Robert Cahaly of the Trafalgar Group, is here to discuss the latest polls and news out of the Atlanta, senate races. Joining him is Matt Towery, Syndicated Columnist, Attorney and Pollster. With the Senate in the balance, there couldn't be a more important time to get involved.The Sean Hannity Show is on weekdays from 3 pm to 6 pm ET on iHeartRadio and Hannity.com. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
You want smart political talk without the meltdowns?
We got you.
I'm Carol Markowitz.
And I'm Mary Catherine Hamm.
We've been around the block in media and we're doing things differently.
Normally is about real conversations.
Thoughtful, try to be funny, grounded, and no panic.
We'll keep you informed and entertained without ruining your day.
Join us every Tuesday and Thursday, normally, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm Ben Ferguson.
And I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down with Verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, glad you're with us.
Thanks, Scott Shannon.
Toll-free, it is 800-941-Sean, if you want to be a part of the program.
These hearings and opening statement by Ron Johnson were fascinating today, calling his Democratic counterpart on a panel a liar for launching false allegations of Russian disinformation.
And the Wisconsin Republicans, Gary Peters, Michigan Democrat, rather, ranking member of the committee spreading misinformation about Russian interference in the 2016 election.
It is stunning.
This is their go-to now.
Russia, Russia, Russia.
Well, we have information about Hunter Biden and his laptop.
That came from Russia.
No, it didn't.
It actually came from Hunter, who left his laptop.
You lied repeatedly to the press that I was spreading Russian disinformation.
That was an outright lie.
And he's talking about the Grassley Graham report.
Not the Grassley, yeah, the Chuck Grassley Johnson report.
And this isn't about airing your grievances.
This is terrible.
Are you doing this?
Committee to get trying to get answers.
You know, it's amazing.
There's a 2007 cut of Biden himself saying that, oh, we got to have paper ballots to make sure that machines are not manipulated.
Listen.
How are you going to keep it from us being able to be in a position where you can manipulate the machines, manipulate the records?
The one way to do that is I think we should pass a federal law mandating that the same machines with paper trails be mandatory for every federal election.
That will be a multi-billion dollar bill for the states because the states will have to make a choice then.
They will have to make a choice whether or not they have two machines.
We can't mandate, as you know, state elections.
We can't tell the state of Delaware or Ohio or Texas what machines and what method they use to vote in their state elections, but we can do it federally.
So in a nutshell, I think we should be mandating, mandating that we have a paper ballot with a standardized machine, standardized requirements.
There's a reason that dozens of liberal countries, far more liberal than this, have, you know, banned these machine ballots.
And, you know, you're never going to get conservative Republicans, the mob and the media, and liberal Democrats all agreeing, especially about one particular machine, before the election, then have 28 states use it, which is separate and apart from everything we're talking about.
There is a bit of a crackup happening.
I'm going to play two cuts here.
One is Ocasio-Cortez.
We need new leadership in the Democratic Party.
And then saying Pelosi and Schumer need to go.
This is an interesting development.
The battle, the war for the soul of the Democrats has begun.
Isn't this grounds, though, to take a stand and say, no, I'm sorry, Nancy Pelosi should not be the speaker and Chuck Schumer should not be the leader?
Well, you know, I do think that we need new leadership in the Democratic Party.
I think one of the things that I have struggled with, I think that a lot of people struggle with, is the internal dynamics of the House has made it such that there's very little option for succession, if you will.
You know, and I think that one could just, I think it's easy for someone to say, oh, well, you know, why don't you run?
But the House is extraordinarily complex and I'm not ready.
It can't be me.
I know that I couldn't do that job.
And so even conservative members of the party who think Nancy Pelosi is far too liberal for them don't necessarily have any viable alternatives, which is why whenever there's a challenge, it kind of collapses.
And that is, I think, the result of just many years of power being concentrated in leadership with a lack of, you know, real grooming of a next generation of leadership.
Are you ready to say Pelosi and Schumer need to go?
I mean, I think so.
I mean, the question is, like this year, for example, the hesitancy that I have is that I want to make sure that if we're pointing people in a direction, that we have a plan.
And my concern, and this I acknowledge as a failing, as something that we need to sort out, is that there isn't a plan.
How do we fill that vacuum?
Because if you create that vacuum, there are so many nefarious forces at play to fill that vacuum with something even worse.
And so the actual sad state of affairs is that there are folks more conservative than even they are willing to kind of fill that void.
And so, you know, the answer is yes.
The answer is we need to shift power.
We need to make sure that we have a transition of power in the leadership of the Democratic Party.
This crackup is just beginning.
It really is.
Let me go to, before I get to Senator Ron Johnson, I mean, his opening statement was amazing today, and what happened in the Senate is amazing today.
But I want to go back to, you know, this dissent in the Wisconsin case, 4-3 decision in the Supreme Court.
And because I think it literally really gets to the root of everything that is going to matter here.
You know, when you have the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin saying a significant portion of the public does not believe the presidential election was fairly conducted, he's right.
Once again, four justices on this court cannot be bothered with addressing what the statutes required to assure the absentee ballots are lawfully cast.
We've gone through chapter and verse.
My main focus, what has it been on?
The law and the Constitution, the U.S. Constitution, in the case of Pennsylvania, the state constitution, and in the case of Wisconsin, focused on state law, the U.S. Constitution, court precedents, the case in Georgia based on the U.S. Constitution.
The legislature should be making the decisions.
You can't have Two varying signature verification systems or a consent decree made by the Secretary of State without bringing in the state legislature to put their approval on it, which was constitutionally sound.
The way they did it was not.
I mean, it's all here.
But four justices on this court can't be bothered with addressing what the statutes require to assure that absentee ballots are lawfully cast.
They could care less.
I mean, for a Supreme Court justice of a state, Chief Justice, to say that is a devastating blow and as hard-hitting as you're ever going to get.
The Chief Justice continuing, four members of this court throw the cloak over numerous problems.
In other words, they ignore it.
That will be repeated again and again until this court has the courage to correct them.
Well, that's been our argument: that if you follow the law, follow the Constitution, state constitutions, federal constitution, that's where this case is won or lost.
That's where all of this matters.
And I agree with the Chief Justice in this case on so many levels in so many states.
They don't want any part.
They don't want anything to do with this.
And then it's summed up by another dissenting justice who said, this is not the rule of law.
It's the rule of judicial activism through inaction.
I'd even take it a step further at the Supreme Court.
There's way too many political considerations and too much factoring in of the outcome of whatever decision they come to rather than just focused on the law and the Constitution itself, which is what their job really is, having co-equal branches of government, checks and balances.
That's what it's all about.
Another dissenting justice: every single voter in this state, meaning Wisconsin, is harmed when a vote is cast in contravention of the statutes.
And well, you know, the idea that one justice said, well, the case should have been brought earlier, what we're supposed to anticipate the laws are going to be broken.
I mean, it's absurdity.
The logic is not, it doesn't, it's not logic by definition.
Or the state of Texas doesn't have standing.
Well, if the four states that they were suing in the Supreme Court with original jurisdiction, if the law of the Constitution, in fact, were followed, then you wouldn't have the disenfranchisement of people in other states.
That would grant standing in my mind to anybody.
Ron Johnson begins saying, you know, there are outstanding issues and court cases, but, you know, then he goes on to talk about the Electoral College.
And then he goes on to say in his opening statement today, there are many reasons that the American people have this skepticism that the American public doesn't believe the November election results are legitimate.
This is not a sustainable state of affairs in our Democratic Republic.
He's right.
You've got to have signature verification standards that are equal.
You've got to follow state law.
You got to follow the U.S. Constitution.
State legislatures, they're the ones that decide, not somebody that just decides they want to change things.
He goes, there are many reasons for this high level of skepticism, Senator Johnson says.
It starts with today's climate of hyper-partisanship, which was only exacerbated by the persistent efforts to delegitimize the results of the 2016 election.
I'm beginning to think I'm the only one that's pointing that out.
That the mob, the media, big tech, they never censored any stories then.
They're the ones that pushed the phony narrative about Trump-Russia collusion in the 2016 election that was proven false.
Had no problem with spying on a presidential candidate or a president.
It goes the corrupt investigation, the media coverage of the Russia collusion hoax reduced our faith in institutions.
What was I talking about all week this week?
Institutional failure.
The media, the Democratic Party, weak Republicans, the court system.
This is institutional.
These are forces, institutional forces that are corrupt at a level that most of us really didn't imagine.
It's hard to come to grips with.
I'm telling you, everybody that I know that follows any of this, they're struggling with all this.
Anyway, the ongoing suppression, censorship of conservative perspectives by biased news media, social media adds fuel to the flames.
He's right.
And he talks about Senator Grassley's and my investigation and reports on the conflict of interest and foreign financial entanglements of the Biden family is one example how media suppression can and does affect the outcome of an election.
He's right on that point.
Solid 10% on a recent poll said they didn't know this about Biden.
Had they known it would have changed their vote about the whole, you know, Russia, Russian oligarchs, Kazakh oligarchs, Ukraine, China, shopping sprees, wire transfers, no experience.
I'm telling you that the Biden family corruption, foreign corruption syndicate, this is going to be a real story that's going to go on for years.
Get to the bottom of it.
What does China have on the Bidens?
I'd like to know.
It's amazing and it's galling.
And that's, by the way, their report, oh, this is just, this is Russian disinformation.
That's a lie, too.
He says this effort should be bipartisan.
He said oversight into election security should continue into the next Congress because we must restore competence and integrity in the voting system.
I've been saying it every day.
My statement announcing this hearing, a state of the goals, a way to resolve suspicions, full transparency, public awareness.
If this does not become our number one priority as a country, we're doomed.
We don't have election integrity and confidence in the outcome of our elections.
Anyway, 800-941-Sean is our number if you want to be a part of the program.
We'll get to more of this.
Pretty amazing statement.
Pretty amazing events happening today.
We'll get to all in the course of the program.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Howe, and I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass.
You're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen.
I'm Ben Ferguson, and I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down a verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
Let me go to Senator Ron Johnson in his own words from today.
Pretty powerful moments that he had.
I just have to talk about Russian disinformation because the people peddling it are not on my side of the aisle.
Senior Democrat leaders, including Ranking Member Peters, were involved in a process of creating a false intelligence product.
It was supposedly classified, they leaked to the media that accused Senator Grassley, the president pro tem of the Senate and myself, of accepting and disseminating Russian disinformation from Andrei Dirkhosh.
I'd never heard of the person until they brought it up.
Senator Peters introduced that false information, Russian disinformation, into our investigation record.
50 people associated with the intelligence community during the, after our Hunter Biden investigation and the revelations of the Hunter Biden computer said, oh, this is Russian disinformation.
Now we find out, no, it's a real investigation by the Justice Department.
So it's just galling.
And I just have to point out that the purveyors of Russian disinformation, the DNC, the Steele dossier, the ranking member accusing Senator Grassley and I of disseminating Russian disinformation, that's where the disinformation is coming.
That's where the false information, the lies, the false allegations.
I can't sit by here and listen to this and say that this is not disinformation, this hearing today.
This is something we have to take a look at to restore confidence in our election integrity.
We're not going to be able to just move on without bringing up these irregularities, examining them, and providing an explanation and see where there really are problems so we can correct it moving forward.
Senator Paul.
Mr. Chairman, I got to respond to that.
I mean, you're saying I'm putting out disinformation.
Well, one, it had nothing to do with this report.
You lied repeatedly.
You lied repeatedly in the press when I was spreading Russian disinformation, and that was an outright lie.
And I told you to stop lying, and you continue to do it.
I mean, it got very, very heated at this committee today, and rightly so, because that's exactly what happened.
I mean, look at more recently.
They come out with their report, Grassley and Senator Ron Johnson.
And what did the media tell us in the lead up to the election about all this stuff with Hunter by 80?
No, this is Russian disinformation.
None of it's true.
The New York Post, none of it's true.
Then big tech censors it.
The media dismisses it.
Now all of a sudden, Joe's elected.
Then we find out, oh my gosh, it was real.
Well, we could report a little bit of it, but we're not going to report all of it.
That's how corrupt the system is.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Hammond.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass, you're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen.
I'm Ben Ferguson.
And I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down with Verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, 25 to the top of the hour.
We'll get back to the hearings and the eruption that took place in the hearings with Ron Johnson.
He's going to be on Hannity tonight, 9 Eastern on Fox News.
You know, sweet baby James does all my email.
I don't really have an email account anymore.
Anyway, so he gets emails from Joe Bastardi.
Joe Bastardi never writes and says, Hey, how are you doing?
What's up?
How's your workouts going?
No, he does occasionally, or he used to.
He'll text me occasionally.
But all I get is, yeah, you're about to get pounded with a foot of snow.
Are you ready?
And that was pretty much sent to Sweet Baby James today.
A Nor'easter could be the biggest East Coast storm in years.
One prediction, actually, as high as in some areas, as much as two feet of snow in parts of the East Coast.
Hey, Sweet Baby, do we have enough shovels around here?
Anyway, Joe Bastardi, is it going to be two feet or what?
I thought it was one foot.
Now it's two feet.
No, it's not two feet there.
It's two feet back here where I am.
Good.
Well, in Pennsylvania, you mean?
Yeah, but yeah, that's right.
We're in Pennsylvania where I am.
And I don't tell anybody where I am because they're come out and look for me.
No, but your area where you are, I take around a foot of snow, but the wind is going to gust to 60 miles an hour.
And the big thing out on the island and into northern New Jersey is that there can be a changeover, and everything is wet, and the wind starts coming in at 50, 60 miles an hour between 9 and midnight.
And there's all sorts of power outages that can occur.
And by the way, basically in every day of work, I do text you about your workouts, okay?
You do.
All right.
So who's going to get hammered the most and how much is the most?
Are you really going to get two feet of snow?
You see, but you're a weather nut.
You used to chase like tornadoes and you're a storm chaser.
So you're a weather nut.
You love doing this stuff.
What I love more now is trying to forecast it as far as we can because what we do at Weatherbell is we get all sorts of clients and the weather servers are great people.
So we have to get them out of information as quick as possible.
So, you know, Sweet Baby and Linda, we're seeing those emails start Friday.
And what I do is I also include them so they don't get caught off guard with things.
So from there.
And you are the official meteorologist of the Sean Hannity Radio Show, Weatherbell.com.
You're the best at what you do.
You're great at it.
And there are times when you give them valuable information about hurricanes, tornadoes, and storms like this one.
And you're saying this, for some people, is going to be pretty bad.
Well, yeah, it's going to be, I'll tell you where roads are going to be closed.
Pennsylvania, let's say, you know, where I am, State College, Harrisburg, Square in that I-80 corridor between Williamsport, East Stroudsburg is probably going to get shut down for at least several hours.
Our governor's trying to shut the state down, and Mother Nature gets jealous and says, I'll show you.
Want to see how you really shut things down?
This is how you shut things down.
Now, in New York City, I think you're going to see rain and sleet mix in for a few hours, which will hold totals down from what they are to the north and west.
If you live up in Orange County, Orange County, you're probably going to see up to 18 inches of snow in there.
Danbury, Connecticut, 18 to 30 inches of snow in there.
Yeah, I got Providence in Boston, 12 to 18 inches in there.
But the big fight zone is across Long Island and back into Princeton, Langhorn, Pennsylvania.
Those areas are probably going to get saved from the extreme snow amount.
But the swap is sleet, freezing rain, and wind gusts of 50 miles an hour take your power out.
D.C. is over to rain.
They're done with this particular storm.
There's a lot of sleet and freezing rain in the northern and western suburbs.
I'm making sure they're taking care of the great one who lives in someplace within 100 miles of D.C.
So I watch a great one.
Why are you giving away bunker locations?
Do you know how top secret that is?
You shouldn't be giving away Levin's bunker.
Hold on a second.
I'm telling him, I'm going to.
Now, Joe Bastardi, I'll say it.
Nobody else will say.
I don't even know exactly where the great one lives.
I know within 100 miles of D.C.
Now, if you've been in the bunker, they blindfold you, and you feel like you're driving around in circles before you ever gain entrance to the bunker.
That's the truth.
By the way, I've joined the club.
I got docs that had the cops come over here one night and tell me, you know, we've got people making threats against you.
I always knew that was going on, but I never had the cops come over here.
I'm sure you may have had the same experience.
My mom calls me and she's crying and asks me why people hate me so much.
I said, well, which reason do you want to know?
Anyway, play the violin.
All right.
So this is going to be a big storm.
Now, look, and that means people are going to race to the store.
They're going to, you know, empty the shelves of toilet paper, paper towels.
Now, it's too late now.
If you weren't listening to Weatherbell, and this is catching you off guard, see, that's a shameless plug.
But it's too late.
Just stay in there.
There's no toilet paper left again.
Is that what you're telling us?
Why is it everyone grabs the toilet paper?
Why is the toilet paper the most popular item in a store when something is about to happen?
I hate that part.
We got plenty of toilet paper in this house.
I'll tell you that right now.
But I'm not telling you where my house is, so you can't come over.
You won't, but who knows what's going on?
I'm in a college town, for goodness sakes.
But in any case, look, let me get the I-95, Boston and Providence, 12 to 18.
All right.
New York City, about a foot, but sleet and freezing rain mix in.
You get down from out on Long Island, where you are, you know, I'm not saying where he is, but much of the island's getting about a foot of snow and then a change over to sleet and freezing rain, and the wind is going to come cranking in there.
And the problem again in these areas for about six hours, the intersection between wet snow, rain, sleet, freezing rain, you know, it's like a Johnny Cash song over here, and these winds gusted to 50, 60 miles an hour are going to create problems with power.
So your power may go out.
Back where I am, it's going to close roads for a day, perhaps two days until they get it cleared up.
The good thing about this storm is when it leaves, it's not going to be followed by northwest winds at 60, you know, 50 blowing and drifting and all that.
It's going to leave, and the weather's relatively tranquil behind it.
I mean, it's going to be the type of weather where we probably will be able to sustain the snow cover for a white Christmas in a lot of areas.
Well, it might snow between now and then.
You never know.
All right, Joe Bistardi.
Yes, I do know.
I think it will try to snow between.
No, I think it's going to try to snow.
All right, Senator.
God knows tomorrow.
That's true.
That's true.
Weatherbell.com, Job Astarte.
Thank you, sir.
800-941, Sean, if you want to be a part of the program.
You know, so Johnson is right today, holding these shares.
This should be a bipartisan effort.
Why isn't it?
Now, think about that.
It's not for a reason because they don't want the integrity.
They want the result.
You know, I stated its goal was to resolve suspicions and full transparency, public awareness.
That is what good oversight can accomplish.
Unfortunately, the Democrats, they just want the results.
Anyway, he says, I believe that alleged irregularities are organized into three basic categories: lax enforcement, violations of election laws.
That happened everywhere.
Partisan observers couldn't observe, among many others, and controls.
Two, fraudulent votes, ballot stuffing.
And three, corruption of voting machine software that might be programmed to add or switch votes.
In the time we've had, it was impossible to fully identify and examine every allegation, and many of the irregularities raise legitimate concern.
There's some truth to that.
You just get to a point.
For me, the focus became the law, the Constitution, and state constitutions, and all these Democrats that were against it.
I mean, you never have any agreement at all.
All these Democrats all warned about voting machines.
And all of this and early voting, and they all warned against all of this.
There's a reason why all of these other countries around the globe don't use voting machines.
Anyway, so fireworks erupted over there.
And, you know, I don't think any of it is surprising anybody.
By the way, we have some Hunter zero experience Hunter Biden news 2017 sent best wishes from the entire Biden family to China firm chairman requesting a $10 million wire.
Unbelievable.
I never got a penny from China.
This lawyer comes down.
Well, he has all his equity.
He hasn't actually cashed in the millions and millions of dollars.
Anyway, asking the chairman to properly fund and operate the Biden joint venture with the Chinese energy company.
And it goes on to say the correspondence between Hunter and the chairman of what is the CEFC shows that Joe Biden's son extending best wishes with the entire family, urging the chairman to quickly send a $10 million wire to properly fund and operate the Biden joint venture with a now bankrupt Chinese energy company.
I guess he had all that experience now, all of a sudden from Burisma.
But $10 million transfer was never completed.
Fox News obtained a copy of the email and asking my letter to Chairman Yi and that they should extend my warmest best wishes.
I hope to see the chairman soon.
I hope my friends are well.
I regret missing you on the last trip to the U.S., he said in the attached love.
Please accept our best wishes from the entire Biden family as well as partners.
Notice father didn't know.
Does he have the right to say that on his father's behalf?
I don't know.
That's another good question.
By the way, Biden's, quote, inauguration plan.
They're urging supporters to stay home so he can hide in the basement, as usual.
I mean, I know that these are hard times for everybody.
I get it.
It's just, it's rough.
You know, I just wonder, you know, we played last night this Eric Swalwell tape.
This guy was pushing probably as hard as anybody in Congress, along with the compromised corrupt congenital liar Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler and, you know, pushing and pushing and lying and lying and advancing the false narrative the Trump-Russia collusion happened.
And the entire time, he knew he was compromised with this woman that turned out to be a Chinese spy that had apparently numerous affairs with elected officials around the country.
Never told any Republican on the House Intel Committee between the Bidens, and that means Joe and Hunter, and whatever correspondence.
And, you know, one of the things that some top intel people have told me is when you go to a country like China or any country where they are dominant in terms of intelligence, they're monitoring everything.
You go to Singapore, we go to Vietnam.
I mean, literally, I'm handed from my job a burner phone.
Don't use your real phone.
Don't even turn it on because they'll download everything on it in seconds.
That's what I'm told.
They really, I have these guys that literally check the room I'm staying in for bugs.
It's insane.
But that's, I guess, the world of spies that we live in.
So knowing the deep sophistication of a hostile regime, a hostile country like China, just like a hostile country like Russia or Iran or other countries, do we think that they actually made the deal with Hunter because he had all this experience in private equity?
I don't think so.
I mean, it was actually really scary what, you know, Rick Renell was saying that, you know, this Christine Fang is just one of many spies involved with top-ranking officials in the United States.
You know, whenever you get to the serious, significant monies involved and then the lack of experience of Hunter and all these countries that want to hire him and do business with him.
Well, they're not hiring him because of his vast experience and because he's the best qualified.
It's obvious they think they're buying access.
And then the question is, how much access did they ultimately get?
We know about Burisma.
We know about attempts of Hunter and Archer and others to go to the State Department as it relates to issues that Burisma was dealing with.
We know Joe's involvement.
You're not getting a billion dollars.
Was there any involvement with Russia and the First Lady of Moscow and a Russian oligarch or the Kazakh oligarch or the Chinese national shopping spree?
Really?
You're going to take my family out on a shopping spree and spend $100,000?
You're going to give me money for $140,000, earmark that sucker for a car.
And then you're going to allow this guy Swalwell to just get away five years, not telling anybody in the House Intel Committee that, in fact, he was compromised.
Not a matter of if he was compromised.
He was compromised.
This woman was raising money for his campaign, got interns in his office.
Do you think the chances, odds are high that the intern was a spy?
I'd argue it probably was.
Republican sending to Nancy Pelosi to demand Swalwell be removed from the House Intel Committee.
Why he's there is unbelievable to me.
Just unbelievable.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Hamm.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass, you're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.
I'm Ben Ferguson, and I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down with Verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, Simple Man Leonard Skinner at our two Sean Hannity show, 800-941.
Sean is our telephone number.
You want to be a part of this extravaganza Ganza.
And Simple Man, that means it's all things BillO'Reilly, BillO'Reilly.com.
He claims to be a simple man.
I argue he is as complicated a human being as I ever met.
Mr. O'Reilly, Merry Christmas.
This will be our last show of the year together.
Last time you're on this year.
Yeah, you're taking what, eight weeks off of it?
Okay, really?
Because I take off so little, especially compared to you.
Well, I have to rest because I, you know, I. You're an older person.
I got it.
Good one.
Good one.
What are you doing?
You're an older man, Mr. O'Reilly.
Simple and older, right?
Yeah.
So you're going to be off.
I'll work a little bit next week on billoreilly.com, and I'm going to take a few days off.
And I appreciate the Merry Christmas.
I hope you have a good one.
You deserve it.
But a tough year.
Worst year since 1929.
You're talking about as a country overall, corona, anarchy, horrible election fraud, or all the above.
It's the worst year in the United States since the collapse.
of the financial system in 1929 and all of the things that you mentioned plus more.
The worst thing about it is the civil war between Americans.
And that has been exacerbated, of course, by the election.
And the COVID just depresses everybody.
So who's happy?
You know, you can't even, Fauci's saying you can't even see your mom on Christmas.
So, I mean, come on.
It doesn't get worse than this.
Well, and, you know, and think about it.
I mean, families, 300,000 of them, we've, you know, lost loved ones and the worst pandemic since 1917 or 18.
You know, out of horrible situations, though, and that's as horrible as you can get.
I mean, look at the amazing how our scientists and medical researchers and doctors and first responders and nurses, you know, they rise to the occasion.
And in less than a year, Bill O'Reilly, we now have a vaccine that is going in people's arms.
And by the end of this year, we'll have, you know, millions and millions of doses that will be given out already.
You know, that's a historic achievement by the Trump administration that will never be acknowledged because of our corrupt media.
Also, the economy that he forged, I think, helped more Americans than any other economy in my lifetime.
And now the progressives are trying to destroy it.
So that, you know, when you add it all up, this has not been a good year.
I don't know, you know, nobody's allowed to go to Times Square anyway.
But even if they were, I don't think they'd go.
I'm not celebrating this year because it has been an awful situation for almost every American.
And that's the truth.
You know, it's, but we are Americans, Bill.
And our parents, my dad served four years in the Pacific.
He grew up in the Great Depression.
This country has faced hard times before.
We all lived through 9-11.
We've all experienced loss, hardship, suffering.
I don't think anyone goes through this life, Bill O'Reilly.
And I know you're a good Catholic guy.
Nobody goes through this life without trial and tribulation.
And I don't care if you're born with money, you have no money.
It's not a financial thing.
It's a life thing.
Yeah, but you want to basically have a society that is united.
And we're not.
And let's be honest about it.
We're not.
And what my job is, and your job, I think you're Sympatico with me on this, is to tell Americans the truth.
And a lot of times it's harsh about your country.
Now, we are resilient people.
History does go in cycles.
I think that things will change for the better, but it's going to be a tough struggle, primarily because for the first time, we don't have an honest flow of information.
So we have these social media companies that are censoring.
That's got to be dealt with by Congress.
Has to be.
And then you have the corporate media, which is flat out corrupt, as we saw with the incessant attacks on Donald Trump and the coverage of the election.
So these are really, really severe problems that we're going to have to address as a people.
You know what's scary to me?
Never thought in our lifetime, Bill, that we'd see just widespread dishonesty, laws violated.
You know, hundreds and hundreds of Americans.
I thought we praised whistleblowers as courageous and patriotic.
And I don't know what you thought.
When you were watching these witnesses describe that they weren't allowed to follow the law and observe election counting and were finding ballots five, six weeks after the election, we hear story after story after story, people, good people that have dedicated their time and these horrible stories about what happened in this election.
I mean, I always thought this couldn't happen here, Bill, but guess what?
It happened here.
The real tragedy about the election is that 43,000 votes in three states put Joe Biden in the Oval Office.
That's all.
43,000.
And you and I last week pledged to try to get the Justice Department to appoint a special counsel to examine allegations of voter tampering, voter fraud, bad machines, on and on.
Every American should want that, including Joe Biden.
I don't believe the president-elect does want it.
But step back.
You're a liberal American.
Why would you not want to know if your country's election was fraudulent?
Wouldn't you want to know that?
Do you know that in the EU, there are 27 countries that ban mail-in voting?
In the most liberal collective nations on earth, most of them ban mail-in voting.
Did you know that?
I did.
I've been talking about it.
Mexico bans it.
Brazil bans it.
Japan bans it.
Why?
Why?
It's all the same reason.
It's too easy to corrupt.
So these countries, which are not conservative bastions, say, you know what?
We'll give you the absentee, but you'll have to obey the rules.
And we require voter IDs.
So you and I went through.
We went through all of this early on, and we've done it numerous times.
You need voter identification.
If you want to go to the Democratic National Committee, you made a joke the last time I brought it up.
You needed an ID, a picture ID.
Okay, you've got to have signature verification with a signature on record.
You can't have varying systems.
You know, the Constitution is clear about state legislatures.
They're the ones that make up the voting roles in the states.
And then you can't have one individual or a few individuals just decide to change it last minute.
If the law calls for partisan observers, then partisan observers need to watch.
Why we would ever pick a machine that liberal journalists, liberal Democrats, conservative Republicans all have criticized.
We're the United States.
We picked the one thing that no, these three parties never agree on a thing, but they all agreed, yeah, they don't like that voting system, yet 28 states used it.
Add all of this together, and there is, what, 83% of Trump supporters, 83% of Republicans do not trust the outcome of the election, and I happen to be among them.
You know what?
But this is the one issue that I'm hoping Americans can come together on.
We'd like to have an honest question.
But Bill, I hate to tell you in this divided time, and I'm saying this with all due respect, I think it's a pipe dream.
I don't think that's going to happen.
They got the result they wanted.
Why would they care about changing the system?
Yeah, that's because the media won't get behind it.
If the media, the left-wing media, corporate media, got behind it.
Bill, they got the outcome they wanted.
They hate Trump.
No, I know that.
But I mean, I'm going to call you a bad American if you don't support.
That's really mean.
Headline, O'Reilly calls Hannity a bad American.
No, not you.
I'm using you collectively, Hannity.
I'm going to call you, my next-door neighbor or anybody else, a bad American if you don't want an honest vote.
If you don't support situations where dishonesty can run wild.
If we don't fix it.
We need the facts about the election 2020.
Who's going to agree with those facts?
But Bill, I was saying going into this election, how do we have this election when we never got to the bottom of all that had happened in the last election?
Now, think about it.
Exactly.
And she went into Illinois.
Well, look, I mean, going forward, voices of reason, okay, that's me.
On Thursday, Friday, and Monday, that's you.
The joke out.
You're such a wise ass.
I mean, you were born, what was the name of that book about you being an incorrigible child?
A bold, fresh piece of humanity.
Yeah, okay.
Well, I was just called incorrigible.
I had teachers that loved it that I played hookie every day.
They loved it.
They were happy I didn't show up.
They'd mark me present just to keep me away.
They gave you lunch money not to show up.
Yeah, that's true.
It was in the same category.
But I think that we have to try to sit down with our liberal neighbors and our Biden supporters on the block.
I hate you, Bill.
Bill, you're hated.
And try to reason with them.
Bill, the sight of you, I've been out with you.
The sight of you, and you could see it in people's faces.
They bubble and fizz like Alka-Seltzer in water, and they all want to hit you, but they're afraid of me.
I got to tell everybody listening today, Hannity and I went out a few months ago to a nice Italian restaurant on Long Island.
We did.
We walked in together, and it was like the Melbrooks movie producers during the number screen time for Hitler.
This is true, actually.
Nobody said a word.
Mouths open.
It was like, we walk in.
Everything stops.
It was hysterical.
It's a lot of pizzetta.
We've got to help our restaurant friends.
I feel so bad for my friends in the restaurant business.
Don't you?
It's horrible.
You do what I'm doing.
I'm like buying all this food that I know I'm not going to eat because I just kind of want to keep everybody going.
And maybe it's just a small gesture, but if everyone does a little small gesture, hopefully these guys can survive.
Well, I can't cook anyway, so I'm always eating out and always getting taken.
But I am giving a lot of money through my charitable foundation and named after my parents to what we both gave to the food bank, but where I live, you were generous to give to my food bank.
Not my food bank, the one in my town.
And we did the Goya thing?
We did.
And we are, you know, absolutely, those of us who are fortunate, Hannah and I are in that category.
We have to help those who are getting pounded by the pandemic, and I want everybody to do so in your hometown.
I don't have the hope that you do.
I'll give you one example.
You got Biden's incoming chief of staff said that Republicans are a bunch of effers.
And I'm like, oh, there we go.
That's his chief of staff.
We're a bunch of effers, and McConnell's the worst of them all.
That's a great way to come in and start negotiations on his part, wouldn't you say?
Well, I was taken aback, and I did this on billoreilly.com last night by his Monday speech when he had a frog in his throat.
Now, that happens to all of us.
But the frog was very confused because the frog's going, wait a minute, he just said he wants to unite the country, and now he's calling everybody an idiot who wants a fair vote count.
How's that going to unite the country when 74 million people think they got jobbed?
All Biden had to do was say, look, I want a fair election.
I'm going to appoint an attorney general who's going to appoint a special counsel to look into the election and make sure we can improve things.
If Biden had done that on Monday, then I would have said, all right, maybe the guy does want to unite the country.
Maybe he is looking out for everybody.
But he's not.
I don't even think he knows what he's saying half the time.
He said in the speech on Monday, did you catch this?
I caught it.
All Americans have a sworn oath to the Constitution.
Do you remember?
I don't remember taking that.
Maybe I took it when I was being baptized when I was six months old and I didn't know it.
We actually grew up at a time where you can mention God and Jesus in the classroom and you weren't thrown out.
I mean, those times have changed, Bill.
I don't even think Shamanot allows, and they may be one of the few holdouts where you can mention God and Jesus.
Well, you can say Merry Christmas thanks to me, Anna.
Do you remember that?
I remember every year Bill O'Reilly's war on Christmas segments, and it would become the press would like go insane that he's saying there's a war on Christmas.
It was worth it just for the reaction it would get from the mob.
Do you remember when Target told their employees they couldn't say Merry Christmas?
I remember that.
That's a big deal, though.
I mean, why can't they say Merry Orley?
It said, what?
And then the next day, there wasn't one person in Target all over the country.
I would have thought Bill O'Reilly probably the closest, you know, modern day version of not being, you're very generous, not in that sense, you know, Bah Humbug and Scrooge and Curmudgeonly as a character.
There's a characterization of you as such.
You know, being the guy that saved Christmas, what a great irony that is, isn't it?
And listen, if I don't go to heaven, man, the fix is in.
Just love.
Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night, right?
Yeah, but you know, I will say this.
I love this country so much, and I know so many people that are listening to us now do.
We have to save this country.
I can't imagine if we don't save this country, the world without us.
And I'm not like a guy that sits at home and wrings my hands and worries, but I'm really worried about future generations.
Bill, we can hope and pray on that one.
But I got to let you go.
BillO'Reilly.com.
All things, O'Reilly.
Sir, simple man, Merry Christmas, my friend.
Happy New Year.
We'll see you in the new year.
Thanks.
Hey there.
I'm Mary Catherine Ham.
And I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass, you're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you listen.
I'm Ben Ferguson, and I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down a verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, as we continue 25 till the top of the hour, let's go back to the president, the importance of the Georgia runoff, which is now, believe it or not, about 20 days away.
I mean, it's coming fast.
Early voting ongoing in Georgia as we speak.
We have a couple of polls we'll share with you and pollsters that will weigh in on the state of that race.
I would argue way too close to call, way too much at stake.
Here's what the president said in Valdosta.
If you don't get out and vote, they are going to win.
Now, you know, a lot of people, friends of mine, say, let's have a vote.
We're not going to vote because we're angry about the presidential election.
And they're friends of mine.
They're people that are great people.
They're real friends and more than just two.
There are numerous people.
And it's almost like a protest.
But if you do that, the radical left wins.
Okay?
It was sort of an instinct of mine.
You know, you're angry because so many votes were stolen.
It was taken away.
And you say, well, we're not going to do it.
We can't do that.
We have to actually do just the opposite.
We can't do that.
We can't do that.
We have to do just the opposite.
If you don't vote, the socialists and the communists win.
They win.
The president couldn't be more right.
Now, we have a number of polls that have been coming out in recent days.
We have Insider Advantage, and that's Matt Towery's pollster company.
And he, interestingly, has both Republicans up by one point and one point only, 49.48, exactly the same.
We have the latest poll by the Trafalgar group.
That's Robert Cahaley.
And in that race, he actually has Osoff up on Purdue, 49.1 to 48.8.
He has Loeffler ahead of Warnock, 50.4 to 47.3.
They both join us now.
And I must say that they're two guys and two of a very unique, perhaps, I'm not sure, John McLaughlin might be the only other one.
Scott Rasmussen, I think, did well too, that really called both 2016 and 2020 accurately.
Anyway, Robert, thank you for being back.
Matt, thank you for being back.
Interestingly, both have their roots in Georgia, and they know the state better than any pollsters in the country.
So having the best pollsters from the state that matters now is important.
Matt, your poll just came out yesterday.
Fox 5 insider advantage poll, 49.48 both races.
That is too close for my liking.
Yeah, it's a very tenuous situation, Sean.
What I'm not liking right now is what I'm seeing in the tracking of the voter turnout right now.
And we have a way to track the ballots that are cast.
It's anemic.
The African-American percent cast right now is well over 30%.
It's closer to about 33%.
That would have to come down for a Republican to be able to win just historically based on many, many prior races.
And also, I'm seeing that a large portion of this early vote, of course, are older voters.
And in my poll, older voters are breaking in about the mid-50s for the Republicans.
We need to get that higher if you're going to see a Republican win.
So this is a very tenuous race.
I wouldn't be ready to call or suggest that either party or any of these candidates has an edge at the moment.
And it's interesting.
You actually have Purdue down by just a few tenths of a point, but Kelly Loeffler with, you know, based on this race, a decent lead against Warnock, why the disparity, Robert Cahaley?
Well, we see some there's a small segment of voters that a lot of them encompass some of the suburban moms and stuff like that that didn't really like Trump that much and aren't socially conservative.
But some of that small group has kind of a kind place in their heart for Osoff.
And so we see some Leffler Osoff crossover there.
And we also see that a little bit with some independents and getting a lot of feedback about the debate and the fact that Lefford did the debate and Purdue didn't, stuff like that.
But I would agree with Matt.
This thing is very, very, very close.
I wouldn't want to make a call either direction.
And from what we see, the way the early voting, I got to agree with him, there's a significant turnout.
And it is all going, even though it is below the pace from 2020 at the 2020s presidential at this point, the turnout is significant and it's weighted very strongly in a way that will be then affected by the.
I have the numbers.
Either one of you, correct me if I'm wrong, but in November, November 3rd, 1,740,795 people had requested a mail-in ballot.
1,362,369 actually used that mail-in ballot.
Now, the requests this time are about a half a million less requests and a third less than they had for the November election.
And, you know, so you have, you know, 600,000 of the people on the list for mail-in ballots, 600 of 1.7 million.
They've been on the list for a long time.
But what are we learning from early voting, which started on Monday, Matt Towery?
And what do you glean from Stacey Abrams contending that 85,000 of 1.2 million mail-in ballot applications received in the state so far have come from Democratic-leaning voters?
Is that true?
Who didn't vote in November, she's claiming?
Well, we see so far about 18,000 voters voting this time.
I think that's correct.
I may be a little bit off, maybe a little less than that, voting right now who did not vote in the November 2020 general election.
So there is some truth to the concept that there may be new voters that presumably the Democrats, for the most part, have been able to find.
What I'm finding, though, and this is a positive for the Republicans ahead, is the early vote, we are seeing a slight decrease in that African-American percent of the overall vote.
Yesterday it was closer to 34%.
Today, it's a little closer to 32%.
If that continues to decline, then you've got a better chance for the Republicans to have a sporting chance of winning.
If that doesn't decline into the upper 20s, particularly when you have another category called other, which is really oftentimes ends up being a combination of other nationalities and African Americans as well, then that's very problematic for the Republicans.
So they're right on the razor's edge of this being a competitive race for the Republicans or not becoming a competitive race.
Right now, it's a competitive race, but they've got to see that early voting pick up, and they've got to be able to turn their folks out on Election Day, which I think only Donald Trump in the end can be the motivator to get people out of their armchairs and into the voting booth if they're actually going to vote on the election day of January 5th, which is a horrific time to stage an election.
The worst day possible.
Robert, your take on that.
I absolutely agree.
I mean, right now, so far with the ones that are voting that did not vote in 2020, we see it's a 2.6%.
It's already 18,000 people.
And so we don't have a good number as to how many of those are newly registered like Abrams is claiming.
But, I mean, 2.6% of the vote is significant.
So this turnout has got to be answered on Election Day, and that's going to be the additional Republicans participating as we get closer to the election, because if Victorine continues and the turnouts low on Election Day being a difficult day, that's not very good news for the Republicans.
Another sidebar issue, you've actually, Robert, factored into your polling.
What, a 3.7% margin for potential fraud?
Both of you have polled the question.
There was a press release by Loffler and Purdue about changing the name of the Atlanta Braves.
I mean, overwhelmingly, I think the number was 71% or around there.
And I think you both had pretty much the same numbers of people in Georgia that do not want the Atlanta Braves to change the name of the team.
Is that now becoming a wedge issue?
First, Robert.
Yeah, I feel like it is because, you know, people don't, the people always say, well, people vote wasn't their best interest.
Well, people vote on a motion.
And this is one of those emotional issues.
And it's so diverse in the sense that whether it's socioeconomic, whether it's racial, demographic, all the way across, the support for the Braves is just there.
I mean, this is Hank Aaron's team.
And so it's one of those things that can have people that feel strongly.
And, you know, I always say with cancel culture, it's one of those things where you can dismiss it or you can embrace it.
But when you get a real opinion, it's when somebody wants to cancel something you care about.
And this is something that the people in this state care about a lot.
You know, Matt, one of the things we've talked about, there is a lot of conservative resentment towards the governor, the Secretary of State, the fact that you have the Secretary of State literally signing on to a consent agreement, I believe, unconstitutional, allowing for two signature verification systems, one relaxed standard for mail-in balloting and a very different standard for in-person voting.
A lot of people are mad that they hadn't taken any steps to fix that or call a special session to fix it.
I would argue it's unconstitutional.
But putting that argument aside, there's a lot of things at stake for the president himself, not the least of which is the hard work he's done over the last four years, the endless investigations a Democratic Senate majority would engage in against him and his family in perpetuity.
And on top of that, stopping this radical agenda, having at least one body that will stop it.
I mean, you don't have any hope if you don't have a majority in the Senate.
No, you don't.
And, you know, let me say this about Robert.
Robert had a fantastic polling year, and we had a great one, too.
But it's ironic that really the powers that be don't really like to hear what the two of us have to say, even though we seem to be right most of the time.
I think we would both agree that President Trump is a critical portion of getting the boat out in Georgia.
I'm surprised that we didn't see commercials earlier on that link these two candidates with President Trump in a stronger way.
Purdue has one now that is basically all Trump talking about Purdue.
Well, and it's about time because that's the only way they're going to get these folks out to turn out to vote.
U.S. senators don't gender a whole lot of love and devotion unless you get some superstar like Lindsey Graham or someone who really stands out.
And in this case, these are two fine U.S. senators, but they just don't have the love of the people the way some of these other senators might have, and certainly better-known politicians.
But Donald Trump is a religion for most Republicans in Georgia, and they've got to use him in every way, shape, possible to get that South, Middle Georgia, and North Georgia vote out.
Because really a runoff more than anything.
I've run a zillion campaigns, as you know, it seems like over the years, Sean.
It's about getting the people out to vote.
Everyone's made their mind up.
You're not going to change a lot of minds.
You've just got to get them out and get them to vote.
At the end of the day, push comes to shove.
How do you see this ending up?
For me, you know, I wouldn't want to be a met.
I mean, your poll is 49, 48 each.
I mean, basically, these are two elections on the edge.
John, I don't like the way the turnout is developing right now, but that does not mean that it can't change.
That's about the best I can say, at least for the Republican side.
So you may split the two.
Robert may be onto something.
Maybe one wins and one doesn't.
But right now, I would not be willing to bet on either one of these races.
And Robert, push comes to shove.
How is this going to end up in Georgia considering the grave importance it has for the whole country?
Well, it could be the same thing we were looking at before.
I mean, we could have a whole nasty fight.
I mean, that's what I was thinking: is that nothing, you know, we keep running to voters who say, what are you going to do different?
Well, if nothing is done different, we're going to be in the exact same boat that we work for.
They're going to be recounting.
There's going to be all kinds of allegations.
And Matt brought something I think is really important is the number of people that are voting that have sketchy details.
Like they can't tell us what sex they are.
They can't tell us what race they are.
They can't even tell us what age they are.
Who are those people?
And why would they?
But why is it that if you vote in person in Georgia, you need a voter ID?
And you get a signature verification based on what Georgia has in their voting base.
Well, there's been a very systematic effort, not only in Georgia, but everywhere else, to loosen those regulations and increase the mailing ballots.
I mean, they've got to address this.
They should have addressed it before this election.
But this is around the country.
I mean, in the name of inclusion, we are including people that have, you know, anybody with a driver's license and since Moto Voter, I mean, you know, you've got a green card.
You can get a driver's license.
Matt, I heard you wanted to weigh in, Matt.
Well, I was going to say is this.
I mean, it was obvious that they should have stepped in and tried to fix this situation in Georgia.
And if there's any degree to which Republicans don't turn out, part of that is going to be their irritation at the leadership for not doing something about this.
All of that said, the one positive for the Republicans is the fewer absentee ballots you have, the less opportunity there is for mischief if one assumes that mischief took place.
But we still have a vote load relative to the overall vote because, like I said, I think the turnout's okay, but it's not something that I would be taking to the bank if I were a Republican right now.
Hey there, I'm Mary Catherine Ham, and I'm Carol Markowitz.
We've been in political media for a long time.
Long enough to know that it's gotten, well, a little insane.
That's why we started Normally, a podcast for people who are over the hysteria and just want clarity.
We talk about the issues that actually matter to the country without panic, without yelling, and with a healthy dose of humor.
We don't take ourselves too seriously, but we do take the truth seriously.
So if you're into common sense, sanity, and some occasional sass, you're our kind of people.
Catch new episodes of Normally every Tuesday and Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen.
I'm Ben Ferguson, and I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So down on Verdict with Ted Cruz Now, wherever you get your podcasts.
News Roundup Information Overload Hour, Sean Hannity Show.
So one of the things we've been telling you on this program, and everyone's done amazing work, everybody, I guess, focused on the things that they felt that they knew the best.
And where I felt the best chances to get to the honesty, integrity, confidence we should all have in elections was going to be by following the law and following the Constitution and following state constitutions.
And that's been a big part of the focus on this program.
And as I said to everybody very early on, I looked at what happened in Philly and you have the Secretary of State deciding, well, we'll extend out mail-in ballots for three days without going to the state legislature.
That's unconstitutional.
That's a matter of fact.
That's a matter of law.
Or the state constitution in Pennsylvania did not allow for mail-in balloting, but they decided to do it anyway.
And literally contradicting that which was in their own state constitution when they passed this bill number 70 or in this in the legislature without following their own state constitution.
I thought the Supreme Court, I thought they had a strong case.
They decided not to take it up.
Then you have the case in Georgia where you have a consent agreement after a lawsuit by all these varying Democratic groups, and they had two sets of signature verification standards, one for in-person voting, which was stringent, and another more relaxed standard for those that were involved in mail-in ballots.
And then you have in the state of Wisconsin, a slam-dunk case as far as I could see.
And in that state, it's clear they don't allow early voting.
And in that particular case, if you follow state law, if you follow court precedent, if you follow the state constitution, then it's crystal clear on the law.
And now you've got yourself a situation where the results now weren't legal or constitutional.
Anyway, I'm going to get to what the court said in Wisconsin in a second.
But this tape that people have found today, PJ Media found it, Biden's saying there should be one machine used nationally with a paper ballot to ensure the machine was not manipulated.
Oh, sounds a lot like Donald Trump and Trump supporters.
Listen.
How are you going to keep it from us being able to be in a position where you can manipulate the machines, manipulate the records?
The one way to do that is I think we should pass a federal law mandating that the same machines with paper trails be mandatory for every federal election.
That will be a multi-billion dollar bill for the states because the states will have to make a choice then.
They will have to make a choice whether or not they have two machines.
We can't mandate, as you know, state elections.
We can't tell the state of Delaware or Ohio or Texas what machines and what method they use to vote in their state elections.
But we can do it federally.
So in a nutshell, I think we should be mandating, mandating that we have a paper ballot with a standardized machine, standardized requirements.
That was Biden, but that was Biden then.
Biden's been nothing but quiet and hiding in his bunker ever since.
Now, in the Supreme Court decision, state of Wisconsin, 4-3 decision, and the Chief Justice writing a powerful, blistering dissent saying a significant portion of the public does not believe that the presidential election was fairly conducted.
Once again, four justices on this court, seven justices, cannot be bothered with addressing what the statutes require to assure that absentee ballots are lawfully cast.
The Chief Justice continues.
Four members of this court throw the cloak over numerous problems that will be repeated again and again until this court has the courage to correct them.
That for a Supreme Court justice in a state is a devastating beatdown.
Another dissenting justice: every single voter in this state is harmed when a vote is cast in contravention of the statutes and continues that the ruling is, quote, doomed to create chaos, uncertainty, undermine confidence, spawn needless litigation.
This is not the rule of law, it is the rule of judicial activism through inaction.
Reines Prievis has been keeping us up to speed from the get-go on this and has really become the expert, go-to expert in the country on it.
Why don't you just lay it out in your own words?
You're also a lawyer, how relevant this is and how profound this dissent is.
Well, thank you for having me, Sean.
Yeah, I mean, you keep hearing Democrats saying that the Trump campaign is filing garbage lawsuits.
Well, we had a 4-3 decision here.
We were one vote away from really turning the Wisconsin election upside down.
And really, what it comes down to is the fact that we have something very different going on here in Wisconsin and other states, as you outlined.
This is not as much about people hauling in ballots that other people filled out.
This is a matter of people in government that are in charge of executing a legal election, taking the law in their own hands, and rewriting the laws that the legislative branch is supposed to be writing.
We have an Article II, Article III, constitutional crisis in this country.
That is, either the courts deciding how elections are going to be run, or you have government bureaucrats deciding that the laws that the legislature passed shouldn't be followed.
And that is exactly what happened in Wisconsin, which is you have clerks that have decided in a state that doesn't allow early vote to create an entirely different system to allow people to vote early through the absentee ballot system,
except for the fact that in Wisconsin and most states, absentee ballot, the absentee ballot process has to be followed very specifically by statute, and the statutes are unequivocal in the fact that they have to be followed exactly right.
And they didn't do that in Wisconsin.
So the fact that you read this blistering dissent, how rare is that that you're going to hear, you know, basically the chief justice calling everybody else on the court a coward that didn't vote the right way and didn't stand by the law.
Well, it's extraordinary in that it was an 81-page decision.
So for your listeners that are, you know, I don't expect people to follow every one of these details, but imagine you have the entire election of the state of Wisconsin comes down to this decision: an 81-page opinion decided by basically one judge that was actually a judge that the president supported.
This was a judge that the president tweeted about and helped get elected, purported to be a conservative.
And what he did was it's kind of strange.
He hid behind a legal doctrine called latches.
And really, what that means is that he's basically trying to say, I don't want to decide on the merits of this because I think you should have brought this lawsuit a few months earlier when you're right.
And here's why it's weak.
And one of the justices says it exactly, Justice Ziegler said in the opinion: to somehow require that challenges must be made before an election, before the ballots are cast, and before a recount is absurd.
It's almost something you could take to the Supreme Court under an Article II violation, which is what you're saying is that in order for you, Sean, or anyone listening to run for office, you need to pre-litigate all of your gripes and concerns with the election laws prior to an actual violation from taking place, just in case you need to go to court so that you don't get thrown out on this theory of what they call latches.
It is absurd to require that of people running for office, and it's probably not constitutional.
All right, Ryan Strivas continues with us on the Supreme Court beatdown dissent 4-3 decision.
I mean, unbelievable.
The wording is unreal.
Explain to people the fact that in Wisconsin, they don't allow early voting.
Now, they do allow for absentee ballots.
They do allow for people that have conditions that don't allow them to leave their house, but not widespread absentee ballots.
And there is a process that must be followed that wasn't followed in the state for this particular election, leading and impacting about a couple hundred thousand votes.
Yeah, so basically, the state of Wisconsin and a lot of different states went through a big debate many years ago over whether or not they were going to allow for early vote.
Meaning, early vote, meaning what most probably people know about, which is you show up at your precinct or a location near your home, and you show up just like you would on election day, and you show up with your identification, you show it, you get your ballot, you vote, you move on with your day.
In Wisconsin, it was decided a long time ago that we would not allow that kind of process in the state of Wisconsin, but we would allow absentee ballot voting.
So, what would happen?
So, what the clerks is, they said, okay, we're going to do something called in-person absentee ballot voting.
But the problem with these clerks is, and in this case, is that if they allow in-person absentee ballot voting, the law says you still need to comply with the absentee ballot voting rules, which means you have to have an application.
And in this case, in the state of Wisconsin, in this election, they had no application.
So, someone would show up to vote.
There would normally be an application.
I want an absentee ballot because of this reason.
Here's my name.
Here's my identification.
Here's where I live.
Here's the information.
You turn that in.
The clerk gives you a ballot.
You put it in the envelope.
You turn it in.
And so what happened in this case is that the Democrats said, well, yeah, we didn't comply with the law, but the envelope, we're going to say the envelope that you put the ballot in is the application.
Except for, number one, the law requires an actual application.
And the law says the application after voting is held with the municipal clerk, and the envelope is held at the county.
So the envelope can't be the application.
Second reason: if I give you an absentee ballot and you put it in the envelope, obviously the envelope can't be the application because I would have given you the ballot before you put it in the envelope that would end up becoming, according to the Democrats, the application.
So that's the first thing.
And they also were literally actively seeking out early votes in parks and elsewhere, weren't they?
Well, right.
So they had something in Madison called Democracy in the Park.
And Democracy in the Park was where the Dane County clerk, who, by the way, was now ruled, this was not proper at all in another case.
The Dane County clerk said, you can come to all these locations in the park and declare yourself what's called indefinitely confined.
Meaning, okay, Sean Hannity lives in Madison, Wisconsin.
You know what?
I'm going to go to the park.
You get out of your car.
If I'm indefinitely confined, how come I'm in a park?
Right.
And in Wisconsin, if you're indefinitely confined, which is usually very elderly, very sad situations in nursing homes, you don't have to have a photo identification.
The nursing professional, the doctor in the nursing home vouches for the fact that you're a citizen there.
You're confined to this nursing room and you vote.
Well, in Dane County, you show up at the park, you don't have identification, you say I'm indefinitely confined, you sign a document, and you move on your way.
And by the way, all in an absentee ballot fashion without the application, without following any of the rules.
And then, even on top of that, which was a part of this case, is that they put them in drop boxes.
And then what they did was they put the absentee ballots in drop boxes and they were co-mingled with other ballots.
So in the end, you couldn't tell the 50,000 ballots that were done that way as opposed to the 100,000 ballots that were done properly, which was also in violation of the law.
I mean, you can't even make this up.
I mean, you know, indefinitely, okay.
How do you get to the park?
If you can get to the park, you can get to the polling place.
And how many ballots are we talking about?
Because, I mean, it's almost like you've got to be kidding me.
You talk about a slight of favor head fake, huh?
And all the and all these things that I just mentioned to you, in just two counties, you were talking over 220,000 ballots.
In the brief to the court, there were all kinds of, you know, this indefinitely confined where then these people that claimed they were indefinitely confined, they were posting pictures of themselves partying over the weekend on Instagram and Facebook.
You know, they were just making it too easy.
So, I mean, the exhibits in this case were, you know, we had exhibits, you know, a mile long in this case of people that were claiming one thing under the law and doing another.
So it does explain then why the dissent, why they were, they were just, this was personal, it seemed, between these justices.
Well, it was personal.
And, you know, it was incredible that the one justice didn't come the Trump campaign way because, you know, when we first went up to court, I don't want to bore everyone with what this is, but you can bypass all these other courts through something called original jurisdiction.
So you can go right to the Supreme Court and say, this case is going to be in front of you anyway.
So just take it now.
You have jurisdiction.
This justice, it didn't come our way that should have.
He said, we got to comply with the statute verbatim.
We got to follow every word of this, and therefore you have to start in a circuit court and we'll look at this later.
So, of course, we did that.
And then when it got back to him, of course, you know, he then ruled it.
Then he basically hid behind this idea that you should have done it earlier.
Ryan's Prievis, pretty scary.
Thank you, sir.
Unbelievable.
Thank you.
800-941, Sean, toll-free number.
You want to be a part of the program?
We'll get to your calls, final half hour of the program.
Scott Chatting 25 to the top of the hour, 800-941, Sean.
You want to be a part of the program?
Right to our busy phones.
Tom is in the great state of Pennsylvania.
Tom, hi, how are you?
We do have a little news out of Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania Republicans are urging the Supreme Court, and we dealt with this this week and last week as we continue our focus on the actual rule of law, the real Constitution of states, and, of course, the Constitution of the United States.
But anyway, Republicans in Pennsylvania have again urged the Supreme Court to take up that lawsuit.
How are you, sir?
Okay.
Hi, Sean.
How are you doing?
Listen, I read the paper.
I look at the internet.
All I hear is Trump lost in Wisconsin his attempt.
Trump's losing cases in Pennsylvania.
Trump's not losing.
The people are losing.
And it got me thinking that he did all the research, all these people that signed affidavits in front of courts.
And he has he has a lot of a lot of proof and a lot of evidence.
And then Texas tried to join all the states and bring it to the Supreme Court and the Supreme Court shut him down.
I am not a lawyer.
I don't fully understand how come.
But to the best of my understanding, Texas got shut down because they don't have the right to ask the Supreme Court why other states were breaking the law.
But me, as a citizen of Pennsylvania, don't I have the right to ask the Supreme Court?
And we've had the group's lawyer, Greg Tufell, I believe his name.
And we've also had Congressman Kelly and Sean Parnell on and the people involved in that suit, and they're trying again.
Yeah, how come you can bring, I don't fully understand this.
You can bring a class action lawsuit against a pesticide company that makes a dangerous product or a cigarette company that is harming people.
But how come we can't bring people together to join?
And so it would be we the people.
Do you want the honest answer?
Do you really want me to be blunt and honest?
I'm probably not going to like it.
Well, I'm just telling you right now because, you know, we have three branches of government, and the judiciary is the check in the balance, supposedly, against the executive and legislative branches.
And what we see is a very, yeah, I think there are two things you can say about it.
One, I'll quote right out of the Wisconsin case, and that this is not the rule of law.
It's the rule of judicial activism through inaction.
I'll say it that way.
I would argue that the Supreme Court under John Roberts, you know, they're very results-oriented.
They're not people.
I mean, they're actually playing politics with the court.
And you're right in pointing out that we have disenfranchised not only the people of Texas, but the people in your state of Pennsylvania as well.
And that the court, I would argue, has no courage or appetite to quote the Supreme Court Chief Justice in Wisconsin.
They don't have the courage to do it.
Because the bottom line is they're looking at what is the reaction outcome going to be if we follow the law and the Constitution.
There's a reason I've spent so much time focused on that aspect of it because I felt that was the winning hand, the law, the Constitution.
Apparently, it's not.
Because I don't really look at this as a, for me, a political thing.
I'm looking at this as the election.
they're political you don't think these justices you know are looking i am telling you right now they want no part of this They don't want to do their job.
And if it means not enforcing the law or look at the fourth justice that they would have needed in Wisconsin, the reason that justice punted, well, you should have brought the case earlier.
That's not an answer.
That's a cop-out.
That's not the rule of law.
And basically, now you're dead in the water.
You're stuck.
And I think the Supreme Court Chief Justice is right, is that this is never going to end.
It's going to be repeated again and again until they have the courage to correct the system and follow the law and follow the Constitution.
Same in Pennsylvania, the same in Georgia, the same in Nevada.
We should get together, not as we should get together as we, not even Republicans and Democrats, just as safely.
Yeah, we should, but we're not going to because they got the results they want.
Yeah, but this is not.
You're not liking my answers.
I don't like them either, to be honest.
I'm just being blunt.
Yeah, because I don't see this ending.
You know, because if nobody, more and more people are unhappy with the not the turnout of the election or the outcome, but how it was handled.
Presidents will come and go, but this is our country.
This is the election.
Tom, you have no idea how many Americans you're speaking for right now.
This is what the Supreme Court Chief Justice in Wisconsin was saying when he said, four members of this court throw the cloak over numerous problems that will be repeated again and again until the court has the courage to correct them.
They didn't have it this time.
I believe we live in the greatest country on earth.
And I just, I don't want to, I don't want to lose faith in the Supreme Court.
I don't know why there's got to be some legal minds that can put something together with everything that we see going on around this.
It's very disturbing.
And I don't see an end to it.
And the only way that this country is going to go forward is one is if we all believe that it's a fair election, regardless of the winner.
Let me ask you a question, an honest question.
Okay.
Everything we've learned the last four years about the media mob and their hatred of all things, Donald Trump.
And remember, Donny Deutsch saying we suck smelly Walmart shoppers, irredeemable, deplorables.
Do you really believe that the media, big tech companies, do you believe the Democrats and even establishment Republicans actually care about what it is you're saying?
Because I don't believe they do.
I feel that everything you just mentioned isn't a large portion of the Democrats.
I really.
I gently disagree.
You had me up to this point.
Now you lost me.
You know, I think that if once I don't want to be like, I don't want to feel like the Democrats felt four years ago.
I don't want to be watching TV and looking at Biden.
He should get impeached for that.
There's Russia collusion.
There's this.
I don't want to be making up stories for the next four years.
And I just don't, I don't think this should happen to either party.
Let me give you a simple example.
Every state, and I focused a lot on this, has statutory language that says partisan observers get to watch the vote counting from start to finish.
Did that happen in any state?
No.
Now, following your logic, everybody should care about that, right?
Yeah.
Okay, do they?
The most important question, do they care about that?
I bet you they would care if Trump won.
They'd care if Trump won.
There you go.
Welcome to our new world.
Yeah.
And it's...
Okay.
I'm just telling you, you're walking through a process here, and your eyes are opening, and it's not pretty what you're seeing, is it?
No, it's not.
But why since they've been through what they feel an injustice was done to them in 2016.
And I really wish if they felt that way.
The only thing, I wish we could have opened up the election to show everybody that Trump did win fair and square then.
Now, I don't, I'm trying to look at this as a bigger.
All right, let me help you out with another thing.
Knew from the get-go, did they not, that Trump-Russia collusion never occurred?
They knew that.
They knew that Hillary paid for a dirty Russian disinformation dossier.
They knew that very early when they talked to the sub-source of Christopher Steele that that dossier was never verifiable, but they used it anyway.
And then that led to Mueller.
They pushed it even when they knew it wasn't true, didn't they?
Yeah.
They knew with Ukraine that Quid Pro quo Joe was on tape bragging about leveraging a billion dollars, and we all knew that Hunter had no experience.
Did they care about that?
I understand what you're saying.
Let me keep going.
Did they vet Obama when he was running?
Yeah.
Did they vet Joe Biden this election?
Right.
I understand what you're saying.
Did they look at the Biden ties, the Biden family foreign corruption syndicate?
They knew about it.
Did they do anything?
Did they report anything?
I got a question that this has been bugging me.
I mean, you're such a decent person.
I mean, I hear nothing but goodness, decency, and you that I don't even have.
You're a far better person than I am.
I can hear your heart.
It's an overwhelming majority of Democrats that are wrong.
I just believe.
Are they wrong or do they know they're lying?
That's what I'm saying.
I think the ones that know that they're lying are hopefully not a small percentage that I'm hoping somehow could be corrected.
Did the media, which is so powerful and pushed their Russia collusion narrative and ignored Quid Pro, quo, Joe, and Hunter and didn't vet Biden.
Did the media know what they were doing or not know what they were doing?
I understand, yes.
Yes.
But how okay.
By the way, you know, this is like, this is what I think we're looking at here.
And I think that this is a process that everybody's going through, including myself.
We're looking at something that we never thought would happen here.
We're looking at all of this together, that they would pick Obama, not vet him.
We're looking at, they care about foreign interference in elections in Russia, but not Hillary's dossier.
They care about equal justice, equal application of our laws, but they didn't mind lying to a court to spy on a candidate and then a president.
They never vetted Biden.
They impeached the president while ignoring the real quid pro quo and the real money and ignoring the ties to China and ignoring Russian oligarchs and ignoring the Johnson-Grassley report and ignoring all of this stuff.
You know, so what you're looking at is what I'm calling institutional failure.
And maybe I'm not doing a very good job communicating it.
And at times I don't think I am.
And that institutional failure is the media, big tech, the Democratic Party, the weak Republican establishment, and it's called the swamp.
And when somebody comes along iconoclastically and shatters that illusion that they're good, decent people that just have a few political disagreements, and you start draining it and you get to the bottom of the swamp, there's no more water, but there's this tarry, disgusting black mud, and these creatures now are being exposed and a little disinfectant and sunlight is on them.
And all of a sudden they're fighting back.
And Donald Trump already beat them on the Russia lie, the Ukrainian impeachment hoax.
My attitude is that whatever the ends justified the means for too many people here, you're trying to reason with people and say, well, the media, mostly, I'm sure, good people that really want fair elections.
And I'm arguing, I think there's a lot of people, I'm not going to get a figure on it, that have no problem with the ends justifies the means because they think they are superior to those of us that, as Donny Deutsch says, suck, just suck, or smelly Walmart shoppers or irredeemable deplorables.
Those are moments where I think it reveals how we the people are looked at.
I may be wrong.
I may be wrong.
You tell me, am I wrong?
No, I agree with everything you're saying.
What group or what people can help this?
I thought it would be the Supreme Court, and I thought that maybe it was just a way of presentation is why the Texas Texas failed.
You mean let me help you out a little bit because you're grasping for hope.
Let me give you some.
Okay.
Okay, the hope is this.
And I'm coming to grips with this in my own way, and because I've gone through a lot of what I hear you're going through.
I don't want to be depressed.
No, don't be.
Let not your heart be troubled.
Listen, we know how the big story ends.
Jesus wins.
You know, God wins.
We know that in the end, there's an ebb and flow.
As somebody that's been doing this 33 years, there's an ebb and flow to these cycles.
And for whatever reason, we stupidly allow ourselves to be convinced that socialism may work this time.
And then there is always, there's something about the American people and spirit of the American people that the fight for liberty and the fight for freedom never ends.
And very, very quickly, the American people are going to see a very distinct difference, assuming Joe Biden is inaugurated on January 20th.
And they're going to see, and it's going to be very quickly, do you miss me yet?
And then some people are going to be like, why did I get so upset over the tweeting?
Why did I care?
Things were so much better then.
Now, the media will tell you things are great, never been better, but they're going to end up missing Donald Trump more than anybody.
They don't even realize how addicted to hating this man they've become.
And then out of that, it's like the Phoenix rising from the ashes.
Out of that will come another wave of conservatism that will once again have to fix the country and make America great again.
And I believe that's how this story ends.
That's my belief.
Okay?
Listen, you've been very, you're just, you just embody all the goodness and greatness of the American people.
I really do thank you for your call.
Thank you.
All right, that's going to wrap things up for today.
An incredible hearing today on election irregularities.
Senator Ron Johnson just beats down the left and the media and the mob.
Also, we'll update you on election irregularities.
Kaylee McInaney, following the Senate race, we'll look at the polls with Robert Cahale and Matt Towery and Senator Kelly Loeffler, Pete Hagseth, Ari Fleischer, Larry and Leo, Nine Eastern, Satan DVR, Hannity, tonight on Fox.
You won't get this news from the mob.
We'll see you tonight, back here tomorrow.
Thanks for being with us.
You want smart political talk without the meltdowns?
We got you.
I'm Carol Markowitz, and I'm Mary Catherine Hamm.
We've been around the block in media and we're doing things differently.
Normally is about real conversations.
Thoughtful, try to be funny, grounded, and no panic.
We'll keep you informed and entertained without ruining your day.
Join us every Tuesday and Thursday, normally, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
I'm Ben Ferguson, and I'm Ted Cruz.
Three times a week, we do our podcast, Verdict with Ted Cruz.
Nationwide, we have millions of listeners.
Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we break down the news and bring you behind the scenes inside the White House, inside the Senate, inside the United States Supreme Court.
And we cover the stories that you're not getting anywhere else.
We arm you with the facts to be able to know and advocate for the truth with your friends and family.
So download Verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
