Latest / The Ben Ferguson Podcast / Behind the Gates with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows

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Behind the Gates with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows · The Ben Ferguson Podcast

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: The White House chief of Staff has traditionally been known
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: as the gatekeeper. Well, we have gone behind the gates
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: with Mark Meadows live from the White House. This is
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Verdict with Ted Cruise. Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: I'm Michael Knowls, little change of scenery today, joined as
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: always by the Senator and Mark Meadows. Great to be
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: with you, mister Meadows. I'm noticing now it is seven
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: o'clock here. This is probably the earliest you have gotten
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: off work since you've taken As soon as we get
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: off work, I'll let you know whether that's a case
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: or not fair enough. Obviously it's it's a twenty four
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: to seven kind of kind of job. But you know,
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  Speaker 1: our nation is in a critical time where we've got
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  Speaker 1: to actually make sure that people like Ted and I
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  Speaker 1: worked together on behalf of all the freedom loving forgotten
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: men and women in this country. And really the impact
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  Speaker 1: is well beyond this is Ted and I have articulated
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  Speaker 1: a number of times. Well, because I know, Senator you
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: and mister Meadows go back a lot farther than just
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: you taking this job as the White House chief of staff. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: he actually would talk to me before I actually was
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  Speaker 1: the chief of staff, you know, so I could count
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  Speaker 1: him on one hand. But well, Mark and I go
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  Speaker 1: back a long time. We were actually both elected to
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  Speaker 1: Congress in the same day November twenty twelve. We showed
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  Speaker 1: up here in January twenty thirteen, looked around and said,
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  Speaker 1: what the hell are we doing here? And it was
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  Speaker 1: Barack Obama had just been reelected. It was a messed
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  Speaker 1: up time. But one of the things we found, we're
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: both brand new, is there were really only a handful
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: of people willing to stand up and fight for anything.
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  Speaker 1: And so we became fast friends. We became fast friends
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  Speaker 1: fighting against Obamacare, where we're standing up, going wait a second,
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  Speaker 1: We got elected to fight this damn thing, and too
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  Speaker 1: many Republicans just wanted to give in. And and it
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  Speaker 1: it's interesting in Washington, like anywhere else, courage is contagious.
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  Speaker 1: So so before it was chief of staff, Mark led
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  Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus of the House and and marketing you know,
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  Speaker 1: maybe helpful. Look, the folks that watch and listen to
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: this podcast are a savvy, educated group. But explain to
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: folks what the Freedom Caucus is and WHYATT, WHYATT matters? Well,
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  Speaker 1: I can tell you you're right. We came in together,
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  Speaker 1: and what I found, Michael, was is that most members
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  Speaker 1: of Congress, on both the Senate side and the House side,
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: actually had the backbone of a banana, you know, had
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: great shape until it was peel back and it got
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  Speaker 1: real mushy. Ted Cruise was not one of those. And
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  Speaker 1: immediately we formed this friendship. But what I found was is,
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  Speaker 1: unlike Ted, who was willing to stand on courage and
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  Speaker 1: I might add a great personal cost where you know,
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  Speaker 1: if you stand for the people back home, you don't
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  Speaker 1: get invited to dinners in Washington, DC. And and it's
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: a real cost. There's not a benefit package of being
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: a real true conservative. But that being said, I think
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  Speaker 1: what I saw was what Ted was able to do
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  Speaker 1: in the Senate. I said, well, we got to create
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  Speaker 1: that same kind of leverage over in the House. And
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: the problem is the key number in the House was
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  Speaker 1: two eighteen. Yeah, we had the majority, and I said, well, gosh,
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  Speaker 1: you know, if a few of the Conservatives would stay together,
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  Speaker 1: we could actually make some policy differences because they would
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  Speaker 1: need our vote to be able to do it. And
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  Speaker 1: Obamacare was the first fight we made Ted an honorary
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  Speaker 1: member of the Freedom Caucus. He was welcome in our
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  Speaker 1: meeting anytime. But it was all about leverage, and for us,
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  Speaker 1: it was about making sure that we didn't just go
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  Speaker 1: along to get along, but we actually stood for something.
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  Speaker 1: And one of the amendments on the Obamacare was what
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  Speaker 1: I call the Crew's Freedom Amendment. It was all about
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: making sure that people had choices. Because I think this
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  Speaker 1: is actually pretty important. The House Freedom Caucus, especially when
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  Speaker 1: it first came around, was the real deal. You know,
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  Speaker 1: these are the real conservative Some people are a little
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  Speaker 1: bit less conservative. They talk a good game, maybe they
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  Speaker 1: don't vote that way. And the Freedom Caucus really stood
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  Speaker 1: for something. So the very fact that the White House
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  Speaker 1: Chief of Staff is a Freedom Caucus guy, I mean
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  Speaker 1: that that does tell you something. And I know that
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  Speaker 1: this Obamacare fight, it didn't just end in two thousand
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  Speaker 1: nine or twenty thirteen, or it kept going on and on,
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  Speaker 1: and I know you two worked on that together well,
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  Speaker 1: and it was interesting. You fast forward to twenty seventeen,
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  Speaker 1: President Trump's been elected and there's an energy, a real
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  Speaker 1: passion to take on the Washington swamp. And you remember
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  Speaker 1: the first thing that came up, it was Obamacare repeal,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: and first White House Chief of Staff was Ryan's previous right.
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: Ryance is a good guy, but Ryan was very very
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  Speaker 1: close with Paul Ryan, the Speaker of the House. They're
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  Speaker 1: both from Wisconsin. And if you remember, the first draft
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  Speaker 1: of Obamacare repeal in the House was terrible. It was
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  Speaker 1: drafted by insurance company lobbyists. It was garbage. But when
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: it was drafted, you remember early on the House leadership
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  Speaker 1: was trying to really weaponize the president to attack the
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  Speaker 1: Freedom Caucus, to attack conservatives, and you know, you go
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  Speaker 1: back to the first few months where the President was
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  Speaker 1: blasting them. And I still remember spring of twenty seventeen,
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  Speaker 1: Marcus in the House, he's leading the Freedom Caucus, I'm
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: in the Senate, and we both would go to Mara
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  Speaker 1: Lagos and basically just drop in on the President unannounced.
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  Speaker 1: We basically called over and said this President, we need
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  Speaker 1: to see it. That's exactly right. That's how you're saying.
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  Speaker 1: That's how urgent this was. This wasn't some prescheduled White
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  Speaker 1: House meeting. You go down to the president's beach resort
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  Speaker 1: in Florida and we sat there and said, listen, if
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: you go down the road of this House bill, insurance
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  Speaker 1: premiums will go up. And yeah, did you hear what
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  Speaker 1: he just said, insurance premiums go up? I mean yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it just it was crazy. Now, the insurance lobbyists loved it.
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  Speaker 1: They want premiums to go up. But but we're both saying,
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  Speaker 1: listen to people who elected you, who elected us, didn't
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  Speaker 1: want us jack enough premiums. And it was a really
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  Speaker 1: important It started to shift that bill away from that
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: first VET version and it ended up getting significantly better. Yeah, okay,
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: you never heard that story before. But something I've noticed
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: just on these shows is you hear so much about
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: how personal relationships and these sort of unplanned moments can
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  Speaker 1: really shift the path of policy in the country. Well,
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: it does, but I think the other thing is the
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  Speaker 1: interesting thing. So so Ted goes, come on, I'm going
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  Speaker 1: over to see the president. You need to come with me.
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  Speaker 1: We need to talk to him about Obamacare. And I'm going, okay,
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: well you got in a point. No, no, we're just
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: going I mean, and so so you get this and
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: you go, okay, we're going to drop in on the
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  Speaker 1: President of the United States and talk policy on a Saturday.
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  Speaker 1: By the way, we literally oopered over. I mean, it
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  Speaker 1: was it's a miracle Secret Service didn't shoot us and
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  Speaker 1: we're there. I don't know about that, but it's all
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  Speaker 1: about one relationship ships. You're exactly right, Michael. But the
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  Speaker 1: other part of that is is about tenacity. It's making
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  Speaker 1: sure you're tenacious about what you know is good for
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  Speaker 1: the American people and you're willing to fight that fight.
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  Speaker 1: And Ted obviously has not only a career of doing that,
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  Speaker 1: but when when you look for profiles and courage, uh,
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's got his picture right there. And so
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  Speaker 1: for us in the Freedom Caucus, we just said we
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  Speaker 1: want to give you a partner in the House, and
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  Speaker 1: it came, you know, at great personal costs. I mean
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  Speaker 1: there were times when well we missed a few dinners
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  Speaker 1: as well. That you know something that I noticed. You
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  Speaker 1: obviously had this very public role before in Congress running
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  Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus. Senator, you still have a very public role.
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  Speaker 1: But your job now, mister Meadows, is a little bit
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  Speaker 1: more of a behind the scenes job. Could you maybe
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  Speaker 1: take us behind the scenes a little bit into what
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  Speaker 1: that day looks like. Well, obviously they've got cameras rolling here,
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  Speaker 1: so I don't know that it'll be too much behind
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  Speaker 1: the scenes, but I will say this, Uh. You know,
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  Speaker 1: since I've come over and we're we're almost at a
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  Speaker 1: day eighty five on this job, I've done no press,
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  Speaker 1: so it's it's it is a behind the scene, so
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  Speaker 1: to bring everybody behind the scenes. I think that the
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  Speaker 1: real key is, I see, the job is to serve
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  Speaker 1: the President of the United States, who serves the American people.
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  Speaker 1: But it's also to make sure that every good idea
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  Speaker 1: that is in the Senate gets the visibility with the
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  Speaker 1: President of the United States, uh, in a nanosecond. And
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  Speaker 1: so one of the things that people don't realize is
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  Speaker 1: that I can get a phone call from Senator Cruz
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  Speaker 1: or Senator Blunt or Lindsey Graham and they're saying, you know, listen,
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  Speaker 1: we've we've got this, uh, this issue. We need you
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  Speaker 1: to take care of it. Sometimes it's just as simple
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  Speaker 1: as we've got some constituents that have raised this concern.
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  Speaker 1: We want to make sure the President of the United
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  Speaker 1: States knows about it, and Ted, Ted can vouch for this.
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  Speaker 1: It's a phone call and within minute, the President of
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  Speaker 1: the United States is weighing in on that particular issue.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing like anything I've ever seen. And it's trying to
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  Speaker 1: be the gatekeeper behind the scenes that maybe is not
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  Speaker 1: as much of a gatekeeper is their megaphone within the
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  Speaker 1: West wing. And so senators have better access, I think,
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  Speaker 1: to this president than historically has been the case. I
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  Speaker 1: think that's a good thing. The closer the president is
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  Speaker 1: to the American people, the more he hears from from
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  Speaker 1: the people of Texas through through Ted or the people
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  Speaker 1: of South Carolina through Tim Scott or Lindsey Graham or
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  Speaker 1: whichever senator it might be, the better off it is.
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  Speaker 1: And so but it's also the power of the executive branch.
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  Speaker 1: You know, when when I was in Congress is saying, boy,
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  Speaker 1: all I wanted to do is make sure that Congress
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  Speaker 1: was empowered. But it's a little bit different role now.
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  Speaker 1: But if we work hand in glove, I think what
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  Speaker 1: we can do. This president is willing to do things
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  Speaker 1: that most presidents are not willing to do and take
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  Speaker 1: political risk. You know, we have an embassy that in
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  Speaker 1: Jerusalem is something that Ted and I share passionately together.
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  Speaker 1: That would It's been promised before, you know, and it
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  Speaker 1: never happened. And so the Republican and Democratic presidents have
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  Speaker 1: broken that promise. Trump is the first one to follow through.
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  Speaker 1: I have to make a confession. When President Trump, when
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: he was running and he said I'm gonna move the
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  Speaker 1: embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, I just didn't believe him.
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: I said, that's the sort of thing people say, but
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: then they don't actually do it. And I think a
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: lot of people in Washington thought that, and then when
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  Speaker 1: it actually happened, everybody was so surprised. One thing that's
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: really unusual in this administration is the kind of lead
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: person on Israel policy has been the US Ambassador Israel,
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: David Friedman, who's great guy, has become a close friend,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: and it's unusual. I don't know of any instance where
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: an ambassadors had that kind of influence, and it's because
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: the President knows and trust him, and David is passionate
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: committed the strengthening the US IS relationship. But I worked
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: very closely with David after the President made the announcement
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: because look the nature of Washington, the swamp, the State Department,
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: foggy bottom, did not want this to happen. So here's
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: how they would normally kill it. They would just slow
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: roll it. We need to study for a year the feasibility.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: We need to do a security assessment, we need to
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: we need to do this and that, and their plan
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: it was clear what their plan was going to be,
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: delay it four years. They were hoping Trump loses reelection
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: and then the next the Democrat who comes in will
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: cancel the announcement. And what the Trump administration did, and
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  Speaker 1: David was the point person. I said, David, the only
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  Speaker 1: way this happens is if you opened the damn embassy.
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  Speaker 1: You don't announce it, you open it. And they found
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: a facility. There was a consular facility in Jerusalem and
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: within a year open the damn thing. I've never seen
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  Speaker 1: anything like it. And it was tenacity and the bureaucracy
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: at State was shocked. But that the scene like the
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: urgency of understanding. Oh and and so true. And you
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: talk about behind the scene. So one story that I
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: don't think is out there is so the State Department
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: pushing back, you know, continuing to push back. I think
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: they gave a list of the pros and cons. And
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: so there were a whole long list of all these
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: cons zero pros for moving. Yeah, no, no, I'm telling
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: you that. And so that's something that doesn't get reported.
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: So it literally was you got all these reasons not
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: to do it, and no reasons to do it, and
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: yet this president stayed true to his campaign promise. And
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: but but it takes the encouragement. Sometimes it's a phone
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: call from Ted Cruz in the middle of the night saying,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: you know, CALLI, it's the right thing to do. And
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: in that affirmation makes a big difference. Well, this is
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: what you said earlier is very interesting to me. This
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  Speaker 1: idea that the chief of staff is the gatekeeper. But
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: the flip side is it means you're the megaphone for
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: good ideas. You're the megaphone for ideas that you're hearing people.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Let me give it. Let me give a real time example.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: So Mark's been in office a couple of months. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: you remember a couple of months ago the president was
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: meeting with CEOs a bunch of big oil companies and
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: I was really worried that at the time, and when
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: the meeting was initially announced it was just the CEOs
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: of the giant companies, and so I called Mark and
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: I said, this is a real problem because the way
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: energy works. Yeah, there are a bunch of small independent producers,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: a lot of guys in Texas that aren't the you know,
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: giant super majors that have the GDP of a country,
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: but they're the innovators. They're the ones that drive the
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: domestic production. And early on they were not on the
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: meeting invite list. And so I called Mark said, look,
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: this is a real problem. We need to make sure
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: we've got an independent producer there. Mark not only got
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: it done, but but said, look, you need to be there.
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  Speaker 1: And I got on a plane the next day. In fact,
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: it was funny when I walked in. There are a
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: couple of other senators there. They said, what the hell
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: are you doing here? I said, well, you know, funny,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: you should ask. And it was because Mark said, come
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: to the meeting. And at that meeting, you want to
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: talk about real action. We pressed a couple of things. Remember,
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: price of oil was collapsing, millions of jobs where in jeopardy.
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: And two things came out of that meeting. Number one,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: the President leaned in hard against the Saudis and the
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: Russians and got them to back off their economic warfare
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: against the US. But number two, the President directed. I
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: suggested to the President it was a real problem of
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: capital being cut off from energy, right. And I suggested,
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: as the President, if you would, you would instruct the
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: Secretary of Energy danbre Yet it was there and the
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: Secretary of the Treasury, Stephen Manuchin to make sure that
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: Wall Street doesn't discriminate against energy and bankrupt every US
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: energy producer. And the President right there said do it.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: He looked at Dan and said make it happen. And
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: that made a real, real difference in terms of capital
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: being available and literally saving millions of jobs in this country. Yeah,
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: and so in less than forty eight hours, a phone
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: call from a center to the chiefest Staff and he's
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: sitting in the cabinet room of the White House with
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: another invited guest who was not on the list, advocating
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: for what is important to the people back home in Texas.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: And and and so that happens a lot. The other
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: thing that I think that is critical is you've got
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: this massive bureaucracy with agencies, and you think, well, there's
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: a Republican administration, so you but there is the swamp
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: that continues to go on whether it's a Democrat or
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: Republican in the overwhel elected people come and go yeah,
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: and I just kind of wighed them out, is exactly
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: what Ted was saying. They waited them out. And so
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: one of the great things is is that if Ted
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: or one of his colleagues they're getting you know, the
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: stiff arm. I call it the legislative heisman. You know,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: if they're getting that, it's really easy for me to
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: pick up and say, you know, why am I getting
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: this phone call from this senator on you not responding
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: to their phone call? Oh, well, we're busy. Well I
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: was busy too, and I took his I mean, why
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: aren't you take it? And so sometimes it's just making
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: them aware that there's somebody else willing to hold them
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: make and two branches there. I mean, this is actually
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: something at center. I knew you've talked a lot about.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: Is you've been talking out for years about social media censorship,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: censorship of conservatives. Well, just recently we got out out
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: of the executive branch, this executive order on social media censorship.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: We still don't know a whole lot about that, at
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: least I don't know a lot about that. Maybe could
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit about how that came
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: to be. Well, I think Ted and I know that
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: as conservatives, sometimes our conservative voice doesn't reach the audience
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: as quickly or as effectively as it is normally intense
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: diplomatic way to put. Yeah, well, I can tell you
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: I was one of the few members of Congress back
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: when I was in Congress that was actually shadow band
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: by Twitter. Yeah, And so we ought to put that
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: out on a tweet and see if they take that down,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: they'll say it wasn't shadow band that we were, but
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: it only happened to be four conservative members of Congress myself,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Matt Gates, Devin Nunis, and Jim Jordan. So you're saying
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: didn't follow that, she didn't make it into that. So
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: one of the things that that's important is that we
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: need to make sure that the free press is really
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: the free press and it's not censored. And what Twitter
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: has done, probably more so than some of the other
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: social media platforms, but YouTube is doing it as well,
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: is that they come in and they start to actually
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: monitor content and so it's not this free open what
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: I call the wild wild West of social media. That's
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: the way, and as freedom loving individuals, we want the
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: free market to work. But when the free market starts
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: to get monopolized by content police, then it's important for
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: us to step in. So we did an EO that
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: actually has the potential of taking away their protection from litigation.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: So if we can't fix it, or if Congress can't
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: fix it, let the trial attorneys fix it, it'll happen requally.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Unleashing the trial attorneys is a really powerful up And
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: I got to say, this is an issue where a
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: White House leadership was so needed, and it's so important
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: because you and I've talked about this before. One of
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: the challenges on the issue of a big tech censorship
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: is all the federal agencies are siloed, and it's a
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: hard issue where the Anitrust Division of Department of Justice
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: doesn't quite fit into what they think they want to
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: do the FTC, it doesn't quite fit in with do
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: they want to do the FCC. Everyone has is sort
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: of looking at their own slice of the problem. And
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: the President's Executive Order on this was important to say,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: damn it, this matters. I think it's the biggest threat
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: to democracy in the whole country. But we needed the
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: President and the White House to lead to get the
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: rest of the executive focused on protecting free speech altogether. Right. Well,
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: the interesting thing, and so I'll always try to give
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: you a little bit of a backstory that no one
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: else knows. So that EO, as it relates to Section
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: two thirty, we started putting it around for a little
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: bit of comment on a very limited basis. All of
• 18:59
  Speaker 1: a sudden, this proposed EO shows up in the New
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: York Times, and it really was fed to the New
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: York Times by a federal worker that didn't agree with
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: this administration, or at least it appears that they didn't,
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: and they didn't agree with the EO, and so they
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: took it and fed it to hum outside sources. And
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: I'm glad to say that we were able to track
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: that person down. They no longer work for the federal government.
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: That's let me ask a question here. That's a great
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: I hadn't heard that story, and that's that's a great story.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Let me take it a slightly different direction. So the
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: job marquess, now, I think it may well be the
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: hardest job at all of Washington. So Marcus chief of
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: staff as a cabinet member, but but he's charged with
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: basically wrestling alligators all day, fall, and and and trying
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: to get some semblance of order and decision making process
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: in this And you look at some of the chiefs
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: of staff that have come for they have been you know,
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: you've had Howard Baker was a Senate majority leader, You've
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: had Johnson Una who was a governor. I mean, you've
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: had major, major, and and I think one of the
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: greatest chiefs of staff ever was James Baker. And there's
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: a legendary discussion. So Baker was Reagan's chief of staff
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: and the head of omb was David Stockman, and Stockman
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: had done an interview in The Atlantic crapping all over
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: the president. It's a terrible interview, basically saying the president's
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: economics is all wrong. There was a horrible interview, and
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: there's a great story a Baker calling calling Stockman and
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: a Stockhan was gonna gonna meet with Reagan, and Bakers
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: quoted and I'm not I'm gonna keep this PG rated
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: what Baker said, but they'll look it up where Baker said, David,
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: you're having lunch with the president and the menu is humble,
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: blank and pipe and would you walk out of that room?
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: You're sorry, blankety blank blank better be dragging on the ground.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: And look, Stockman was not, shall we say, timid or shy,
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: And you've got to be enough of a principle, enough
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: of a leader, strong enough to stand up to cabinet members,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: to stand up to congressional leadership, to stand up to whoever.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: And I got to say, I'm thrilled marks in this job.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: So all of that is a setup to just just
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: ask a question, what is a day in the life
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: of the chief of staff? Just, you know, a typical day, like, well, like,
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: what do you do each day? You know, that's that's interesting.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: My wife asked me that question. I said nothing, I
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: met with nobody, so she may tune in just to
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: figure out exactly what you know. It starts normally pretty early,
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: so I'll normally come in around seven fifteen. I get
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: my daily briefing, which is an intel briefing at seven
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: thirty that will scare anybody of all the threats that
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: we get. It goes from there. We have a fifteen
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: minute meeting on what we call our our senior meeting
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: on the comms of the day, so we'll look at
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: what stories are out there. We go from from there
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: to a number of policy meetings. All of this is
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: happening before before eleven o'clock, so you try to get
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: in a full day's work before eleven o'clock, um. And
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: and as we look at that, the big thing then becomes,
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: all right, what are we going to do with the
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: policy in the in the calendar? Because all you have
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: is a full day, and it is always full. There's
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: there's always more to do than what you could ever
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: fit in, and so are we advancing it? And the
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: big thing that you're saying, Ted, is we start to
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: put time frames on if we've got this policy, when
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: is the president going to be able to make a
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: decision on it? Because he didn't care about the rhetoric.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: Now he does like creative chaos. So if you want
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: to come in so normally in the afternoon and you
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: have at least one creative chaos moment where you have
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: a whole bunch of people come in from the West wing,
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: they're arguing back and forth, and he will purposefully, you know,
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: he would look at you, Michael and say, well what
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: do you think, knowing that you have an opposing view
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: from Ted, and then he'll go, well, Ted, don't you
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: disagree with that? And then sit back and watch you fight,
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: Watch you fight. And you've been in those meetings many times,
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: and so you know, so a lot of times. What
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: will happen is is those will continue on and then
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: around five o'clock or so, you're normally getting back to
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: some of the emails and so forth that you have,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: trying to set up the follow up because I've got
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: to I try to make sure that I'm calling everybody
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: back before I go to bed. Now that sometimes sometimes
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: that means that I'm calling them back at eleven thirty
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: at night from well, so I'll normally get home between
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: eight and nine thirty. And uh, and and you're doing
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: all your emails because a lot of times you have
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: your your phone and it goes in a secure setting
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: because you're actually in a skiff, So you're getting secure
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: phone calls throughout the day. Uh. You'll talk to cabinet members.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: You mentioned cabinet members, So you'll normally I'll normally have
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: four or five calls with different cabinet members every day. Uh.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: Sometimes it's those candid conversations where you said, you said
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: what uh and uh and and who thought that that
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: was a good idea? Uh? But but in that I
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: think the real key it's all about results. And the
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: key with results is that if you produce, uh, you
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: start to restore the confidence that comes back and and
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: it's why people hate politicians. You know. I used to
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: say that members of Congress had an approval rating lower
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: than a cockroach. Uh and uh, and that's saying something.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: And I didn't know it was quite that high. But
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: but as we look at this, UM, it's it's about, uh,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: you know, making sure that we work with the National
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: security team, the mic Pompeios and et cetera. You know,
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: I think probably the biggest thing is is for Ted
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: and I. Fighting for freedom is a twenty four to seven,
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: three hundred and sixty five day a year job. And
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: it is calling. It's a calling. And you know, whether
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: I'm here tomorrow or gone tomorrow, you know, you've got
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: to give it your utmost while you're there. The president
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: comes under unbelievable attacks and and what it's it's doing
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: is preparing him to make the best decisions. He's a
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: quick decision maker. And just like when he called out
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: to Ted, he says, Ted, I want to make sure
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: that gets done. That's a good idea, and he expects
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: it to get done. And you think he will forget.
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: He never doesn't forget. Never forget. You know. It's very
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: interesting on this point of the unexpected and chaos. I
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: don't know if our microphones are able to pick it up.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: But right now we're here at the White House. Outside
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: you can hear the protests that have been raging for weeks.
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: We know there have been riots around the country, cities
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: burning down. What is the opinion here in Washington and
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: in the White House on this protect You can hear
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: real time they're outside screaming. We've obviously seen horrific violence,
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: We've seen rioting, We've seen police officers murdered, and it
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: all started with a grotesque act of police brutality of
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: George Floyd. What happened to him was wrong. It is
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: It is the exactly the right thing that the officers
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: who did that are being prosecuted, and and that's the
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: way the system's supposed to operate. But you know, I
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: got to tell you, Mark was talking about the challenges
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: any president faces, but particularly this president faces, and this
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: very polarizing divided time. Last week, last Thursday night, Heidi
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: and I are doing date night in Houston. We're heading
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: home from from the restaurant. President calls me on my
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: cell phone, which which happened regularly, and we talked about
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: a couple of things. But I told him, I said,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: miss President, Heidi's here, you mind if I put put
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: you on speaker? And he chatted with Heidi. But it
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: was interesting, Heidi said. She said, mister President, it is
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: really really important for you to speak out to the
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: racial injustice in this country and for you to speak
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: for unity. And she was really heartfelt and emotional about it,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: said she. You know, Heidi said, look, I can't think
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: of anything more important for you to do. And it
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: was interesting. Afterwards, I told her, I said, you know, Heidi,
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: he actually has and he has repeatedly and you haven't
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: heard it because the media won't cover it. So when
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: he stands up and says, don't commit commit rioting and
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: burn churches down and and murder police officers, they'll cover
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: that sort of yeah. But when he speaks out and
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: says what happened to George Floyd was wrong and racist
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: and bigoted, and the officers who did that need to
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: be prosecuted, they don't cover that part of it. And
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: that's got to be frustrating. Well, it is frustrating. He
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: gave an unbelievable speech when we saw SpaceX elon us
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: rocket go uh into orbit, and he gave a great speech,
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: and the first part of that speech was literally about
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: what you were talking about didn't get covered. I mean,
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: in fact, you you said, well, he gave a great speech,
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: and no one could find it. They couldn't see it.
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: It wasn't you know, CNN, MSNBC, none of them covered it.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: Even I who I am living this stuff. I'm a
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: political I didn't see it. Yeah, And so so you
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: have all of that in social media censorship on top
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: of that's right, well, and that's the key. That's why
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: the EO on the social media platforms is so key,
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: because it is the workaround and the very fact that
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: people are viewing this right now, are hearing this is
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: a critical thing that we have to preserve and protect.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: But I say, the other other aspect of that is
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: this when when you look at what this president faces, um,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: it is the voice of millions of people across this
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: country and actually get to him that he sees it
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: in real time, He hears about it from from senators
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: who are constantly calling out another story that no one
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: knows about. You know, so we have a church that
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: was burning. I'm getting text messages and and everybody saying
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: the President has got to do something. Washington, DC, literally
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: was burning at the Lafayette Park. It was a Sunday night.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: I'm on the phone with the President of the United
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: States after midnight, and uh, he says, you know, Mark,
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: we've got to get control of it. So what happens
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: is is the next morning we put things in motion
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: with Attorney General bar and and bring in National Guard
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: troops and all of that to actually say that we're
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: going to restore law and order. And you know what happened.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: We restored law and order. Right now, it's it's But
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: that wasn't the first midnight call. The first midnight call
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: was in Minneapolis, where he calls the governor of Minnesota
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: and says, Governor, and I was on the phone with
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: General Millie with the President. The President calls the governor
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: of Minnesota, says, listen, I'm watching in real time. What's
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: happening in your cities there in Minnesota. He says, yeah,
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: the police have abandoned things. He says, we're gonna send
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: the National Guard, will help you. And that was a
• 30:17
  Speaker 1: president at almost one am talking to a governor in Minnesota.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Nobody ever sees that nobody even knows that other than
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: the three of us that we're on the phone call right. Well,
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: this so we have to get to a couple of
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: mail bad questions. Okay, I think the audience will kill
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: us if we don't do it. The first question is
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: directly about your job, mister Meadows. What is the least
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: expected thing that you found about your job when you
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: started it? You know, I thought I had it all
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: figured out the minute I got here. And it's kind
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: of like a minor league player getting called up to
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: the big leagues. The pitches are faster, they do brushback pitches.
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: I thought I had had everything said and done to
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: me in Congress they could have been said or done,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: and that was not the case. And so so I
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: think probably the biggest thing was that. The other big
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: surprise is how much the president wants to hear from
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: the American people. I knew he wanted to hear from
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: Ted and I, but he really he keeps saying, well,
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: what are the American people saying? What are they wanting?
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: And that was the it was really eye opening. Well,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: the next question is for both of you. This question
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: came in we're in an election year. If all the
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: protests and all the craziness that we've been seeing didn't
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: remind us of that we're in an election year. Assuming
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: everything goes well, what's priority number one looking ahead into
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, restart the economy
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: and bring back jobs. A man, three four months ago,
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: we had pluming economic growth. We had the lowest unemployment
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: in fifty years. And by the way you want to talk,
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: you want to talk racial equality, we had the lowest
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: African American unemployment ever recorded. Now, tragically that that that
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: got derailed by by a global pandemic from Wuhan, China.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: That that that that that that ended up. We had
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: a lockdown across the country and we destroyed forty million jobs.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: And coming out of that is not going to be easy.
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: But I'll tell you this, If, if God forbid, we
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: go down a socialist road of the far left um
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: jacking up taxes, destroying small businesses, that's going to kill jobs.
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: And by the way, if they follow through on their
• 32:33
  Speaker 1: promise to abolish police departments, a whole lot more people
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: are going to die. And and so my top priority,
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: and I think yours and the presidents is get get
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: this economy, moving back and bring back up. It has
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: to be. I mean, that's the number one priority. It's
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: also the thing that the president is best at. Right,
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: he's already done it, he can do it again, he's
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: already starting to do it again. And then along with
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: that is preserving freedoms. I think we're getting to a
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: place where we see defund the police, we see you know,
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: abolish ice. We see what so many on the left
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: or wanting to do is basically say we don't want
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: any rules, but more importantly, we don't want anybody to
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: even enforce the rules that should be enforced. And so
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: we need to make sure that we preserve freedom, but
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: also understand that we need to uphold the rule of law.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: But certainly the economy is number one, because we are
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: a nation of law, not a nation of men. Though
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: there are men that need to help us maintain those
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: laws and maintain those freedoms, and women and women and women.
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: I know, I now we're going to be canceled. We
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: are certainly going to be censored for that. But we
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: have taken enough of your time, mister Meadows. I'm sure
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: you've got another several hours of work to do, so
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: thank you so much. Thank you, it's been great to
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: be with you and Senator We'll see you on the
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: next episode. I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is being brought
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: to you by Jobs, Freedom and Security Pack, a political
• 34:08
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• 34:13
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• 34:16
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• 34:20
  Speaker 1: Congress and help the Republican Party across the nation.