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July 23, 2023 - Huckabee Today
50:00
Trump is SKYROCKETING in the Polls and It’s Because of Democrats | FULL EPISODE | Huckabee
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Tonight on Huckabee, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt.
Former New York Yankee Jason Brimsley.
Laugh out loud comedy from Brent Plitt.
singer and author, Cacio Cucci.
That's Dre Corley and the Music City Connection.
And I'm your announcer Keith Bilbrey.
And now, here's What a great audience we have here tonight.
I'm always thrilled when we have people who come with some enthusiasm.
I like to say, you know, sometimes you have an Episcopalian crowd and sometimes you got a Pentecostal crowd that like to make some noise.
I like the Pentecostal crowds.
I don't care whether you go to church.
And sometimes the Episcopalians can be loud and the Pentecostals can be quiet.
I don't know.
You know, there's an old saying that just because you eat your soup louder than others doesn't mean it tastes better.
But if you're doing a show, you kind of like people to slurp it up and have fun.
So I like this crowd we got here tonight.
So let me ask you a question.
Will there ever be an end to the deep state government goons indicting Donald Trump for something that for anyone else would not even be a crime, wouldn't even be a parking ticket?
You know, one would think that the lesson would begin to dawn on the corrupt officials who have abused their power to focus on destroying a former and perhaps future president.
Kind of like the Roadrunner always being targeted by Wile E. Coyote, Donald Trump not only survives the bombs and the bullets from the Acme munitions box, but with each indictment or baseless attack, his approval numbers and his support goes up.
At the rate it's going...
I mean, folks, at the rate it's going, Trump is going to be at 90% support for the GOP presidential race soon because of this.
And it's not because, let's be fair, it's not because he stopped being offensive with some of his statements or tweets, but it's because the American people aren't stupid.
And even all but the most partisan of political hacks can see that there truly is a disgusting double standard of justice in this country.
One that applies to Donald Trump or anyone who supports him or the conservative, pro-life, pro-Israel or America First agenda.
And then a completely different standard that's applied to Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, Hunter Biden, the leadership of the FBI or the Department of Justice or to Democrats in Congress.
When the Democrats and deep staters scream that no one is above the law, most of us double over laughing because we know that is a lie.
A lot of people are clearly above the law.
All I got to do is hate Donald Trump.
That's the golden ticket that gets you a free ride past the jailhouse and straight into the White House.
Heck, you can even show up at the White House with a bag of cocaine and not only will you not get arrested, but law enforcement won't even try to find you.
How any decent-thinking American could be okay with this disastrous government is beyond me.
Now look, the elites sneer at the working-class Americans who struggle to pay their rent, groceries, gas, and utilities.
And they act with contempt toward those who go to church, sweat to make a living on the farm or in the factory, and who really don't want a thing from the government except just to be left alone, to live their lives, raise their families, and not be victims of random violent crime by people who get let out every time they get arrested.
Will the political bosses of Washington ever be held accountable for the contempt of the law?
Are there shredding of the constitutional standards of equal justice, due process, and presumption of innocence for all?
Well, I'm not sure.
But I do commend the Republican members of the House who are using what is a bare majority status to try and get answers from reluctant government power players who pretend That they can't remember a thing related to a once vice president and current president arrogantly proclaiming his honesty while a long line of credible witnesses testify under oath that he's the big guy who has taken millions in foreign money through phony business deals concocted
by his deadbeat, drug-addled son who has less business acumen than a kid selling lemonade from a card table in front of his parents' house.
But what we can't do is lose heart or hope.
Rising up, speaking up, and voting are some ways we can fight against the moral meltdown of this nation.
I mean, we've got people running the country who are supposed to be the smartest people in the room, and they hold university degrees from the finest Ivy League schools.
These guys don't even know the difference between a man and a woman.
And they believe that taxpayers who couldn't afford to pay for college, they ought to pay off the student debts of their doctor or their lawyer who makes more money in a year than they'll make in a lifetime.
Look, I still really do feel more at home with the people at the Waffle House than those at the Opera House.
I really do.
I'd rather eat barbecue with construction workers any day than nibble on caviar with the Harvard faculty.
And never forget that there are a whole lot more of us than there are of those who truly do believe they're just better than us.
And someday, it'll be time to deliver the news to them.
It's time for you to go.
You've done enough damage to our country.
Be gone, the whole lot of you.
And don't let the door hit you where the good Lord split you.
Kevin Stitt serves four million citizens as the 28th governor of the great state of Oklahoma.
He is committed to making it a top 10 state, so whether you want to move your family there or your business or just take a nice vacation, Oklahoma is a place to live the American dream and their governor is determined to make it even better.
Please welcome to our show in Nashville for the first time, Governor Kevin Stitt.
Governor, great to have you here.
And, you know, you've got some stuff going on in Oklahoma.
Absolutely.
Man, it's great to be here with you guys.
Well, we're excited to have you.
And I want to get started by talking about some of the things that you are doing, one of which, and it's been controversial, but you have, along with the legislators, decided that when people go to a school library or a public library, they should know that there are certain materials that are not really appropriate for children.
Now, nobody's saying you want to ban books, but that's what you get accused of.
It's unbelievable to us.
I mean, it's pretty common sense in Oklahoma that we're going to protect our kids.
We're not banning books, but we're not going to over-sexualize.
We're not going to allow pornography in schools.
Overwhelmingly, Oklahomans support me on this issue.
So we want to put parents back in charge in Oklahoma.
And again, it's pretty common sense.
And some of the stuff that we've seen in some of the elementary books in our libraries, it's just unbelievably disgusting.
And why would any right-thinking citizen want children to see that kind of material?
It is beyond me why we're getting any kind of pushback whatsoever.
Again, I think it comes from the George Soros.
It comes from these groups out of New York, California.
They're going to come in and sue and try to spin everybody up that we're trying to ban books.
It's not true.
We want to teach kids.
We don't want to indoctrinate them.
And we're not going to overly sexualize.
We're not going to allow pornography, gender identity in our elementary schools.
You've made a clear distinction.
That this is not about adults.
This is about children.
I am shocked at the pushback that comes as if you have gotten a can of gasoline, a book of matches, and you're going to go burn the library down because you don't want kids to be able to read a cartoon book.
Yeah, it's just craziness.
We've got to get back to teaching our kids.
Again, like I said, not indoctrinating them.
The other thing, one of my favorite bills I signed this year was the Save Women in Sports bill.
And we basically are just going to say...
Thank you.
I basically just said that we're not going to let a biological male compete in a girl's sport, okay?
Pretty self-explanatory.
And then the Washington Post interviewed me.
They were like, Governor, you signed this controversial bill.
And I was like, well, which one?
And they were like, oh, to save women in sport.
I said, well, it's really not controversial in Oklahoma.
I said, we know the difference between a boy and a girl.
And how novel.
How novel.
And I'm telling you, these young ladies that compete in track at the University of Oklahoma or play volleyball, these 14-year-old girls just thanking me for giving them an ability to have a scholarship and a fair competition.
And so it's just really common sense.
And then I had to ban transgender surgeries, permanent transgender surgeries for minors.
Okay?
In the state of Oklahoma.
And that shouldn't be controversial.
It shouldn't be controversial.
You're protecting a child.
And like you said, if somebody wants to have an elective surgery, they can do that after they're an adult.
I'm not going to use taxpayer dollars to do it, but they can go do that.
But we have an obligation to protect our young people.
And so again, these are minors.
They can't buy alcohol or cigarettes.
And so we're not going to let them permanently alter and do permanent harm to themselves as minors in the state of Oklahoma.
You also have sent some of your National Guard troops down to the border because like every state, this is not just a border state issue.
The seven or eight or however many million the number is now of people crossing without any screening.
Did you get much criticism from people of Oklahoma because you sent some of your folks down there to help protect the border?
You know, quite the opposite.
I mean, we track our calls that come into the governor's office and really just tremendous support.
Hey, thanks, governor, for protecting us.
We're a border state right above Texas.
And so I've been to the border with all my fellow governor friends, and Abbott had us down there.
It is absolutely a travesty what the Biden administration is doing at our southern borders.
We have an obligation to protect and know who's coming through our southern borders.
The way it affects Oklahoma is all the fentanyl deaths.
They've gone up 500% since I've taken office.
500%?
Yes.
The fentanyl deaths have gone up 500%.
That's all coming from the southern border.
And here's the deal.
We need one policy change.
And it's simply the remain in Mexico policy.
That's the way Trump had it.
Biden canceled that day one in office.
That's created this mass migration, right?
So now everybody knows that if you just touch the U.S. border, you get released, you get a piece of paper that says show back up in two years to your court date.
How many people do you think are showing back up in two years?
Probably not a lot.
That's right.
So we have to have the Remain in Mexico policy.
We need immigration reform.
We have a 12% Hispanic population in Oklahoma.
They do an amazing job.
But everybody with a brain knows we need to know who's coming through our southern border and have a protected border.
Absolutely.
Well, we want you to stick around because we have a lot more to talk about with Governor Kevin Sitt of Oklahoma.
So not only is he going to stick around, but you better stick around, too.
We'll be right back.
Still to come, the hilarious comedy of Fred Clint and later their inspiring music of Ketchy Okuchi.
Don't go away.
Go to MikeHuckabee.com and sign up for his free newsletter and follow at GovMikeHuckabee on Twitter.
Gov.com and sign up for your newsletter.
And welcome back, everybody.
What a great group of folks we got in this audience, and they're enjoying some what I'm enjoying.
That's Governor Kevin Sitt of Oklahoma, who is our guest tonight.
Governor, one of the things that I find very significant in Oklahoma, you're working hard to make Oklahoma one of the top 10 states in the country, making it tourist friendly, business friendly.
What are some of the specific things that you target to say Oklahoma is the place for you?
I came from the business world when I became governor, and I'm trying to run the state of Oklahoma more like a business.
We have 30,000 state employees, $22 billion budget, and I believe in lower taxes, smaller government, more efficient government.
You'd never fit in in Washington.
There's no way.
You better stay in Oklahoma, brother.
But we have the largest savings account we've ever had in state history right now.
We cut taxes in Oklahoma.
And then also the way we led through COVID, people saw that.
I was one of the few governors in the country that refused to do a mask mandate statewide, kept our state open.
And you know, it's interesting.
States that had a more open policy had equal, if not better, results in terms of health outcomes.
So we learned through all of this.
And you know, I recognized in the early days, we just didn't know.
But then we, quite frankly, I think we got lied to.
Guys like Fauci kept saying, wear two or three masks.
I said, dude, I can't hardly breathe with one.
You put three on me.
And you know, I'm going to suffocate.
Only my wife wants me to wear that many masks.
And she's upping the life insurance on me for it.
But I mean, I think we look back and we're thinking maybe it was states like Oklahoma and others that had it right from the beginning.
I think so.
I mean, here's what I believe.
You know, you don't put your constitution in the attic just because somebody in Washington, D.C. named Fauci tells you to, right?
We're going to make sure that we have—we believe in personal responsibility, freedoms.
Let's be transparent with the data.
Let's give everybody all the information.
But we're not going to dictate it.
We're not going to close businesses and say, this is an essential business.
This is not— The only non-essential business is the one that you don't invest in or you don't get your paycheck from.
And so people were just kind of losing their minds during that time period.
We had some state governors closing churches down in some of the blue states.
I mean, where is our protections under the Constitution?
And so again, it was really baffling to me how we just kind of gave over our freedoms in some states.
It was just, it was unbelievable.
You're doing something that I find very intriguing.
I don't want to ask you about it.
It's the Modern Justice Task Force that you're working on to not incarcerate everyone that has committed a crime, but actually, in doing so, you're working to get people Integrated back into the society, but keeping the violent offenders away.
Explain how you're approaching this and what results you're seeing.
When I took office, I realized we were 50th last place in the country in incarceration rates.
So I was like, well, we either...
There's something wrong with our people or more our policies.
So I started digging into our policies.
Today, we have 5,000 fewer people incarcerated than when I took office.
I've closed four prisons.
I've saved the taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.
Now we're number one in the country in lowest recidivism rate.
That means people going back into prison.
That's an extraordinary number.
Unbelievable.
And basically...
What we said is, listen, let's lock up people that we're really afraid of, not just who we're mad at.
So if they had a fine or some kind of parole issue where they weren't able to meet with their parole officer, a lot of things were kind of weird from a business perspective that didn't make sense.
So public safety is number one for me.
We all have to have safe communities, and we back the blue in Oklahoma.
I've given our law enforcement...
Thank you.
I gave...
When you're fiscally conservative, you can invest in certain things.
I gave our law enforcement a 30% pay increase this past year.
Good for you.
So we back the blue in Oklahoma.
But making sure that task force brings everybody to the table, our prosecutors and the Department of Corrections and then the second chance folks, and we kind of get together and we started saying A through D, what is a violent, nonviolent crime?
What should they be punished for?
What is the time?
Because we saw some counties give somebody 30 years and some counties give somebody a year.
And I was like, that's too wide of a gap.
We've got to kind of narrow that and actually punish the folks that we need to and make it more fair across the system.
Governor, I commend you for it, and you're doing the kind of job we hope all 50 governors will do.
I've got my eyes on one particular governor over in your neighboring state, Arkansas, and I'm keeping up with her, and she better do well.
But I think she is.
But so are you, and we're excited to have you here.
I hope you'll keep up with Governor Sid on social media, and we've got the links for you to do just that.
If you'll go to Huckabee.tv, we will connect you.
Right now, our band Trey Corley and the Music City Connection are going to play a tribute to the late, great Tony Bennett who passed away this week at the age of 96. I had the privilege of meeting him in Hot Springs, Arkansas when he opened the Hot Springs Convention Center, 10,000-seat arena.
And the reason he was there and opened it is because the first time he ever sang the song, his signature song, I Left My Heart in San Francisco, was in Hot Springs, Arkansas.
Little music trivia for you.
Well, the band's going to play some Tony Bennett music, and Keith Bilbrey is going to tell you what we've got coming up next.
Well, up next, get ready to laugh with comedian Fred Glitt.
Then, the Federalist founder, Sean Davis, talks Biden corruption.
It's all ahead on Huckabee.
It's all ahead.
Well, the band is just on fire tonight.
I'm so glad they did that tribute to Tony Bennett.
that give the band Trey Corley, The Music City Connection a great hand.
Fred Kletts, family friendly comedy has made him very popular on top cruise ships worldwide, but he's appeared on many major networks and he's worked with high profile names from Jay Leno to Jerry Seinfeld. but he's appeared on many major networks and he's worked His Drybar comedy special called One of Ten has over 65 million views.
And tonight, we got him.
Would you please give a big hand to Fred Klett?
Thank you.
Please stop.
Hey, I just got to tell you this.
My wife and I were married for two months when we decided we were going to have children because she was pregnant.
We've got three sons.
They're grown up now.
They're out of the house, but we love it when they stay in touch.
One of the best things that we ever did was we let them piggy bank on us with the streaming services.
Father's Day, 5 p.m., I haven't heard from any of my sons.
I changed the password to Netflix.
Within an hour, I hear from all three.
three.
I've been married for 41 years.
I'm very happy.
I asked my wife if I was happy.
She told me I am.
And that's good enough for me.
But I got married.
Our relationship changed immediately.
Not gradually, but immediately.
My wife started to share knowledge with me, knowledge I had no idea she had before we got married.
Tremendous amounts of knowledge she must have stored throughout the years waiting to share with her future husband.
Not all at one time, just bits and pieces here and there on an ongoing basis.
and at one time I thought it would end, now I know it never will.
But the thing that amazes me is I never know what's gonna trigger her desire to share additional knowledge.
I wish.
There are days when I'm gonna walk through a room and I see my wife and I just do a little U-turn and go the other way.
I never know what's going to trigger her desire to share additional knowledge.
One day I just opened our back door.
That's all I did, simply opened the back door.
Listen to me, opened the back door, perhaps slightly too long.
I don't know what the exact time parameter is.
I only know I must have went over because my wife whirled and yelled, shut the door, you just let 800 mosquitoes into the house.
No, I had no idea that mosquitoes fly in swarms of 800. You would think that many in a swarm, you'd see something come through the door.
I saw nothing.
But my wife, with her keen eyesight and wealth of knowledge, knew that 800 got into our house.
God bless her, we could have been bitten to death that night.
Wait.
Don't applaud anymore.
I don't have enough time.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that marriage can be good because you learn things that you never knew when you were single.
Marriage can be good because you learn things that you never knew when you were single.
And you know what?
You see examples of that all the time.
I'm in a cafeteria behind an elderly couple.
Husband reaching for whole milk.
Reaching for Reaching for whole milk.
Listen carefully.
Reaching for whole milk.
Mid-reach, his wife states, you do not drink whole milk.
He didn't stop, he did not turn to reply, just feared off, went straight to the skim milk.
Now I watched this and I thought how lucky that man was to have found that woman.
How many years did he drink the wrong milk?
You learn things when you get married you didn't know when you were single.
For instance, now that I'm married, I know when it's time to leave a party.
I never used to know.
When I was single, I would do really stupid things like stay until I quit having fun!
Never realizing I should have left hours ago simply because it was time.
How come you're leaving a party, man?
It's time, pal, and you should get married so you'd know, too.
You learn things when you get married you never knew when you were single.
For instance, now that I'm married, I realize that I never knew how to get dressed.
You ever get dressed up to go out with your wife?
You come out of the bedroom and she just looks at you and says, no.
No, you go back now.
I will help you.
You learn things when you get married that you never knew when you were single.
For instance, now that I'm...
You know what?
You see it around us all the time.
At the hotel I'm staying in, I'm walking down the hallway behind what had to be a husband and wife.
He said, I'm hungry.
She said, no, you're not.
He walked by me, looked up at me as if to say, yes, I'm not hungry.
Sure thought I was hungry.
Sometimes I get a pain in my stomach like I'm hungry.
Good thing I married her.
I could be eating right now and I'm not even hungry.
Well, I hope I die first.
You learn things when you get married that you never knew when you were single.
This is one of my favorites.
This is one of the more recent ones in my own marriage.
I told my wife, Nancy, that I wanted some new shirts to perform in.
This is one of the shirts that she got me.
I just looked at Nancy and I said, Nancy, I don't want to wear a pink shirt.
She said, "It's not pink, it's hibiscus." And I went, "Ahh." "I think I must have missed school the day they covered that color." I don't ever remember asking another kid, hey, pass me that hibiscus crayon.
But this is where I know all of you are with me on this.
After a show, I had a couple come up to me.
The wife wanted her picture with me in my hibiscus shirt.
She started to take her shawl off.
As a joke, I said, why don't I wear your shawl?
Her husband immediately said, no, the shawl is salmon.
That would clash with the hibiscus.
Hey, thanks a whole lot, everybody.
Thank you.
Thanks.
That was great, Fred.
Oh, my gosh.
Every married person in this room can identify with what you have just said.
Don't you love Fred Klett?
Wasn't he great?
If you want to see more of Fred Klett online, And get information on his upcoming fundraiser for less than the least ministries in Texas.
If you go to Huckabee.tv, we will show you exactly how to connect.
Right now, our announcer, Keith Bilbrey, who is himself one in a million, is going to tell you what we have coming up.
After the break, Sean Davis talks white powder in the West Wing.
Then later, former Yankee pitcher Jason Brinsley is here on Huckabee.
Go to Huckabee.tv and get your very own Made in the USA Huckabee mugs, t-shirts, and more.
Thank you.
And welcome back.
Sean Davis is the CEO and the co-founder of The Federalist.
It's one of the most prestigious and reliable news sources in the nation right now.
He says, hey, we're all living through the biggest political scandal in American history.
The DOJ and the FBI are covering up the Biden family's conspiracy to sell influence, launder money, and evade taxes.
Sean says everyone involved in both the crimes and the cover-up ought to be in prison.
Please welcome back to the show one of our favorites, Sean Davis.
Sean, good to have you back.
Good to be back.
Thanks for having me.
There was a, you know, the word bombshell kind of becomes overused and we get immune to it, but there really was one this week when Charles Grassley, senior senator from Iowa, released an FBI report from a confidential human source that laid out in very specific terms That Hunter Biden and Joe Biden each got $5 million from Ukraine business interests related to Burisma,
basically to keep the Ukrainian officials from investigating.
How big a deal was that?
It's a pretty big deal, especially if you look at what they tried to go after Trump for.
They tried to say he had done Russian collusion, of which there was no evidence based on thin nonsense from a Clinton campaign paid hack.
They impeached him for having made a phone call where he asked about corruption in Ukraine.
And here we have from the FBI evidence in black and white and a document that they had during the election in 2020 from a top source that the Bidens were coercing this businessman into giving them bribes so that they wouldn't allow prosecutors to take down this company.
That's an impeachment level, far beyond Watergate level scandal, and our media have just ignored it entirely.
How can they do that?
How can they just sort of pretend it didn't happen?
I guess the power they have allows them to do it.
I have a friend who says the job of the corporate media is to cover stories with a pillow until they stop moving.
And that's what they're doing here.
That's a great analogy of what we're seeing.
There's clearly some corruption within the DOJ and the FBI. And I'm just stunned that we've seen these whistleblowers come out this week.
Very credible from the IRS. Why don't we see more?
It's a great question, and I'm glad you hit on the DOJ angle, because of course it's bad when you have your president and his son collecting bribes in exchange for official acts.
It's worse when you have the nation's premier law enforcement agency, the Department of Justice, turning into basically a Stasi, a protection racket for one party.
Because it's bigger than just Biden and his family.
It's about the rule of law and they're destroying it.
And I think the reason we don't see more whistleblowers is because so much of that agency doesn't actually care about the rule of law.
They don't care about equal protection.
They care about protecting the Democrat Party.
What happens to a republic like ours if we don't have equal justice?
What happens?
We become tyranny.
We become an oligarchy.
You can't have a republic without rule of law.
Rule of law is the foundation.
It's the basis of all free society.
And as soon as you throw that out, you end up with a narco-tyranny, with tyranny.
You don't end up anyplace good, and it's why our legislators and our Congress Have to actually crack down on this.
They can't just do sternly worded letters anymore.
They actually have to do something.
What pressures do you feel sometimes that you're going to get maybe shut down by the platforms of Twitter, maybe not now under Musk, but before, or Facebook, or YouTube?
Because they don't want you to be able to tell these things.
No, in fact, the most terrifying thing to a tyrant is somebody being able to say the truth unfettered.
And so we're constantly dealing with Google trying to shut us down, Facebook trying to shut us down.
That's a concern, but we get up every day and all we care about is finding out the facts and reporting them.
And when you don't care what other people in the media are going to say about you, when you don't care what Democrats are going to say about you, you only care about reporting the truth, it's the most liberating thing you can ever do.
Do you think it's possible that cocaine could be found in the White House And all of the law enforcement officials are unable to determine how it ever got there.
The most secure single building in the entire world.
It's amazing.
You almost have to give them credit for it.
And I heard a story, I don't know if it's true, that they were looking at the cocaine baggie and they tried to do handwriting analysis on it because there is scrawled in marker, Hunter Biden's Coke don't snort.
But unfortunately, the analysis came back inconclusive.
So what are you going to do?
Well, I don't know, but I'll tell you, we better rescue this country from the oblivion to which we're headed.
And the voice of the Federalists is a very important part.
Please continue to give us a good resource to turn to, and you certainly have done so.
Thank you.
Now, I know you're going to want to connect with Sean and also be a subscriber to The Federalist.
Join them on social media.
Follow their stories because they have some of the best reporters and analysts in the entire country.
We've got all the links for doing just that on our website, Huckabee.tv.
We also have Keith Bilbrey standing by in his little spot over here.
He's going to tell you what we have coming up next.
Well up next, author and former New York Yankees shares his redemption story.
And later, an inspirational performance from Kenji Okuchi.
You're watching Huckabee!
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Well, our next guest spent 15 years as a major league relief pitcher, playing for seven teams, including two World Series championships for the New York Yankees.
Fame and money brought some wild times, drugs, and nearly the loss of his life and marriage.
But God had other plans, as he reveals in his new book, and it is a page turner, Cross Stitch, One Man's Journey from Ruin to Redemption.
Give a great big welcome to Jason Grimsley.
I was just captivated by your book It was a phenomenal read.
And it's not a sweet story of a guy who played baseball and got a few things wrong and then got it all fixed.
I mean, it's a tough story.
Oh, I'm still not fixed.
You can ask my wife about that.
Well, I actually did.
And, you know, I told her before the show, I said, you're the hero of this book.
Oh, definitely.
That led me to faith.
He dragged me to church when I didn't want to go, when I wasn't a Christian.
But I'd go just to placate her.
And, you know, I got a whole lot smarter when I got married.
I didn't know that.
Didn't we all?
Yes, we did.
There were a couple of things I want to mention.
One was when you were a major league player and all of the controversy was going around about Drugs in the league and people using performance enhancing drugs.
You had an encounter with the FBI. They came.
They grilled you.
They wanted you to put the finger on other players.
They wanted you to rat on other players.
And you told them you didn't have anything.
They were threatening to destroy your family, destroy your home, rip it apart.
Now we're reading about stuff happening into political figures.
So some of this has been going on a long time.
I mean, your experience was shocking.
You're a baseball player.
You weren't even trying to change the world.
Just throw pitches.
Yeah, I was just a means to try to actually get to people that they actually wanted.
You know, they wanted me to wear a wire and talk to my teammates and talk to other players on different teams and I wasn't going to do that.
And they were really targeting people like Barry Bonds and some of the marquee players that were prominently known and essentially saying, if you cooperate and you finger these guys, we'll go easy on you.
We'll really hit them hard.
I know you didn't do that in part because you didn't feel like that you could.
And secondly, you didn't know you had seen anything that you could personally attest to.
Well, even if I had seen something, I wasn't going to do it anyway.
Yeah, I mean, but they squeezed you hard in that.
They did.
They did.
And for about 20 to 25 days, I got a call every day from them telling me they were going to basically arrest me or expose me.
And I finally had had enough and said, all right, just do what you got to do.
You have one or two things.
You can take my job or put me in jail.
I'm going to take one of them off the table so you only have one option.
I quit.
You were ready to take your own life.
You tried to.
Squeezed the trigger.
And somehow it didn't fire.
I've been to three different rehabs, the psych ward and I was tired of disappointing everybody, and I honestly thought and believed at that time, which was the biggest lie Evil has ever told, that my family would be better off, everybody would be better off without me around.
And I had about an ounce of cocaine and I don't know how many bottles of vodka and beer, what else.
That didn't work over three days, so I figured I'd just do it the right way.
Funny thing is, when I did pull the trigger and the gun didn't go off, all I thought about was I can't even do this right.
God must have been saying to you, I don't know if you could hear it at the time, you know, Jason, I may not be finished with you quite yet.
Did that occur to you then?
Not like it did.
In 1999, I became a Christian.
And the worst thing in the world that could have happened was We won the World Series.
Most of us would think that's pretty cool.
That ring on your right hand over there.
That was a great experience for me and my family.
But it focused on me again.
And then I thought about, look how great I am.
Look what I did.
And then it just slowly but surely eroded away.
And when I fell away, I wasn't only embarrassed, but I was ashamed of the fact that I could even be called a Christian.
And then I really, really ran from it.
And I honestly thought that I was beyond redemption.
And couldn't stand to look at myself in the mirror.
Hated what I saw.
And then figured that that would be the way to fix it.
You know, it's a very honest book.
It's not one that is filled with platitudes and sweet little moments, but it's a very raw story of a guy who struggled, but through whom God has worked an incredible miracle, using your wife Dana for a big part of that.
And I hope people will read the story because a lot of people have given up on themselves.
Maybe they've given up on a family member.
And reading your story is a great reminder that even if we give up on ourselves, God doesn't give up on us.
Which is a great, great story.
This is the book, Jason Grimsley's Cross Stitch, a must-read, and it's available right now.
If you go to Huckabee.tv to order it online, we'll show you how to do that and how to keep up with this amazing man with a story that is worth hearing.
Speaking of stepping up to the mound, Keith Bilbrey is warming up out in the bullpen.
We're going to bring him out on the field, and he's going to pitch to us what's coming up next.
Well, stay right where you are.
A stunning performance by Cacio Cucci is right after the break.
Thank you.
Join Huckabee next week and meet the newest convert to the GOP, Georgia House Representative Zmesha Maynor.
That was why she left the Democrat Party.
Plus, country soul singer T. Graham Brown sings his classic hit, Darlene.
Welcome back.
Kechi Okuchi was one of only two survivors of a major plane crash in her native Nigeria.
110 people didn't make it.
She and one other were the only survivors.
But she didn't let extensive burns and problems with over a hundred operations stop her from pursuing her dreams, which included Earning an MBA and a triumphant appearance on America's Got Talent.
She recently released her first album and an inspiring memoir called More Than My Scars.
Please welcome back to the show, Kechi Okuchi.
Kechi, great having you here.
Welcome back.
Oh, happy to be back.
You have been a busy young lady since you were with us before.
Yeah, I've been busy.
I've been going around a lot, yeah, for sure.
Are you mostly doing concert work and singing?
Yeah, so it's a lot of singing, a lot of performing, and a lot of speaking as well, a lot of speaking.
Are people just blown away by your story?
Because, I mean, when I first heard it, and you were with us before, I mean, it's a remarkable miracle that you survived that plane crash.
Yeah, it is, yeah.
People are definitely very inspired by it.
I try my best to talk about it as honestly as possible so people can see through my life that there is indeed life after trauma, and that life can be pretty amazing.
So that's usually the message I try to put out there, and so far, You know, it's been received pretty well, I would say.
Have you ever had contact with the other person who survived that crash?
Oh yes, she's a very good friend of mine right now.
I didn't know her prior, but now we talk pretty often.
She's still in Nigeria.
She has a family now, kids and everything.
But yeah, we stay in touch pretty frequently.
And how long after that before you could get on an airplane and go somewhere?
Matter of fact, I went on a plane almost like a few months right after it happened.
But I was not very aware of that particular trip because I was mostly passed out for it.
But I had to leave Nigeria where the accident happened to be treated at a place that had the hospital care, medical care, you know.
And so I had to get on a plane almost like immediately, honestly, which is, I guess, ironic.
But yeah, I've been flying ever since, honestly.
Because, I mean, obviously, to do your career, to go sing and to do all these speaking engagements all over the world, you have to fly.
Exactly.
Are you nervous?
In the beginning, first few years, I used to have this, like, reaction, like, reflex reaction to, like, when the plane's about to maybe, like, touch down on the ground.
And I couldn't control it.
But it was just a few seconds of nerves.
So it wasn't enough to stop me from actually traveling.
I felt like it was just a small little issue.
And as time passed, it stopped being an issue.
So I travel pretty normally now with no issues.
So I thank God for that.
You know, I know people that have never been in a plane crash, and they're scared to death to get on an airplane every time they get on.
And that's just because they don't want to go through the TSA hustle.
Oh, I see.
They don't even care about the flying.
They just don't want to have somebody put their hands all over them.
I can't believe them, yeah.
It's definitely invasive, I'm not going to lie.
When your book came out, you were able to tell your story in a way that you had not been able to before.
Correct.
I'm sure it's having an impact on a lot of people who look at their own lives and say, You know, I've had some problems, but I've never been through something like Ketchy's been through.
Do you have that when people come up to you after you've spoken?
Yes, all the time.
All the time.
People always feel like if it were them in that situation, they would react differently, they would take it in differently.
But you never really know until you're in a situation how you can handle it, I always say.
So who's to say how they would handle it?
I'm just grateful that I had the kind of support system that I had because they're a big reason why I was able to come through what happened the way that I did.
Well, I'm glad you did, Ketchy, because it's a wonderful story.
You have a magnificent voice that was not impacted by the airplane crash.
And we're just excited that you're back and you're going to sing for us.
Yes, I am.
I'm very excited.
We are, too.
All right, Keith, tell the viewers at home how they can learn more about Ketchy and her inspirational music and performances.
Now, to follow Ketchy on social media and to get her debut album and her inspiring new book, just go to Huckabee.tv.
Now, performing Since You Came Along with Trey Cordley of the Music City Connection and Mike on Bass, here's Ketchy Okuchi!
So many rainy days pouring through my head The forecast doesn't seem to be changing Misery always
seems to find me Happiness routinely keeps me waiting But now that I met you, it turned me around I was lost and lonely,
but now I am found Now that I found you I can feel my heart grow stronger.
Life is brighter.
I can smile.
Cause my fears have disappeared.
Loving is what you do best.
I plan to love you for the rest.
Life is better.
I've grown strong.
All is right that once was wrong.
Since you came along Yeah Yeah Looking in the past we all have regrets
But with you, I can clearly see And it's all about you and me.
Where we live happily ever after.
Cause now that I've met you, it turned me around.
I was lost and lonely, but now I am found.
Now that I've found you, Since you came along, I can feel my heart go stronger.
Life is brighter.
I can smile, cause my fears have disappeared.
Loving is what you do best.
I plan to love you for the I've grown strong.
All is right there once was wrong.
Since you came along.
Came along.
It grows stronger.
Life is brighter.
I can't smile.
Cause my fears have disappeared.
Loving is what you do best.
I plan to love you for the rest.
Life is better.
I've grown strong.
All is right that once was wrong.
Since you came along.
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