January 31, 2025 • 38 mins
Tragic DC Airline Crash-How It Happened & the Investigations that Follow plus Trump Nominees WILL ALL Be Confirmed
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome in his verdict with Center. Ted Cruz.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Nice to have you with us on this Friday morning,
and Center, We've got a lot to talk about, including
the tragedy that happened. You were right there in Washington
when all this was unfolding with this helicopter and airplane
colliding at Reagan National Airport.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Well, it was truly a tragic and horrific accident, and
it cost the lives of sixty seven souls. The commercial
airliner from American Airlines, flying from Wichita, Kansas to Washington
d C. Reagan Airport had sixty passengers on it and
four crew members, and then an Army black Hawk helicopter
(00:40):
had three soldiers on it, bringing the total death toll
to sixty seven. The two collided just before nine pm
on Wednesday night. They collided as the American Airlines airliner
was landing at d C. Reagan Airport. And I'll tell
(01:02):
you today, so you and I are recording this Thursday night. Today,
I spent a lot of the day dealing with the
aftermath of this. So, as you know, I'm the chairman
of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. It
has jurisdiction over all of aviation. And so today I
hosted briefings from the FAA and the NTSB, the National
(01:24):
Traffic Safety Board, and we were heard from. They were
bipartisan briefings. I had senators both Republicans and Democrats that participated,
and we got we got briefings the NTSB, which is
(01:46):
as I said, the National Transportation Safety Board does investigations
whenever there's a serious accident, whenever there's an accident, an
aviation accident, whenever there's a rail accident, they do investigations,
and we heard from them. Now as of Thursday, the
NTSB had over a dozen investigators on the ground. And listen,
(02:10):
in the wake of an accident, you've got to actually
see what happened. You've got to investigate and discover the facts,
discover the evidence. In this instance, we know that the
American Airlines flight was coming in. It was initially on
runway one at Reagan Airport, and then the air traffic
controllers moved it to runway thirty three, So they shifted
(02:31):
the runway right at the very end, and the American
Airlines pilots changed their descent to land on runway thirty three. Now,
simultaneously there was an Army black Hawk helicopter that was traveling.
There are multiple helicopter routes that go in and around
Reagan Airport, and that Army helicopter was on Route one
(02:53):
and then it was shifting from Route one to Root four,
and the air traffic controllers were in contact with the
pilots of the American Airlines flight and also the pilots
of the helicopter, and after telling the American Airlines jet
to land on Runway thirty three, the air traffic controller
(03:15):
tells the black Hawk pilots to visually confirm and have
in the line of sight the incoming plane, and the
black Hawk helicopter pilots confirmed that yes, they have the
plane in sight, and they also instruct the black Hawk
pilots to come behind the plane that is landing. What
(03:38):
in fact happens, or what appears to have happened, is
the black Hawk helicopter came in front of the plane
that was landing. The two collided midair and exploded midair.
Now at this point it appears everyone involved died. Both
the plane and the black Hawk helicopter sunk into the
(03:59):
Potomac River. They were both in relatively shallow water about
seven to eight feet of water where they had sunk,
and as of Thursday, the black box, the flight recorder
had been recovered from the airplane and they are in
(04:20):
the process of recovering the black box the audio transcript
recorder for the Blackhawk helicopter, so both of those will
be recovered and they're trying to piece together what happened.
What do we know. We know that somebody were multiple
somebodies made a catastrophic mistake, a catastrophic mistake that led
(04:41):
to a massive loss of life at this point, and look,
there are lots of people who are giving all sorts
of theories, who are jumping on all sorts of possibilities.
In my view, we shouldn't speculate. We shouldn't we shouldn't
get ahead of the evidence. We need to understand exactly
what caused this accident, whether it was an error on
the part of the army pilot, whether it was conceivably
(05:05):
an error on the part of the commercial airliner pilot,
whether it was an error on the part of the
air traffic controller, or some combination of multiplayers in that regard.
We don't know right now. What we do know is
two aircraft we're in the same place at the same time.
Now as we were having the briefing from the NTSB
(05:27):
and the FAA that they told us several things. Number
number one that had the helicopter stayed on Route four,
it would have been well out of the way of
the landing path of the airline, and it would have
been in a lower altitude than where the helicopter and
(05:50):
the jet collided. We don't know what happened exactly. One
of the things the NTSB is going to do in
this investigation is they're going to listen to the black
boxer coardings of both aircraft and they're going to retrace
the path the exact path of both aircraft to discover
was one of them where it was not supposed to be?
Were both of them where they were not supposed to be.
(06:12):
At this point, we don't have a clear answer to that,
and it's easy I would say, don't trust twitter, don't
trust every theory. Look, they looked at one theory and actually,
something I asked the NTSB, I said, when the air
traffic controller asked the black Hawk pilots, do you have
visual confirmation to the aircraft, and the black Hawk pilots
confirm that do we have evidence that they were looking
(06:34):
at a different airplane. You could certainly this strikes me
as a reasonable inference that the the helicopter pilot looks
and says, yes, I see the plane and perhaps didn't
realize it was a different plane that was landing, because
presumably if they saw the plane that led to the collision,
they would not have stayed in the in the path
of the plane, but they would would have piloted elsewhere.
(06:55):
So NTSB and FAA told me right now, we don't know,
so that's not confirmed. That's a theory people are saying
online it is a plausible theory, but we don't have
confirmation of that right now. There's also discussion about the equipment.
So the Blackhawk helicopter had a transponder, so it was
(07:18):
appearing on radar. It did not have technology called ADSB,
which is technology that pings the location of an aircraft,
and it does so using GPS rather than radar, and
ADSB is more accurate and more reliable then simply a
(07:39):
transponder that is pinging on radar. Now, under the FAA rules,
military aircraft and federal law enforcement, an aircraft are exempted
from the requirement that they have ADSB technology, And I
will tell you as we were talking with the FAA,
as we were talking with the NTSB, what they told us,
(08:05):
at least initially, is that had the Blackhawk had ADSB,
they said, it would have not have altered the ability
of air traffic control and the American Airlines pilot to
see the helicopter. I don't know. I will confess I
don't know the technical answers to this precisely, which is
(08:27):
why the investigation needs to proceed. I expect to get
an answer on that, but we don't know the answer
to that exactly. I will say, also, Ben, I think
a very reasonable question that a number of senators were
asking is why exactly are there so many helicopter flight
paths immediately in the vicinity of such a busy airport
(08:50):
as DC Reagan Airport. Is that a sound policy decision
to have helicopters traveling that close. Now, now, I don't
know if that's the cause of it, By the way,
we will. What we do know is the two should
not have collided, and so somebody screwed up, and we'll
figure out who and how and why.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
And look, Washington and I talked to a pilot today,
and he said, Washington's just different and Reagan's just different.
There's a lot more helicopters there, there's a lot more
airspace there that's different than other parts. It's a lot
more intense, there's a lot more rules, especially after nine
to eleven, and so you got to look at all
those things. It goes back to what you're saying, it's
just different. Private airplanes, for example, aren't going into Reagan.
(09:34):
You go into DoLS for that exact reason, because you're
protecting and so there are so many X factors. Is
one pilot to today, There's so many questions to ask.
This is not a simple yes or no or point
of finger because there's so many X factors when you
fly to DCA.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Well, and I'll say the briefing that I hosted with
NTSB of the FAA, so I had, I was on it.
Obviously Maria Cantwell, who's the ranking member of the senior
Democrat on the Commerce Committee, she was on it. We
also had both of the Kansas Senators, Jerry Moran and
Roger Marshall. They both participated, and obviously the flight came
from WHICHITAS. So the Kansas senators are particularly engaged and
(10:13):
then we had Tammy Duckworth and Jerry Moran and Tammy
Duckworth are the chairman and ranking member, respectively of the
Aviation Subcommittee of the Commerce Committee, so they're both particularly
engaged in aviation issues, which is why I invited both
of them to participate. So Tammy Duckworth was in the military.
She was a helicopter pilot and she's in a wheelchair.
She was very badly wounded in a combat injury. But
(10:39):
she is an experienced helicopter pilot. I will tell you
in the briefing, I commented, I said, Tammy, it's really
helpful to have an experienced helicopter pilot as part of
this discussion, because she was literally she had the maps
out of the flight path and she's looking at, okay,
where runway thirty three is and where helicopter Roote four is.
And Tammy was saying in the course of the discussion,
(11:00):
if the helicopter stayed on helicopter Route four, it should
not have been anywhere close to the landing pattern for
runway thirty three. So that was an insight. Look, I'm
not a helicopter pilot. I don't have the insight to
look at those maps and determine that. I thought that
was a very interesting insight from her. I'll tell you
something else she said that I didn't know that was interesting.
(11:21):
It's been widely reported the Army black helicopter was on
a training mission. What she said is the Army routinely
codes virtually every flight as a training mission. And she
said the reason they do that is Army pilots are
required to have a certain number of hours to keep
their certification, and so every flight they do as a
(11:42):
training mission to maintain those hours. So what she said
is it doesn't necessarily convey what the purpose of that
flight was that it is being called a training mission.
I have to admit I would not have known that
had she not said that, And I think all of
us we were like, oh, that's.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
Interesting because when you listen this, especially if you're just
watching the news, and they're like, why would you have
this training flight this time of night? Yeah, right there
in this airspace. Surely there's somewhere else you could go
and treat that is a lot less congested than DCA
and all the regulations that you have, and this bravo
space around the Washington d C. At the highest level
(12:19):
go somewhere else and be safer. But the way that
you just described it from her, well, this actually makes sense.
They could be doing real work and they categorize it.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
As a training mission.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
So look, I think in the days that go forward,
we're going to find out what the precise mission was.
My understanding is the pilots for the American Airlines flight
were quite experienced. They had a very significant number of
hours of flight, so they were very experienced. At this point,
I don't have a clear picture of what the experience
level was for the Army pilots. I'm confident we will
(12:51):
find out more about that, and I'm confident we will
have discussions on policy questions. One discussion I'm sure we
will have is whether the exemptions of the FAA rules
for military aircraft and federal law enforcement aircraft from having
the ADSB technology, Whether that is a good decision or not.
(13:12):
My understanding is one of the reasons for that exemption
is the military law enforcement sometimes doesn't want to be tracked.
They don't want their location evident, And there may be
reasons for both military law enforcement context why you want
the ability not to be tracked in real time. I
think that's a discussion we're going to have to have,
(13:33):
and as I sit here today, I don't know whether
that if the Blackhawk had that technology, whether it would
have made a material difference preventing this accident. I think
that's a reasonable question to ask. Secondly, I think we're
going to get some real questions about, Okay, how many
helicopter flights are there in and around Reagan Airport? Do
(13:56):
we need all of those flights? Is there an unnecessary
unreasonable risk. I don't know the answer to that. There
may be some compelling reason why you need to have that.
I certainly think you ought to give the military a
chance to explain it. But I think given this horrific
collision and the lives that are lost, we're going to
have to have a very serious conversation about what caused
(14:20):
this accident and what steps can be taken to prevent
this from happening in the future.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Well, let's talk about the government aspect of this as well,
because there's people that have been asking is there full staffing?
Are we understaffed? Are there enough people in the towers?
Are there enough qualified people in the towers? Has that
even become part of the conversation yet?
Speaker 1 (14:41):
On the hill.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
It's certainly part of the conversation. I would say, at
this point, we don't know. So I've seen reports that
the air traffic controller was assigned to multiple responsibilities. It's
not clear what the facts are on that. And one
of the dangers coming out of a catastrophic accident is
there's a fog of war. There's people here snip at
this and the other, and they repeat it. And I'm
(15:03):
a big believer, I will say the NTSB, I've grown
to really respect the work they do. They investigate when
you have a catastrophic accident. They investigate based on the facts,
based on evidence, and they do a good job of
not jumping into conclusions, trying to figure out, okay, exactly
what happened. So a last airlines when you had the
door plug blow off, and TSB did a very thorough
(15:24):
investigation there and presented their conclusions. And so today we
heard from them, but it was barely twelve hours into
the investigation, so they didn't know a whole lot yet.
And I do think and they will reach a conclusion expeditiously.
These guys are serious and technical and they try to
(15:45):
follow the facts, and that investigation is important. Once we
know the facts of what caused the accident, then we
can say, all right, what steps can be taken to
minimize these risks going forward. But I do think one
of the things I'm merging my colleagues, both Republicans and Democrats,
(16:07):
is is don't don't get ahead of ourselves. And by
the way, I'll tell you just a personal aspect to this.
So last night, Wednesday night, I was having dinner in Washington,
d C. I was having dinner with Mike Waltz. Mike
Waltz is President Trump's national security advisor. And so most
nights when I'm in Washington, d C. I have working dinners.
(16:29):
I have dinners with colleagues, with other senators or House members.
I have dinners with cabinet members. Sometimes I have dinners
with subject matter experts. So last night I was having
dinner with Mike Waltz, the Trump's national security advisor, and
we were talking foreign policy. We're talking the Middle East.
We were talking Israel and Iran and China and all
of the foreign policy challenges facing this country. And I
(16:50):
will tell you right at the end of the dinner,
we actually were just wrapping up when Mike got a
call and said, oh, wow, okay, there's been a collision
between a jet and helicopter a DC Reagan airport. So
Mike left to go back to the White House to
deal with it. And as I was walking out, I'll
tell you been a particularly personal aspect. So last night
(17:11):
Heidi was flying into d C and she was flying
into Reagan. Wow. And she was due to land about
thirty minutes after this accident happened. And so I'll say,
my body man, who's a great kid, is with me frequently,
came up. I'll give him credit what he said to
me walking up, As he said, Heidie's okay, but there's
(17:34):
been an accident at d C Reagan and a commercial
jettis Hitt helicopter. I was very glad he started with
Heidie's okay, because I got to say, and so what happened.
Her flight was diverted from Reagan and it landed in
BWI for beer.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
They don't know.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
Bw's Baltimore, Baltimore, Washington, and it's about forty five minutes away.
There are three airports that serve DC Washington. Reagan is
the closest to d C Washington. Dulles's in northern Virginia
a little further out, and then BWI Baltimore, Washington is,
like I said, forty five minutes to an hour out.
So she was diverted. And so when she landed it
(18:09):
was interesting. I texted her immediately said hey, are you okay?
I got no answer because she was still in the air.
And then when she landed, I called her immediately, and
as she was getting off the plane, she said, what happened?
I don't understand. Why do we get sent to BWI?
So they didn't tell the passengers why they were diverted,
and so I told her what had happened, and she
was and I look, I understand, you don't want to
(18:31):
tell passengers on an airplane. Hey, there was just a
plane crash that freaks people out. But I told her
and then she came home. But I got ad met it.
It freaked me out a little bit that my wife
was within twenty thirty minutes of where there was a
fatal plane crash at that airport, and you and I
both landed at DCA hundreds if not hundreds of thousands
(18:54):
of times, and so it's I got to say. I did.
I was, I said a long prayer and was like God,
thank you for sparing Heidi and I. When she got
to our apartment, I gave her a very long hug.
And it's uh. And I am grieving for the sixty
(19:14):
seven families who are mourning the loss of their loved ones.
It's horrific and and and we're certainly grieving them. And
we're grateful for all the first responders and everyone who's
been really heroic, UH, try to deal with this, this
this catastrophe since it happened.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Well, I also want to just highlight the response was incredible.
And I'm sure you've got some of that briefing that
came about this. You know, there's always criticism of we
could do things better, but the on the ground first responders'
response truly seemed unbelievable. How quick they were responding, how
(19:51):
fast there were so many people there to help. You
were hoping for good news that they were going to
be survivors. We now know that the tragic loss of
life and what the reality was, but even in the recovery,
it was all hands on deck. And it made me
proud to be an American. I mean, it was it
was truly incredible to watch it in real time on TV.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Yeah. I talked early this morning to Robert Isam, who's
the CEO of American Airlines. He flew to DC. He
was on the ground. Obviously they were dealing with sixty
passengers and four crew members who were killed, and they
were dealing with trying to provide help and support to
the families, and I talked to him. I also talked
to Sean Duffy as the Secretary of Transportation. You know,
(20:33):
Seawan was confirmed the day earlier, like it literally this
was his first day on the job. Yeah, And Shawn
is a good man and a serious man, and he's
been diving in and trying to deal with it. But
this is a heck of a welcome to be Secretary
of Transportation. We've got a major airplane accident on day
one and he's dealing with it and look the resources
(20:56):
to investigate to try to determine ex exactly what happened.
The NTSB in particular, they're very good at this, and
we're trying to track down Obviously there was a massive
mistake somewhere, but we need to figure out who made
it and why and and and how could it have
been prevented so that we can learn lessons and try
(21:18):
to stop this from happening again. I will say this
though also as just to comfort everyone. As horrific as
this is, it is worth remembering that air travel is
is hands down the safest mode of transport it and
your odds of being killed driving to the airport are
still higher than they are being killed flying on a
(21:41):
commercial airline, so they're not zero. And and and in
some ways it is amazing given the flights that occur
all over this country in so many places, that that
that that it has been a long time since we've
had a mass fatality accident in the United States, given
how complicated lying is, and in some ways that's remarkable.
(22:02):
But nonetheless this tragedy, we should do everything we can
to press for zero fatalities. And so we're going to
learn lessons from this and try to try to prevent
it from happening again.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
You mentioned something and just you talk about perspective, it
was it's amazing just how fast things can change. Because
Sean Duffy, who you know well, and his wife Rachel,
they have a large family, and he was welcomed just
minutes before at his office and his family was there,
(22:37):
and he walked up to walk into the office where
he's going to serve the American people. And he went
into that office and then I'm sure afterwards was immediately
rushed out because of what happened. And I sent a
note to is what Rachel last night. I just said,
you know, I'm so proud and I'm so sorry that
the first night that this is what you're having to
deal with the best that I know. God has put
y'all there for times like this to lead into comfort.
(23:00):
And I do think the American peoples to understand they're
incredible leaders that we have just gained who are going
to do an amazing job in times like these.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
Sean is one of those.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Yeah, and look, I'm grateful that he was on board
and confirmed and was able to be doing his job
on the day of this accident. Also Pete Hegseth, who
was just confirmed as Secretary of Defense. Listen, this is
a crisis involving the loss of life for three soldiers
as well and the question of who was at fault.
There's at least some real question whether the military pilots
(23:34):
have committed some serious error. We don't know for sure,
but that you look at Pete Hegseith, you're just confirmed
his Defense secretary. This is a serious challenge to deal
with in his first couple of days as well, and
I'm grateful both of them were confirmed on the job,
because you need strong leadership to deal with the crisis
of this magnitude.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I was going to ask you my next question quickly
was going to be the follow up on the military.
We talked so much about, you know, transportation, the airlines
and the CEO and et cetera, But let's talk about
the military side.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
There was loss of life there as well. What do
we know from that perspective.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
We know three soldiers were aboard the Blackhawk and they
were all killed. We don't know the details now of
who made the mistake. Obviously somebody did because this should
not have happened, But we don't know where the mistake was,
and it's where the investigation, like NTSB will retrace the
exact path of each airline, each aircraft and figure out, Okay,
(24:37):
who was not where they were supposed to be, Who
was in the wrong place? Was there a miscommunication? Look,
as you review the transcripts, you know FA and NTSB
told us, at least initially reviewing the transcript. It appeared
like when the air traffic controllers said, okay, do you
have visual confirmation of the airline and the helicopter pilot
said yes. What we were told in the b anything
(25:00):
is ordinarily the air traffic controller would move on say okay,
you guys are taken care of, onto the next flight.
So that was their initial take. Is that exchange appeared
to be a fairly typical exchange back and forth of
navigating multiple aircraft in close proximity. Nevertheless, we'll find out
(25:22):
as we examine. Was there just one individual who made
an error? Were there multiple individuals? Was what was the
cause of this? And that I'm confident I've told the
other members of the Commerce Committee. As NTSB reaches conclusions,
i'll have another briefing where we sit down with them
and can ask them, ask them hard questions and understand, Okay,
(25:46):
what really caused this and how do we prevent it
from happening again.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
This brings us to confirmations, and I do want to
just give a quick update for everybody about where we are.
It shows you the importance of having people in these
positions you talk about. Sean Duffy is a great example.
Confirmed on the day this happened. There are several other
major posts that we have confirmation hearings that wrapped up
on Thursday, as you and I recording this Thursday night.
(26:13):
There will not be votes on them till next week.
How are things moving forward? Where are we in general
right now compared to in the past, Because I'm just saying,
are they slowing us down? Are we getting back on track?
Where are we?
Speaker 4 (26:26):
So?
Speaker 3 (26:26):
Look, the Democrats are certainly engaged in delay and obstruction.
That being said, where we are now? Eight cabinet members
have been confirmed, So we.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Are so ple know what's the total number that is
a full.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Cabinet in the low twenties.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Okay, So we're far away. We're not even a half,
We're not even a fifty percent.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Correct, But we are ahead of where Biden was at
this point, and we're ahead of where Trump was in
the first term. So eight is moving with greater expedition
than the last two administrations of scene and so started with.
The first cabinet member confirm was Marco Rubio. He was
confirmed on January twentieth, the first day, and he was
(27:06):
confirmed ninety nine to zero. The second cabinet member was
the CIA director John Ratcliffe. He had seventy four yeses
and twenty five knows. After that, you had Pete Hegseth
as Defense Secretary. He had fifty one yeses and fifty knows.
The Vice President J. D. Vance cast the tie breaking vote.
The next person confirmed was the Secretary of Homeland Security,
(27:28):
Christy Dome. She had fifty nine yeses and thirty four nos.
After that, the Treasury Secretary was confirmed. He had sixty
eight yes, twenty nine knows. That's Scott Bessent. After that,
the Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was confirmed. We're very glad
he was confirmed given this crisis. He had seventy seven
(27:48):
yeses and twenty two knows. After that, the EPA Administrator
Lee Zelden, former congressman from New York, former candidate for
governor in New York, a friend of mine. He was
confirmed as EPA administrator with fifty six yes's, forty two knows.
And then just today, the Interior Secretary Doug Burgham, the
(28:08):
former governor of North Dakota. He was confirmed seventy nine
yes as eighteen nos. Now where do we stand now?
In addition to confirming Doug Burgham, we've teed up as
the next cabinet members to be confirmed, Chris Wright as
Secretary of Energy, Doug Collins as Secretary of Veterans Affairs,
and Pam Bondy as Attorney General, and Scott Turner as
(28:32):
Secretary of Housing in Urban Development. All of those are
our scheduled to be confirmed next week, so they're teed up.
We were going to ram through the weekend and keep
the Democrats here because they were engaged in obstruction, and
Thursday night the Democrats caved and they agreed to expedite
and move these forward. So we're moving now on a
(28:53):
faster pace than we would have if we had rammed
through the weekend and the Democrats had extended all the time.
So they agreed, all right, we'll compress the time if
we let them fly home, and so by next week,
as I said, Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Eddans Affairs,
Attorney General and hud we'll all make it through next week.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
That obviously means the pace is moving up. When you
look at so far what's happened there does seem to
be a little bit of a change. Now we're noticing
it with the Democrats in the media especially, it seems
like there's a real appetite to just get a nominee
whatever when they get their hands on to not pass.
(29:36):
Is that part of the gainsmanship that we're witnessing. Am
I reading the room the right way?
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (29:40):
Look, I still believe, and I've said this a number
of times, that all of Trump's cabinet nominees are going
to be confirmed, and I think they'll be confirmed within
thirty days. That we are leaning in. We're putting the
pedal to the medal under the Senate rules that the
Democrats can delay some, but I think within thirty days
we'll get them all through Out the two the three
(30:03):
that they are going after hardest are in terms of
cabinet nominees, Tulca Gabbert for Director of National Intelligence, Bobby
Kennedy for Health and Human Services, and then it's not
a cabinet position, but Cash Pateel for Director of the FBI,
which it's a sub cabinet position but a very very
important law enforcement position. Those are the three. It's not
(30:26):
complicated or subtle. Those three are the top targets of
the Democrats. Today. In the Senate Judiciary Committee, we had
cash Betel's hearing. I was vigorous at the hearing defending him.
I will tell you I think I think Cash did
very well. I think he acquitted himself in an excellent way.
(30:46):
This evening I was on Sean Hannity, and as I
put it, I said, my assessment of the Democrats behavior
at cash Betel's hearing reminded me of the quote from
Shakespeare's Macbeth. It was a tale told by an idiot,
full of out in fury and signifying nothing.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
That is a great accurate way of describing it. Was
a you know what show is how I was going
to put it.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
But they didn't land any material blows. And look, the
point on Cash. What they're attacking him on not that
he's not qualified. He's clearly qualified. He has over a
decade of experience in law enforcement, national security, including having
been a federal public defender, including having been a federal prosecutor,
having worked in the National Security Division of the Department
(31:31):
of Justice, having worked in the White House and the
National Security Council, having been a senior intelligence staffer on
Capitol Hill, and having been the chief of staff at
the United States Defense Department. They're not arguing he's unqualified.
What they're arguing is they're terrified he will do exactly
what President Trump promised he would do, which is eliminate
(31:52):
the politicization and weaponization of the FBI and get it
back to its core function. I believe Cash Bettel will
do that, and I think the Democrats are free out
because they don't want them to do that. But I
think Cash will make it through. We also had hearings
this week for both Bobby Kennedy and Tulsea Gabbert. I
don't know, it is not impossible that one of those
(32:13):
nominees is defeated, but I think they all make it through.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
Right now, when you look at the Republicans, when Democrats
are pushing this obstructionism the way that they are doing
it and trying to slow things down, does that unify
the Republican base more because it's like, all right, come on, guys.
Does that make it actually easier to get the votes
you need because you realize what you're up against?
Speaker 3 (32:36):
A look, potentially, you had Pete hag Seth, who is
the one they went after the hardest so far, and
that vote was fifty to fifty. We lost three Republicans.
We lost Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitch McConnell. Because
we have a fifty three to forty seven majority, losing
three made it fifty to fifty, and that meant the
(32:57):
Vice President JD. Vance could break the tie. I am
glad we have fifty three. If we had a fifty
one vote majority, I would not be nearly so sanguine.
I would not be saying every Trump Cabinet nominee is
going to be confirmed if we had a fifty one
vote majority. But because we have fifty three, we can
lose up to three, and so I think all of
(33:17):
these make it through. Listen, Tulsi. Tulsi was a Democrat
for most of her career. She is perceived if you
look at Republican foreign policy, they're interventionists and isolationists. There
are many who perceive Tulsi as much more of an isolationist.
So there are Republicans who have real concerns with her
will that play out into no votes. I don't know.
(33:40):
I think the President deserves a considerable amount of deference
in naming his cabinet members, and he has decided to
name Tulci Gabbert. I'm going to vote yes, but I
don't know. It's not impossible that we get four no votes,
which would take down the nomination. Likewise, Bobby Kennedy. Bobby
Kennedy's a complicated situation. Both Kennedy and Tulsa, until like
(34:02):
twelve minutes ago, they were both Democrats, and so Bobby
Kennedy obviously a scion of one of the great Democrat
royalty families, Camelot. It is a curious dynamic. It's not
clear to me any Democrat is going to vote for him,
which is an interesting situation. Listen, there's some conservatives. Bobby Kennedy,
(34:26):
until recently, on many policies is his views were quite
left of center. I'm going to vote for Bobby Kennedy
because I think he's a change agent, because I think
he has courage to take on I think some of
the corruption that we have at HHS, particularly with big Pharma,
that gets in bed with the career bureaucrats there and
(34:47):
stifles competition and drives up costs. I think if you
have a terrible disease, you should have a right to
access life saving medication. And I'm one of the original
sponsors of the right to Try legislation. I think that's
very important, and i think Bobby Kennedy is going to
shake up the cronyism that that has characterized HHS. What's
(35:15):
not clear to me is I don't if any Democrats
want that cronyism shaken up, and to be honest, there
may be some Republicans that don't. Let's play this exchange.
So this is Bobby Kennedy responding to Bernie Sanders. Bernie's
going to vote now. When Bernie was attacking him like crazy,
but I got to say, Bobby Kennedy popped him back
(35:36):
pretty hard. Listen to this exchange.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
I'm going to make America healthier than other countries in
the world. Right now, will.
Speaker 4 (35:43):
You guarantee do what every other major country. It's a
simple question.
Speaker 5 (35:48):
And by the way, Bernie, you know the problem of
corruption is not just in the federal agents, is in
Congress too. Almost all the members of this panel are accepting,
include yourself, or accepting millions of dollars from the pharmaceutical
industry protecting their interests.
Speaker 4 (36:06):
Oh I thought that that would No. No, I ran
for president like you. I got millions, millions of contributions.
They did not come from the executives, not one nickel
of pack money from the pharmaceuticals and they came to
twenty twenty.
Speaker 5 (36:24):
In twenty twenty, you were the single largest.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
Because I received a pharmaceutical combinations from workers all over
this country.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
Workers.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
You were this, not a nickel from corporate.
Speaker 5 (36:37):
You was the single largest pharmaceutical.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Dollars from workers in point three five million. Yeah, out
of two hundred millions.
Speaker 3 (36:46):
All right, but.
Speaker 4 (36:48):
You have not answered last question.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
I mean that you want to talk about a beatdown
with the facts there, Bernie, You've accepted millions of dollars
in the pharmaceutical industry.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
In twenty twenty, you were this single.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Largest receiver of pharmacyal dollars one point five millions.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Like, let's just move on here.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
Yeah, he did not like that exchange. By the way,
I've never seen a confirmation hearing where the nominee refers
to the senator by his first name. He keeps calling
him Bernie. Like it's clear Bobby Kennedy and Bernie Sanators
they know each other well. I mean, they've got a
long history there. Because that's that that that's quite unusual too.
But I gotta say Bernie was not anticipating that pop back.
(37:30):
We'll see how it plays out. But I think Kennedy's
gonna get confirmed. I want him to get confirmed. I
like Bobby Kennedy, and I also think there are a
lot of Americans, a lot of Americans who are not
even very political, a lot of moms who are worried
about the garbage that that our kids are are consuming,
are worried about the rise in in in in chronic illness,
(37:52):
that that that that. I think Bobby Kennedy is a
very good person to take that on well.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
And the keyword you use was an age of change. Ye,
there is an appetite for that in Washington. The status
quo people are sick and tired of. And that's part
of the reason why I think Donald Trump brought who
he brought to the table. Absolutely, don't forget. We did
a show Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We do a week
in review as well on Saturdays. At that subscribe or
(38:18):
auto download button on those in between days, grab my
podcast to Ben ferguson podcasts as well, and I'll keep
you up to down on the latest breaking news and the
Sina and I will see you back here Saturday for
the weekend review.
Welcome in his verdict with Center. Ted Cruz.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Nice to have you with us on this Friday morning,
and Center, We've got a lot to talk about, including
the tragedy that happened. You were right there in Washington
when all this was unfolding with this helicopter and airplane
colliding at Reagan National Airport.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Well, it was truly a tragic and horrific accident, and
it cost the lives of sixty seven souls. The commercial
airliner from American Airlines, flying from Wichita, Kansas to Washington
d C. Reagan Airport had sixty passengers on it and
four crew members, and then an Army black Hawk helicopter
(00:40):
had three soldiers on it, bringing the total death toll
to sixty seven. The two collided just before nine pm
on Wednesday night. They collided as the American Airlines airliner
was landing at d C. Reagan Airport. And I'll tell
(01:02):
you today, so you and I are recording this Thursday night. Today,
I spent a lot of the day dealing with the
aftermath of this. So, as you know, I'm the chairman
of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. It
has jurisdiction over all of aviation. And so today I
hosted briefings from the FAA and the NTSB, the National
(01:24):
Traffic Safety Board, and we were heard from. They were
bipartisan briefings. I had senators both Republicans and Democrats that participated,
and we got we got briefings the NTSB, which is
(01:46):
as I said, the National Transportation Safety Board does investigations
whenever there's a serious accident, whenever there's an accident, an
aviation accident, whenever there's a rail accident, they do investigations,
and we heard from them. Now as of Thursday, the
NTSB had over a dozen investigators on the ground. And listen,
(02:10):
in the wake of an accident, you've got to actually
see what happened. You've got to investigate and discover the facts,
discover the evidence. In this instance, we know that the
American Airlines flight was coming in. It was initially on
runway one at Reagan Airport, and then the air traffic
controllers moved it to runway thirty three, So they shifted
(02:31):
the runway right at the very end, and the American
Airlines pilots changed their descent to land on runway thirty three. Now,
simultaneously there was an Army black Hawk helicopter that was traveling.
There are multiple helicopter routes that go in and around
Reagan Airport, and that Army helicopter was on Route one
(02:53):
and then it was shifting from Route one to Root four,
and the air traffic controllers were in contact with the
pilots of the American Airlines flight and also the pilots
of the helicopter, and after telling the American Airlines jet
to land on Runway thirty three, the air traffic controller
(03:15):
tells the black Hawk pilots to visually confirm and have
in the line of sight the incoming plane, and the
black Hawk helicopter pilots confirmed that yes, they have the
plane in sight, and they also instruct the black Hawk
pilots to come behind the plane that is landing. What
(03:38):
in fact happens, or what appears to have happened, is
the black Hawk helicopter came in front of the plane
that was landing. The two collided midair and exploded midair.
Now at this point it appears everyone involved died. Both
the plane and the black Hawk helicopter sunk into the
(03:59):
Potomac River. They were both in relatively shallow water about
seven to eight feet of water where they had sunk,
and as of Thursday, the black box, the flight recorder
had been recovered from the airplane and they are in
(04:20):
the process of recovering the black box the audio transcript
recorder for the Blackhawk helicopter, so both of those will
be recovered and they're trying to piece together what happened.
What do we know. We know that somebody were multiple
somebodies made a catastrophic mistake, a catastrophic mistake that led
(04:41):
to a massive loss of life at this point, and look,
there are lots of people who are giving all sorts
of theories, who are jumping on all sorts of possibilities.
In my view, we shouldn't speculate. We shouldn't we shouldn't
get ahead of the evidence. We need to understand exactly
what caused this accident, whether it was an error on
the part of the army pilot, whether it was conceivably
(05:05):
an error on the part of the commercial airliner pilot,
whether it was an error on the part of the
air traffic controller, or some combination of multiplayers in that regard.
We don't know right now. What we do know is
two aircraft we're in the same place at the same time.
Now as we were having the briefing from the NTSB
(05:27):
and the FAA that they told us several things. Number
number one that had the helicopter stayed on Route four,
it would have been well out of the way of
the landing path of the airline, and it would have
been in a lower altitude than where the helicopter and
(05:50):
the jet collided. We don't know what happened exactly. One
of the things the NTSB is going to do in
this investigation is they're going to listen to the black
boxer coardings of both aircraft and they're going to retrace
the path the exact path of both aircraft to discover
was one of them where it was not supposed to be?
Were both of them where they were not supposed to be.
(06:12):
At this point, we don't have a clear answer to that,
and it's easy I would say, don't trust twitter, don't
trust every theory. Look, they looked at one theory and actually,
something I asked the NTSB, I said, when the air
traffic controller asked the black Hawk pilots, do you have
visual confirmation to the aircraft, and the black Hawk pilots
confirm that do we have evidence that they were looking
(06:34):
at a different airplane. You could certainly this strikes me
as a reasonable inference that the the helicopter pilot looks
and says, yes, I see the plane and perhaps didn't
realize it was a different plane that was landing, because
presumably if they saw the plane that led to the collision,
they would not have stayed in the in the path
of the plane, but they would would have piloted elsewhere.
(06:55):
So NTSB and FAA told me right now, we don't know,
so that's not confirmed. That's a theory people are saying
online it is a plausible theory, but we don't have
confirmation of that right now. There's also discussion about the equipment.
So the Blackhawk helicopter had a transponder, so it was
(07:18):
appearing on radar. It did not have technology called ADSB,
which is technology that pings the location of an aircraft,
and it does so using GPS rather than radar, and
ADSB is more accurate and more reliable then simply a
(07:39):
transponder that is pinging on radar. Now, under the FAA rules,
military aircraft and federal law enforcement, an aircraft are exempted
from the requirement that they have ADSB technology, And I
will tell you as we were talking with the FAA,
as we were talking with the NTSB, what they told us,
(08:05):
at least initially, is that had the Blackhawk had ADSB,
they said, it would have not have altered the ability
of air traffic control and the American Airlines pilot to
see the helicopter. I don't know. I will confess I
don't know the technical answers to this precisely, which is
(08:27):
why the investigation needs to proceed. I expect to get
an answer on that, but we don't know the answer
to that exactly. I will say, also, Ben, I think
a very reasonable question that a number of senators were
asking is why exactly are there so many helicopter flight
paths immediately in the vicinity of such a busy airport
(08:50):
as DC Reagan Airport. Is that a sound policy decision
to have helicopters traveling that close. Now, now, I don't
know if that's the cause of it, By the way,
we will. What we do know is the two should
not have collided, and so somebody screwed up, and we'll
figure out who and how and why.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
And look, Washington and I talked to a pilot today,
and he said, Washington's just different and Reagan's just different.
There's a lot more helicopters there, there's a lot more
airspace there that's different than other parts. It's a lot
more intense, there's a lot more rules, especially after nine
to eleven, and so you got to look at all
those things. It goes back to what you're saying, it's
just different. Private airplanes, for example, aren't going into Reagan.
(09:34):
You go into DoLS for that exact reason, because you're
protecting and so there are so many X factors. Is
one pilot to today, There's so many questions to ask.
This is not a simple yes or no or point
of finger because there's so many X factors when you
fly to DCA.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Well, and I'll say the briefing that I hosted with
NTSB of the FAA, so I had, I was on it.
Obviously Maria Cantwell, who's the ranking member of the senior
Democrat on the Commerce Committee, she was on it. We
also had both of the Kansas Senators, Jerry Moran and
Roger Marshall. They both participated, and obviously the flight came
from WHICHITAS. So the Kansas senators are particularly engaged and
(10:13):
then we had Tammy Duckworth and Jerry Moran and Tammy
Duckworth are the chairman and ranking member, respectively of the
Aviation Subcommittee of the Commerce Committee, so they're both particularly
engaged in aviation issues, which is why I invited both
of them to participate. So Tammy Duckworth was in the military.
She was a helicopter pilot and she's in a wheelchair.
She was very badly wounded in a combat injury. But
(10:39):
she is an experienced helicopter pilot. I will tell you
in the briefing, I commented, I said, Tammy, it's really
helpful to have an experienced helicopter pilot as part of
this discussion, because she was literally she had the maps
out of the flight path and she's looking at, okay,
where runway thirty three is and where helicopter Roote four is.
And Tammy was saying in the course of the discussion,
(11:00):
if the helicopter stayed on helicopter Route four, it should
not have been anywhere close to the landing pattern for
runway thirty three. So that was an insight. Look, I'm
not a helicopter pilot. I don't have the insight to
look at those maps and determine that. I thought that
was a very interesting insight from her. I'll tell you
something else she said that I didn't know that was interesting.
(11:21):
It's been widely reported the Army black helicopter was on
a training mission. What she said is the Army routinely
codes virtually every flight as a training mission. And she
said the reason they do that is Army pilots are
required to have a certain number of hours to keep
their certification, and so every flight they do as a
(11:42):
training mission to maintain those hours. So what she said
is it doesn't necessarily convey what the purpose of that
flight was that it is being called a training mission.
I have to admit I would not have known that
had she not said that, And I think all of
us we were like, oh, that's.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
Interesting because when you listen this, especially if you're just
watching the news, and they're like, why would you have
this training flight this time of night? Yeah, right there
in this airspace. Surely there's somewhere else you could go
and treat that is a lot less congested than DCA
and all the regulations that you have, and this bravo
space around the Washington d C. At the highest level
(12:19):
go somewhere else and be safer. But the way that
you just described it from her, well, this actually makes sense.
They could be doing real work and they categorize it.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
As a training mission.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
So look, I think in the days that go forward,
we're going to find out what the precise mission was.
My understanding is the pilots for the American Airlines flight
were quite experienced. They had a very significant number of
hours of flight, so they were very experienced. At this point,
I don't have a clear picture of what the experience
level was for the Army pilots. I'm confident we will
(12:51):
find out more about that, and I'm confident we will
have discussions on policy questions. One discussion I'm sure we
will have is whether the exemptions of the FAA rules
for military aircraft and federal law enforcement aircraft from having
the ADSB technology, Whether that is a good decision or not.
(13:12):
My understanding is one of the reasons for that exemption
is the military law enforcement sometimes doesn't want to be tracked.
They don't want their location evident, And there may be
reasons for both military law enforcement context why you want
the ability not to be tracked in real time. I
think that's a discussion we're going to have to have,
(13:33):
and as I sit here today, I don't know whether
that if the Blackhawk had that technology, whether it would
have made a material difference preventing this accident. I think
that's a reasonable question to ask. Secondly, I think we're
going to get some real questions about, Okay, how many
helicopter flights are there in and around Reagan Airport? Do
(13:56):
we need all of those flights? Is there an unnecessary
unreasonable risk. I don't know the answer to that. There
may be some compelling reason why you need to have that.
I certainly think you ought to give the military a
chance to explain it. But I think given this horrific
collision and the lives that are lost, we're going to
have to have a very serious conversation about what caused
(14:20):
this accident and what steps can be taken to prevent
this from happening in the future.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
Well, let's talk about the government aspect of this as well,
because there's people that have been asking is there full staffing?
Are we understaffed? Are there enough people in the towers?
Are there enough qualified people in the towers? Has that
even become part of the conversation yet?
Speaker 1 (14:41):
On the hill.
Speaker 3 (14:42):
It's certainly part of the conversation. I would say, at
this point, we don't know. So I've seen reports that
the air traffic controller was assigned to multiple responsibilities. It's
not clear what the facts are on that. And one
of the dangers coming out of a catastrophic accident is
there's a fog of war. There's people here snip at
this and the other, and they repeat it. And I'm
(15:03):
a big believer, I will say the NTSB, I've grown
to really respect the work they do. They investigate when
you have a catastrophic accident. They investigate based on the facts,
based on evidence, and they do a good job of
not jumping into conclusions, trying to figure out, okay, exactly
what happened. So a last airlines when you had the
door plug blow off, and TSB did a very thorough
(15:24):
investigation there and presented their conclusions. And so today we
heard from them, but it was barely twelve hours into
the investigation, so they didn't know a whole lot yet.
And I do think and they will reach a conclusion expeditiously.
These guys are serious and technical and they try to
(15:45):
follow the facts, and that investigation is important. Once we
know the facts of what caused the accident, then we
can say, all right, what steps can be taken to
minimize these risks going forward. But I do think one
of the things I'm merging my colleagues, both Republicans and Democrats,
(16:07):
is is don't don't get ahead of ourselves. And by
the way, I'll tell you just a personal aspect to this.
So last night, Wednesday night, I was having dinner in Washington,
d C. I was having dinner with Mike Waltz. Mike
Waltz is President Trump's national security advisor. And so most
nights when I'm in Washington, d C. I have working dinners.
(16:29):
I have dinners with colleagues, with other senators or House members.
I have dinners with cabinet members. Sometimes I have dinners
with subject matter experts. So last night I was having
dinner with Mike Waltz, the Trump's national security advisor, and
we were talking foreign policy. We're talking the Middle East.
We were talking Israel and Iran and China and all
of the foreign policy challenges facing this country. And I
(16:50):
will tell you right at the end of the dinner,
we actually were just wrapping up when Mike got a
call and said, oh, wow, okay, there's been a collision
between a jet and helicopter a DC Reagan airport. So
Mike left to go back to the White House to
deal with it. And as I was walking out, I'll
tell you been a particularly personal aspect. So last night
(17:11):
Heidi was flying into d C and she was flying
into Reagan. Wow. And she was due to land about
thirty minutes after this accident happened. And so I'll say,
my body man, who's a great kid, is with me frequently,
came up. I'll give him credit what he said to
me walking up, As he said, Heidie's okay, but there's
(17:34):
been an accident at d C Reagan and a commercial
jettis Hitt helicopter. I was very glad he started with
Heidie's okay, because I got to say, and so what happened.
Her flight was diverted from Reagan and it landed in
BWI for beer.
Speaker 1 (17:48):
They don't know.
Speaker 3 (17:48):
Bw's Baltimore, Baltimore, Washington, and it's about forty five minutes away.
There are three airports that serve DC Washington. Reagan is
the closest to d C Washington. Dulles's in northern Virginia
a little further out, and then BWI Baltimore, Washington is,
like I said, forty five minutes to an hour out.
So she was diverted. And so when she landed it
(18:09):
was interesting. I texted her immediately said hey, are you okay?
I got no answer because she was still in the air.
And then when she landed, I called her immediately, and
as she was getting off the plane, she said, what happened?
I don't understand. Why do we get sent to BWI?
So they didn't tell the passengers why they were diverted,
and so I told her what had happened, and she
was and I look, I understand, you don't want to
(18:31):
tell passengers on an airplane. Hey, there was just a
plane crash that freaks people out. But I told her
and then she came home. But I got ad met it.
It freaked me out a little bit that my wife
was within twenty thirty minutes of where there was a
fatal plane crash at that airport, and you and I
both landed at DCA hundreds if not hundreds of thousands
(18:54):
of times, and so it's I got to say. I did.
I was, I said a long prayer and was like God,
thank you for sparing Heidi and I. When she got
to our apartment, I gave her a very long hug.
And it's uh. And I am grieving for the sixty
(19:14):
seven families who are mourning the loss of their loved ones.
It's horrific and and and we're certainly grieving them. And
we're grateful for all the first responders and everyone who's
been really heroic, UH, try to deal with this, this
this catastrophe since it happened.
Speaker 2 (19:30):
Well, I also want to just highlight the response was incredible.
And I'm sure you've got some of that briefing that
came about this. You know, there's always criticism of we
could do things better, but the on the ground first responders'
response truly seemed unbelievable. How quick they were responding, how
(19:51):
fast there were so many people there to help. You
were hoping for good news that they were going to
be survivors. We now know that the tragic loss of
life and what the reality was, but even in the recovery,
it was all hands on deck. And it made me
proud to be an American. I mean, it was it
was truly incredible to watch it in real time on TV.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
Yeah. I talked early this morning to Robert Isam, who's
the CEO of American Airlines. He flew to DC. He
was on the ground. Obviously they were dealing with sixty
passengers and four crew members who were killed, and they
were dealing with trying to provide help and support to
the families, and I talked to him. I also talked
to Sean Duffy as the Secretary of Transportation. You know,
(20:33):
Seawan was confirmed the day earlier, like it literally this
was his first day on the job. Yeah, And Shawn
is a good man and a serious man, and he's
been diving in and trying to deal with it. But
this is a heck of a welcome to be Secretary
of Transportation. We've got a major airplane accident on day
one and he's dealing with it and look the resources
(20:56):
to investigate to try to determine ex exactly what happened.
The NTSB in particular, they're very good at this, and
we're trying to track down Obviously there was a massive
mistake somewhere, but we need to figure out who made
it and why and and and how could it have
been prevented so that we can learn lessons and try
(21:18):
to stop this from happening again. I will say this
though also as just to comfort everyone. As horrific as
this is, it is worth remembering that air travel is
is hands down the safest mode of transport it and
your odds of being killed driving to the airport are
still higher than they are being killed flying on a
(21:41):
commercial airline, so they're not zero. And and and in
some ways it is amazing given the flights that occur
all over this country in so many places, that that
that that it has been a long time since we've
had a mass fatality accident in the United States, given
how complicated lying is, and in some ways that's remarkable.
(22:02):
But nonetheless this tragedy, we should do everything we can
to press for zero fatalities. And so we're going to
learn lessons from this and try to try to prevent
it from happening again.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
You mentioned something and just you talk about perspective, it
was it's amazing just how fast things can change. Because
Sean Duffy, who you know well, and his wife Rachel,
they have a large family, and he was welcomed just
minutes before at his office and his family was there,
(22:37):
and he walked up to walk into the office where
he's going to serve the American people. And he went
into that office and then I'm sure afterwards was immediately
rushed out because of what happened. And I sent a
note to is what Rachel last night. I just said,
you know, I'm so proud and I'm so sorry that
the first night that this is what you're having to
deal with the best that I know. God has put
y'all there for times like this to lead into comfort.
(23:00):
And I do think the American peoples to understand they're
incredible leaders that we have just gained who are going
to do an amazing job in times like these.
Speaker 1 (23:08):
Sean is one of those.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Yeah, and look, I'm grateful that he was on board
and confirmed and was able to be doing his job
on the day of this accident. Also Pete Hegseth, who
was just confirmed as Secretary of Defense. Listen, this is
a crisis involving the loss of life for three soldiers
as well and the question of who was at fault.
There's at least some real question whether the military pilots
(23:34):
have committed some serious error. We don't know for sure,
but that you look at Pete Hegseith, you're just confirmed
his Defense secretary. This is a serious challenge to deal
with in his first couple of days as well, and
I'm grateful both of them were confirmed on the job,
because you need strong leadership to deal with the crisis
of this magnitude.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
I was going to ask you my next question quickly
was going to be the follow up on the military.
We talked so much about, you know, transportation, the airlines
and the CEO and et cetera, But let's talk about
the military side.
Speaker 1 (24:08):
There was loss of life there as well. What do
we know from that perspective.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
We know three soldiers were aboard the Blackhawk and they
were all killed. We don't know the details now of
who made the mistake. Obviously somebody did because this should
not have happened, But we don't know where the mistake was,
and it's where the investigation, like NTSB will retrace the
exact path of each airline, each aircraft and figure out, Okay,
(24:37):
who was not where they were supposed to be, Who
was in the wrong place? Was there a miscommunication? Look,
as you review the transcripts, you know FA and NTSB
told us, at least initially reviewing the transcript. It appeared
like when the air traffic controllers said, okay, do you
have visual confirmation of the airline and the helicopter pilot
said yes. What we were told in the b anything
(25:00):
is ordinarily the air traffic controller would move on say okay,
you guys are taken care of, onto the next flight.
So that was their initial take. Is that exchange appeared
to be a fairly typical exchange back and forth of
navigating multiple aircraft in close proximity. Nevertheless, we'll find out
(25:22):
as we examine. Was there just one individual who made
an error? Were there multiple individuals? Was what was the
cause of this? And that I'm confident I've told the
other members of the Commerce Committee. As NTSB reaches conclusions,
i'll have another briefing where we sit down with them
and can ask them, ask them hard questions and understand, Okay,
(25:46):
what really caused this and how do we prevent it
from happening again.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
This brings us to confirmations, and I do want to
just give a quick update for everybody about where we are.
It shows you the importance of having people in these
positions you talk about. Sean Duffy is a great example.
Confirmed on the day this happened. There are several other
major posts that we have confirmation hearings that wrapped up
on Thursday, as you and I recording this Thursday night.
(26:13):
There will not be votes on them till next week.
How are things moving forward? Where are we in general
right now compared to in the past, Because I'm just saying,
are they slowing us down? Are we getting back on track?
Where are we?
Speaker 4 (26:26):
So?
Speaker 3 (26:26):
Look, the Democrats are certainly engaged in delay and obstruction.
That being said, where we are now? Eight cabinet members
have been confirmed, So we.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
Are so ple know what's the total number that is
a full.
Speaker 3 (26:38):
Cabinet in the low twenties.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
Okay, So we're far away. We're not even a half,
We're not even a fifty percent.
Speaker 3 (26:44):
Correct, But we are ahead of where Biden was at
this point, and we're ahead of where Trump was in
the first term. So eight is moving with greater expedition
than the last two administrations of scene and so started with.
The first cabinet member confirm was Marco Rubio. He was
confirmed on January twentieth, the first day, and he was
(27:06):
confirmed ninety nine to zero. The second cabinet member was
the CIA director John Ratcliffe. He had seventy four yeses
and twenty five knows. After that, you had Pete Hegseth
as Defense Secretary. He had fifty one yeses and fifty knows.
The Vice President J. D. Vance cast the tie breaking vote.
The next person confirmed was the Secretary of Homeland Security,
(27:28):
Christy Dome. She had fifty nine yeses and thirty four nos.
After that, the Treasury Secretary was confirmed. He had sixty
eight yes, twenty nine knows. That's Scott Bessent. After that,
the Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was confirmed. We're very glad
he was confirmed given this crisis. He had seventy seven
(27:48):
yeses and twenty two knows. After that, the EPA Administrator
Lee Zelden, former congressman from New York, former candidate for
governor in New York, a friend of mine. He was
confirmed as EPA administrator with fifty six yes's, forty two knows.
And then just today, the Interior Secretary Doug Burgham, the
(28:08):
former governor of North Dakota. He was confirmed seventy nine
yes as eighteen nos. Now where do we stand now?
In addition to confirming Doug Burgham, we've teed up as
the next cabinet members to be confirmed, Chris Wright as
Secretary of Energy, Doug Collins as Secretary of Veterans Affairs,
and Pam Bondy as Attorney General, and Scott Turner as
(28:32):
Secretary of Housing in Urban Development. All of those are
our scheduled to be confirmed next week, so they're teed up.
We were going to ram through the weekend and keep
the Democrats here because they were engaged in obstruction, and
Thursday night the Democrats caved and they agreed to expedite
and move these forward. So we're moving now on a
(28:53):
faster pace than we would have if we had rammed
through the weekend and the Democrats had extended all the time.
So they agreed, all right, we'll compress the time if
we let them fly home, and so by next week,
as I said, Secretary of Energy, Secretary of Eddans Affairs,
Attorney General and hud we'll all make it through next week.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
That obviously means the pace is moving up. When you
look at so far what's happened there does seem to
be a little bit of a change. Now we're noticing
it with the Democrats in the media especially, it seems
like there's a real appetite to just get a nominee
whatever when they get their hands on to not pass.
(29:36):
Is that part of the gainsmanship that we're witnessing. Am
I reading the room the right way?
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (29:40):
Look, I still believe, and I've said this a number
of times, that all of Trump's cabinet nominees are going
to be confirmed, and I think they'll be confirmed within
thirty days. That we are leaning in. We're putting the
pedal to the medal under the Senate rules that the
Democrats can delay some, but I think within thirty days
we'll get them all through Out the two the three
(30:03):
that they are going after hardest are in terms of
cabinet nominees, Tulca Gabbert for Director of National Intelligence, Bobby
Kennedy for Health and Human Services, and then it's not
a cabinet position, but Cash Pateel for Director of the FBI,
which it's a sub cabinet position but a very very
important law enforcement position. Those are the three. It's not
(30:26):
complicated or subtle. Those three are the top targets of
the Democrats. Today. In the Senate Judiciary Committee, we had
cash Betel's hearing. I was vigorous at the hearing defending him.
I will tell you I think I think Cash did
very well. I think he acquitted himself in an excellent way.
(30:46):
This evening I was on Sean Hannity, and as I
put it, I said, my assessment of the Democrats behavior
at cash Betel's hearing reminded me of the quote from
Shakespeare's Macbeth. It was a tale told by an idiot,
full of out in fury and signifying nothing.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
That is a great accurate way of describing it. Was
a you know what show is how I was going
to put it.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
But they didn't land any material blows. And look, the
point on Cash. What they're attacking him on not that
he's not qualified. He's clearly qualified. He has over a
decade of experience in law enforcement, national security, including having
been a federal public defender, including having been a federal prosecutor,
having worked in the National Security Division of the Department
(31:31):
of Justice, having worked in the White House and the
National Security Council, having been a senior intelligence staffer on
Capitol Hill, and having been the chief of staff at
the United States Defense Department. They're not arguing he's unqualified.
What they're arguing is they're terrified he will do exactly
what President Trump promised he would do, which is eliminate
(31:52):
the politicization and weaponization of the FBI and get it
back to its core function. I believe Cash Bettel will
do that, and I think the Democrats are free out
because they don't want them to do that. But I
think Cash will make it through. We also had hearings
this week for both Bobby Kennedy and Tulsea Gabbert. I
don't know, it is not impossible that one of those
(32:13):
nominees is defeated, but I think they all make it through.
Speaker 2 (32:17):
Right now, when you look at the Republicans, when Democrats
are pushing this obstructionism the way that they are doing
it and trying to slow things down, does that unify
the Republican base more because it's like, all right, come on, guys.
Does that make it actually easier to get the votes
you need because you realize what you're up against?
Speaker 3 (32:36):
A look, potentially, you had Pete hag Seth, who is
the one they went after the hardest so far, and
that vote was fifty to fifty. We lost three Republicans.
We lost Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitch McConnell. Because
we have a fifty three to forty seven majority, losing
three made it fifty to fifty, and that meant the
(32:57):
Vice President JD. Vance could break the tie. I am
glad we have fifty three. If we had a fifty
one vote majority, I would not be nearly so sanguine.
I would not be saying every Trump Cabinet nominee is
going to be confirmed if we had a fifty one
vote majority. But because we have fifty three, we can
lose up to three, and so I think all of
(33:17):
these make it through. Listen, Tulsi. Tulsi was a Democrat
for most of her career. She is perceived if you
look at Republican foreign policy, they're interventionists and isolationists. There
are many who perceive Tulsi as much more of an isolationist.
So there are Republicans who have real concerns with her
will that play out into no votes. I don't know.
(33:40):
I think the President deserves a considerable amount of deference
in naming his cabinet members, and he has decided to
name Tulci Gabbert. I'm going to vote yes, but I
don't know. It's not impossible that we get four no votes,
which would take down the nomination. Likewise, Bobby Kennedy. Bobby
Kennedy's a complicated situation. Both Kennedy and Tulsa, until like
(34:02):
twelve minutes ago, they were both Democrats, and so Bobby
Kennedy obviously a scion of one of the great Democrat
royalty families, Camelot. It is a curious dynamic. It's not
clear to me any Democrat is going to vote for him,
which is an interesting situation. Listen, there's some conservatives. Bobby Kennedy,
(34:26):
until recently, on many policies is his views were quite
left of center. I'm going to vote for Bobby Kennedy
because I think he's a change agent, because I think
he has courage to take on I think some of
the corruption that we have at HHS, particularly with big Pharma,
that gets in bed with the career bureaucrats there and
(34:47):
stifles competition and drives up costs. I think if you
have a terrible disease, you should have a right to
access life saving medication. And I'm one of the original
sponsors of the right to Try legislation. I think that's
very important, and i think Bobby Kennedy is going to
shake up the cronyism that that has characterized HHS. What's
(35:15):
not clear to me is I don't if any Democrats
want that cronyism shaken up, and to be honest, there
may be some Republicans that don't. Let's play this exchange.
So this is Bobby Kennedy responding to Bernie Sanders. Bernie's
going to vote now. When Bernie was attacking him like crazy,
but I got to say, Bobby Kennedy popped him back
(35:36):
pretty hard. Listen to this exchange.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
I'm going to make America healthier than other countries in
the world. Right now, will.
Speaker 4 (35:43):
You guarantee do what every other major country. It's a
simple question.
Speaker 5 (35:48):
And by the way, Bernie, you know the problem of
corruption is not just in the federal agents, is in
Congress too. Almost all the members of this panel are accepting,
include yourself, or accepting millions of dollars from the pharmaceutical
industry protecting their interests.
Speaker 4 (36:06):
Oh I thought that that would No. No, I ran
for president like you. I got millions, millions of contributions.
They did not come from the executives, not one nickel
of pack money from the pharmaceuticals and they came to
twenty twenty.
Speaker 5 (36:24):
In twenty twenty, you were the single largest.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
Because I received a pharmaceutical combinations from workers all over
this country.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
Workers.
Speaker 1 (36:34):
You were this, not a nickel from corporate.
Speaker 5 (36:37):
You was the single largest pharmaceutical.
Speaker 4 (36:40):
Dollars from workers in point three five million. Yeah, out
of two hundred millions.
Speaker 3 (36:46):
All right, but.
Speaker 4 (36:48):
You have not answered last question.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
I mean that you want to talk about a beatdown
with the facts there, Bernie, You've accepted millions of dollars
in the pharmaceutical industry.
Speaker 1 (36:58):
In twenty twenty, you were this single.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Largest receiver of pharmacyal dollars one point five millions.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
Like, let's just move on here.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
Yeah, he did not like that exchange. By the way,
I've never seen a confirmation hearing where the nominee refers
to the senator by his first name. He keeps calling
him Bernie. Like it's clear Bobby Kennedy and Bernie Sanators
they know each other well. I mean, they've got a
long history there. Because that's that that that's quite unusual too.
But I gotta say Bernie was not anticipating that pop back.
(37:30):
We'll see how it plays out. But I think Kennedy's
gonna get confirmed. I want him to get confirmed. I
like Bobby Kennedy, and I also think there are a
lot of Americans, a lot of Americans who are not
even very political, a lot of moms who are worried
about the garbage that that our kids are are consuming,
are worried about the rise in in in in chronic illness,
(37:52):
that that that that. I think Bobby Kennedy is a
very good person to take that on well.
Speaker 2 (37:57):
And the keyword you use was an age of change. Ye,
there is an appetite for that in Washington. The status
quo people are sick and tired of. And that's part
of the reason why I think Donald Trump brought who
he brought to the table. Absolutely, don't forget. We did
a show Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We do a week
in review as well on Saturdays. At that subscribe or
(38:18):
auto download button on those in between days, grab my
podcast to Ben ferguson podcasts as well, and I'll keep
you up to down on the latest breaking news and the
Sina and I will see you back here Saturday for
the weekend review.
Host
Ben Ferguson
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