February 10, 2025 • 38 mins
Media Losing their Minds over Musk and DOGE also How this will Play out in the Weeks and Months Ahead plus What the Cuts at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Mean to You
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Good Monday morning.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
It is verdict was Centator Ted Cruz Ben Ferguson with you, Senator.
It was a sleeper of a Super Bowl is just
say the least. It wasn't that great of a game,
but all of America I'm sure was watching.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Well.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
It was a blowout and and congratulations to the Eagles
for for a dominating night. All of the hopes of
Kansas City having a three peet those were dashed almost
from the from the kickoff. The Eagles dominated the game.
It was uh, it was impressive to watch, although I
got to say, the guy on that field sure didn't
look like Patrick Mahomes, not the one we've uh uh
(00:35):
we we we've come to expect and and and listen.
The Eagles were expected to come in with a run game.
Their run game didn't materialize, but Kansas City spent so
much time trying to stop the run game that that
that kind of short and short and medium pass game
was there the entire night. And and they owned the game. Uh,
from from the beginning to the end.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
It was. It was truly incredible.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
What was also crazy was the fact that we had
the President United States of America that was a center
point of being at this game and the media didn't
like it. They're having a melt down about that, as
they're also melting down about Doge.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Well, that's right, and we're going to talk about that.
So I had dinner with President Trump Friday night along
with a number of other Republican senators. We're going to
talk about that. We're also going to talk about Doge.
We are twenty days into the administration, less than three weeks,
and the media and the Democrats are losing their mind
over Elon Musk's efforts to cut government spending. We're going
(01:31):
to break that down. We're going to talk about some
of the egregious abuses that are being uncovered, but we're
also going to walk you through what to expect how
this is going to play out in the days and
weeks ahead. We're also going to talk to you about
the CFPB, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which which is
being ordered to halt all of their efforts right now
(01:53):
and being ordered to halt that by their new acting head.
We're going to break that down for you as well.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Yeah, really important story and it's going to affect a
lot of people lives. Want to tell you real quick
about the IFCJ. After more than a year of war,
terror and pain in Israel, there is still a great
demand for basic humanitarian aid. That is where the International
Fellowship of Christians and Jews has supported and continues to
support those in the Holy Land still facing the lingering
(02:18):
horrors of war, and those who are in desperate need
right now. Your ongoing monthly gift of forty five dollars
will provide critically needed aid to communities in the North
and the South devastated by the ongoing war, and your
generous donation each month will deliver help to those in need,
including evacuees and refugees from the war torn areas, also
(02:42):
first responders and volunteers, wounded soldiers and elderly Holocaust survivors,
families who have lost everything, and so many more. You
can provide hope during a time of great uncertainty and
the need is real. So to give a gift to
bless Israel and her people, you can do that by
visiting support IFCJ dot org. That's one word support if
(03:05):
CJ dot org. You can also call to give eighty
eight for eight eight I F CJ. That's triple eight
for eight eight I F CJ eighty eight four eight
eight four three two five or support IFCJ dot org.
So let's just enjoy for a moment just how different
(03:26):
this Super Bowl was than a year ago from a
political standpoint. Uh, the President went, a lot of other
conservatives showed up, other elected officials were there. Uh, the
media was covering Donald Trump. He was talking at the
before the super Bowl and during the flight and tweeting
out about the government working for you, and Doge and
(03:46):
and one of those.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
At CNN, Brian and Skelpter came out with an interesting
tweet I think you saw it as well, where he said,
I think think about it. A year ago, you could
go days without seeing or thinking about Joe Biden. Now
you're lucky if you can go hours without thinking about
President Trump. His point is he's controlling everything, and now
(04:10):
he says the Super Bowl is also the Trump Bowl.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
I think it's amazing to watch this melt down.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, listen, the media is melting down. The Democrats are
melting down. I gotta tell you. This past week I
enjoyed a number of times turning to my Democrat colleague
and colleagues and just dead padding. Well, three years and
fifty weeks to go.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
What's the response, Because I mean some of them you're friendly.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
With that, they start twitching with no affect at all.
I just just say those words, and I've yet to
see a Democrat who doesn't start shaking at that thought.
I mean, listen, there has never been in the history
of a country a two weeks like this. And as
I mentioned, I had dinner with President Trump on Friday.
(04:59):
We had a retre treed of Republican senators down in
Florida and we went to forty three of us went
and had dinner with President Trump and mar A Lago
Friday night. I got to tell you, the President was
in in great mood. He was happy, he was energized,
and and there's never been shock and awe. You know. Actually,
(05:20):
I have a theory about this, and I have a
theory about the speed and volume of what's coming, which
is that the media, I believe has a specific quantum
of outrage. And that quantum I call the arsenic quantum
of outrage. Now what does that mean? Ben If you
remember back to the first term of George W. Bush
(05:43):
in two thousand and one, one of one of the
first things Bush did is the EPA rescinded a rule
concerning arsenic and it regulated how many parts per million
of arsenic could be in water. And the media for
weeks lit their hair on fire about how evil Republicans
(06:04):
want to poison all our children with arsenic, and they
just went on and on and on arsenic, arsenic, arsenik.
It was on the six o'clock news night after night. Well,
my theory is that is the amount of outrage they have,
and when Trump does one hundred things, or two hundred things,
or three hundred things, they have that same quantum of outrage,
but they have to divide it up among everything, and
(06:27):
so instead they just just light their hair on fire
and begin running in circles.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
It is weird.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And I was talking to a colleague of mine who
worked in the first Trump ministruation and he's now working
the second. And the way he described it to me
on Friday, he said, Ben, in twenty sixteen, he goes
go ask any center, any congressman that met with the president.
The meetings revolved around around Okay, what are we going
to do or what do we want to do? He said,
this time, it's all right, this is what we are doing.
(06:54):
And this is how we're going to do it, he said,
it's a completely different mindset. Have you found that when
you're having dinner at more of like, Hey, we're in charge,
let's go down the field. Let's use the super Bowl
now as he throw the long ball, and let's let's
make the pass, and let's get the points on the board.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Well, listen, in twenty seventeen, when President Trump came into
the White House, I don't think he was expecting to win.
I don't think his team was expecting him to win.
And and and and they came in and and he
never worked in the federal government. Virtually every senior official
in the Trump White House had never worked in the
federal government. And so they came in and did not
(07:31):
know how how the agencies operated. They they did. They
did not understand the machinery they were attempting to turn around,
and and and they didn't understand the deep state. They
didn't understand the embedded career bureaucrats who were going to
fight against them tooth and nail. One of the results
(07:53):
is is they made some real mistakes when it came
to personnel. Uh, they appointed people to senior positions to
cabinet positions who ended up fighting against the president from
day one. This time around, I think they've done a
much better job with cabinet nominees and and they've hit
the ground running. The level of preparation the executive orders
(08:13):
they've rolled out, one after the other after the other,
it is clear that they have had teams working on
these orders for months, if not years, that that they
came in with a fundamentally different level of understanding and
sophistication about how the government operates, about what are the
(08:34):
levers of power and authority within the government, and how
you turn the machine and understand they're dealing with four
years of Joe Biden the Democrats weaponizing every aspect of
the federal government. Not just doj and FBI, We've talked
(08:55):
a lot about that, but but weaponizing every grant they give,
weaponize every program, weaponizing from agency to agency to agency.
That the holistic approach that the Biden administration did, that
every dollar they had was there to reward their political
allies or to punish their political enemies. And sadly, it
(09:18):
was all politics all the time. And I think that's
a big part of the reason why if you look
at what Elon Musk is doing it dough. She's he's
going in and he and he's working around the clock.
And and I know Elon well, he does not he
does not sleep much. And he works and and and
he is going at the federal government. And it's it's
(09:38):
a remarkable thing. Ben I got to say, So Trump
derangements syndrome has been a thing for a long time
that Democrats in the media going nuts. Well there's now
a new phenomena, new disease has come to Washington and
and that's called Elon derangement syndrome.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
It's almost worse in some ways.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I mean they this man has become like more hated
and in some circles and even Trump, and that's hard
to do.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
So I'll tell you in exchange I had last week
with several reporters, but it was following so I had
a closed door briefing from the FAA and the National
Traffic Safety Board on the horrific crash outside Reagan Airport.
And as I came out, the reporters that we were
(10:24):
talking about the accident and where the investigation is going.
And reporters were asking, well, aren't you worried that Elon
Musk is going to be involved in updating the technology
for air traffic control. And I just started laughing, and
(10:44):
I said, look, our air traffic control system is desperately
in need of modernization. We are literally using nineteen fifties technology.
We use radar and little slips of paper, that's how
they do it. And you're telling me that one of
the world's greatest technology CEOs who has ever lived, is
(11:07):
willing to work for free to modernize the technology for
air traffic control, to use GPS and current technology rather
than nineteen fifties technology to take us into the twenty
first century. And you somehow think that is a bad thing.
And I got to say, the reporters were just bewildered.
They're just like, no no elon bad Trump bad. That
(11:30):
that's the extent of analysis they're capable of.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
You look at the access that he's also gained, and
it is to fifteen different government agencies. The President has
made it very clear now he believes this as part
of his mandate why the American people sent him to Washington.
And he said this in an interview on Sunday for
(11:54):
Super Bowl Sunday with Brett Bher where there's some people
trying to Honormine, and I think this is the machine
going after a Musk. They're trying to undermine and they're
trying to somehow get him kicked out of this or
to have some sort of press conference where Elon Musk
is no longer with us and working in you know,
in the government. We've we've dismissed him. That's what they're clearly,
it's like a way of impeaching him in essence, and
and Brett asked the question like, do you does he
(12:17):
have your full faith? Because this is where the media
is going, right, and so he's like, does does he
still have your full support? And I want everybody here,
this is what Trump said.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
I don't know if it's kickback, so what's going on?
But the people, look, I ran on this and the
people want me to find it. And I've had a
great help with Elon Musk, who's been terrific. I'm one
you say you trust him, Trust Elon. Oh, he's not
gaining anything. In fact, I wonder how he can devote
the time to it. He's so into it. But I
told him to do that. Then I'm going to tell
(12:46):
him very soon, like maybe in twenty four hours to
go check the Department of Education. He's going to find
the same thing. Then I'm going to go go to
the military. Let's check the military. We're going to find billions,
hundreds of billions of DIFE is a fraud and abuse.
And you know the people elected me on that.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
People elected me.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
He's listening to the people and that's why it's populated
right now. Is about fifty percent fifty three percent in
one of the polls today.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Well and understand what Elon is doing. So so Elon
this weekend he tweeted the following quote. To be clear,
what the DOGE team and the US Treasury team have
jointly agreed makes sense. Is the following require that all
outgoing government payments have a payment categorization code, which is
(13:35):
necessary in order to pass financial audits. This is frequently
left blank, making audits almost impossible. All payments must also
include a rationale for the payment in the comment field,
which is currently left blank. Importantly, we are not yet
applying any judgment to this rationale, but simply require that
(14:00):
some attempt be made to explain the payment more than nothing.
The okay, and just just keep listening. Because this is
so simple that for government at shocking. The do not
pay list of entities known to be fraudulent, or people
(14:24):
who are dead or are probable fronts for terrorist organizations,
or do not match congressional appropriations must actually be implemented
and not ignored. Also, it can currently take up to
a year to get on this list, which is far
too long. This list should be updated at least weekly,
(14:47):
if not daily. The above super obvious and necessary changes
are being implemented by existing, longtime career government employees, not
anyone from DOGE. It is ridiculous that these ch didn't
exist already. Yesterday I was told that there are currently
over one hundred billion dollars a year of entitlement payments
(15:10):
to individuals with no Social Security numbers or even a
temporary ID number. If accurate, this is extremely suspicious. When
I asked if anyone at Treasury had a rough guest
for what percentage of that number is unequivocal and obvious fraud,
the consensus in the room was about half, so fifty
(15:35):
billion a year or one billion dollars a week. This
is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Why would anyone be angry at that? And I say
that look is a rhetorical question. The people that don't
want you to find this out are clearly the ones
that are abusing the system for whether it's their corruption,
family friends. The list goes on and on that has
been mentioned there. But if you are a taxpayer, I
(16:05):
don't care if you're a Republican or Democrat. You should
want to know where your money's going and want to
know if there's waste fraud abuse, so we get rid
of it because it could mean that we're all paying
way more in taxes than we ever could have imagined.
We should be able to pay to get great services
at a much lower rate because you get rid of
all the fraud abuse.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Well, i'll get I'll give you another interesting data. Do
you know what has what the median household income is
in Washington DC. It's one hundred and twenty one thousand
a year. That's the median. The national median is eighty
two thousand dollars a year, So Washington d C. Is
fifty percent greater. And by the way, compare that to
(16:49):
the only place higher is California's Bay Area. So Washington
DC has a higher median income than New York ninety
five thousand Bridgeport one hundred and eleven thousand, Chicago eighty
seven one thousand, Dallas eighty six thousand, Baltimore ninety four thousand,
New Orleans sixty one thousand, Boston one hundred and ten thousand,
Raleigh ninety six thousand, San Diego one hundred and three thousand,
(17:12):
Los Angeles ninety one thousand, Honolulu one hundred and three thousand, Washington,
d C. One hundred and twenty one thousand. Right at the.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Top question you got to ask yourself, is I wonder
why could it be? There's so many people there that
are getting hookups with the government and jobs and making
sure money is spent and going to the right places
that they get compensated very well for that.
Speaker 3 (17:33):
Well, there are a ton of people a and senior
government jobs that are making six figure incomes and many
of the government buildings are empty. That the average across
the federal government right now for showing up to work
is five to eight percent of the employees, and they're
adamant that they have an entitlement to do this, that
(17:53):
it is horrific to expect them to show up to work.
They're also armies of lobbyists and contractors and people getting
rich off government, and so those two together are are
operating powerfully. And it's interesting that Elon has been able
to affect such significant change simply by starting with saying,
(18:15):
where is the money going? Show me the flow of
cash going out the door. I want to see it
dollar by dollar. That that is a threat right to
the heart of the deep state and and the corruption
machine the Democrats have had for a long time.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Well, let me ask you another question about dinner. And
you are one of those that this is a compliment.
If you've ever had dinner with you, you're a working dinner guy.
You're one of those that just likes to get stuff done.
I think that's probably one of the reasons why you
and Eli get well get along so well. You're having
these dinners now where you're getting stuff done, and in
(18:56):
government that's not always the case. How happy and how
much fun is it for you personally to know now
that when you're going into these meetings with Trump and
these other senators like you guys are actually getting to
do your job, Because I know that's driven you crazy
over the years when you just feel like you're just
spinning your wheels because governments spinning their wheels and not
getting stuff done?
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Is this like that? Is this what made you want
to get into politics and to serve.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Listen, it is fun and it is exciting because we
have a unique opportunity right now. You look at the
mandate from November. Obviously, the people re elected Donald Trump.
They elected a Republican Senate, not just a Republican Senate
with a relatively big majority. Fifty three Republicans is sizeable
(19:46):
in the Senate. They gave us a majority in the House,
albeit a very narrow one. We have an opportunity to
accomplish an enormous amount. And I'll tell you, Ben, it's
fun and exciting, but there's also a seriousness to this.
We can't screw I think failure is not an option
and and so I'm jumping out of bed every day.
I am excited to go. And you look at the work,
(20:11):
all right, and you see everything Elon's doing. Here, here's
a story that broke that gives you the sense of
why there's so much work to be done. Headlined from
the weekend, Biden admin filled terrorist coffers with over one billion,
three hundred million dollars before Trump took wrecking ball to
(20:32):
foreign aid and I'm just going to just start with
that article. More than one point three billion dollars in
taxpayer funds from the Biden administration ended up helping groups
that sponsored or committed terrorism, and the biggest part of
that was to UNRA, the United Nations Relief and Work
Work Agency. The Biden administration gave one billion, fifty three
(20:58):
million and four hundred thous thousand dollars in US taxpayer
money to UNRA and an UNRA. Remember but by the way,
under Trump, initially there was a ban on unrefunding because
they have been so intertwined with Hamas and Hamas terrorists.
We now know that in the wake of October seventh,
you had Hamas terrorists on the UNRA payroll.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
And yet yeah, that's a fact. By the way, we
need to make that clear. That is one hundred percent confirmed.
It is a fact.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Here is intelligent. This is also from the article quote.
Intelligence officials later revealed that more than one thousand UNRA employees,
or around ten percent, were linked to the groups Hamas
and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. According to documents found on the
bodies of dead terrorists and other evidence, ten percent of
(21:54):
their employees were linked to Hamas and Palestinian Islam Jahad,
and the Biden administration right up till the last day
was shoveling cash. And I got to say, it's one
of the things that I think is most offensive about
what Biden the Democrats did is they didn't just spend
(22:15):
four years pushing a radical agenda, but after election day,
when the voters made clear, we don't like this agenda,
we want to change course. Right up until the moment
Trump was sworn in, they did everything they could to
frustrate the ability of the new administration to turn things around.
I've never seen a president do that. To the best
(22:36):
of my knowledge, We've never had one do that, and
it really demonstrates a contempt for the voters.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
This goes back you just mentioned contempt of the voters.
Democrats now trying to figure out their footing. They had
Alamomar who went on TV today saying that Trump has
decided he will not abide by the constitution, just throwing
it out there, and then she says, by the way,
every exact kive order that's been to court now has
been shut down by the court.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
That's a lie, not true.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
But even face the nation try to softly correct her
because they want this to be true, right, And then
there's this new threat of like, all right, we'll just
shut down the government. I kind of laugh because for
many concerns are like, great, let's shut it down and
save some money for a while. I wish it worked
that way. I wish it was that simple. It's obviously not.
(23:26):
But this is the new temper tantrum of the left.
They're saying, if we aren't in charge, then we want
to destroy what the government does. Well, we want to
hurt people, and we want to shut down the government
to hurt people. So you'll blame Donald Trump. That's what
this is really all about.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Am I wrong?
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Well, look, understand, there's a battle going back and forth,
and at some level, this battle is inherent in the
structure of our government. It's inherent in the Constitution. Congress.
Under Article one, all legislative power is vested in the
Congress of the United States. Congress passes the laws, the
President signs into law, and that are then binding federal law.
(24:05):
The executive all executive power is vested in the President
of the United States. That's under Article two of the Constitution,
and the president is charged with has given the authority
to and also the responsibility to quote take care that
the laws be faithfully executed. That's the Constitution's language, and
(24:26):
so a lot of you know, it's interesting as I
travel around and talk to people back back home in
Texas or around the country, they ask, Okay, so is
what Elon's doing? Is what Trump is doing cutting off
funding at USAID pausing other funding? Is that going to stick?
And this is a battle back and forth between the
(24:47):
executive and legislature that has occurred since the very first
days of the Republic. And one of the things right
at the heart of this battle is about something called impoundment. Now,
what is in pound mean? Impoundment is when the president
of the United States decides not to spend money that
has been appropriated by the US Congress. Now you might ask, okay,
(25:11):
is impoundment some crazy theory that Donald Trump cooked up
or Elon Musk cooked up? Well, no, no, impoundment has
been around for more than two hundred years. The first
president to exercise impoundment was Thomas Jefferson, and he did
so in eighteen oh one. And if you look at
what Thomas Jefferson did, the first use of impoundment involved
(25:34):
a refusal to spend fifty thousand dollars, which fifty thousand
dollars in twenty twenty three dollars is about one point
twenty four million in funds that were appropriated for the
acquisition of gunboats for the United States Navy, and Thomas
Jefferson said in eighteen oh three that quote, the sum
of fifty thousand dollars appropriated by Congress for providing gunboats
(25:57):
remains unexpended. The favor and peaceful turn of affairs on
the Mississippi rendered an immediate execution of that law unnecessary. Now,
Jefferson did so, and in the years that went on,
presidents did so for two hundred years. Now what happened, well,
in the nineteen seventies, Richard Nixon had a battle with Congress,
(26:21):
and Congress got angry with Richard Nixon and felt he
was using impoundment too aggressively, and Congress passed a law
called the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of nineteen
seventy four that purported to remove the power of impoundment,
or at least to severely curtail it. And the Supreme
(26:45):
Court heard a decision. It was a decision called Train
versus City of New York, where the Supreme Court upheld
the Impoundment Control Act and significantly red reduced the president's
power to exercise impoundment. Now, by the way that there
(27:06):
was a subsequent wrinkle in this in that Congress came
back afterwards and passed a bill called the Line Item
Veto Act of nineteen ninety six. This happened after the
Republican takeover of Congress, Knut Gingrich came in, and the
line Audam Veto Act gave the president the power of
line Adam Vito, which Bill Clinton used on the federal
(27:30):
budget eighty two times. However, that law was struck down
in nineteen ninety eight by the Supreme Court. It was
a five to four vote. Actually, my former boss and
very good friend, Chuck Cooper, the man who taught me
how to be a lawyer, argued that case. Unfortunately, he
was on the losing side of that case and lost
five to four. The point what Elon is doing and
(27:54):
what Trump is doing, there's a long history of presidents
saying I don't want to spend money is wasteful and
I'm not going to Now there's also a history of
Congress pushing back what's likely to happen. There is already
and there will be more a crap ton of litigation
(28:15):
challenging these actions. We're seeing Democrat attorneys general bringing lawsuits.
We're going to see Democrat interest groups being bringing lawsuits.
We're going to see activist judges striking down actions executive orders.
And this is going to test the legal boundaries. At
(28:35):
the end of the day. Part of what is going
on is this is designed to go to the Supreme
Court and to restore the power of impoundment to the president.
I think that would be a very good thing. I
think it is consistent. It is an inherent authority of
the president to exercise the authority of impoundment. But understand,
(28:57):
we're going to see a mitigation battle Royale and it'll
take in all likelihood.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
So this is that you're saying, this is a fight
that we want to go to the Spring Court and
and and if it does go to the Supreme Court and
it plays to our advantage the way that you're describing
it with the law, how long is it going to
take us to get it there?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Probably a couple of years, two to three years.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
So and so in the next two or three years,
we're going to be just dealing with pure fights with
with the media. Democrats coming after and trying to stop
everything that they're trying to cut with waste, fraud, abuse.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yes, and and understand Elon and Doze that they're embodying
right now, the Silicon Valley mantra of move fast and
break things. I mean, that's what they're doing. Not everything
that they do is going to be upheld. There will
be injunctions issued, and I think they understand that, and
I think they're trying to They're trying to implement the
(29:54):
mandate that came from the voters as rapidly and effectively
as possible. Listen. One, I'm excited about that. And and
I think if you look at some of the egregious
abuses that have been uncovered so far, it gives an
illustration of just how important this is.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
Before we move on to the federal financial watchdog order
to ce se activity, and that's important we're gonna do
with that. In a second, one final question on this,
we could go back I think whenever the sale was
a year and a half whatever it was, when Elon
Musk took over Twitter and we saw the Twitter files
and then we saw the corruption. I actually think you
(30:32):
can trace this all the way back to there. When
people really start paying attention to saying I don't trust
the government. You add COVID in there, and the lies
of the vaccine and the and the two weeks stuff,
the spread, and then we want into virology, and then
the lies over the hunter Byden laptop. And there started
to be these moments that were big where people are like, Okay,
maybe I shouldn't be so trusting of the news, Maybe
(30:54):
I shouldn't be trusting of the government, the deep state,
the president, and then you have him take over or
Twitter now X. Part of the reason why I think
Donald Trump's having so much success now is because we're
getting the word out about the waste and the fraud
and getting the line out of it, and people are
seeing it. Because before you go back twenty sixteen, center,
(31:16):
big tree falls in the forest, no one's around.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Does it make a sound, right? The answer is no.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
But now what we're getting in the info that we're
getting and it's getting out because big tech can't suppress
it on X, how valuable is that to saving our democracy?
Speaker 3 (31:31):
Look, I think it's incredibly valuable. I believe Elon Musks
buying Twitter was the most important development for free speech
in modern times because it turned around the rampant censorship
from big tech. It put positive pressure on the rest
of big tech, and it created a vehicle for the
(31:52):
truth to get out. So you know, we've gone through
in previous podcasts all the examples, not all the examples,
but a number of examples of abuse. Of spending two
million dollars for sex changes in Guatemala. Now, who the
hell can defend that? Why US taxpayers are paying for
sex changes in Guatemala money to the BBC, the British
(32:14):
Broadcasting Corporation, By the way, that why the hell are
American taxpayers paying for the BBC? The last I checked,
the United Kingdom is a major developed country. They can
pay for their own damn television station. What we need?
What do we need to pay for that? And what's
amazing is the Democrats are just digging in. Give a
listen to Senator Chris Coons defending spending twenty million dollars
(32:38):
on American taxpayer money for Sesame Street in Iraq. Give
a listen.
Speaker 5 (32:43):
Is funding Sesame Street a judicious use of soft power? Well,
Michael the way you put it is the way I
hope folks considering your poll today will think about it.
This isn't just funding a kid show for children, millions
of children in countries like it's a show that helps
teach values, helps teach public health, helps prevent kids from
(33:06):
dying from dysentery and disease, and helps push values like collaboration, peacefulness,
cooperation in a society where the alternative is isis extremism
and terrorism. And to your point, it's pennies on the dollar.
The US Department of Defense has an annual budget of
(33:26):
about eight hundred and fifty billion dollars. USAID was spending
about thirty billion dollars. It is a small proportion of
our total federal spending. And as Joe and I would
often say, it's not just soft power, it's smart power.
Let me leave you with one other quote, Michael, if
I could, Jim Mattis, who is a four star Marine
(33:47):
Corps general and Trump's Secretary of Defense in his first term,
in a hearing back then said if you slash development
and AID spending, then I'm going to need more bullets
for our troops.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
I mean, you want to talk about stretching he's saying,
Sesame's He's going to save us from extremism?
Speaker 1 (34:05):
Are we kidding ourselves?
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Well, look, the Democrats are dug into defending everything to
defending all of the money that was just flowing out
with no checks whatsoever. And I think these examples are
having a real effect of pissing people off, saying, why
is my money going to that? By the way, if
Democrats think that's such a good idea, let them give
(34:28):
their own money for that. But what right do they
have to take your money that you're working hard to
provide for your kids and your family, to take it
and spend it on every radical agenda item they want
to push. That's what's been happening. It happened at egregious
levels under the Biden administration, and I think that's what
Trump's working very hard to turn around.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Yeah, great point.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Finally, I want to ask you about this because I
think it should be on listeners, radar screen. It's an
important issue. The New York Times is coming out talking
about this. The federal financial watchdog has been ordered to
see activity, known as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Why
is this happening and what does this mean?
Speaker 3 (35:09):
Well, the CFPB the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was was
created by the Dodd Frank Law. This is a creation
of Elizabeth Warren and and and it is. It has
descended like locusts putting putting all sorts of regulations and costs.
It brings abusive litigation. It is it is an avenue
(35:32):
for for left wing bureaucrats to try to control community banks,
smaller financial institutions, and to drive up costs. And the CFPB.
I've introduced repeatedly legislation to eliminate the Cfpbuh. What happened
this week is russ vote was confirmed leave the Office
(35:55):
of Management and Budget. And Russ's is a good friend.
He's a good guy. He he ran omb under Trump
during the first term. And Russ was just confirmed. We
just confirmed him this past week to run o and
be again. And on Friday he was also named the
acting director of the of the Consumer Financial Protection Beer
(36:16):
the CFPB, and as a result, he issued an order
for them to halt what they're doing. So one chunk
of it. So the way Elizabeth Warren structured it, Congress
does not appropriate money to the CFPB, which is weird.
By the way, if you look at virtually every federal agency,
Congress appropriates money for them. That's part of the checks
(36:38):
and balances of how the federal government is set up well.
Dodd Frank instead has the CFPB funded with money from
the Federal Reserve that flows automatically, so Congress doesn't get
to appropriate and engage in the oversight that comes with that. So,
as a result, on Saturday, Russ Vote wrote that he
(37:04):
had notified the Federal Reserve that the CFPB quote will
not be taking its next straw of unappropriated funding because
it is not reasonably necessary to carry out its duties.
The bureau's current balance of seven hundred and eleven point
six million dollars is in fact excessive in the current
(37:25):
fiscal environment. This spigot, long contributing to CFPB's unaccountability is
now being turned off. That is fantastic. And I'll tell
you what. I've introduced legislation that will zero out the CFPB,
that will shut it down permanently. I believe we will
get that done as part of budget reconciliation, and so
(37:51):
eliminating the CFP would be a major victory for lowering inflation,
for lowering burdensome regulation, for lowering the nanny state control
of big government, and if we get that done, that's
a huge victory. I'll tell you Russ vote taking over
as acting director in the past few days was a
major step forward in that regard.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Yeah, incredible. Don't forget. We do this show Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
Hit that subscribe or auto download button so you don't
miss an episode.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
Please run us a five star review. It helps us reach.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
More people and tell your family and friends again about
this show as it continues to grow, especially with all
the news we're giving you in this new Trump Ara.
It's a lot of fun. Don't miss an episode. We'll
see you back here Wednesday morning.
Good Monday morning.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
It is verdict was Centator Ted Cruz Ben Ferguson with you, Senator.
It was a sleeper of a Super Bowl is just
say the least. It wasn't that great of a game,
but all of America I'm sure was watching.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Well.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
It was a blowout and and congratulations to the Eagles
for for a dominating night. All of the hopes of
Kansas City having a three peet those were dashed almost
from the from the kickoff. The Eagles dominated the game.
It was uh, it was impressive to watch, although I
got to say, the guy on that field sure didn't
look like Patrick Mahomes, not the one we've uh uh
(00:35):
we we we've come to expect and and and listen.
The Eagles were expected to come in with a run game.
Their run game didn't materialize, but Kansas City spent so
much time trying to stop the run game that that
that kind of short and short and medium pass game
was there the entire night. And and they owned the game. Uh,
from from the beginning to the end.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
It was. It was truly incredible.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
What was also crazy was the fact that we had
the President United States of America that was a center
point of being at this game and the media didn't
like it. They're having a melt down about that, as
they're also melting down about Doge.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
Well, that's right, and we're going to talk about that.
So I had dinner with President Trump Friday night along
with a number of other Republican senators. We're going to
talk about that. We're also going to talk about Doge.
We are twenty days into the administration, less than three weeks,
and the media and the Democrats are losing their mind
over Elon Musk's efforts to cut government spending. We're going
(01:31):
to break that down. We're going to talk about some
of the egregious abuses that are being uncovered, but we're
also going to walk you through what to expect how
this is going to play out in the days and
weeks ahead. We're also going to talk to you about
the CFPB, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which which is
being ordered to halt all of their efforts right now
(01:53):
and being ordered to halt that by their new acting head.
We're going to break that down for you as well.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Yeah, really important story and it's going to affect a
lot of people lives. Want to tell you real quick
about the IFCJ. After more than a year of war,
terror and pain in Israel, there is still a great
demand for basic humanitarian aid. That is where the International
Fellowship of Christians and Jews has supported and continues to
support those in the Holy Land still facing the lingering
(02:18):
horrors of war, and those who are in desperate need
right now. Your ongoing monthly gift of forty five dollars
will provide critically needed aid to communities in the North
and the South devastated by the ongoing war, and your
generous donation each month will deliver help to those in need,
including evacuees and refugees from the war torn areas, also
(02:42):
first responders and volunteers, wounded soldiers and elderly Holocaust survivors,
families who have lost everything, and so many more. You
can provide hope during a time of great uncertainty and
the need is real. So to give a gift to
bless Israel and her people, you can do that by
visiting support IFCJ dot org. That's one word support if
(03:05):
CJ dot org. You can also call to give eighty
eight for eight eight I F CJ. That's triple eight
for eight eight I F CJ eighty eight four eight
eight four three two five or support IFCJ dot org.
So let's just enjoy for a moment just how different
(03:26):
this Super Bowl was than a year ago from a
political standpoint. Uh, the President went, a lot of other
conservatives showed up, other elected officials were there. Uh, the
media was covering Donald Trump. He was talking at the
before the super Bowl and during the flight and tweeting
out about the government working for you, and Doge and
(03:46):
and one of those.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
At CNN, Brian and Skelpter came out with an interesting
tweet I think you saw it as well, where he said,
I think think about it. A year ago, you could
go days without seeing or thinking about Joe Biden. Now
you're lucky if you can go hours without thinking about
President Trump. His point is he's controlling everything, and now
(04:10):
he says the Super Bowl is also the Trump Bowl.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
I think it's amazing to watch this melt down.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Well, listen, the media is melting down. The Democrats are
melting down. I gotta tell you. This past week I
enjoyed a number of times turning to my Democrat colleague
and colleagues and just dead padding. Well, three years and
fifty weeks to go.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
What's the response, Because I mean some of them you're friendly.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
With that, they start twitching with no affect at all.
I just just say those words, and I've yet to
see a Democrat who doesn't start shaking at that thought.
I mean, listen, there has never been in the history
of a country a two weeks like this. And as
I mentioned, I had dinner with President Trump on Friday.
(04:59):
We had a retre treed of Republican senators down in
Florida and we went to forty three of us went
and had dinner with President Trump and mar A Lago
Friday night. I got to tell you, the President was
in in great mood. He was happy, he was energized,
and and there's never been shock and awe. You know. Actually,
(05:20):
I have a theory about this, and I have a
theory about the speed and volume of what's coming, which
is that the media, I believe has a specific quantum
of outrage. And that quantum I call the arsenic quantum
of outrage. Now what does that mean? Ben If you
remember back to the first term of George W. Bush
(05:43):
in two thousand and one, one of one of the
first things Bush did is the EPA rescinded a rule
concerning arsenic and it regulated how many parts per million
of arsenic could be in water. And the media for
weeks lit their hair on fire about how evil Republicans
(06:04):
want to poison all our children with arsenic, and they
just went on and on and on arsenic, arsenic, arsenik.
It was on the six o'clock news night after night. Well,
my theory is that is the amount of outrage they have,
and when Trump does one hundred things, or two hundred things,
or three hundred things, they have that same quantum of outrage,
but they have to divide it up among everything, and
(06:27):
so instead they just just light their hair on fire
and begin running in circles.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
It is weird.
Speaker 2 (06:32):
And I was talking to a colleague of mine who
worked in the first Trump ministruation and he's now working
the second. And the way he described it to me
on Friday, he said, Ben, in twenty sixteen, he goes
go ask any center, any congressman that met with the president.
The meetings revolved around around Okay, what are we going
to do or what do we want to do? He said,
this time, it's all right, this is what we are doing.
(06:54):
And this is how we're going to do it, he said,
it's a completely different mindset. Have you found that when
you're having dinner at more of like, Hey, we're in charge,
let's go down the field. Let's use the super Bowl
now as he throw the long ball, and let's let's
make the pass, and let's get the points on the board.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
Well, listen, in twenty seventeen, when President Trump came into
the White House, I don't think he was expecting to win.
I don't think his team was expecting him to win.
And and and and they came in and and he
never worked in the federal government. Virtually every senior official
in the Trump White House had never worked in the
federal government. And so they came in and did not
(07:31):
know how how the agencies operated. They they did. They
did not understand the machinery they were attempting to turn around,
and and and they didn't understand the deep state. They
didn't understand the embedded career bureaucrats who were going to
fight against them tooth and nail. One of the results
(07:53):
is is they made some real mistakes when it came
to personnel. Uh, they appointed people to senior positions to
cabinet positions who ended up fighting against the president from
day one. This time around, I think they've done a
much better job with cabinet nominees and and they've hit
the ground running. The level of preparation the executive orders
(08:13):
they've rolled out, one after the other after the other,
it is clear that they have had teams working on
these orders for months, if not years, that that they
came in with a fundamentally different level of understanding and
sophistication about how the government operates, about what are the
(08:34):
levers of power and authority within the government, and how
you turn the machine and understand they're dealing with four
years of Joe Biden the Democrats weaponizing every aspect of
the federal government. Not just doj and FBI, We've talked
(08:55):
a lot about that, but but weaponizing every grant they give,
weaponize every program, weaponizing from agency to agency to agency.
That the holistic approach that the Biden administration did, that
every dollar they had was there to reward their political
allies or to punish their political enemies. And sadly, it
(09:18):
was all politics all the time. And I think that's
a big part of the reason why if you look
at what Elon Musk is doing it dough. She's he's
going in and he and he's working around the clock.
And and I know Elon well, he does not he
does not sleep much. And he works and and and
he is going at the federal government. And it's it's
(09:38):
a remarkable thing. Ben I got to say, So Trump
derangements syndrome has been a thing for a long time
that Democrats in the media going nuts. Well there's now
a new phenomena, new disease has come to Washington and
and that's called Elon derangement syndrome.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
It's almost worse in some ways.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
I mean they this man has become like more hated
and in some circles and even Trump, and that's hard
to do.
Speaker 3 (10:03):
So I'll tell you in exchange I had last week
with several reporters, but it was following so I had
a closed door briefing from the FAA and the National
Traffic Safety Board on the horrific crash outside Reagan Airport.
And as I came out, the reporters that we were
(10:24):
talking about the accident and where the investigation is going.
And reporters were asking, well, aren't you worried that Elon
Musk is going to be involved in updating the technology
for air traffic control. And I just started laughing, and
(10:44):
I said, look, our air traffic control system is desperately
in need of modernization. We are literally using nineteen fifties technology.
We use radar and little slips of paper, that's how
they do it. And you're telling me that one of
the world's greatest technology CEOs who has ever lived, is
(11:07):
willing to work for free to modernize the technology for
air traffic control, to use GPS and current technology rather
than nineteen fifties technology to take us into the twenty
first century. And you somehow think that is a bad thing.
And I got to say, the reporters were just bewildered.
They're just like, no no elon bad Trump bad. That
(11:30):
that's the extent of analysis they're capable of.
Speaker 2 (11:34):
You look at the access that he's also gained, and
it is to fifteen different government agencies. The President has
made it very clear now he believes this as part
of his mandate why the American people sent him to Washington.
And he said this in an interview on Sunday for
(11:54):
Super Bowl Sunday with Brett Bher where there's some people
trying to Honormine, and I think this is the machine
going after a Musk. They're trying to undermine and they're
trying to somehow get him kicked out of this or
to have some sort of press conference where Elon Musk
is no longer with us and working in you know,
in the government. We've we've dismissed him. That's what they're clearly,
it's like a way of impeaching him in essence, and
and Brett asked the question like, do you does he
(12:17):
have your full faith? Because this is where the media
is going, right, and so he's like, does does he
still have your full support? And I want everybody here,
this is what Trump said.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
I don't know if it's kickback, so what's going on?
But the people, look, I ran on this and the
people want me to find it. And I've had a
great help with Elon Musk, who's been terrific. I'm one
you say you trust him, Trust Elon. Oh, he's not
gaining anything. In fact, I wonder how he can devote
the time to it. He's so into it. But I
told him to do that. Then I'm going to tell
(12:46):
him very soon, like maybe in twenty four hours to
go check the Department of Education. He's going to find
the same thing. Then I'm going to go go to
the military. Let's check the military. We're going to find billions,
hundreds of billions of DIFE is a fraud and abuse.
And you know the people elected me on that.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
People elected me.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
He's listening to the people and that's why it's populated
right now. Is about fifty percent fifty three percent in
one of the polls today.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Well and understand what Elon is doing. So so Elon
this weekend he tweeted the following quote. To be clear,
what the DOGE team and the US Treasury team have
jointly agreed makes sense. Is the following require that all
outgoing government payments have a payment categorization code, which is
(13:35):
necessary in order to pass financial audits. This is frequently
left blank, making audits almost impossible. All payments must also
include a rationale for the payment in the comment field,
which is currently left blank. Importantly, we are not yet
applying any judgment to this rationale, but simply require that
(14:00):
some attempt be made to explain the payment more than nothing.
The okay, and just just keep listening. Because this is
so simple that for government at shocking. The do not
pay list of entities known to be fraudulent, or people
(14:24):
who are dead or are probable fronts for terrorist organizations,
or do not match congressional appropriations must actually be implemented
and not ignored. Also, it can currently take up to
a year to get on this list, which is far
too long. This list should be updated at least weekly,
(14:47):
if not daily. The above super obvious and necessary changes
are being implemented by existing, longtime career government employees, not
anyone from DOGE. It is ridiculous that these ch didn't
exist already. Yesterday I was told that there are currently
over one hundred billion dollars a year of entitlement payments
(15:10):
to individuals with no Social Security numbers or even a
temporary ID number. If accurate, this is extremely suspicious. When
I asked if anyone at Treasury had a rough guest
for what percentage of that number is unequivocal and obvious fraud,
the consensus in the room was about half, so fifty
(15:35):
billion a year or one billion dollars a week. This
is utterly insane and must be addressed immediately.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Why would anyone be angry at that? And I say
that look is a rhetorical question. The people that don't
want you to find this out are clearly the ones
that are abusing the system for whether it's their corruption,
family friends. The list goes on and on that has
been mentioned there. But if you are a taxpayer, I
(16:05):
don't care if you're a Republican or Democrat. You should
want to know where your money's going and want to
know if there's waste fraud abuse, so we get rid
of it because it could mean that we're all paying
way more in taxes than we ever could have imagined.
We should be able to pay to get great services
at a much lower rate because you get rid of
all the fraud abuse.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Well, i'll get I'll give you another interesting data. Do
you know what has what the median household income is
in Washington DC. It's one hundred and twenty one thousand
a year. That's the median. The national median is eighty
two thousand dollars a year, So Washington d C. Is
fifty percent greater. And by the way, compare that to
(16:49):
the only place higher is California's Bay Area. So Washington
DC has a higher median income than New York ninety
five thousand Bridgeport one hundred and eleven thousand, Chicago eighty
seven one thousand, Dallas eighty six thousand, Baltimore ninety four thousand,
New Orleans sixty one thousand, Boston one hundred and ten thousand,
Raleigh ninety six thousand, San Diego one hundred and three thousand,
(17:12):
Los Angeles ninety one thousand, Honolulu one hundred and three thousand, Washington,
d C. One hundred and twenty one thousand. Right at the.
Speaker 2 (17:20):
Top question you got to ask yourself, is I wonder
why could it be? There's so many people there that
are getting hookups with the government and jobs and making
sure money is spent and going to the right places
that they get compensated very well for that.
Speaker 3 (17:33):
Well, there are a ton of people a and senior
government jobs that are making six figure incomes and many
of the government buildings are empty. That the average across
the federal government right now for showing up to work
is five to eight percent of the employees, and they're
adamant that they have an entitlement to do this, that
(17:53):
it is horrific to expect them to show up to work.
They're also armies of lobbyists and contractors and people getting
rich off government, and so those two together are are
operating powerfully. And it's interesting that Elon has been able
to affect such significant change simply by starting with saying,
(18:15):
where is the money going? Show me the flow of
cash going out the door. I want to see it
dollar by dollar. That that is a threat right to
the heart of the deep state and and the corruption
machine the Democrats have had for a long time.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Well, let me ask you another question about dinner. And
you are one of those that this is a compliment.
If you've ever had dinner with you, you're a working dinner guy.
You're one of those that just likes to get stuff done.
I think that's probably one of the reasons why you
and Eli get well get along so well. You're having
these dinners now where you're getting stuff done, and in
(18:56):
government that's not always the case. How happy and how
much fun is it for you personally to know now
that when you're going into these meetings with Trump and
these other senators like you guys are actually getting to
do your job, Because I know that's driven you crazy
over the years when you just feel like you're just
spinning your wheels because governments spinning their wheels and not
getting stuff done?
Speaker 1 (19:17):
Is this like that? Is this what made you want
to get into politics and to serve.
Speaker 3 (19:23):
Listen, it is fun and it is exciting because we
have a unique opportunity right now. You look at the
mandate from November. Obviously, the people re elected Donald Trump.
They elected a Republican Senate, not just a Republican Senate
with a relatively big majority. Fifty three Republicans is sizeable
(19:46):
in the Senate. They gave us a majority in the House,
albeit a very narrow one. We have an opportunity to
accomplish an enormous amount. And I'll tell you, Ben, it's
fun and exciting, but there's also a seriousness to this.
We can't screw I think failure is not an option
and and so I'm jumping out of bed every day.
I am excited to go. And you look at the work,
(20:11):
all right, and you see everything Elon's doing. Here, here's
a story that broke that gives you the sense of
why there's so much work to be done. Headlined from
the weekend, Biden admin filled terrorist coffers with over one billion,
three hundred million dollars before Trump took wrecking ball to
(20:32):
foreign aid and I'm just going to just start with
that article. More than one point three billion dollars in
taxpayer funds from the Biden administration ended up helping groups
that sponsored or committed terrorism, and the biggest part of
that was to UNRA, the United Nations Relief and Work
Work Agency. The Biden administration gave one billion, fifty three
(20:58):
million and four hundred thous thousand dollars in US taxpayer
money to UNRA and an UNRA. Remember but by the way,
under Trump, initially there was a ban on unrefunding because
they have been so intertwined with Hamas and Hamas terrorists.
We now know that in the wake of October seventh,
you had Hamas terrorists on the UNRA payroll.
Speaker 2 (21:20):
And yet yeah, that's a fact. By the way, we
need to make that clear. That is one hundred percent confirmed.
It is a fact.
Speaker 3 (21:29):
Here is intelligent. This is also from the article quote.
Intelligence officials later revealed that more than one thousand UNRA employees,
or around ten percent, were linked to the groups Hamas
and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. According to documents found on the
bodies of dead terrorists and other evidence, ten percent of
(21:54):
their employees were linked to Hamas and Palestinian Islam Jahad,
and the Biden administration right up till the last day
was shoveling cash. And I got to say, it's one
of the things that I think is most offensive about
what Biden the Democrats did is they didn't just spend
(22:15):
four years pushing a radical agenda, but after election day,
when the voters made clear, we don't like this agenda,
we want to change course. Right up until the moment
Trump was sworn in, they did everything they could to
frustrate the ability of the new administration to turn things around.
I've never seen a president do that. To the best
(22:36):
of my knowledge, We've never had one do that, and
it really demonstrates a contempt for the voters.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
This goes back you just mentioned contempt of the voters.
Democrats now trying to figure out their footing. They had
Alamomar who went on TV today saying that Trump has
decided he will not abide by the constitution, just throwing
it out there, and then she says, by the way,
every exact kive order that's been to court now has
been shut down by the court.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
That's a lie, not true.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
But even face the nation try to softly correct her
because they want this to be true, right, And then
there's this new threat of like, all right, we'll just
shut down the government. I kind of laugh because for
many concerns are like, great, let's shut it down and
save some money for a while. I wish it worked
that way. I wish it was that simple. It's obviously not.
(23:26):
But this is the new temper tantrum of the left.
They're saying, if we aren't in charge, then we want
to destroy what the government does. Well, we want to
hurt people, and we want to shut down the government
to hurt people. So you'll blame Donald Trump. That's what
this is really all about.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Am I wrong?
Speaker 3 (23:42):
Well, look, understand, there's a battle going back and forth,
and at some level, this battle is inherent in the
structure of our government. It's inherent in the Constitution. Congress.
Under Article one, all legislative power is vested in the
Congress of the United States. Congress passes the laws, the
President signs into law, and that are then binding federal law.
(24:05):
The executive all executive power is vested in the President
of the United States. That's under Article two of the Constitution,
and the president is charged with has given the authority
to and also the responsibility to quote take care that
the laws be faithfully executed. That's the Constitution's language, and
(24:26):
so a lot of you know, it's interesting as I
travel around and talk to people back back home in
Texas or around the country, they ask, Okay, so is
what Elon's doing? Is what Trump is doing cutting off
funding at USAID pausing other funding? Is that going to stick?
And this is a battle back and forth between the
(24:47):
executive and legislature that has occurred since the very first
days of the Republic. And one of the things right
at the heart of this battle is about something called impoundment. Now,
what is in pound mean? Impoundment is when the president
of the United States decides not to spend money that
has been appropriated by the US Congress. Now you might ask, okay,
(25:11):
is impoundment some crazy theory that Donald Trump cooked up
or Elon Musk cooked up? Well, no, no, impoundment has
been around for more than two hundred years. The first
president to exercise impoundment was Thomas Jefferson, and he did
so in eighteen oh one. And if you look at
what Thomas Jefferson did, the first use of impoundment involved
(25:34):
a refusal to spend fifty thousand dollars, which fifty thousand
dollars in twenty twenty three dollars is about one point
twenty four million in funds that were appropriated for the
acquisition of gunboats for the United States Navy, and Thomas
Jefferson said in eighteen oh three that quote, the sum
of fifty thousand dollars appropriated by Congress for providing gunboats
(25:57):
remains unexpended. The favor and peaceful turn of affairs on
the Mississippi rendered an immediate execution of that law unnecessary. Now,
Jefferson did so, and in the years that went on,
presidents did so for two hundred years. Now what happened, well,
in the nineteen seventies, Richard Nixon had a battle with Congress,
(26:21):
and Congress got angry with Richard Nixon and felt he
was using impoundment too aggressively, and Congress passed a law
called the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of nineteen
seventy four that purported to remove the power of impoundment,
or at least to severely curtail it. And the Supreme
(26:45):
Court heard a decision. It was a decision called Train
versus City of New York, where the Supreme Court upheld
the Impoundment Control Act and significantly red reduced the president's
power to exercise impoundment. Now, by the way that there
(27:06):
was a subsequent wrinkle in this in that Congress came
back afterwards and passed a bill called the Line Item
Veto Act of nineteen ninety six. This happened after the
Republican takeover of Congress, Knut Gingrich came in, and the
line Audam Veto Act gave the president the power of
line Adam Vito, which Bill Clinton used on the federal
(27:30):
budget eighty two times. However, that law was struck down
in nineteen ninety eight by the Supreme Court. It was
a five to four vote. Actually, my former boss and
very good friend, Chuck Cooper, the man who taught me
how to be a lawyer, argued that case. Unfortunately, he
was on the losing side of that case and lost
five to four. The point what Elon is doing and
(27:54):
what Trump is doing, there's a long history of presidents
saying I don't want to spend money is wasteful and
I'm not going to Now there's also a history of
Congress pushing back what's likely to happen. There is already
and there will be more a crap ton of litigation
(28:15):
challenging these actions. We're seeing Democrat attorneys general bringing lawsuits.
We're going to see Democrat interest groups being bringing lawsuits.
We're going to see activist judges striking down actions executive orders.
And this is going to test the legal boundaries. At
(28:35):
the end of the day. Part of what is going
on is this is designed to go to the Supreme
Court and to restore the power of impoundment to the president.
I think that would be a very good thing. I
think it is consistent. It is an inherent authority of
the president to exercise the authority of impoundment. But understand,
(28:57):
we're going to see a mitigation battle Royale and it'll
take in all likelihood.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
So this is that you're saying, this is a fight
that we want to go to the Spring Court and
and and if it does go to the Supreme Court and
it plays to our advantage the way that you're describing
it with the law, how long is it going to
take us to get it there?
Speaker 3 (29:17):
Probably a couple of years, two to three years.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
So and so in the next two or three years,
we're going to be just dealing with pure fights with
with the media. Democrats coming after and trying to stop
everything that they're trying to cut with waste, fraud, abuse.
Speaker 3 (29:30):
Yes, and and understand Elon and Doze that they're embodying
right now, the Silicon Valley mantra of move fast and
break things. I mean, that's what they're doing. Not everything
that they do is going to be upheld. There will
be injunctions issued, and I think they understand that, and
I think they're trying to They're trying to implement the
(29:54):
mandate that came from the voters as rapidly and effectively
as possible. Listen. One, I'm excited about that. And and
I think if you look at some of the egregious
abuses that have been uncovered so far, it gives an
illustration of just how important this is.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
Before we move on to the federal financial watchdog order
to ce se activity, and that's important we're gonna do
with that. In a second, one final question on this,
we could go back I think whenever the sale was
a year and a half whatever it was, when Elon
Musk took over Twitter and we saw the Twitter files
and then we saw the corruption. I actually think you
(30:32):
can trace this all the way back to there. When
people really start paying attention to saying I don't trust
the government. You add COVID in there, and the lies
of the vaccine and the and the two weeks stuff,
the spread, and then we want into virology, and then
the lies over the hunter Byden laptop. And there started
to be these moments that were big where people are like, Okay,
maybe I shouldn't be so trusting of the news, Maybe
(30:54):
I shouldn't be trusting of the government, the deep state,
the president, and then you have him take over or
Twitter now X. Part of the reason why I think
Donald Trump's having so much success now is because we're
getting the word out about the waste and the fraud
and getting the line out of it, and people are
seeing it. Because before you go back twenty sixteen, center,
(31:16):
big tree falls in the forest, no one's around.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
Does it make a sound, right? The answer is no.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
But now what we're getting in the info that we're
getting and it's getting out because big tech can't suppress
it on X, how valuable is that to saving our democracy?
Speaker 3 (31:31):
Look, I think it's incredibly valuable. I believe Elon Musks
buying Twitter was the most important development for free speech
in modern times because it turned around the rampant censorship
from big tech. It put positive pressure on the rest
of big tech, and it created a vehicle for the
(31:52):
truth to get out. So you know, we've gone through
in previous podcasts all the examples, not all the examples,
but a number of examples of abuse. Of spending two
million dollars for sex changes in Guatemala. Now, who the
hell can defend that? Why US taxpayers are paying for
sex changes in Guatemala money to the BBC, the British
(32:14):
Broadcasting Corporation, By the way, that why the hell are
American taxpayers paying for the BBC? The last I checked,
the United Kingdom is a major developed country. They can
pay for their own damn television station. What we need?
What do we need to pay for that? And what's
amazing is the Democrats are just digging in. Give a
listen to Senator Chris Coons defending spending twenty million dollars
(32:38):
on American taxpayer money for Sesame Street in Iraq. Give
a listen.
Speaker 5 (32:43):
Is funding Sesame Street a judicious use of soft power? Well,
Michael the way you put it is the way I
hope folks considering your poll today will think about it.
This isn't just funding a kid show for children, millions
of children in countries like it's a show that helps
teach values, helps teach public health, helps prevent kids from
(33:06):
dying from dysentery and disease, and helps push values like collaboration, peacefulness,
cooperation in a society where the alternative is isis extremism
and terrorism. And to your point, it's pennies on the dollar.
The US Department of Defense has an annual budget of
(33:26):
about eight hundred and fifty billion dollars. USAID was spending
about thirty billion dollars. It is a small proportion of
our total federal spending. And as Joe and I would
often say, it's not just soft power, it's smart power.
Let me leave you with one other quote, Michael, if
I could, Jim Mattis, who is a four star Marine
(33:47):
Corps general and Trump's Secretary of Defense in his first term,
in a hearing back then said if you slash development
and AID spending, then I'm going to need more bullets
for our troops.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
I mean, you want to talk about stretching he's saying,
Sesame's He's going to save us from extremism?
Speaker 1 (34:05):
Are we kidding ourselves?
Speaker 3 (34:07):
Well, look, the Democrats are dug into defending everything to
defending all of the money that was just flowing out
with no checks whatsoever. And I think these examples are
having a real effect of pissing people off, saying, why
is my money going to that? By the way, if
Democrats think that's such a good idea, let them give
(34:28):
their own money for that. But what right do they
have to take your money that you're working hard to
provide for your kids and your family, to take it
and spend it on every radical agenda item they want
to push. That's what's been happening. It happened at egregious
levels under the Biden administration, and I think that's what
Trump's working very hard to turn around.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Yeah, great point.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
Finally, I want to ask you about this because I
think it should be on listeners, radar screen. It's an
important issue. The New York Times is coming out talking
about this. The federal financial watchdog has been ordered to
see activity, known as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Why
is this happening and what does this mean?
Speaker 3 (35:09):
Well, the CFPB the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was was
created by the Dodd Frank Law. This is a creation
of Elizabeth Warren and and and it is. It has
descended like locusts putting putting all sorts of regulations and costs.
It brings abusive litigation. It is it is an avenue
(35:32):
for for left wing bureaucrats to try to control community banks,
smaller financial institutions, and to drive up costs. And the CFPB.
I've introduced repeatedly legislation to eliminate the Cfpbuh. What happened
this week is russ vote was confirmed leave the Office
(35:55):
of Management and Budget. And Russ's is a good friend.
He's a good guy. He he ran omb under Trump
during the first term. And Russ was just confirmed. We
just confirmed him this past week to run o and
be again. And on Friday he was also named the
acting director of the of the Consumer Financial Protection Beer
(36:16):
the CFPB, and as a result, he issued an order
for them to halt what they're doing. So one chunk
of it. So the way Elizabeth Warren structured it, Congress
does not appropriate money to the CFPB, which is weird.
By the way, if you look at virtually every federal agency,
Congress appropriates money for them. That's part of the checks
(36:38):
and balances of how the federal government is set up well.
Dodd Frank instead has the CFPB funded with money from
the Federal Reserve that flows automatically, so Congress doesn't get
to appropriate and engage in the oversight that comes with that. So,
as a result, on Saturday, Russ Vote wrote that he
(37:04):
had notified the Federal Reserve that the CFPB quote will
not be taking its next straw of unappropriated funding because
it is not reasonably necessary to carry out its duties.
The bureau's current balance of seven hundred and eleven point
six million dollars is in fact excessive in the current
(37:25):
fiscal environment. This spigot, long contributing to CFPB's unaccountability is
now being turned off. That is fantastic. And I'll tell
you what. I've introduced legislation that will zero out the CFPB,
that will shut it down permanently. I believe we will
get that done as part of budget reconciliation, and so
(37:51):
eliminating the CFP would be a major victory for lowering inflation,
for lowering burdensome regulation, for lowering the nanny state control
of big government, and if we get that done, that's
a huge victory. I'll tell you Russ vote taking over
as acting director in the past few days was a
major step forward in that regard.
Speaker 2 (38:13):
Yeah, incredible. Don't forget. We do this show Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
Hit that subscribe or auto download button so you don't
miss an episode.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
Please run us a five star review. It helps us reach.
Speaker 2 (38:22):
More people and tell your family and friends again about
this show as it continues to grow, especially with all
the news we're giving you in this new Trump Ara.
It's a lot of fun. Don't miss an episode. We'll
see you back here Wednesday morning.
Host
Ben Ferguson
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.