1. Jill Biden and President Joe Biden
- Jill Biden’s remarks about President Biden’s debate performance.
- She feared he may have been having a stroke, arguing that:
- Her actions afterward (campaign event, public praise, restaurant visit) contradict that concern.
- This suggests either exaggeration or dishonesty.
- Claims that President Biden experienced cognitive decline.
- Allegations that political leaders and media knowingly concealed this.
-
- Media organizations and Democratic officials were aware of Biden’s alleged condition.
- There was a coordinated effort to hide or minimize it.
- They frame this as an example of:
- Political power being prioritized over transparency.
- A broader credibility problem in U.S. politics.
2. U.S. Shipbuilding and National Security
- Key points:
- Heavy reliance on foreign-built ships is presented as a national security risk.
- A major funding initiative (~$24 billion) for the U.S. Coast Guard is described.
- Investment includes:
- New ships and helicopters
- Arctic icebreakers
- Shipyard construction (notably in Texas)
- Claimed benefits:
- Increased domestic manufacturing
- Job creation (thousands of jobs)
- Strategic competition with China and Russia in the Arctic
- The senator describes:
- Internal negotiations over where shipbuilding contracts would go (Texas vs. Louisiana).
- Involvement of the White House and President Trump (in this narrative timeline).
- Emphasis is placed on:
- Negotiation strategy
- Achieving a “win-win” outcome
- Expanding production beyond initial goals
3. College Sports Crisis and NIL Issues
- Problems identified:
- Escalating athlete compensation (tens of millions per team)
- Transfer portal instability
- Financial losses for universities
- Elimination of non-revenue sports (e.g., tennis, Olympic sports)
- Proposed solution:
- A bipartisan bill called the “Protect College Sports Act”
- Supporting arguments:
- College sports provide educational opportunities for disadvantaged students
- They promote social unity and personal development
- Includes testimony from Nick Saban highlighting unsustainable financial trends.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome in his verdict with Ted Cruz, wee can review
Ben Ferguson with you. And here's some of the stories
that you may have missed that we talked about this
past week.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
First up, Joe Biden wants you to buy her new book.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
She also is trying to rewrite history and tell you
that her husband was totally fine even though she thought
he was having a stroke during the debate with President Trump.
So why did she take him to a campaign event
right afterwards and then to waffle house.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
We'll dive into that in just a moment.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Also, in a big move for America's national security, we're
bringing shipbuilding back to the United States of America instead
of relying on foreign countries would put our national security.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
In major risk.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
And lastly sent her Cruz authoring legislation that could save
college sports, and the President United States of America saying
he's all in for it as well. It's the week
in review and it starts right now. I want to
move finally on to Joe Biden, and you want to
talk about a dumpster fire of interviews. Joe Biden's out there.
I was like, is she i Witley was searching. I'm
(01:01):
like is she promoting a book and does she write
about autobiography. She's out there doing all these interviews trying
to rewrite history, but also wants you to feel sorry
for her and her husband, saying that his bad night,
she was terrified he was having a stroke. The only
problem is after she thought he may be having a
stroke in that debate with Donald Trump, she had no
problem taking him to a campaign event and then to
(01:21):
a waffle house and said on TV with him standing there,
I'm so proud of you did such a great job tonight.
It's either I'm like, all right, well, it's you a
senior abuse or your pathological liar or both.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Well, you and I did an emergency podcast the night
of that debate. We did it immediately as the debate concluded,
and we told Verdict listeners at the time, you've just
watched the single most consequential presidential debate in American history.
And the reason is, and you and I predicted that
night as the debate ended, this debate will change the
names on the ballot in November. This debate was such
(01:53):
a disaster, such a train wreck. The Democrats will do
what we're worried they're going to do. With Graham Plattner,
which is pull them off and put someone else on.
The Democrats are really Republicans are lousy at this. By
the way, Republicans almost never managed to do this. The
Democrats are ruthlessly efficient. And we saw that debate. We
saw it went badly, but it turns out apparently Jill
(02:16):
Biden thought it went even worse than we did. Give
a listen to what she said. She thought when she
was watching the debate.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
When you horrified as you saw it on fold, I
wasn't horrified. I was frightened because I had never ever
seen Joe like that before or since, never since yes,
or he's never seen never, No, Well have happened. I
(02:46):
don't know what happened. I mean when I as I
watched it, I thought, oh my god, he's having a stroke,
and it scared me to death.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Senator, if you think that your spouse is having a stroke, A,
why would you leave him on stage? B why would
you then ta him to a campaign event afterwards? And
C why would you then go to waffle house in
sead it to a doctor? And D if this is
the worst it ever was, And the whole world saw
(03:15):
that exact moment it's never been anywhere close before. After
you're either a pathological liar A or B. You're either
a pathological liar who's crazy. You pick which one you
want to be.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Look, Ben, this is an area where I think the
American people have a great sense of intuition of judging
whether someone's speaking the truth or lying. You asked the
right question, what would you do if you believed your spouse,
your spouse of many decades, was having a stroke? And
the answer every one of us would give the answer
(03:48):
you would give the answer I would give. The answer
everyone would give is you take your doctor, your spouse
to the hospital immediately.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Regardless of what they're doing, regardless.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Of what thinks they're having a stroke. And maybe you
don't rush out and pull him off national TV. I
don't know about that, but at a minimum, so suppose
you just just just you're scared, but you don't as
soon as it was over, how do you not say
we're going to the emergency room, We're gonna go Okay,
you don't want a big public public bruhaha, all right,
get a doctor when you're watching it, he's having a stroke,
(04:19):
Get a doctor here right now.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
The instant he steps off stage. I want him being.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Examined like that. Anyone who is watching their spouse and
thinks they're having a stroke would do that. She didn't
do that. She went to the campaign party, she cheered
and celebrated. I'm actually not critical like you're giving. You're
giving harsh criticism because she said he did great. Look
(04:43):
she's a campaign spouse. Every campaign spouse is gonna say that.
I'm understanding of that. If I do a terrible job
at a debate, I don't really want Heidi to go, wow,
he really craped the bed like that.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I understand that.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
But my one is the pathological lying aspect of this.
I don't believe for a second that she's telling the truth.
And she says it's the worst it's ever been. It
only happened that one time. It happened to be the
one and a half hours that was on national television
during a presidential debate.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
I don't believe her.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Number one and number two, if you are I mean center,
let's go to a debate night with you. If I thought,
as one of your friends that you're having a stroke
and you could make it till the end, I would
immediately do what you just said. And I'm not your spouse,
and I think your team would. But second of all,
I think you'd also if you thought there was a
(05:33):
medical issue there, you probably would actually let people know,
because they did. Remember, they may have excuse they lied
and said he had a cold, Mike. If you thought
something was bad, that's your alibi to get out.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Of a terrible debate.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Which is why I think they didn't actually say it
is because this was the cognitive normal for him. And
so I think it's another part of the pathological lyeing
of the Democratic Party in the cover up is that
they're like, no, no, no, this is she says one time.
I think, no, it wasn't. This is the guy that
wasn't running the countries. Somebody else was in the White House,
and then they glied and covered it up. And now
she's saying it only happened one time. I don't believe
(06:06):
her for a moment.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Well, And in fact, listen to a reporter asked asking
her about whether this had been going on for a
long time.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Give a listen.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Did you ever see signs that he was falling into
cognitive decline?
Speaker 3 (06:23):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:24):
No, no, truly no, I mean.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
That's just totally insane. Everyone saw it.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
There was examples that you could actually give that were
caught on tape. And then I go back to what
she said. It was the worst I ever saw. I
thought he was having a stroke, but I didn't do
anything when he was having a stroke. And I never
saw anything like this ever. Again, this is why I
think so many Americans have distrust for politicians and why
you should even be asking more questions now about who
the hell was running the country.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Was it Joe Biden? I don't know.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
And by the way, I'll say again, I am more
forgiving of a Jill Biden of the spouse. But every
Democrat aide knew that he was in massive mental decline,
that that that he was not capable of doing the job.
Every reporter knew that abcnw that CBS knew, that NBC new,
that CNN knew, that msnbcnew that.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
They all knew that.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
It was going on.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Every Democrat senator, every Democrat house member, they all knew that.
The four years Joe Biden was president. Do you know
how many times I spoke with him in person in
those four years? I'm going to guess one or zero zero,
Not a single time. That is weird. It is a
regular part of the job of being a senator to
talk to the president. When Obama was president, I talked
(07:44):
to him regularly. When Trump is president, I talked to
him sometimes every week or sometimes even every day. You know,
last time I talked to Trump was three days ago.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
It is weird.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
And by the way, it was not just me. Almost
every single Republican senator did not speak to him at
all during his presidency. We would sit around at lunch
and talk about how weird it was that the White
House would not let us talk.
Speaker 5 (08:08):
To the president. And understand, we all knew him.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Joe was a man of the Senate for forty plus years,
so every one of us had a personal relationship with
Joe Biden and the fact that they wouldn't let him
speak to us was a screaming alarm bell that his
metal capacity has diminished so much that they couldn't let
us see it. And it's why the debate was so
(08:31):
high risk, because there you had the TV cameras going
and you couldn't have an aid step in and save him.
But well, by the way, what did the Biden staffs
say about Joe Biden's comments about thinking he was having
a stroke. Well, an axious reporter said, quote ex Biden aids,
simply don't believe Jill Biden.
Speaker 5 (08:53):
And there's your sign. Well there's your sign.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
No kidding, but I'll tell you and and this story
links back to the story we started with.
Speaker 5 (09:04):
Number one.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Democrats in the party and the media do not care
about anything other than power. That sounds too harsh, but
they were willing to have for four years and potentially
for eight years, someone who was senile, who was unable
to put together coherent thoughts as the commander in chief understand,
(09:27):
Joe Biden could have pushed a button, launched our nukes,
an annihilated mankind from the face of the planet. And
yet Democrats say, you know what, if he's there, we
get to run things. So, you know, what does it
matter if our enemies look at the commander in chief
and think he's an adult old man who can't operate
the TV remote control? That level of cynicism. Frankly, it's
(09:50):
the same thought process that says, what does it matter
if someone is a commi, nazi, misogynist, racist, What does
it matter? My party gets to stay in power, so
that's good by me.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
There is.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Look, I think it is number one. We keep and
by the way, swallwell, they were fine, someone's a repeat
sexual predator. They were great with him until there was
a political problem, and then with all three they immediately
jettisoned them and throw them out the back. I'm going
(10:27):
to try to be restrained and say that is not
the behavior of a party that gives a damn about principle.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
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, I
want to move center on to another really interesting story.
It does with national security, especially with what's happening in
the redle East. And I ran right now and something
that we've highlighted and talked about on this show in
(10:56):
the past, and that was that ship building was not
happening in the United States to America. That is a
national security issue, and it was a very clear national
security issue that was brought up. You were one of
those sounding the alarm on it, because when you're dependent
on your ships being made overseas and you have things
that happened, whether it's COVID, right, that's not even a war,
(11:16):
but with COVID and all of these issues that we're
now seeing in the Middle East, we needed to bring
shipbuilding back to the United States of America, and now
we are seeing that actually happen.
Speaker 5 (11:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Another one of the major provisions of the Working Families
Tax Cut was the funding for the Coastguard. And the
way it works in the Senate when you're writing a
bill in reconciliation, which is the process we used to
pass the Working Families Tax Cut, each committee chairman writes
the portion of the bill that is within his or
her jurisdiction. I'm the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science,
(11:49):
and Transportation. We've got jurisdiction over about forty percent of
the US economy. Every single provision that was in my
jurisdiction I was responsible for writing, and I did write.
One of the subjects that is within the jurisdiction of
the Commerce Committee is the Coast Guard. The Coastguard falls
within our jurisdiction. We funded more than twenty four billion
(12:13):
dollars billion with a B into the Coast Guard. That
is the largest single investment in the history of the
United States.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
And the Coast Guard.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I want to give you a sense of the order
of magnitude of that the annual budget of the Coast
Guard is between eleven and twelve billion dollars. In one year,
we invested more than double the annual budget of the
Coast Guard to rebuild their fleet, to rebuild to purchase
new ships, to purchase new helicopters, to purchase new capital
and infrastructure. One of the biggest elements of our investment
(12:46):
was Arctic ice cutters.
Speaker 5 (12:49):
So if you look at.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
The Arctic, near the North Pole and all around the Arctic,
that is a major national security contested domain. Russia and
China are both killing us in the Arctic, and the
United States has fallen way behind. And we put in
the funding to build new Arctic ice cutters, and the
(13:12):
Trump administration signed a contract to purchase eleven new Arctic
ice cutters and in particular to.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Build many of them here in the United States.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
So I started this week Monday morning down in Galveston, Texas.
And in Galveston we had a groundbreaking for a brand
new shipyard where there's over a billion dollars being invested.
It's going to create more than two thousand jobs to
build Arctic ice cutters and not only is that important
for that investment, those new jobs, but that's an expertise
(13:43):
that doesn't exist in the United States. We're going to
see more commercial ships built in the United States and
in Texas and Galveston and Port Arthur because of this investment.
I spoke at the groundbreaking. Give a listen to what
I had to say at the groundbreaking. And I was
very proud when President Trump announced that three and a
half billion dollars was going to Davy Defense to build
(14:05):
five Arctic security cutters and to build them here in
the Texas Gulf Coast. That is going to produce over
two thousand high paying jobs here on the Texas Gulf Coast.
And and mark my word, that's just the beginning because
(14:34):
that is going to fuel a renaissance of shipbuilding right
here on the Texas Golf Coast. A final observation about Galveston.
Folks here are really particular about Galveston. It's a thing
you will learn. There's a phrase that folks from Galveston
(14:58):
will tell you, which is BOI born on the islands.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
And it's a little bit.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
There's an old line that you never ask anyone if
he's a Texan, if he is, he'll tell you, and
if he's not, you don't want to embarrass the guy.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I love, by the way, that line there, center because
it is, by the way, totally accurate. But this is
a really big, I think moment as you described it
for national security. It also makes us not dependent on
foreign countries and foreign workforces for things that deal with
national security. This is part of what you've been advocating
(15:35):
for with America First Policy is with the Trump administration
as well, and being able to do this and do
it quickly, and also to get these cutters back into
the Arctic where we need them from a national security standpoint,
this is a big win all the way around, and
it produces American jobs, and not just a few, as
you mentioned, You've got thousands, and then you have the
(15:56):
supporting jobs around those jobs as well.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
Well. That's that's right.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
And let me tell you a little bit of history.
You look, you're a relatively new Texan. You're from Memphis.
So this is a bit of history that I shared
at the press conference that that that that you may
not know, and that everyone in Galveston knew, but maybe
other people don't. So Galveston used to be the largest
(16:21):
city in Texas. Wow, Galveston was called the Queen of
the Gulf Coast. Galveston was also called the Wall Street
of the Southwest, and Galveston was called the Ellis Island
to the south. And just like Ellis Island, when people
came as immigrants, they would come to Galveston.
Speaker 5 (16:42):
That that that was the.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
Port of entry where where vast numbers of people came
to America through Galveston. And and what happened is in
nineteen hundred, there was a devastating hurricane that killed between
eight thousand and twelve thousand people in Galveston, and they
didn't have the technology to have it early warning signs,
so the hurricane just hit and destroyed the city and
(17:05):
it remains the single most devastating natural disaster in US history.
But a really cool fact that I pointed out, and
I bet you you don't know this bend. In eighteen
thirty six, Galveston was the capital of the Republic of Texas.
The Republic of Texas, we were our own nation, and
Galveston was our capital right when we became our own nation.
Speaker 5 (17:28):
And so I said, look, it's really special that we're.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
Seeing thousands of new manufacturing jobs coming to Galveston shipbuilding jobs.
And I mentioned in the clip you we just played
the phrase BOI. And by the way, you'll meet people
from Galveston who are fifth, sixth, seventh generation BOI board
on island. And what I called for at the press conference,
I said, listen, every Arctic ice cutter you build there.
(17:52):
I turned to the CEO of the company Davies that's
going to be building them, and I said, I hope
and expect on every one of those Arctic ice cutters,
somewhere in the interior on the hall, you will engrave
the simple letters BOI, because those Arctic ice cutters will
have been born on the island of Galveston. And that's
(18:13):
an awesome thing. But it's an awesome thing for American jobs.
You look at what President Trump is fighting to do,
what I'm fighting to do, it is bring jobs back
to American manufacturing jobs. And I'll tell you a little bit.
Let me bring you a little bit inside the story.
So the bill we wrote, we had the funding for
what was likely to be five to six Arctic ice cutters.
Speaker 5 (18:36):
And there was a battle.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
There was a battle that went to the to the
White House about where that contract would go, and that
battle was principally between Texas and Louisiana. Now I love Louisiana.
My parents met New Orleans. My mom went to high
school in Batterie Rouge. Louisiana is a great state. And
to be clear, Louisiana is the home of the Speaker
of the House Mike Johnson and Steve Scalise, the House
(18:58):
Majority leader. They're both very good friends. They they were
understandably fighting for their state and wanted the ship building
in Louisiana. I was fighting for Texas, and I will
tell you it was a knife fight at the White House.
I spoke repeatedly to the President of the United States.
I spoke to the senior staff in the White House
over and over and over again, and it was a
real fight. We didn't know who was gonna win Texas
(19:20):
and Louisiana. And I want to give the President real
props here. Look, we all know before he was in
the White House, the President was a businessman. Yeah, and
he is very committed to getting more for less. So
the proposal, the legislation that had been passed was funding
to build five to six new ice cutters. Trump said
that's not enough. I don't want five to six. I
(19:42):
want eleven. And so they found new funding that had
been appropriated by Congress, and what they ended up doing
was approving both. So there's several ice cutters being built
in Louisiana, there are several being built in Texas.
Speaker 5 (19:54):
And it was a win win, and it's a great example.
Speaker 3 (19:57):
He went to the ship building companies and he said,
I want you to cut your prices and deliver more ships.
And they did. And this was not staff driven. This
was you know, Trump is a builder, so he I mean,
he likes things like negotiating a contract. And he leaned
in and instead of five to six ized cutters, we're
(20:18):
getting eleven. Instead of just one place Louisiana or Texas,
we're getting both. And we're getting thousands and thousands of
new jobs, and we're going to be able to compete
with and protect our national security the Arctic against Russia
and China.
Speaker 5 (20:30):
It is a win win all around.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
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 well.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
This week I shared a hearing on college sports and
saving college sports. And we've talked before on Verdict about
how college sports is in crisis right now.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
It is chaos.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
You've got an out of control transfer portal with athletes
transferring three, four, five times.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
You've got people playing until they're twenty.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
Six, twenty seven, twenty eight years old.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
You've got people with six seven years of playing time.
You have virtually every athletics program in the country losing
money and losing millions or even tens of millions of dollars.
Schools are going broke. They're canceling programs every week. You're
seeing women's sports getting canceled. You're seeing Olympic sports getting canceled.
You're seeing your favorite tennis getting canceled. That happened at
(21:28):
Arkansas just a few weeks ago. And it is if
we don't act, we are going to see much of
college sports decimated and destroyed. And so last week I
introduced bipartisan legislation with Maria Cantwell. Maria Cantwell's a Democrat
from Washington State. She is the ranking member of the
senior Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee. I'm the chairman
(21:51):
of the Senate Commerce Committee. This week, we had a
big hearing and we heard testimony from leaders in college
athletics about the urgency of solving the crisis. Now, one
of our witnesses was coach Nick Saban, the legendary coach
of Alabama, and Coach Saban's testimony was incredibly powerful and
(22:12):
give a listen to a little bit of Coach Nick
Saban on why Congress needs to pass or protect College
Sports Act.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
All right, let's play for you Nick Saban. Part of
what he had to say in front of your committee hearing.
It truly was impressive to hear him talk about sports,
especially in front of Congress.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
Take a listen, Cooba.
Speaker 6 (22:31):
Let me give you the history. My first year, we
had collective at Alabama two point seven million. Next year
seven million, next year ten million. I've retired. Next year
of seventeen million, next year twenty four million. Now you
have schools that have close to forty million dollar rosters.
So if we continue to do that, we're gonna lose
Olympic sports, We're gonna lose non revenue sports, We're gonna
(22:53):
lose scholarships, and basically what's going to happen is we're
going to have football and basketball succeed, and we'll have
clubs sports for everything else.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
He's not wrong, by the way, Center, I was in
one of those non money making sports tennis, right, You
had a lot of friends that you get to know
that are in those Olympic sports, for example, that would
all disappear. And when you think about having a college
roster at eighty million, if you're a student athlete, that
in theory sounds great, but that's only in two sports.
Really the majority of that eighty you know you're talking
(23:23):
about Alabama. I mean, there's not that much in basketball,
I promise you at Alabama. So unless you pick football,
you're left behind. And that's the reason why you're taking
this action now and why Saban was saying what he
was saying at the time.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Well, and that there's only a handful of powerhouses that
generate and can dominate football, and so what if we
don't act. I think within five years we will see
thirty to fifty colleges that have a football program and
they'll basically be an NFL and the rest of the
schools that their programs will be obliterated and There are
(23:57):
a lot of reasons that's tragic. One is just sports
brings us together. Sports is so much fun. Look, we're
divided on so many issues today. We scream at each
other where we're like it really is hard to.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
Find common ground.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
And yet you can go cheer on your alma mater
and you can be there with people of different parties,
people of different races, people have different religions, and you're
all standing together. That's really important. Every bit as critical
as that is. College sports is an amazing avenue for
education for millions of young men and women. And until
(24:30):
I really started diving in to this topic and working
to save college sports, I hadn't really focused on how
college athletics is something that is unique in the United States.
No other country has anything remotely resembling what we have
here with college sports. There are today more than a
(24:50):
half million college athletes right now.
Speaker 5 (24:55):
Every year.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
Athletics enables kids, many kids from low income homes, many
minority kids, who otherwise might not have had a chance
to go to college. It enables them to go to
college to study, to get a degree, to learn skills,
to learn hard work and discipline and teamwork and sportsmanship.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
Accountability just showing up.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
I can't tell you how much I learned from just
the accountability, which, by the way, it made me a
better person. It made me better in business, It made
me better in my job that I did afterwards. There
are so many young men when I was at Old
Miss that said, they literally believe they would either have
been dead, they would have been in a gang if
it wasn't for sports keeping them out of trouble in
(25:39):
high school. And then they said, if it wasn't for
college and getting that college education, they would have immediately
been into bad stuff on the streets. They said that
sports actually saved their life, and not only say their life.
A lot of them they were the first member of
their family to ever go to college, and they went
because they were an incredible athlete. It gave them the opportunity,
it gave them a free education, it seemed unattainable, and
(26:00):
it completely changed their families trajectory in life. I think
that's one of the most important things about college sports
that people don't talk about now.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
That is exactly right, and the status quo is unsustainable.
If Congress doesn't act, we will end up with hundreds
of thousands of those college athletic positions going away, and
those kids, many of them having no chance to go
to school, to go to college to get those skills,
those life skills that set them up for success. And
(26:31):
look the way I approach this, I didn't worry too
much about about the top one percent. I didn't worry
about the Michael Jordan's or arch mannings. I worried about
the ninety nine percent of college athletes who are never
going to play pro ball, but it's giving them opportunity.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I had a ton of people Centator that were calling me.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
I had friends and people I've known the past come
out of that would work because they knew how important
this bill was. They knew how important it was to you.
Asking me questions. There was a lot of people saying
they're just not gonna be able to get this done.
There's no way you'll get by parsonship here. That seems
to not be true. And they said, well, there's no
way even though he'll be able to get the White
House behind it.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
That also doesn't seem to be true either.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
There is a lot of growing by parson support here
to get this thing done.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Well, there is, And I worked for months. Rick Cantwell
and I negotiated. We sat in the conference room six
eight hours a day negotiating provision by provision by provision.
We introduced it with Cantwell and myself a Democrat and Republican,
and also with Eric Schmidt, a Republican from Missouri, and
Chris Coon's a Democrat from Delaware. So we had two Democrats,
(27:33):
two Republicans on the bill, and we've seen phenomenal.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
Support for it.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
So the ACC has come out emphatically in support of it,
The Big Twelve has come out emphatically and support of it.
Condoleeza Rice at Stanford has come out emphatically in support
of it. At the hearing, Pete Bavaqua, the athletic director
at Notre Dame, testified strongly in support of it. Gordon
Gee testified at the hearing, former president of West Virginia
(28:00):
University also Vanderbilt, has been a president of actually five universities.
Speaker 5 (28:05):
He testified that this is a.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Crisis and this bill is the only hope to save
college sports. And we've had already, We've had over one
hundred and thirty signatures from leaders at more than sixty
five universities come out in support of the bill, and importantly,
this week President Donald J. Trump came out strongly in
support of the bill. He's he sent a truth social
(28:29):
that I want to read to you. Here's what he said.
College sports, a great American institution that produces our many athletes, leaders,
and Olympic dominance, is a total mess, and everyone is
saying that it must be fixed. After uninny lawsuits and
crazed rulings, there are virtually no limits anymore, and soon
most colleges won't have sports because each and every one
(28:49):
of them will be bankrupt, never to be heard from again.
Women's sports and the Olympics itself are in the most
danger from this catastrophic situation. College sports are turning into
pro sports, except with absolutely no rules, a result no
one wants. University presidents, conference commissioners, student athletes, coaches, and
(29:11):
athletic directors all complained to me that it has become
a disaster after years of no action, and that schools
were losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year. They
compared it to a freight train that can't be stopped.
That is why a few months ago I convened a
roundtable bringing together were a world class team as some
(29:32):
of the best sports executives, student athletes, and political leaders
in our country. The goal was to find a bipartisan
solution to fix the problem. Based on these meetings and
the expertise of the leading authorities, I signed an executive order,
but I always said that the best solution was to
get a bipartisan act through Congress to my desk in
(29:54):
order to save a long and embarrassing road through Hell
for the these institutions. I'd like to thank Senators Ted Cruz,
Eric Schmidt, Maria Cantwell, and Chris Coons, among others, for
introducing the Protect College Sports Act. This law resolves many
of the most urgent issues challenging our universities and student athletes,
(30:16):
stops the chaos, and most importantly, it may be the
last chance to save college sports and colleges themselves before
it's too late. The House has worked long and hard
on this issue as well, and I'm very grateful to
Speaker Mike Johnson and Leader Steve Scalise for their work
to fix this very major problem. I urge the House
(30:36):
and Senate to come together to pass a final bipartisan
law that I can sign this summer that reflects the
views and input of both chambers and in all caps,
we have to save college sports. Thank you for your
attention to this matter, President Donald J.
Speaker 5 (30:54):
Trump.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
The support we're seeing is really significant, and I think
we're going to see, hope and believe, a big bipartisan
vote in the Senate behind this bill.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Well, what's the timeline now and how much is there
going to be people pushing since now this has become so,
you know, such a big discussion to try to change
things the last minute. Is that going to be a
problem and what does that look like?
Speaker 3 (31:16):
Oh, look, that is going on, and there are a
handful of people that are criticizing and throwing rocks, But
I'll tell you most people are shocked that we could
actually find a bipartisan compromise and and and listen, one
of the natures of that. That means that that I
had to give quite a bit and and the Democrats
had to give quite a bit to find a common
(31:38):
ground because we can't pass this bill unless you get
at least sixty votes in the Senate. That means you
need at least seven Democrats. There are only fifty three Republicans.
And my objective, frankly, is to get a lot more
than sixty votes. I'd like to see a big bipartisan
vote come out of the Senate. The House has tried
several times to fix this problem, and unfortunately, every time
(32:01):
they try to take up a bill, it's failed in
the House. And so I think the Senate has got
to step in because the clock is ticking. And I
will say that there's a real risk also of the
biggest players coming together to form a super league, and
I think that would be disastrous for everybody else and
(32:22):
not good for fans. Let's take my home state of Texas.
Look my home state of Texas. If Congress does nothing
in three to five years, I am certain that the
University of Texas will survive, and I'm certain A and
M will survive. They're so big, they have such a
big donor base and alumni base that they'll survive no
matter what happens. But it's not at all clear that
(32:44):
the other players in Texas survive. It's not clear that
TCU or SMU or University of Houston or Rice or
Texas Tech or Baylor, all of the different programs in
Texas they could go under in the status quo, and
I think that would be a terrible outcome if we
lose historic programs all over Texas, not just football, but
(33:04):
when you lose football, football pays for all the other sports.
So when you lose football, you end up losing the
entire array of sports. That would be tragic and we
can't let it happen.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Yeah, you're absolutely right there.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
If people want to get behind this legislation, is this
one of those where they talk to their senators and
their congressman.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Who do they need to contact quickly?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Look, the first order of business is your senator and
urging your senator, whether your senator is a Republican or Democrat,
urging your senator get behind this bill, the Bipartisan Protect
College Sports Act. There's an urgency. I am hoping to
move quickly on this. I'd like to get a big
vote in the Senate. Once we get it out of
the Senate, then the next step will be the House.
(33:44):
But calling your senator, going on social media, speaking out
and saying that sports, college sports should be saved, that's
really valuable.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Senator
Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
with my podcast and you can listen to my podcast
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 in his verdict with Ted Cruz, wee can review
Ben Ferguson with you. And here's some of the stories
that you may have missed that we talked about this
past week.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
First up, Joe Biden wants you to buy her new book.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
She also is trying to rewrite history and tell you
that her husband was totally fine even though she thought
he was having a stroke during the debate with President Trump.
So why did she take him to a campaign event
right afterwards and then to waffle house.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
We'll dive into that in just a moment.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Also, in a big move for America's national security, we're
bringing shipbuilding back to the United States of America instead
of relying on foreign countries would put our national security.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
In major risk.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
And lastly sent her Cruz authoring legislation that could save
college sports, and the President United States of America saying
he's all in for it as well. It's the week
in review and it starts right now. I want to
move finally on to Joe Biden, and you want to
talk about a dumpster fire of interviews. Joe Biden's out there.
I was like, is she i Witley was searching. I'm
(01:01):
like is she promoting a book and does she write
about autobiography. She's out there doing all these interviews trying
to rewrite history, but also wants you to feel sorry
for her and her husband, saying that his bad night,
she was terrified he was having a stroke. The only
problem is after she thought he may be having a
stroke in that debate with Donald Trump, she had no
problem taking him to a campaign event and then to
(01:21):
a waffle house and said on TV with him standing there,
I'm so proud of you did such a great job tonight.
It's either I'm like, all right, well, it's you a
senior abuse or your pathological liar or both.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
Well, you and I did an emergency podcast the night
of that debate. We did it immediately as the debate concluded,
and we told Verdict listeners at the time, you've just
watched the single most consequential presidential debate in American history.
And the reason is, and you and I predicted that
night as the debate ended, this debate will change the
names on the ballot in November. This debate was such
(01:53):
a disaster, such a train wreck. The Democrats will do
what we're worried they're going to do. With Graham Plattner,
which is pull them off and put someone else on.
The Democrats are really Republicans are lousy at this. By
the way, Republicans almost never managed to do this. The
Democrats are ruthlessly efficient. And we saw that debate. We
saw it went badly, but it turns out apparently Jill
(02:16):
Biden thought it went even worse than we did. Give
a listen to what she said. She thought when she
was watching the debate.
Speaker 4 (02:24):
When you horrified as you saw it on fold, I
wasn't horrified. I was frightened because I had never ever
seen Joe like that before or since, never since yes,
or he's never seen never, No, Well have happened. I
(02:46):
don't know what happened. I mean when I as I
watched it, I thought, oh my god, he's having a stroke,
and it scared me to death.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
Senator, if you think that your spouse is having a stroke, A,
why would you leave him on stage? B why would
you then ta him to a campaign event afterwards? And
C why would you then go to waffle house in
sead it to a doctor? And D if this is
the worst it ever was, And the whole world saw
(03:15):
that exact moment it's never been anywhere close before. After
you're either a pathological liar A or B. You're either
a pathological liar who's crazy. You pick which one you
want to be.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Look, Ben, this is an area where I think the
American people have a great sense of intuition of judging
whether someone's speaking the truth or lying. You asked the
right question, what would you do if you believed your spouse,
your spouse of many decades, was having a stroke? And
the answer every one of us would give the answer
(03:48):
you would give the answer I would give. The answer
everyone would give is you take your doctor, your spouse
to the hospital immediately.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Regardless of what they're doing, regardless.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Of what thinks they're having a stroke. And maybe you
don't rush out and pull him off national TV. I
don't know about that, but at a minimum, so suppose
you just just just you're scared, but you don't as
soon as it was over, how do you not say
we're going to the emergency room, We're gonna go Okay,
you don't want a big public public bruhaha, all right,
get a doctor when you're watching it, he's having a stroke,
(04:19):
Get a doctor here right now.
Speaker 5 (04:21):
The instant he steps off stage. I want him being.
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Examined like that. Anyone who is watching their spouse and
thinks they're having a stroke would do that. She didn't
do that. She went to the campaign party, she cheered
and celebrated. I'm actually not critical like you're giving. You're
giving harsh criticism because she said he did great. Look
(04:43):
she's a campaign spouse. Every campaign spouse is gonna say that.
I'm understanding of that. If I do a terrible job
at a debate, I don't really want Heidi to go, wow,
he really craped the bed like that.
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I understand that.
Speaker 1 (04:59):
But my one is the pathological lying aspect of this.
I don't believe for a second that she's telling the truth.
And she says it's the worst it's ever been. It
only happened that one time. It happened to be the
one and a half hours that was on national television
during a presidential debate.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
I don't believe her.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Number one and number two, if you are I mean center,
let's go to a debate night with you. If I thought,
as one of your friends that you're having a stroke
and you could make it till the end, I would
immediately do what you just said. And I'm not your spouse,
and I think your team would. But second of all,
I think you'd also if you thought there was a
(05:33):
medical issue there, you probably would actually let people know,
because they did. Remember, they may have excuse they lied
and said he had a cold, Mike. If you thought
something was bad, that's your alibi to get out.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
Of a terrible debate.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
Which is why I think they didn't actually say it
is because this was the cognitive normal for him. And
so I think it's another part of the pathological lyeing
of the Democratic Party in the cover up is that
they're like, no, no, no, this is she says one time.
I think, no, it wasn't. This is the guy that
wasn't running the countries. Somebody else was in the White House,
and then they glied and covered it up. And now
she's saying it only happened one time. I don't believe
(06:06):
her for a moment.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Well, And in fact, listen to a reporter asked asking
her about whether this had been going on for a
long time.
Speaker 5 (06:15):
Give a listen.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Did you ever see signs that he was falling into
cognitive decline?
Speaker 3 (06:23):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:24):
No, no, truly no, I mean.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
That's just totally insane. Everyone saw it.
Speaker 1 (06:33):
There was examples that you could actually give that were
caught on tape. And then I go back to what
she said. It was the worst I ever saw. I
thought he was having a stroke, but I didn't do
anything when he was having a stroke. And I never
saw anything like this ever. Again, this is why I
think so many Americans have distrust for politicians and why
you should even be asking more questions now about who
the hell was running the country.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
Was it Joe Biden? I don't know.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
And by the way, I'll say again, I am more
forgiving of a Jill Biden of the spouse. But every
Democrat aide knew that he was in massive mental decline,
that that that he was not capable of doing the job.
Every reporter knew that abcnw that CBS knew, that NBC new,
that CNN knew, that msnbcnew that.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
They all knew that.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
It was going on.
Speaker 3 (07:23):
Every Democrat senator, every Democrat house member, they all knew that.
The four years Joe Biden was president. Do you know
how many times I spoke with him in person in
those four years? I'm going to guess one or zero zero,
Not a single time. That is weird. It is a
regular part of the job of being a senator to
talk to the president. When Obama was president, I talked
(07:44):
to him regularly. When Trump is president, I talked to
him sometimes every week or sometimes even every day. You know,
last time I talked to Trump was three days ago.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
It is weird.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
And by the way, it was not just me. Almost
every single Republican senator did not speak to him at
all during his presidency. We would sit around at lunch
and talk about how weird it was that the White
House would not let us talk.
Speaker 5 (08:08):
To the president. And understand, we all knew him.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Joe was a man of the Senate for forty plus years,
so every one of us had a personal relationship with
Joe Biden and the fact that they wouldn't let him
speak to us was a screaming alarm bell that his
metal capacity has diminished so much that they couldn't let
us see it. And it's why the debate was so
(08:31):
high risk, because there you had the TV cameras going
and you couldn't have an aid step in and save him.
But well, by the way, what did the Biden staffs
say about Joe Biden's comments about thinking he was having
a stroke. Well, an axious reporter said, quote ex Biden aids,
simply don't believe Jill Biden.
Speaker 5 (08:53):
And there's your sign. Well there's your sign.
Speaker 3 (08:57):
No kidding, but I'll tell you and and this story
links back to the story we started with.
Speaker 5 (09:04):
Number one.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
Democrats in the party and the media do not care
about anything other than power. That sounds too harsh, but
they were willing to have for four years and potentially
for eight years, someone who was senile, who was unable
to put together coherent thoughts as the commander in chief understand,
(09:27):
Joe Biden could have pushed a button, launched our nukes,
an annihilated mankind from the face of the planet. And
yet Democrats say, you know what, if he's there, we
get to run things. So, you know, what does it
matter if our enemies look at the commander in chief
and think he's an adult old man who can't operate
the TV remote control? That level of cynicism. Frankly, it's
(09:50):
the same thought process that says, what does it matter
if someone is a commi, nazi, misogynist, racist, What does
it matter? My party gets to stay in power, so
that's good by me.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
There is.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Look, I think it is number one. We keep and
by the way, swallwell, they were fine, someone's a repeat
sexual predator. They were great with him until there was
a political problem, and then with all three they immediately
jettisoned them and throw them out the back. I'm going
(10:27):
to try to be restrained and say that is not
the behavior of a party that gives a damn about principle.
Speaker 1 (10:35):
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, I
want to move center on to another really interesting story.
It does with national security, especially with what's happening in
the redle East. And I ran right now and something
that we've highlighted and talked about on this show in
(10:56):
the past, and that was that ship building was not
happening in the United States to America. That is a
national security issue, and it was a very clear national
security issue that was brought up. You were one of
those sounding the alarm on it, because when you're dependent
on your ships being made overseas and you have things
that happened, whether it's COVID, right, that's not even a war,
(11:16):
but with COVID and all of these issues that we're
now seeing in the Middle East, we needed to bring
shipbuilding back to the United States of America, and now
we are seeing that actually happen.
Speaker 5 (11:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
Another one of the major provisions of the Working Families
Tax Cut was the funding for the Coastguard. And the
way it works in the Senate when you're writing a
bill in reconciliation, which is the process we used to
pass the Working Families Tax Cut, each committee chairman writes
the portion of the bill that is within his or
her jurisdiction. I'm the chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science,
(11:49):
and Transportation. We've got jurisdiction over about forty percent of
the US economy. Every single provision that was in my
jurisdiction I was responsible for writing, and I did write.
One of the subjects that is within the jurisdiction of
the Commerce Committee is the Coast Guard. The Coastguard falls
within our jurisdiction. We funded more than twenty four billion
(12:13):
dollars billion with a B into the Coast Guard. That
is the largest single investment in the history of the
United States.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
And the Coast Guard.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I want to give you a sense of the order
of magnitude of that the annual budget of the Coast
Guard is between eleven and twelve billion dollars. In one year,
we invested more than double the annual budget of the
Coast Guard to rebuild their fleet, to rebuild to purchase
new ships, to purchase new helicopters, to purchase new capital
and infrastructure. One of the biggest elements of our investment
(12:46):
was Arctic ice cutters.
Speaker 5 (12:49):
So if you look at.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
The Arctic, near the North Pole and all around the Arctic,
that is a major national security contested domain. Russia and
China are both killing us in the Arctic, and the
United States has fallen way behind. And we put in
the funding to build new Arctic ice cutters, and the
(13:12):
Trump administration signed a contract to purchase eleven new Arctic
ice cutters and in particular to.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Build many of them here in the United States.
Speaker 3 (13:21):
So I started this week Monday morning down in Galveston, Texas.
And in Galveston we had a groundbreaking for a brand
new shipyard where there's over a billion dollars being invested.
It's going to create more than two thousand jobs to
build Arctic ice cutters and not only is that important
for that investment, those new jobs, but that's an expertise
(13:43):
that doesn't exist in the United States. We're going to
see more commercial ships built in the United States and
in Texas and Galveston and Port Arthur because of this investment.
I spoke at the groundbreaking. Give a listen to what
I had to say at the groundbreaking. And I was
very proud when President Trump announced that three and a
half billion dollars was going to Davy Defense to build
(14:05):
five Arctic security cutters and to build them here in
the Texas Gulf Coast. That is going to produce over
two thousand high paying jobs here on the Texas Gulf Coast.
And and mark my word, that's just the beginning because
(14:34):
that is going to fuel a renaissance of shipbuilding right
here on the Texas Golf Coast. A final observation about Galveston.
Folks here are really particular about Galveston. It's a thing
you will learn. There's a phrase that folks from Galveston
(14:58):
will tell you, which is BOI born on the islands.
Speaker 5 (15:02):
And it's a little bit.
Speaker 3 (15:03):
There's an old line that you never ask anyone if
he's a Texan, if he is, he'll tell you, and
if he's not, you don't want to embarrass the guy.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
I love, by the way, that line there, center because
it is, by the way, totally accurate. But this is
a really big, I think moment as you described it
for national security. It also makes us not dependent on
foreign countries and foreign workforces for things that deal with
national security. This is part of what you've been advocating
(15:35):
for with America First Policy is with the Trump administration
as well, and being able to do this and do
it quickly, and also to get these cutters back into
the Arctic where we need them from a national security standpoint,
this is a big win all the way around, and
it produces American jobs, and not just a few, as
you mentioned, You've got thousands, and then you have the
(15:56):
supporting jobs around those jobs as well.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
Well. That's that's right.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
And let me tell you a little bit of history.
You look, you're a relatively new Texan. You're from Memphis.
So this is a bit of history that I shared
at the press conference that that that that you may
not know, and that everyone in Galveston knew, but maybe
other people don't. So Galveston used to be the largest
(16:21):
city in Texas. Wow, Galveston was called the Queen of
the Gulf Coast. Galveston was also called the Wall Street
of the Southwest, and Galveston was called the Ellis Island
to the south. And just like Ellis Island, when people
came as immigrants, they would come to Galveston.
Speaker 5 (16:42):
That that that was the.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
Port of entry where where vast numbers of people came
to America through Galveston. And and what happened is in
nineteen hundred, there was a devastating hurricane that killed between
eight thousand and twelve thousand people in Galveston, and they
didn't have the technology to have it early warning signs,
so the hurricane just hit and destroyed the city and
(17:05):
it remains the single most devastating natural disaster in US history.
But a really cool fact that I pointed out, and
I bet you you don't know this bend. In eighteen
thirty six, Galveston was the capital of the Republic of Texas.
The Republic of Texas, we were our own nation, and
Galveston was our capital right when we became our own nation.
Speaker 5 (17:28):
And so I said, look, it's really special that we're.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
Seeing thousands of new manufacturing jobs coming to Galveston shipbuilding jobs.
And I mentioned in the clip you we just played
the phrase BOI. And by the way, you'll meet people
from Galveston who are fifth, sixth, seventh generation BOI board
on island. And what I called for at the press conference,
I said, listen, every Arctic ice cutter you build there.
(17:52):
I turned to the CEO of the company Davies that's
going to be building them, and I said, I hope
and expect on every one of those Arctic ice cutters,
somewhere in the interior on the hall, you will engrave
the simple letters BOI, because those Arctic ice cutters will
have been born on the island of Galveston. And that's
(18:13):
an awesome thing. But it's an awesome thing for American jobs.
You look at what President Trump is fighting to do,
what I'm fighting to do, it is bring jobs back
to American manufacturing jobs. And I'll tell you a little bit.
Let me bring you a little bit inside the story.
So the bill we wrote, we had the funding for
what was likely to be five to six Arctic ice cutters.
Speaker 5 (18:36):
And there was a battle.
Speaker 3 (18:37):
There was a battle that went to the to the
White House about where that contract would go, and that
battle was principally between Texas and Louisiana. Now I love Louisiana.
My parents met New Orleans. My mom went to high
school in Batterie Rouge. Louisiana is a great state. And
to be clear, Louisiana is the home of the Speaker
of the House Mike Johnson and Steve Scalise, the House
(18:58):
Majority leader. They're both very good friends. They they were
understandably fighting for their state and wanted the ship building
in Louisiana. I was fighting for Texas, and I will
tell you it was a knife fight at the White House.
I spoke repeatedly to the President of the United States.
I spoke to the senior staff in the White House
over and over and over again, and it was a
real fight. We didn't know who was gonna win Texas
(19:20):
and Louisiana. And I want to give the President real
props here. Look, we all know before he was in
the White House, the President was a businessman. Yeah, and
he is very committed to getting more for less. So
the proposal, the legislation that had been passed was funding
to build five to six new ice cutters. Trump said
that's not enough. I don't want five to six. I
(19:42):
want eleven. And so they found new funding that had
been appropriated by Congress, and what they ended up doing
was approving both. So there's several ice cutters being built
in Louisiana, there are several being built in Texas.
Speaker 5 (19:54):
And it was a win win, and it's a great example.
Speaker 3 (19:57):
He went to the ship building companies and he said,
I want you to cut your prices and deliver more ships.
And they did. And this was not staff driven. This
was you know, Trump is a builder, so he I mean,
he likes things like negotiating a contract. And he leaned
in and instead of five to six ized cutters, we're
(20:18):
getting eleven. Instead of just one place Louisiana or Texas,
we're getting both. And we're getting thousands and thousands of
new jobs, and we're going to be able to compete
with and protect our national security the Arctic against Russia
and China.
Speaker 5 (20:30):
It is a win win all around.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
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 well.
Speaker 3 (20:47):
This week I shared a hearing on college sports and
saving college sports. And we've talked before on Verdict about
how college sports is in crisis right now.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
It is chaos.
Speaker 3 (20:57):
You've got an out of control transfer portal with athletes
transferring three, four, five times.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
You've got people playing until they're twenty.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
Six, twenty seven, twenty eight years old.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
You've got people with six seven years of playing time.
You have virtually every athletics program in the country losing
money and losing millions or even tens of millions of dollars.
Schools are going broke. They're canceling programs every week. You're
seeing women's sports getting canceled. You're seeing Olympic sports getting canceled.
You're seeing your favorite tennis getting canceled. That happened at
(21:28):
Arkansas just a few weeks ago. And it is if
we don't act, we are going to see much of
college sports decimated and destroyed. And so last week I
introduced bipartisan legislation with Maria Cantwell. Maria Cantwell's a Democrat
from Washington State. She is the ranking member of the
senior Democrat on the Senate Commerce Committee. I'm the chairman
(21:51):
of the Senate Commerce Committee. This week, we had a
big hearing and we heard testimony from leaders in college
athletics about the urgency of solving the crisis. Now, one
of our witnesses was coach Nick Saban, the legendary coach
of Alabama, and Coach Saban's testimony was incredibly powerful and
(22:12):
give a listen to a little bit of Coach Nick
Saban on why Congress needs to pass or protect College
Sports Act.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
All right, let's play for you Nick Saban. Part of
what he had to say in front of your committee hearing.
It truly was impressive to hear him talk about sports,
especially in front of Congress.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
Take a listen, Cooba.
Speaker 6 (22:31):
Let me give you the history. My first year, we
had collective at Alabama two point seven million. Next year
seven million, next year ten million. I've retired. Next year
of seventeen million, next year twenty four million. Now you
have schools that have close to forty million dollar rosters.
So if we continue to do that, we're gonna lose
Olympic sports, We're gonna lose non revenue sports, We're gonna
(22:53):
lose scholarships, and basically what's going to happen is we're
going to have football and basketball succeed, and we'll have
clubs sports for everything else.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
He's not wrong, by the way, Center, I was in
one of those non money making sports tennis, right, You
had a lot of friends that you get to know
that are in those Olympic sports, for example, that would
all disappear. And when you think about having a college
roster at eighty million, if you're a student athlete, that
in theory sounds great, but that's only in two sports.
Really the majority of that eighty you know you're talking
(23:23):
about Alabama. I mean, there's not that much in basketball,
I promise you at Alabama. So unless you pick football,
you're left behind. And that's the reason why you're taking
this action now and why Saban was saying what he
was saying at the time.
Speaker 3 (23:35):
Well, and that there's only a handful of powerhouses that
generate and can dominate football, and so what if we
don't act. I think within five years we will see
thirty to fifty colleges that have a football program and
they'll basically be an NFL and the rest of the
schools that their programs will be obliterated and There are
(23:57):
a lot of reasons that's tragic. One is just sports
brings us together. Sports is so much fun. Look, we're
divided on so many issues today. We scream at each
other where we're like it really is hard to.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
Find common ground.
Speaker 3 (24:09):
And yet you can go cheer on your alma mater
and you can be there with people of different parties,
people of different races, people have different religions, and you're
all standing together. That's really important. Every bit as critical
as that is. College sports is an amazing avenue for
education for millions of young men and women. And until
(24:30):
I really started diving in to this topic and working
to save college sports, I hadn't really focused on how
college athletics is something that is unique in the United States.
No other country has anything remotely resembling what we have
here with college sports. There are today more than a
(24:50):
half million college athletes right now.
Speaker 5 (24:55):
Every year.
Speaker 3 (24:56):
Athletics enables kids, many kids from low income homes, many
minority kids, who otherwise might not have had a chance
to go to college. It enables them to go to
college to study, to get a degree, to learn skills,
to learn hard work and discipline and teamwork and sportsmanship.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
Accountability just showing up.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
I can't tell you how much I learned from just
the accountability, which, by the way, it made me a
better person. It made me better in business, It made
me better in my job that I did afterwards. There
are so many young men when I was at Old
Miss that said, they literally believe they would either have
been dead, they would have been in a gang if
it wasn't for sports keeping them out of trouble in
(25:39):
high school. And then they said, if it wasn't for
college and getting that college education, they would have immediately
been into bad stuff on the streets. They said that
sports actually saved their life, and not only say their life.
A lot of them they were the first member of
their family to ever go to college, and they went
because they were an incredible athlete. It gave them the opportunity,
it gave them a free education, it seemed unattainable, and
(26:00):
it completely changed their families trajectory in life. I think
that's one of the most important things about college sports
that people don't talk about now.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
That is exactly right, and the status quo is unsustainable.
If Congress doesn't act, we will end up with hundreds
of thousands of those college athletic positions going away, and
those kids, many of them having no chance to go
to school, to go to college to get those skills,
those life skills that set them up for success. And
(26:31):
look the way I approach this, I didn't worry too
much about about the top one percent. I didn't worry
about the Michael Jordan's or arch mannings. I worried about
the ninety nine percent of college athletes who are never
going to play pro ball, but it's giving them opportunity.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I had a ton of people Centator that were calling me.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
I had friends and people I've known the past come
out of that would work because they knew how important
this bill was. They knew how important it was to you.
Asking me questions. There was a lot of people saying
they're just not gonna be able to get this done.
There's no way you'll get by parsonship here. That seems
to not be true. And they said, well, there's no
way even though he'll be able to get the White
House behind it.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
That also doesn't seem to be true either.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
There is a lot of growing by parson support here
to get this thing done.
Speaker 3 (27:11):
Well, there is, And I worked for months. Rick Cantwell
and I negotiated. We sat in the conference room six
eight hours a day negotiating provision by provision by provision.
We introduced it with Cantwell and myself a Democrat and Republican,
and also with Eric Schmidt, a Republican from Missouri, and
Chris Coon's a Democrat from Delaware. So we had two Democrats,
(27:33):
two Republicans on the bill, and we've seen phenomenal.
Speaker 5 (27:37):
Support for it.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
So the ACC has come out emphatically in support of it,
The Big Twelve has come out emphatically and support of it.
Condoleeza Rice at Stanford has come out emphatically in support
of it. At the hearing, Pete Bavaqua, the athletic director
at Notre Dame, testified strongly in support of it. Gordon
Gee testified at the hearing, former president of West Virginia
(28:00):
University also Vanderbilt, has been a president of actually five universities.
Speaker 5 (28:05):
He testified that this is a.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
Crisis and this bill is the only hope to save
college sports. And we've had already, We've had over one
hundred and thirty signatures from leaders at more than sixty
five universities come out in support of the bill, and importantly,
this week President Donald J. Trump came out strongly in
support of the bill. He's he sent a truth social
(28:29):
that I want to read to you. Here's what he said.
College sports, a great American institution that produces our many athletes, leaders,
and Olympic dominance, is a total mess, and everyone is
saying that it must be fixed. After uninny lawsuits and
crazed rulings, there are virtually no limits anymore, and soon
most colleges won't have sports because each and every one
(28:49):
of them will be bankrupt, never to be heard from again.
Women's sports and the Olympics itself are in the most
danger from this catastrophic situation. College sports are turning into
pro sports, except with absolutely no rules, a result no
one wants. University presidents, conference commissioners, student athletes, coaches, and
(29:11):
athletic directors all complained to me that it has become
a disaster after years of no action, and that schools
were losing hundreds of millions of dollars a year. They
compared it to a freight train that can't be stopped.
That is why a few months ago I convened a
roundtable bringing together were a world class team as some
(29:32):
of the best sports executives, student athletes, and political leaders
in our country. The goal was to find a bipartisan
solution to fix the problem. Based on these meetings and
the expertise of the leading authorities, I signed an executive order,
but I always said that the best solution was to
get a bipartisan act through Congress to my desk in
(29:54):
order to save a long and embarrassing road through Hell
for the these institutions. I'd like to thank Senators Ted Cruz,
Eric Schmidt, Maria Cantwell, and Chris Coons, among others, for
introducing the Protect College Sports Act. This law resolves many
of the most urgent issues challenging our universities and student athletes,
(30:16):
stops the chaos, and most importantly, it may be the
last chance to save college sports and colleges themselves before
it's too late. The House has worked long and hard
on this issue as well, and I'm very grateful to
Speaker Mike Johnson and Leader Steve Scalise for their work
to fix this very major problem. I urge the House
(30:36):
and Senate to come together to pass a final bipartisan
law that I can sign this summer that reflects the
views and input of both chambers and in all caps,
we have to save college sports. Thank you for your
attention to this matter, President Donald J.
Speaker 5 (30:54):
Trump.
Speaker 3 (30:55):
The support we're seeing is really significant, and I think
we're going to see, hope and believe, a big bipartisan
vote in the Senate behind this bill.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Well, what's the timeline now and how much is there
going to be people pushing since now this has become so,
you know, such a big discussion to try to change
things the last minute. Is that going to be a
problem and what does that look like?
Speaker 3 (31:16):
Oh, look, that is going on, and there are a
handful of people that are criticizing and throwing rocks, But
I'll tell you most people are shocked that we could
actually find a bipartisan compromise and and and listen, one
of the natures of that. That means that that I
had to give quite a bit and and the Democrats
had to give quite a bit to find a common
(31:38):
ground because we can't pass this bill unless you get
at least sixty votes in the Senate. That means you
need at least seven Democrats. There are only fifty three Republicans.
And my objective, frankly, is to get a lot more
than sixty votes. I'd like to see a big bipartisan
vote come out of the Senate. The House has tried
several times to fix this problem, and unfortunately, every time
(32:01):
they try to take up a bill, it's failed in
the House. And so I think the Senate has got
to step in because the clock is ticking. And I
will say that there's a real risk also of the
biggest players coming together to form a super league, and
I think that would be disastrous for everybody else and
(32:22):
not good for fans. Let's take my home state of Texas.
Look my home state of Texas. If Congress does nothing
in three to five years, I am certain that the
University of Texas will survive, and I'm certain A and
M will survive. They're so big, they have such a
big donor base and alumni base that they'll survive no
matter what happens. But it's not at all clear that
(32:44):
the other players in Texas survive. It's not clear that
TCU or SMU or University of Houston or Rice or
Texas Tech or Baylor, all of the different programs in
Texas they could go under in the status quo, and
I think that would be a terrible outcome if we
lose historic programs all over Texas, not just football, but
(33:04):
when you lose football, football pays for all the other sports.
So when you lose football, you end up losing the
entire array of sports. That would be tragic and we
can't let it happen.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Yeah, you're absolutely right there.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
If people want to get behind this legislation, is this
one of those where they talk to their senators and
their congressman.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Who do they need to contact quickly?
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Look, the first order of business is your senator and
urging your senator, whether your senator is a Republican or Democrat,
urging your senator get behind this bill, the Bipartisan Protect
College Sports Act. There's an urgency. I am hoping to
move quickly on this. I'd like to get a big
vote in the Senate. Once we get it out of
the Senate, then the next step will be the House.
(33:44):
But calling your senator, going on social media, speaking out
and saying that sports, college sports should be saved, that's
really valuable.
Speaker 1 (33:53):
As always, thank you for listening to Verdict with Senator
Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you don't forget to deal
with my podcast and you can listen to my podcast
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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