Live at the RNC

bit of patriotism. I don't think there could have been a starker contrast between the two parties as we head into November, and we will get into all of it with someone who knows all of the players, set knows all of the issues, and is deeply involved in everything that we're looking forward to, not just in November, but moving forward afterward. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. Welcome back to Verdict. I'm Michael Noles. Is a very special episode.

We simply could not wait to get this stream out tonight, so this one is going alive. It occurred to us with everything that's going on, we hadn't even been able to cover the DNC, and obviously the RNC took place. Senator, I have to tell you that I accidentally spread fake news earlier today. I told people on our previous stream when I was on Daily Wire, I said that you were in Washington right now, but your schedule is so hectic that turns out you're not even in Washington. Well,

that's true. I'm in the great state of Texas, although when I woke up this morning, I didn't know where for sure I would be. You know, we obviously had a hurricane late last night that made landfall right at the Texas Louisiana border, and so I had been planning this morning to fly up to Washington and be at the White House for the President's acceptance speech. But we were obviously monitoring the hurricane closely, and so I got up this morning about six am and talked to my team.

The hurricane had made landfall late last night, and we were assessing where the damage was, and we made the decision, which which frankly I thought was pretty likely. But we made the decision that I needed to go and survey the damage and meet with the local officials. And so went down, went down and jumped on a on a Coastguard helicopter UH and flew to East Texas, flew to Orange, Texas, which is right near the border with Louisiana, and then went up and did a tour of the areas that

were impacted by the hurricane. And UH, you know, I gotta say Texas. At least we were blessed. We were really spared what could have been much, much, much worse. At about two or three in the morning last night, the hurricane shifted course and moved east about thirty miles and it ended up hitting Louisiana much much worse. But but it had the effect also sparing much of Texas, and so there was some wind damage in far East Texas, there was some flooding, but it was really Louisiana that

that took the braun of the hit. And and I have to say, having been through multiple hurricanes, including obviously Hurricane Harvey, which was the most devastating certainly of my lifetime, I think everyone was grateful that this was not nearly

as bad as it could have been. I'm so pleased to hear it, because obviously we've all been, you know, focused on national politics and this issue and that issue and these rioters, and that you forget that a natural disaster can strike and kind of puts puts everything on pause. So it's I'm you certainly did the right thing by going down surveying the damage, even even if it might have been more fun to be at the Republican Party

in DC. But but you were able to watch some of the convention, so I was, and and it did lead lead to right now, we're revisiting what was really the birth of Verdict, which is we're doing an episode at at at nearly midnight, you know, for the same reason because all of Washington was going late late into the night and the President just finished his speech not long ago, and I jumped in the car and drove

over to the studio and now we're live. And I have to say, this is something that maybe people don't know about you, but I have seen it up close many times. You're nocturnal, you never sleep. You seem to have more energy at two in the morning than you do it two in the afternoon. I am a night owl and I hate mornings. Like if I ever had to do a morning show, I think it killed me. Yeah, but but but you know, a midnight show i'd be I'd be all on board with that. Yeah, that's maybe.

Maybe we'll just set it there all the time. I don't know how happy my wife would be about that, but that's okay. If we'll do it, we'll do it for the show. Actually, speaking of that, speaking the origins of Verdict, Our first question in from Laurel is a simple question, but I think a lot of people maybe don't know the answer. What is a verdict? So um?

A verdict in in legal sense obviously is the judgment of the court and and and it's the judgment of a jury, typically of guilt or in a sense, uh in a criminal case, or the judgment of whether the plaintiff or defendant prevails in a civil case. And and it is well, don't know, I'm not going to intrude on you. I was going to say what it's from in the Latin. But but but let me not step on the great Michael Knowles is to tell so tell

us what is it in the Latin mind? Well, in the Latin, since you bring it up, Senator, it means a true saying ver like for truth and dickt like dictum, you know, a saying. And so we try to obviously speak the truth on this show. And Senator, you know, in our in our absolutely populoust appeal, every so often

we have to get into Latin etymology. We have to cover everything everything on the Yeah, yeah, so uh you know, as you know right now, if if you are watching this on YouTube, send your questions in you put your questions into the live chat, we will of course answer them live. We've got another question. This is from Stephen, and I don't know that I know the answer or to this. How does an average citizen go about proposing legislation to their elected representatives? Um? Well, there are lots

of avenues of communicating. What one can certainly do is call either your representative, or you can call your senator. You can go by and try to visit, uh with their staff to and typically either a representative senator will have staff both in DC and in the home district. Um. You can you can write something. You can write an op ed and suggest it. You find some way to come up with a good idea and uh, and you know I'll give an interesting example of that. So so look,

we know actually how legislation gets proposed. You remember the schoolhouse rock. I'm just a bill, uh, you know, sitting on the steps of Capitol Hill. And I will not um injure anyone's ears by trying to sing it, because

I can't carry a tune to save my life. But an interesting story of a bill that was proposed by some New Jersey high school students, and it somehow came to the attention and I don't remember exactly how of Alabama's Senator Doug Jones, a Democrat, and it was a bill to take the records from cold cases civil rights cases from the nineteen fifties or sixties, so a church bombing, a clan murder, or something, but a case that had

never been solved. And the idea of the New Jersey High school students was to put these records, make them public, and let citizen journalist go try to solve the case. Fifty sixty seventy years later, and somehow Doug heard about this, and so he was giving a floor speech on the Senate floor as a brand new freshman. He was talking about that he'd introduced a bill to do this, that he'd heard that idea, he liked the idea, and I

was presiding. And so the way it works in the Senate is the majority party gets to preside, and it typically rotates between the more junior senators, either first term or second term senators. You typically preside for maybe an hour a week. So I just happened. I was in the chair and Doug was standing there and he was talking about this idea, and I try to listen when people get floor speeches. By the way, a speech on the Senate floor usually as to an empty cavernous room

and c span and no one's listening. But I listened to what Doug was saying, thought it was an interesting idea, and so I went down afterwards, said hey, let's do this together. We teamed up together, work together, and passed the bill into law. So it started with New Jersey high school students and it ended up being a good idea and getting passed into law. Well, so this is

a hugely important aspect of it. And then I know some people have asked about the deep state, you know, or the administrative state, or the bureaucracy, which seems like makes a lot of laws for people, but they're they're not accountable. You can't call your senator, you can't call your congressman. And I know this is an issue you've talked about quite a lot. Well, yeah, I mean it's one of the massive problems of the administrative state, and

for that matter, of judicial activism. Right, you have government officials that are completely unaccountable. Federal judges have life tenure, and so if they're if they're enacting policy, you don't have a constraint over them. Bureaucrats many of their views, as they will outlast every elected official. They're the permanent government, and whoever's coming and going is just sort of a temporary irritant. Yeah. And it's one of the great virtues

of our constitution is accountability. And so I think it's really important to have as much decision making as possible in the elected parts of government. And also, I mean that's really separation of powers at the federal level, but also as much decision making and policies at the state or local level, because all of that increases accountability, it empowers the people. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Question and from Daniel,

could you guys explain the Hatch Act? Uh, somewhat, although I'm not an expert, and it's the general principle on the Hatch Act is it restricts many, many federal employees from from engaging in politics. Yeah, and so there are some exceptions to it, some are allowed to do so, but as a general matter, the kind of run of mill, run of the mill federal employee, the Hatch Act bars them from engaging in politics because the idea behind it

is they don't want to politicize our government. It also prohibits using official assets, So you know, I can't I can't do a political thing in my Senate office. I'm I'm not allowed to do that. That would be a violation. It's actually, I think, not technically the Hatch Act for Congress. It's the Senate Ethics rules, but it's the same principle. Yeah. And the reason everyone is asking is there's lots of chatter about the president's speech tonight on the White House

and whether that violated the Hatch Act. Short answer for me is, I don't know. I haven't studied that question. The argument that it doesn't violate the Hatch Act. As I understand, it is their portions of the White House that are considered the president's residence that are separate from the official parts. So, as I understand the argument, he would not have been able to give that speech in the Oval office, but the South Lawn is essentially his residence.

It's also COVID and so these are extraordinary times. But to be fair, I haven't studied the legal arguments on either side, so so I don't know who who has the better of that argument, right, And there was a moment during the President's speech where he said this is the White House, really though I think of it as a home, and perhaps that there was a nod at this controversy that Democrats are cooking up. A question from Meetsa. Nietsa says, Hello, I'm a young conservative and plan to

open up a business later in my life. Then use that money to campaign for Congress. Wow, it's a full plan. So my question to Senator Cruz is what are your best campaign suggestions? Get involved in an issue you care about and fight for it rather than just run for office and have all these ideas. Go fight for something that matters and build a record, and so that when you do run, you can point to what you've done and you've said, Look, you want to know what I believe,

look at what I've been fighting for. And so you can be engaged in whatever issue motivates you, get your get your blood boiling, go and build a record on that. Yeah, yep. From Paul, what is the deepest reason why the Democrats won't disavow Antifa or the rioters? What philosophical hang ups keep them from taking a stance against political violence? You know, I gotta say for Paul that that is a great question.

I don't know for sure. Um, you know, a couple of weeks ago I chared a hearing on Antifa violence and mob violence, and we heard really chilling testimony about all of the assaults, the assaults on police officers, the violence. Seven Democratic senators participated in that hearing, and not a one of them was willing to denounce Antifa, and and and there's it's interesting the Democrats. They have a message discipline to them. I mean, I mean, look, part of

it is Democrats believe in government. They're collectivists, and so when they have orders, they follow orders. I mean, it's yes, comrade, And they all say the same damn thing. Um, you know, Republicans we can barely agree on what time of day it is. I mean, we bigger like crazy. And look, a little bit is that you've got some individualists. So you've got you know, any party that has Susan Collins and Ran Paul in it is a party with a lot of diversity because they and everyone else there's a

lot of disagreement. So for whatever reason, at that hearing, it was clear the Democratic talking points had gone out that whenever Antifa or BLM violences is raised, simply attack and say it's right wing violence, that it's a problem. That was their talking point, and so they'd say, well, what about the clan, what about Nazis? And look, of course my response is the clan clan and Nazis are ignorant, bigoted racists and if they commit violence, we should lock

them up in jail. Like I don't have a problem denouncing them hired, how about you? How about Antifa and crickets. I don't know how much of it is fear that that you know right now the Democratic Party, it's driven by angry voices and maybe they're scared to take them on. I don't know how much of it is in the

Democratic Party. There's kind of a a glorifying of nineteen sixties protests, and you know, it's sort of part of the self narrative of a lot of Democrats as we're back at Berkeley and we're, you know, protesting against Vietnam.

You know his famous story of Reagan when he was governor driving through Berkeley during protests and there were a bunch of hippies who were yelling and screaming in a protest, and that they that they either held up a sign or they chanted we are the future, and Reagan grabbed a pad of paper and he scrawled on it and held it up to the window and said, I'll sell my bonds. So maybe that's some of it that they

identify with protesters. But I also think some of it is there's a woke identity politics that that particularly because much of this violence arose in the context of questions of racial justice. I think Democrats are terrified to say anything criticizing someone who they perceive as a racial justice warrior, even if they're committing horrific and organized acts of violence.

So so I don't know what's driving it, but some combination of those factors I do know the end result, which is, you know, we went through a Democratic convention last week where we've got cities on fire, police officers being attacked, being murdered, and the Democrats are unable or unwilling to bring themselves to condemn it. Yeah, that's right,

And I think you make a great point. It hadn't really occurred to me in all of this madness, but this glorification of the nineteen sixties protests and rioting and violence in some cases is still there even with these boomer Democrats who don't don't ever seem to have really left Berkeley. Maybe they did physically mental It's weird, Michael. Yeah, even though they glorify protesters, leftist today don't believe in

free speech right right, It's a very weird. You know. Look, I'm passionate about free speech, and I believe you've got a right to advocate any view you want, no matter how idiotic. I look, I defend people who attack me because you've got a right to do it. What you

don't have a right to do is violence. And what's strange about today's left is when it comes to someone speaking on college campus, or speaking in their job, or speaking anywhere else and saying some view that is inconsistent with their orthodoxy, they'll get you fired, they'll silence you.

I mean, they're perfectly happy to stifle free speech. But when it comes to you know, there was a CNN still shot that was making the rounds on Twitter today of you know, building just totally in flames, and the chiron at the bottom was and I'm maybe getting this slightly wrong, what was something to the effect of, although fiery, largely peaceful protest and it's literally all on frigging fire like fire is not peaceful. This is not a complicated concept.

If you light someone on fire, you're not being peaceable to them. And this didn't used to be a contribute virtual notion. This is also the second time the mainstream media have done this. We now have screenshots on MSNBC, n CNN of reporters standing in front of whole buildings on fire. And it's mostly peaceful. It's mostly ignore, there's nothing to see here, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Just for the sake of argument, let me ask you the phrase burn it all down? Is

that ever a peaceful notion? Like like, why does one burn things down? And it's look, we just see CNN as a propagandist. We see much of the mainstream media as propagandists right now, right, that's right? And you know, speaking of burning, I mean, I think the Democrats are caught in this issue, which is that they've encouraged the protests. They've encouraged the riots in some cases, and when you play with fire, you might get burned. And I think

they're seeing that probably in the polling. Speaking of polling, a dean wants to know this is an important issue. It keeps coming up as people talk about the election. How does the GOP win over more suburban women voters. Look, it's a great question. We've talked a lot on Verdict about what I think are the two broadest demographic trends in the US politically, which is number one, blue collar voters moving right, that's moving Midwestern states more Republican yea.

And number two, suburban voters, especially suburban women, moving left. That's moving big suburban states like Georgia, like Texas, like Arizona are all getting more purple. You know, it's interesting. I think there's a very real possibility this week and last week we may look back on them as a real turning point in this campaign. And I don't mean it for the traditional reason. Look, we kind of expect conventions to have a bounce. I mean that's sort of traditionally.

One side has their convention, they get a bounce, their numbers go up in the polls. The other side has their convention, they get to bounce, their numbers go up in the polls. I actually not focused on the conventions as much, although I think the Democratic Convention was was very ineffective last week, and I think the Republicans did a very good job with our convention this week. But but I actually think it was a broader turning point

the violence we saw in places like Kenosha. And I think as we've seen this violence continue, not just in the immediate aftermath of George Floyd's death, but continuing week after week after week, I do think there are a lot of folks who may not even be all that political, who are seeing this and understandably saying this. This is a little scary, you know. I know you've seen and our viewers are really engaged. So I suspect a lot of our viewers. I've seen the video of these angry

leftist mobs screaming at people having dinner. You know, there's one of this woman having dinner and they're demanding put your fist in the air for black power. And it's I mean, it's screaming angry. If you don't salute what we demand, we're gonna berate you. And there's a real threat of or worse, there's a I mean, the threat of violence is in the air. And and I do think and you know why I think it may be something of a turning point is we're suddenly seeing Democrats

react like they touched a hot stove. They're suddenly realized, oh crap, people don't like it when their cities are on fire and like people are threatening violence to them. And it's it's been even the past couple of days where it seems like we may have reached a little bit of a tipping point on this. We'll see if we have, but but I do think the angry radicals are getting more and more extreme, and I feel confident the Joe Biden campaign is sitting there right now saying,

what the hell do we do about this? This is dangerous? That's right, and you know it's it's good in some ways to make wonkish arguments about tax rates or trade policy or or what have you. There is a place for that. When the country's on fire, That's not what

people are thinking about. They're thinking about who's burning down the country, who's trying to put water on those fires, Who you know, wants to tear down George Washington, and who wants to look forward to an American future that resonates with people, even if even if you don't have your nose in white papers from think tanks and that sort of thing. Question from people want to be prosperous

but but but even more fundamentally, people want to be safe. Yes, yes, yeah, you know, And I do think that the basic contrast between the two conventions on the Republican side the kind of core messages will keep you safe and we're gonna fight for you to have a job, and the Democratic side not promising to keep anyone safe. And on the economy, they don't really have a message either other than we hate Trump. Yeah, and so we're going to raise taxes

that have massive regulations. But trust us, it'll be great for the economy. And you know, I think a lot of people are pretty pretty smart and realize, well, that doesn't sound like it's great for the economy. Yeah, yeah, that's right. And when you have when you have Democrats, you know, led by the future of the Democratic Party.

As a DNC chairman, Tom Perez Cooll's AOC talking about the Green New Deal, this ninety three trillion dollar plan by by some estimates, I don't think people look at that and say this is going to lead to prosperity. Now on this so let me actually dis agree with Paris on one thing. I don't think she's the future of the Democratic Party. I think she's the president. You know.

A couple of weeks ago, I was up in Alaska, which by the way, was very cool, and Heidie and I and the girls went up there and I went up there to campaign for Dan Sullivan, who is the Senator from there. He's a good friend and he's up for re election and I was campaigning for him, and one of it, we did several events for Dan. And one of the things I said at each of the events, as I said, you may not realize it, but AOC is on the ballot in Alaska. And I mean people

are really kind of puzzled and startled. What do you mean she's on the ballot in Alaska? I said, Listen, if if this is a bad election, if if Democrats win, and if they take the Senate, and that's a real possibility, Chuck Schumer will be majority leader. But as a practical matter, Chuck Schumer has seen all of these Democrats being primaried

from the left and losing. And Schumer is up in twenty twenty two, and if he becomes a majority leader, he is going to be utterly terrified of being primaried by AOC. And for all intents and purposes, that will make AOC effectively the Senate majority leader, because whatever she demands, he's going to be so scared of that primary challenge that I think he'd be more than happy to jump

to her tune. And it was kind of an interesting point for Alaskans to think about it, and and I was saying, look, Alaska is a great bellweather where if Sullivan loses, and and Alaska's has elected both Democrats and Republicans, it's a state that has shown it can vote either way. If Alaska loses, and their number states for which this is true, there's a real possibility Schumer's majority leader and AOC is driving the train and setting the agenda in the Democratic

Party today, not tomorrow in the future. You know, as a native New Yorker, I'm not even an Alaskan, I have no excuse that hadn't occurred to me. But there has been chattered that AOC could primary Chuck Schumer, and you're right. Effectively, what that means is AOC is going to be calling the shots even more than she already is, and she obviously is already wielding a lot of influence.

And Schumer's a political being which means like his only objective will be to stop that, and and so just as a practical matter, that means he's going to be terrified. He does not want to let her outflank him to the left in any respect. You know, minority leader, that's much less of a problem. But if he actually controls a Senate majority, yeah, that's that could be very dangerous.

They do have a saying in New York. I think, even still with the riots and all the mayhem, that the most dangerous place in the state of New York is between Chuck Schumer and a television camera. So I think that is the issue. I have heard that although I will confess a affinity for TV cameras is not a unique sin in Washington among Chuck Schumer. That's I can imagine. It's a maybe an occupational hazard down there.

A question from Matt, Hey, guys, love your work. How do we know that the right is correct and that true political reality doesn't lie somewhere in the middle of the political scale. I guess what Matt's asking is. You know, as you senator, you're probably one of the most conservative guys in all of Washington, DC. Why should we be strong conservatives? And not squishes. Well, look, I would say, don't don't accept my word for it. Don't accept it

on faith test the propositions. Read both sides, study both sides, you know, spend time listening to what the left says, listening look to the right says, and even you know, how do we know the right is correct? One of the things, And we talked about this before, there's a lot of diversity on the right in terms of what is even whether you're you know, a paleo conservative, a neo conservative, a libertarian, half these things. I mean, I

barely know what they mean. But there are sharp differences of opinion when it comes to foreign policy within the whole world on the right, when it comes to the role of government within the whole world on the right. What I would say is take the time to think through and analyze the issues one side. The left though right now, doesn't want you to do that. The fact that they're willing to use coersion to silence views that contradict Look, I mean, you know, you look at college

campuses where they won't allow conservative speakers to come. When I was in school, when I was in law school at Harvard, there were more openly Marxist professors on the faculty than there were Republicans. Yeah, and it wasn't even close. There was one open Republican on the faculty, Charles Freed, who who worked in the Reagan administration as Solicitor General.

M I worked as a research assistant for him. And by the way, Charles Freed, who at the time was the loan Republican on the faculty, voted for Barack Obama, so that he ended up even he ended up voting democratic. Wow, there were and are multiple open Marxist and you know, it's it's interesting. One one person who listens to our podcast, Michael, is Heidi. And look, you and I are both married. The fact that my wife actually listens to what we

say a is complimentary. But but I'll tell you she kind of chewed us out recently and said, you guys are getting too dogmatic and preaching to the choir too much. And and and the reason she listens to it is she says, listen, I'm really busy. And what she said, and it's the same thing we've heard a lot on this show, is she says, I learned things from the show, spend a little more time. And she actually brought up like, you know, you talked about several of the organizers of

BLM or avowed Marxist. She said, a lot of people don't know what Marxist are. And it reminds me we spent a lot of time early in impeachment kind of tapping the brakes and saying, Okay, what is this, what does this mean? And look, Marxism is a philosophy. It was propagated by Karl Marx. Obviously it's the foundation of communism, but but it it advocates it. It it views history

through a lens of class warfare. Yeah, and a battle of the proletariat versus the bourgeoisie, the working people versus the property owners, and and it calls for a revolution. Marxism it's an approach to history, it's an approach to government. But and it advocates socialism as its economic system. So socialism is just the economic arm of Marxism. It's but Marxism also consistently says we need actually phrase I think

it was. Lennon used a dictatorship of the proletariat, which is inevitably to get to Marxism, you have to have a totalitarian government come in and take the property from the people who have it. And what happens every single time is the Marxist who have power live like kings, and everyone else lives in misery. And so when someone is a Marxist, they are advocating for the principles reflected in the Communist Manifesto that Karl Marx wrote that that

advocated for Marxism anyway. So I give, I'm not going to necessarily tell you the right is always correct on everything. What I am going to say is that I believe, if you look at the evidence, free enterprises more successful than socialism in terms of lifting people's economic welfare, combating poverty,

producing prosperity. And I also believe that our constitutional liberties are important, and that includes the pluralism and diversity of thought that free speech and religious liberty and all the rest allows that that that if you don't agree, go make your case and convince your fellow citizens that's right, and look at the evidence. You know, as you say in these socialists never seem to get to that Marxism

where everybody's free and equal. I was reminded of an expression I once heard someone asked the difference between socialism and communism and they said, well, Christians go to heaven and socialists go to communism, and the problem is you don't get heaven on earth, so it never never seems to materialize. I do also want to get I give a simpler answer, which is the differences in AK forty evan.

It's more visual socialisms the economic system. But but inevitably it gets enforced in communism with brute force and oppression. I also want to remind all of our viewers right now, we have a lot of viewers right now live to click that subscribe button, ring the bell. We really appreciate it. That way you will get notifications so long as big tech does not shut us down, which I'm sure is

always a possibility. You can also head over to Apple Podcasts and if you would like, if you were so inclined to leave a five star review, we would really appreciate that helps us get over a little bit of the hurdle that is sometimes imposed on non leftist outlets out there. We're also on Google Play, Stitcher, probably my Space, I don't know. We're just all over the place on

the internet. For now, we really appreciate it. We've got a lot of views at this point you know, the show hit number one unexpectedly in the first couple of weeks of it, and we just appreciate all of our listeners. Sticking around question from Venray Law, somebody tells me that's not the name that your parents gave you, ven Ray,

but I like it anyway. Hey, Senator, why do you think it took tonight's speech to mention David Dorne on the mainstream media despite the mainstream media's support for black Lives matter, Because the media are hypocrites and they're pitching an ideological message. And Dorn's speech was incredible, yeah and powerful. So and Dorn is the widow of David Dorn, a retired Saint Louis police officer who was murdered in the riots,

and he is African American. And when when you have people screaming black lives matter, apparently David Dorn's is not included because because he was murdered in the violence by the rioters and and his wife her speech. It's one of the things I think the RNC better than the DNC, as it told real stories. I'm actually glad they had a lot fewer politicians on the RNC. Yeah, um, I I you know, I think listening uh to to an An Dorn or Clarence Henderson or or or the stories

that were told were really powerful. And and and her story now she's a police sergeant as well, and and she told the story of of of waking up and finding out he'd been murdered, that he'd gone he was he was retired and was working security to pawn shop and the alarm went off and he went went went to the pawn shop and was was murdered by the

rioters and looters. And in any sane conversation, we ought to be talking about the victims of this violence and and and and those that that uh have have been murdered. But but the media doesn't want you to know that. And it's part of it is we've talked about this before. Donald Trump has broken the media. Yeah, that's right. It you used to see the media. CNN is a great example where they try to be balanced. Um, they're not anymore.

You know. It's interesting. I watched the President's speech tonight at home on CNN. I don't know why, but that just happened to be what I turned on. And did you did you watch it on CNN? Do you remember what network you watch, Well, no, Senator, I assume you must live in an airport if you were watching it on CNN. That's the only place I ever see CNN live. Now, I was actually watching it on c SPAN because we were doing the stream, but sometimes I will click on

just to see the left wing commentary on it. So what was fascinating on CNN is when they were airing the president's speech. Um, when he got to talking about coronavirus and COVID nineteen, they put up at the bottom a chart of the number of cases of COVID nineteen in the US and the number of people who've died on COVID nineteen. And then they began doing a real time what I guess they were pitching is fact checking of the president's speech. And so it was denominated facts

first and so. And they just did this during the COVID nineteen portion of the speech. I mean, he spoke seventy minutes and it was just during the you know kind of I don't know, eight ten minutes that he was talking about about the pandemic. And so the first one said something like for months, you know, facts first, for months. The President dismissed the seriousness of this crisis. So the first one was really tendentious. It was political,

it was and I don't remember that. The second one was equally political, and so like the first, I almost turned it off. It was really ticking me off, Like have you ever seen a network covering either political party's nominee putting at the bottom what they call fact checking, disputing what he said? Like it was really like, who in the hell do they think they are? Like you're literally listening to the nominee's speech and they're gonna put

under him. But you know, it was fascinating. So that's in part an answer to why they don't want to say the name of David Dorne. They don't like telling that story. They don't like telling the story of the other officers assaulted, attacked, and murdered. But an interesting flip side, they did include one. I guess you'd call it a pro Trump fact fact check, and I guess somebody felt like, okay, we can't only put fact checks saying we disagree with the president, And the pro Trump one they put up

was fascinating. It was when the President was talking about Joe Biden's going to shut down the entire economy, and they said facts. First, Joe Biden said he would shut down the United States if scientists recommended it to him, and I got to say that fact check. I don't think CNN realizes how devastating that fact check. And it's true, but but you rarely get journalist acknowledging things that are true.

I mean, Biden did say that, yeah, but I think that is an absolutely devastating emission that, yes, Joe Biden wants to shut down the entire economy and take away your job. And they're like, yep, that's what he said. And so it was an interesting I don't know how that slipped through. I'm wondering if some CNN intern got fired for it maybe, but but but somehow they put it up on air. That is amazing, Although I do wonder if it was just so obvious it was undeniable.

The man said it himself, and so they have to get that out there. But but just the whole idea of the fact check, which is very rarely factual. It's always just based in political opinion. You know, the left always points to Fox, which which as far as I can tell, has left wing voices on it, much more balanced than c ann or MSNBC, even though it certainly tilts right. Word, but you wouldn't ever see Fox having

a running chiron just contradicting a candidate of either party. Yeah, and look, I think there are reasonable criticisms one can make a Fox. You know, earlier the question was given, how do we know the right is right? I certainly would not advise someone go listen to Fox News and whatever they say, believe it. Certainly, go educate yourself. Go read on the other side. You know, I try to.

I try to. Unfortunately, at anything resembling objective journalism is almost disappeared, and so you have to view things almost through the lens of all right, let's get partisans on both sides. So for years I used to read every day. I would read the Washington Post on politics and I'd read National Review, and the two side by side would give you some modoc of that. Sorry for like a

daily wire is a great place to do so. I don't mean to be pitching competitors, but but you know, read folks on both sides, and to be honest, the truth is usually somewhere in the middle that people are pitching something, but getting educated on both sides helps then to assess what's right and what isn't. No, that's right, And of course, I mean, of course the Daily Wire is the one news source in all of history that

is perfectly balanced. Give you. I'm joking. I would get this question off and they'd say, how do I get an objective perspective? And I said, forget about that idea. Just read both. You want to read the Daily Wire, it's good, and then go read I don't know, the Huffington Post or Box or something and figure out where their truth lies. Have I ever told you my idea for running a newspaper. I don't think so. So I've

thought about this for a long time. Like if I woke up one day and they made me the editor of the New York Times, and you know, they just fired the New York Times, So here's the job on me soon. Yeah, but but actually they fired the editorial page editor in the New York Times. More on the news side, I think, oh if I was if I was editor of either, I think what I would do is, rather than purport to be objective, I would consciously try

to frame a dialectic. I'd consciously try to frame and say, you know what, we're going to have conservative voices and liberal voices, so on our ed pages they're going to battle it out, and you're gonna get to listen to both. And by the actually the Post used to do that. They used to have some pretty good conservatives, and they still do it more than The Times does. But but instead I would just embrace the dialectic and say, you'll be smarter and more informed if you listen to smart

conservatives and smart liberals and assess it. And here's the piece. On the news media side, I'd do the same thing on news stories. And where a lot of the bias of journalism comes in is what stories get green lit, what gets decided this is news and this isn't so. Frankly, if if I owned a newspaper, if I was the editor of a newspaper, I'd probably have a conservative news editor and a liberal news editor, both with the authority

to green light stories. And I'd allow some of that same dialectic and have real conservatives and liberals, so they would, you know, and you would get hopefully in that clash, you'd get somewhere closer to truth. That's a great idea, and it's funny you mentioned that The Washington Post used to be a little more balanced. Back when it was I would read the Washington Post certainly much more than

I do now. It's a great idea, but certainly no one in the mainstream media is going to take that advice. It's too good, it's too insightful. Oh now, Michael, let me let me do something that will surprise you. And and this is connected to the last two questions we've gotten. Yeah, I'm going to defend the owner of the Washington Post and defend big tech, which is excuse me, sir, where have you put Senator Cruz. We gotta get the Senator

crews back here. I don't know if you saw, like protesters set up a guillotine outside of the home of Jeff Bezos. And and look, I've got lots of criticisms of the Washington Post. I think Bezos big Tech. I have lots of criticisms, though Amazon has been less noxious than some of the other players. But there are lots of reasons to criticize Bezos. But setting up and I'm not talking a mock guillotine, I'm you know, I mean the the If you haven't seen the video of it,

it is chilling. It is, by all appearances, a full working guillotine with a razor sharp blade. And you know that's just deranged. I mean, that is a terrorist threat. And this is outside, as I understand it, his personal home. Um, this is another manifestation of of the mob that we're seeing. You know, you don't get to threaten people with murder. When you put a guillotine in front of someone's house. You're not saying I disagree with your views. You're saying

I'm going to murder you. The reason you're putting it there is you're threatening to put their head and neck into it. And that, Um, I just think that was deranged. It absolutely was, And it's it's funny I had the same impulse I suppose that you had. Nobody has been tougher on big big tech than you have. Senator. You've you've really gone after them, when a lot of your fellow Republicans have not. But you look at that and you say, guys, that what are you doing. I can't believe.

I can't believe the left is now making me defend Jeff Bezos and Amazon Washington Post. But but that's where they've put us. You know, it's a it's a strange moment right now. No one who is who is alive has lived through a political moment like this. A question comes in from Tyler specifically about the election results right now. An estimated eighty to one hundred million people are going

to vote by mail in the election. I assume a huge number of them are not going to make their ballots hit the deadline, so they're going to come in late. We are very likely not going to know who won the election on election night. So his question is what happens if the election results are delayed beyond January twentieth, President Pelosi or does Trump remain in office? Or what are we looking at? There's a lot of uncertainty on that.

I think number one. On election day, if the race is at all close, you're going to see delays because of mail at vooting. But you're also going to see litigation Bush versus Gore. Look, I was very involved in litigating Bush versus Gore twenty years ago. I was a young campaign staff or young lawyer working for the George W. Bush campaign in two thousands, So I was down in Tallahassee as part of the legal team during Bush versus Gore. Yeah, I think there's a very real chance this year we'll

see a Bush versus Gore in ten twenty thirty fifty jurisdictions. Wow, it's been reported that Biden has already hired six hundred lawyers to contest elections. And what that means is, if it's at all close, there's a very good chance. We don't know the answer. If you get to January third, it could be thrown if if there is uncertainty, it could be thrown to Congress, which means the House of Representatives chooses the president, and it means that that the

Senate chooses the vice president. Now here's what's interesting. It doesn't work by simple majority in the House, so it's not whoever has the majority chooses the president. It's rather each state gets one vote, so each congressional delegation gets a single vote, So California gets one vote. And right now in the current Congress, I think the number is that they're twenty six Republicans ates, that Republicans have a majority, that delegation, twenty two that Democrats have a majority, and

two that are tied. I think it's Pennsylvania and Michigan are tied. The reason they can Dems can still have a majority is they rack up huge numbers in states like California and New York, so they have more than two hundred eighteen, but they don't have a majority of the states. Right. What that means is there's a real incentive if Democrats have the majority to prevent it from

going to the House. And there is an argument that come January twentieth, if if Congress hasn't exercised its authority to select the president select the vice president, there is an argument that they are are putting forward that on January twentieth, Donald Trump and Mike Pence cease being president and vice president, and third in line of succession is

Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House. And if they would lose otherwise, I fully expect the Democrats to do everything they can to prevent any constitutional mechanism for having a Republican president. So I fully expect them to try to delay to January twentieth and argue that Nancy Pelosi has now become president. That is, and we are in such uncharted legal territory, constitutional territory, these questions, if we

get there, are going to be hotly, hotly contested. Senator, when I saw this suggestion of President Pelosi floating around social media. I thought, oh, this is just one of those hokey, crazy things that goes around social media. I kind of dismissed it. And now you've made me feel so so much more worried about this election in November. Well, I will say, if we get to Congress choosing the president and vice president, we will be doing verdict live every night, just as we did an impeachment. And I

hope and pray that does not happen. I don't wish this to become a nightly midnight report from insanity, which which is what that would be. So so let's let's hope we don't find that out. But look, Democrats are already setting the foundation for, in their view, one of two outcomes in this election. Yeah, either they win, which

they might, or the election is illegitimate. Yes, yeah, if Donald Trump wins, if Republicans win, the odds are now one hundred point zero percent that Democrats and the media are going to say the election was stolen from Yes, that's right. And you know you saw recently Hillary Clinton said, under no circumstances should Joe Biden concede. I mean, it's This is the political equivalent of the rage mob. It's we will not accept will of the people. We won't

accept the outcome of the election. And you know, there's a weird Freudian projection. Remember a couple of weeks ago, there was a little news boomlet of all these Democrats and reporters saying, will Trump accept it if he's lost? Right? Right? And the absurd thing is, look the ones who still

don't accept it. Hillary Clinton still think she's she's president. Ye. They haven't accepted the last election, and they're making very explicit they don't intend to accept this one either, and so and their tell is they accuse the other side of doing it. And I think that Hillary Clinton is actually just saying out loud what a lot of Democrats are thinking, because do you remember in twenty sixteen she said Donald Trump is said he might not accept the

results of the election. This is a threat to our democracy. And then what happens. Hillary is the one who doesn't accept it, and it's not just her. Stacy Abrams still thinks she's the governor of Georgia. That's Governor Abrams. J Michael, he does governor. I want to be respectful. Former President Al Gore still believes he won in two thousand on

that recount. This seems to be a trend with democratic politicians. Um. Well, if there's no such thing as truth, and this is actually a Marxist concept, yeah, um, then you can dictate truth is what you say it is, and and and and and that's um when you have a compliant media. Let's go back to the CNN image of buildings on fire and they call fiery yet peaceful protests that that that that that's like hot yet cold, like I'm sorry

that those are antonyms. You don't get to have two things directly contradictory other than one of them is your political narrative. Yes, yeah, that's right. And there's also this idea that they know the science of history actually another Marxist concept, that you know, they're on the right side of history. And so if you know how history is supposed to go and something happens to get in the

way of that, well clearly that's illegitimate by definition. This actually raises a question from Daniel and maybe maybe we'll end on this question because it will give us so much to stew on until our next episode. Do you think that the Democratic party has become so radical that

the party will split into two completely separate parties. You know, the BLM organization is behaving in some ways like a political party, he asks, you know, will there be one party of the liberals and one party of the leftist socialists? So I actually don't think that. I think what we're witnessing is a leftist takeover the Democratic Party. Yeah, and there are no There are no moderate Democrats left. They've been driven out of the party. There used to be. There,

used to be conservative Democrats. I mean, I mean, point me to a conservative Democrat today and look some of it is. We talked about this before, how Democrats are collectivists, they believe in government power, they believe that they are I mean, there's a herd discipline. When do you see Democrats disagreeing on a vote in the Senate? Yeah? Pretty much never. Yeah, where's Republicans? We do all the time, for good and for ill. Sometimes we're frustrated. How come

we can't have the discipline and cohesion they do. I'd rather our problems of individualism the Republican Party. Splintering is always a potential threat. Yeah, the Democratic Party. I think one or two things will happen. If they win, I think you will see the leftist take over the party completed. That essentially, Joe Biden has ceded the party to Bernie

Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and AOC. You know, you look at President Trump did a nice job tonight about talking about the the the Biden Bernie Manifesto that they wrote together, laying out the most radical socialist agenda of any major party nominee in modern times. Yeah. So I think the if the Democrats win, the left completes its takeover. And by the way, one illustration of that, and this goes back again to the the sort of origin story of

a verdict. When we voted on impeachment in the Senate, every single Democrat voted to impeach. And you remember when I in particularly when Joe Mansion. So people will point to Joe Mansion or Doug Jones, Doug Jones from Alabama, Joe Mansion from West Virginia. They're both pointed to as oh, they're conservative Democrats. We're both voted to convict the president. And I had interesting reactions. I had different reactions to

both of them. So when Doug Jones voted to convict, that didn't surprise me, actually, because I think Doug Jones knows he's gonna lose. Tommy Tubberville, Republican dominee is going to beat him, and I think Dougs decided he's going to go down and ablaze a glory and be a liberal hero back home. And if Biden wins, he'll be in the cabinet, right and and so he knows he ain't winning in November, and he's just let's go. Um, Mansion is different. So Mansion, you recall, voted to confirm

Brett Kavanaugh. Yeah, that's right, and it was one brief moment of apostasy and it probably reelected Joe. Um, he got reelected that cycle, and that vote may have saved his bacon. When he voted to convict the president. My reaction I sit next to David Purdue in the Senate floor. I turned to David and said, huh, Mansion's not running again. He's done. And and that's how I interpreted that vote. Is Mansion. And Joe's never really liked the Senate. He

was governor before. He liked being governor a lot more than being in the Senate. Yeah, but I think when he voted to there the sort of last vestiges of dissent in the Democratic Party. He just decided to heck with it. I'll vote with the rest of them, because look, in West Virginia, impeaching the president is extraordinarily unpopular. If you're actually looking to get reelected in West Virginia, that's

a dumb vote. And the different scenario in terms of the future of the Democratic Party if the Democrats lose, if Trump is reelected, and I think there's a real possibility of that, obviously, I hope that happens. Yeah, I think Democrats will lose their mind even more than they have now. I think the press will lose their mind even more than they have now. But you might see in the wake of a Trump reelection some sort of reassessment in the Democratic Party and a resurgence of more

reasonable voices. There will at least be some Democrats that will have the thought, holy crap, being wild eyed socialist and standing with a mob burning our cities to the ground may not be the most appealing electoral platform. If they win, they're not going to say that, but if they lose, they might say that. But I don't think it's going to be a splittering party. I think it's going to be a battle for who controls the party.

That's right. You always hear this is the most important election of our lifetimes, and in some ways it's always true, because you know, things progress down a certain path and certain dangers can become more pronounced. But you know, we've talked on this show, on an earlier episode about what could happen if the Democrats win, particularly if the Democrats take the Senate. You know, you could have Puerto Rican statehood.

You got a dcase statehood. You got to the end of the filibuster, you have a real surge of a democratic power grab. Really puts the stakes into perspective, really puts the conventions into perspective. And Senator I know that you could stay up all night and keep talking and then show up for work, you know, at seven am. I am not like that. I cannot do that, So I have got to I think end it here. We

will have another episode soon. I hope that all the people who are watching right now on YouTube please head on over. First of all, Ring that Bell subscribe on YouTube, Then go over to Apple Podcasts subscribe to the Verdict podcast. You can get on Google play Stitcher on everywhere you can get it everywhere. It's on Spotify, so go please subscribe. We so appreciate it. Be sure to write into the mailbag. You can do that on Twitter by tagging either the

Senator or me with hashtag Verdict. You can do that by writing into mailbag at Verdict podcast dot com. Thank you for the excellent questions, Senator. Thank you for us staying up and giving us insight into all the questions that I can't answer. Pleasure as always, and in the meantime,

I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. 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.