December 27, 2025 • 27 mins
1. Welfare System Fraud and Structural Issues
- Based on an op-ed by Phil Gramm and John Early in The Wall Street Journal titled “The Biggest Fraud in Welfare”.
- Key points:
- U.S. welfare spending has skyrocketed 765% since the mid-1970s, now totaling $1.4 trillion annually.
- If distributed evenly among the 19.8 million families classified as poor, each would receive $71,000 per year.
- The government fails to count non-cash benefits (Medicaid, housing subsidies, food stamps) as income, creating a distorted picture of poverty.
- Example: A single parent earning $11,000 annually can receive benefits worth $53,128, bringing total resources to $64,128, well above the poverty threshold.
- Criticism of the system: It traps people in dependency instead of promoting self-sufficiency, contrasting with Trump-era welfare reform that moved 7 million people off food stamps into the workforce.
2. Massive Fraud in Minnesota’s Medicaid and Welfare Programs
- Federal prosecutors allege up to $9 billion in fraud since 2018, possibly 50% of the $18 billion spent on 14 programs.
- Fraud described as “industrial scale”, involving fake companies and individuals exploiting housing and autism assistance programs.
- Some funds allegedly funneled to Al Shabab, a Somali terrorist organization.
- Criticism of Minnesota’s Democratic leadership for lack of oversight and alleged vote-buying incentives.
- Prediction: Similar fraud likely exists in California, New York, and Illinois.
- Media accused of downplaying the scandal; local CBS reports highlighted the severity.
3. Strong U.S. Economic Performance Under Trump
- Latest GDP report shows 4.3% growth in Q3, the strongest in two years, beating expectations of 3.2%.
- Growth driven by consumer spending, healthcare, tech, and AI-related investments.
- Inflation reportedly down to 1.6%, signaling economic stability.
- Commentary contrasts media narratives predicting economic collapse with reality of strong holiday spending and trade policy success.
- Trump’s supply-side policies (tax cuts, deregulation) and trade strategies credited for economic boom.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
It is Verdict with Ted Cruz Week in Review Ben
Ferguson with you, and here are some of the big
stories that you may have missed as you were celebrating
Christmas with your family and your friends. First up, Wall
Street Journal is now reporting there's massive fraud in the
US government, Like we didn't see that coming, but they're
even admitting now it's worse and you could ever imagine.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
We'll have the details of that for you in just
a moment.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Also, Minnesota fraud costing taxpayers billions of dollars.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
And what we're.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Also being told is the fraud, well, it's not going
away anytime soon, so how do we stop it. We'll
explain that as well. And finally, the media and the
liberals got it wrong. Economic data looking great for the
GDP report, and the media is now downplaying it, trying
to act like it never even happen. It's the Week
(00:54):
in Review and it starts right now, all right, So
I want to move to another part of the story,
and it's bigger than Minnesota. We were talking about the
fraud there, but the Wall Street Journal came out with
a very interesting report and I think it's worth as
taking a moment to talk about it. It's the biggest
fraud in welfare and it just talks about how much
abuse there is in the welfare system. It's costing hundreds
(01:17):
of billions of dollars to American taxpayers.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, and in particular what it talks about is is
bogus bookkeeping that covers it up. And this is an
op ed that was written by Phil Graham and John Earley.
Phil Graham was previously senator from the state of Texas.
He's an economist. Phil is a good friend of mine,
and it's an important op ed that he wrote December
seventeenth in the Journal. It's entitled the Biggest Fraud in Welfare.
(01:41):
The government gives tens of thousands of dollars in benefits
to the poor, which it doesn't count as income. And
so this is in some ways an accounting story. And
please don't go to sleep right now, particularly if you're driving.
Don't go to it is an accounting story that matters.
So here's what Phil Graham wrote. Something is profoundly wrong
with the US welfare system, a problem that runs far
(02:03):
deeper and is more dangerous than the shocking fraud in
Minnesota that has been making headlines. Across the past half century,
America has seen what in any other country would be
considered a golden age, in which lower income households have
made incredible progress. Despite the end of our post war
economic dominance around nineteen seventy five, the country's real per
(02:25):
capita gross domestic product grew by one hundred and forty
two percent from nineteen seventy four to twenty twenty four.
More than two thirds of US households have inflation adjusted
incomes today that would have put them in the top
one fifth of households in nineteen sixty seven. So used
(02:46):
to be the top one fifth of households in nineteen
sixty seven. Today, more than two thirds of US households
have inflation that would put them there. Sixty two percent
of all children who grew up in the poorest fifth
of all households in the seventies and eighties worked their
way up to a higher income bracket as adults, some
all the way up to the top quintile. Yet, even
(03:07):
as our economy has experienced broad based growth, real federal
welfare spending has soared by what do you think the
number is.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
I'm going to guess seventy percent.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Seven hundred and sixty five percent, more than twice as
fast as total federal spending, and now costs one point
four trillion dollars Annuallyble We're that were that money simply
to be doled out evenly to the nineteen point eight
million families the government defines as poor each household. How
(03:44):
much you think each household would receive a year if
you just took all the welfare payments and sent a
check to each household directly?
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Yeah? Yeah, I mean, I'm going to guess in the thousands.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
More than seventy thousand dollars a year.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Tell me about me, I mean, tell me that's not
a perfect example of government waste when you could just
send direct checks of seventy grand a year to people.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
The source of this dramatic mismatch is a fraud built
into how various programs determine welfare eligibility. The government doesn't
count any refundable tax credits or benefits that aren't paid
in cash as income to the recipients. Some claim this
is appropriate because the beneficiaries aren't free to spend non
cash benefits on whatever they like, But that is a
(04:30):
specious argument, because money is fungible receiving Medicaid, for example,
freeze up cash that would otherwise be spent on healthcare,
allowing the recipients to spend the newly freed cash on
other things. Non Cash benefits aren't, in the end that
different from income, except that salaries are taxed while government
benefits aren't, and if individual welfare programs often don't even
(04:51):
count benefits paid in cash as income for the purposes
of gauging eligibility, the government's failure to count its largess
as the recipient's income allows welfare households to blow past
the income level above which a working family no longer
qualifies for government help. Take a single parent with two
(05:11):
school aged children who earns eleven thousand dollars annually from
part time work. The government considers this household in poverty
because its income is below twenty five thousand, two hundred
and seventy three dollars, But this family would qualify for
benefits worth fifty three thousand, one hundred and twenty eight dollars.
It would receive Treasury checks of three thousand, four hundred
(05:33):
dollars in refundable tax credits and four thousand, four hundred
dollars in refundable earned income tax credits, would also receive
food stamp debit cards worth nine thousand, two hundred and
sixteen dollars a year, nine thousand, four hundred and seventy
six dollars in housing subsidies, eight hundred and seventy seven
dollars of government payments for utility bills, sixteen thousand and
thirty three dollars to fund Medicaid, three thousand, one hundred
(05:54):
and two dollars in free meals at schools, and six thousand,
six hundred and twenty four dollars in temporary assistants needy families.
All this puts the family's income at sixty four thousand,
one hundred and twenty eight dollars, or two hundred and
fifty four percent of the poverty level. And look, the
point Phil Graham goes on on this, But the point
is when they're measuring income, they exclude all the welfare
(06:18):
and benefits that are going down, and then they measure
income and said, look how poor people are without counting
the money that is going out out the door. And
by the way, this also contributes to the massive fraud
we saw in Minnesota because because the Democrats, and the
federal government and state government are just focusing on shoveling
cash out the door, and they're not focusing on how
(06:41):
do you how do you actually ensure any accountability or
even more importantly, how do you get people off welfare. Look,
one of my favorite phrases is that the social safety
net should be a trampoline and not a hammock. And
by that what it means is is, listen, many people
(07:03):
get down on their luck. They need help. But the
entire focus should be to get you back on your feet.
The entire focus should be to spring you out of
the safety net and get you where you're working, where
you have a job, where you're providing for your own family.
You know, there's a dignity to work. You look at
families that are trapped in generational poverty one generation after
(07:26):
another after another, and you lose the self respect.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
One of the amazing successes of welfare reform, one of
the amazing successes of the first term of Trump that
saw over seven million people go off food stamps and
go into the workforce, is that seven million people that
get to experience the dignity of work. I mean, that's
(07:52):
literally a single mom who comes home from her job
and is carrying two bags of groceries and puts those
growth trees on the kitchen table, and she looks at
her kids and she has the self respect of knowing, Hey,
I'm providing for you, and the kids look at her
and know that my mom is providing for you. Look, look,
(08:13):
God created mankind. I believe to work and to be
productive and to make a difference, to provide for your family.
And this welfare machine that the Left is so invested
in traps people in dependency. And you're not doing anyone
a favor by making them dependent on government. Instead, you're
(08:34):
sapping them of the path to the American dream.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Now, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation,
you can go back and listen to the full podcast
from earlier this week. Now onto story number two. Senator,
There's another big story that I want to get to,
and that is the out of control fraud. We have
now got a number, and it could go higher. At
least nine billion was looted from the Minnesota medicaid programs.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Plus there was welfare fraud as well.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
In a bombshell report coming from the Wall Street Journal,
This does not look good for the governor there, and
a lot of mayors have now sent him a letter
saying we are in trouble and it's your fault.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Look, the level of fraud we're seeing welfare medicaid fraud
in Minnesota is staggering. It is an order of magnitude
greater than we've seen. And here are the basic facts.
Federal prosecutors alleged Thursday that Minnesota may have lost billions
of dollars to fraud in its medicaid program. The latest
(09:37):
development in an ongoing investigation, as much as half, half
fifty percent of the roughly eighteen billion dollars Minnesota has
spent since twenty eighteen on fourteen medicaid programs, particularly vulnerable
to abuse, may have been siphoned off by fraudsters, according
to Assistant US Assistant Attorney Joe Thompson, and made the
(10:00):
remarks as prosecutors announced to additional charges in the ongoing
investigation of the staggering industrial scale fraud engulfing the state. Quote,
the fraud is not small, It isn't isolated. The magnitude
cannot be overstated. What we see in Minnesota is not
(10:21):
a handful of a bad actors committing crimes. It's a staggering,
industrial scale fraud. It's swamping Minnesota and calling into question
everything we know about our state, the level of it.
Half of medicaid for years, that's in Minnesota. By the way,
if you watch the corporate media, you've seen very little
(10:43):
about this. They don't want to cover this at all
because it is the complicity of the Democrats in office.
And understand, Minnesota is a one party state. It is
governed by Democrats. Democrats are in charge. They looked the
other way. Why did they look the other way? Well,
much of this fraud was carried out Somali's We covered
the previous verdict how the single largest contributor to al Shabab.
(11:07):
Al Shabab is a radical Islamist terrorist organization in Somalia.
The single largest contributor to al Shabab are the Minnesota taxpayers.
That's the level of the of the the theft that
went on and Democrats elected Democrats in Minnesota. They happily
look the other way. Why because they were buying votes.
(11:28):
And you know what if they actually watched the taxpayer
dollars and didn't let the criminals steal it, Well, somebody
might be upset if they if they had even the
tiniest modicum of scrutiny. It is shocking.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
Well, and you know what you mentioned like a moment ago,
and that is that the media has not been touching this. Luckily,
local media has CBS, for example, locally UH in Minnesota.
They did a report on this that was just kind
of throwing their hands up in the air, like this
is so egregious. We need you to know the now,
social media completely silent, no accountability for the governor. There
(12:04):
are those in leadership under him. I want to play
this for people. This is again the local CBS affiliate.
They're talking about the fraud crisis. Take a listen.
Speaker 5 (12:12):
Minnesota's fraud crisis is growing today. Prosecutors charge more people
for billing the state for social services they did not provide.
The federal prosecutor says it's possible half or more of
the eighteen billion dollars billed to fourteen programs since twenty
eighteen is fraudulent. We have team coverage started with Jona
Kaplan with more on what we've learned about these latest charges. Jonah,
(12:34):
So we've gone from maybe a billion dollars to possibly
nine billion or more well.
Speaker 6 (12:40):
We've heard from the new US Attorney, Frank that we're
not even at the end of the beginning of this investigation,
and now we know why Feeding our Future was just
the tip of the iceberg.
Speaker 7 (12:51):
The fraud is not small, it isn't isolated. The manitude
cannot be overstated.
Speaker 6 (12:57):
Prosecutors on Thursday indicting six people, including one already charged
in another case. The five new defendants are all accused
of defrauding a state program meant to provide housing assistance
to the disabled and those dealing with addiction. Two people
charged aren't even from here. According to officials, Anthony Jefferson
and Lester Brown came from Philadelphia to Minnesota looking for
(13:19):
an opportunity to make money. They set up two fake
companies and collected three point five million dollars.
Speaker 7 (13:25):
This is an instance of what essentially fraud tourism. Mister
Jefferson and Brown were residents of Philadelphia. We had no
connection to Minnesota except for they heard that Minnesota and
its Housing Stabilization Services program was easy money.
Speaker 6 (13:42):
The state already cut off the housing stabilization program because
of suspected fraud, but it's one of fourteen social programs
now under federal investigation. Together, they built eighteen billion dollars
since twenty eighteen. We asked how much could have been fraud.
Speaker 7 (13:56):
You know, I don't make these generalizations in a hasty way.
So when I say a significant a mount, I'm talking
in an order of half or more. But we'll see.
Speaker 6 (14:04):
One of the new indictments accuses of fraud ser of
exploiting a program to help children with autism. Court documents
say Abd Najib Hasan yusef use some of the six
million bucks he stole to buy a freightliner semi truck.
Governor Walls, in a statement said he applauded the new indictments, saying, quote,
this is exactly the type of strong action we need
from prosecutors to ensure fraudsters are put behind bars. Frank,
(14:29):
this is not going away anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
That I love the end there, Frank, this is not
going away anytime soon. Well, if Democrats have their way
and the governor this will just be like a one
time reporter.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Then we just move on.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
And hey, if it goes from nine billion to twelve
billion or fifteen billion, who knows where the number could end.
And that was what they were referring to there at
CBS Local, They're like, hey, we went from one billion
to nine billion, and that may not be the final number.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Well, and Tim Waltz says he applauds the indictments. Well,
my question is where was Tim Waltz. Where was the governor?
He was like, where's Waldo? He was popping up everywhere
he could. He was following Kamala Harris on the campaign trail,
but he was not actually doing his job as governor.
And listen, there is a political reason. And Ben, I'm
going to make a prediction right now.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
I love it when you do this because usually you're right.
So pay attention to everyone.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
As horrific as this fraud is in Minnesota, and it
is staggering, it is historically bad. I'm going to make
a prediction that it is worse, that there is even
more fraud in New York, California, and Illinois.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
So you don't believe this is an isolated instant to
the I followed my money, I do not.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
I think in bright blue states where the Democrats control
all of the levers of government, all of the machinery,
I think the same incentives that cause the Democrat politicians
in Minnesota to try to buy votes by allowing people
to rob the taxpayers blind. I think those exact same
incentives are playing out in New York. I think those
(16:03):
exact same incentives are playing out in Illinois. And I
think those exact same incentives are playing out in California.
So I'm calling on the Trump administration to audit, audit
every state, but start with the big blue states, because
I think that is where you were most likely to
find find the fraud, where the pattern is the same.
And I gotta I gotta tell you, people like Gavin
(16:25):
Newsom are sweating right now. They don't want anyone looking
at the fraud in California because my the incentives are identical,
and I suspect you're going to see the very same
pattern playing out over and over and over again.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
You know you mentioned they don't want you looking. There
was a very interesting playbook. When Democrats get in trouble,
they usually just start playing the race card, throwing down
the race card. Tim Malts had a press conference and
he was asked about the fraud in this my community,
the money going back to the terrorist organization Al Shabab,
and how much just just total pure corruption. There was
and then he was asked about ice raids in Minnesota.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
He's obviously against that.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
They are a welcoming state, as he describes it, they're
a sanctuary state. And what Tim Waltz had to say
back it really did kind of make me laugh because
it's so predictable, and yet it's the classic playbook they've
been using. You question them on anything they get wrong,
they're like, oh, well, your racist, a big at, homophobes,
enephob the list goes on't on, well, now it's white
supremacy if you actually enforce the law of the land
(17:29):
with the legal immigrants in the state. Here's how he
put it, Tim Waltz in Minnesota.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
So this is what happens when your own federal government
wages war against you. This is what happens when they
target communities for their own benefit. This is what happens
when they scapegoat, And this is what say happens when
they no longer hide the idea of white supremacy. When
you hear the Vice President of the United States talk
about now white people won't have to apologize for being white.
(17:54):
That's never happened once in my whole damn life. And
I think everybody in this room knows what they're doing.
So we're here today to say enough of this. We're
here today to stand that Minnesota will protect their neighbors.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Minnesota will protect their neighbors. And this is what happened.
Robbed them blind, Yeah, and rob them blind nine nine
billion that we know of right, And he says, we're
not gonna We're know we're gonna allow them to hide
the idea of white supremacy. When you hear the Vice president,
I mean, this is the classic democratic playbook.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Don't look at what I'm doing. I'm gonna yell you're
a racist.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Like he has literally overseen the biggest recorded fraud in
US government history, not just a fraud on the taxpayers
that defrauded the taxpayers of Minnesota, that defrauded the taxpayers
of every state, federal taxpayers, but also that saw the
federal tax dollars diverted to illegal immigrants to Somali's who
(18:51):
sent it to Al Shabab, a radical Islamic terror organization.
So it's fraud funding Islamist terror. And what is Tim
Waltz's response to scream white supremacy, white supremacy. At some
point those talking points get a little tired, and it's
a clear and transport parent effort just to avoid any
(19:13):
accountability and to be avoid being held responsible for what
he allowed to happen.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
As before, if you want to hear the rest of
this conversation on this topic, you can go back and
dow the podcasts from earlier this week to hear the
entire thing. I want to get back to the big
story number three of the week. You may have missed center.
There was a Christmas gift that was given to all Americans.
It didn't matter if you're rich or poor. It didn't
matter if you were black or white, or Hispanic or
(19:41):
anything else in between. We got some new economic data
and it was.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
I tell you what.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
If there's anybody that had colon their stocking, it was
the media. There was an article that came out by
the New York Times predicting the complete opposite of what
GDP report showed. Of course, they're not going to retract it,
but they do look like idiots. And again you got
to ask yourself this question, are they really willing and
wanting to hurt Americans? They want Americans to suffered just
so Donald Trump looks bad, because that's what their reporting
(20:10):
seems to look.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Like well, listen, the news that broke just this week
is the economy is booming. That the latest GDP numbers
show four point three percent GDP growth, which is terrific
GDP growth. And let me read from the Wall Street Journal,
consumers power strongest US economic growth in two years. A
long delayed government report shows third quarter GDP grew at
(20:34):
an annual four point three percent rate. Robust spending by
US consumers drove greater than expected economic expansion in the
third quarter and the strongest growth rate in two years.
Gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services
produced across the economy, rose at a seasonally and inflationally
adjusted four point three percent annual rate from July through September,
(20:59):
the Commers Department said Tuesday. The report was delayed nearly
two months by the government shutdown and looks back at
the period before the shutdown was in effect. It does, however,
offer a snapshot of an economy that has managed to
keep humming along for much of the year. Growth picked
up from three point eight percent in the previous corner
(21:20):
and easily beat the three point two percent forecast among
economists polled by The Wall Street Journal. It was by
the way, it's over a point higher than expectations. That's
a big deal. As the journal said, it was the
strongest expansion since the third quarter of twenty twenty three.
Rising consumer spending was partly driven by healthcare, including outpatient
(21:42):
services and at hospitals and nursing homes. International travel, legal services,
and spending on products like personal computers and software also contributed.
Artificial intelligence related spending helped too, though the pace of
growth appeared to cool from the second quarter. Overall business
investment grows slow to two point eight percent in the
(22:03):
third quarter from seven point three percent in the prior
three months. This is great news. And listen, when GDP
is booming, what that means is it means there's more jobs.
It means there's more productivity. It means the stock market
is going up. It means people four oh one k's
are going up. It means wages are likely to rise.
(22:23):
And so GDP growth, it's not always immediate. Are there
still people struggling, Yes, But GDP growth is driven And
I'll tell you one of the things we're seeing is
the Christmas spending numbers are very, very strong, and so
that's one of the signs of consumer confidence that you know,
if you're worried, if you're scared about not being able
to pay your rent or your mortgage, then you don't
(22:45):
necessarily go out and do some big shopping for Christmas time.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
We sell the record breaking numbers on Black Friday and
Cyber Monday. And that was as the Democrats are saying
that we were in a tail spin and this was
a disaster of an economy, and they were trying to
say Donald Trump is ruining your Christmas.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I'm like, well, the data says that people, as.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
You just mentioned, they're going out and spinning at record
numbers on Black Friday in Cyber Monday.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
So that tells me that someone's lying.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
That's exactly right. And here I want to show you.
You talked about the press being dismayed, and I got
to say that the corporate media is utterly corrupt. They
are dishonest. I just want to read to you two tweets.
The first tweet is from October thirtieth, twenty twenty four. Now, now,
what was happening right after October thirtieth, twenty.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Twenty four the election presidential There.
Speaker 3 (23:36):
Was a presidential election, and who was president oft October
twenty twenty four, at least nominally.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Well, the auto pen but if you're what an actual
person with a heartbeat, we'll go with Joe Biden.
Speaker 3 (23:44):
Okay, So here's what ABC News tweeted tweeted October thirtieth,
twenty twenty four, one week before the presidential election. Just in,
the US economy grew at a robust two point eight
percent annualized rate in the third quarter, slowing slightly from
the previous quarter, but continuing to dispel any concern about
(24:06):
a possible shutdown. This report comes just ahead of the
presidential election. All right, so that was a year ago.
Now that was two point eight percent. What do you
think ABC News said about four point three percent?
Speaker 1 (24:20):
What was it?
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Just in, the US economy expanded more than economists expected
over a recent three month period, recording robust growth despite
concerns about sluggish hiring and cash strap shoppers. Federal government
data showed, So two point eight percent is robust and fantastic,
And yeay, four point three percent, Well, we're really worried
(24:46):
about sluggish hiring and cash strap shoppers. And yeah, okay,
I guess it is like almost twice as high, But
damn it. We don't like those numbers. That is not news.
And I literally whoever wrote that tweet should be fire.
Like if ABC pretended to be a journalist, you'd say, Okay,
go work for the DNC, because you want to be
(25:07):
a partisan parrot. That's who they are and it's why
people don't trust the news. Now, I want you to
listen to Kevin Hasset. Kevin Hasset is the head of
the National Economic Council in the White House. Listen to
Kevin talking about these recent GDP numbers.
Speaker 8 (25:22):
No, it's a fantastic report. Four point three percent. That's
just about as good as GDP numbers get, and especially
coming on the heels of the CPI report consumer Price
Index report we got, which you actually showed some interesting
data that's consistent with this, showed that quarter inflation is
all the way down to one point six percent. And
so I think that these numbers are showing the President
(25:45):
Trump's trade policy and his supply side policy, which is
really increasing new factory production and so on, is having
a big, big effect, as is his trade policy. So
if we abstract from the reduction of the trade deficit,
then the four three percent number would only be two
point six percent. So Trump's trade policy is really working
as well.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
You know, as they mentioned trade policy, because that was
one of the other big lies this year in twenty
twenty five, which is the shelves are gonna be empty
at Christmas, the toys you wanted for your kids were
gonna be note on those shelves. You're not gonna be
able to afford basic things. Half of the store is
gonna be gone at Walmart and Target and Costco and
Sam's Club.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
None of that happened.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
And they said there was gonna be massive spikes and
prices for everything that you couldn't afford.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Again, that didn't happen either.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
While we collected record number of tariffs and cash, the
presence trade deals seem to actually be working and the
leverage seems to be working, and they don't want to
admit that this has not been a disaster.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
Well, listen, there's still some volatility when it comes to
trade policy, and I you know, I'd been advocating that
the president uses trade policy as leverage to open up
forward markets, and he's been doing that that has been very,
very successful. This also underscores basic supply side principles that
when you cut tack as we did, and when you
repeal job killing regulations as President Trump is doing, it
(27:05):
results in more investments, more jobs, and the economy is booming.
This is basic cause and effect.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Center,
Ted Cruz Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
with my podcast and you can listen to my podcasts
every other day you're not listening to Verdict or each
day when you listen to Verdict. Afterwards, I'd love to
have you as a listener to again the Ben Ferguson
podcasts and we will see you back here on Monday morning.
Welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:00):
It is Verdict with Ted Cruz Week in Review Ben
Ferguson with you, and here are some of the big
stories that you may have missed as you were celebrating
Christmas with your family and your friends. First up, Wall
Street Journal is now reporting there's massive fraud in the
US government, Like we didn't see that coming, but they're
even admitting now it's worse and you could ever imagine.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
We'll have the details of that for you in just
a moment.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Also, Minnesota fraud costing taxpayers billions of dollars.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
And what we're.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Also being told is the fraud, well, it's not going
away anytime soon, so how do we stop it. We'll
explain that as well. And finally, the media and the
liberals got it wrong. Economic data looking great for the
GDP report, and the media is now downplaying it, trying
to act like it never even happen. It's the Week
(00:54):
in Review and it starts right now, all right, So
I want to move to another part of the story,
and it's bigger than Minnesota. We were talking about the
fraud there, but the Wall Street Journal came out with
a very interesting report and I think it's worth as
taking a moment to talk about it. It's the biggest
fraud in welfare and it just talks about how much
abuse there is in the welfare system. It's costing hundreds
(01:17):
of billions of dollars to American taxpayers.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, and in particular what it talks about is is
bogus bookkeeping that covers it up. And this is an
op ed that was written by Phil Graham and John Earley.
Phil Graham was previously senator from the state of Texas.
He's an economist. Phil is a good friend of mine,
and it's an important op ed that he wrote December
seventeenth in the Journal. It's entitled the Biggest Fraud in Welfare.
(01:41):
The government gives tens of thousands of dollars in benefits
to the poor, which it doesn't count as income. And
so this is in some ways an accounting story. And
please don't go to sleep right now, particularly if you're driving.
Don't go to it is an accounting story that matters.
So here's what Phil Graham wrote. Something is profoundly wrong
with the US welfare system, a problem that runs far
(02:03):
deeper and is more dangerous than the shocking fraud in
Minnesota that has been making headlines. Across the past half century,
America has seen what in any other country would be
considered a golden age, in which lower income households have
made incredible progress. Despite the end of our post war
economic dominance around nineteen seventy five, the country's real per
(02:25):
capita gross domestic product grew by one hundred and forty
two percent from nineteen seventy four to twenty twenty four.
More than two thirds of US households have inflation adjusted
incomes today that would have put them in the top
one fifth of households in nineteen sixty seven. So used
(02:46):
to be the top one fifth of households in nineteen
sixty seven. Today, more than two thirds of US households
have inflation that would put them there. Sixty two percent
of all children who grew up in the poorest fifth
of all households in the seventies and eighties worked their
way up to a higher income bracket as adults, some
all the way up to the top quintile. Yet, even
(03:07):
as our economy has experienced broad based growth, real federal
welfare spending has soared by what do you think the
number is.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
I'm going to guess seventy percent.
Speaker 3 (03:19):
Seven hundred and sixty five percent, more than twice as
fast as total federal spending, and now costs one point
four trillion dollars Annuallyble We're that were that money simply
to be doled out evenly to the nineteen point eight
million families the government defines as poor each household. How
(03:44):
much you think each household would receive a year if
you just took all the welfare payments and sent a
check to each household directly?
Speaker 1 (03:50):
Yeah? Yeah, I mean, I'm going to guess in the thousands.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
More than seventy thousand dollars a year.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Tell me about me, I mean, tell me that's not
a perfect example of government waste when you could just
send direct checks of seventy grand a year to people.
Speaker 3 (04:09):
The source of this dramatic mismatch is a fraud built
into how various programs determine welfare eligibility. The government doesn't
count any refundable tax credits or benefits that aren't paid
in cash as income to the recipients. Some claim this
is appropriate because the beneficiaries aren't free to spend non
cash benefits on whatever they like, But that is a
(04:30):
specious argument, because money is fungible receiving Medicaid, for example,
freeze up cash that would otherwise be spent on healthcare,
allowing the recipients to spend the newly freed cash on
other things. Non Cash benefits aren't, in the end that
different from income, except that salaries are taxed while government
benefits aren't, and if individual welfare programs often don't even
(04:51):
count benefits paid in cash as income for the purposes
of gauging eligibility, the government's failure to count its largess
as the recipient's income allows welfare households to blow past
the income level above which a working family no longer
qualifies for government help. Take a single parent with two
(05:11):
school aged children who earns eleven thousand dollars annually from
part time work. The government considers this household in poverty
because its income is below twenty five thousand, two hundred
and seventy three dollars, But this family would qualify for
benefits worth fifty three thousand, one hundred and twenty eight dollars.
It would receive Treasury checks of three thousand, four hundred
(05:33):
dollars in refundable tax credits and four thousand, four hundred
dollars in refundable earned income tax credits, would also receive
food stamp debit cards worth nine thousand, two hundred and
sixteen dollars a year, nine thousand, four hundred and seventy
six dollars in housing subsidies, eight hundred and seventy seven
dollars of government payments for utility bills, sixteen thousand and
thirty three dollars to fund Medicaid, three thousand, one hundred
(05:54):
and two dollars in free meals at schools, and six thousand,
six hundred and twenty four dollars in temporary assistants needy families.
All this puts the family's income at sixty four thousand,
one hundred and twenty eight dollars, or two hundred and
fifty four percent of the poverty level. And look, the
point Phil Graham goes on on this, But the point
is when they're measuring income, they exclude all the welfare
(06:18):
and benefits that are going down, and then they measure
income and said, look how poor people are without counting
the money that is going out out the door. And
by the way, this also contributes to the massive fraud
we saw in Minnesota because because the Democrats, and the
federal government and state government are just focusing on shoveling
cash out the door, and they're not focusing on how
(06:41):
do you how do you actually ensure any accountability or
even more importantly, how do you get people off welfare. Look,
one of my favorite phrases is that the social safety
net should be a trampoline and not a hammock. And
by that what it means is is, listen, many people
(07:03):
get down on their luck. They need help. But the
entire focus should be to get you back on your feet.
The entire focus should be to spring you out of
the safety net and get you where you're working, where
you have a job, where you're providing for your own family.
You know, there's a dignity to work. You look at
families that are trapped in generational poverty one generation after
(07:26):
another after another, and you lose the self respect.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
One of the amazing successes of welfare reform, one of
the amazing successes of the first term of Trump that
saw over seven million people go off food stamps and
go into the workforce, is that seven million people that
get to experience the dignity of work. I mean, that's
(07:52):
literally a single mom who comes home from her job
and is carrying two bags of groceries and puts those
growth trees on the kitchen table, and she looks at
her kids and she has the self respect of knowing, Hey,
I'm providing for you, and the kids look at her
and know that my mom is providing for you. Look, look,
(08:13):
God created mankind. I believe to work and to be
productive and to make a difference, to provide for your family.
And this welfare machine that the Left is so invested
in traps people in dependency. And you're not doing anyone
a favor by making them dependent on government. Instead, you're
(08:34):
sapping them of the path to the American dream.
Speaker 2 (08:39):
Now, if you want to hear the rest of this conversation,
you can go back and listen to the full podcast
from earlier this week. Now onto story number two. Senator,
There's another big story that I want to get to,
and that is the out of control fraud. We have
now got a number, and it could go higher. At
least nine billion was looted from the Minnesota medicaid programs.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Plus there was welfare fraud as well.
Speaker 2 (09:03):
In a bombshell report coming from the Wall Street Journal,
This does not look good for the governor there, and
a lot of mayors have now sent him a letter
saying we are in trouble and it's your fault.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Look, the level of fraud we're seeing welfare medicaid fraud
in Minnesota is staggering. It is an order of magnitude
greater than we've seen. And here are the basic facts.
Federal prosecutors alleged Thursday that Minnesota may have lost billions
of dollars to fraud in its medicaid program. The latest
(09:37):
development in an ongoing investigation, as much as half, half
fifty percent of the roughly eighteen billion dollars Minnesota has
spent since twenty eighteen on fourteen medicaid programs, particularly vulnerable
to abuse, may have been siphoned off by fraudsters, according
to Assistant US Assistant Attorney Joe Thompson, and made the
(10:00):
remarks as prosecutors announced to additional charges in the ongoing
investigation of the staggering industrial scale fraud engulfing the state. Quote,
the fraud is not small, It isn't isolated. The magnitude
cannot be overstated. What we see in Minnesota is not
(10:21):
a handful of a bad actors committing crimes. It's a staggering,
industrial scale fraud. It's swamping Minnesota and calling into question
everything we know about our state, the level of it.
Half of medicaid for years, that's in Minnesota. By the way,
if you watch the corporate media, you've seen very little
(10:43):
about this. They don't want to cover this at all
because it is the complicity of the Democrats in office.
And understand, Minnesota is a one party state. It is
governed by Democrats. Democrats are in charge. They looked the
other way. Why did they look the other way? Well,
much of this fraud was carried out Somali's We covered
the previous verdict how the single largest contributor to al Shabab.
(11:07):
Al Shabab is a radical Islamist terrorist organization in Somalia.
The single largest contributor to al Shabab are the Minnesota taxpayers.
That's the level of the of the the theft that
went on and Democrats elected Democrats in Minnesota. They happily
look the other way. Why because they were buying votes.
(11:28):
And you know what if they actually watched the taxpayer
dollars and didn't let the criminals steal it, Well, somebody
might be upset if they if they had even the
tiniest modicum of scrutiny. It is shocking.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
Well, and you know what you mentioned like a moment ago,
and that is that the media has not been touching this. Luckily,
local media has CBS, for example, locally UH in Minnesota.
They did a report on this that was just kind
of throwing their hands up in the air, like this
is so egregious. We need you to know the now,
social media completely silent, no accountability for the governor. There
(12:04):
are those in leadership under him. I want to play
this for people. This is again the local CBS affiliate.
They're talking about the fraud crisis. Take a listen.
Speaker 5 (12:12):
Minnesota's fraud crisis is growing today. Prosecutors charge more people
for billing the state for social services they did not provide.
The federal prosecutor says it's possible half or more of
the eighteen billion dollars billed to fourteen programs since twenty
eighteen is fraudulent. We have team coverage started with Jona
Kaplan with more on what we've learned about these latest charges. Jonah,
(12:34):
So we've gone from maybe a billion dollars to possibly
nine billion or more well.
Speaker 6 (12:40):
We've heard from the new US Attorney, Frank that we're
not even at the end of the beginning of this investigation,
and now we know why Feeding our Future was just
the tip of the iceberg.
Speaker 7 (12:51):
The fraud is not small, it isn't isolated. The manitude
cannot be overstated.
Speaker 6 (12:57):
Prosecutors on Thursday indicting six people, including one already charged
in another case. The five new defendants are all accused
of defrauding a state program meant to provide housing assistance
to the disabled and those dealing with addiction. Two people
charged aren't even from here. According to officials, Anthony Jefferson
and Lester Brown came from Philadelphia to Minnesota looking for
(13:19):
an opportunity to make money. They set up two fake
companies and collected three point five million dollars.
Speaker 7 (13:25):
This is an instance of what essentially fraud tourism. Mister
Jefferson and Brown were residents of Philadelphia. We had no
connection to Minnesota except for they heard that Minnesota and
its Housing Stabilization Services program was easy money.
Speaker 6 (13:42):
The state already cut off the housing stabilization program because
of suspected fraud, but it's one of fourteen social programs
now under federal investigation. Together, they built eighteen billion dollars
since twenty eighteen. We asked how much could have been fraud.
Speaker 7 (13:56):
You know, I don't make these generalizations in a hasty way.
So when I say a significant a mount, I'm talking
in an order of half or more. But we'll see.
Speaker 6 (14:04):
One of the new indictments accuses of fraud ser of
exploiting a program to help children with autism. Court documents
say Abd Najib Hasan yusef use some of the six
million bucks he stole to buy a freightliner semi truck.
Governor Walls, in a statement said he applauded the new indictments, saying, quote,
this is exactly the type of strong action we need
from prosecutors to ensure fraudsters are put behind bars. Frank,
(14:29):
this is not going away anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (14:31):
That I love the end there, Frank, this is not
going away anytime soon. Well, if Democrats have their way
and the governor this will just be like a one
time reporter.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Then we just move on.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
And hey, if it goes from nine billion to twelve
billion or fifteen billion, who knows where the number could end.
And that was what they were referring to there at
CBS Local, They're like, hey, we went from one billion
to nine billion, and that may not be the final number.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Well, and Tim Waltz says he applauds the indictments. Well,
my question is where was Tim Waltz. Where was the governor?
He was like, where's Waldo? He was popping up everywhere
he could. He was following Kamala Harris on the campaign trail,
but he was not actually doing his job as governor.
And listen, there is a political reason. And Ben, I'm
going to make a prediction right now.
Speaker 1 (15:16):
I love it when you do this because usually you're right.
So pay attention to everyone.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
As horrific as this fraud is in Minnesota, and it
is staggering, it is historically bad. I'm going to make
a prediction that it is worse, that there is even
more fraud in New York, California, and Illinois.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
So you don't believe this is an isolated instant to
the I followed my money, I do not.
Speaker 3 (15:42):
I think in bright blue states where the Democrats control
all of the levers of government, all of the machinery,
I think the same incentives that cause the Democrat politicians
in Minnesota to try to buy votes by allowing people
to rob the taxpayers blind. I think those exact same
incentives are playing out in New York. I think those
(16:03):
exact same incentives are playing out in Illinois. And I
think those exact same incentives are playing out in California.
So I'm calling on the Trump administration to audit, audit
every state, but start with the big blue states, because
I think that is where you were most likely to
find find the fraud, where the pattern is the same.
And I gotta I gotta tell you, people like Gavin
(16:25):
Newsom are sweating right now. They don't want anyone looking
at the fraud in California because my the incentives are identical,
and I suspect you're going to see the very same
pattern playing out over and over and over again.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
You know you mentioned they don't want you looking. There
was a very interesting playbook. When Democrats get in trouble,
they usually just start playing the race card, throwing down
the race card. Tim Malts had a press conference and
he was asked about the fraud in this my community,
the money going back to the terrorist organization Al Shabab,
and how much just just total pure corruption. There was
and then he was asked about ice raids in Minnesota.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
He's obviously against that.
Speaker 2 (17:06):
They are a welcoming state, as he describes it, they're
a sanctuary state. And what Tim Waltz had to say
back it really did kind of make me laugh because
it's so predictable, and yet it's the classic playbook they've
been using. You question them on anything they get wrong,
they're like, oh, well, your racist, a big at, homophobes,
enephob the list goes on't on, well, now it's white
supremacy if you actually enforce the law of the land
(17:29):
with the legal immigrants in the state. Here's how he
put it, Tim Waltz in Minnesota.
Speaker 4 (17:34):
So this is what happens when your own federal government
wages war against you. This is what happens when they
target communities for their own benefit. This is what happens
when they scapegoat, And this is what say happens when
they no longer hide the idea of white supremacy. When
you hear the Vice President of the United States talk
about now white people won't have to apologize for being white.
(17:54):
That's never happened once in my whole damn life. And
I think everybody in this room knows what they're doing.
So we're here today to say enough of this. We're
here today to stand that Minnesota will protect their neighbors.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Minnesota will protect their neighbors. And this is what happened.
Robbed them blind, Yeah, and rob them blind nine nine
billion that we know of right, And he says, we're
not gonna We're know we're gonna allow them to hide
the idea of white supremacy. When you hear the Vice president,
I mean, this is the classic democratic playbook.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Don't look at what I'm doing. I'm gonna yell you're
a racist.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Like he has literally overseen the biggest recorded fraud in
US government history, not just a fraud on the taxpayers
that defrauded the taxpayers of Minnesota, that defrauded the taxpayers
of every state, federal taxpayers, but also that saw the
federal tax dollars diverted to illegal immigrants to Somali's who
(18:51):
sent it to Al Shabab, a radical Islamic terror organization.
So it's fraud funding Islamist terror. And what is Tim
Waltz's response to scream white supremacy, white supremacy. At some
point those talking points get a little tired, and it's
a clear and transport parent effort just to avoid any
(19:13):
accountability and to be avoid being held responsible for what
he allowed to happen.
Speaker 2 (19:20):
As before, if you want to hear the rest of
this conversation on this topic, you can go back and
dow the podcasts from earlier this week to hear the
entire thing. I want to get back to the big
story number three of the week. You may have missed center.
There was a Christmas gift that was given to all Americans.
It didn't matter if you're rich or poor. It didn't
matter if you were black or white, or Hispanic or
(19:41):
anything else in between. We got some new economic data
and it was.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
I tell you what.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
If there's anybody that had colon their stocking, it was
the media. There was an article that came out by
the New York Times predicting the complete opposite of what
GDP report showed. Of course, they're not going to retract it,
but they do look like idiots. And again you got
to ask yourself this question, are they really willing and
wanting to hurt Americans? They want Americans to suffered just
so Donald Trump looks bad, because that's what their reporting
(20:10):
seems to look.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Like well, listen, the news that broke just this week
is the economy is booming. That the latest GDP numbers
show four point three percent GDP growth, which is terrific
GDP growth. And let me read from the Wall Street Journal,
consumers power strongest US economic growth in two years. A
long delayed government report shows third quarter GDP grew at
(20:34):
an annual four point three percent rate. Robust spending by
US consumers drove greater than expected economic expansion in the
third quarter and the strongest growth rate in two years.
Gross domestic product, the value of all goods and services
produced across the economy, rose at a seasonally and inflationally
adjusted four point three percent annual rate from July through September,
(20:59):
the Commers Department said Tuesday. The report was delayed nearly
two months by the government shutdown and looks back at
the period before the shutdown was in effect. It does, however,
offer a snapshot of an economy that has managed to
keep humming along for much of the year. Growth picked
up from three point eight percent in the previous corner
(21:20):
and easily beat the three point two percent forecast among
economists polled by The Wall Street Journal. It was by
the way, it's over a point higher than expectations. That's
a big deal. As the journal said, it was the
strongest expansion since the third quarter of twenty twenty three.
Rising consumer spending was partly driven by healthcare, including outpatient
(21:42):
services and at hospitals and nursing homes. International travel, legal services,
and spending on products like personal computers and software also contributed.
Artificial intelligence related spending helped too, though the pace of
growth appeared to cool from the second quarter. Overall business
investment grows slow to two point eight percent in the
(22:03):
third quarter from seven point three percent in the prior
three months. This is great news. And listen, when GDP
is booming, what that means is it means there's more jobs.
It means there's more productivity. It means the stock market
is going up. It means people four oh one k's
are going up. It means wages are likely to rise.
(22:23):
And so GDP growth, it's not always immediate. Are there
still people struggling, Yes, But GDP growth is driven And
I'll tell you one of the things we're seeing is
the Christmas spending numbers are very, very strong, and so
that's one of the signs of consumer confidence that you know,
if you're worried, if you're scared about not being able
to pay your rent or your mortgage, then you don't
(22:45):
necessarily go out and do some big shopping for Christmas time.
Speaker 2 (22:49):
We sell the record breaking numbers on Black Friday and
Cyber Monday. And that was as the Democrats are saying
that we were in a tail spin and this was
a disaster of an economy, and they were trying to
say Donald Trump is ruining your Christmas.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
I'm like, well, the data says that people, as.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
You just mentioned, they're going out and spinning at record
numbers on Black Friday in Cyber Monday.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
So that tells me that someone's lying.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
That's exactly right. And here I want to show you.
You talked about the press being dismayed, and I got
to say that the corporate media is utterly corrupt. They
are dishonest. I just want to read to you two tweets.
The first tweet is from October thirtieth, twenty twenty four. Now, now,
what was happening right after October thirtieth, twenty.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Twenty four the election presidential There.
Speaker 3 (23:36):
Was a presidential election, and who was president oft October
twenty twenty four, at least nominally.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Well, the auto pen but if you're what an actual
person with a heartbeat, we'll go with Joe Biden.
Speaker 3 (23:44):
Okay, So here's what ABC News tweeted tweeted October thirtieth,
twenty twenty four, one week before the presidential election. Just in,
the US economy grew at a robust two point eight
percent annualized rate in the third quarter, slowing slightly from
the previous quarter, but continuing to dispel any concern about
(24:06):
a possible shutdown. This report comes just ahead of the
presidential election. All right, so that was a year ago.
Now that was two point eight percent. What do you
think ABC News said about four point three percent?
Speaker 1 (24:20):
What was it?
Speaker 3 (24:23):
Just in, the US economy expanded more than economists expected
over a recent three month period, recording robust growth despite
concerns about sluggish hiring and cash strap shoppers. Federal government
data showed, So two point eight percent is robust and fantastic,
And yeay, four point three percent, Well, we're really worried
(24:46):
about sluggish hiring and cash strap shoppers. And yeah, okay,
I guess it is like almost twice as high, But
damn it. We don't like those numbers. That is not news.
And I literally whoever wrote that tweet should be fire.
Like if ABC pretended to be a journalist, you'd say, Okay,
go work for the DNC, because you want to be
(25:07):
a partisan parrot. That's who they are and it's why
people don't trust the news. Now, I want you to
listen to Kevin Hasset. Kevin Hasset is the head of
the National Economic Council in the White House. Listen to
Kevin talking about these recent GDP numbers.
Speaker 8 (25:22):
No, it's a fantastic report. Four point three percent. That's
just about as good as GDP numbers get, and especially
coming on the heels of the CPI report consumer Price
Index report we got, which you actually showed some interesting
data that's consistent with this, showed that quarter inflation is
all the way down to one point six percent. And
so I think that these numbers are showing the President
(25:45):
Trump's trade policy and his supply side policy, which is
really increasing new factory production and so on, is having
a big, big effect, as is his trade policy. So
if we abstract from the reduction of the trade deficit,
then the four three percent number would only be two
point six percent. So Trump's trade policy is really working
as well.
Speaker 2 (26:06):
You know, as they mentioned trade policy, because that was
one of the other big lies this year in twenty
twenty five, which is the shelves are gonna be empty
at Christmas, the toys you wanted for your kids were
gonna be note on those shelves. You're not gonna be
able to afford basic things. Half of the store is
gonna be gone at Walmart and Target and Costco and
Sam's Club.
Speaker 1 (26:23):
None of that happened.
Speaker 2 (26:24):
And they said there was gonna be massive spikes and
prices for everything that you couldn't afford.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
Again, that didn't happen either.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
While we collected record number of tariffs and cash, the
presence trade deals seem to actually be working and the
leverage seems to be working, and they don't want to
admit that this has not been a disaster.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
Well, listen, there's still some volatility when it comes to
trade policy, and I you know, I'd been advocating that
the president uses trade policy as leverage to open up
forward markets, and he's been doing that that has been very,
very successful. This also underscores basic supply side principles that
when you cut tack as we did, and when you
repeal job killing regulations as President Trump is doing, it
(27:05):
results in more investments, more jobs, and the economy is booming.
This is basic cause and effect.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Center,
Ted Cruz Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
with my podcast and you can listen to my podcasts
every other day you're not listening to Verdict or each
day when you listen to Verdict. Afterwards, I'd love to
have you as a listener to again the Ben Ferguson
podcasts and we will see you back here on Monday morning.
Host
Ben Ferguson
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The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Two Guys, Five Rings: Matt, Bowen & The Olympics
Two Guys (Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers). Five Rings (you know, from the Olympics logo). One essential podcast for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. Bowen Yang (SNL, Wicked) and Matt Rogers (Palm Royale, No Good Deed) of Las Culturistas are back for a second season of Two Guys, Five Rings, a collaboration with NBC Sports and iHeartRadio. In this 15-episode event, Bowen and Matt discuss the top storylines, obsess over Italian culture, and find out what really goes on in the Olympic Village.