April 24, 2024 • 30 mins
I talk with Nebraska's 2nd District Congressman about foreign defense spending, Trump and Biden, and a lot more ahead of his May 14th primary challenge.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Scott Vordiz Don Bacon, welcome back. Thank you Scott. Great to be
back on kfab and in Omaha.Yes, you guys have done quite a
lot to us in Washington, dC. Here recently. We'll talk about
that here. We had your challengerin the upcoming Republican primary, which is
less than a month away now,twenty days Tuesday, May fourteenth. We
(00:22):
had Dan Fry in here a coupleof weeks ago. That's up on the
podcast link on the Scott Vorhe's pageat kfab dot com. And I'm not
going to go point by points saywell, Dan Fry said this, I
want you to respond. But oneof the big things that I hear from
constituents and that he mentioned, whichinterestingly, we don't hear from your potential
(00:43):
Democratic challenger in this race, TonyVargas in November, should you make it
to the general election. It hasto do with congressional spending. We just
had billions more dollars approved by Congressthis week for aid to Ukraine, aid
to Israel. There is something elsein there. We've we want China to
divest from TikTok. You know thisall obviously costs a lot of money.
(01:07):
Where are you on this latest roundof congressional spending. Congressman, Well,
first of all, big picture,this past year, we cut spending going
over the Fiscal Year Development Planner,the Fight Up we call it, by
about two and a half trillion dollars. That was the FRA that the Speaker
McCarthy at the time, I reachedan agreement with the president. If you
remember, the president refuse to negotiate. McCarthy insisted, and through that process
(01:30):
got the biggest cuts in history,right, or so is that cuts from
what they wanted to spend? Likewhen you say, you know, two
and a half billion dollars in cuts, that's not cuts from year over year.
It's not like we were spending onehundred billion hour spending ninety seven point
two and a half trillion dollars andprotected spending. Yeah, it's it's like
my wife says, I saved onehundred dollars on this dress. I paid
(01:53):
five hundred for it. I said, you sound like you spent five hundred
dollars. She's like, well itwas six hundred. Well, it was
still the biggest reductions in history.And the alternative was we're gonna have a
government shutdown. That's what my opponentsays. Okay, no, we're going
to shut it down. That doesn'twork. Folks don't want government shutdowns.
This district does not want shutdowns.But we negotiated the best ideal I think
(02:15):
we could get with Speaker McCarthy nowin the spending that we did last week.
I do think it's in our nationalsecurity interest that Ukraine remained independent.
If you don't stand up to abully, the bully keeps coming after you.
And he invaded a Ukraine. It'san illegal invasion, of barbaric invasion,
and I think we've learned in historyif you don't stand up to that,
of worse things happen. The Ukrainiansare doing the fighting. We don't
(02:37):
have any soldiers there or any troops, but our weapons are good and we've
put a serious hurt on Russia sofar with our weapons. Also, I
think we stand by our best friendin the Middle East, Israel, who's
been attacked un mercifully. You know, on October seventh, I ran just
hit them with three hundred and thirtyprojectiles or munitions, one hundred and ten
ballistic missiles out of that three hundredand thirty, and I think if we
(03:00):
don't help Taiwan now a theemics weremore likely with China. So I support
what we did with America is theleader of the free world. We're the
indispensable power for freedom. We can'tdo it by ourselves. We need good
allies. But if if we're notthere, or Russia and China and Iran
will fill the void. It's somethinglike sixty billion dollars to Ukraine, twenty
(03:21):
six billion dollars to Israel, eightbillion dollars to Taiwan. Does this cover
it? It covers it for abouta year, and hopefully with the weapons
in Ukraine, Russia, they didn'tfill any pressure they were running. Ukraine
was running out of weapons. Wewere three four months overdue on trying to
do this. Russia had no reasonto negotiate. Now with these weapons there,
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We're gonna give them some of thehigher end surface surface missiles a tackle
as we call them, one hundredand eighty mile range. These can be
game changers. We got to putRussia, We've got to leverage these and
put pressure on them to negotiate.Let's talk about Israel a bit more here,
as the top story this week hasbeen these protests erupting on college campuses
across the country. Many of theseprotesters are holdover as from Occupy Wall Street
(04:10):
or Black Lives Matters or whatever.They don't know what they're protesting. They
just see, Oh, this lookslike Antifa, let's do this. And
in the middle of this is Israel, still reeling from the attack you mentioned
from October hostages still held hostage bytwenty since October. What are your thoughts
(04:31):
here as you see these protests thathave been shutting down commuters, airports,
and now college campuses in America thatare against one of our biggest allies.
Well, I'm thankful we're in Nebraska, for starters, we have much less
of this in our university. Ihear there's some of it, But some
of these universities, like in youknow, whether it's jail, we're seeing
(04:53):
it right now. In New YorkCity, for I think decades, they
were allowing anti Israel, anti Semitic, pro Palestinian thought. With the professor's
there. Now we have a monsteron our hands. And I would tell
folks it's all right to protest ifyou want to protest Israel's operations in Gaza,
fair enough, But the many youstart assaulting and harassing Jewish students,
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are desecrating the synagogues. That's antisemitism. So we got to be clear,
this is anti Semitism at these campuses, and we got to be clear.
It's unacceptable and we should we shouldcall them out for what it is.
And it's unacceptable. This is happeningin our country. I have a
lot of Jewish friends, and theysee corollaries to what happened in Europe in
the early nineteen thirties, and they'rescared. We got to stand by our
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Jewish friends on this, and ifthis ever happens in Nebraska, op our
border regents and the leadership expels thesestudents because it's unacceptable. I look at
the world landscape here for potential wars. You see what China is lying and
wait about you see what Russia's beendoing. You see what Iran and Hamas
been doing to Israel. These arethis is America's allies here. We've said
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we stand by Ukraine, we standby Israel, we stand by Taiwan in
some cases via treaty, and yetthese nations are still under all these threats
or under attack in some instances.Is our president, is our nation showing
enough leadership to ward off these threats. And if not, what good is
(06:23):
more money going to do If noneof these countries are afraid of what our
response might be. Well, themoney going to Ukraine will be well spent
because the Ukrainians are doing the fightingwe're not. But give them those weapons
helps them hold Russia back and hopefullythey'll force Russia to the negotiating table.
But we'll see. I mean that'stheir decision. Having these weapons go to
Taiwan are report for deterrence. Andby the way, they need see mins,
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they need harpoon missiles to hit shipsat forty miles out. I need
long range Jared defenses. All thatstuff should be in this package. And
of course US supporting our good friendIsrael, I think in our national security
interests now our I want to maybecrush twelfth I said earlier some of these
cuts were real cuts, like wehad growth in the military, growth in
VA, but in other areas therewere actual cuts to the two and two
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a half trillion. But if youput it all together as of being a
wash, because we're increasing spending inmilitary and VA. So I just wanted
to clarify that. But it's importantthat we have the strongest military in the
world because we are the leader ofthe free world. And I get I'll
say, as I mentioned earlier,we need good allies. We can't do
it all by ourselves. But ifwe're not there, or Russia and China
and Iran fills that void and thisrole becomes a more dangerous place. Isolationism
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does not work. Congressman, withyour congressional and military background, you're uniquely
qualified to answer this question of militaryfamilies, potential military families. Though,
a lot of kids about to graduatefrom high school wonder what that next step
is going to be, and theyturn on the TV and they see rockets
from Iran into Israel. They sawwhat happened in October against our ally.
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We see about this. We weresending money to Taiwan to try and ward
off potential Chinese threat, and there'salways the possibility that Russia could drag us
into some sort of war over Ukraine. And they think, wow, I
want to send my kids into themilitary to go deal with just the centuries
long conflict in the Middle East becausethese guys can't get along and we got
(08:18):
to get dragged into it. Idon't know what I'm thinking about this.
I mean, how much should Americabe involved in these escalating conflicts. Well,
I think we should be very carefulabout ever sending US troops in a
harms way. I think that's whatthey have learned after thirty years in the
military. A lot of when weput our troops at harms way, there's
often an unattended consequences, and Ithink we should be extraordinarily cautious. However,
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providing arms to your friends is adifferent story now. Thankfully, we've
recruited the best people in our countryto serve in the military. The all
volunteer Force has worked very well.We should defend it. In fact,
I was the chairman of a temporarysubcommittee to improve the quality of life for
our military. We just came outa report this past month, three or
five recommendations. I love to talkabout it later in the show. But
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we need people who are willing tostand and defend our country and defend the
values. It's better to win afight with Ukraine doing the fighting then for
Russia to later invade NATO and wehave to have people in the fight.
So it's better to help out ourallies and our friends now without our troops.
But we need strong and good characterpeople serving our military and I encourage
(09:26):
them to join. Steve emails viathe Zonker's custom woods Inbox Scott at kfab
dot com. It says, isUkraine ever going to win? This seems
like another Vietnam. Well, wehad troops in Vietnam and we lost fifty
eight thousand troops. We have zerotroops doing fighting in Ukraine. Ukraine is
the one is the victim. Russiadid the invasion? Do you just let
(09:48):
Russia break the rule of lot inveda neighboring country matter in fact, they
had an agreement in the nineties ofUkraine removed its nuclear weapons at Russia with
respected sporders. So they broke thatagreement with this invasion. I think as
long as Ukraine has the will tofight and defend us freedom by way the
number two guy in Russia. Sotheir goal is to illuminate Ukraine period.
No Ukraine on the map anymore,No more Ukrainians. They're going to be
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Russian. They're gonna stamp out Ukrainianculture and language. That's their vision for
Ukraine. Ukrainians don't want that.They want to protect their heritage, their
culture, you know their families.We've managed to go down about ten minutes
into this conversation. I haven't evenbrought up Trump's name, but I think
that that name deserves to be throwninto this conversation in this election year based
(10:33):
on what we didn't see under hispresidency, which we're seeing under President Biden.
You have upset some people within yourown party for various stances on some
of this. We'll pick up therewhen we rejoin this conversation with Nebraska's second
District Congressman Don Bacon. Next ScottVoice News Radio eleven ten kfab Congressman Don
(10:56):
Bacon is with us in the studio, Nebraska's second district congressman who's got a
primary challenger we talked with a fewweeks ago and Dan Frye the primary on
May fourteenth. General election in November, and it's more than the names of
the congressional candidates on the ballot inNovember. We've got a presidential election this
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year. We talked a lot inthis last segment about world conflicts. Amazing
that all the people thought Trump wasgoing to get us into World War III
seemed to be silent on that front, as Russia behaved, China behaved,
Iran behaved, and then President Bidencomes it back, and Russia starts going
into Ukraine like they did under theObama Biden regime. China starts rattling sabers,
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Iran's lighting things up with money thatPresident Biden gave them. Yet,
you've been hot and cold on Trumppresidency over the years, with all these
things here, Where are you rightnow on re electing President Donald Trump.
Well, I've made it very clearwhen it's between President Trump or President Biden,
I'm going to support President Trump mainly. He will fix the border,
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and it is the number one problemfacing our country. And you're not gonna
be able to fix the border withPresident Biden. I don't care what we
passed legislatively. His heart's done init to progress. The progressive willing is
not for it. In fact,if you look at twenty Vargus's he's never
said anything about the border. He'sright along with the squad on this.
So I'm with President Trump on theborder. I want to have good Supreme
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Court justices. He'll build a bettereconomy because he has a better handle and
how to control regulations and protecting ourbusiness community and so I'm with him hands
down when it comes between him andJoe Biden. I've criticized things in the
past, but I work for thepeople of this district. I don't work
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for any one person. I don'twork for the negop and I think my
promise to the voters is I'm goingto be honest. I'm going to try
to speak the truth to the bestof my ability. I know good people
can disagree, but I owe thisdistrict on if I saw an action that
I didn't agree with. I washonest when I came to President Trump,
and I've been the same way withPresident Biden. Folks in this district want
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me to be candid. We haveto remember our district went for Joe Biden
by seven points. A lot ofpeople forget that, and so to win
this district, you have to winindependent swing voters. To win the Republican
primary, you have to win Trumpvoters. And I'm winning at five to
one. Well, okay, seventyabout twenty percent. Don't make me do
math trum Trump supporters. Trump supportersdidn't like some of the stans you took
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here. In the battle the battlesover who is going to be the Speaker
of the House. They feel likeyou called them, and the quote was,
we cannot allow twenty people to holdus hostage act as political terrorists.
And they say, well, DonBacon called us terrorists. Well, I
was a figure of speech. Idid not call any but none of my
opponent's terrorists or any of the folkswho support my opponent never call them terrorists.
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However, I think we should stand. Okay, we've got two issues
here. In October of the Speaker'sfight, we had eight people vote with
Democrats to get rid of Kevin McCarthy. The other two hundred and fourteen voted
for Kevin McCarthy. So eight peoplevoted for voted against McCarthy with the Democrats,
seven of which were Jim Jordan supporters. And then we voted on Steve's
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Police and he won it pretty handily, and we had about eight Jim Jordan
supporters refused to vote for me.Can only lose four because I have a
four seat majority, and Jim Jordansat by and watched it. No good
Republican, no good American, isgoing to let a small minority tell the
majority what to do. And thatwas my principle there. If Jim Jordan
would have won the vote outright,I would have been different on that.
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Now there's been this accusation of mcalling people terrorists. It's not true.
There was one time I got ona bill four years ago that was to
strengthen the FBI's domestic terrorism program.We have voted on it multiple times before.
That was bipartisan. Some of thefolks that are on their PUBLICA side,
Hey, they're going to use thatBilly go against does I go,
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No, this is intended for everybody, jihadists, unibombers. It's I don't
like any terrorists, and this onearound. But for a couple of months,
you're doing this bill to go afterAID. No, we're not doing
that. And so he goes,why are you on this bill because I
don't like terrasts? Oh, youcall us terrists. I did not.
I do not like terrorists, period, and that's why I want to support
this legislation. Then another one cameup recently when I voted for PISA,
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and my opponents said, hey,I would have voted against FISA. We
have to have PISA to after terroristsoverseas. That's how we find them,
that's how we know what Putin's doingand what President She's doing. PISA is
so valuable to our telegs collection againstforeign threats. And so he said he
voted against it, and I said, well, the terrosts would agree with
you. I literally meant the realterrorists, not calling anybody domestically that.
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But I find in this campaign peopletwist and lie and abuse. So but
that's I wanted to clarify that,and I appreciate the opportunity. Yeah,
here we break some news this morning. Congressman Don Bacon does not like terrorists.
That's a fact. People though hereyou come out against those in the
speaker battle and talk about some ofthis stuff, but they don't hear you
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standing up for President Trump. He'sin courtroom after courtroom on things that you
usually see happen in Banana Republics.Here's my political opponent. Let's either throw
them in jail or try in thisinstance on a lot of different fronts.
For those who are thinking about whatto do in the Republican primary, many
of whom are pretty strident supporters ofDonald Trump, what do you need to
(16:30):
do to win them over? Andsay, look, I agree with you
on some of these things related toPresident Trump. More than policy decisions.
Do you need to stand up moreforcefully for Trump and what he's facing right
now. I'm going to stand upwhen I think I'm going to focus more
on policy. There's no doubt aboutthat, and I support, for example,
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it's a domestic policy I think istremendous energy independence. I mean,
all the things that he stood forI was able to do during his administration
I think are outstanding. We gota number two, you got fo or
five different types of cases going onhere. They're all different. I think
some of the legal expertise is accuratethat some of the things he did was
wrong but normally would not be prosecuted. But they're going after him. So
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I do think we have a prosecutedprosecutors that are politically zealous going after him.
But I also believe in our courtsystem that will work in the end,
between the juries the appeals, Iknow we have the best system in
the world. Is this going towork out in the end? And right
or wrong? I think I thinkjustice will be done. I was a
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little surprised when the Douglas County RepublicanParty endorsed you in this race, just
because the Republican Party locally and inthe state, especially with some of these
county parties, a little different thanit used to be. It's been we
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have different leadership, I'll put itthat way. So they had a recent
vote and said, yep, wewant Don Bacon to win reelection. And
then based on the chair of theDouglas County Republican Party, Chris Rothy,
he said, they had a meetingthat I wasn't invited to, and some
people who aren't in charge of theDouglas County Republican Party had a meeting this
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week yesterday without approval of the chairmanand flipped their endorsement from you to Dan
Fry, and from Pete Ricketts toJohn Glenn Weaver. And the chairman says,
nope, doesn't count. The resultsof the unofficial meeting are null and
void. This is as voters aretrying to figure out on the conservative side
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of the political spectrum, including someconservative minded independence what to do in the
May fourteenth primary. Here, whatdo you think about all of this?
Well, first of all, saidthe divisiveness at the NGP and at the
county level, well probably heard ofat some areas. Hopefully I will survive
and win in November. But it'sgoing to cost us somewhere, maybe a
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state Senate seat or maybe you know, it's some down ballot. And this
division is toxic out there in it, and the anger and the hate is
not helpful. That's not going towin in a swing district like here.
They want more optimism, enthusiasm,and you know, the America, our
greater days are are still looking for, are still coming towards us. So
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I'll say that upfront. And Ithink Chris Routhy is outstanding chairman. I
appreciate the great job he's done withthis group that did this in Douglas County.
First of all, there were DanFry supporters, so it was surely
done out of his campaign. Butthey represent i'm guessing Scott, maybe twenty
percent of the views of the Republicanvoters somewhere in there. They're a title
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to that, and I respect it. They have that freedom to be involved
and vote the way they want.But it's literally about one in five Republican
voters share those hardcore, more popular, less views. How do I know
that? Well, right now,I'm pulling sixty nine nineteen. That was
last week's pulling. There was anoutside group came in so I was up
fifty points, and then a monthand a half ago I was a pull.
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I was up forty nine points.So I got pretty good consistent numbers
there. But let's just put meto the side. So they also endorsed
against Senator Ricketts. His opponent isgetting nine percent in this district, nine
percent, so they're throwing their lotbehind a guy that's getting ninety percent.
Go to Starpe County. They endorsedagainst Mike Flood. Mike Flood's opponent doesn't
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even live in District one. Forone couldn't afford the filing fee, so
he had to file off Popper's feebecause he couldn't afford the violing fee.
And at times he calls himself awitch, and they endorsed him. My
point is the party has gone offthe rails, and I'm going to leave
it at that. We will reevaluate this after May fourteenth. We'll get
the numbers in, and I thinkthe party will have to ask themselves why
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they're not representing the vast majority ofRepublicans. That will be the question.
How much of you looked back onwhat happened in this district ten years ago.
You had Lee Terry, who hadbeen serving in Nebraska's second district in
the House of Representatives for several terms, and then he had a primary challenge
from Dan Frye, and fry madea lot of headway and a lot of
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longtime Lee Terry supporters withdrew their support, and whereas Terry emerged from that primary,
he was burned enough by that challengethat it got him in November.
So as you look at a similardynamic coming up here in the district that
this district has in the past,said he's been there too long. I
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want change, and I'm gonna blamethat guy because he's been there too long.
What do you say to them,Well, first of all, if
they get my primary opponent, theywill have Tony Vargus as the congressman.
My primary opponent probably can't come witha ton points of beating Tony Vargus,
in my view, because he hasno pull with independent swing voters, and
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that's what it takes. We're thirtyeight percent Republican, thirty six percent Democrat,
and the rest are independent and swingvoters. I do think there's some
big differences between now and twenty fourteen. I right now, I got high
favorables, I'm a fifty fifty twoto fifty five percent. And so if
you ask, so everywhere, inevery way, our campaign is stronger than
it's ever been other than what's goingon with the public the parties right now,
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and I would say that's the onlyarea that's different. So I feel
very confident going into the campaign.I think I'm right where the majority of
this district is at. Yes,there's some anger and a certain segu of
the Republican Party, but they're gonnahave to ask theseulves do they want a
Tony Vargas that votes He wants zerorestrictions on abortion, zero even a day
before birth. He supports transgender womenplaying in women's sports. I can go
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on and on. He's a BernieSanders Democrat that will be the choice in
November. And we got to cometogether and beat that, beat him,
and we got and right now wehave a one seat majority. If Tony
Argus is sitting on the seat rightnow, Hakeem Jeffries would be the Speaker
of the House. This seat isvaluable, important, but the vast majority
of the voters support me. I'mready to the most effective Republican in DC
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by the Center for Lawmaking effectiveness.It's a partnership between University of Virginia and
Vanderbilt University. I have passed morebills than any other Republican in the House
in the last Congress. I mayeight this Congress. I've been a great
spokesman for this district. Whether it'soften camp Aschland or Probaly anan On,
we have delivered and I've and I'vebeen a supporter of our conservative values.
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I'm a part of the conservative team, and I support our conservative speaker.
I don't throw them under the buswhen some of these voters say, yeah,
but we send all these Republicans toWashington, and not just you.
You hear about this across the country. Yet deficit spending continues. The national
debt is double what it was tenyears ago. We're up around thirty four
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to thirty five trillion dollar in debt. We were told by all these candidates,
Hey, we're gonna we're gonna bringspending under control, We're gonna put
a hand on our national debt,we're gonna get rid of Obamacare, we're
going to close the border and allthis stuff. And they look at this
and go, none of this stuffever gets done here and they're the inflation's
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going crazy, people having a hardtime making ends meet, and they say,
yep, maybe it's time for change. What do you say to the
people with that very real mindset.If we lived in a parliament, this
would be easier. If we havethe majority of parliament, we could do
what you want. But we don't. We have three branches of government and
by Cameron in the legislature and we'redivided government. James Madison designed this that
you have to get consensus with theother party to do anything. And you
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can see it's very frustrating. Youknow what you need to do, the
other party fights it, and soyou try to get as much as you
can. But that's the reality.And so look at the spending. You
know, there is an opportunity forreflection. Under President Trump. I supported
the budgets that he negotiated with Pelosi, and he asked it, he called
me, please support my budget.I negotiated this. So I supported the
(25:02):
budgets that the Republican president had.Now we did some things during COVID that
maybe we could go back and reevaluate. But again working with the Republican
president, which I tried to workwith his agreements. Now when we had
Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, Iopposed those budgets. They were massive mons.
Suspending the American Rescue Plan was liketwo points some trillion dollars. It
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was adding ten percent our economy andone bill of fake money to throw in
the economy. Well, we haveinflation today. It's because the American Rescue
Plan, which not a single Republicanvoted for. I voted against the IRA
the Inflation Reduction Act, which hadnothing to do with inflation reducing is inflation
producing act. Right, So Iopposed the Democrat high spending. And then
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when Pelosi was a speaker. Butnow we have a Republican speaker, and
he negotiated an agreement with the Presidentand cut two point five trillion dollars.
Do you vote against that or doyou vote for it? Vote? I
supported our speaker in the agreement hemade, so I can look back and
and think, yes, we Iwish you could do. I wish you
would do better. But it's hardto do better and divited government with three
(26:07):
branches of government. And but we'veI've voted for and supported our speaker with
the largest spending reduction in history.We got to remind people that New gingrich
thanks to that point very clearly.I asked you a little bit about what
you thought about President Trump. Wantto do the same thing. What do
you think about President Biden to whatyou're seeing from him, not just from
a leadership perspective, but also personally. And bear in mind before you start
(26:33):
hammering away, they're dealing with thedeath and the family when his uncle was
eaten by cannibals, which was madeup. Take it easy on it.
I know he makes stuff up allthe time. It's I don't know how
he does it or why he doesn't. First of I think he was elected
in twenty twenty because people thought hewas going to be a moderate. He
ran against you know, Bernie Sanders. I'm going to be this moder guy.
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They thought he'd be stable. Heended up racing almost the entire Obama
staff and he went far left.So he has run a very left winning
a White House, so he promisesyou'd do otherwise. So I'll say that
he's been extraordinarily left winning leader.He's been bad for a country. He's
showed zero leadership on the border Afghanistan. Some of the worst things I've ever
(27:18):
seen in my life. I seea lot of incompetence he has pulled.
He pulls the worst of any republicor any president. Excuse me going back
to nineteen fifty two when Truman hadto say he wasn't running for president,
and that's when Eisenhower won. Sopeople see gross and competence, they see
a left wing agenda, and he'sbad for a country. That's why when
(27:40):
it comes between President Trump and PresidentBiden, to support Psident Trump, we
need a vastly different agenda for ourcountry what Biden has provided. Every time
you see a president seek a secondterm, you look at you know,
kind of how he looks and actsfour years after being the commander in chief
Washington, d C. The stressof these jobs does something to you.
How are you holding up, Congressman, Well, I think the worst thing
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that happened to me in the lasteight years is I got asthma in twenty
eighteen. Really, and you know, I was running a thirty five minute
five mile run right when I wascoming out of the militarism of great shape.
But this asthma was late age onsetof asthma. It put me back
a bit, but I think wegot it under control. And I'm trying
to get my run times back down. I got to get myself back in
better physical shape. What it holdsme together. I believe in God and
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I know and I think God's givenme a mission and no matter what I'm
doing, I'm going to reflect him. And I've just tried. I try
to legislate with truth as my cornerstone. What is the right thing to do
for our country? What is thetruthful thing to do? And that's how
that's how I govern myself. Mywife and I are blussed forty years of
marriage. We have eight grand kidsnow, and so our my goals.
(28:52):
I just got to get myself backin shape after that asthma. They finally
found a doctor that knew how totreat it. Exercise induced asthma. It
sounds like what you're dealing with.I it's a thing. I have it
too. You know what I didabout it? I stopped exercising. Yeah,
I stopped playing basketball. Mine wasThey said it was allergy induced to
asthma at late at late age.Yeah, it's it's climate change. Congressman,
(29:14):
all right, the primary is Mayfourteenth. You've got a challenger in
Dan Frye. He was here inthe studio with us a few weeks ago.
You can hear that entire conversation onthe Vintage of Vorheas podcast link at
kfab dot com, and that's wherewe'll post this entire conversation as well.
Just a moment here, a sumup here, tell people what you hope
they do on May fourteenth, anda website they can go for more information.
(29:37):
Congressman, well, we really needyou to vote on May fourteenth.
We have a significant lead. It'slike I say, about a fifty point
lead. However, given the dynamicsof this primary, without a competitive possession,
the only thing that would hurt usis a low turnout. And if
we don't nominate the right person,we will get Tony Vargas in the Congress.
And I hope people vote for me. You know, this is this
(29:57):
is how I prioritize myself a Christian. First, I'm an American NOx,
and then I'm a Republican. I'mgoing to do the right thing for our
country and for this district. Andwith me, you have the most effective
Republican in Congress, and we geta lot done and this district is benefiting
from it, and I think ourcountry is benefiting from it, and we
(30:17):
need more people that know how totreat people respectfully and know how to work
and get things done. And I'vebeen proving that. I think five commands
in the Air Force has helped mebe a good leader in Congress. Brigadier
General Second District Representative Don Bacon websitefor more information on the campaign, Don
Jbacon dot com dot com. Thatis Don J. Bacon here, Congressman
(30:38):
from Nebraska's second District on news radioeleven ten KFAB. Thank you very much
for the time today, Scott BoyesMornings nine to eleven our news Radio eleven ten KFAB
Scott Vordiz Don Bacon, welcome back. Thank you Scott. Great to be
back on kfab and in Omaha.Yes, you guys have done quite a
lot to us in Washington, dC. Here recently. We'll talk about
that here. We had your challengerin the upcoming Republican primary, which is
less than a month away now,twenty days Tuesday, May fourteenth. We
(00:22):
had Dan Fry in here a coupleof weeks ago. That's up on the
podcast link on the Scott Vorhe's pageat kfab dot com. And I'm not
going to go point by points saywell, Dan Fry said this, I
want you to respond. But oneof the big things that I hear from
constituents and that he mentioned, whichinterestingly, we don't hear from your potential
(00:43):
Democratic challenger in this race, TonyVargas in November, should you make it
to the general election. It hasto do with congressional spending. We just
had billions more dollars approved by Congressthis week for aid to Ukraine, aid
to Israel. There is something elsein there. We've we want China to
divest from TikTok. You know thisall obviously costs a lot of money.
(01:07):
Where are you on this latest roundof congressional spending. Congressman, Well,
first of all, big picture,this past year, we cut spending going
over the Fiscal Year Development Planner,the Fight Up we call it, by
about two and a half trillion dollars. That was the FRA that the Speaker
McCarthy at the time, I reachedan agreement with the president. If you
remember, the president refuse to negotiate. McCarthy insisted, and through that process
(01:30):
got the biggest cuts in history,right, or so is that cuts from
what they wanted to spend? Likewhen you say, you know, two
and a half billion dollars in cuts, that's not cuts from year over year.
It's not like we were spending onehundred billion hour spending ninety seven point
two and a half trillion dollars andprotected spending. Yeah, it's it's like
my wife says, I saved onehundred dollars on this dress. I paid
(01:53):
five hundred for it. I said, you sound like you spent five hundred
dollars. She's like, well itwas six hundred. Well, it was
still the biggest reductions in history.And the alternative was we're gonna have a
government shutdown. That's what my opponentsays. Okay, no, we're going
to shut it down. That doesn'twork. Folks don't want government shutdowns.
This district does not want shutdowns.But we negotiated the best ideal I think
(02:15):
we could get with Speaker McCarthy nowin the spending that we did last week.
I do think it's in our nationalsecurity interest that Ukraine remained independent.
If you don't stand up to abully, the bully keeps coming after you.
And he invaded a Ukraine. It'san illegal invasion, of barbaric invasion,
and I think we've learned in historyif you don't stand up to that,
of worse things happen. The Ukrainiansare doing the fighting. We don't
(02:37):
have any soldiers there or any troops, but our weapons are good and we've
put a serious hurt on Russia sofar with our weapons. Also, I
think we stand by our best friendin the Middle East, Israel, who's
been attacked un mercifully. You know, on October seventh, I ran just
hit them with three hundred and thirtyprojectiles or munitions, one hundred and ten
ballistic missiles out of that three hundredand thirty, and I think if we
(03:00):
don't help Taiwan now a theemics weremore likely with China. So I support
what we did with America is theleader of the free world. We're the
indispensable power for freedom. We can'tdo it by ourselves. We need good
allies. But if if we're notthere, or Russia and China and Iran
will fill the void. It's somethinglike sixty billion dollars to Ukraine, twenty
(03:21):
six billion dollars to Israel, eightbillion dollars to Taiwan. Does this cover
it? It covers it for abouta year, and hopefully with the weapons
in Ukraine, Russia, they didn'tfill any pressure they were running. Ukraine
was running out of weapons. Wewere three four months overdue on trying to
do this. Russia had no reasonto negotiate. Now with these weapons there,
(03:46):
We're gonna give them some of thehigher end surface surface missiles a tackle
as we call them, one hundredand eighty mile range. These can be
game changers. We got to putRussia, We've got to leverage these and
put pressure on them to negotiate.Let's talk about Israel a bit more here,
as the top story this week hasbeen these protests erupting on college campuses
across the country. Many of theseprotesters are holdover as from Occupy Wall Street
(04:10):
or Black Lives Matters or whatever.They don't know what they're protesting. They
just see, Oh, this lookslike Antifa, let's do this. And
in the middle of this is Israel, still reeling from the attack you mentioned
from October hostages still held hostage bytwenty since October. What are your thoughts
(04:31):
here as you see these protests thathave been shutting down commuters, airports,
and now college campuses in America thatare against one of our biggest allies.
Well, I'm thankful we're in Nebraska, for starters, we have much less
of this in our university. Ihear there's some of it, But some
of these universities, like in youknow, whether it's jail, we're seeing
(04:53):
it right now. In New YorkCity, for I think decades, they
were allowing anti Israel, anti Semitic, pro Palestinian thought. With the professor's
there. Now we have a monsteron our hands. And I would tell
folks it's all right to protest ifyou want to protest Israel's operations in Gaza,
fair enough, But the many youstart assaulting and harassing Jewish students,
(05:15):
are desecrating the synagogues. That's antisemitism. So we got to be clear,
this is anti Semitism at these campuses, and we got to be clear.
It's unacceptable and we should we shouldcall them out for what it is.
And it's unacceptable. This is happeningin our country. I have a
lot of Jewish friends, and theysee corollaries to what happened in Europe in
the early nineteen thirties, and they'rescared. We got to stand by our
(05:38):
Jewish friends on this, and ifthis ever happens in Nebraska, op our
border regents and the leadership expels thesestudents because it's unacceptable. I look at
the world landscape here for potential wars. You see what China is lying and
wait about you see what Russia's beendoing. You see what Iran and Hamas
been doing to Israel. These arethis is America's allies here. We've said
(06:01):
we stand by Ukraine, we standby Israel, we stand by Taiwan in
some cases via treaty, and yetthese nations are still under all these threats
or under attack in some instances.Is our president, is our nation showing
enough leadership to ward off these threats. And if not, what good is
(06:23):
more money going to do If noneof these countries are afraid of what our
response might be. Well, themoney going to Ukraine will be well spent
because the Ukrainians are doing the fightingwe're not. But give them those weapons
helps them hold Russia back and hopefullythey'll force Russia to the negotiating table.
But we'll see. I mean that'stheir decision. Having these weapons go to
Taiwan are report for deterrence. Andby the way, they need see mins,
(06:46):
they need harpoon missiles to hit shipsat forty miles out. I need
long range Jared defenses. All thatstuff should be in this package. And
of course US supporting our good friendIsrael, I think in our national security
interests now our I want to maybecrush twelfth I said earlier some of these
cuts were real cuts, like wehad growth in the military, growth in
VA, but in other areas therewere actual cuts to the two and two
(07:09):
a half trillion. But if youput it all together as of being a
wash, because we're increasing spending inmilitary and VA. So I just wanted
to clarify that. But it's importantthat we have the strongest military in the
world because we are the leader ofthe free world. And I get I'll
say, as I mentioned earlier,we need good allies. We can't do
it all by ourselves. But ifwe're not there, or Russia and China
and Iran fills that void and thisrole becomes a more dangerous place. Isolationism
(07:32):
does not work. Congressman, withyour congressional and military background, you're uniquely
qualified to answer this question of militaryfamilies, potential military families. Though,
a lot of kids about to graduatefrom high school wonder what that next step
is going to be, and theyturn on the TV and they see rockets
from Iran into Israel. They sawwhat happened in October against our ally.
(07:55):
We see about this. We weresending money to Taiwan to try and ward
off potential Chinese threat, and there'salways the possibility that Russia could drag us
into some sort of war over Ukraine. And they think, wow, I
want to send my kids into themilitary to go deal with just the centuries
long conflict in the Middle East becausethese guys can't get along and we got
(08:18):
to get dragged into it. Idon't know what I'm thinking about this.
I mean, how much should Americabe involved in these escalating conflicts. Well,
I think we should be very carefulabout ever sending US troops in a
harms way. I think that's whatthey have learned after thirty years in the
military. A lot of when weput our troops at harms way, there's
often an unattended consequences, and Ithink we should be extraordinarily cautious. However,
(08:41):
providing arms to your friends is adifferent story now. Thankfully, we've
recruited the best people in our countryto serve in the military. The all
volunteer Force has worked very well.We should defend it. In fact,
I was the chairman of a temporarysubcommittee to improve the quality of life for
our military. We just came outa report this past month, three or
five recommendations. I love to talkabout it later in the show. But
(09:03):
we need people who are willing tostand and defend our country and defend the
values. It's better to win afight with Ukraine doing the fighting then for
Russia to later invade NATO and wehave to have people in the fight.
So it's better to help out ourallies and our friends now without our troops.
But we need strong and good characterpeople serving our military and I encourage
(09:26):
them to join. Steve emails viathe Zonker's custom woods Inbox Scott at kfab
dot com. It says, isUkraine ever going to win? This seems
like another Vietnam. Well, wehad troops in Vietnam and we lost fifty
eight thousand troops. We have zerotroops doing fighting in Ukraine. Ukraine is
the one is the victim. Russiadid the invasion? Do you just let
(09:48):
Russia break the rule of lot inveda neighboring country matter in fact, they
had an agreement in the nineties ofUkraine removed its nuclear weapons at Russia with
respected sporders. So they broke thatagreement with this invasion. I think as
long as Ukraine has the will tofight and defend us freedom by way the
number two guy in Russia. Sotheir goal is to illuminate Ukraine period.
No Ukraine on the map anymore,No more Ukrainians. They're going to be
(10:11):
Russian. They're gonna stamp out Ukrainianculture and language. That's their vision for
Ukraine. Ukrainians don't want that.They want to protect their heritage, their
culture, you know their families.We've managed to go down about ten minutes
into this conversation. I haven't evenbrought up Trump's name, but I think
that that name deserves to be throwninto this conversation in this election year based
(10:33):
on what we didn't see under hispresidency, which we're seeing under President Biden.
You have upset some people within yourown party for various stances on some
of this. We'll pick up therewhen we rejoin this conversation with Nebraska's second
District Congressman Don Bacon. Next ScottVoice News Radio eleven ten kfab Congressman Don
(10:56):
Bacon is with us in the studio, Nebraska's second district congressman who's got a
primary challenger we talked with a fewweeks ago and Dan Frye the primary on
May fourteenth. General election in November, and it's more than the names of
the congressional candidates on the ballot inNovember. We've got a presidential election this
(11:18):
year. We talked a lot inthis last segment about world conflicts. Amazing
that all the people thought Trump wasgoing to get us into World War III
seemed to be silent on that front, as Russia behaved, China behaved,
Iran behaved, and then President Bidencomes it back, and Russia starts going
into Ukraine like they did under theObama Biden regime. China starts rattling sabers,
(11:41):
Iran's lighting things up with money thatPresident Biden gave them. Yet,
you've been hot and cold on Trumppresidency over the years, with all these
things here, Where are you rightnow on re electing President Donald Trump.
Well, I've made it very clearwhen it's between President Trump or President Biden,
I'm going to support President Trump mainly. He will fix the border,
(12:05):
and it is the number one problemfacing our country. And you're not gonna
be able to fix the border withPresident Biden. I don't care what we
passed legislatively. His heart's done init to progress. The progressive willing is
not for it. In fact,if you look at twenty Vargus's he's never
said anything about the border. He'sright along with the squad on this.
So I'm with President Trump on theborder. I want to have good Supreme
(12:26):
Court justices. He'll build a bettereconomy because he has a better handle and
how to control regulations and protecting ourbusiness community and so I'm with him hands
down when it comes between him andJoe Biden. I've criticized things in the
past, but I work for thepeople of this district. I don't work
(12:46):
for any one person. I don'twork for the negop and I think my
promise to the voters is I'm goingto be honest. I'm going to try
to speak the truth to the bestof my ability. I know good people
can disagree, but I owe thisdistrict on if I saw an action that
I didn't agree with. I washonest when I came to President Trump,
and I've been the same way withPresident Biden. Folks in this district want
(13:09):
me to be candid. We haveto remember our district went for Joe Biden
by seven points. A lot ofpeople forget that, and so to win
this district, you have to winindependent swing voters. To win the Republican
primary, you have to win Trumpvoters. And I'm winning at five to
one. Well, okay, seventyabout twenty percent. Don't make me do
math trum Trump supporters. Trump supportersdidn't like some of the stans you took
(13:33):
here. In the battle the battlesover who is going to be the Speaker
of the House. They feel likeyou called them, and the quote was,
we cannot allow twenty people to holdus hostage act as political terrorists.
And they say, well, DonBacon called us terrorists. Well, I
was a figure of speech. Idid not call any but none of my
opponent's terrorists or any of the folkswho support my opponent never call them terrorists.
(13:56):
However, I think we should stand. Okay, we've got two issues
here. In October of the Speaker'sfight, we had eight people vote with
Democrats to get rid of Kevin McCarthy. The other two hundred and fourteen voted
for Kevin McCarthy. So eight peoplevoted for voted against McCarthy with the Democrats,
seven of which were Jim Jordan supporters. And then we voted on Steve's
(14:16):
Police and he won it pretty handily, and we had about eight Jim Jordan
supporters refused to vote for me.Can only lose four because I have a
four seat majority, and Jim Jordansat by and watched it. No good
Republican, no good American, isgoing to let a small minority tell the
majority what to do. And thatwas my principle there. If Jim Jordan
would have won the vote outright,I would have been different on that.
(14:39):
Now there's been this accusation of mcalling people terrorists. It's not true.
There was one time I got ona bill four years ago that was to
strengthen the FBI's domestic terrorism program.We have voted on it multiple times before.
That was bipartisan. Some of thefolks that are on their PUBLICA side,
Hey, they're going to use thatBilly go against does I go,
(15:00):
No, this is intended for everybody, jihadists, unibombers. It's I don't
like any terrorists, and this onearound. But for a couple of months,
you're doing this bill to go afterAID. No, we're not doing
that. And so he goes,why are you on this bill because I
don't like terrasts? Oh, youcall us terrists. I did not.
I do not like terrorists, period, and that's why I want to support
this legislation. Then another one cameup recently when I voted for PISA,
(15:22):
and my opponents said, hey,I would have voted against FISA. We
have to have PISA to after terroristsoverseas. That's how we find them,
that's how we know what Putin's doingand what President She's doing. PISA is
so valuable to our telegs collection againstforeign threats. And so he said he
voted against it, and I said, well, the terrosts would agree with
you. I literally meant the realterrorists, not calling anybody domestically that.
(15:45):
But I find in this campaign peopletwist and lie and abuse. So but
that's I wanted to clarify that,and I appreciate the opportunity. Yeah,
here we break some news this morning. Congressman Don Bacon does not like terrorists.
That's a fact. People though hereyou come out against those in the
speaker battle and talk about some ofthis stuff, but they don't hear you
(16:06):
standing up for President Trump. He'sin courtroom after courtroom on things that you
usually see happen in Banana Republics.Here's my political opponent. Let's either throw
them in jail or try in thisinstance on a lot of different fronts.
For those who are thinking about whatto do in the Republican primary, many
of whom are pretty strident supporters ofDonald Trump, what do you need to
(16:30):
do to win them over? Andsay, look, I agree with you
on some of these things related toPresident Trump. More than policy decisions.
Do you need to stand up moreforcefully for Trump and what he's facing right
now. I'm going to stand upwhen I think I'm going to focus more
on policy. There's no doubt aboutthat, and I support, for example,
(16:52):
it's a domestic policy I think istremendous energy independence. I mean,
all the things that he stood forI was able to do during his administration
I think are outstanding. We gota number two, you got fo or
five different types of cases going onhere. They're all different. I think
some of the legal expertise is accuratethat some of the things he did was
wrong but normally would not be prosecuted. But they're going after him. So
(17:14):
I do think we have a prosecutedprosecutors that are politically zealous going after him.
But I also believe in our courtsystem that will work in the end,
between the juries the appeals, Iknow we have the best system in
the world. Is this going towork out in the end? And right
or wrong? I think I thinkjustice will be done. I was a
(17:34):
little surprised when the Douglas County RepublicanParty endorsed you in this race, just
because the Republican Party locally and inthe state, especially with some of these
county parties, a little different thanit used to be. It's been we
(17:55):
have different leadership, I'll put itthat way. So they had a recent
vote and said, yep, wewant Don Bacon to win reelection. And
then based on the chair of theDouglas County Republican Party, Chris Rothy,
he said, they had a meetingthat I wasn't invited to, and some
people who aren't in charge of theDouglas County Republican Party had a meeting this
(18:18):
week yesterday without approval of the chairmanand flipped their endorsement from you to Dan
Fry, and from Pete Ricketts toJohn Glenn Weaver. And the chairman says,
nope, doesn't count. The resultsof the unofficial meeting are null and
void. This is as voters aretrying to figure out on the conservative side
(18:44):
of the political spectrum, including someconservative minded independence what to do in the
May fourteenth primary. Here, whatdo you think about all of this?
Well, first of all, saidthe divisiveness at the NGP and at the
county level, well probably heard ofat some areas. Hopefully I will survive
and win in November. But it'sgoing to cost us somewhere, maybe a
(19:04):
state Senate seat or maybe you know, it's some down ballot. And this
division is toxic out there in it, and the anger and the hate is
not helpful. That's not going towin in a swing district like here.
They want more optimism, enthusiasm,and you know, the America, our
greater days are are still looking for, are still coming towards us. So
(19:26):
I'll say that upfront. And Ithink Chris Routhy is outstanding chairman. I
appreciate the great job he's done withthis group that did this in Douglas County.
First of all, there were DanFry supporters, so it was surely
done out of his campaign. Butthey represent i'm guessing Scott, maybe twenty
percent of the views of the Republicanvoters somewhere in there. They're a title
(19:48):
to that, and I respect it. They have that freedom to be involved
and vote the way they want.But it's literally about one in five Republican
voters share those hardcore, more popular, less views. How do I know
that? Well, right now,I'm pulling sixty nine nineteen. That was
last week's pulling. There was anoutside group came in so I was up
fifty points, and then a monthand a half ago I was a pull.
(20:10):
I was up forty nine points.So I got pretty good consistent numbers
there. But let's just put meto the side. So they also endorsed
against Senator Ricketts. His opponent isgetting nine percent in this district, nine
percent, so they're throwing their lotbehind a guy that's getting ninety percent.
Go to Starpe County. They endorsedagainst Mike Flood. Mike Flood's opponent doesn't
(20:32):
even live in District one. Forone couldn't afford the filing fee, so
he had to file off Popper's feebecause he couldn't afford the violing fee.
And at times he calls himself awitch, and they endorsed him. My
point is the party has gone offthe rails, and I'm going to leave
it at that. We will reevaluate this after May fourteenth. We'll get
the numbers in, and I thinkthe party will have to ask themselves why
(20:55):
they're not representing the vast majority ofRepublicans. That will be the question.
How much of you looked back onwhat happened in this district ten years ago.
You had Lee Terry, who hadbeen serving in Nebraska's second district in
the House of Representatives for several terms, and then he had a primary challenge
from Dan Frye, and fry madea lot of headway and a lot of
(21:17):
longtime Lee Terry supporters withdrew their support, and whereas Terry emerged from that primary,
he was burned enough by that challengethat it got him in November.
So as you look at a similardynamic coming up here in the district that
this district has in the past,said he's been there too long. I
(21:38):
want change, and I'm gonna blamethat guy because he's been there too long.
What do you say to them,Well, first of all, if
they get my primary opponent, theywill have Tony Vargus as the congressman.
My primary opponent probably can't come witha ton points of beating Tony Vargus,
in my view, because he hasno pull with independent swing voters, and
(22:00):
that's what it takes. We're thirtyeight percent Republican, thirty six percent Democrat,
and the rest are independent and swingvoters. I do think there's some
big differences between now and twenty fourteen. I right now, I got high
favorables, I'm a fifty fifty twoto fifty five percent. And so if
you ask, so everywhere, inevery way, our campaign is stronger than
it's ever been other than what's goingon with the public the parties right now,
(22:23):
and I would say that's the onlyarea that's different. So I feel
very confident going into the campaign.I think I'm right where the majority of
this district is at. Yes,there's some anger and a certain segu of
the Republican Party, but they're gonnahave to ask theseulves do they want a
Tony Vargas that votes He wants zerorestrictions on abortion, zero even a day
before birth. He supports transgender womenplaying in women's sports. I can go
(22:48):
on and on. He's a BernieSanders Democrat that will be the choice in
November. And we got to cometogether and beat that, beat him,
and we got and right now wehave a one seat majority. If Tony
Argus is sitting on the seat rightnow, Hakeem Jeffries would be the Speaker
of the House. This seat isvaluable, important, but the vast majority
of the voters support me. I'mready to the most effective Republican in DC
(23:11):
by the Center for Lawmaking effectiveness.It's a partnership between University of Virginia and
Vanderbilt University. I have passed morebills than any other Republican in the House
in the last Congress. I mayeight this Congress. I've been a great
spokesman for this district. Whether it'soften camp Aschland or Probaly anan On,
we have delivered and I've and I'vebeen a supporter of our conservative values.
(23:34):
I'm a part of the conservative team, and I support our conservative speaker.
I don't throw them under the buswhen some of these voters say, yeah,
but we send all these Republicans toWashington, and not just you.
You hear about this across the country. Yet deficit spending continues. The national
debt is double what it was tenyears ago. We're up around thirty four
(23:57):
to thirty five trillion dollar in debt. We were told by all these candidates,
Hey, we're gonna we're gonna bringspending under control, We're gonna put
a hand on our national debt,we're gonna get rid of Obamacare, we're
going to close the border and allthis stuff. And they look at this
and go, none of this stuffever gets done here and they're the inflation's
(24:18):
going crazy, people having a hardtime making ends meet, and they say,
yep, maybe it's time for change. What do you say to the
people with that very real mindset.If we lived in a parliament, this
would be easier. If we havethe majority of parliament, we could do
what you want. But we don't. We have three branches of government and
by Cameron in the legislature and we'redivided government. James Madison designed this that
you have to get consensus with theother party to do anything. And you
(24:41):
can see it's very frustrating. Youknow what you need to do, the
other party fights it, and soyou try to get as much as you
can. But that's the reality.And so look at the spending. You
know, there is an opportunity forreflection. Under President Trump. I supported
the budgets that he negotiated with Pelosi, and he asked it, he called
me, please support my budget.I negotiated this. So I supported the
(25:02):
budgets that the Republican president had.Now we did some things during COVID that
maybe we could go back and reevaluate. But again working with the Republican
president, which I tried to workwith his agreements. Now when we had
Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, Iopposed those budgets. They were massive mons.
Suspending the American Rescue Plan was liketwo points some trillion dollars. It
(25:23):
was adding ten percent our economy andone bill of fake money to throw in
the economy. Well, we haveinflation today. It's because the American Rescue
Plan, which not a single Republicanvoted for. I voted against the IRA
the Inflation Reduction Act, which hadnothing to do with inflation reducing is inflation
producing act. Right, So Iopposed the Democrat high spending. And then
(25:45):
when Pelosi was a speaker. Butnow we have a Republican speaker, and
he negotiated an agreement with the Presidentand cut two point five trillion dollars.
Do you vote against that or doyou vote for it? Vote? I
supported our speaker in the agreement hemade, so I can look back and
and think, yes, we Iwish you could do. I wish you
would do better. But it's hardto do better and divited government with three
(26:07):
branches of government. And but we'veI've voted for and supported our speaker with
the largest spending reduction in history.We got to remind people that New gingrich
thanks to that point very clearly.I asked you a little bit about what
you thought about President Trump. Wantto do the same thing. What do
you think about President Biden to whatyou're seeing from him, not just from
a leadership perspective, but also personally. And bear in mind before you start
(26:33):
hammering away, they're dealing with thedeath and the family when his uncle was
eaten by cannibals, which was madeup. Take it easy on it.
I know he makes stuff up allthe time. It's I don't know how
he does it or why he doesn't. First of I think he was elected
in twenty twenty because people thought hewas going to be a moderate. He
ran against you know, Bernie Sanders. I'm going to be this moder guy.
(26:56):
They thought he'd be stable. Heended up racing almost the entire Obama
staff and he went far left.So he has run a very left winning
a White House, so he promisesyou'd do otherwise. So I'll say that
he's been extraordinarily left winning leader.He's been bad for a country. He's
showed zero leadership on the border Afghanistan. Some of the worst things I've ever
(27:18):
seen in my life. I seea lot of incompetence he has pulled.
He pulls the worst of any republicor any president. Excuse me going back
to nineteen fifty two when Truman hadto say he wasn't running for president,
and that's when Eisenhower won. Sopeople see gross and competence, they see
a left wing agenda, and he'sbad for a country. That's why when
(27:40):
it comes between President Trump and PresidentBiden, to support Psident Trump, we
need a vastly different agenda for ourcountry what Biden has provided. Every time
you see a president seek a secondterm, you look at you know,
kind of how he looks and actsfour years after being the commander in chief
Washington, d C. The stressof these jobs does something to you.
How are you holding up, Congressman, Well, I think the worst thing
(28:03):
that happened to me in the lasteight years is I got asthma in twenty
eighteen. Really, and you know, I was running a thirty five minute
five mile run right when I wascoming out of the militarism of great shape.
But this asthma was late age onsetof asthma. It put me back
a bit, but I think wegot it under control. And I'm trying
to get my run times back down. I got to get myself back in
better physical shape. What it holdsme together. I believe in God and
(28:29):
I know and I think God's givenme a mission and no matter what I'm
doing, I'm going to reflect him. And I've just tried. I try
to legislate with truth as my cornerstone. What is the right thing to do
for our country? What is thetruthful thing to do? And that's how
that's how I govern myself. Mywife and I are blussed forty years of
marriage. We have eight grand kidsnow, and so our my goals.
(28:52):
I just got to get myself backin shape after that asthma. They finally
found a doctor that knew how totreat it. Exercise induced asthma. It
sounds like what you're dealing with.I it's a thing. I have it
too. You know what I didabout it? I stopped exercising. Yeah,
I stopped playing basketball. Mine wasThey said it was allergy induced to
asthma at late at late age.Yeah, it's it's climate change. Congressman,
(29:14):
all right, the primary is Mayfourteenth. You've got a challenger in
Dan Frye. He was here inthe studio with us a few weeks ago.
You can hear that entire conversation onthe Vintage of Vorheas podcast link at
kfab dot com, and that's wherewe'll post this entire conversation as well.
Just a moment here, a sumup here, tell people what you hope
they do on May fourteenth, anda website they can go for more information.
(29:37):
Congressman, well, we really needyou to vote on May fourteenth.
We have a significant lead. It'slike I say, about a fifty point
lead. However, given the dynamicsof this primary, without a competitive possession,
the only thing that would hurt usis a low turnout. And if
we don't nominate the right person,we will get Tony Vargas in the Congress.
And I hope people vote for me. You know, this is this
(29:57):
is how I prioritize myself a Christian. First, I'm an American NOx,
and then I'm a Republican. I'mgoing to do the right thing for our
country and for this district. Andwith me, you have the most effective
Republican in Congress, and we geta lot done and this district is benefiting
from it, and I think ourcountry is benefiting from it, and we
(30:17):
need more people that know how totreat people respectfully and know how to work
and get things done. And I'vebeen proving that. I think five commands
in the Air Force has helped mebe a good leader in Congress. Brigadier
General Second District Representative Don Bacon websitefor more information on the campaign, Don
Jbacon dot com dot com. Thatis Don J. Bacon here, Congressman
(30:38):
from Nebraska's second District on news radioeleven ten KFAB. Thank you very much
for the time today, Scott BoyesMornings nine to eleven our news Radio eleven ten KFAB
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