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Dec. 9, 2021 - Firebrand - Matt Gaetz
37:29
Episode 19: Censured (feat. Rep. Paul Gosar) – Firebrand with Matt Gaetz
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The embattled Congressman Matt Gaetz.
Matt Gaetz was one of the very few members in the entire Congress who bothered to stand up against permanent Washington on behalf of his constituents.
Matt Gaetz right now, he's a problem in the Democratic Party.
He could cause a lot of hiccups in passing applause.
So we're going to keep running those stories to keep working.
If you want to build America up and not burn her to the ground, then welcome, my fellow patriots!
You are in the right place!
This is the movement for you!
You ever watch this guy on television?
Like a machine.
Matt Gaetz.
I'm a cancelled man in some corners of the internet.
Many days I'm a marked man in Congress, a wanted man by the deep state.
They aren't really coming for me.
They're coming for you.
I'm just in the way.
Are there different batches of vaccines in white neighborhoods for white people?
You'll be surprised what one of the expert witnesses House Democrats brought to the Judiciary Committee has to say about that subject following our interview with Dr. Paul Gosar.
Now, Paul Gosar is an America First congressman.
He is also the first member of Congress to be sanctioned and censured by the body since Alexander Hamilton.
Now, when Democrats needed something to unify an otherwise splintered caucus leading up to the massive spending legislation they were pushing, they actually used the Gosar censure to try to create unity.
On their side, I thought it was pretty clownish.
Here's what I had to say.
I am no expert on Japanese anime, but I am told and I do believe that it is not real.
What is real is the crisis on our border, the inflation-crushing American families, unvetted Afghans in our country.
And what is definitely real is the violence that burned our cities and harmed our businesses in the summer of 2020, often encouraged by Democrats in Congress.
An anime is fiction, to the point of the absurd, it's not really my thing and it does glorify violence, but often to symbolize conflict, not realistic harm to another person.
In the last session week we had, we reviewed Steve Bannon's podcast.
Today we're critiquing Paul Gosar's anime.
Next week, we might be indicting the Wile E. Coyote for an explosive ordinance against the Roadrunner.
If you don't like Paul Gosar's tweets, tweet back at him.
We know there are plenty of folks in big tech who will amplify your message.
But the gentlelady from Pennsylvania gave the game away.
This isn't really about a tweet.
It's about removing a powerful conservative Paul Gosar from the Oversight Committee.
And so earlier I spoke with Congressman Paul Gosar of Arizona regarding his censure, regarding the Congress, and the future of the America First movement.
Take a listen.
I'm here with Arizona Congressman Paul Gosar.
We're going to talk election integrity, corruption in Congress, the fight we have ahead, how to use the Republican representation that we do have to build leverage in the battle for our people.
But first, Paul, just how would you describe your political ideology?
Conservative, conservative, conservative.
Well, you know, within the conservative movement, we have kind of friends like Thomas Massey, the libertarian-leaning conservatives.
There are folks who, you know, consider themselves very socially conservative.
There is this new ascendant populism.
How do you balance those things, or would you just say across the board?
No, I think there's some pragmatic aspects to me in regards to how do we get the conservative message across.
But there's also some tenacity.
You know, you've got to be like a dog on a bone to make sure that you're forceful, but stalwart in trying to get those messages across.
And why it applies, the constitutional application to people and the principles.
You know, we like to bring folks into the room, behind the scenes.
And one of the places that we should be developing that vision and strategy is in our House Republican conference meetings.
This is where the Republicans get together as a team and decide how we're going to confront the Democrats.
And earlier, you and I were at one of these meetings.
It was actually Congresswoman Boebert sitting with us at a breakfast.
And the leadership and their polling operation were trying to tell us what we really needed to be talking about on the campaign trail.
And they said the most important thing to talk about is inflation, inflation, inflation.
And that was really what was going to drive our voters.
And we see the way Bidenflation is really hurting people.
But I asked them to go back and tell us where election integrity fit on that issue matrix.
And lo and behold, they did not even test election integrity.
You know, you have been on the forefront of a lot of these election battles in Arizona.
How do you see the issue of election integrity with Americans?
It's the foremost issue in my district.
I'm not an affluent district.
I'm a very rural district.
I represented over 85% of Arizona at one time or another.
So lots of small places, lots of small businesses.
They believe that if they don't have a true election and that they can trust their ballot getting to the person they vote for, that the Republic cannot stand.
So it is paramount, the number one issue, Matt.
And what would happen, you think, to Republicans practically if we stopped talking about election integrity?
Trust is a series of promises kept.
And I think, more importantly, that people would lose trust in the last people that they think that they have fighting for their right and their republic.
Do you think it's fair to say then that discussing the Biden failures are necessary but not sufficient?
And what is absolutely critical is continuing to pursue legal changes, strategy changes, tactical changes, Changes in state statute, changes in personnel, in order to ensure that when people cast their precious vote, that they feel it is valued.
It is.
And in order to understand the magnitude, you have to have a come-to-Jesus moment where you put everything on the table.
Show the American people.
They're the ones that are the governed.
And you've got to make sure that you're checking the box, making sure what is the checks and balance.
How is this ballot being looked at?
How is it being carefully monitored?
How is it carefully being tabulated?
You know, those are very important to people.
And we have very little time to do it.
And what is your expectation of that time frame?
Well, my expectation has been delayed because of the executive branch in Arizona, the governor.
He should be calling a special session so that we can look at some of the things that the audit, the forensic audit brought out, that some of the things that the Attorney General is now looking at that they weren't able to look at from the audit standpoint, and making sure that we're correcting those things before 2022. So do you believe that Governor Ducey, the Republican governor of Arizona, has done enough to advance the cause of election integrity?
Absolutely not.
Do you believe that the Arizona Attorney General, Mr. Brnovich, has done enough to protect people's vote?
Not yet.
Now what's happening, we're all watching because he now controls the whole issue.
It's been referred for criminal intent in regards to what happened with the election.
He gets access to the routers, which they never got a chance to get to because of the way that the board of supervisors challenged the state senate.
So, we'll see.
Is Arizona a blue state now?
No.
It's a red state.
And you got two Democrat senators.
You've got a majority of the delegation in Congress represented by Democrats.
What's your best evidence that it's a red state?
Well, I mean, when you look at it, there's some things that are unique to Arizona.
One of them is the legacy of John McCain.
You know, when you look at the last election, that was a lot of influence from the former senator.
From the grave?
Absolutely.
From the family and from his network.
John ran Arizona.
And he did not like Donald Trump.
And so you think that in upcoming elections, you could see a different issue matrix matter to people.
You know, there are a lot of folks who expect that Republicans are going to take the majority.
Biden, president, maybe even Schumer in the Senate.
But in a world in which Joe Biden is president and Republicans are in control in the House, How should we use leverage in order to get some wins for our people?
Because so many folks right now feel beaten down by these mandates and lockdowns, and they want hope.
Would a Republican majority give people hope?
It would, if, once again, it gets back to that trust as a series of promises kept.
Everybody wants to talk about this contract with America, doing it again.
You've probably heard me.
I'm happy with that, but with one exception, and that is it comes from the people.
Not from Washington down, like the last one did, but from the people up.
What do you think is the most fundamental promise we need to keep?
Is trust.
We did not keep promises on repealing Obamacare.
And so we lost the majority, I think in large part because we didn't keep that promise.
You are representing a border state.
You lead on a lot of immigration issues in the Congress.
Is there a more important promise to keep from a policy standpoint than sealing that border and deporting people who are here illegally?
You know, it gets back to the rule of law.
You know, allowing people to come in uninvited, defying our rule of law as our first act of coming in the United States, is defiance to the whole matrix of the republic.
And I think that's one of those.
But I think there's so many.
We've let this republic down so far.
Congress has given so much of its power back to the executive branch.
And it's we the people and the states that have to fight back that federal government.
So I think the biggest thing is empowering states to take back those issues.
Like in your state, Governor DeSantis is one of the people I cite all the time.
You don't know what you can do until you do it.
The role of oversight will be a very important one.
You've got a strong background in oversight, serving on the Oversight Committee previously.
What is the most important investigation that you think Republicans need to advance into the Biden administration?
I think it's this whole legal cover-up of the Biden scam.
A personal graft?
Absolutely.
And I think that how the FBI covered it up, how the FBI squelched it during the election of 2020, and making people be held accountable.
Why would the FBI go to such length to protect the Bidens?
Is that your assertion?
Yeah, it is.
You know, so we just had a president, President Trump, that did everything he said he was going to do.
Isn't that novel?
You know?
And now we've got a guy that will lie every time he gets a chance.
And the only enablers are the law.
You know, in oversight, you bring it up.
I've been here.
We're fast and furious.
Benghazi, the IRS, the oversight.
You questioned people during the Russia hoax.
Absolutely.
On the oversight.
And tell me where justification came for the application of the letter of the law.
Nobody.
And America sees that.
They see one law for me.
A different law.
And what do you think is that divide?
I mean, you know, Biden and Trump were both president, so it's not just that the FBI would cover for any president, because your assertion seems to be that they targeted Trump, and we obviously saw that in the evidence, and that they're covering for Biden family personal graft.
Yeah.
Well, this gets to the bureaucracy.
You know, this has been a self-feeding machine here in Washington, D.C., this bubble they talk about, the swamp, the sewer, as I call it.
And it breeds upon itself.
You know, it says, you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours.
It's not about the representation of the people.
That's what I worry about, Paul.
I worry that we could win the majority.
Joe Biden could be president, and we could have a docile, you know, compromising leadership willing to cut deals and just allow Joe Biden to go about his merry way, whereas my perspective is that we need tough, Effective, fair, but rigorous and dogged oversight.
That dog with a bone on a lot of these different things that the Biden administration is doing.
One of the points of leverage that people talk about is the utilization of shutdowns.
What would be the Paul Gosar standard for what is worth shutting the government down if we had the majority?
To get back to the systems of the way the process works.
Good process builds good policy, builds good politics.
It's that simple.
It's getting back to get light on all these issues.
Would you shut down the government over immigration?
I would.
Would you shut down the government over vaccine mandates?
Absolutely.
Would you shut down the government over mask mandates?
I might do it a different way, but I think that and I don't think you have to get that.
What about funding for Planned Parenthood?
Would you hold a government funding bill if the Planned Parenthood funding didn't come out?
Yeah, I actually would.
I mean, in my short history in Congress, we've seen a couple shutdowns.
Why are Republicans so scared of them?
It seems like Republicans are worried that, oh, any shutdown, we're going to take the blame.
And frankly, I think we've had some shutdowns in the past where we haven't explained our basis well to people.
But there seems to be a Republican fear about using government shutdowns as leverage.
It seems as though you would use the threat of that shutdown to advance these promises that we seem to make to our voters year after year.
But I don't think that's the only thing, Matt.
I think we lack a strategy.
You know, there's ways of getting things done.
And you set something up by putting one bill to tee it off, and then you bring something else behind it.
What I've seen here is people are timid to actually step out.
And we need people that are going to say, okay, we do this first, we do this, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.
You build that trust.
Ask the people.
Okay?
And you've heard me speak, you know, what if you were going to be speaker on a moment's notice?
What would you do?
You've got to know those things.
You know, would you already have it prearranged for your committee's assignments?
And what are those committees going to take up?
You know, it's like a business person.
And President Trump did this so well.
What is the issue?
How are we going to solve it?
What's the process?
What's the strategy?
And what's the time frame?
When are we going to get it done?
That's what's missing in Washington, D.C. When are you going to get it done?
And we've got to play the playbook back at the Democrats, at the Marxists, like they've done to us.
And you can't be shy.
You've got to have a thick skin.
And look, for five years, President Trump took every heckle, every blade, every nuance they could send his way.
And look how much he accomplished.
That's leadership.
That's what we need to get back to, is be daring, bold.
Go bold or go home.
Do you think that attitude is why they target you so much?
They do.
I mean, there was articles written and there was a hit piece by MSNBC that called me the most dangerous congressman on the Hill.
I hope you have it framed in your office.
I do.
I do.
You can't make a better one on this up.
And their comment was, this guy talks only when he wants to, but he's a doer.
He gets things done.
And that's the business part of me.
I'm a dentist by profession.
I don't run away from it.
I run to it.
One of my things I like doing is talking to people.
It's what hurts?
How can I help you?
And I found that this has done very well for me.
It's because the people on Main Street have to live with these and they know what the problem is.
That sounds so reasonable, Paul, and yet you and I and several of the folks who kind of work with us to try to get things done seem to get more than our fair share of interest from the national media and from the mainstream outlets that I think are America Last in a lot of their perspective.
Some people are targeted because they're in swing districts.
Some people are targeted because they're real outspoken.
But you seem to be targeted because you're able to do things that advance the agenda and they haven't quite figured out how to stop you yet.
Now the latest attempt has been to remove you from the Oversight Committee and from the Natural Resources Committee.
Walk me through how you see your role in the Congress in the coming months.
So now what they did is they took my, as you said, took my committees away.
So now I actually sit on all committees.
It's how you look at it.
So you're going to hurt me.
I like being busy.
So I'm going to be on the floor.
I'm going to be in the committees that I want to be on the issues that are pertinent.
That kind of sounds like someone we know, doesn't it?
Yes.
Doesn't that sound like Marjorie Taylor Greene?
It does.
Are we building a new model here for members that really audit the body more than serve one particular interest or group or policy area on committees?
It is.
And what's so magic about this, Matt, is that the committee structure is broken.
Committee staff runs it.
It's not the members.
And what most people don't realize is it's the special interests and lobbyists who lobby the committees who then turn around and tell the leadership which members they want on those committees.
So it's not really a fair fight with the lobby corps against the rest of America because the lobby corps has picked the referee.
You're exactly right.
So why play by their rules?
Establish our own rules.
You know, and what I like about you and Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, you know, Jody Heiss, Andy Biggs, is we're all asking, why do you do that?
You know, and I like the fact that we question.
And how does this get us back to what?
You know, sound policy?
You know, it's like the idea that we've talked about with the NDA, this recent NDA, we should have held it up.
We had the perfect storm.
We had the perfect storm.
We had military generals who made millions off the Iraqi-Afghanistan War, the industrial complex that Eisenhower warned us about.
We saw the leaving of 80-some billion dollars' worth of our equipment behind.
We saw a hurried… Well, just a totally incompetent withdrawal.
Totally incompetent.
And then we see supersonic expertises in China and Russia and we don't have it?
Something's wrong with this picture.
We should have shut that thing down and said, wait a minute, whoa, whoa, whoa.
We need light on all this.
Where's the money going?
Is it sole sourcing, you know, to one of the big conglomerates that now has gobbled all up their competition?
Yeah, the big defense contractors.
What is it?
And why are we demanding that our military men and women be forced to take a mandated vaccine?
Well, one of the reasons is because Republicans on the Armed Services Committee in leadership publicly acknowledge they support vaccine mandates.
Matter of fact, the leading Republican on the Armed Services Committee, who's probably right about a lot of things, led the debate against me when I offered amendments to try to protect our service members.
Even within the Republican conference, I think we have a real divergence of opinion on issues that are pretty central to how our own voters and constituents think about us.
You talk a lot about the leadership style of President Trump.
I know he's a great influence on you, me as well, but it seems as though he led not just a campaign or even a political movement, but a realignment.
Where more of those voters who wear their name on their shirt and take a shower after work every day are joining a conservative political course of action, whereas a lot more of the elites and the woke corporations are trending bluer.
What do you think that means for our politics?
It comes down to victimization and empowerment.
People in America want to be empowered.
They don't want to be victims.
And they want to be listened to.
And when you ask a question of somebody, you're empowering them.
So when Nancy Pelosi took your committee assignments, did she victimize you or empower you?
She empowered me.
Because now you get the wide-angle lens.
She's not limiting.
She's actually expanding my horizons.
People don't get that.
See, I think that they think they got you, but really, they unchained you.
Part of Washington tries to silo people and to keep them busy and to keep folks away from the real fight.
And now you get to define what the real fight is on behalf of your constituents.
That's right.
And I do think that this trend that Marjorie Taylor Greene has endured, that you are now enduring, could be one that continues.
When we take the majority, will our leadership have the guts to throw some of their members off committees?
They'll have to deal with this dog if they don't.
What will you do?
It can make things pretty miserable.
You know, from that standpoint, you always look at trying to give somebody a way out, but to do the right thing to get out.
That seems gracious.
That seems like a normal human extension of grace.
You would think.
And then you reward good behavior over and over again, saying, attaboy, attaboy, attaboy.
See what that did?
It didn't hurt.
You did something different.
You know, Einstein always made the comment.
He said, we don't have to think more.
We just have to think differently.
And that's why people like you and Marjorie Taylor Greene, myself, we're hated because we don't think like a bunch of lemmings.
We think there's a different way to get from A to Z. And it doesn't mean that you have to go through all the little pomp and circumstance.
You know, roll up your sleeves, get down and dirty, and simplify it.
Keep it simple.
I guess that good old KISS theory, keep it simple stupid.
You have endorsed candidates around the country that share policy goals that you have.
Do you think that not being on committees and being able to survey the body at large and engage the body at large will give you a greater opportunity to influence the membership of the body?
It does.
Because the other thing we do, Matt, is we explore different ways of communication.
You can say that again, Paul.
Absolutely.
But you know, from my standpoint, we noticed that people got a lot more out of a video or a picture than a written piece.
And so we've been trying to engage people differently.
You know, to get them to look back at the issue and say, never thought about that.
I would have never thought that was an immigration piece.
When did you know that this piece that you'd put together that really was making a border immigration argument, when did you know that it was going to be something different?
The hits, the hits came flying at it.
You know, we had 3 million hits in less than 24 hours.
And we've done other things.
You know, we did an acronics with Epstein Didn't Kill Himself that got over 33 million hits.
And then we had Katie Hill to jump in.
So you think that if this anime video that distracted the House totally unnecessarily for an extended period of time, that if it wasn't so successful in its reach, that it would not have drawn the ire of Democrats?
It wouldn't have.
What I've noticed is the Democrats start squealing and screaming.
And I can tell your audience, I've got seven siblings that are Marxist.
And when they start squealing and crying, I know I'm over the bombing sites.
Just stay there and keep on going.
Yeah, I recall they made a few videos disagreeing with some of your politics on health care and other things.
Paul Glosser, the congressman.
Isn't doing anything to help rural America.
Paul's absolutely not working for his district.
If they care about health care, they care about their children's health care, they would hold him to account.
If they care about jobs, they would hold him to account.
If he actually cared about people in rural Arizona, I bet he'd be fighting for social security, for better access to health care.
I bet he would be researching what is the most insightful water policy to help the environment of Arizona sustain itself and be successful.
And he's not listening to you, and he doesn't have your interests at heart.
My name is Tim Gosar.
David Gosar.
Grace Gosar.
Joan Gosar.
Gaston Gosar.
Jennifer Gosar.
Paul Gosar is my brother.
My brother.
And I endorse Dr. Brill.
Dr. Brill.
Wholeheartedly endorse Dr. David Brill for Congress.
I'm Dr. David Brill, and I approve this message.
But that didn't seem to phase you and it also didn't seem to phase your voters.
No, no, you know, and that's what's great about it.
When you engage with people, when you empower people, they're there to support you.
They may not agree with everything that you stand for, but the fact that you listen to them, empower them, and have them part of the solution, that is ominous.
And I'll give you another way of turning this around.
You know, when you build trust with your constituents, When big magazines or newspapers like the Arizona Republic, I call them the repugnant, do big pieces, why is it that I become more popular?
They don't get it.
Trust is a series of promises kept.
So when they made their allegations at me earlier, I went to people and explained.
Teaching moments.
Those teaching moments that you can't recapture.
Take the time.
Explain.
Let them ask the questions.
Dialogue with them.
Be open policy.
What do we got to lose?
A republic if we don't.
It is a way for, I think, us to impact this town in a positive way because right now we see the sludge, the slime, the swamp, the sewer as you would call it.
We see the way that that sells out to folks that are counting on us to deliver on our promise to fight for them.
I think all over this country right now, you've got people who feel like they are under attack.
From corporations that are out to get them, from government institutions that seek more and more control over their lives.
And you know what?
It's choose your fighter time.
And I think a lot of folks in Arizona and really throughout the country appreciate the fact that even if it's going to draw a special degree of animus, you're going to be in that fight for them.
In the coming Congress, you put the challenge on your colleagues.
If you were speaker tomorrow, would you be ready?
What would a Paul Gosar speaker agenda look like in the first several hours or days?
Well, first of all, I would make sure that the committee staff has done answers to the members.
And I would love to see the members actually elect the chairperson.
You know, and that would be a novel concept because, you know, chairpeople actually serve at the whims of the members, not the other way around.
And the speaker should be the same way.
When you look at history...
So who should be speaker?
I'll put you on the spot.
Who should be speaker if we take the majority?
The person that can empower the members to be part of the solution and not part of the problem.
Leader McCarthy said if he were to become Speaker, not only would he put you back on committees, he might put you on better committees.
Are there other committees that you think are better than natural resources and oversight?
You seem to love those.
You seem to love that.
When I first got here, Matt, I wanted to get on Energy and Commerce, and that wasn't going to happen.
So I got an oversight.
Explain to people.
Why would someone like you not get on Energy and Commerce?
You just described your leadership style.
Have a vision.
Be open-minded.
Listen to people.
Why would that not be something that would be welcome on the Energy and Commerce Committee?
Well, it should be, but you don't pay your respect, and I'm not one of those people that bow and kiss the ring.
Oh, so what you're saying is that the cost of buying a seat on Energy and Commerce is something that precludes some members from participation.
It's about a million dollars.
That goes to the team.
So there's one group of committees that, you know, the highest echelon, and by the way, why is it a million bucks to get on there?
Because that's where you can go raise the money from the lobbyists, right?
So you're expected to pay tribute, then go and get the money from the lobbyists and then sit in meetings like you and I sat in with Lauren Boebert where they tell you to stop talking about election integrity and your money that you went and raised into your campaign or got through lobbyists is what is funding that manipulation.
Do I have that about right?
I think you have that about right.
I think you have that about right.
But my people back home look at oversight as an A committee.
Totally.
And natural resources as an A committee.
You know, you look at, you know, the five C's of Arizona.
One of them is copper, and it means mining.
So all these new things that are coming about, electric cars, wind turbines, solar cells, batteries.
All those come from rare earths and critical minerals that come from Arizona.
We're blessed with it.
We're very blessed with it.
So what you're saying is very strange in Washington, that the issues that are most important to your constituents matter more than the committees that give you the greatest leverage to raise money from lobbyists?
Exactly right.
You know what?
That might just be one of the reasons they seem to go after my good friend Paul Gosar.
Well, Paul, thank you for joining me on Firebrand.
Thank you for all your due.
My prediction is that the Democrats are going to be begging to put you back on committees after you're watching out, after all the committees, watching out for all of your constituents, and I would say watching out for all Americans.
Thanks for being here.
The House Judiciary Committee is a place where we ought to have stimulating discussions about administrative procedures, the role of the bureaucracy, the constitutional rights of our citizens that we must vindicate through our action.
But instead, House Democrats brought in Ms. Patterson to talk about the way in which race overlays how we think about the regulatory dynamic in America.
Her prior statements were ridiculous, as I pointed out here.
Ms. Patterson, in Chairman Cicilline's introduction of you, he referenced your master's in public health.
And so I want to ask a question about public health.
Is there a different chemical composition for vaccines in white neighborhoods as opposed to non-white neighborhoods?
Yes, so my Master's in Public Health does not mean that I have in any way had any access to be able to examine the different compositions of different vaccines that are provided in different neighborhoods.
Do you have any basis to believe that the vaccines being administered in white neighborhoods versus non-white neighborhoods are different?
I don't have any basis to even begin to evaluate that question because, again, I don't have access to the data samples or anything like that.
What about the batching process?
Is there something called a white batch of vaccines as opposed to a batch of vaccines that would be intended for non-white people?
Not that I've heard of.
Not that you've heard of.
It's interesting, I found a tweet of yours from December 3rd, almost a year ago today, 2020, where you tweeted, my COVID-19 vaccination plan, colon, go to the whitest neighborhood I can find to make sure my dose comes from a white batch.
How should we think about that tweet?
As the humor that it was intended, albeit kind of a dark humor in terms of the reality of the Tuskegee experiments and so forth in our community.
And so there was a whole string of commentary that we had following from that about how it was a shame that we even have to think in these types of terms.
So that's where it would seemingly be more of a shame if we thought in these terms without a basis And I understand people, you know, put things on Twitter sometimes that are jokes, and I noted in response to your tweet, an account called Urban Dashboard replied, you have a great sense of humor, but too painful to laugh at that joke.
And then you replied, I know, it's all too painful all day every day.
And as I said, I was barely joking because it's real!
Yes, yes, the situation is real.
So is it real that there's different, because you talked about a white, are white batches real?
As I said before, that the reference was putting in context this larger conversation about the differential access to affordable and quality health care in our communities.
So it shouldn't be taken literally.
Oh, it shouldn't be taken literally.
Okay, well, I guess my question is, you know, you gave testimony today about your concern over the monopolistic sharing of information, about the criticality of the input of public interest groups, about how we have to stop the politicization of agency decisions.
Do you think it damages public health and do you think it damages the credibility of public interest groups like yours when you put out that your personal vaccination plan is to go to the whitest neighborhood so that you can ensure that your dose comes from the whitest batch?
Absolutely not.
You don't think that's dangerous?
Is that misinformation?
So how do I know if a batch is a white batch?
If I wanted to follow your vaccination plan and I wanted one from the white batch too, where would I go?
Again, you're being facetious and I've already responded to the question and so I'm not going to respond to it again because there's not new information to provide.
Do you think that being facetious about race-based vaccination issues is dangerous because we have seen data That there are communities of color that are more skeptical of vaccines?
And do you think that facetious comments like this are helpful?
So I think that they're important to raise a dialogue about why it is that people are more skeptical.
I think it's important to raise a dialogue about how we can...
I only have a few moments left.
Oh, you're interrupting me.
Yeah, I'm interrupting you because I only have a few seconds left.
No, you're asking me a question.
What's the most important part of the dialogue to understand from a white bat?
I think it's not really a legitimate seeking of information when you're breaking in when I'm actually responding to the question.
It's always legitimate to ask witnesses before the committee about their own statements.
But it's not legitimate to interrupt when someone is trying to answer the question.
Do you regret this tweet?
Since it seems to be causing some consternation, do you regret having sent it?
No.
Because it's causing consternation with you, it caused an interesting and important dialogue that is not one that I'm the only one having.
I think that sometimes that dialogue can metastasize into disinformation and can actually harm the people that you say are here to help.
No, it actually acknowledges...
That was the House Judiciary Committee.
Be better, Chairman Nadler.
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