Feel free to text in at five six six nine zero. We've been having some awesome dialogue here. Well, I'm so honored to introduce our guests joining us today from DC Congressman Jeff Crank from Colora's fifth Congressional district. Jeff, thank you so much for joining us today. I appreciate it.
Debra, It's great to be with you. You're doing an awesome jeffassen for.
A little bit, of course, I would expect nothing less from you.
Well, thank you, sir. Coming from someone else who has been on the radio a fair amount, I take that as a compliment. It was great to see you in Firson last week in DC, and thanks for joining us today. There's so much going on and I just want to jump right into it. I appreciate you, know, your leadership
both in our state and in our country. And you posted something on X on Twitter that I think a lot of people need to know, and it was about the Boulder terrorist suspect Mohammed Sabrey Sulomon and about what happens in states like Colorado where they're is a bit of leeway, shall we say, with those who may not be here legally. Can you talk about what happened versus his visa and a driver's license.
Yeah, sure, Debra.
So the assailant was here on.
A visa, had a visa here to be in the United States, that visa expired, and then after it expired, over a year after it expired, the state of Colorado gave him a driver's license right and issued him a driver's license. In addition to that, we now know that he tried to buy a handgun, and both the police.
Colorado Beer of Investigation and.
The FBI under Joe Biden.
Knew that he was not a citizen because he has.
Denied the purchase of a handgun. But they didn't do anything with that information. They just said, oh, great, well we can't give him a gun. But they could have taken that information and given it to Ice.
Ice could have gone and got this guy and deported him, and this whole thing never would have happened.
He wouldn't had the opportunity to do this. So that's the real crime of it. And you know the problem with this is it's a breakdown of the rule of law when governments don't work together.
And the example I use I just I love.
Going on ride a launch with our law enforcement, and some with the Colora Springs Police Department, some with the Alpaco County Sheriff's office. And you know, when I'm out there with them, they're going along and they see someone and they pull them over for an expired.
Tag, him a ticket. And the reason they're doing.
That is because the State of Colorado.
Needs their money. So, you know, I sort of asked the question toy in Chek, I guess what would happen if to the State.
Of Colorado, which doesn't seem to want to.
Work with our local law.
Enforcement and certainly doesn't want to work with ice.
What would happen if the El Paso.
County sheriff for the Douglas County sheriff or whatever sheriff's office just decided, you know what, we don't want to do that anymore. We're not the tax collectors for the state of Colorado. We're just not going to do it. They wouldn't get their money, and government collapses, right, And
that's what happens when we have these sanctuary communities. I think they know immigration better than the federal government, and you know, I think the American people expect better than that from their government.
Well, and we started the entire show talking about what is a civilization If we do not have a set of laws and a structure that define who we are, what our values are. We've got I think the best guidelines in the United States of America of any country. I do believe that. But the minute we begin.
To selectively choose which laws we follow and which ones we don't, which ones are government enforces and which one it doesn't that this is what happens and how Colorado goes from one.
Of the safest states to being I think it is the most violent amongst the most populated cities in America, higher now than Chicago under these different policies that are going on. You know, Jeff, I know, I know that it's divided, to say the least in the House of Representatives and in DC. But there's something I would have
thought everybody could have agreed to. And Representative Gabe Evans of Color's a new eighth Congressional District introduced a resolution condemning the Boulder attack, and one hundred and thirteen Democrats voted against it simply because it outlined what you just shared, that this individual was here illegally and if he'd been arrested. This never would have happened. Talk about that for a moment. First of all, good for Gabe for doing that, Congressman Evans,
but what is the justifiation. What are conversations that you have with with those on the other side of the aisle about things like just condemning the Boulder attack.
Yeah, well, yeah, I thought it was shameful, you know that we even had this, had this fight and this discussion on the House floor. There were at least three resolutions that were presented. I was a co sponsor of the one that Gave Evans introduced, Yeah, you bet, and of.
Course I supported it as well, and.
It condemned the anti Semitic attack, and then it also talked about the importance of local law enforcement working with the federal government and others to coordinate our response.
And then the last thing it said was that.
You know, it was it's important that Colorado's understand that we're working together, the governments, working together to solve this problem. That's essentially what the resolution said.
I don't know how.
Anybody could vote against that, but there are some who wanted it to not include anything about the sanctuary Polly's policies of the state. It didn't say Colorado was a sanctuary state. It just said that, you know, Colorado hasn't been working with immigration on.
Some of these things.
So this kind of turned into a little bit of a floor fight. But at the end of the day, Jonah Goose had a separate resolution that he wanted to vote on. I actually co sponsored his great resolution too.
And I did because his resolution.
Called out how terrible that anti Semitic Hateful Act was.
It's just that Gabes went a little farther because it also.
Talked about the aspect of working governments working together. I co sponsored both of them. Had Jonah Goose has been on the floor, I would have voted for it, but many Democrats decided to not vote for Gabe Evans. Now, I will give Jonah Goose credit. He did end up voting for the resolution that Gabe put out there. All of the Republicans did who were there.
And then jo Nah Goose, But then we had, you know, Diana.
To get Britney Patterson, Jason Crowe all decided to not support that.
I don't understand it.
I don't either, because, particularly when you add the element of the fact that the perpetrator, the terrorists basically who did the horrible attack and Boulder could have been stopped. I mean, as you said, Colorado and the CBI and the FBI both knew he was here illegally, which is why he didn't get a gun. But it isn't just this instance if we don't call out the cause. It's not just what happened in Boulder, which was horrific, it's
also Lake and Riley. So yes, it's good to call it the nearly nine hundred percent increase in anti Semitism, but we've also got to call out that there are many who were whose murders could have been prevented. To say the least, thank you for your leadership on that something I want to up in a good positive way because obviously in your district, and if you're just tuning in,
this is Deborah Flora sitting in from Mandy Connell. My guest is Congressman Jeff Crank of Colorado's fifth Congressional district. The Air Force Academy is in your district. My dad served in the Air Force, and I actually, at twelve years old, got to watch walk down the aisle of the Air Force Academy Chapel as my sister married a graduated cadet. But one of the things that's really positive, and you serve on the House Armed Services Committee, there's
record enlistment happening over the last few years. Under the previous administration, there was a challenge meeting any limits. The Army, for instance, has already met its recruiting goal of sixty one thousand four months early. Can you talk about what you see is this change in the military culture, because I think it's a positive thing for our country.
Yeah, it really is. It's very heartening to see.
You know, obviously, when you have and I'll be honest, I think we've.
Had an administration for four years.
Prior that really blamed America. It was kind of the blame America first crowd that was running the show. And when you do that, there's not a lot of pride to run out and join the military and go fight what to be blamed for all of the world's ills, you know. And this is one of the great things we saw we saw when Ronald Reagan got elected, right, we saw this resurgence of patriotism.
And you know, this is a debate we have in our country. I believe in American exceptionalism. I know you do as well. And I think most people take for granted what we have in the United States and how great we have it here. We didn't take it for granted because we live in the greatest country in the world. We have all these freedoms and liberties and we don't
even think about them. But I think sometimes we have you know, as with President Trump coming in, it is you know, I know people sometimes on the left get triggered by the phrase, you know, America First or make America great again. I think most Americans understand what that means. Yeah, America is a great country. We're great because we have the Constitution, we have the Bill of Rights that protect them, and we ought to be helping export that to the world.
America is not a bad thing, it's a good thing, and I think people are signing up for the military because they want to be a.
Part of that.
I agree, I agree, and I'm really glad to see that, particularly with the instability we're seeing in the world right now. Well, unfortunately have a limited time today, Congressman, but thank you so much for joining in. And this will just be the first of many times we'll hopefully get to do this again. Thank you for all you're doing. I greatly appreciate it.
Debra, it was great seeing you last week, and thanks for all you're doing in Colorado. And we'll talk to you soon.
That sounds great. Thanks so much. I appreciate it. Well, that was my guest, Congressman Jeff Crank. Were heading through a break. When we come back, I got a question for you, and that I'm gonna tell you. Why how do you take your coffee? Some good news for you. Ahead five six six nine zero. How do you take your coffee? If you drink coffee, I do up. We'll be right back. I'm Debborah Flora, sitting in for Mandy Connell,