Inside The State Of The Union

Union addresses I've ever seen. It was raucous. Before we get to that, I have to talk about Iowa because the last time I saw you, we were here for three hours last night waiting to do a podcast about Iowa, and then the results never came in. Look two words dumpster fire. I mean it is so last night, last night, Monday night, you and I arrived here at nine. The plan was we're doing a podcast. So you said, all right, we'll get Iowa results and we'll go just on air

and react to them. And then nine o'clock became ten, that became eleven, that became twelve, and we're sitting there going we have no results. We still don't have results. But the nice thing about a podcast, Look, if we had a TV show that went on at nine pm, we'd have to go on air and say tonight we know nothing and you just kind of sit there and said, we said, all right, if we don't know the results, let's do the podcast tomorrow. But you remember then we said,

all right, let's do it at ten am. We didn't have results at ten any and we said let's do it at three pm. We didn't have results at three pm. And we're sitting here now at twelve forty three in the morning, and we have sixty percent of Iowa report, We have sixty percent of IRA reporting. There is a discrepancy between the delegates and the popular vote. Now, you happened to win Iowa in twenty sixteen, so I want

your insider take. But just from what I'm reading, Pete Buddha Jedge, who declared victory last night with no results in he has twenty should give him some credit. That was a ballsy boot. And so look in that scenario, and actually the numbers are back in him up. If he had come in with three percent, he would have looked pretty ridiculous. But that fortune favors the bold. That's

exactly right now. In terms of delegates, Pete Buddha Judge has twenty seven percent, Bernie is at twenty five percent. Elizabeth Warren eighteen percent, pour Joe Bibing down at fifteen percent, Amy Club Char twelve point six percent, and yet Bernie is leading in the popular vote. I think people have no idea what the Iowa caucus is, including many Iowans. You spent a lot of time in Iowa in twenty sixteen and it paid off because you won the state.

What happened? What does it look like? So? Iowa is a state where they take their responsibility very seriously, and people pour thousands of hours into grassroots campaigning in Iowa because Iowa has proven to be a launching ground where look, Iowa rarely Alexa nominee or Alexa president, but it excludes a lot of people, and it could elevate someone who wasn't a front runner, who wasn't dominant, to major top

tear status. And so you know, you look at the results in Iowa to night or whenever we get them, assuming they resemble the ones you just read, it's a catastrophic night for Joe Biden. Joe Biden was the inevitable, the unstoppable front runner and he's in fourth place. That's

a big problem. Um, it wasn't a great night for Elizabeth Warren Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are battling for who can be the great leftist Hope and Bernie right now one if those numbers hold up, and you got to assume moving into New Hampshire, the poll numbers out of New Hampshire, Bernie as a neighbor in Vermont is in a very strong position sout, so Warren coming in third. She's still around, but between Bernie and Warren, she's not

in a great place. It's a great night for Buddha Jedge And look, Biden's donors right now are freaking out. Biden's supporters are freaking out. And if you figure there's twenty to thirty percent of moderate Democrats, they got a flee somewhere. Boots did a nice job of throwing himself in contention. Klobuchar would have been another person in contention. She's not totally out, but fifth place is not. She wanted to come in and shock the world with say

a second place phinish an Ioway. If that had happened, it could have really elevated Klobuchar to be the alternative to Biden. What you may see some oxygen for is a Michael Bloomberg coming in. He seems to be trying to veer into this moderate lane. The Biden campaign is collapsing. It's amazing what fifty billion dollars could do. But but you know, the Democrats of the Party of the People and the Party of Poor People, and you know, Frankly, you know, Bloomberg does look at Tom Steier and say,

you're a really poor billionaire. That's true as far as billionaires go, it's a rarefied air. But you know, this does make the Democratic candidates look a little bit ridiculous, in part because the candidate who won the popular vote very well may not win the state and didn't. Berney's a socialist, so he's going to redistribute his votes to others. You know, I gotta say number one that they the Democrats, couldn't and it's the state Democratic Party that screwed this up.

They couldn't figure out how to count the votes. Last night I was thinking about, you know, I felt really bad for the volunteers. Every one of these candidates have people who pour their hearts into it. I mean, I remember four years ago in Iowa. I mean, we had worked for over a year. We had volunteers who had come in from Texas, from all over the country who'd moved to Iowa. We actually rented an entire dormitory, a college dorm that was filled with volunteers that would go

out in blizzard conditions knocking on doors. And there's something called the Full Grass Leet where Chuck Chuck Grassley, the senior senator from Iowa. Chuck goes to all ninety nine counties in Iowa every single year, and four years ago in Iowa, I did the Full Grass You hit every county I hit, and in fact, we hit the ninety nine county on the day of the caucus. And it look Iowa. You drive through a lot of sparse, rural counties you're doing events. I remember one of my favorite events.

It was about ten thirty at night and it was a county where there were not many kind of big gathering places. So we did it a gas station and it was a pretty big gas station, and it was it was on the road, and it was ten thirty at night and we had I think close to one hundred people came out to the gas station from from the county and I jumped behind the counter and uh, you know, began serving people coffee because it was ten

ten thirty at night and they came out here. You know, it's a place where people have poured their hearts in. And to get to last night, to get to the cat complete debacle, it collapses, and to not have a result, Yeah, I think that I've never seen anything more messed up. So and by the way, Democrats are the people that tell you they want the federal government to be in

charge everything. They think they're geniuses, and so they say, put us in charge of your healthcare, put us in charge of the economy, put us in charge of your life. These people can't count votes. It ain't complicated. You literally go to a gymnasium and go stand over there. If you're with boden, go stand over there. If you're with birth, that's very complicated. But they can control your entire healthcare.

There is a big contrast right between the Democratic Iowa caucus is a complete debacle and tonight's State of the Union, which you've just come from. This is the Republican president counting off his victories, and the president spent the first what twenty twenty five minutes of the speech just listing off his victories. I know that you spoke with the President a few days before the State of the Union.

I was obviously not on the phone call, but I suspect you've talked about what that speech should look like. So I talked to him on Sunday. He called me and we visited about a number of topics, but but on the State of the Union. I encouraged him. I said, make it positive, make it optimistic, focus on substance, focus on results, focus on success. Don't focus on impeachment. And that was my very explicit advice. I said, mister President, for what it's worth, I wouldn't say a word about impeachment.

And the reason is, look, impeachment's gonna be over tomorrow, but there are still potentially a couple of votes in flux. So I told the President on Sunday, I said, I think the votes, the votes for not guilty will be somewhere between fifty and fifty six. Okay, I said, fifty is the bare minimum. There will be fifty not guilty votes, and I'm confident of that. And as long as he is, I mean he'll he would need sixty seven votes of guilty to be removed from so that's not going to happen.

There was never any risk of that. But on the upside, I think we could get as high as fifty six not guilty votes. And I said, look, mister President, if if you gave us state of the Union that people saw as spiking the ball and it ticked them off, I said, look, a lot of the you could end up seeing a few of these votes go south. And you have a little insider knowledge here because you're speaking to the people who could be those votes that go one way or the other, and you're speaking to the

president and so on. Sunday, the six votes that were in play, you had three three Republicans, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Mitt Romney. Now I told the President, I said, frankly, I think all three will vote not guilty. Now we know as of tonight Collins and Murkowski have announced they're going to vote not guilty, so that that much is right. If Mitt has announced, I haven't seen it, so I think he probably will as well, but but we'll find

out tomorrow. On the Democratic side, I think there are only three votes that are even plausibly in contention, and that's Joe Mansion, who I think probably does vote not guilty. He has it seems he's signaled that he's seriously considering voting not guilty, breaking with his party. Yeah. I had a reporter run up to me in the Capitol all excited and said, Hey, what do you think of Joe mansion censure motion? And I said, I hope it means he's voting not guilty, like you know that. That's what

he suggested. Instead of voting guilty, removed from office, he suggested vote vote for censure, say that the president did a bad thing, slap him on the hand, but leave him in office. And I think the odds are pretty good that Mansion votes not guilty. The other two votes that are potentially in play are Kirsten Cinema from Arizona, who has she hadn't been in the Senate long, but she's been trying to carve out a more moderate path. I think it's at least possible she votes not guilt.

And then the third one is Doug Jones from Alabama, who at least possibly could. So my advice to the President was, rather than, you know, rather than risk getting out of them angry, just focus on the incredible results at a positive vision. And I got to say, and I wasn't the only one who gave the president of that advice that that was a lot of people were

giving him that advice. But how did he do. I don't know that any of us were sure he would follow it, to be honest, I don't know that he was sure he would follow it, but he was open to it when we talked, and I thought he did spectacularly at night. It is the best speech I've ever seen Donald Trump give. And it started out just relentlessly making the case of the substance of victories we've had in the last three years. And it was powerful, it

was compelling, it it was optimistic. And the contrast the way congressional Democrats behaved tonight was horrible. They wouldn't even stand up or applaud for low unemployment. Or there were women wearing white or like the suffragettes, and they wouldn't

stand up and applaud for female unemployment. It was one after the other where the President says, with the lowest unemployment in history, stone cold silence, the lowest African American unemployment history, stone cold silence, lowest Hispanic unemployment in history, stone cold silence. As you point out lowest unemployment for women in seventy years, and you have all of these congressional women in white who just are sitting there snarlet what do they want to? What more could they ask?

And I like that the President he didn't just have one line about it. He had one after the other after the other. They were all based on facts, they were all based on substance. So when the President says the lower fifty percent of income, the people who are struggling the most have seen their incomes go up, go up the most as a percentage, stone cold silence for the Democrats. When he talks about poverty, the lowest African

American poverty in history, stone cold silence. You know the moment in the early part of the speech that was most dismaying. The President talked about how seven million Americans have come off of food stamps and ten million Americans have come off of welfare, and not only did the congressional Democrats not applaud, there was hissing. I mean it was because you couldn't really hear that on the TV.

On the floor, they were hissing, and it was like it was like some leftists in a college college classroom. And I'm going to say that's really twisted, and it reveals where the modern Democratic Party is because they're saying, they're saying to people who who are struggling that they want you to remain dependent, they want you to unemployed, they want you to you Those seven million people the last three years have gotten jobs. These are real men

and women. These are single moms who are suddenly now working. They're they're providing for their kids. They have the dignity of work. The self respect and the approach of the Democrats, the congressional Democrats, they hissed that it's bad that they're off welfare, and it is revealing of, I think, a really cynical attitude. There was also so one of the things the president did did really well. They're what are called Lenny Stutnick moments. Okay, now what is the Leny

Sutni moment? So Lenny Stutnick is is we see them allott in State of the Unions where the president calls someone out in the gallery. Okay, And the origin of that it was actually Ronald Reagan who invented that. It was nineteen eighty two and Reagan called out Lenny Stuttnik, who who who had saved someone who had crashed into the Potomac and it look. Reagan was a master showman. He understood the power of it. But that was the first time in two hundred years of our country's history

that the president had done that. Now every state of the Union. You haven't Lenny Stutning moment. What President Trump did with that tonight, I've never seen. And he's taken it to another level. So we saw, for example, Rush Limbaugh. There was an amazing moment um when the President awarded him the Medal of Freedom right there and then and and and Milania put it around his neck. Rush, I think, and I was sitting kind of right beneath where Rush was, so I was looking right up at him. He was

probably on fifty feet away from me. Rush was so astonished. And look, yesterday Rush announced he has stage four lung cancer um and and and if you haven't listened to his announcement on air, it's it's worth listening to it. And you know, Rush, Rush is a friend. He is I think the man is a hero, and he's a patriot.

And you know, I remember having dinner with Rush. I think it was twenty fifteen, before the whole presidential campaign had started and we were talking about the future, and it had been eight years of Obama or seven years at the time, and and Rush at the time was it was a little I wouldn't say discourage, but he wasn't sure we could turn things around. It was a discouraging era. And I remember telling him, I said, Rush, you have twenty million Americans who listened to you every

single week. Look, you and I are pretty hot, Daddy Skippy happy that we've had two million downloads in two weeks. So I look, that ain't nothing. That's pretty good. That's not And you know we didn't, by the way, just to mention it's in passing, we didn't podcast for a few days. Here shows still at number two, even even with several days of silence with well, that's the sound of silence, that's that's the power of people wanting content.

But my point was that I said to Russias, I said, look, you got twenty million people a week that listened to you. If every one of your listeners gets two other people to come out and vote, that's it. Just each person find two people in America to come vote. That's sixty million people. I remember telling Rush was six million people. We can turn this country around. Donald Trump won in

twenty sixteen with sixty two million votes. Those numbers were almost and Rush, you know, it's an interesting You and I both went on Glenn Beck this morning. We were back to back to back. We pounded this podcast. You and I think Glenn was ready to strangle us. Both the show. Guy's good to um. But both Glenn and then I did Hannity earlier tonight, and both of them gave beautiful emotional tributes to Rush that he had blazed

the field. I mean that that he's number one. I mean, in many ways, what we're doing right now would be unthinkable without Rush. And he was the kind of lonely voice in the wilderness. And what was so powerful there was all sorts of people across America that we're sitting there going I thought I was the only one, and he just he spoke for the everyman. He and by the way he speaks for the everyman, I don't want to.

So my mom is a two time cancer survivor. Cancer is a horrific, nasty, vicious disease, and having been by my mom's side through chemo, through radiation, it's horrible. Rush is a tough tenacious fighter. So I mean I sent sent Russia note yesterday that one of the things I said is, look, yours is an incredibly important voice in America and we need you and we're all And it was a great moment to see Malania put it on

and obviously everybody's praying for him. But that that we've never seen in terms of a Lenny study, I would actually have the metal. And since Rush was blown away, there were three times I had tears in my eyes, and I've been to now I think seventh State of the Unions. I've never had tears in my eyes, and I had three times before the other two. That moment Calamueller, who was tortured and killed by ISIS, her parents were there.

The President did an incredible job telling her story, seeing them looking up look, particularly as the father of daughters. You know, I kept looking at the dad, I mean look and the mom, but you know I identified with the dad and to know the horrific hell that their daughter went through. And the President told a great story about the special Forces team naming their mission to take out al bag Daddy after her birthday because it ties in Look, we all know about the policy accomplished right,

But the personal story is what I agree. I had tears of I it was beautiful and powerful. And the third time was the mom with her to the kids, who's a soldier and her husband's a soldier and he was deployed in Afghanistan, I think. And then the president said, and he's back here now, Yeah, we'll talk about a reveal. And look on her face and to see him come down, that sergeant come down the steps and her like she was next to Milanni, and then the joy she expressed

her kids. I mean seeing him hugs little girl, huggs little boy. I okay, that that is a new threshold. There's never been a Lenny Stuttning moment where you actually reunite a soldier's family right in front of you. I think, to the surprise of of of of the family that that was incredible, It was powerful. It was it turned everything up to eleven and I agree, I mean it was.

It was just such an effective speech. He didn't mention impeachment, which I'm very glad that was part of your conversation, and other other people had had encouraged him that way too. And by the way, he did a great contrast last week. Yeah, last week, I was the White House twice. One day for the announcement of his Middle East peace proposal. He was there with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin net and Yahoo the next day for the signing of the US MCA,

the Mexico Canada Trade Agreement. And I thought the silent contrast of he's working for the country for good, for the future, while the Congressional Democrats are just consumed with hate. I think that was a really sharp content. And we'll see the contrast again tomorrow because you had the State of the Union, a really really strong State of the Union and State of the Union address. Tomorrow is the

vote on impeachment. I mean, you're gonna go. It's pretty latent into the evening, so you know in a few hours you're going to head back to the Senate. How does impeachment end? Well, before we finished the State of the Union, let me say two quick things on it. Okay, Number one, I think the Democrats seemed incredibly out of touch. I think to any America and watching, you wonder, why

can't you cheer for Americans? Yeah, like when the President says twelve thousand new factories, we're seeing a blue collar boom. Democrats for years have claimed to be the party of working men and women, the party of unions, and they're

sitting there snarling, furious at manufacturing jobs. Um. You know when when the President pointed out one of the first people who pointed out in the gallery was an African American band from Ohio who'd been homeless, who'd been had substance abuse problems, and because of an opportunity zone part of what we implemented, the tax cuts that incentivizes capital and jobs and struggling neighborhoods, he now has a job, he's he's he's clean, and he's turned his life around.

And the Democrats just snarled and and and you think about it, most of these inner cities, these these areas with with severe poverty, almost all of them are represented by Democrats. Yea. And it was literally their own congressional representatives angry that their constituents who were struggling are doing better that someone else did for them. It ruins their narrative.

And the moment that I think captured the whole night, sadly was at the end of the speech when Nancy Pelosi stood up and ripped the speech and half I thought that was the constitution. She was ripped. It was the speech. Okay, maybe I mistook that, and I was I was sitting not very far from her either. I was off on the side, was actually sitting between Marco Rubio and Rand Paul. It was kind of an interesting

the day after Aisle. It was sort of amusing. But that was just accidental reunion where we walked in, but we were kind of I was kind of laughing at how the seating worked out. But and the I didn't initially see her tear the speech. It was Marco who nudge means that, did you see her tearing the speech? And I looked up and she was still tearing it, and I was seething. It was pitiful and disgusting and it I think Nancy Pelosi should be ashamed and disrespectful it.

I'm fine. I get that parties have different views and you don't like. But look, I went to I think four State of the Union's Obama gave. He talked about all sorts of policies I didn't like, and I didn't applaud for all of them. So there's one picture I think it was from the twenty thirteen State of the Union where you had in a row me. I forget the order, but it was me, Chuck Schumer, Kirsten Jella Brand, Lindsey Graham, John McCain, and Obama was saying we need

to give amnesty for illegal aliens. And Schumer and Lindsay and McCain and Jilla Brand are all standing cheering, and I'm sitting there silently. I'm actually perfectly fine with that picture. They want to cheer for amnesty, I ain't gonna that. That's fine. I don't mind where there's a policy disagreement expressing it. But to rip the speed each and half showed a contempt not just for Donald Trump personally, but a contempt for the presidency, aempt for the American people

that I thought was repulsive. And I can tell you one Democratic Senator who will remain nameless, but on the elevator down he turned to me and said, did Pelosi really rip up the speech? You mentioned this the other day, you said, and it was this was just tonight, This was just like an hour ago, two hours ago. You mentioned also how some of these Democratic senators or more

moderate senators, they really have not liked this intense. He was really unhappy with that I said it was pitiful and offensive and disgusting, and I was, I was, I was genuinely pissed. Yeah, I mean it made me angry, and it was interesting this one Democratic senator that's terrible. That's completely now. Look he didn't like some of what Trump said, but it was sort of the when I look at the Congressional Democrats, they're consumed by hate and

hates ugly. Yeah, it is an ugly like fine, if you want to disagree on substance, but we should be rooting for the American people. We should be celebrating victories. And by the way, my job, I represent twenty eight million Texans. I don't just represent the Republicans, and I

represent Democrats in Texas and libertarians and independence. But you know what, if I'm fighting for more jobs and higher wages and protecting their rights, that benefits everyone, right, and it it made me angry, but it also made me sad to see that right now, hatred of Trump consumes all else. We ought to all be able to root for Americans because that that that should be who we are. I was obviously not there in person. I was just

watching on TV. And I agree with you, the anger of the sourpuss, the what appeared to be hatred doesn't play well on TV. I'm glad to hear that there were there was at least one Democratic colleague who who found it troubling as well. Before we go or we're obviously so much to get to, we'll have to get to more tomorrow. Let's try to get to one or two mail bag questions. First question from Miles Iowa caucus implosion hilarious thing or the most hilarious thing? Ridiculous napped?

As I said, I felt bad for the activists, like the Pete volunteers who worked, but luck for Democrats who want to run everything they ought to demonstrate they can count votes first, right, one question, I guess can tease. By the way, can you can you imagine these rock and scientists taking over and deciding like whether, when and if you get a hard transplant? Yeah, that's well, we got a system in an app, and I'm sorry the app doesn't work, so I'll have to cross some border

in three days whatever the app operates. Hope you're doing all right by then. This is a question. It's a little bit on impeachment, but I guess it'll touch on tomorrow's vote as well, because tomorrow is going to be the big vote. Do you quit the president or do you remove him from office? From Karen, I understand treason, bribery, and high crimes as grounds for impeachment. What I do not understand is misdemeanors. How do you go from treason

to misdemeanors? So far, no one's explained what that means exactly, and I'm hoping you Senator Ken. Yeah. Look, it's a good question, and it's a weird term. Some of it to remember is the distinction of felonies and misdemeanors didn't exist as those terms are understood, because you think of a misdemeanor is kind of a minor crime, and so that's a confusing part of the phrase. I wouldn't think

of them as separate categories. The phrase as a whole is other high crimes and misdemeanors, and that that was a unified So there were misdemeanors at the time the Constitution was adopted that were punishable by death. Yikes. So so a misdemeanor was not a speeding ticket, it was not a parking ticket. It was the phrase high crime or misdemeanors were serious crimes, and they were crimes against the public trust. They were things like bribery and treason.

So it wasn't just um, you know, knocking over a seven to eleven. It was it was a crime that did harm to the public to the nation, like treason. But by the way, the you know, one of the examples that that Adam Schiff used is is well under the definition of high crimes and misdemeanors that that Dershowitz and others are saying, what happens if if a president allowed Alaska to be invaded? And I gotta say, Dan Sullivan, the Center from Alaska was pretty worked up about to say,

I don't know, I'm against that. Yeah, I oppose the invasion of Alaska. And I pointed out Dan and he agreed with me on this, But I said, Dan, if a president allows a foreign country to invade the United States of America, that's treason. That is actively Constitution defines treason in the text of the Constitution. And you don't get to allow our enemies to invade and take over any of the United States. It's a shame that we have to teach our legislators that now, although I'm sure

emphatically so I'm not throwing him. I'm sure though that there are going to be many House Democrats who do try to impeach the president again for speeding tickets and for parking tickets. So that's something to look forward to. We will be discussing, obviously the big vote that comes out tomorrow, but unfortunately we're out of time today. This

is Verdict with Ted Cruz. We'll see you tomorrow. This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is being brought to you by Jobs, Freedom and Security Pack, a political action committee dedicated to supporting conservative causes, organizations, and candidates across the country. In twenty twenty two, Jobs Freedom and Security Pack plans to donate to conservative candidates running for Congress and help the Republican Party across the nation.