Latest / The Ben Ferguson Podcast / Jill Biden’s ‘Stroke Scare’ sent Joe to Waffle House, U.S. Shipyards Roar Back to Life & Is NIL Killing College Athletics Week In Review

Transcript

Jill Biden’s ‘Stroke Scare’ sent Joe to Waffle House, U.S. Shipyards Roar Back to Life & Is NIL Killing College Athletics Week In Review · The Ben Ferguson Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome in his verdict with Ted Cruz, wee can review
0:02
Speaker 1: Ben Ferguson with you. And here's some of the stories
0:04
Speaker 1: that you may have missed that we talked about this
0:06
Speaker 1: past week.
0:07
Speaker 2: First up, Joe Biden wants you to buy her new book.
0:11
Speaker 1: She also is trying to rewrite history and tell you
0:14
Speaker 1: that her husband was totally fine even though she thought
0:17
Speaker 1: he was having a stroke during the debate with President Trump.
0:20
Speaker 1: So why did she take him to a campaign event
0:23
Speaker 1: right afterwards and then to waffle house.
0:25
Speaker 2: We'll dive into that in just a moment.
0:27
Speaker 1: Also, in a big move for America's national security, we're
0:31
Speaker 1: bringing shipbuilding back to the United States of America instead
0:35
Speaker 1: of relying on foreign countries would put our national security.
0:39
Speaker 2: In major risk.
0:40
Speaker 1: And lastly sent her Cruz authoring legislation that could save
0:45
Speaker 1: college sports, and the President United States of America saying
0:48
Speaker 1: he's all in for it as well. It's the week
0:51
Speaker 1: in review and it starts right now. I want to
0:53
Speaker 1: move finally on to Joe Biden, and you want to
0:55
Speaker 1: talk about a dumpster fire of interviews. Joe Biden's out there.
0:59
Speaker 1: I was like, is she i Witley was searching. I'm
1:01
Speaker 1: like is she promoting a book and does she write
1:03
Speaker 1: about autobiography. She's out there doing all these interviews trying
1:07
Speaker 1: to rewrite history, but also wants you to feel sorry
1:10
Speaker 1: for her and her husband, saying that his bad night,
1:13
Speaker 1: she was terrified he was having a stroke. The only
1:15
Speaker 1: problem is after she thought he may be having a
1:17
Speaker 1: stroke in that debate with Donald Trump, she had no
1:19
Speaker 1: problem taking him to a campaign event and then to
1:21
Speaker 1: a waffle house and said on TV with him standing there,
1:24
Speaker 1: I'm so proud of you did such a great job tonight.
1:26
Speaker 1: It's either I'm like, all right, well, it's you a
1:28
Speaker 1: senior abuse or your pathological liar or both.
1:32
Speaker 3: Well, you and I did an emergency podcast the night
1:34
Speaker 3: of that debate. We did it immediately as the debate concluded,
1:38
Speaker 3: and we told Verdict listeners at the time, you've just
1:41
Speaker 3: watched the single most consequential presidential debate in American history.
1:45
Speaker 3: And the reason is, and you and I predicted that
1:47
Speaker 3: night as the debate ended, this debate will change the
1:51
Speaker 3: names on the ballot in November. This debate was such
1:53
Speaker 3: a disaster, such a train wreck. The Democrats will do
1:57
Speaker 3: what we're worried they're going to do. With Graham Plattner,
1:59
Speaker 3: which is pull them off and put someone else on.
2:02
Speaker 3: The Democrats are really Republicans are lousy at this. By
2:04
Speaker 3: the way, Republicans almost never managed to do this. The
2:07
Speaker 3: Democrats are ruthlessly efficient. And we saw that debate. We
2:12
Speaker 3: saw it went badly, but it turns out apparently Jill
2:16
Speaker 3: Biden thought it went even worse than we did. Give
2:19
Speaker 3: a listen to what she said. She thought when she
2:22
Speaker 3: was watching the debate.
2:24
Speaker 4: When you horrified as you saw it on fold, I
2:28
Speaker 4: wasn't horrified. I was frightened because I had never ever
2:34
Speaker 4: seen Joe like that before or since, never since yes,
2:41
Speaker 4: or he's never seen never, No, Well have happened. I
2:46
Speaker 4: don't know what happened. I mean when I as I
2:48
Speaker 4: watched it, I thought, oh my god, he's having a stroke,
2:51
Speaker 4: and it scared me to death.
2:55
Speaker 1: Senator, if you think that your spouse is having a stroke, A,
3:01
Speaker 1: why would you leave him on stage? B why would
3:04
Speaker 1: you then ta him to a campaign event afterwards? And
3:07
Speaker 1: C why would you then go to waffle house in
3:10
Speaker 1: sead it to a doctor? And D if this is
3:13
Speaker 1: the worst it ever was, And the whole world saw
3:15
Speaker 1: that exact moment it's never been anywhere close before. After
3:19
Speaker 1: you're either a pathological liar A or B. You're either
3:22
Speaker 1: a pathological liar who's crazy. You pick which one you
3:25
Speaker 1: want to be.
3:27
Speaker 3: Look, Ben, this is an area where I think the
3:30
Speaker 3: American people have a great sense of intuition of judging
3:34
Speaker 3: whether someone's speaking the truth or lying. You asked the
3:38
Speaker 3: right question, what would you do if you believed your spouse,
3:41
Speaker 3: your spouse of many decades, was having a stroke? And
3:45
Speaker 3: the answer every one of us would give the answer
3:48
Speaker 3: you would give the answer I would give. The answer
3:50
Speaker 3: everyone would give is you take your doctor, your spouse
3:54
Speaker 3: to the hospital immediately.
3:55
Speaker 2: Regardless of what they're doing, regardless.
3:57
Speaker 3: Of what thinks they're having a stroke. And maybe you
4:00
Speaker 3: don't rush out and pull him off national TV. I
4:03
Speaker 3: don't know about that, but at a minimum, so suppose
4:05
Speaker 3: you just just just you're scared, but you don't as
4:08
Speaker 3: soon as it was over, how do you not say
4:10
Speaker 3: we're going to the emergency room, We're gonna go Okay,
4:13
Speaker 3: you don't want a big public public bruhaha, all right,
4:16
Speaker 3: get a doctor when you're watching it, he's having a stroke,
4:19
Speaker 3: Get a doctor here right now.
4:21
Speaker 5: The instant he steps off stage. I want him being.
4:23
Speaker 3: Examined like that. Anyone who is watching their spouse and
4:28
Speaker 3: thinks they're having a stroke would do that. She didn't
4:32
Speaker 3: do that. She went to the campaign party, she cheered
4:34
Speaker 3: and celebrated. I'm actually not critical like you're giving. You're
4:40
Speaker 3: giving harsh criticism because she said he did great. Look
4:43
Speaker 3: she's a campaign spouse. Every campaign spouse is gonna say that.
4:48
Speaker 3: I'm understanding of that. If I do a terrible job
4:52
Speaker 3: at a debate, I don't really want Heidi to go, wow,
4:54
Speaker 3: he really craped the bed like that.
4:58
Speaker 2: I understand that.
4:59
Speaker 1: But my one is the pathological lying aspect of this.
5:03
Speaker 1: I don't believe for a second that she's telling the truth.
5:05
Speaker 1: And she says it's the worst it's ever been. It
5:07
Speaker 1: only happened that one time. It happened to be the
5:08
Speaker 1: one and a half hours that was on national television
5:11
Speaker 1: during a presidential debate.
5:12
Speaker 2: I don't believe her.
5:13
Speaker 1: Number one and number two, if you are I mean center,
5:19
Speaker 1: let's go to a debate night with you. If I thought,
5:21
Speaker 1: as one of your friends that you're having a stroke
5:24
Speaker 1: and you could make it till the end, I would
5:26
Speaker 1: immediately do what you just said. And I'm not your spouse,
5:29
Speaker 1: and I think your team would. But second of all,
5:31
Speaker 1: I think you'd also if you thought there was a
5:33
Speaker 1: medical issue there, you probably would actually let people know,
5:37
Speaker 1: because they did. Remember, they may have excuse they lied
5:39
Speaker 1: and said he had a cold, Mike. If you thought
5:41
Speaker 1: something was bad, that's your alibi to get out.
5:43
Speaker 2: Of a terrible debate.
5:45
Speaker 1: Which is why I think they didn't actually say it
5:47
Speaker 1: is because this was the cognitive normal for him. And
5:50
Speaker 1: so I think it's another part of the pathological lyeing
5:53
Speaker 1: of the Democratic Party in the cover up is that
5:54
Speaker 1: they're like, no, no, no, this is she says one time.
5:56
Speaker 1: I think, no, it wasn't. This is the guy that
5:58
Speaker 1: wasn't running the countries. Somebody else was in the White House,
6:01
Speaker 1: and then they glied and covered it up. And now
6:03
Speaker 1: she's saying it only happened one time. I don't believe
6:06
Speaker 1: her for a moment.
6:07
Speaker 3: Well, And in fact, listen to a reporter asked asking
6:11
Speaker 3: her about whether this had been going on for a
6:14
Speaker 3: long time.
6:15
Speaker 5: Give a listen.
6:17
Speaker 4: Did you ever see signs that he was falling into
6:21
Speaker 4: cognitive decline?
6:23
Speaker 3: No?
6:24
Speaker 4: No, no, truly no, I mean.
6:29
Speaker 2: That's just totally insane. Everyone saw it.
6:33
Speaker 1: There was examples that you could actually give that were
6:35
Speaker 1: caught on tape. And then I go back to what
6:38
Speaker 1: she said. It was the worst I ever saw. I
6:39
Speaker 1: thought he was having a stroke, but I didn't do
6:41
Speaker 1: anything when he was having a stroke. And I never
6:43
Speaker 1: saw anything like this ever. Again, this is why I
6:45
Speaker 1: think so many Americans have distrust for politicians and why
6:49
Speaker 1: you should even be asking more questions now about who
6:51
Speaker 1: the hell was running the country.
6:53
Speaker 2: Was it Joe Biden? I don't know.
6:55
Speaker 3: And by the way, I'll say again, I am more
6:58
Speaker 3: forgiving of a Jill Biden of the spouse. But every
7:03
Speaker 3: Democrat aide knew that he was in massive mental decline,
7:07
Speaker 3: that that that he was not capable of doing the job.
7:11
Speaker 3: Every reporter knew that abcnw that CBS knew, that NBC new,
7:15
Speaker 3: that CNN knew, that msnbcnew that.
7:17
Speaker 5: They all knew that.
7:21
Speaker 2: It was going on.
7:23
Speaker 3: Every Democrat senator, every Democrat house member, they all knew that.
7:27
Speaker 3: The four years Joe Biden was president. Do you know
7:29
Speaker 3: how many times I spoke with him in person in
7:31
Speaker 3: those four years? I'm going to guess one or zero zero,
7:34
Speaker 3: Not a single time. That is weird. It is a
7:39
Speaker 3: regular part of the job of being a senator to
7:41
Speaker 3: talk to the president. When Obama was president, I talked
7:44
Speaker 3: to him regularly. When Trump is president, I talked to
7:46
Speaker 3: him sometimes every week or sometimes even every day. You know,
7:49
Speaker 3: last time I talked to Trump was three days ago.
7:52
Speaker 5: It is weird.
7:53
Speaker 3: And by the way, it was not just me. Almost
7:57
Speaker 3: every single Republican senator did not speak to him at
8:00
Speaker 3: all during his presidency. We would sit around at lunch
8:03
Speaker 3: and talk about how weird it was that the White
8:06
Speaker 3: House would not let us talk.
8:08
Speaker 5: To the president. And understand, we all knew him.
8:11
Speaker 3: Joe was a man of the Senate for forty plus years,
8:14
Speaker 3: so every one of us had a personal relationship with
8:17
Speaker 3: Joe Biden and the fact that they wouldn't let him
8:20
Speaker 3: speak to us was a screaming alarm bell that his
8:25
Speaker 3: metal capacity has diminished so much that they couldn't let
8:29
Speaker 3: us see it. And it's why the debate was so
8:31
Speaker 3: high risk, because there you had the TV cameras going
8:34
Speaker 3: and you couldn't have an aid step in and save him.
8:36
Speaker 3: But well, by the way, what did the Biden staffs
8:40
Speaker 3: say about Joe Biden's comments about thinking he was having
8:43
Speaker 3: a stroke. Well, an axious reporter said, quote ex Biden aids,
8:49
Speaker 3: simply don't believe Jill Biden.
8:53
Speaker 5: And there's your sign. Well there's your sign.
8:57
Speaker 3: No kidding, but I'll tell you and and this story
9:00
Speaker 3: links back to the story we started with.
9:04
Speaker 5: Number one.
9:06
Speaker 3: Democrats in the party and the media do not care
9:10
Speaker 3: about anything other than power. That sounds too harsh, but
9:14
Speaker 3: they were willing to have for four years and potentially
9:17
Speaker 3: for eight years, someone who was senile, who was unable
9:21
Speaker 3: to put together coherent thoughts as the commander in chief understand,
9:27
Speaker 3: Joe Biden could have pushed a button, launched our nukes,
9:31
Speaker 3: an annihilated mankind from the face of the planet. And
9:34
Speaker 3: yet Democrats say, you know what, if he's there, we
9:38
Speaker 3: get to run things. So, you know, what does it
9:40
Speaker 3: matter if our enemies look at the commander in chief
9:43
Speaker 3: and think he's an adult old man who can't operate
9:46
Speaker 3: the TV remote control? That level of cynicism. Frankly, it's
9:50
Speaker 3: the same thought process that says, what does it matter
9:54
Speaker 3: if someone is a commi, nazi, misogynist, racist, What does
10:00
Speaker 3: it matter? My party gets to stay in power, so
10:02
Speaker 3: that's good by me.
10:05
Speaker 5: There is.
10:07
Speaker 3: Look, I think it is number one. We keep and
10:11
Speaker 3: by the way, swallwell, they were fine, someone's a repeat
10:15
Speaker 3: sexual predator. They were great with him until there was
10:18
Speaker 3: a political problem, and then with all three they immediately
10:22
Speaker 3: jettisoned them and throw them out the back. I'm going
10:27
Speaker 3: to try to be restrained and say that is not
10:30
Speaker 3: the behavior of a party that gives a damn about principle.
10:35
Speaker 1: Now, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation,
10:38
Speaker 1: you can go back and listen to the full podcast
10:40
Speaker 1: from earlier this week. Now onto story number two, I
10:44
Speaker 1: want to move center on to another really interesting story.
10:47
Speaker 1: It does with national security, especially with what's happening in
10:50
Speaker 1: the redle East. And I ran right now and something
10:52
Speaker 1: that we've highlighted and talked about on this show in
10:56
Speaker 1: the past, and that was that ship building was not
10:58
Speaker 1: happening in the United States to America. That is a
11:01
Speaker 1: national security issue, and it was a very clear national
11:05
Speaker 1: security issue that was brought up. You were one of
11:07
Speaker 1: those sounding the alarm on it, because when you're dependent
11:10
Speaker 1: on your ships being made overseas and you have things
11:12
Speaker 1: that happened, whether it's COVID, right, that's not even a war,
11:16
Speaker 1: but with COVID and all of these issues that we're
11:18
Speaker 1: now seeing in the Middle East, we needed to bring
11:21
Speaker 1: shipbuilding back to the United States of America, and now
11:23
Speaker 1: we are seeing that actually happen.
11:26
Speaker 5: Yeah.
11:26
Speaker 3: Another one of the major provisions of the Working Families
11:29
Speaker 3: Tax Cut was the funding for the Coastguard. And the
11:32
Speaker 3: way it works in the Senate when you're writing a
11:34
Speaker 3: bill in reconciliation, which is the process we used to
11:38
Speaker 3: pass the Working Families Tax Cut, each committee chairman writes
11:42
Speaker 3: the portion of the bill that is within his or
11:45
Speaker 3: her jurisdiction. I'm the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science,
11:49
Speaker 3: and Transportation. We've got jurisdiction over about forty percent of
11:52
Speaker 3: the US economy. Every single provision that was in my
11:56
Speaker 3: jurisdiction I was responsible for writing, and I did write.
12:00
Speaker 3: One of the subjects that is within the jurisdiction of
12:04
Speaker 3: the Commerce Committee is the Coast Guard. The Coastguard falls
12:06
Speaker 3: within our jurisdiction. We funded more than twenty four billion
12:13
Speaker 3: dollars billion with a B into the Coast Guard. That
12:16
Speaker 3: is the largest single investment in the history of the
12:19
Speaker 3: United States.
12:20
Speaker 5: And the Coast Guard.
12:21
Speaker 3: I want to give you a sense of the order
12:23
Speaker 3: of magnitude of that the annual budget of the Coast
12:26
Speaker 3: Guard is between eleven and twelve billion dollars. In one year,
12:30
Speaker 3: we invested more than double the annual budget of the
12:34
Speaker 3: Coast Guard to rebuild their fleet, to rebuild to purchase
12:37
Speaker 3: new ships, to purchase new helicopters, to purchase new capital
12:41
Speaker 3: and infrastructure. One of the biggest elements of our investment
12:46
Speaker 3: was Arctic ice cutters.
12:49
Speaker 5: So if you look at.
12:50
Speaker 3: The Arctic, near the North Pole and all around the Arctic,
12:54
Speaker 3: that is a major national security contested domain. Russia and
13:00
Speaker 3: China are both killing us in the Arctic, and the
13:04
Speaker 3: United States has fallen way behind. And we put in
13:07
Speaker 3: the funding to build new Arctic ice cutters, and the
13:12
Speaker 3: Trump administration signed a contract to purchase eleven new Arctic
13:16
Speaker 3: ice cutters and in particular to.
13:18
Speaker 5: Build many of them here in the United States.
13:21
Speaker 3: So I started this week Monday morning down in Galveston, Texas.
13:25
Speaker 3: And in Galveston we had a groundbreaking for a brand
13:28
Speaker 3: new shipyard where there's over a billion dollars being invested.
13:32
Speaker 3: It's going to create more than two thousand jobs to
13:35
Speaker 3: build Arctic ice cutters and not only is that important
13:38
Speaker 3: for that investment, those new jobs, but that's an expertise
13:43
Speaker 3: that doesn't exist in the United States. We're going to
13:45
Speaker 3: see more commercial ships built in the United States and
13:48
Speaker 3: in Texas and Galveston and Port Arthur because of this investment.
13:53
Speaker 3: I spoke at the groundbreaking. Give a listen to what
13:56
Speaker 3: I had to say at the groundbreaking. And I was
13:58
Speaker 3: very proud when President Trump announced that three and a
14:01
Speaker 3: half billion dollars was going to Davy Defense to build
14:05
Speaker 3: five Arctic security cutters and to build them here in
14:09
Speaker 3: the Texas Gulf Coast. That is going to produce over
14:20
Speaker 3: two thousand high paying jobs here on the Texas Gulf Coast.
14:25
Speaker 3: And and mark my word, that's just the beginning because
14:34
Speaker 3: that is going to fuel a renaissance of shipbuilding right
14:39
Speaker 3: here on the Texas Golf Coast. A final observation about Galveston.
14:49
Speaker 3: Folks here are really particular about Galveston. It's a thing
14:54
Speaker 3: you will learn. There's a phrase that folks from Galveston
14:58
Speaker 3: will tell you, which is BOI born on the islands.
15:02
Speaker 5: And it's a little bit.
15:03
Speaker 3: There's an old line that you never ask anyone if
15:06
Speaker 3: he's a Texan, if he is, he'll tell you, and
15:10
Speaker 3: if he's not, you don't want to embarrass the guy.
15:14
Speaker 1: I love, by the way, that line there, center because
15:17
Speaker 1: it is, by the way, totally accurate. But this is
15:21
Speaker 1: a really big, I think moment as you described it
15:24
Speaker 1: for national security. It also makes us not dependent on
15:28
Speaker 1: foreign countries and foreign workforces for things that deal with
15:32
Speaker 1: national security. This is part of what you've been advocating
15:35
Speaker 1: for with America First Policy is with the Trump administration
15:38
Speaker 1: as well, and being able to do this and do
15:41
Speaker 1: it quickly, and also to get these cutters back into
15:45
Speaker 1: the Arctic where we need them from a national security standpoint,
15:48
Speaker 1: this is a big win all the way around, and
15:51
Speaker 1: it produces American jobs, and not just a few, as
15:54
Speaker 1: you mentioned, You've got thousands, and then you have the
15:56
Speaker 1: supporting jobs around those jobs as well.
15:59
Speaker 5: Well. That's that's right.
16:00
Speaker 3: And let me tell you a little bit of history.
16:03
Speaker 3: You look, you're a relatively new Texan. You're from Memphis.
16:07
Speaker 3: So this is a bit of history that I shared
16:09
Speaker 3: at the press conference that that that that you may
16:12
Speaker 3: not know, and that everyone in Galveston knew, but maybe
16:16
Speaker 3: other people don't. So Galveston used to be the largest
16:21
Speaker 3: city in Texas. Wow, Galveston was called the Queen of
16:26
Speaker 3: the Gulf Coast. Galveston was also called the Wall Street
16:32
Speaker 3: of the Southwest, and Galveston was called the Ellis Island
16:36
Speaker 3: to the south. And just like Ellis Island, when people
16:39
Speaker 3: came as immigrants, they would come to Galveston.
16:42
Speaker 5: That that that was the.
16:43
Speaker 3: Port of entry where where vast numbers of people came
16:47
Speaker 3: to America through Galveston. And and what happened is in
16:50
Speaker 3: nineteen hundred, there was a devastating hurricane that killed between
16:55
Speaker 3: eight thousand and twelve thousand people in Galveston, and they
16:58
Speaker 3: didn't have the technology to have it early warning signs,
17:01
Speaker 3: so the hurricane just hit and destroyed the city and
17:05
Speaker 3: it remains the single most devastating natural disaster in US history.
17:10
Speaker 3: But a really cool fact that I pointed out, and
17:14
Speaker 3: I bet you you don't know this bend. In eighteen
17:17
Speaker 3: thirty six, Galveston was the capital of the Republic of Texas.
17:22
Speaker 3: The Republic of Texas, we were our own nation, and
17:24
Speaker 3: Galveston was our capital right when we became our own nation.
17:28
Speaker 5: And so I said, look, it's really special that we're.
17:30
Speaker 3: Seeing thousands of new manufacturing jobs coming to Galveston shipbuilding jobs.
17:37
Speaker 3: And I mentioned in the clip you we just played
17:39
Speaker 3: the phrase BOI. And by the way, you'll meet people
17:43
Speaker 3: from Galveston who are fifth, sixth, seventh generation BOI board
17:47
Speaker 3: on island. And what I called for at the press conference,
17:49
Speaker 3: I said, listen, every Arctic ice cutter you build there.
17:52
Speaker 3: I turned to the CEO of the company Davies that's
17:55
Speaker 3: going to be building them, and I said, I hope
17:58
Speaker 3: and expect on every one of those Arctic ice cutters,
18:00
Speaker 3: somewhere in the interior on the hall, you will engrave
18:04
Speaker 3: the simple letters BOI, because those Arctic ice cutters will
18:09
Speaker 3: have been born on the island of Galveston. And that's
18:13
Speaker 3: an awesome thing. But it's an awesome thing for American jobs.
18:16
Speaker 3: You look at what President Trump is fighting to do,
18:19
Speaker 3: what I'm fighting to do, it is bring jobs back
18:22
Speaker 3: to American manufacturing jobs. And I'll tell you a little bit.
18:25
Speaker 3: Let me bring you a little bit inside the story.
18:27
Speaker 3: So the bill we wrote, we had the funding for
18:31
Speaker 3: what was likely to be five to six Arctic ice cutters.
18:36
Speaker 5: And there was a battle.
18:37
Speaker 3: There was a battle that went to the to the
18:39
Speaker 3: White House about where that contract would go, and that
18:43
Speaker 3: battle was principally between Texas and Louisiana. Now I love Louisiana.
18:47
Speaker 3: My parents met New Orleans. My mom went to high
18:49
Speaker 3: school in Batterie Rouge. Louisiana is a great state. And
18:53
Speaker 3: to be clear, Louisiana is the home of the Speaker
18:55
Speaker 3: of the House Mike Johnson and Steve Scalise, the House
18:58
Speaker 3: Majority leader. They're both very good friends. They they were
19:01
Speaker 3: understandably fighting for their state and wanted the ship building
19:05
Speaker 3: in Louisiana. I was fighting for Texas, and I will
19:08
Speaker 3: tell you it was a knife fight at the White House.
19:10
Speaker 3: I spoke repeatedly to the President of the United States.
19:13
Speaker 3: I spoke to the senior staff in the White House
19:15
Speaker 3: over and over and over again, and it was a
19:17
Speaker 3: real fight. We didn't know who was gonna win Texas
19:20
Speaker 3: and Louisiana. And I want to give the President real
19:23
Speaker 3: props here. Look, we all know before he was in
19:25
Speaker 3: the White House, the President was a businessman. Yeah, and
19:28
Speaker 3: he is very committed to getting more for less. So
19:33
Speaker 3: the proposal, the legislation that had been passed was funding
19:36
Speaker 3: to build five to six new ice cutters. Trump said
19:39
Speaker 3: that's not enough. I don't want five to six. I
19:42
Speaker 3: want eleven. And so they found new funding that had
19:46
Speaker 3: been appropriated by Congress, and what they ended up doing
19:49
Speaker 3: was approving both. So there's several ice cutters being built
19:51
Speaker 3: in Louisiana, there are several being built in Texas.
19:54
Speaker 5: And it was a win win, and it's a great example.
19:57
Speaker 3: He went to the ship building companies and he said,
20:01
Speaker 3: I want you to cut your prices and deliver more ships.
20:04
Speaker 3: And they did. And this was not staff driven. This
20:08
Speaker 3: was you know, Trump is a builder, so he I mean,
20:11
Speaker 3: he likes things like negotiating a contract. And he leaned
20:16
Speaker 3: in and instead of five to six ized cutters, we're
20:18
Speaker 3: getting eleven. Instead of just one place Louisiana or Texas,
20:21
Speaker 3: we're getting both. And we're getting thousands and thousands of
20:24
Speaker 3: new jobs, and we're going to be able to compete
20:26
Speaker 3: with and protect our national security the Arctic against Russia
20:29
Speaker 3: and China.
20:30
Speaker 5: It is a win win all around.
20:33
Speaker 1: As before, if you want to hear the rest of
20:35
Speaker 1: this conversation on this topic, you can go back and
20:38
Speaker 1: dow the podcasts from earlier this week to hear the
20:40
Speaker 1: entire thing. I want to get back to the big
20:44
Speaker 1: story Number three of the week you may have missed well.
20:47
Speaker 3: This week I shared a hearing on college sports and
20:51
Speaker 3: saving college sports. And we've talked before on Verdict about
20:54
Speaker 3: how college sports is in crisis right now.
20:56
Speaker 5: It is chaos.
20:57
Speaker 3: You've got an out of control transfer portal with athletes
21:00
Speaker 3: transferring three, four, five times.
21:02
Speaker 5: You've got people playing until they're twenty.
21:04
Speaker 2: Six, twenty seven, twenty eight years old.
21:06
Speaker 3: You've got people with six seven years of playing time.
21:10
Speaker 3: You have virtually every athletics program in the country losing
21:14
Speaker 3: money and losing millions or even tens of millions of dollars.
21:17
Speaker 3: Schools are going broke. They're canceling programs every week. You're
21:20
Speaker 3: seeing women's sports getting canceled. You're seeing Olympic sports getting canceled.
21:25
Speaker 3: You're seeing your favorite tennis getting canceled. That happened at
21:28
Speaker 3: Arkansas just a few weeks ago. And it is if
21:32
Speaker 3: we don't act, we are going to see much of
21:37
Speaker 3: college sports decimated and destroyed. And so last week I
21:40
Speaker 3: introduced bipartisan legislation with Maria Cantwell. Maria Cantwell's a Democrat
21:46
Speaker 3: from Washington State. She is the ranking member of the
21:48
Speaker 3: senior Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee. I'm the chairman
21:51
Speaker 3: of the Senate Commerce Committee. This week, we had a
21:53
Speaker 3: big hearing and we heard testimony from leaders in college
21:58
Speaker 3: athletics about the urgency of solving the crisis. Now, one
22:02
Speaker 3: of our witnesses was coach Nick Saban, the legendary coach
22:06
Speaker 3: of Alabama, and Coach Saban's testimony was incredibly powerful and
22:12
Speaker 3: give a listen to a little bit of Coach Nick
22:14
Speaker 3: Saban on why Congress needs to pass or protect College
22:19
Speaker 3: Sports Act.
22:20
Speaker 1: All right, let's play for you Nick Saban. Part of
22:22
Speaker 1: what he had to say in front of your committee hearing.
22:24
Speaker 1: It truly was impressive to hear him talk about sports,
22:27
Speaker 1: especially in front of Congress.
22:29
Speaker 2: Take a listen, Cooba.
22:31
Speaker 6: Let me give you the history. My first year, we
22:33
Speaker 6: had collective at Alabama two point seven million. Next year
22:37
Speaker 6: seven million, next year ten million. I've retired. Next year
22:40
Speaker 6: of seventeen million, next year twenty four million. Now you
22:43
Speaker 6: have schools that have close to forty million dollar rosters.
22:47
Speaker 6: So if we continue to do that, we're gonna lose
22:50
Speaker 6: Olympic sports, We're gonna lose non revenue sports, We're gonna
22:53
Speaker 6: lose scholarships, and basically what's going to happen is we're
22:56
Speaker 6: going to have football and basketball succeed, and we'll have
22:59
Speaker 6: clubs sports for everything else.
23:02
Speaker 1: He's not wrong, by the way, Center, I was in
23:04
Speaker 1: one of those non money making sports tennis, right, You
23:07
Speaker 1: had a lot of friends that you get to know
23:09
Speaker 1: that are in those Olympic sports, for example, that would
23:12
Speaker 1: all disappear. And when you think about having a college
23:14
Speaker 1: roster at eighty million, if you're a student athlete, that
23:17
Speaker 1: in theory sounds great, but that's only in two sports.
23:20
Speaker 1: Really the majority of that eighty you know you're talking
23:23
Speaker 1: about Alabama. I mean, there's not that much in basketball,
23:25
Speaker 1: I promise you at Alabama. So unless you pick football,
23:28
Speaker 1: you're left behind. And that's the reason why you're taking
23:31
Speaker 1: this action now and why Saban was saying what he
23:34
Speaker 1: was saying at the time.
23:35
Speaker 3: Well, and that there's only a handful of powerhouses that
23:39
Speaker 3: generate and can dominate football, and so what if we
23:43
Speaker 3: don't act. I think within five years we will see
23:46
Speaker 3: thirty to fifty colleges that have a football program and
23:50
Speaker 3: they'll basically be an NFL and the rest of the
23:53
Speaker 3: schools that their programs will be obliterated and There are
23:57
Speaker 3: a lot of reasons that's tragic. One is just sports
23:59
Speaker 3: brings us together. Sports is so much fun. Look, we're
24:03
Speaker 3: divided on so many issues today. We scream at each
24:05
Speaker 3: other where we're like it really is hard to.
24:08
Speaker 5: Find common ground.
24:09
Speaker 3: And yet you can go cheer on your alma mater
24:12
Speaker 3: and you can be there with people of different parties,
24:14
Speaker 3: people of different races, people have different religions, and you're
24:16
Speaker 3: all standing together. That's really important. Every bit as critical
24:21
Speaker 3: as that is. College sports is an amazing avenue for
24:27
Speaker 3: education for millions of young men and women. And until
24:30
Speaker 3: I really started diving in to this topic and working
24:34
Speaker 3: to save college sports, I hadn't really focused on how
24:39
Speaker 3: college athletics is something that is unique in the United States.
24:42
Speaker 3: No other country has anything remotely resembling what we have
24:47
Speaker 3: here with college sports. There are today more than a
24:50
Speaker 3: half million college athletes right now.
24:55
Speaker 5: Every year.
24:56
Speaker 3: Athletics enables kids, many kids from low income homes, many
25:03
Speaker 3: minority kids, who otherwise might not have had a chance
25:07
Speaker 3: to go to college. It enables them to go to
25:09
Speaker 3: college to study, to get a degree, to learn skills,
25:12
Speaker 3: to learn hard work and discipline and teamwork and sportsmanship.
25:16
Speaker 2: Accountability just showing up.
25:18
Speaker 1: I can't tell you how much I learned from just
25:21
Speaker 1: the accountability, which, by the way, it made me a
25:23
Speaker 1: better person. It made me better in business, It made
25:25
Speaker 1: me better in my job that I did afterwards. There
25:28
Speaker 1: are so many young men when I was at Old
25:30
Speaker 1: Miss that said, they literally believe they would either have
25:34
Speaker 1: been dead, they would have been in a gang if
25:36
Speaker 1: it wasn't for sports keeping them out of trouble in
25:39
Speaker 1: high school. And then they said, if it wasn't for
25:41
Speaker 1: college and getting that college education, they would have immediately
25:44
Speaker 1: been into bad stuff on the streets. They said that
25:46
Speaker 1: sports actually saved their life, and not only say their life.
25:50
Speaker 1: A lot of them they were the first member of
25:52
Speaker 1: their family to ever go to college, and they went
25:54
Speaker 1: because they were an incredible athlete. It gave them the opportunity,
25:57
Speaker 1: it gave them a free education, it seemed unattainable, and
26:00
Speaker 1: it completely changed their families trajectory in life. I think
26:04
Speaker 1: that's one of the most important things about college sports
26:06
Speaker 1: that people don't talk about now.
26:09
Speaker 3: That is exactly right, and the status quo is unsustainable.
26:13
Speaker 3: If Congress doesn't act, we will end up with hundreds
26:17
Speaker 3: of thousands of those college athletic positions going away, and
26:22
Speaker 3: those kids, many of them having no chance to go
26:26
Speaker 3: to school, to go to college to get those skills,
26:29
Speaker 3: those life skills that set them up for success. And
26:31
Speaker 3: look the way I approach this, I didn't worry too
26:35
Speaker 3: much about about the top one percent. I didn't worry
26:37
Speaker 3: about the Michael Jordan's or arch mannings. I worried about
26:41
Speaker 3: the ninety nine percent of college athletes who are never
26:43
Speaker 3: going to play pro ball, but it's giving them opportunity.
26:46
Speaker 2: I had a ton of people Centator that were calling me.
26:49
Speaker 1: I had friends and people I've known the past come
26:51
Speaker 1: out of that would work because they knew how important
26:53
Speaker 1: this bill was. They knew how important it was to you.
26:56
Speaker 1: Asking me questions. There was a lot of people saying
26:57
Speaker 1: they're just not gonna be able to get this done.
26:59
Speaker 1: There's no way you'll get by parsonship here. That seems
27:02
Speaker 1: to not be true. And they said, well, there's no
27:03
Speaker 1: way even though he'll be able to get the White
27:04
Speaker 1: House behind it.
27:05
Speaker 2: That also doesn't seem to be true either.
27:07
Speaker 1: There is a lot of growing by parson support here
27:10
Speaker 1: to get this thing done.
27:11
Speaker 3: Well, there is, And I worked for months. Rick Cantwell
27:15
Speaker 3: and I negotiated. We sat in the conference room six
27:18
Speaker 3: eight hours a day negotiating provision by provision by provision.
27:21
Speaker 3: We introduced it with Cantwell and myself a Democrat and Republican,
27:26
Speaker 3: and also with Eric Schmidt, a Republican from Missouri, and
27:31
Speaker 3: Chris Coon's a Democrat from Delaware. So we had two Democrats,
27:33
Speaker 3: two Republicans on the bill, and we've seen phenomenal.
27:37
Speaker 5: Support for it.
27:38
Speaker 3: So the ACC has come out emphatically in support of it,
27:42
Speaker 3: The Big Twelve has come out emphatically and support of it.
27:46
Speaker 3: Condoleeza Rice at Stanford has come out emphatically in support
27:50
Speaker 3: of it. At the hearing, Pete Bavaqua, the athletic director
27:53
Speaker 3: at Notre Dame, testified strongly in support of it. Gordon
27:56
Speaker 3: Gee testified at the hearing, former president of West Virginia
28:00
Speaker 3: University also Vanderbilt, has been a president of actually five universities.
28:05
Speaker 5: He testified that this is a.
28:06
Speaker 3: Crisis and this bill is the only hope to save
28:09
Speaker 3: college sports. And we've had already, We've had over one
28:15
Speaker 3: hundred and thirty signatures from leaders at more than sixty
28:19
Speaker 3: five universities come out in support of the bill, and importantly,
28:23
Speaker 3: this week President Donald J. Trump came out strongly in
28:26
Speaker 3: support of the bill. He's he sent a truth social
28:29
Speaker 3: that I want to read to you. Here's what he said.
28:32
Speaker 3: College sports, a great American institution that produces our many athletes, leaders,
28:36
Speaker 3: and Olympic dominance, is a total mess, and everyone is
28:40
Speaker 3: saying that it must be fixed. After uninny lawsuits and
28:43
Speaker 3: crazed rulings, there are virtually no limits anymore, and soon
28:47
Speaker 3: most colleges won't have sports because each and every one
28:49
Speaker 3: of them will be bankrupt, never to be heard from again.
28:53
Speaker 3: Women's sports and the Olympics itself are in the most
28:57
Speaker 3: danger from this catastrophic situation. College sports are turning into
29:01
Speaker 3: pro sports, except with absolutely no rules, a result no
29:05
Speaker 3: one wants. University presidents, conference commissioners, student athletes, coaches, and
29:11
Speaker 3: athletic directors all complained to me that it has become
29:15
Speaker 3: a disaster after years of no action, and that schools
29:19
Speaker 3: were losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year. They
29:23
Speaker 3: compared it to a freight train that can't be stopped.
29:27
Speaker 3: That is why a few months ago I convened a
29:29
Speaker 3: roundtable bringing together were a world class team as some
29:32
Speaker 3: of the best sports executives, student athletes, and political leaders
29:36
Speaker 3: in our country. The goal was to find a bipartisan
29:40
Speaker 3: solution to fix the problem. Based on these meetings and
29:43
Speaker 3: the expertise of the leading authorities, I signed an executive order,
29:47
Speaker 3: but I always said that the best solution was to
29:49
Speaker 3: get a bipartisan act through Congress to my desk in
29:54
Speaker 3: order to save a long and embarrassing road through Hell
29:59
Speaker 3: for the these institutions. I'd like to thank Senators Ted Cruz,
30:04
Speaker 3: Eric Schmidt, Maria Cantwell, and Chris Coons, among others, for
30:07
Speaker 3: introducing the Protect College Sports Act. This law resolves many
30:12
Speaker 3: of the most urgent issues challenging our universities and student athletes,
30:16
Speaker 3: stops the chaos, and most importantly, it may be the
30:21
Speaker 3: last chance to save college sports and colleges themselves before
30:25
Speaker 3: it's too late. The House has worked long and hard
30:28
Speaker 3: on this issue as well, and I'm very grateful to
30:30
Speaker 3: Speaker Mike Johnson and Leader Steve Scalise for their work
30:33
Speaker 3: to fix this very major problem. I urge the House
30:36
Speaker 3: and Senate to come together to pass a final bipartisan
30:40
Speaker 3: law that I can sign this summer that reflects the
30:44
Speaker 3: views and input of both chambers and in all caps,
30:48
Speaker 3: we have to save college sports. Thank you for your
30:52
Speaker 3: attention to this matter, President Donald J.
30:54
Speaker 5: Trump.
30:55
Speaker 3: The support we're seeing is really significant, and I think
30:59
Speaker 3: we're going to see, hope and believe, a big bipartisan
31:03
Speaker 3: vote in the Senate behind this bill.
31:05
Speaker 1: Well, what's the timeline now and how much is there
31:07
Speaker 1: going to be people pushing since now this has become so,
31:11
Speaker 1: you know, such a big discussion to try to change
31:13
Speaker 1: things the last minute. Is that going to be a
31:15
Speaker 1: problem and what does that look like?
31:16
Speaker 3: Oh, look, that is going on, and there are a
31:20
Speaker 3: handful of people that are criticizing and throwing rocks, But
31:23
Speaker 3: I'll tell you most people are shocked that we could
31:26
Speaker 3: actually find a bipartisan compromise and and and listen, one
31:31
Speaker 3: of the natures of that. That means that that I
31:33
Speaker 3: had to give quite a bit and and the Democrats
31:36
Speaker 3: had to give quite a bit to find a common
31:38
Speaker 3: ground because we can't pass this bill unless you get
31:41
Speaker 3: at least sixty votes in the Senate. That means you
31:44
Speaker 3: need at least seven Democrats. There are only fifty three Republicans.
31:48
Speaker 3: And my objective, frankly, is to get a lot more
31:50
Speaker 3: than sixty votes. I'd like to see a big bipartisan
31:54
Speaker 3: vote come out of the Senate. The House has tried
31:57
Speaker 3: several times to fix this problem, and unfortunately, every time
32:01
Speaker 3: they try to take up a bill, it's failed in
32:03
Speaker 3: the House. And so I think the Senate has got
32:06
Speaker 3: to step in because the clock is ticking. And I
32:10
Speaker 3: will say that there's a real risk also of the
32:14
Speaker 3: biggest players coming together to form a super league, and
32:18
Speaker 3: I think that would be disastrous for everybody else and
32:22
Speaker 3: not good for fans. Let's take my home state of Texas.
32:25
Speaker 3: Look my home state of Texas. If Congress does nothing
32:30
Speaker 3: in three to five years, I am certain that the
32:32
Speaker 3: University of Texas will survive, and I'm certain A and
32:35
Speaker 3: M will survive. They're so big, they have such a
32:37
Speaker 3: big donor base and alumni base that they'll survive no
32:40
Speaker 3: matter what happens. But it's not at all clear that
32:44
Speaker 3: the other players in Texas survive. It's not clear that
32:47
Speaker 3: TCU or SMU or University of Houston or Rice or
32:50
Speaker 3: Texas Tech or Baylor, all of the different programs in
32:54
Speaker 3: Texas they could go under in the status quo, and
32:57
Speaker 3: I think that would be a terrible outcome if we
32:59
Speaker 3: lose historic programs all over Texas, not just football, but
33:04
Speaker 3: when you lose football, football pays for all the other sports.
33:07
Speaker 3: So when you lose football, you end up losing the
33:11
Speaker 3: entire array of sports. That would be tragic and we
33:14
Speaker 3: can't let it happen.
33:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're absolutely right there.
33:17
Speaker 1: If people want to get behind this legislation, is this
33:20
Speaker 1: one of those where they talk to their senators and
33:21
Speaker 1: their congressman.
33:22
Speaker 2: Who do they need to contact quickly?
33:24
Speaker 3: Look, the first order of business is your senator and
33:28
Speaker 3: urging your senator, whether your senator is a Republican or Democrat,
33:31
Speaker 3: urging your senator get behind this bill, the Bipartisan Protect
33:35
Speaker 3: College Sports Act. There's an urgency. I am hoping to
33:38
Speaker 3: move quickly on this. I'd like to get a big
33:40
Speaker 3: vote in the Senate. Once we get it out of
33:42
Speaker 3: the Senate, then the next step will be the House.
33:44
Speaker 3: But calling your senator, going on social media, speaking out
33:48
Speaker 3: and saying that sports, college sports should be saved, that's
33:52
Speaker 3: really valuable.
33:53
Speaker 1: As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Senator
33:57
Speaker 1: Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
33:59
Speaker 1: with my podcast and you can listen to my podcast
34:01
Speaker 1: every other day you're not listening to Verdict, or each
34:03
Speaker 1: day when you listen to Verdict afterwards, I'd love to
34:06
Speaker 1: have you as a listener to again the Ben Ferguson Podcasts,
34:09
Speaker 1: and we will see you back here on Monday morning.