Reverse Robin Hood

forgave student debt. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is sponsored by American Hartford Gold. If you're like me, then you are growing more and more concerned about the state of our country and about your own future. Inflation is at the highest rate that we've seen in forty years, and interest rates

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first qualifying order. So don't wait, call them now. Call eight five five seven six eight one eight eight three. That's eight five five seven six eight one eight eight three. Or if you prefer text messaging, you can text the word cactus to six five five three two. Again the phone number is eight five five seven six eight one eight eight three. Or you can send the word cactus via text message to six five five three two. You'll be glad you did. Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz.

I am Michael Knowles, joined as ever by Senator Cruz. We're so happy to be with all of you, and condolences to all of the poor schmucks out there who actually paid off your student debts or your kids student debts. You really blew it, folks. You could have gotten a freebe but you did the right thing, and now too bad for you. It's fairly stunning. You know. I'm reminded of mel Brooks when he observed it's good to be the king. What Joe Biden is doing is completely lawless.

So Senator I not only take your word for it that this is not legal, I so take Nancy Pelosi's word for it. Never thought I would say that's statement. But when's the last time Nancy and I agreed this might be the one and only time Joe Biden bringing the country together. I think the argument they tried to make was that this in some way related to the Heroes Act after September eleventh, and they're all these kind of bizarro expost facto explanations of how Biden did this.

But I take both of your word for it that it's not really legal, and yet obviously he is doing it so well. He might not have the right to do it, he apparently has the power to do it. My question then, is less about the law and more about the politics of this Biden. I guess he just thinks he's buying votes and the way that machine politics has often bought votes. Is this going to work in November. Well,

let's thank those one at a time. On the law question, I think it is clear that he does not have the legal authority to do this, and this week's cloak Room on Verdict Plus is entirely about that we do a deep dive into the statutes, into the asserted justifications. The Biden Department of Justice put out a new memorandum from the Office Legal Counsel trying to claim it had the authority to do this, and so on cloak Room, I go into the statutes, into the details and explain

why all of that is nonsense. And in terms of the politics, I don't know. So there are cross cutting concerns, and the honest answer is I don't know how this will play politically. Let me give the argument for why it will play badly for the Democrats, and then I'll give the argument why it'll play well. The argument why it plays badly is that it is reverse Robin Hood. Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave from the poor. This is Joe Biden stealing from the poor and giving

to the rich. And let me give you some statistics. According to Brookings, the left wing think to the media, and income of households with student loans is seventy six thousand, four hundred. Only seven percent of those are below the poverty line. So these are not typically the poor that we're talking about that have student loans. But look they've gone to college or grad school, so that that tends to move you up in the income skis strata to

begin with, among those making payments on their loans. So if you exclude the people who aren't making any payments and you focus just on those making payments on their loans, the media income is eighty six thousand, five hundred dollars, so that's starting to get up there, and only four percent are in poverty. Overall, the top forty percent of

American households hold sixty percent of the student loans. How many Americans have degrees, Well, thirty seven percent of Americans have a bachelor's degree and fourteen percent of Americans have a graduate or professional degree. That's courted the Census Bureau and the unemployment rate for college graduates right now is two point nine percent. Approximately eighty seven percent of American adults do not have student loans, so it is benefiting

a relatively small, discreete class um. This could play very badly for Joe Biden if the people who are paying for it are pissed off. You know this is this will cost every taxpayer on average two thousand, one hundred dollars to give away this money. So, Senator, do you remember a couple of years ago there was a voter or constituent on the campaign trail he approached Liz Warren, your colleague, when Senator Warren was pitching student loan forgiveness,

and he didn't like the idea I'm having. Yep, I just want asking questions. My daughter's getting out of school. I saved all my money. Just am I gonna get my money back? So you're gonna pay for people who didn't save the money, so that those of us that did the right thing get screwed. My buddy hit Fun bought a car, went on vacations. I saved my money. He made more than idea, but I worked a double. The ship worked extra, my dallars works. He his ten.

So you're laughing, Yeah, that's exactly what you're doing. We did the right thing and we get screwed. I appreciate I didn't look like that was playing very well in Peoria. And so I do think folks like that guy questioning Elizabeth Warren are going to be pissed off. I do think, Uh, steel workers and truck drivers and plumbers have a reason to be pissed off. All of this could bounce badly for Democrats. Don't let me give you the flip argument.

It may be a political master stroke. Why is that that? There's there's a school of thought and economics that's called public choice theory, and public choice theory examines how decision making is made in a democratic society. And essentially what it focuses on is when you have a relatively small group with a concentrated benefit and you have a large group with a diffuse harm. The small group cares a

lot about it, and the large group typically doesn't. And so look that there is a real risk if if you are that that slacker barista who who wasted seven years in college studying completely useless things now has loans and can't get a job. Joe Biden just gave you twenty grand, like holy cow, twenty grand that you know, maybe you weren't going to vote in November and suddenly

you just got twenty grand. And you know, if you can, you know, get off the bond for a minute and head down to the voting station or just send in your mail in ballot that the Democrats have helpfully sent you, it could drive up turnout, particularly among young people and the people who are getting screwed. It's not necessarily the

case that they understand they're getting screwed. It's a little more diffuse of I'm paying taxes, but it's not like you get a bill in October, Dear Michael, send in your two thousand, one hundred dollars to pay for slacker boys loans getting forgiven. When I think of the whatever the estimated three hundred billion to six hundred billion dollars that this could cost, we don't have a really firm number yet, I think, yeah, that's a lot of money.

But in the perspective of all the other money that the federal government spends, it's it's just not going to

make a huge difference. So that is one great fear, and then the other fear long term as to whether or not this is a Democrat political masterstroke is you've now created a system of incentives whereby people will be more likely to go to college, assuming that they're not going to have to pay back their loans, assuming that the big Daddy government is going to come in and take care of them whenever a Democrat is in the White House. And the thing we know about college these

days is it doesn't train you for jobs. It doesn't give you a liberal education that seemed to go out the window decades ago. All it really seems to do is make people more likely to vote for Democrats. So even forgetting even about the midterm elections or twenty twenty four, in the long term, as a result of this education bill that almost certainly will not result in any real additional education for people, you could have Democrats grooming a whole new generation of voters to be more likely to

support them. Well, I think that's possible. I think there's another effect that this act is going to drive up inflation. I think significantly. You know, it's amazing, between this and the build back Broke bill they just jammed through, the Democrats have just spent another trillion dollars. Inflation is the number one issue in the country, and they're just pouring

gasoline on it. You know, we just saw today the Wall Street Journal reported that that home mortgage rates have jumped up even more to five and a half percent. You know, look, that's real economic pain for a first time home buyer for for that matter, or anyone trying to buy a home. One of the effects of the inflation most concentrated is going to be on college tuition. You know, everyone this does nothing about the crisis. I actually agree there's a student loan problem because universities are

engaged in hyper inflation. You know, they've got you know, you're and my alma maters have endowments, you know, thirty forty fifty billion dollars, and yet they're bilking students out of massive amounts. They keep jacking up the prices year after year after year. And they've got tenured faculty who teach one class. They've got you know, fifty diversity administrators who all make six figure checks. This is the very worst of leftist politics, which is they take care of

their friends and they give them money. You look at this build back Broke bill where they paid off all these left wing environmentalist groups who are just making billions of dollars, and all the Washington lobbyists that are making billions of dollars, they take care of their friends and they screw their enemies. I mean, for the left, it is a zero sum game of reward and retribution, and it creates a vicious cycle where all the people they're paying off are then going to keep trying to keep

the people paying them off in power. I'm reminded of one of my favorite Simpsons episodes where where Grandpa Simpsons has been getting checks for I think it was having like itch an Itchy and scratchy cartoon or something, and he hadn't done it. It was a mistake, and and and Lisa says, well, Grandpa didn't. Didn't you think it was strange that you were getting checks in the mail for not having done anything? And he says no, Lisa,

I just figured the Democrats were back in power. Well, speaking of the friends of the Democrats, and actually speaking of your ability, you know, to send your kids to school and to make any money at all, Senator, I don't know if you saw this headline, but someone is coming for your job. You have got a major figure. At least according to CNN and MSNBC, coming after you, the future former congress Lady Liz Cheney is launching a

political action committee. She's targeting not Democrats, of course, she's targeting Republicans. And you or at the top of the list. Well, you know, you can tell a lot about a person by their friends, and you can tell even more by their enemies. Listen, I gotta say, Liz Cheney, I've known Liz a long time. I've known her twenty plus years. Yet there are some people who Donald Trump just broke that. They just they hate Trump so much that their mind

went on Fritz. And I gotta say, Liz is unrecognizable. She has become a left wing Democrat now and like ten years ago, the idea that Liz Cheney was a left wing Democrat would have been ludicrous. Obviously, her dad was Dick Cheney. He was a conservative Republican. She was. Look, they're both too neo Connie for me. They're both too eager to get us involved in foreign wars. But that being said, on taxes, on social issues, on most issues,

Liz Cheney was a down the road conservative Republican. And by the way, that's where Wyoming is, and and and then Trump came into power and her mind just shattered, and and and she what's amazing is that she's become It's not even just that she says, Okay, I don't like Donald Trump, like I don't like his what he says, I don't like how he acts. That's I understand someone who says that I don't like everything he says and does I like the policies we had acted together. I

work closely with him on that. But she doesn't limit it to that. It's it's like Bill Crystal as someone else, like Liz Cheney who has just become a liberal Democrat who what they say, you know, Cheney's uh circus act on on the January sixth Commission is indistinguishable from what Nancy Pelosi would say. It's indistinguishable from what Chuck Schumer would say. And so we just had the primary and in in Wyoming, and you know, she had won by I don't know, seventy eighty percent last time around in

the primary. This time she didn't just lose. She lost by almost forty points. Thirty nine points is what she lost by. And the reason is simple. She doesn't represent the people of Wyoming anymore. The people of Wyoming are conservative, and she's decided she is a Washington, DC left wing Democrat now. And so it's completely unsurprising, you know, right after she gets just trounced by the voters, there's no remorse,

there's no contrition, there's no gush. You know, for some reason, the people of Wyoming don't think I'm representing them anymore. There's none of that. It is. Instead, she says it's her mission to do what defeat conservative Republicans. And I guess it's a badge of honor that I'm the number

one person on her list. That she's going to take the PAC money she raised, and I think she's gotten like seven eight million dollars that came from lefty Democrats all over the place, and she's going to use that now to attack Republican And listen, there are two things Liz Cheney is doing. Number One, she's got a fundraising grift where she will raise money like the Lincoln Project.

Lincoln Project is a great example where it's a fundraising grift of people who used to be kind of sort of Republicans who now make millions of dollars when they're not engaged in other illicit activities. Now make millions of dollars raising money from lefties to attack Republicans. And they're, to use that phrase useful idiots because their attacks arguably have some saliots, because they can say I was once a Republican, now I can be a left wing Democrat

attack them. So she'll engage in a fundraising grift for a while. My guess is she probably runs for president, she gets crushed, and then she will happily retire to being a commentator at either MSNBC or CNN. I don't know which one it'll be, or maybe Mother Jones. I mean, I mean, I think those are choices. Now, Senator, speaking of large amounts of money and empowering bad forces, the Iran nuclear deal seems to be back on the table.

The Obama administration crafted this deal and sent palettes of cash to Iran and paid obeisance to Iran after they captured our sailors and set them on the path to getting a nuclear weapon, all of which was very, very bad. And then Obama leaves, Trump comes in, and the Republicans and Trump tear up the Iran nuclear deal. Now Biden seems to be reviving it, although the details are a little bit unclear. I know you've been very, very involved

in this issue. What do we need to know? Look, Biden is desperate to an announce that an Iran deal, and he doesn't care what the substances he is willing to give the Ayatola. I think literally anything the Ayatola wants. It is a political mission for Biden in the White House and to say it is indefensible. You know, it was a year ago that Biden surrendered to the Taliban and Afghanistan. Biden is right now trying to give Iran

and the Iatola nuclear weapons. That that is the effect of the deal that they're negotiating is to make it inevitable that Iran has nuclear weapons. And let's be clear, the Iatola leads chance of death to America and death

to Israel with thousands of people. In fact, every year they celebrate in Iran what they call Death to America Day, and that is it is the anniversary of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard taking American hostages in nineteen seventy nine in Iran, and that is in effect a national holiday where they

celebrated in Iran every day. Right now, today, the current Iatola Commune is actively trying to murder the former Secretary State of the United States Mike Pompeo, the former National Security Advisor in the White House, John Bolden, and another State Department official, Brian Hook. All three of them have hit squads being paid for by the Iranian government actively

trying to murder them. And you may recall a couple of months ago, Tony blink In the Secretary of State was testifying in the Senate Form Relations Committee, and I asked him in the hearing, I said, is it true that the State Department is right now paying two million dollars a month for security for Pompeo and Hook to protect them from Iranians trying to murder them? He said, yeah,

that's true. And I said, is it true that as you were sitting down in Vienna negotiating with the Iranians, that the Biden State Department asked the Iranians, hey, would you guys stop actively trying to murder former senior US government officials, and that they said no, no, we will not stop trying to murder them. And you still sat there and said, Okay, well, let's keep negotiating and and

Blincoln back pedaled and he obfuscated. He didn't want to answer that question because the answer is yes, and about the only thing I got candor from Lincoln on as I said. My next question was, I said, mister secretary, would you agree that trying to murder the US Secretary of State is a pretty bit big damn deal At Blncoln was forced to laugh and say, yeah, okay, that that is a big deal. But who I'm stopped Biden,

it is ludicrous. Here's some good news. The chances that the next Republican president, which I think will be in twenty twenty five, will rip up whatever ridiculous deal these guys negotiate. I think they're very close to one hundred percent. And that's something I'm trying to make very very clear. I'm trying to lay the basis for it, lay the factual credit it for it. The aetola. The biggest thing the aetola wants an agreement is some sort of promise

that will bind the next president. Because Trump the most important national security decision he made was to tear up the older Rand deal. The next Republican president, whoever it is, I think there's widespread agreement whoever the next Republican president is, will tear up whatever disastrous deal this is. That's a very good thing. And you know, look, one of the things that the Biden team is desperately trying to find is some way to tie the hands of the next president.

I don't think they'll succeed, but they're trying to write into the agreement clauses that, you know, hand over a massive amount of money if the next administration pulls over. They're trying to put poison pills in there to prevent the next administration from pulling out. We'll see what they

come up with. But I think regardless, the next president is pulling out of this disastrous deal because allowing the Aetola to have a nuclear weapon is an unacceptably high risk that that weapon would be used to murder millions of Americans. Now, the Biden administration is clearly working overtime in this regard, but gen Z is not working overtime. And I know that we are going overtime, but I

have to get your opinion on this. This is completely outside of the Iran deal or even the Education Bill. Is just a cultural matter. But it really shocked me as reading the Wall Street Journal that there is a trend that has taken over TikTok and all sorts of commentary among the zoomers, among Gen z, you know, the people younger than millennials, which is the trend of quiet quitting. And quiet quitting is when you keep your job. You're not You don't quit, you don't resign, you don't even

get fired. You just do the bare minimum. You clock in at nine o'clock on the dot, you clock out at five o'clock on the dot. You don't pick up your phone, you don't work weekends, you don't do anything. And it was so bizarre to read this because I was always raised that you just work hard and you never stop working hard. And all the guys at the top are working really hard. I know you work about twenty seven hours a day. I've seen it up close

in cities all around the country. How do you explain this trend and do the zoomers have any sort of point when they're looking for work life balance. Well, Michael, I gotta say, I think you're being agist, and it may just be that you've gotten too old and you're too far removed from the youngsters and you need someone like me. Who's who's more in touch with the utes. Listen, we have a prominent example of someone doing this, Joseph Robinette Biden Julian The guys had a job for a

year to and he hasn't left his basement. You know it it um Look. I do think the pandemic had all sorts of harms, but it was particularly harmful to gen z. It was particularly harmful to people starting their careers. It's very harmful to kids too. I mean kids who had school shuts down, shut down. That was incredibly harmful. But you know, you have a lot of people in their early twenties who have their first job and their first job was during the pandemic where they worked from

home and they just zoom from home. And I get to say now, and I talked to a lot lots of people in the workplace who say that that. You know, twenty somethings say hey, I'm just going to work from home this week, and they think that it's it's just the way it's done, that you just zoom in. And there are lots of problems with that, one of which is that that often people who are working from home

don't work like they claim. I'm working, and magically they're doing everything from you know, playing golf to sleeping to you know, running on the beach, but none of which are actually the job presumably you're paid to do. But it also really hurts young people not to be in the office. And I look at you know, I mean, I think back to when I was in my twenties and just starting working, the experience of being there, of being in the office, culture, of seeing people who are

more experienced, of learning from them. You know, look, I worked obviously as a lawyer. It is still very much the case that the way you learn how to be a lawyer, you don't learn how to be a lawyer in law school. You learn to be a lawyer much like they did in the days of Abraham Lincoln, which could you carry someone's briefcase. You just watch someone, you apprentice under someone who is doing it, and you learn

by osmosis. You learn by just observing and being there and seeing the day to day rhythm and how you do it. And I do think young people in particular who think I don't ever need to go into the office to work are robbing themselves of really critical education and on the job training and that at the end of the day, it's not healthy for society, but it's

not healthy for them either. Like working hard and you know, listen, I had years after years after years of you know, working sixteen, eighteen, twenty hours a day, and that that discipline. If if you want to do things that are important and significant, it takes that time and commitment and energy. And so I do worry that all of the lessons society is teaching the younger generations are lessons that are going to be really harmful for them in the long term. Well,

I'm glad that I could. I could get that insight from someone who is young and hip to what the youths are talking about, and I can take that back and stew in that. Before we go, I have to remind you to subscribe if you're on Apple, Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, wherever, go subscribe YouTube, make sure you join locals and the Verdict plus community because there will be a whole other episode of The Cloak Room coming up with our friend Liz Wheeler. Liz, what are you going to talk about? Hi,

Michael High, Senator. Yes, So it's very obvious that Biden's student loan debt cancelation executive order is unfair to people who have paid their debts off. It's also very expensive. It's going to cost the American taxpayer billions of dollars. It's redistribution of wealth, but opposite from what the Democrats usually advocate for. This is actually taken from the poor to give to the rich. It's also inflationary. It's going to increase or worse in inflation. But here's here's a

million dollar question. Is Joe Biden canceling student loan debt via this executive order even legal? That's what we're going to explore it today on the Cloakroom. Join us at Verdict with Ted Cruise dot com slash plus. If you use my promo code Cloakroom, you can watch for free for the first month of your annual subscription. That's Verdict with Ted Cruise dot com slash Plus. Sounds fabulous, by the way, speaking of speaking of speaking, we want to see all of you in person. Verdict is going back

on the road. You can apply to have your school be one of the Verdict stops at yaf dot org slash Verdict. That deadline is coming up, so make sure you submit your school today. Hyaf dot org slash Verdict, and I very much hope that I will see all of you in person soon. In the meantime, I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruise. 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.