October 17, 2025 • 36 mins
Hour 1 of today’s Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show dives into major breaking news and sharp political analysis. The program opens with discussion of a dramatic strike on a suspected cartel drug submersible off the coast of Venezuela, signaling an intensifying real-world war on drugs. Clay and Buck preview an upcoming conversation with former Navy SEAL and podcast host Dave Rutherford for expert insight on special operations and the evolving threat in the Caribbean.
The hour’s centerpiece is the bombshell indictment of former National Security Advisor John Bolton on charges related to the transmission and retention of national defense information. Buck explains the gravity of the allegations, noting Bolton allegedly kept top-secret material and wrote detailed diary entries from classified meetings for a future book deal.
The hosts break down the legal complexities, including the “graymail” defense, the role of secure facilities (SCIFs), and why Bolton’s case differs from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago documents controversy. They also compare Bolton’s situation to Hillary Clinton’s email scandal and Joe Biden’s classified document mishandling, highlighting what they call a double standard in DOJ enforcement.
Clay and Buck then pivot to the political fallout from Democrats’ handling of President Biden’s cognitive decline. They spotlight comments from Charlamagne tha God, who blasted Democrats for lying about Biden’s fitness for office, asking, “If they lied about Joe Biden, how can you trust them on anything?” The hosts critique Rep. Eric Swalwell’s inflammatory claim that “Republicans are for cancer,” calling it a childish and dishonest argument. This segment underscores growing cracks in Democratic messaging and previews how figures like Gavin Newsom may benefit from distancing themselves from the Biden administration.
Additional discussion touches on the looming government shutdown, the Virginia attorney general race, and the broader implications of prosecutorial power in America—arguing that aggressive investigations can manufacture charges against anyone. The hour closes with listener humor and a tease for upcoming segments on the New York City mayoral debate and Venezuela’s escalating crisis.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome everybody. Friday edition of the Clay Travis end Buck
(00:02):
Sexton Show gets going right now and we have much
to discussed. You have another strike on a suspected cartel
drug vessel off the coast of Venezuela and the Caribbean.
This time around there are survivors. I think this was
an undersea meaning submersible like a It's like a submarine,
(00:26):
but just a few feet below the surface. That's my understanding.
So we will talk a bit more about what's going
on with this war, a real war on drug It's
not just a metaphorical war on drugs. This is real
war on drug stuff. And we'll talk to our friend,
former Davy Seal Dave Rutherford about this later on. He well,
he knows about special operations for sure. He's also a
(00:46):
host in the Clay and Buck podcast network, so we'll
have a conversation with him. We've also gotten Nicole Parker
in the third hour. She's a former FBI agent, and
we'll talk to her about everything going on over at
the bureau, the Kombe indictment, and also, yes, the big
news story of the day today, which is the indictment
(01:07):
of former National Security advisor Bolton. So John Bolton is
now facing a whole lot of charges relating to transmission
of and retention of national defense information. This is going
(01:28):
to be already play. It's a case that has a
lot of people speaking about the politics involved, and they're
talking about this whole situation as though it is just
Trump doing things that he shouldn't be doing and trying
to settle scores. Okay, I read the indictment and it
(01:50):
primarily relates to John Bolton going home from his job
as National Security Advisor, where you see you can see
anything near the National Security Advisor, meaning you're cleared for
the most sensitive compartmented stuff, covert actions in foreign countries,
very sensitive collection methods, you know, you name it, right,
(02:13):
I mean the nuclear arsenal, whatever you want to know.
When you're NSA, you can know, and you are seeing
that stuff on a daily basis. Bolton was going home
Clay while he was serving as Trump's National Security Advisor
and writing a diary of all of his conversations so
that he could put it in a book. Now, that
(02:35):
is bizarre behavior. And I would tell you that if
I had a friend in the national security world who said, hey,
I've got a plan. I'm going to just sit and
classified briefings and reclassified stuff all day, and then I'm
going to go home and I'm going to relay what
I I mean, when I was at CIA, they said,
(02:56):
you don't talk to your family about what we're doing here.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Yeah, they brought it to me.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
By the way, not having been in the CIA, it
seems like that's kind of important for top secret information.
Like when I would go home if I got a
call from my mom when I and I was just
a lowly analyst, but if I got a call from
my mom, I was like, you know, mom, we're working
on this this sensitive counter terrorism platform and we're gonna
be able to blow up bad guys in this province
(03:22):
because of it. And man, I hit some bureaucracy on
that one, like no, you don't do that. Now they're
saying in the indictment that the stuff that.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
He was relaying Clay would be classified up to the
top secret sci compartmented level. So I mean, this is
they're saying, it's very sensitive stuff. And they lay out, now,
this is interesting. You can't see the information right because
then you're they're sharing classify with everybody. So there's a
little bit of taking the government's word for it that
(03:51):
has to go on here. They call this the gray
mail defense, where they say, well, if people could only
know that this information is what you're talking about, it's
actually not that sensitive. So that's going to be one
of the ways they fight on this. The other thing
is going to be I've seen reporting that there were
marked classified documents in his home, but essentially the primary
(04:12):
part of the indictment is that he was writing down
stuff from his meetings that was clearly classified, emailing it
to family members, and preparing it in a diary every day,
and that is I think he's got some big problems here.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
So this is one of those things where.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
It's almost not that complicated of a case to prove
it would be my analysis as someone who has never
been involved in top secret documents. You've talked about this before, that,
for instance, Joe Biden taking things out as a senator
that are marked top secret and storing it in his
garage and bragging about it on tape with his autobiographer,
(04:54):
that these are things that are relatively easy to prove
because their form of strict liability. You either did or
did not do it, And so the intent matters less.
I haven't seen there are eighteen counts brought in this indictment.
Unlike we saw with Letitia James, and unlike we saw
(05:16):
with James Comey, I haven't seen the same level of
oh my goodness, this is a unbelievable act by Trump.
And I think it's because one, this investigation started under
Joe Biden, and then I would suspect bucks, see if
you sign off on this or co sign on this.
As soon as they realized that Joe Biden had classified documents,
(05:40):
they really started waving their arms and saying, let's just
this class if I remember initially when mar A Lago
they took a picture of it on the ground and
everybody just grabbed their pearls and fell on their fainting couch.
Even though Trump had been the president to talk about
how this was an unbelievable jeopardy of national security and
this was very very serious and there's no way that
(06:01):
Trump was going to be able to escape prosecution on it.
And then you remember when they found out that Biden
had all these classified documents, not just in his home
garage beside the corvette, but also I think in his
office at university of Pennsylvania and in his office in Washington,
d C. And they just kept finding all these classified documents.
The idea that classified documents and having them was a
(06:24):
crime that was one of the greatest that could be
committed by anyone in our nation.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
They just basically stopped.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
And so I think they were smart enough to recognize
they couldn't prosecute John Bolton because Joe Biden has had
his own classified documents. But this was an investigation that
to a large extent, was taking place while Joe Biden
was president and the raid, remember even the criticism of
the early morning raid, which now we know it appears
(06:50):
they found documents that are indicative of crimes being committed.
I don't feel like everybody's lining up to argue this
is a this is Trump exceeding the bounds of presidential authority.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I will tell you the Wall Street Journal, to my surprise,
went all out on Bolton's defense, pretty much on their
real age.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
They did.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Yes, Wall Street Journal has been breaking with Trump on
a number of things. I think they're a little bit
bitter over there because their consensus on trade stuff has
really undermined. That's a core competency. You would think for
the Wall Street Journal, and I think Trump on trade
has looked a lot savvier than they gave him credit for,
(07:31):
and a lot of their warnings have seemed like they
were incorrect. So there's that. But yeah, they went all
in on defense of John Bolton on this when they're
saying this is clearly a political effectively political payback because
Bolton was such a critic of the Trump administration. Now
it's interesting because the Biden administration dropped this probe, and
(07:54):
I think you might be able to see or argue
that Biden's team dropped the probe because he was such
a Trump critic. They're like, oh, well, this guy, we
kind of like what he's doing. Former National Security advisor
is sticking his thumb in Trump's eye, and you know,
let's let's let this keep going. The defense though for
both and as I see, it is going to be
a couple of things. One and I see different things
(08:17):
on this. If he had marked classified documents at home,
he's going to have to take a plea deal unless
there's gonna be much way.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
To really defend.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
For your perspective, Trump's defense was I'm president, so I
can declassify anything. Now people try to argue against it.
But Bolton, as his positions, does not have that as
a potential defense. Direc there's no defense of he had
a skiff. This comes up in the indictment, a secure
compartmented information facility, a little secure room where he was
allowed to have classified.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
In his home. And and he also got hacked by
the Iranians, I might add on his personal email, so
that comes up in this too. This is all the indictment.
But he was allowed to have classify documents at his home,
and then he wasn't when the skiff, when he no
longer had that government job, the skiff essentially goes away,
as does your right to have any classified documents at home. Okay,
(09:11):
so what he's going to say is my recollections of
meetings I did not believe to be classified information, and
nobody else would think it's classified information. And what I
put in the book got cleared through the White House,
So clearly it's not classified information in some cases or
(09:32):
maybe in all cases, because you know this is this
goes to what Komy did as well. Contemporaneous notes of
a classified discussion can or can you know can be
or aren't necessarily classified?
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Right, so let me, let me, let me pause you there,
because I this is me putting on my lawyer hat.
If I can't take the actual classified documents out because
it would be a crime, it doesn't make sense to
me that I can take a yellow legal pad in
and write down what's on the classified documents, yes, and
(10:08):
then take it outside of my house.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
And let me explain if everybody out there listening.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
If my yellow legal pad was stolen, which recited the
information that was on a classified document, the practical impact
of an enemy getting the information is the same whether
it's written on my yellow legal pad or shared in
an email or anything else, as it would be if
I was in physical possession of the document itself. Right,
(10:33):
So for me, that's a distinction that should not be
a difference of magnitude from a practical perspective.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
That is correct. The fundamentally the information is what is classified, correct,
It is not the marketing. And this came up with
the Hillary thing too, right, because she says, well, it
wasn't mark classified. Now in Hillary's case, they were xeroxing
classified and putting it in the emails. I mean that
she absolutely broke national defense law. She absolutely could have
(11:04):
and should have been prosecuted, no question. Okay, that was
actually like open and shutcase as much as everyone at
the time because they wanted her to be president. Try
to defend from the Democrat side on this side, or
rather on this case both In is going to say,
the things that I wrote down were not actually classified
from those meetings, and the things that I wrote down
(11:28):
were the basis for a book that was cleared by
the White House. Therefore nothing is actually like he's just
going to argue the information isn't classified, and this becomes
a tough case for the government because the government has
to convince people that it is classified.
Speaker 4 (11:43):
Now.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
I think the jury will be able to see.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
This this I don't know.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Some have never been involved in a classified case, but
I don't understand how you could convict someone without showing
what was classified that the person had in their possession,
even though to your point, that further exposes national security
because twelve random people on a jury suddenly get the
news about whatever classified documents that Bolton was holding, which
(12:10):
would theoretically allow even more of a national security issue.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
I mean, this is where this is a little bit
like the pornography. I know it when I see it
classified to those who have held the clearance, you know
when you see it. You know, if Bolton was going
home writing down from his meetings, which he very well
could have, Oh, we're going to do a strike tomorrow
on Abu Jihad in this country using you know hell
(12:33):
fire missiles which were launching out of this allied country's
you know airspace. That's very very classified.
Speaker 5 (12:41):
Right.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
The fact that it's not Mark classified as he writes
it down does not change because to your point, well,
then I could sit there in this I could sit
there and Langley and read about all the covert actions
and then just get on a phone and call somebody
and talk about it and like I'm not My words
aren't Mark classific. The information is what is classified, and
it is your responsibility, as somebody with access to it
(13:03):
to know. You know where these lines are and what
you where you can operate well. And this is where
I come back to. I understand the importance of taking notes.
I mean every lawyer does.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
It's why I do the entire show every day on
yellow legal pads, right, that's all I have. But those notes,
if they are truly classified information, should not be able
to leave a secure place your brain should be the
place where you keep extremely classified information.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Well, I think again, I think that what he was doing,
Clay was going home and writing a diary entry based
on his meetings. Yeah, so it's not contemporaneous in the
meeting notes. I think I got it. I might have
to go back and check this in the indictment, because
you know, I had to read the whole thing this morning.
My sense is he was creating diary entries day to day, which,
(13:55):
by the way, the notion that you would create a
diary like this when you're the national secut your advisor
so you can write a book is so gross. It's
not about your book that no one's going to read. Like,
you're supposed to be keeping Americans safe and protecting our interests.
This thing, This goes to a lot of things, and
everybody listening is out of clearance, knows what I'm going
to say. There's this idea the like people actually doing
(14:18):
the work every day in the national security apparatus, military side,
civilian side, they are expected to be perfect with all
this stuff or their lives are ruined. But when you
get to be senior enough, it's all about whatever publishing house.
You know, wants to give you the biggest book deal,
and that matters more than the law and your oath,
and I think people are sick of that. And this
(14:39):
this is there's the legal aspect of his claim. There's
also the it's kind of just gross. The way that
he was doing this was just gross because it was
all meant to hit Trump too. So he's working for Trump,
trying to undermine Trump, using national security information to do it.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I think that's one hundred percent correct, and so
again I will be curious to see how this plays out,
but not a not a strong position in general to
break down. I mean, I think beyond a shadow of
a doubt, so John Bolton latest, I think the question
(15:15):
is how many more people are going to get charges
brought and how many of these people are eventually going
to get convicted versus a jury pool that is likely
predisposed to not like Trump, although you know Trump's approval
ratings starting to go up, so maybe even in Northern Virginia,
there are people who are having their having their expectations
(15:36):
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Speaker 1 (17:24):
We're gonna have a quick term. We're gonna get into
more on this National Security Advisor Bolton situation, and then
also a little bit more on a shutdown here at
some point you think they are gonna have to reopen
the government, but it's looking like it's pretty uh dug
in on both sides. We will dive into that and
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(18:46):
four eight two four safe. Welcome back in Clay Travis
buck Sexton Show. Appreciate all of you hanging out with
us as we are rolling through the Friday edition of
the program. We mentioned David Rutherford will be with us
at one point thirty to talk some about this seems
to be somewhat escalating situation in Venezuela and what we
should expect to happen there. Also, in the third hour,
(19:08):
Nicole Parker will join us former FBI agent.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
She's got a book out.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
We will see how the Cash Patel and Dan Bongino
led FBI has maybe been changing the culture.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
But I wanted to mention something.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Buck that I saw from one of our iHeart colleagues, Charlottage,
the god Mister of the God, as I believe you
call him, and I think you guys had a meal together,
if I'm not mistaken this summer at a big iHeart event.
He has a large black audience, probably the largest black
audience inside of the iHeart family.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
And he does a popular show out of New York
City and.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Increase very pleasant dinner company, I must say very pleasant.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
Increasingly he is willing to call out the left on
his show, even though that he regularly has the Kamala Harris'
of the world as in studio guests. And I saw
this clip where he was discussing what I think is
going to continue to be a looming issue for many
(20:11):
people who were involved in the Joe Biden administration and
carried water for the idea that Joe Biden was not
physically or mentally capable to do the presidency. He asked
a really pretty basic question, if they lied about Joe Biden,
how can you trust Democrats on anything? Let's play that cut.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I think party after they lied to us so long
about Bredident Biden.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
I think that Democrats have tried every strategy except for
two things.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Honesty encourage.
Speaker 6 (20:39):
Well, there's a lot of people who are courageous right
now in the Democratic Party. Our bread and butter issue
are danced with. The one that brought you is healthcare.
People have always trusted us on healthcare. That's our issue,
from President Johnson to President Obama to when Donald Trump
tried to take it away. That's how we won the
House in twenty eighteen. And now this reconciliation bill is
going to take fourteen million people off their health care.
(21:01):
We're not only going to protect healthcare, because I think
protecting health care is not enough. We need to invest
in cures. And these mothers are firing cancer doctors. So
we have a real clean contrast. We're for cures, they're
for cancer.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Who is that? Who is the guy who was talking
with him, that was Swallwell. I was like, who is
who is the d bag guy? I mean, give me a.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
Break, I mean he is just Swallwell.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So, first of all, Charlemagne, I think speaking some measure
of truth, even if you are the most died in
the wall left wing legacy media consumer. The idea that
Democrats are for cures and Republicans are for cancer is
I mean, that's good take, But I agree.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
I think that a lack of honesty and lack of
courage is a fundamental and central problem for the Democrat Party.
And I think that for a Democrat, Charlemagne or any
other to bring that up and speak to that is
an effort to actually write the ship of the Democrat Party,
especially after the Biden lying fiasco, which all the establishment
Democrats have had to fess up to you, they all
(22:10):
lied about this, They didn't believe it, they lied about it.
Okay for Swowell to say Republicans want to give people cancer?
What a I'm trying to think of things we can
say on the radio.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
I just I don't even I think that Swowell is
really bad at communication and also arguments, And basically that's
the entire.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Job of politics.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
I think you're saying that Swalwell is just kind of dumb.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
I think for a lot of these guys, the question
is are they dumb or are they just willing to
say whatever is necessary and not smart enough to understand
how devastating the CounterPunch is this tight end buck, did
you see the Virginia Democrat Party called out and win
some seers because there's an email thread, sorry, a text
(22:58):
message thread that turned into a political story about young
people saying sometimes inappropriate things on this text thread that
somebody then leaked and they said, when are you going
to condemn this? Basically win some seers and win some
seers said, yeah, I unequivocally condemdemn this. When are you
going to talk? And we'll talk some more during the
course of the program about Jay Jones, the Attorney General.
(23:20):
And so I look at some of these things, and
I know you think about it all.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
The time too.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
Some people can only throw punches, and if you like
boxing at all, there is a value in being an
attacker and being able to throw punches. But what is
most devastating to me in boxing and also in politics,
it isn't the punch it's the CounterPunch. And so if
(23:46):
you are trying to throw a punch, I think you
expose yourself and your lack of understanding of an issue
if you aren't able to have the mits up to
think about opening yourself up to the devast stating CounterPunch.
And I think Swollwell constantly gets knocked out by the
counter punch. I think what he's relying on, and I
(24:08):
think what a lot of these Democrats rely on is
no one sees the counter punch. All they care about
is the punch.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Well with Swowell, with the with what he's saying here.
First of all, the more people learn about healthcare, specifically Obamacare,
the more they realize it.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Is a disaster complete.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
All the things that conservatives said about this, and I
was one of them fifteen years ago or roughly what
is it, thirteen years ago? Now, all the things that
we said about this true. It's not going to bring
costs down. It's going to make costs much worse. Illegals
will get access to care because you know, we'll get
access greed, we'll get their care paid for because of this,
and it's just going to destroy health insurance even more
(24:45):
under the pretense of it's making everyone's health insurance better
and cheaper, which was all I. But beyond that, there
are the arguments that someone can say to us, hey,
you know when they do these when they do these
ice raids, it's really upsetting to some people who are
illegals and they're not bad people, and it's and it
(25:05):
you know, they they're they're paying a price here, and
it's really sad. And to enforce the law, you're gonna
make some families cry over this one. And that is
a cost. Now, it's a cost that I am willing
for the government to bear. But that is a legitimate cost.
That is someone saying, you know, hey, you're really going
to make people upset by enforcing our immigration laws. And
(25:27):
there are going to be people that you know, emotionally
are going to pull on your heartstrings when they're deported.
Not talking about the gang members and the bad people,
but just in general. And you know, that's a real
cost that I say. Okay, our side says, yeah, but
we have to have sovereignty and we have to have laws. Clay,
neither you, nor I, nor anybody else is pro cancer,
and to make an argument like that is just childish.
(25:49):
It's just dumb and for swallwell to go there. That's
not a cost that we're in favor of, Like this
is that's not a real thing. But it's like calling
Trump voters and Nazis when Trump is the most popular
president from the standpoint of Israel in American history. Like
it's just it's not a real argument. It's fantasyland stuff.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
Yeah, And I do think the question that Charlemagne asked
is one that the persuadable, reasonable universe of voters, which
let's be honest, is probably no more than twenty percent,
maybe it's ten percent, fifteen percent of American voters.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
It's one that I think it's going to be very.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
Difficult for Democrats to get past because if you will
lie to me about the most important question is the
president qualified to do the job or not? Then how
can I trust you to be honest with me on
any questions. And it's one that I think candidly is
a very real issue that Democrats are going to have.
(26:51):
And the closer you were connected to Joe Biden, the
more difficult it's going to be to distinguish yourself, whether
that's Kamala Harris, whether that's may Pete It's why I
think Gavin Newsom is actually going to benefit off of this,
because he can say, Hey, I was out in California,
I didn't know. I think if you were in the
cabinet with Joe Biden to the extent that media are
(27:12):
willing to ask you questions, I think it's going to
be difficult for you to argue that you weren't aware
of how much he cognitively declined.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
This reminds me of the enormous luck that Barack Obama
had in running for the Democrat primary, which was because
he wasn't really in the game. He can say, no,
I think the Iraq War was a disaster and it
wasn't my fault, unlike Hillary. Now, was that because Barack
Obama was some genius who went against the current of
(27:41):
his time that was voting for the Iraq War. No,
but he was lucky, right, And you know, you take
the wins that are given to you. And the same
thing is true of Gavin Newsom because he wasn't involved
at all in the Biden Kamala administration. He is clear
of the stink of lying about Biden's dementia is not clear,
by the way, and I think Gavin would go I
(28:03):
think he'd go out.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
I think he'd go after over that. I think so too.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
There's been a lot of talk about the toxicity of
that relationship. I would just also point out that's how
Trump benefited too. Now, Trump was on the record as
being skeptical of the Iraq War in general, But the
first time that I really noticed Trump was in that
summer twenty fifteen debate when he called out George W.
Bush and Dick Cheney. Because now, I think most people
(28:28):
are aware that the Iraq War was a poor decision
and we should have never gone in the way that
we did, and we shouldn't have spent the money that
we did. I think that's general consensus view. In twenty fifteen,
that was not the consensus view for a Republican candidate
to be willing to utter. And I think a lot
(28:49):
of people took note of that that Trump was willing
to criticize a bad decision that the Bush administration had made. Now,
did it partly help him go after Jeb Bush, who
was the establishment can ended it at that point in time,
the continuation of the Bush dynasty politically, yes, But I
think also Trump was right and nailed it bringing us.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
Back here to the Bolton situation, the indictment of Trump's
former national security advisor, but both in big neocon, big hawk,
big interventionist, a very bad choice for Trump. Under NSA,
Trump admits that he made some beat. You go to
war with the army you have, and you run an
(29:33):
administration with the people that you know of who have
had these jobs at least the first time around. So
he had he had a learning curve, There's no question
about it. And here he is reacting to John Bolton's indictment.
This is cup one play.
Speaker 7 (29:46):
It just indicted by a Brandur and Maryland. Do you
have a reaction to that.
Speaker 5 (29:53):
I didn't know that, you tell me for the first time.
But I think he's, you know, a bad person. I
think he's a guy. Yeah, he's a bad guy, too bad.
But that's the where it goes. That's the way it goes, right,
that's the way it goes. Well I want him, No,
I haven't. I haven't, But I just think he's a
bad person.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
We'll see, you know one thing that I do want
to be. There's a lot of voices out there, Clay,
They're saying, oh, this is about reprisal. Or whatever. Hold
on a second. The law is the law or it's not.
And I'm gonna tell you we actually got into this
thing on the right where, for example, with Hillary, Hillary
absolutely broke the law with the way that she was
conducting her emails and everything else. No question, there is
(30:35):
a specific recklessness continue you know, component of the statute
that she violated in the espionage back recklessness, right, So
what she did was absolutely reckless for a secretary of state,
there's no question. I mean, otherwise, there's no such thing
as reckless. But we said all for politics and whatever
Trump said this, we'll let it go. All is saying
(30:56):
I would not be okay with this administration. I don't
care who it is. I would not be okay if
I felt like the DOJ was fabricating crimes, you know,
or or pretending people did things, or pretending they violated
laws when they didn't. But if you're just enforcing the law,
why is that. It's the removal of special treatment that
(31:18):
we're actually talking about here. It's not getting bad treatment
because Trump doesn't like you. It's sorry, you actually broke
the law. True of Letitia James as well.
Speaker 3 (31:27):
Well, it's it's also just a response to deciding that
Trump was going to be indicted in four different places.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
They what I mean, that removed the.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Special treatment that he should have gotten as a former
president quote unquote special treatment, and they actually were fabricating
crimes against him. I do not believe that. I mean,
the thing that happened in New York was completely insane.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Yeah, and not only that, while they were prosecuting Trump
for everything, they had Joe Biden dead to write, and
Robert Hurr led him off because he said he didn't
have the mental capacity for a jury to convict him,
even though he was dead to rights on holding classified
(32:07):
documents and did not have the presidential privilege at all
because at that point in time he had been a
senator and vice president. But the fact that Robert Hurr's
decision was, yes, he committed crimes, but because his brain
is so broken, no jury would convict him. By the way,
(32:27):
he may have been right, but that was the guy
who was the president of the United States. So they
were even still letting Biden off under the pre existing
Hillary standards while throwing the book at Trump.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Is exactly right. And this is what is so essential
what you are seeing with Trump thus far, with whether
it's Letitia James or Komy or this is a we're
all going to be held to the same standard standard. Yes,
we're not going to have they can make up stuff. Again,
the New York thing was an absolute fabrication crime of crime.
(33:01):
Nothing wrong there. It was completely absurd. I can argue
on the other ones too that they're but you know,
the New York thing was just completely out of outrageous
and specifically the most outrageous I think. And now what
we're saying is okay, well, Democrats, when you actually break
the law, we're going to hold you accountable. Yes, I
(33:21):
don't see what the problem is. In fact, I think
there'd be a problem not doing this. And by the way,
what you're also recognizing is something we've talked about on
this program for a long time. If you bring your microscope,
if you bring your spyglass, and you aggressively investigate anybody,
there is a prosecutor who can make a case against them.
(33:43):
The amount of prosecutorial power that we have embedded in
a criminal justice system, irrespective Democrat, Republic and independent, every
single person out there with us right now you can
think you have lived the most honest, transparent, completely in
compliance with every You can write something down on your
(34:04):
books that you paid off totally legally, Clay, and all
of a sudden you're facing thirty seven felony counts.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
Correct, They can't find a crime for any of you
out there. I really believe this if they investigated you
vociferously and aggressively.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
As they did Trump.
Speaker 5 (34:20):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Look this weekend, Caro and I are having some steaks.
I'm actually going shooting on Saturday and I'm gonna be
having some steaks Saturday night. They're gonna be sizzling, they're
gonna be juicy, they're gonna be delicious, and they're gonna
be Good Ranchers. Good Ranchers delivers amazing steaks, burgers, chicken,
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Speaker 4 (35:23):
Peek out with the guys on the Sunday Hang with
Clay and Buck podcast, a new episode every Sunday.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
Find it on the iHeart app or wherever you get
your podcasts. Welcome back in Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
It's Friday.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
We'll get to some of your reactions, such as AA,
I remember seeing this as I got ready for the show.
I don't remember exactly what was said, but I do
know it was funny what we got here.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Podcast listener Jim.
Speaker 7 (35:50):
Wisdom that sharks do not attack lawyers due to professional courtesy,
So if a shart ever approaches you, simply show him
your barcard. You should be.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
Fine very well if you couldn't hear Jim very well.
There he was saying, lawyers don't attack sharks. Sorry, sharks
don't attack lawyers as a part of professional courtesy.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
So yes, a little bit of humor there.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Well, dude, there is a lawyer joke, a shark joke,
and a dad joke all at the same.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Into one good that's a good, good job by Jim.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
There we come back, Buck, Your home city of New
York is in serious trouble. The New York City Mayor's
race debate happened last night. So did, by the way,
the Virginia Attorney General debate. We got cuts from both
of those. Plus ourbuddy David Rutherford on the latest in Venezuela.
What should we know about what's going on there? All
that next
Welcome everybody. Friday edition of the Clay Travis end Buck
(00:02):
Sexton Show gets going right now and we have much
to discussed. You have another strike on a suspected cartel
drug vessel off the coast of Venezuela and the Caribbean.
This time around there are survivors. I think this was
an undersea meaning submersible like a It's like a submarine,
(00:26):
but just a few feet below the surface. That's my understanding.
So we will talk a bit more about what's going
on with this war, a real war on drug It's
not just a metaphorical war on drugs. This is real
war on drug stuff. And we'll talk to our friend,
former Davy Seal Dave Rutherford about this later on. He well,
he knows about special operations for sure. He's also a
(00:46):
host in the Clay and Buck podcast network, so we'll
have a conversation with him. We've also gotten Nicole Parker
in the third hour. She's a former FBI agent, and
we'll talk to her about everything going on over at
the bureau, the Kombe indictment, and also, yes, the big
news story of the day today, which is the indictment
(01:07):
of former National Security advisor Bolton. So John Bolton is
now facing a whole lot of charges relating to transmission
of and retention of national defense information. This is going
(01:28):
to be already play. It's a case that has a
lot of people speaking about the politics involved, and they're
talking about this whole situation as though it is just
Trump doing things that he shouldn't be doing and trying
to settle scores. Okay, I read the indictment and it
(01:50):
primarily relates to John Bolton going home from his job
as National Security Advisor, where you see you can see
anything near the National Security Advisor, meaning you're cleared for
the most sensitive compartmented stuff, covert actions in foreign countries,
very sensitive collection methods, you know, you name it, right,
(02:13):
I mean the nuclear arsenal, whatever you want to know.
When you're NSA, you can know, and you are seeing
that stuff on a daily basis. Bolton was going home
Clay while he was serving as Trump's National Security Advisor
and writing a diary of all of his conversations so
that he could put it in a book. Now, that
(02:35):
is bizarre behavior. And I would tell you that if
I had a friend in the national security world who said, hey,
I've got a plan. I'm going to just sit and
classified briefings and reclassified stuff all day, and then I'm
going to go home and I'm going to relay what
I I mean, when I was at CIA, they said,
(02:56):
you don't talk to your family about what we're doing here.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Yeah, they brought it to me.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
By the way, not having been in the CIA, it
seems like that's kind of important for top secret information.
Like when I would go home if I got a
call from my mom when I and I was just
a lowly analyst, but if I got a call from
my mom, I was like, you know, mom, we're working
on this this sensitive counter terrorism platform and we're gonna
be able to blow up bad guys in this province
(03:22):
because of it. And man, I hit some bureaucracy on
that one, like no, you don't do that. Now they're
saying in the indictment that the stuff that.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
He was relaying Clay would be classified up to the
top secret sci compartmented level. So I mean, this is
they're saying, it's very sensitive stuff. And they lay out, now,
this is interesting. You can't see the information right because
then you're they're sharing classify with everybody. So there's a
little bit of taking the government's word for it that
(03:51):
has to go on here. They call this the gray
mail defense, where they say, well, if people could only
know that this information is what you're talking about, it's
actually not that sensitive. So that's going to be one
of the ways they fight on this. The other thing
is going to be I've seen reporting that there were
marked classified documents in his home, but essentially the primary
(04:12):
part of the indictment is that he was writing down
stuff from his meetings that was clearly classified, emailing it
to family members, and preparing it in a diary every day,
and that is I think he's got some big problems here.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
So this is one of those things where.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
It's almost not that complicated of a case to prove
it would be my analysis as someone who has never
been involved in top secret documents. You've talked about this before, that,
for instance, Joe Biden taking things out as a senator
that are marked top secret and storing it in his
garage and bragging about it on tape with his autobiographer,
(04:54):
that these are things that are relatively easy to prove
because their form of strict liability. You either did or
did not do it, And so the intent matters less.
I haven't seen there are eighteen counts brought in this indictment.
Unlike we saw with Letitia James, and unlike we saw
(05:16):
with James Comey, I haven't seen the same level of
oh my goodness, this is a unbelievable act by Trump.
And I think it's because one, this investigation started under
Joe Biden, and then I would suspect bucks, see if
you sign off on this or co sign on this.
As soon as they realized that Joe Biden had classified documents,
(05:40):
they really started waving their arms and saying, let's just
this class if I remember initially when mar A Lago
they took a picture of it on the ground and
everybody just grabbed their pearls and fell on their fainting couch.
Even though Trump had been the president to talk about
how this was an unbelievable jeopardy of national security and
this was very very serious and there's no way that
(06:01):
Trump was going to be able to escape prosecution on it.
And then you remember when they found out that Biden
had all these classified documents, not just in his home
garage beside the corvette, but also I think in his
office at university of Pennsylvania and in his office in Washington,
d C. And they just kept finding all these classified documents.
The idea that classified documents and having them was a
(06:24):
crime that was one of the greatest that could be
committed by anyone in our nation.
Speaker 2 (06:28):
They just basically stopped.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
And so I think they were smart enough to recognize
they couldn't prosecute John Bolton because Joe Biden has had
his own classified documents. But this was an investigation that
to a large extent, was taking place while Joe Biden
was president and the raid, remember even the criticism of
the early morning raid, which now we know it appears
(06:50):
they found documents that are indicative of crimes being committed.
I don't feel like everybody's lining up to argue this
is a this is Trump exceeding the bounds of presidential authority.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
I will tell you the Wall Street Journal, to my surprise,
went all out on Bolton's defense, pretty much on their
real age.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
They did.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
Yes, Wall Street Journal has been breaking with Trump on
a number of things. I think they're a little bit
bitter over there because their consensus on trade stuff has
really undermined. That's a core competency. You would think for
the Wall Street Journal, and I think Trump on trade
has looked a lot savvier than they gave him credit for,
(07:31):
and a lot of their warnings have seemed like they
were incorrect. So there's that. But yeah, they went all
in on defense of John Bolton on this when they're
saying this is clearly a political effectively political payback because
Bolton was such a critic of the Trump administration. Now
it's interesting because the Biden administration dropped this probe, and
(07:54):
I think you might be able to see or argue
that Biden's team dropped the probe because he was such
a Trump critic. They're like, oh, well, this guy, we
kind of like what he's doing. Former National Security advisor
is sticking his thumb in Trump's eye, and you know,
let's let's let this keep going. The defense though for
both and as I see, it is going to be
a couple of things. One and I see different things
(08:17):
on this. If he had marked classified documents at home,
he's going to have to take a plea deal unless
there's gonna be much way.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
To really defend.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
For your perspective, Trump's defense was I'm president, so I
can declassify anything. Now people try to argue against it.
But Bolton, as his positions, does not have that as
a potential defense. Direc there's no defense of he had
a skiff. This comes up in the indictment, a secure
compartmented information facility, a little secure room where he was
allowed to have classified.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
In his home. And and he also got hacked by
the Iranians, I might add on his personal email, so
that comes up in this too. This is all the indictment.
But he was allowed to have classify documents at his home,
and then he wasn't when the skiff, when he no
longer had that government job, the skiff essentially goes away,
as does your right to have any classified documents at home. Okay,
(09:11):
so what he's going to say is my recollections of
meetings I did not believe to be classified information, and
nobody else would think it's classified information. And what I
put in the book got cleared through the White House,
So clearly it's not classified information in some cases or
(09:32):
maybe in all cases, because you know this is this
goes to what Komy did as well. Contemporaneous notes of
a classified discussion can or can you know can be
or aren't necessarily classified?
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Right, so let me, let me, let me pause you there,
because I this is me putting on my lawyer hat.
If I can't take the actual classified documents out because
it would be a crime, it doesn't make sense to
me that I can take a yellow legal pad in
and write down what's on the classified documents, yes, and
(10:08):
then take it outside of my house.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
And let me explain if everybody out there listening.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
If my yellow legal pad was stolen, which recited the
information that was on a classified document, the practical impact
of an enemy getting the information is the same whether
it's written on my yellow legal pad or shared in
an email or anything else, as it would be if
I was in physical possession of the document itself. Right,
(10:33):
So for me, that's a distinction that should not be
a difference of magnitude from a practical perspective.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
That is correct. The fundamentally the information is what is classified, correct,
It is not the marketing. And this came up with
the Hillary thing too, right, because she says, well, it
wasn't mark classified. Now in Hillary's case, they were xeroxing
classified and putting it in the emails. I mean that
she absolutely broke national defense law. She absolutely could have
(11:04):
and should have been prosecuted, no question. Okay, that was
actually like open and shutcase as much as everyone at
the time because they wanted her to be president. Try
to defend from the Democrat side on this side, or
rather on this case both In is going to say,
the things that I wrote down were not actually classified
from those meetings, and the things that I wrote down
(11:28):
were the basis for a book that was cleared by
the White House. Therefore nothing is actually like he's just
going to argue the information isn't classified, and this becomes
a tough case for the government because the government has
to convince people that it is classified.
Speaker 4 (11:43):
Now.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
I think the jury will be able to see.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
This this I don't know.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
Some have never been involved in a classified case, but
I don't understand how you could convict someone without showing
what was classified that the person had in their possession,
even though to your point, that further exposes national security
because twelve random people on a jury suddenly get the
news about whatever classified documents that Bolton was holding, which
(12:10):
would theoretically allow even more of a national security issue.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
I mean, this is where this is a little bit
like the pornography. I know it when I see it
classified to those who have held the clearance, you know
when you see it. You know, if Bolton was going
home writing down from his meetings, which he very well
could have, Oh, we're going to do a strike tomorrow
on Abu Jihad in this country using you know hell
(12:33):
fire missiles which were launching out of this allied country's
you know airspace. That's very very classified.
Speaker 5 (12:41):
Right.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
The fact that it's not Mark classified as he writes
it down does not change because to your point, well,
then I could sit there in this I could sit
there and Langley and read about all the covert actions
and then just get on a phone and call somebody
and talk about it and like I'm not My words
aren't Mark classific. The information is what is classified, and
it is your responsibility, as somebody with access to it
(13:03):
to know. You know where these lines are and what
you where you can operate well. And this is where
I come back to. I understand the importance of taking notes.
I mean every lawyer does.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
It's why I do the entire show every day on
yellow legal pads, right, that's all I have. But those notes,
if they are truly classified information, should not be able
to leave a secure place your brain should be the
place where you keep extremely classified information.
Speaker 1 (13:32):
Well, I think again, I think that what he was doing,
Clay was going home and writing a diary entry based
on his meetings. Yeah, so it's not contemporaneous in the
meeting notes. I think I got it. I might have
to go back and check this in the indictment, because
you know, I had to read the whole thing this morning.
My sense is he was creating diary entries day to day, which,
(13:55):
by the way, the notion that you would create a
diary like this when you're the national secut your advisor
so you can write a book is so gross. It's
not about your book that no one's going to read. Like,
you're supposed to be keeping Americans safe and protecting our interests.
This thing, This goes to a lot of things, and
everybody listening is out of clearance, knows what I'm going
to say. There's this idea the like people actually doing
(14:18):
the work every day in the national security apparatus, military side,
civilian side, they are expected to be perfect with all
this stuff or their lives are ruined. But when you
get to be senior enough, it's all about whatever publishing house.
You know, wants to give you the biggest book deal,
and that matters more than the law and your oath,
and I think people are sick of that. And this
(14:39):
this is there's the legal aspect of his claim. There's
also the it's kind of just gross. The way that
he was doing this was just gross because it was
all meant to hit Trump too. So he's working for Trump,
trying to undermine Trump, using national security information to do it.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I think that's one hundred percent correct, and so
again I will be curious to see how this plays out,
but not a not a strong position in general to
break down. I mean, I think beyond a shadow of
a doubt, so John Bolton latest, I think the question
(15:15):
is how many more people are going to get charges
brought and how many of these people are eventually going
to get convicted versus a jury pool that is likely
predisposed to not like Trump, although you know Trump's approval
ratings starting to go up, so maybe even in Northern Virginia,
there are people who are having their having their expectations
(15:36):
altered relative to what they expected beforehand. Because Trump two
point zero is really kind of making everything awesome, let's
be honest. And so as I break down everything here,
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Making America great again isn't just one man, It's many.
The team forty seven podcasts Sundays at noon Eastern in
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Speaker 1 (17:24):
We're gonna have a quick term. We're gonna get into
more on this National Security Advisor Bolton situation, and then
also a little bit more on a shutdown here at
some point you think they are gonna have to reopen
the government, but it's looking like it's pretty uh dug
in on both sides. We will dive into that and
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(18:46):
four eight two four safe. Welcome back in Clay Travis
buck Sexton Show. Appreciate all of you hanging out with
us as we are rolling through the Friday edition of
the program. We mentioned David Rutherford will be with us
at one point thirty to talk some about this seems
to be somewhat escalating situation in Venezuela and what we
should expect to happen there. Also, in the third hour,
(19:08):
Nicole Parker will join us former FBI agent.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
She's got a book out.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
We will see how the Cash Patel and Dan Bongino
led FBI has maybe been changing the culture.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
But I wanted to mention something.
Speaker 3 (19:24):
Buck that I saw from one of our iHeart colleagues, Charlottage,
the god Mister of the God, as I believe you
call him, and I think you guys had a meal together,
if I'm not mistaken this summer at a big iHeart event.
He has a large black audience, probably the largest black
audience inside of the iHeart family.
Speaker 2 (19:44):
And he does a popular show out of New York
City and.
Speaker 1 (19:47):
Increase very pleasant dinner company, I must say very pleasant.
Speaker 3 (19:51):
Increasingly he is willing to call out the left on
his show, even though that he regularly has the Kamala Harris'
of the world as in studio guests. And I saw
this clip where he was discussing what I think is
going to continue to be a looming issue for many
(20:11):
people who were involved in the Joe Biden administration and
carried water for the idea that Joe Biden was not
physically or mentally capable to do the presidency. He asked
a really pretty basic question, if they lied about Joe Biden,
how can you trust Democrats on anything? Let's play that cut.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
I think party after they lied to us so long
about Bredident Biden.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
I think that Democrats have tried every strategy except for
two things.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
Honesty encourage.
Speaker 6 (20:39):
Well, there's a lot of people who are courageous right
now in the Democratic Party. Our bread and butter issue
are danced with. The one that brought you is healthcare.
People have always trusted us on healthcare. That's our issue,
from President Johnson to President Obama to when Donald Trump
tried to take it away. That's how we won the
House in twenty eighteen. And now this reconciliation bill is
going to take fourteen million people off their health care.
(21:01):
We're not only going to protect healthcare, because I think
protecting health care is not enough. We need to invest
in cures. And these mothers are firing cancer doctors. So
we have a real clean contrast. We're for cures, they're
for cancer.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Who is that? Who is the guy who was talking
with him, that was Swallwell. I was like, who is
who is the d bag guy? I mean, give me a.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
Break, I mean he is just Swallwell.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
So, first of all, Charlemagne, I think speaking some measure
of truth, even if you are the most died in
the wall left wing legacy media consumer. The idea that
Democrats are for cures and Republicans are for cancer is
I mean, that's good take, But I agree.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
I think that a lack of honesty and lack of
courage is a fundamental and central problem for the Democrat Party.
And I think that for a Democrat, Charlemagne or any
other to bring that up and speak to that is
an effort to actually write the ship of the Democrat Party,
especially after the Biden lying fiasco, which all the establishment
Democrats have had to fess up to you, they all
(22:10):
lied about this, They didn't believe it, they lied about it.
Okay for Swowell to say Republicans want to give people cancer?
What a I'm trying to think of things we can
say on the radio.
Speaker 3 (22:21):
I just I don't even I think that Swowell is
really bad at communication and also arguments, And basically that's
the entire.
Speaker 2 (22:31):
Job of politics.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
I think you're saying that Swalwell is just kind of dumb.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
I think for a lot of these guys, the question
is are they dumb or are they just willing to
say whatever is necessary and not smart enough to understand
how devastating the CounterPunch is this tight end buck, did
you see the Virginia Democrat Party called out and win
some seers because there's an email thread, sorry, a text
(22:58):
message thread that turned into a political story about young
people saying sometimes inappropriate things on this text thread that
somebody then leaked and they said, when are you going
to condemn this? Basically win some seers and win some
seers said, yeah, I unequivocally condemdemn this. When are you
going to talk? And we'll talk some more during the
course of the program about Jay Jones, the Attorney General.
(23:20):
And so I look at some of these things, and
I know you think about it all.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
The time too.
Speaker 3 (23:25):
Some people can only throw punches, and if you like
boxing at all, there is a value in being an
attacker and being able to throw punches. But what is
most devastating to me in boxing and also in politics,
it isn't the punch it's the CounterPunch. And so if
(23:46):
you are trying to throw a punch, I think you
expose yourself and your lack of understanding of an issue
if you aren't able to have the mits up to
think about opening yourself up to the devast stating CounterPunch.
And I think Swollwell constantly gets knocked out by the
counter punch. I think what he's relying on, and I
(24:08):
think what a lot of these Democrats rely on is
no one sees the counter punch. All they care about
is the punch.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Well with Swowell, with the with what he's saying here.
First of all, the more people learn about healthcare, specifically Obamacare,
the more they realize it.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Is a disaster complete.
Speaker 1 (24:23):
All the things that conservatives said about this, and I
was one of them fifteen years ago or roughly what
is it, thirteen years ago? Now, all the things that
we said about this true. It's not going to bring
costs down. It's going to make costs much worse. Illegals
will get access to care because you know, we'll get
access greed, we'll get their care paid for because of this,
and it's just going to destroy health insurance even more
(24:45):
under the pretense of it's making everyone's health insurance better
and cheaper, which was all I. But beyond that, there
are the arguments that someone can say to us, hey,
you know when they do these when they do these
ice raids, it's really upsetting to some people who are
illegals and they're not bad people, and it's and it
(25:05):
you know, they they're they're paying a price here, and
it's really sad. And to enforce the law, you're gonna
make some families cry over this one. And that is
a cost. Now, it's a cost that I am willing
for the government to bear. But that is a legitimate cost.
That is someone saying, you know, hey, you're really going
to make people upset by enforcing our immigration laws. And
(25:27):
there are going to be people that you know, emotionally
are going to pull on your heartstrings when they're deported.
Not talking about the gang members and the bad people,
but just in general. And you know, that's a real
cost that I say. Okay, our side says, yeah, but
we have to have sovereignty and we have to have laws. Clay,
neither you, nor I, nor anybody else is pro cancer,
and to make an argument like that is just childish.
(25:49):
It's just dumb and for swallwell to go there. That's
not a cost that we're in favor of, Like this
is that's not a real thing. But it's like calling
Trump voters and Nazis when Trump is the most popular
president from the standpoint of Israel in American history. Like
it's just it's not a real argument. It's fantasyland stuff.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
Yeah, And I do think the question that Charlemagne asked
is one that the persuadable, reasonable universe of voters, which
let's be honest, is probably no more than twenty percent,
maybe it's ten percent, fifteen percent of American voters.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
It's one that I think it's going to be very.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
Difficult for Democrats to get past because if you will
lie to me about the most important question is the
president qualified to do the job or not? Then how
can I trust you to be honest with me on
any questions. And it's one that I think candidly is
a very real issue that Democrats are going to have.
(26:51):
And the closer you were connected to Joe Biden, the
more difficult it's going to be to distinguish yourself, whether
that's Kamala Harris, whether that's may Pete It's why I
think Gavin Newsom is actually going to benefit off of this,
because he can say, Hey, I was out in California,
I didn't know. I think if you were in the
cabinet with Joe Biden to the extent that media are
(27:12):
willing to ask you questions, I think it's going to
be difficult for you to argue that you weren't aware
of how much he cognitively declined.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
This reminds me of the enormous luck that Barack Obama
had in running for the Democrat primary, which was because
he wasn't really in the game. He can say, no,
I think the Iraq War was a disaster and it
wasn't my fault, unlike Hillary. Now, was that because Barack
Obama was some genius who went against the current of
(27:41):
his time that was voting for the Iraq War. No,
but he was lucky, right, And you know, you take
the wins that are given to you. And the same
thing is true of Gavin Newsom because he wasn't involved
at all in the Biden Kamala administration. He is clear
of the stink of lying about Biden's dementia is not clear,
by the way, and I think Gavin would go I
(28:03):
think he'd go out.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
I think he'd go after over that. I think so too.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
There's been a lot of talk about the toxicity of
that relationship. I would just also point out that's how
Trump benefited too. Now, Trump was on the record as
being skeptical of the Iraq War in general, But the
first time that I really noticed Trump was in that
summer twenty fifteen debate when he called out George W.
Bush and Dick Cheney. Because now, I think most people
(28:28):
are aware that the Iraq War was a poor decision
and we should have never gone in the way that
we did, and we shouldn't have spent the money that
we did. I think that's general consensus view. In twenty fifteen,
that was not the consensus view for a Republican candidate
to be willing to utter. And I think a lot
(28:49):
of people took note of that that Trump was willing
to criticize a bad decision that the Bush administration had made. Now,
did it partly help him go after Jeb Bush, who
was the establishment can ended it at that point in time,
the continuation of the Bush dynasty politically, yes, But I
think also Trump was right and nailed it bringing us.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
Back here to the Bolton situation, the indictment of Trump's
former national security advisor, but both in big neocon, big hawk,
big interventionist, a very bad choice for Trump. Under NSA,
Trump admits that he made some beat. You go to
war with the army you have, and you run an
(29:33):
administration with the people that you know of who have
had these jobs at least the first time around. So
he had he had a learning curve, There's no question
about it. And here he is reacting to John Bolton's indictment.
This is cup one play.
Speaker 7 (29:46):
It just indicted by a Brandur and Maryland. Do you
have a reaction to that.
Speaker 5 (29:53):
I didn't know that, you tell me for the first time.
But I think he's, you know, a bad person. I
think he's a guy. Yeah, he's a bad guy, too bad.
But that's the where it goes. That's the way it goes, right,
that's the way it goes. Well I want him, No,
I haven't. I haven't, But I just think he's a
bad person.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
We'll see, you know one thing that I do want
to be. There's a lot of voices out there, Clay,
They're saying, oh, this is about reprisal. Or whatever. Hold
on a second. The law is the law or it's not.
And I'm gonna tell you we actually got into this
thing on the right where, for example, with Hillary, Hillary
absolutely broke the law with the way that she was
conducting her emails and everything else. No question, there is
(30:35):
a specific recklessness continue you know, component of the statute
that she violated in the espionage back recklessness, right, So
what she did was absolutely reckless for a secretary of state,
there's no question. I mean, otherwise, there's no such thing
as reckless. But we said all for politics and whatever
Trump said this, we'll let it go. All is saying
(30:56):
I would not be okay with this administration. I don't
care who it is. I would not be okay if
I felt like the DOJ was fabricating crimes, you know,
or or pretending people did things, or pretending they violated
laws when they didn't. But if you're just enforcing the law,
why is that. It's the removal of special treatment that
(31:18):
we're actually talking about here. It's not getting bad treatment
because Trump doesn't like you. It's sorry, you actually broke
the law. True of Letitia James as well.
Speaker 3 (31:27):
Well, it's it's also just a response to deciding that
Trump was going to be indicted in four different places.
Speaker 2 (31:35):
They what I mean, that removed the.
Speaker 1 (31:37):
Special treatment that he should have gotten as a former
president quote unquote special treatment, and they actually were fabricating
crimes against him. I do not believe that. I mean,
the thing that happened in New York was completely insane.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Yeah, and not only that, while they were prosecuting Trump
for everything, they had Joe Biden dead to write, and
Robert Hurr led him off because he said he didn't
have the mental capacity for a jury to convict him,
even though he was dead to rights on holding classified
(32:07):
documents and did not have the presidential privilege at all
because at that point in time he had been a
senator and vice president. But the fact that Robert Hurr's
decision was, yes, he committed crimes, but because his brain
is so broken, no jury would convict him. By the way,
(32:27):
he may have been right, but that was the guy
who was the president of the United States. So they
were even still letting Biden off under the pre existing
Hillary standards while throwing the book at Trump.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Is exactly right. And this is what is so essential
what you are seeing with Trump thus far, with whether
it's Letitia James or Komy or this is a we're
all going to be held to the same standard standard. Yes,
we're not going to have they can make up stuff. Again,
the New York thing was an absolute fabrication crime of crime.
(33:01):
Nothing wrong there. It was completely absurd. I can argue
on the other ones too that they're but you know,
the New York thing was just completely out of outrageous
and specifically the most outrageous I think. And now what
we're saying is okay, well, Democrats, when you actually break
the law, we're going to hold you accountable. Yes, I
(33:21):
don't see what the problem is. In fact, I think
there'd be a problem not doing this. And by the way,
what you're also recognizing is something we've talked about on
this program for a long time. If you bring your microscope,
if you bring your spyglass, and you aggressively investigate anybody,
there is a prosecutor who can make a case against them.
(33:43):
The amount of prosecutorial power that we have embedded in
a criminal justice system, irrespective Democrat, Republic and independent, every
single person out there with us right now you can
think you have lived the most honest, transparent, completely in
compliance with every You can write something down on your
(34:04):
books that you paid off totally legally, Clay, and all
of a sudden you're facing thirty seven felony counts.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
Correct, They can't find a crime for any of you
out there. I really believe this if they investigated you
vociferously and aggressively.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
As they did Trump.
Speaker 5 (34:20):
Oh.
Speaker 1 (34:20):
Look this weekend, Caro and I are having some steaks.
I'm actually going shooting on Saturday and I'm gonna be
having some steaks Saturday night. They're gonna be sizzling, they're
gonna be juicy, they're gonna be delicious, and they're gonna
be Good Ranchers. Good Ranchers delivers amazing steaks, burgers, chicken,
even salmon to your home on a monthly subscription. When
our shipment of Good Ranchers meat arrives, it's like Christmas
(34:41):
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and here's the fun part. Every week, one lucky winner
(35:03):
will win a free Thanksgiving hand for just sharing a
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Speaker 4 (35:23):
Peek out with the guys on the Sunday Hang with
Clay and Buck podcast, a new episode every Sunday.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
Find it on the iHeart app or wherever you get
your podcasts. Welcome back in Clay Travis Buck Sexton Show.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
It's Friday.
Speaker 3 (35:37):
We'll get to some of your reactions, such as AA,
I remember seeing this as I got ready for the show.
I don't remember exactly what was said, but I do
know it was funny what we got here.
Speaker 2 (35:48):
Podcast listener Jim.
Speaker 7 (35:50):
Wisdom that sharks do not attack lawyers due to professional courtesy,
So if a shart ever approaches you, simply show him
your barcard. You should be.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
Fine very well if you couldn't hear Jim very well.
There he was saying, lawyers don't attack sharks. Sorry, sharks
don't attack lawyers as a part of professional courtesy.
Speaker 2 (36:13):
So yes, a little bit of humor there.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Well, dude, there is a lawyer joke, a shark joke,
and a dad joke all at the same.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Into one good that's a good, good job by Jim.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
There we come back, Buck, Your home city of New
York is in serious trouble. The New York City Mayor's
race debate happened last night. So did, by the way,
the Virginia Attorney General debate. We got cuts from both
of those. Plus ourbuddy David Rutherford on the latest in Venezuela.
What should we know about what's going on there? All
that next
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