6: something about starting things, and we just got started and
19:04
Speaker 6: the snowball started rolling. And here we are three and
19:06
Speaker 6: a half years later, and I think we're on the precipice.
19:10
Speaker 6: I think your great leadership, the great leadership in the
19:13
Speaker 6: House and the White House of making this happen. And
19:17
Speaker 6: I agree with you. I think we're going to look
19:19
Speaker 6: back in ten or twenty years and this is going
19:22
Speaker 6: to be a massive legacy of this moment.
19:24
Speaker 1: You just said a word a moment ago, the word
19:26
Speaker 1: and it's become a bad word now. Is bipartisanate like
19:29
Speaker 1: never happens anymore. So I'm going to ask both of
19:31
Speaker 1: you this, is there a chance that this can be
19:36
Speaker 1: such a great idea that it is in fact by
19:39
Speaker 1: partisan and that Democrats and Republicans can work together like
19:42
Speaker 1: they used to twenty thirty years ago. When there are
19:46
Speaker 1: nonpartisan ideas that are just great ideas that are great
19:50
Speaker 1: for all Americans.
19:51
Speaker 2: And this one, by the.
19:51
Speaker 1: Way, I would actually argue with skewmore to helping those
19:54
Speaker 1: that are poor in this country look than anyone.
19:56
Speaker 3: Else, unquestionably, And I'll give you some positive signs on
20:00
Speaker 3: this one. There are significant overlaps between this idea and
20:04
Speaker 3: an idea that Corey Booker had called baby bonds, and
20:07
Speaker 3: his idea was to create bonds and create a savings
20:10
Speaker 3: account for every baby born in America, and when he
20:13
Speaker 3: was running for president, a campaign on that, and Corey's
20:15
Speaker 3: a friend of mine, Brad knows Corey well. I will
20:19
Speaker 3: say this is different from Corey's baby bonds because I
20:23
Speaker 3: was not a supporter of just the baby bonds of
20:25
Speaker 3: an investment account that is accruing interest. What really sold
20:30
Speaker 3: me on this was making a generation of capitalists. Was
20:34
Speaker 3: the fact that this money is not just a savings account,
20:37
Speaker 3: which is easy for Democrats to support, but rather it
20:40
Speaker 3: is investing in the equity markets. It is making children
20:44
Speaker 3: owners of the major companies in America, and that to
20:47
Speaker 3: me was really exciting. That being said, I think there's
20:51
Speaker 3: a good chance that we will get Democrats to support this.
20:54
Speaker 3: I'll say Dick Durbin, who is the Democrat whip and
20:59
Speaker 3: very liberal senator, although I've served with him on the
21:01
Speaker 3: Judiciary Committee for thirteen years. Dick Durbin, in a press
21:04
Speaker 3: story today, actually praise this idea, and it's common about
21:09
Speaker 3: me that Dick is wicked smart. But we said about
21:11
Speaker 3: me as he said, well, a stop clock is right
21:14
Speaker 3: twice a day. And I actually ran into Dick in
21:18
Speaker 3: the wall in the hallway and I said, Dick, you
21:22
Speaker 3: praised me in the press. He said it must have
21:24
Speaker 3: been a mistake. And I reminded him of the quote
21:26
Speaker 3: and he laughed, and I said, Dick, it's a good
21:28
Speaker 3: thing you're retiring. They might primary in the Democrat primary
21:31
Speaker 3: for saying something nice about me. And I'll tell you
21:35
Speaker 3: there was another Democrat senator, a freshman, it was newly elected,
21:37
Speaker 3: who came and approached me and said, I really like
21:40
Speaker 3: this idea. This is interesting. And I said, well, look,
21:42
Speaker 3: so no Democrat is going to vote for the reconciliation bill.
21:46
Speaker 3: That's going to be a pure party line bill. So
21:48
Speaker 3: the actual bill that passes this no Democrat will vote for.
21:52
Speaker 3: But what I told this this Democrat freshman, I said, well,
21:55
Speaker 3: co sponsor my invest America bill, so you can make
21:58
Speaker 3: clear you supported. I think we've got a decent chance
22:01
Speaker 3: of getting Democrats on board. Brad did a good job
22:04
Speaker 3: of talking to them, and I will tell you a
22:08
Speaker 3: couple of things. So Brad was describing all the time
22:10
Speaker 3: and energy he put in, and he said, quite modestly,
22:14
Speaker 3: he said, well, I've had some success in business. Ben
22:17
Speaker 3: Let me be clear, Brad is a billionaire. Like he's
22:20
Speaker 3: got a crap ton of money, and he could sit
22:23
Speaker 3: back and play golf all day long and never need
22:25
Speaker 3: to work again, and he'd be fine, and his kids
22:28
Speaker 3: would be fine, and his grandkids would be fine. But
22:31
Speaker 3: he's not doing that. A He's got a ton of energy,
22:33
Speaker 3: but he has poured so much time and energy and money.
22:37
Speaker 3: So I will tell you the way this got done
22:39
Speaker 3: is he was relentless. He was talking to everybody in
22:42
Speaker 3: the House. Why is this in the House bill? Because
22:45
Speaker 3: Brad was talking repeatedly to Jason Smith, the Chairman of
22:47
Speaker 3: Ways and Means. He was talking repeatedly to Mike Johnson,
22:50
Speaker 3: the Speaker of the House. By the way, I was too.
22:52
Speaker 3: I was talking to both of them. They're both good friends.
22:54
Speaker 3: He was talking repeatedly to me and other senators. I
22:58
Speaker 3: sat down with Brad this week with Mike Crapo, the
23:01
Speaker 3: chairman of the Finance Committee, who's drafting the tax portion
23:04
Speaker 3: of the reconciliation of the Senate. He's been talking in
23:07
Speaker 3: the White House to Kevin Hasset, who runs the National
23:09
Speaker 3: Economic Council, over and over and over again, he's been
23:11
Speaker 3: talking to the President. It is been that relentless. And
23:14
Speaker 3: by the way, President Trump weighed in directly with the
23:18
Speaker 3: Speaker of the House and said, I like this idea included.
23:22
Speaker 3: How did this idea get like like a lot of
23:24
Speaker 3: the press is shocked, why is this in the House bill?
23:29
Speaker 3: A big part of the reason is the President weighed
23:31
Speaker 3: in and said, I really like this idea, and so
23:34
Speaker 3: the House included it. That wouldn't have happened without Brad's
23:38
Speaker 3: efforts and my efforts making the case to the House,
23:42
Speaker 3: to the Senate and to the White House. And I
23:44
Speaker 3: think we will get this done and it will have
23:48
Speaker 3: an impact when all three of us are dead and
23:51
Speaker 3: buried as before.
23:53
Speaker 1: If you want to hear the rest of this conversation
23:55
Speaker 1: on this topic, you can go back and dow the
23:58
Speaker 1: podcast from early this week to hear the entire thing.
24:02
Speaker 1: I want to get back to the big story number
24:04
Speaker 1: three of the week.
24:05
Speaker 2: You may have missed.
24:06
Speaker 1: Is there going to be any oversight slash investigation? Should
24:10
Speaker 1: there be from Congress? And I know that's a weird question,
24:13
Speaker 1: because there's somebody like, look, we want let's move on.
24:16
Speaker 1: But like I do, actually, as an American citizen, want
24:18
Speaker 1: to know who is running the United States of America
24:21
Speaker 1: that was elected by no one.
24:24
Speaker 2: I want to know who was calling the shots.
24:25
Speaker 1: It was elected by no one, because whether I win
24:28
Speaker 1: or lose an election, my vote should not be canceled
24:30
Speaker 1: out by by some sort of dictator or tyrant within
24:33
Speaker 1: an administration that no one knows who's running a government.
24:36
Speaker 3: And by the way, there's a related question to that
24:38
Speaker 3: Ben which as we see the stories that apparently a
24:41
Speaker 3: substantial number of official things that Biden signed were signed
24:44
Speaker 3: by the auto pen.
24:45
Speaker 2: So was he even making the decision to sign them, right?
24:47
Speaker 3: And he didn't even seem to know like some of
24:49
Speaker 3: the pardons. And I actually think you'll have this litigated.
24:52
Speaker 3: I don't not aware of any courts that's ever decided
24:55
Speaker 3: is is a pardon? Does a pardon have to actually
24:59
Speaker 3: be signed by the pres So, look, every elected official
25:01
Speaker 3: has an autopen. I have an autopen. And so for
25:04
Speaker 3: things like constituent correspondence, if you write into your senator,
25:07
Speaker 3: you'll you'll get a response back, and we try to
25:09
Speaker 3: respond substantively in the autop pen will sign it, and
25:12
Speaker 3: I get millions of those letters, so I couldn't physically
25:14
Speaker 3: sign them all.
25:15
Speaker 2: All I'm thinking about right now is how where that
25:17
Speaker 2: autopen is and how much fun I could happen keep going.
25:19
Speaker 3: But look, it's fine for if something like correspondence.
25:22
Speaker 2: A birthday wish.
25:24
Speaker 3: But the question is for something that has legal force
25:27
Speaker 3: of law. And I actually want to know did they
25:29
Speaker 3: use the autopen to sign any legislation, because it's not
25:32
Speaker 3: clear to be legislation that the president didn't sign has
25:35
Speaker 3: legal force. The autopen is not the commander in chief
25:39
Speaker 3: and the chief judges.
25:40
Speaker 1: For example, if he did an autopen, which means I'm
25:43
Speaker 1: truly convinced that he didn't know what was going on.
25:46
Speaker 2: He didn't know who's appointing. He probably didn't know who's pardoning.
25:49
Speaker 3: And if that happening, the parties are where it'll be litigated.
25:52
Speaker 2: Okay, and that will Why is that so different?
25:56
Speaker 3: Because look, it's it's interesting like a pardon under the Constitution,
25:59
Speaker 3: all you have to have is a document from the
26:02
Speaker 3: president that said, you know, I I pardoned Ben Ferguson
26:06
Speaker 3: and and and suddenly, actually, only if it's a federal offense,
26:09
Speaker 3: so he can't.
26:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, the per I take, the abuse I take, but.
26:15
Speaker 3: It literally there's no pomp and circumstance. It doesn't have
26:18
Speaker 3: to have gold leaf on the paper. It doesn't have
26:21
Speaker 3: to be an official. It's just a piece of paper
26:23
Speaker 3: with a signature, with those words and his signature, that
26:26
Speaker 3: is legally a pardon. But if you don't actually have
26:29
Speaker 3: a signature, Listen, I've been in the oval dozens of times,
26:33
Speaker 3: probably more when when President Trump is signing things and
26:37
Speaker 3: pulls out he actually so have you seen the president sign.
26:40
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, I've got like I've got one of the
26:42
Speaker 2: big sharpie.
26:44
Speaker 3: Like most presidents use like a sharpie to have a
26:47
Speaker 3: signing pen. But but President Trump's it's a marker that's
26:50
Speaker 3: probably what ten inches long, and maybe.
26:53
Speaker 2: It's gold like gold is signature and like an inch.
26:56
Speaker 3: In diameter, like it's it is massive. But he signed
27:00
Speaker 3: one after the other after the other after the other,
27:02
Speaker 3: because that's what gives it legal force of law. If
27:06
Speaker 3: you have a president that's mentally incompetent and you have
27:08
Speaker 3: staffers running thing, it makes you wonder. Doctor Fauci's pardon.
27:14
Speaker 2: Is chine it?
27:15
Speaker 6: I don't know.
27:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, And if it's the auto pen, which I'm sure
27:18
Speaker 2: they can figure that out, it will be.
27:21
Speaker 3: It's an interesting question, you know. I'll say a few
27:24
Speaker 3: more of these quotes from the cabinet members. The cabinet
27:28
Speaker 3: members in this book described said. One said quote, the
27:33
Speaker 3: staff did him wrong. If you were with him every
27:36
Speaker 3: day and you knew this was going to be a problem,
27:38
Speaker 3: why didn't you go to him and say something. Another
27:41
Speaker 3: said quote, access dropped off considerably in twenty twenty four,
27:44
Speaker 3: and I didn't interact with him as much. A third
27:48
Speaker 3: said quote, Yes, the president is making the decisions, but
27:51
Speaker 3: if the inner circle is shaping them in such a way,
27:54
Speaker 3: is it really a decision? And here was another cabinet secretary.
27:57
Speaker 3: I don't think he has dementia. But the thing thing
28:00
Speaker 3: is he's an old man. The president can give you
28:02
Speaker 3: four to six good hours a day. When he got tired,
28:04
Speaker 3: sloppy isn't the right word, but his guard was down.
28:07
Speaker 3: That would be the commander in chief of the United States.
28:10
Speaker 1: I want to go back to the last quote, Sata,
28:11
Speaker 1: that you just said about the people around the president.
28:16
Speaker 1: Now that it's over, now that everybody knows the kign
28:19
Speaker 1: of decline, Now that the books are being written. They're
28:21
Speaker 1: telling you they may have only gotten four hours a
28:24
Speaker 1: day out of the President United atspiragra. That is maybe
28:26
Speaker 1: one of the most shocking statements I've ever heard about
28:29
Speaker 1: any president.
28:30
Speaker 6: Yet.
28:30
Speaker 3: Look, it's he was not mentally capable to do the job.
28:34
Speaker 3: They knew it, and they lied about it. And by
28:36
Speaker 3: the way, Jake Tapper's whole premise that gosh, little old
28:39
Speaker 3: me Jake was deceived. They just didn't tell me the truth.
28:42
Speaker 3: I just didn't know. Well, Jake, if you listened to Verdict,
28:47
Speaker 3: we were telling you the facts, and we were telling
28:49
Speaker 3: you the facts early on here. I want you to
28:51
Speaker 3: go back to January of twenty twenty four. I want
28:53
Speaker 3: you to listen to a segment of Enemy in the
28:55
Speaker 3: podcast back in January of twenty four talking about Biden's deterioration.
29:00
Speaker 3: Give a listen.
29:02
Speaker 5: You and I and kind of anyone with eyes and
29:05
Speaker 5: common sense have been observing for a long time that
29:09
Speaker 5: Joe Biden's cognitive decline is massive. But it's easy for
29:15
Speaker 5: some observers to dismiss that and say, you know, these
29:17
Speaker 5: guys are biased, they're partisans, they don't like Biden. So
29:20
Speaker 5: what they're saying is not true. In this instance, the
29:27
Speaker 5: people speaking are the Biden Department of Justice and not
29:31
Speaker 5: any department of justice. This is a department of Justice
29:34
Speaker 5: that has proven itself the most politicized and partisan department
29:38
Speaker 5: of justice in history, and they have argued so for example.
29:43
Speaker 3: I'm going to read you a paragraph from the report.
29:46
Speaker 3: In his interview with our office, mister Biden's memory was worse.
29:51
Speaker 3: He did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting
29:56
Speaker 3: on the first day of the interview when his term
29:59
Speaker 3: ended quote if it was twenty thirteen, when did I
30:03
Speaker 3: stop being vice president? And forgetting on the second day
30:06
Speaker 3: of the interview when his term began quote in two
30:11
Speaker 3: thousand and nine, am I still vice president? He did
30:16
Speaker 3: not remember even within several years when his son Bo died,
30:22
Speaker 3: and his memory appeared hazy when describing the Afghanistan debate
30:28
Speaker 3: that was once so important to him, among other things,
30:32
Speaker 3: he mistakenly said he quote had a real difference of
30:37
Speaker 3: opinion with General Carl Aitkinberry, when in fact Aitkinberry was
30:43
Speaker 3: an ally whom mister Biden cited approvingly in his thanksgiving
30:49
Speaker 3: memo to President Obama.
30:51
Speaker 5: All of that was authored by the Biden Department of Justice.
30:55
Speaker 5: And when they are describing the sitting president as a
30:59
Speaker 5: well meaning elderly man with a poor memory, the natural
31:05
Speaker 5: question for anyone to say is, holy crap. If he's
31:08
Speaker 5: not competent to stand trial, why is he the commander
31:12
Speaker 5: in chief with the authority to send our sons and
31:15
Speaker 5: daughters into harm's way? Why does he have access to
31:18
Speaker 5: the nuclear codes? Understand the description here They say, you
31:22
Speaker 5: couldn't charge him with a crime because he's not aware
31:25
Speaker 5: of enough to have the requisite mental intent. And yet
31:29
Speaker 5: Joe Biden tonight, if he's so desired, could literally exterminate
31:34
Speaker 5: humanity from the face of the planet. As commander in chief,
31:38
Speaker 5: if he gave the order launch the nuclear weapons now,
31:44
Speaker 5: unless the military refused to obey the commander in chief,
31:49
Speaker 5: Joe Biden could exterminate every life on this planet. And
31:52
Speaker 5: if he's not mentally competent to stand trial, that is terrifying.
31:58
Speaker 5: So that was a year and a half ago, a
32:00
Speaker 5: year and a half ago on this podcast, And understand
32:03
Speaker 5: the entire basis of Tapper's book is he couldn't possibly
32:05
Speaker 5: know about known about this mental decline. The Department of
32:08
Speaker 5: Justice in this would be the Biden Department of Justice
32:11
Speaker 5: went into court. So the Robert Herr Report, Remember they
32:14
Speaker 5: did not prosecute Biden.
32:16
Speaker 2: And where was that? I wonder do you remember the
32:17
Speaker 2: timeframe on that.
32:18
Speaker 3: That was early twenty four.
32:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, we covered it a lot, and that with them
32:23
Speaker 2: interviewing him in twenty three.
32:25
Speaker 1: So in twenty three when they were interviewing Joe Biden,
32:28
Speaker 1: they then in twenty four told America he's so bad
32:32
Speaker 1: off we can't even charge him with anything.
32:34
Speaker 3: So they concluded if they charged him, he would be
32:37
Speaker 3: found not competent to be convicted. That is a stunning. Look,
32:42
Speaker 3: there's a standard. There are people that are not competent
32:44
Speaker 3: to be tried. If you have dementia, if you're like
32:47
Speaker 3: mentally ill, that you're not able that The legal standard
32:50
Speaker 3: is you have to form what's called mensraa, which is intent.
32:53
Speaker 3: And they said, well, he's so old and senile, we
32:56
Speaker 3: can't charge him. So that's why they said, oh, yeah,
32:58
Speaker 3: he clearly violated the law to felony. Remember he kept
33:01
Speaker 3: classified materials everywhere including his garage next to his antique car.
33:06
Speaker 2: Not a joke, that's real.
33:08
Speaker 3: And they said he was guilty of that, but they
33:11
Speaker 3: couldn't charge him because he was incompetent to Centrial. I
33:13
Speaker 3: want you to listen in twenty twenty three to me
33:17
Speaker 3: laying out his mental decline and MSNBC Morning Joe making
33:21
Speaker 3: fun of me for it gives.
33:22
Speaker 2: Us like one of their big intros. May fourth, twenty
33:25
Speaker 2: twenty three.
33:27
Speaker 5: Twenty eleven, when Republicans in the House stood strong on
33:32
Speaker 5: the death ceiling again because Democrats had had majority of
33:36
Speaker 5: the Congress for two years, had passed trillions in irresponsible spending,
33:40
Speaker 5: and Republicans stood strong and said, we will not raise
33:43
Speaker 5: the death ceiling without serious fiscal reform.
33:46
Speaker 2: What happened then?
33:48
Speaker 5: Vice President Joe Biden came and negotiated a deal, a
33:52
Speaker 5: deal called the Budget Control Act. Vice President Biden sat
33:56
Speaker 5: down with House Republicans and reached a meaningful compromise. President
34:02
Speaker 5: Joe Biden needs to do the same thing, and I'll say, sadly,
34:06
Speaker 5: the reason he hasn't so far, I believe is because
34:12
Speaker 5: his mental faculties are too diminished.
34:14
Speaker 2: Right now, you know, I know, hold on, hold on,
34:18
Speaker 2: hold on.
34:19
Speaker 9: He has such a point, his mental faculties are so
34:23
Speaker 9: diminished that he passed more bipartisan signed more bipartisan legislation,
34:29
Speaker 9: but he was doing it.
34:30
Speaker 8: Last year than any president since LBJ. My god, if
34:38
Speaker 8: he were his coaching as he had been in twenty eleven,
34:40
Speaker 8: but he could have been like you could have gone
34:44
Speaker 8: back to FDR.
34:45
Speaker 5: What else he did without without apparently realizing what he
34:48
Speaker 5: was doing.
34:49
Speaker 2: He like, held NATO together to fight aggression in Ukraine.
34:55
Speaker 9: And my god, I know he only increased eight hundre
35:00
Speaker 9: and miles border NATO with.
35:03
Speaker 3: Russia exactly, but I guess he you know, he thought
35:05
Speaker 3: he was happen.
35:07
Speaker 9: You know, it reminds me of Ronald Reagan when he
35:09
Speaker 9: was speaking at Harvard a eurek in college grad and
35:12
Speaker 9: he's sitting there talking to the grads and he's making
35:14
Speaker 9: fun of his education. At the end, he goes, you know,
35:17
Speaker 9: sometimes I just sit here with a presidential seal in
35:20
Speaker 9: front of him, and I wonder what I could have
35:23
Speaker 9: been with a.
35:24
Speaker 1: Good get go back and read David, go back and
35:32
Speaker 1: read Reagan. He says, By golly, I mean, I love this.
35:35
Speaker 1: And by the way, we do know who was doing
35:36
Speaker 1: it now. It was either an autopin or a bunch
35:38
Speaker 1: of old staffers.
35:39
Speaker 3: So I'm curious that I may have missed this. But
35:42
Speaker 3: as Joe Scarborough apologized for lying to America.
35:46
Speaker 2: No, he's probably writing a book about the decline of
35:48
Speaker 2: Joe Biden.
35:49
Speaker 3: Howka apologized, has MSNBC as NBC. If any of them apologized,
35:53
Speaker 3: they knew he was mentally diminished and they covered it
35:57
Speaker 3: up because they were partisans and they supported his agenda.
36:01
Speaker 3: To heck with whether we had a competent commander in
36:03
Speaker 3: chief or not.
36:04
Speaker 1: As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with senter
36:07
Speaker 1: Ted Cruz Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
36:10
Speaker 1: with my podcast and you can listen to my podcast
36:12
Speaker 1: every other day you're not listening to Verdict or each
36:14
Speaker 1: day when you listen to Verdict. Afterwards, I'd love to
36:17
Speaker 1: have you as a listener to again the Ben Ferguson podcasts,
36:20
Speaker 1: and we will see you back here on Monday morning.