Latest / The Ben Ferguson Podcast / High-Tech Drone Rescue Abroad plus Waltz put Whistleblowers Under Watch
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: I'm on Family Vacation and Center Cruz did me as
- 0:03Speaker 1: solid and join me so we could do a dual show.
- 0:06Speaker 1: We do our show Verdict with Tech Cruise wherever you
- 0:08Speaker 1: heit your podcasts. But he said, yeah, we'll do a
- 0:11Speaker 1: dual show together. Give me a little more time with
- 0:13Speaker 1: my family. And we had two big subjects we talked about.
- 0:15Speaker 1: First up, an incredible rescue of some Americans that were
- 0:19Speaker 1: shot down by Iran by a drone boat. We have
- 0:23Speaker 1: the details on that for you. And also more exposure
- 0:27Speaker 1: with fraud in Minnesota, but this time it was government
- 0:30Speaker 1: officials harassing government employee whistleblowers who were telling about the
- 0:36Speaker 1: fraud they were witnessing. But before we get to that,
- 0:38Speaker 1: I want to take a moment and talk to you
- 0:40Speaker 1: about how you can get involved with Compassion International and
- 0:43Speaker 1: have a real impact. I want to be honest with
- 0:46Speaker 1: you for a second about how an act of compassion
- 0:49Speaker 1: really feels. A couple of years ago, I made the
- 0:52Speaker 1: choice to partner with an amazing organization called Compassion International.
- 0:57Speaker 1: Why because I wanted to sponsor a child in need.
- 1:01Speaker 1: It was a nice idea, sure, but I had no
- 1:04Speaker 1: idea just how much that simple act would change my
- 1:07Speaker 1: life as well. I sponsored Nadia and got to watch
- 1:11Speaker 1: your life change right in front of my eyes, going
- 1:14Speaker 1: from starving literally alone on the streets, to getting the
- 1:18Speaker 1: healthcare and education she needs to reach her God given
- 1:22Speaker 1: full potential. I got to be a part of that change.
- 1:26Speaker 1: And the light of that compassion not only illuminates in her,
- 1:30Speaker 1: it illuminates now in me. That is the power of compassion.
- 1:35Speaker 1: The light of Christ shines on all of us. Feel
- 1:38Speaker 1: it for yourself and change literally a child's life, change
- 1:43Speaker 1: the world, and you also change yourself. You can sponsor
- 1:46Speaker 1: child today. Visit compassion dot com. That's compassion dot com.
- 1:53Speaker 1: All right, So Sentata, let's get into this first story
- 1:56Speaker 1: and you said it best.
- 1:59Speaker 2: Welcome to just Technology.
- 2:01Speaker 1: In twenty twenty six, for the first time in history,
- 2:05Speaker 1: you had a drone boat that saved the lives of
- 2:09Speaker 1: two Americans that were shut down by Iran.
- 2:12Speaker 2: There's no pilot, like, no one on board.
- 2:15Speaker 1: This is a boat just like a drone in the
- 2:17Speaker 1: sky that is controlled by you know, a joystick, and
- 2:21Speaker 1: it was able to go extremely fast, get these guys
- 2:26Speaker 1: and get out before the enemy could touch them. This
- 2:29Speaker 1: is unbelievable and the best part is this technology is
- 2:33Speaker 1: coming out of the United States of American.
- 2:35Speaker 2: In fact, it's coming out of Texas. Well.
- 2:38Speaker 3: It's not even directly controlled by a joystick. It's actually
- 2:41Speaker 3: AI that controls this. And this is a company based
- 2:44Speaker 3: in Austin. I've been to their factory. I've seen their factory.
- 2:47Speaker 3: It's amazing that they're building these ships. And the ships
- 2:51Speaker 3: are and they have all sorts of different sizes. They
- 2:54Speaker 3: have bigger ones, they have smaller ones. They're gonna have
- 2:56Speaker 3: drone ships that are are over one hundred and fifty
- 2:59Speaker 3: feet long that are big ships, but they also have
- 3:04Speaker 3: smaller military vessels, and then they have really small drones.
- 3:07Speaker 3: And these drones can do all sorts of things. They're
- 3:09Speaker 3: all boats, but they can do surveillance, they can do espionage,
- 3:13Speaker 3: they can do military combat. They could be armed with weaponry.
- 3:18Speaker 3: They can transport supplies. If you're trying to say, resupply
- 3:23Speaker 3: soldiers that are in a form forward combat position, they
- 3:26Speaker 3: can resupply them. So this is all coming out of Austin, Texas.
- 3:30Speaker 3: It's amazing technology. And what precipitated it is that that earlier,
- 3:36Speaker 3: earlier today, an armed Iranian shah head drones struck a
- 3:42Speaker 3: US Apache helicopter and it went down in the sea
- 3:46Speaker 3: off the coast of Aman on Monday. US Central Command
- 3:50Speaker 3: reported that the helicopter was on patrol when it was
- 3:53Speaker 3: struck by the drone, but the two pilots who were
- 3:56Speaker 3: aboard the Apache helicopter were safely rescued with it a
- 4:00Speaker 3: out two hours of the strike. And it's worth here.
- 4:06Speaker 3: We're going to play the Fox News report that covered it.
- 4:08Speaker 3: And for those of you who are watching this on YouTube,
- 4:12Speaker 3: you could watch the video of this drone ship that
- 4:15Speaker 3: was responsible for rescuing our soldiers in combat. Give a listen,
- 4:20Speaker 3: give watch.
- 4:21Speaker 4: Deron's under attack.
- 4:22Speaker 5: Trump ordered Sentcom to launch self defense strikes after an
- 4:25Speaker 5: enemy drone took down an Apache helicopter patrolling the straight
- 4:29Speaker 5: The two pilots were rescued out of the water by
- 4:32Speaker 5: an unmanned sea drone operated by Task Force fifty nine
- 4:36Speaker 5: in Bahrain.
- 4:37Speaker 4: The drones Texas made.
- 4:38Speaker 5: It's twenty four feet long and can travel one thousand
- 4:42Speaker 5: miles and hit speeds of thirty five knots and it's
- 4:45Speaker 5: the first sea drone rescue in combat history. Trump was
- 4:49Speaker 5: on the phone with the press when he gave the order.
- 4:52Speaker 5: Podas said, this is a retaliation for the helicopter hit,
- 4:56Speaker 5: and it's important that our response is strong and powerful.
- 4:59Speaker 5: Sencom call our response proportional.
- 5:01Speaker 4: But sources say.
- 5:02Speaker 5: We're taking out Iranian air defenses, radar systems all along
- 5:06Speaker 5: the Straight and we're not finished technically. I know it
- 5:10Speaker 5: doesn't seem like it, but we're still in a ceasefire.
- 5:13Speaker 5: And the President continues to say we're close to.
- 5:16Speaker 3: A deal where in the final throes of what will
- 5:20Speaker 3: be a very very good deal that will not allow
- 5:23Speaker 3: in any way, shape or form, nuclear weapons, etc.
- 5:27Speaker 2: And then Straight will open up right away.
- 5:29Speaker 3: It'll open up immediately upon signing, which could be in
- 5:32Speaker 3: two or three days.
- 5:33Speaker 4: Trump's made the terms clear.
- 5:34Speaker 5: The ranium must be turned over and destroyed, enrichment must
- 5:38Speaker 5: stop for two decades at least, all nuclear sites must
- 5:42Speaker 5: be completely dismantled, and the United States is able to
- 5:45Speaker 5: conduct snap inspections whenever the heck we want.
- 5:49Speaker 1: You listen to that report and it goes back to
- 5:51Speaker 1: the bigger issue in the war and what we're trying
- 5:53Speaker 1: to accomplish their Senator, but you go back to just
- 5:55Speaker 1: the beginning of it. Thirty five knots, that's about forty
- 5:59Speaker 1: miles an hour in rough seas. That's incredibly fast, especially
- 6:03Speaker 1: if you're twenty five foot boat.
- 6:04Speaker 2: As they described here.
- 6:05Speaker 1: This technology allows these boats to go faster than what
- 6:09Speaker 1: most like. If you're a human riding in a boat
- 6:12Speaker 1: and heavy seas and rough seas, going at that speed
- 6:15Speaker 1: is going to be very risky to you. This takes
- 6:17Speaker 1: that away as well, which again talks about how the
- 6:20Speaker 1: speed they were able to actually get to these two
- 6:24Speaker 1: pilots that have been shot down.
- 6:26Speaker 3: Yeah, and look, it's a manifestation of the new age
- 6:29Speaker 3: of warfare where where these drone ships are not massively expensive.
- 6:37Speaker 3: You look at aircraft carriers and expensive ships that can
- 6:41Speaker 3: cost hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars that
- 6:44Speaker 3: are powered with nuclear reactors. That's been how we've approached
- 6:48Speaker 3: naval power for seventy years. And now we have a
- 6:55Speaker 3: scenario where these drones are not terribly expensive to be built.
- 6:58Speaker 3: They can be built at scale, and you can deploy
- 7:01Speaker 3: one of them, or ten of them, or a thousand
- 7:03Speaker 3: of them, or ten thousand of them, and the ability
- 7:08Speaker 3: and with AI you can control Look, ten thousand. In
- 7:11Speaker 3: a normal world, you'd have to have ten thousand captains
- 7:14Speaker 3: piloting them. You could have AI and you can assign.
- 7:18Speaker 3: You could assign, for example, ten thousand drone ships patrol
- 7:22Speaker 3: this area. AI can direct them, but they're searching and
- 7:26Speaker 3: they'll engage in espionage and gain engage in reporting on
- 7:31Speaker 3: what they find. You can train them to protect protect
- 7:35Speaker 3: a particular ship, protect something that's going on, protect a
- 7:39Speaker 3: port or harbor. They can do that. You can assign
- 7:42Speaker 3: them go intercept this vessel. And if they're armed with
- 7:45Speaker 3: ordnance that they can fire torpedoes, they can have explosives.
- 7:50Speaker 3: And because the ships themselves are not super expensive, it
- 7:55Speaker 3: also means that if you lose one ship or ten
- 7:59Speaker 3: or one hundred, it's not the end of the world.
- 8:00Speaker 2: It's not that is risks.
- 8:04Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's Look, we're saying the same thing with
- 8:06Speaker 3: aerial drones, where we're headed very quickly to a world
- 8:09Speaker 3: and some of this we're actually getting some foreshadowing of
- 8:12Speaker 3: this with the war in Ukraine, where the battle between
- 8:15Speaker 3: Ukraine and Russia, much of it is involving drones and
- 8:18Speaker 3: the ability to have thousands or tens of thousands of
- 8:20Speaker 3: drones and instead of one big, really expensive thing, lots
- 8:26Speaker 3: and lots of smaller less expensive things which can overwhelm
- 8:31Speaker 3: the previous technology. And I got to say that having
- 8:34Speaker 3: been to the factory. Look, these guys are a startup
- 8:38Speaker 3: at Austin, Texas. I know, I know the CEO, I
- 8:41Speaker 3: know the lead funders, and they're you know, young techies
- 8:45Speaker 3: who are entrepreneurial, who have a vision and and and
- 8:50Speaker 3: there desire to scale this. It is very cool. This
- 8:55Speaker 3: is the first drone rescue at sea in combat in
- 8:59Speaker 3: the history of the world. And you know what, this
- 9:01Speaker 3: is not going to be the last. We're going to
- 9:02Speaker 3: see a lot more. By the way, there are civilian
- 9:05Speaker 3: applications of this that have nothing to do with combat. Look,
- 9:08Speaker 3: look the Coastguard, I would say.
- 9:11Speaker 1: I literally was talking the Coastguard as we were on
- 9:13Speaker 1: family vacation and one of the guys I saw and
- 9:16Speaker 1: you know, just saying things. But one of the things
- 9:18Speaker 1: that was cool they were talking about is technology. They
- 9:22Speaker 1: said a lot of times the helicopters, when there's the
- 9:25Speaker 1: worst weather and boats get in trouble, they can be
- 9:28Speaker 1: commercial vessels, they can be recreational, they can be commercial
- 9:31Speaker 1: fishing boats. When things get really bad with weather. Unfortunately,
- 9:36Speaker 1: sometimes the weather's too bad to go out right at
- 9:38Speaker 1: that moment in a helicopter because it's so bad. But
- 9:42Speaker 1: if you have drones that you can risk no life
- 9:45Speaker 1: going out there, it changes the entire way that it works.
- 9:48Speaker 1: And there's some of that are afraid, like, hey, well
- 9:50Speaker 1: that's gonna take jobs and a way human beings. But
- 9:53Speaker 1: if you can't be there in that moment and you
- 9:56Speaker 1: can send out a drone that could quite possibly save
- 9:59Speaker 1: your life. Did a normal if it's if it's if
- 10:02Speaker 1: it's you know, man controlled, you just can't take that
- 10:06Speaker 1: risk and you come back it's too rough. You can
- 10:08Speaker 1: throw drones out there and save countless lives in that scenario.
- 10:12Speaker 1: This is technology that is life changing.
- 10:16Speaker 3: Yeah, and I will say, Ben, have you ever met
- 10:18Speaker 3: Coastguard swimmers.
- 10:20Speaker 2: Yes, they're unbelievable.
- 10:21Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean they're kind of they're the equivalent
- 10:24Speaker 3: of Navy seals or Delta Force green Berets' they're the
- 10:31Speaker 3: most badass coasts. Yeah, and I met met a number
- 10:36Speaker 3: of them, particularly in the wake of Hurricane Harvey. So
- 10:38Speaker 3: Hurricane Harvey was a twenty seventeen was at the time
- 10:43Speaker 3: the second most costly natural disaster in American history, did
- 10:48Speaker 3: massive damage all the way down from Corpus Christie all
- 10:52Speaker 3: the way up hundreds of miles up the Texas coast
- 10:55Speaker 3: to the border right with Louisiana, and it just was
- 10:58Speaker 3: devastating damage and the coasts that these swimmers would go out,
- 11:03Speaker 3: and these guys you meet them, and they're like twenty
- 11:06Speaker 3: year old guys and sort of imagine like g I
- 11:12Speaker 3: Joe combined with a California surfer dude.
- 11:16Speaker 2: Yep.
- 11:16Speaker 3: So they're guys. They have these, you know, enormous chests
- 11:19Speaker 3: because they're like massive swimmers, and so imagine Michael Phelps
- 11:24Speaker 3: with these like long ass arms and like massive swimmers,
- 11:27Speaker 3: but with sort of bleach blonde hair and they've got
- 11:30Speaker 3: like shades hanging from their head and they're like, yeah, bro,
- 11:35Speaker 3: like it's it's They're not.
- 11:38Speaker 1: Like guys that you also met that save people's lives
- 11:41Speaker 1: and the flooding that happened in Texas.
- 11:43Speaker 3: Not that yes, yes, look last summer fourth of July.
- 11:47Speaker 3: But these swimmers, they will get on helicopters in the
- 11:50Speaker 3: middle of a hurricane where you've got waves in the
- 11:54Speaker 3: ocean that are ten twenty feet high that are terrify,
- 11:58Speaker 3: and these guys will jump out of a helicopter into
- 12:01Speaker 3: the crashing waves and go rescue someone. And it is
- 12:05Speaker 3: there's a fearlessness to not only jumping in crashing twenty
- 12:11Speaker 3: foot waves, which which most of us, if we're in
- 12:14Speaker 3: those waves, are going to die, but they'll don't jump
- 12:17Speaker 3: in when there are people in harm's way and they'll
- 12:19Speaker 3: go grab them. To be clear, if you or I
- 12:22Speaker 3: were in twenty foot waves and drowning, someone came, we'd
- 12:24Speaker 3: grab on them and pull on and you're terrified, like
- 12:26Speaker 3: they know they're going to go rescue someone who's freaking out,
- 12:29Speaker 3: who's gonna not intentionally, but it's going to effectively try
- 12:32Speaker 3: to pull them under, and they're just they're really cool.
- 12:36Speaker 3: But you're right. There are times where the weather is
- 12:38Speaker 3: so bad you can't send the chopper in, and and
- 12:42Speaker 3: and the ability to send a drone in to have
- 12:44Speaker 3: something to rescue, say, you know someone that's out, you know,
- 12:50Speaker 3: just just on a boat and gets in trouble. That
- 12:53Speaker 3: is game changing. And that's coming out of Tech Texas
- 12:56Speaker 3: and all of the new tech that is based in Texas.
- 13:00Speaker 2: Yeah, it really is an incredible story.
- 13:01Speaker 1: Every once in a while you get a feel good
- 13:03Speaker 1: story like this, and we should celebrate it. It also
- 13:05Speaker 1: is a reminder I think of why it's so important
- 13:07Speaker 1: to make sure that we're adequately funding technology. You've talked
- 13:11Speaker 1: about this, and I've talked about this a lot. Center
- 13:13Speaker 1: This is a perfect example of us winning the war
- 13:16Speaker 1: on AI to make sure that our adversary, China is
- 13:20Speaker 1: not leading the way on AI. If this is AI controlled,
- 13:24Speaker 1: this goes and this is one of those examples. I
- 13:26Speaker 1: do think we should highlight it for a second. This
- 13:28Speaker 1: is why America has to win the AI race. You
- 13:32Speaker 1: have less us and you've been warning on this issue,
- 13:36Speaker 1: and I think we should just take them out. Remind people,
- 13:39Speaker 1: if we aren't in charge of this, our adversary would
- 13:42Speaker 1: be and that's a scary world as well.
- 13:44Speaker 3: And by the way, if China masters this technology before
- 13:47Speaker 3: we do, that is a generation skipping advance in technology.
- 13:54Speaker 3: And if they have the ability to send a thousand
- 13:57Speaker 3: or ten thousand or one hundred thousand AI controlled owns
- 14:00Speaker 3: at one of our aircraft carriers, there's a real risk
- 14:04Speaker 3: that that you know, the weapons we have to take
- 14:06Speaker 3: out say surface surface to surface missiles or bombs we have,
- 14:13Speaker 3: you know those our aircraft carriers are incredibly expensive and
- 14:17Speaker 3: powerful tools, but they were made to take out a
- 14:20Speaker 3: limited number of ordinance and not just massive drone assaults.
- 14:25Speaker 3: We're shifting to a new technology where where look, if
- 14:29Speaker 3: we're in a conflict with a smaller rival, that's less dangerous.
- 14:36Speaker 3: Although you know what in times even terrorists and smaller rivals,
- 14:39Speaker 3: we're going to see. We're going to see more and
- 14:42Speaker 3: more military attacks using drones. We're going to see things,
- 14:45Speaker 3: We're going to see assassinations, We're going to see people
- 14:48Speaker 3: killed using drones. That that is, unfortunately where the future
- 14:52Speaker 3: is heading. One of the things the US military is
- 14:55Speaker 3: investing in heavily with American technology is counter drone technology.
- 14:59Speaker 3: How do you take out how do you take out
- 15:02Speaker 3: drones that are attacking you? And some of what is
- 15:05Speaker 3: working is lower cost ordinance that you can't fire a
- 15:10Speaker 3: patriot missile at every drone coming in. It just the
- 15:14Speaker 3: cost differential they can swarm you. So, you know, was
- 15:18Speaker 3: that another Texas company where they're building basically the equivalent
- 15:23Speaker 3: of a really big, badass machine gun that is power
- 15:28Speaker 3: that is firing like fifty cow rounds, but is firing
- 15:32Speaker 3: them with AI where they could target hundreds or thousands
- 15:36Speaker 3: of drones. But the cost of a round is not
- 15:38Speaker 3: very expensive. So instead of spending an entire patriot missile
- 15:44Speaker 3: or something that you have limited supply of, we have
- 15:48Speaker 3: essentially unlimited supply of rounds and so but using those
- 15:53Speaker 3: robot powered with AI to take out takeout attacks in scale.
- 15:59Speaker 3: More and more that is coming in their different ways
- 16:01Speaker 3: to take out drones. You've got ordnance, got laser and
- 16:06Speaker 3: microwave and that we're exploring all sorts of different technologies
- 16:09Speaker 3: to take out a hostile drone. But if we lose
- 16:13Speaker 3: this race, we would be at a serious military disadvantage
- 16:17Speaker 3: to China. We can't let that happen, and I don't
- 16:19Speaker 3: think we're going to.
- 16:21Speaker 1: All right, I want to move on to this other
- 16:23Speaker 1: incredible story center coming out of Minnesota, and in life,
- 16:27Speaker 1: especially in government work, you're told that if you're a
- 16:30Speaker 1: whistleblower that you have protections and that if you're a
- 16:34Speaker 1: whistleblower you should not be afraid for your job or
- 16:37Speaker 1: that someone's going to come after you, certainly the government
- 16:39Speaker 1: that you work for. Well, apparently that's not the case
- 16:43Speaker 1: in Minnesota. And if you want to know how the
- 16:45Speaker 1: Somali fraud got so bad, it might actually be because
- 16:50Speaker 1: the governor was coming after the whistleblower, not those that
- 16:54Speaker 1: were committing the crimes in Minnesota with his new shocking report.
- 16:58Speaker 3: Well, that is inevitable. Number one, the law, federal law
- 17:01Speaker 3: and typically state law that protects whistleblowers. That gives you
- 17:04Speaker 3: legal protection because you want whistleblowers to call attention to fraud.
- 17:09Speaker 2: Uh.
- 17:10Speaker 3: But number two, if a government official goes after the whistleblowers,
- 17:16Speaker 3: attacks the whistleblowers, refuses to follow the law and whistleblowers,
- 17:20Speaker 3: that is powerful indication of a guilty mind that you're
- 17:26Speaker 3: covering something up. It's sort of like if if someone
- 17:29Speaker 3: is is murdered in Central Park and and you catch
- 17:33Speaker 3: a person burning their clothes from that night and destroying
- 17:37Speaker 3: the murder weapon. Yeah, that is powerful, powerful evidence that
- 17:41Speaker 3: they're the murderer. That that that that that that it
- 17:44Speaker 3: is typically the guilty who destroys evidence who tries to
- 17:47Speaker 3: cover it up. That that that that if you're not guilty,
- 17:51Speaker 3: you have far less motivation, far less likelihood to try
- 17:56Speaker 3: to silence whistleblowers to try to destroy evidence. So here's
- 17:59Speaker 3: the story that broken in the Daily Caller. The headline
- 18:02Speaker 3: is Tim Walts's staff hired private investigators to silence fraud whistleblowers.
- 18:06Speaker 3: Committee report finds senior Minnesota state officials allegedly hired outside
- 18:11Speaker 3: investigators to silence whistleblowers in an attempt to cover up
- 18:15Speaker 3: widespread state social services fraud. A House committee report released
- 18:20Speaker 3: Monday found The two hundred page staff report by the
- 18:23Speaker 3: House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform found that Democrat
- 18:26Speaker 3: Minnesota Governor Tim Waltz's state's administration intimidated and retaliated against
- 18:33Speaker 3: state employees who raised concerns about fraud solicitings private investigators
- 18:40Speaker 3: investigators to reveal employees' personal details. Report titled The Cost
- 18:46Speaker 3: of Doing Nothing, How Tim Waltson Keith Ellison Fueled Minnesota's
- 18:50Speaker 3: fraud explosion, exposed that senior state officials as high as
- 18:56Speaker 3: allegedly Governor Waltz, were aware of widespread fraud for years
- 19:01Speaker 3: and neglected to respond to reports. A Minnesota Department of
- 19:05Speaker 3: Education official who contacted the FBI told federal investigators she
- 19:09Speaker 3: was pressured quote at every turn by her superiors to
- 19:15Speaker 3: stop raising fraud concerns and was quote handslapped when she
- 19:20Speaker 3: continued to investigate, according to the report. The official also
- 19:24Speaker 3: reported that she was warned by state administrators to quote
- 19:27Speaker 3: stop digging into things, as it would appear that she
- 19:32Speaker 3: was quote targeting certain groups. This is DEI and fraud
- 19:38Speaker 3: all coming together along with corruption to elect Democrats, The
- 19:42Speaker 3: article continues. Dozens of other whistleblowers reported dozens that they
- 19:47Speaker 3: were told to stay silent about fraud concerns by the
- 19:51Speaker 3: Minnesota Department of Human Services because they would be labeled
- 19:55Speaker 3: quote racist or islamophobic. DHS also told st employees that
- 20:00Speaker 3: raising fraud concerns would harm the state, the report said.
- 20:05Speaker 3: Whistleblowers reported the DHS conducted arbitrary investigations to photograph their
- 20:11Speaker 3: cars and houses, monitor their phones and computers, and asked
- 20:17Speaker 3: employees where their kids attended school. Now that it's going
- 20:22Speaker 3: to get worse, then, Temporary Commissioner Sharene Gandhi, by the way,
- 20:28Speaker 3: I'm going to give you some foreshadowing that that that
- 20:31Speaker 3: miss Gandhi did not behave like Gandhi. Instead, she confirmed
- 20:39Speaker 3: and a testimony copied in the report that the state
- 20:42Speaker 3: department used outside entities to conduct these investigations of employees,
- 20:50Speaker 3: but could not confirm whether independent law firms were used.
- 20:54Speaker 3: Gandhi also confirmed in her testimony that DHS management would
- 20:58Speaker 3: regularly meet and quote shack in on employees who had
- 21:02Speaker 3: reported fraud concerns. Gandhi continued to conduct these check ins
- 21:06Speaker 3: on DHS whistleblower Fay Bernstein quote a year or two
- 21:13Speaker 3: after her investigatory leave. So they hunted them down and
- 21:16Speaker 3: they stayed harassing them. Bernstein alleged that Gandhi quote shamed
- 21:20Speaker 3: her in a meeting after she raised concerns about fraud
- 21:24Speaker 3: and quote excluded her from further meetings on the topic.
- 21:27Speaker 3: Whistleblowers also alleged that former State Commissioner Jody Harpstead held
- 21:32Speaker 3: a division wide meeting and told attendees that quote, employees
- 21:36Speaker 3: would be punished if they reported concerns about fraud and
- 21:42Speaker 3: DHS programs. According to the report, DHS employee Emmanuel Nuala told
- 21:48Speaker 3: colleagues that he quote did intelligence research within the army
- 21:53Speaker 3: and appears to have threatened to provide IP addresses to
- 21:58Speaker 3: former colleagues in order to find the locations of whistleblowers'
- 22:04Speaker 3: email addresses. An email obtained through a public data request
- 22:09Speaker 3: showed now it's about to get even worse. The report
- 22:14Speaker 3: also alleged that DHS d anonymized an internal fraud hotline
- 22:23Speaker 3: for employees in an attempt to intimidate fraud reporters. After
- 22:29Speaker 3: whistleblowers later created an anonymous external email to report fraud,
- 22:34Speaker 3: DHS blocked the email address. Whistleblowers reported that their fraud
- 22:40Speaker 3: hotline tips were sent to Human Resources and used against them.
- 22:46Speaker 3: The hotline was originally anonymous, but was de anonymised under
- 22:51Speaker 3: Gandhi's tenure as deputy Commissioner of HR. Governor Waltz appointed
- 22:57Speaker 3: Gandhi's commissioner of DHS in February twenty twenty, but removed
- 23:00Speaker 3: her in May before her confirmation hearing amid scrutiny of
- 23:05Speaker 3: her response to fraud allegations. This is anyone who claims, gosh,
- 23:13Speaker 3: the elected officials of Minnesota, they were victims. They didn't know.
- 23:18Speaker 3: They wanted to go after the fraud, which, by the way,
- 23:20Speaker 3: both Waltz and Ellison keep saying, oh, we wanted to
- 23:23Speaker 3: go after the fraud, we wanted to prosecute it. This demonstrates,
- 23:28Speaker 3: I think powerfully they are lying. Not only did they
- 23:32Speaker 3: not want to go after the fraud, they were doing
- 23:34Speaker 3: everything they could to silence the whistleblowers and prevent anyone
- 23:38Speaker 3: from knowing about the fraud.
- 23:40Speaker 1: Yeah, and this goes back to the other question of accountability.
- 23:45Speaker 1: If everything that we just mentioned turns out to be true,
- 23:48Speaker 1: there's obviously now an open investigation into this. If you
- 23:52Speaker 1: do these things, are you breaking the law? And if
- 23:56Speaker 1: it goes all the way the governor is he breaking
- 23:58Speaker 1: the law? And the people below are they breaking the law?
- 24:01Speaker 1: And is there any accountability for this or is this
- 24:03Speaker 1: just well, Walt isn't running for reelection, so it doesn't
- 24:07Speaker 1: really matter anymore, and we'll just move on and yeah,
- 24:10Speaker 1: we may continue to do things like this in the
- 24:12Speaker 1: future without accountability.
- 24:14Speaker 3: Listen, the Department of Justice has created an entire new
- 24:17Speaker 3: division focused going after fraud. And I hope everyone who
- 24:21Speaker 3: made these decisions faces accountability if they committed criminal violations,
- 24:26Speaker 3: that they are prosecuted. I am hopeful. I can tell
- 24:29Speaker 3: you I'm urging the Department of Justice hold them accountable.
- 24:32Speaker 3: To the way our constitutional system works, it's not the legislature. Look,
- 24:37Speaker 3: I'm in the Senate. I can't prosecute anybody. I don't
- 24:39Speaker 3: have executive authority. I have legislative authority. I can write legislation,
- 24:43Speaker 3: which I have, but I can't the power to bring
- 24:46Speaker 3: an indictment the power to go before a grand jury
- 24:50Speaker 3: to get an indictment to prosecute. That is exclusively within
- 24:53Speaker 3: the executive branch, within principally the US Department of Justice
- 24:57Speaker 3: at the federal level. And so I can I tell
- 25:00Speaker 3: you this, I am urging the Attorney General and DJ
- 25:03Speaker 3: prosecute every single person who committed criminal acts, who covered
- 25:07Speaker 3: up this fraud, who benefited from it, who knew what
- 25:10Speaker 3: they were doing. And this is this is a real
- 25:13Speaker 3: smoking gun.
- 25:14Speaker 2: And at the age I go back to Ellison there
- 25:17Speaker 2: we know his name.
- 25:18Speaker 1: Well, if he's involved in this and is using and
- 25:22Speaker 1: weaponizing the government to go after those that were not
- 25:25Speaker 1: committing the fraud, those that were trying to whistle blow
- 25:28Speaker 1: on the fraud fraud and they are harassed. Is there
- 25:31Speaker 1: any lane for the people that were being harassed to
- 25:34Speaker 1: somehow have like, you know, restitution for what they went through.
- 25:38Speaker 2: If you're being.
- 25:39Speaker 1: Harassed for two years after you put in a tip,
- 25:42Speaker 1: that's got to put a lot of stress in your life.
- 25:45Speaker 2: I'm assuming it puts stress in your career. I'm assuming it.
- 25:48Speaker 1: Could have affected a lot of people getting promotions that
- 25:50Speaker 1: they deserved.
- 25:52Speaker 4: Yeah.
- 25:52Speaker 3: Look, and I would assume we're going to see civil
- 25:55Speaker 3: litigation of people fire filing lawsuits and seeking UH compensation
- 26:01Speaker 3: for this, and and that litigation could well be successful.
- 26:05Speaker 2: UH.
- 26:05Speaker 3: In terms of criminal prosecution, this would not surprise me.
- 26:08Speaker 3: I don't know sitting here, UH if if Minnesota law
- 26:12Speaker 3: makes doing this a criminal violation in Minnesota. Now, of course,
- 26:17Speaker 3: the federal government can't prosecute violations of Minnesota law. It
- 26:20Speaker 3: would take a a Minnesota district attorney UH to bring
- 26:24Speaker 3: that case. And and I got to admit, I'm very
- 26:27Speaker 3: skeptical that that that there are any prosecutors in Minnesota
- 26:31Speaker 3: willing to hold the corrupt Democrats in charge of that
- 26:34Speaker 3: state accountable.
- 26:36Speaker 2: UH.
- 26:36Speaker 3: If they're not, then there's not really a mechanism to
- 26:39Speaker 3: enforce Minnesota law, which means you would be left with
- 26:43Speaker 3: with federal law. And given that these are federal funds
- 26:46Speaker 3: that were effectively being stolen and fund funneled to Somali,
- 26:50Speaker 3: fund funneled to Somalian fraudsters, being sent, among other places,
- 26:55Speaker 3: to al Shabab, and we before h on this PODCAS
- 27:00Speaker 3: cast that the single largest funder of ALA, which is
- 27:04Speaker 3: the Dacaslamic terrorist group that is in Somalia, their number
- 27:08Speaker 3: one funder was the taxpayers of Minnesota, and those are
- 27:11Speaker 3: also federal taxpayer money. So look, I expect the Department
- 27:15Speaker 3: of Justice. They've already prosecuted a number of the fraudsters
- 27:18Speaker 3: at the lower level, but I hope they go right
- 27:20Speaker 3: up right up the ladder of accountability and any politicians
- 27:25Speaker 3: that are responsible. And to be clear, this happened because
- 27:29Speaker 3: it was in politicians' political interest for this to happen,
- 27:33Speaker 3: because they were getting money from campaign donations and they
- 27:37Speaker 3: were getting votes from allowing Somalian fraudsters to rob the
- 27:42Speaker 3: taxpayers of Minnesota and the American taxpayers. And look that
- 27:47Speaker 3: this has happened also in other states. It's happened in
- 27:51Speaker 3: Maine under the Democrat governor there. It's happened in California,
- 27:55Speaker 3: it's happened in Illinois. It's happened, I think, all over
- 27:57Speaker 3: the country, but predominantly in Democrat states where there are
- 28:02Speaker 3: Democrat politicians who are benefiting from turning the other way
- 28:07Speaker 3: to fraud. And I think everyone who committed a criminal
- 28:10Speaker 3: act should face prosecution and real consequences.
- 28:13Speaker 1: Don't forget Share this podcast with your family and friends,
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- 28:19Speaker 1: back here.
- 28:20Speaker 2: Tomorrow,