Congressman Kevin Brady of Texas’ 8th district is the ranking Repubican on the House Ways and Means committee. Today he joins to preview the President’s joint address and discuss how devastating tax hikes will be for the American people. As the author of the 2017 tax reform, Rep. Brady is uniquely qualified to discuss these issues.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.
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 at Verdict with Ted Cruz Now, wherever you get your podcasts.
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.
When I told people, I was making a podcast about Benghazi.
Nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
From Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries, this is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Thanks, Scott Shannon.
Thanks to all of you.
800-941 Sean, if you want to be a part of this program, we have a lot of ground to get to.
The poll has officially closed on the question, should Linda listen to me and get her five-year-old son a happy meal, which makes kids happy at McDonald's.
And let's just say, it wasn't a good day for Linda the last 24 hours, but we'll get to that later.
You're far too happy about this.
Way too happy about the world.
I'm just saying, I had a sneak peek at looking at the results.
And not looking good for you, but looking great for little Liam.
I'll tell you that.
That's like manna from heaven for a kid.
I mean, I'm not sure.
This is the spirit.
God gives you the heavenly love and waters from heaven.
And then when you're a kid and you're born of flesh, there's nothing better than a happy meal.
And this kid's been deprived of happy meal.
Is that part of the Bible?
I felt like you were getting a little biblical about McDonald's.
If you let me talk to your preacher and stop hiding him from me.
I'm not hiding him.
Oh, yes, you won't give me his number.
Well, I mean, I don't think you should be best friends or anything, you know.
Well, I'm not looking to be his best friend.
Well, if I give you his number, what if he doesn't want to give you his number?
Well, how about you ask him because you haven't asked him yet?
I'll do that right after I get that happy meal.
Yeah, okay, exactly.
Basically, when hell freezes over, we might get it.
All right.
We'll start with some breaking news.
This is interesting, sad on one level.
I'm suspicious on another level.
And didn't take long for Biden to start using the Justice Department to go after political enemies.
And clearly at the top of the list is a guy by the name of Rudy Giuliani, America's mayor.
Now, Giuliani, of course, he was front and center investigating Hunter Biden's corrupt dealings with Ukraine.
You know, zero experience, Hunter, being paid millions and millions of dollars.
Does an interview.
Good morning, America.
Do you have any experience in energy or oil or gas of any kind whatsoever?
No.
Did you ever do any business in Ukraine before?
No.
No particular skill set to be helping a burisma oil company, energy company, gas company?
No.
Why do you think you got the millions of dollars?
I don't know.
Maybe because your father was in control.
Yeah, I think that's probably why.
One of the dumbest interviews a 50-year-old man ever gave.
And anyway, so that became a pretty thorny issue.
Now, also, as it relates to Hunter, one person that has seen and has likely a copy of Hunter Biden's laptop is Rudy Giuliani.
And I'll get to that in a second here.
But remember, Joe Biden is on tape, you know, saying, bragging about how, you know, I said to them, I'm leaving in about six hours and you're not getting the billion dollars.
You're not going to get the billion unless you fire that prosecutor.
Who is the prosecutor?
This guy Shokin.
This guy Shokin, a Ukrainian prosecutor.
Why would Joe Biden, vice president in charge of Ukraine for the Obama administration, care about a prosecutor in Ukraine?
Because he was investigating zero-experience Hunter who was being paid millions of dollars.
That's a good reason.
Anyway, so now, and by the way, this is a FARA violation that we're talking about here.
Meaning you're supposed to register with the government if you're lobbying on behalf of another government.
Well, my understanding was that Rudy was investigating all of this as part of op research, which happens with every campaign.
It's a blood sport politics.
It's uglier now than it's ever been.
And of course, he investigated his corrupt dealings with Ukraine.
Now, remember, Kazakhstan oligarchs, they were paying Hunter Biden's firm.
We have the First Lady of Moscow, another Russian oligarch, millions of dollars in wire transfers going into Hunter's firm.
Then the billion five from the Bank of China, no experience that I see in private equity.
Not sure why Goldman Sachs or Deutsche Bank or any of the big financial firms on Wall Street wouldn't have gotten this business over zero experience Hunter, but he got that deal too.
I haven't gotten a penny yet, but his lawyer has to come out and say, well, he does have a lot of equity in it.
Wonder if he'll give it back.
I tend to doubt it.
So anyway, so now we're at this point that Rudy Giuliani, this raid took place.
Federal authorities raided the Upper East Side apartment of the former mayor as part of a criminal probe into the former mayor's dealings in Ukraine.
And the reports are now saying that it's a FARA investigation.
In other words, did he not register?
The investigators confiscated Giuliani's electronic devices as part of the search warrant, according to the New York Times, and a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District.
These are serious people.
Rudy once was in the Southern District U.S. Attorney's Office, as was guys like Andy McCarthy.
A lot of brilliant people have come out of there.
And anyway, so we're watching all of this, and they declined comment on the reported raid.
A call to Giuliani's cell phone went straight to voicemail.
And we're told that Giuliani may issue a statement or his lawyers may issue a statement at some point.
I don't know.
It goes without saying that this raid on Giuliani, just off the top of my head, what have I been saying lately?
If you're a Republican, if you're a conservative, if you're a Trump supporter, it's even worse.
I mean, they'll put you in jail for years for spitting on the sidewalk or jaywalking.
You know, we have, look at Roger Stone's case in particular.
You get, you know, 20 guys, tactical gear, frogmen, pre-dawn raid, guns, you know, blazing, and CNN cameras tipped off there watching and filming the whole thing for, what, a process crime of lying to Congress or what they did with Paul Manafort.
You know, we're talking about tax issues here and a case that had long been abandoned for lack of evidence.
And they just bring it up from the dead as a means of pressuring Manafort into saying what they wanted him to say about Trump.
And look at the poor Papadopoulos, two weeks in jail.
I mean, it's unbelievable.
General Flynn, another case.
And we can keep going.
And, you know, well, what happened to the Inspector General Horowitz's recommendations?
He put referrals out there for the very same thing that Roger Stone got charged with.
Well, that never happens to anybody there.
Where's John Durham's report?
Guess we're not getting indictments, ever getting, you know, just the whole thing just stinks to high heaven.
I do not believe any longer that we have equal justice and equal application of our laws after watching all of this unfold with the Trump-Russia collusion hoax.
I don't believe it anymore.
You know, the idea that one president gets impeached over as president, as President Trump would say, a perfectly fine phone call that he knew numerous people were listening to.
How is it possible?
And you got Joe bragging on tape, leveraging a billion taxpayer dollars to fire a Ukrainian prosecutor, the same guy investigating his son, the son that is part of the Biden family syndicate that's being paid millions with zero experience.
Oh, there's nothing there.
There's nobody, no serious person says there's anything wrong with that.
Oh, I don't know.
Last name was Trump, and it was Vice President Trump, and it was Donald Trump Jr.
that was the one with no experience being paid millions.
I would suspect that there would be a lot of attention given to it and probably even more likely criminal charges brought.
So how can I have faith in the justice system anymore?
How can anybody have faith in it?
It's sad.
You know, it was supposed to have due process, equal justice, equal application of our laws.
I mean, you wouldn't believe the phone calls I have with my lawyers and my accountants.
Pay it, pay it, pay it, pay it, pay it, pay it.
That's what I say every day.
Well, you probably, you know, this is a legal deduction.
I go, yeah, I know.
Why don't you save more receipts?
I said, because what's the difference?
We're not going to use it anyway.
I mean, these are the conversations.
Why?
Because, you know, if one comma is out of place, God forbid that they'll want to throw the book at a conservative.
And that's how I govern my life.
Because I don't feel that there's equal justice and equal application of our laws.
And I do believe our justice system has been politicized.
Now, is it possible Rudy Giuliani did something wrong here?
I would assume it's unlikely because he is a lawyer and he is smart.
I don't know.
It doesn't make sense to me.
A FARA violation is a bit of a stretch.
There have been other people in the past that, yeah, did the same thing, didn't have a pre, you know, a raid of their house, their apartment.
Now, there was a copy supposedly of Hunter Biden's laptop that Rudy Giuliani had.
And my sources that have seen the laptop, there's still a lot of information, I'm told, that hasn't come out yet.
And, you know, my lawyers are forbidding me from even attempting to get a copy of it because of what is on there.
I'm like, well, why can't I, I'm doing it in the capacity of investigative work, which is what I do.
And they're like, under over our dead body.
That was the ant, Linda, true or false.
Did I not get that message from my lawyers?
Yes, you did, 100%.
Yes, I did.
All the time.
I'm like, well, it's information.
People have it.
There's numerous copies.
We're able to verify it.
Doesn't matter.
You know, look at what the New York Post, they buried that story.
And now I know the Daily Mail has shown some courage.
They're actually taking it a bit further.
It looks like they have a copy too.
There are copies out there and have to be briefed by separate sources that have seen the laptop, that have verified its authenticity.
Then you can bring up names like Bobolinski, Tony Bobolinski, or what's the name, the nice man that runs the computer repair shop, Isaac, what's his name?
Paul Isaac.
Paul Isaac, yeah, great guy.
We've interviewed him.
I've talked to other sources that know.
Everyone corroborates the same thing.
And it just, what is Hunter going to do about it?
Well, Hunter apparently is, you know, taking on a new career.
It's pretty unbelievable, actually, that there are no consequences if you are a liberal Democrat.
Hunter apparently is going to get, you know, $80,000 a year.
Well, that's what you pay your kids to go to Tulane University and then find out what former crackhead, sex addict Hunter Biden, will be one of your kids' teachers because apparently he's going to teach a class on fake news at Tulane University in New Orleans.
It's a great school.
I have nothing against Tulane.
I think it's a great school in Louisiana.
The course is entitled Media Polarization, Public Policy Impacts.
It'll include several guest speakers throughout its 10 weeks, including the president's son.
By the way, I would like to volunteer my services to speak at this class.
Linda, you can call them and tell them I gladly do it.
Anyway, 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 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.
What I told people I was making a podcast about Benghazi, nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
It's almost a dirty word, one that connotes conspiracy theory.
Will we ever get the truth about the Benghazi massacre?
Bad faith, political warfare, and frankly, bullshit.
We kill the ambassador just to cover something up.
You put two and two together.
Was it an overblown distraction or a sinister conspiracy?
Benghazi is a Rosetta Stone for everything that's been going on for the last 20 years.
I'm Leon Nayfak from Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries.
This is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Yes, that's right.
Lock her up.
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, as we roll along, Sean Hannity's show.
Now, we just got a response as it relates to what's going on with Mayor Giuliani, and his lawyers have responded and referred to this as legal thuggery in this particular case and a political targeting of the mayor.
Anyway, so in statements to the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Mayor Giuliani's attorney, a guy by the name of Robert Costello, said it was, quote, legal thuggery.
Giuliani's lawyer, Robert Costello, called the search as unnecessary because his client had offered to answer questions from prosecutors, except those regarding his privileged communications with the former president.
What they did today was legal thuggery.
Why would you do this to anyone, let alone someone who was the Associate Attorney General, United States Attorney, mayor of New York City, and personal lawyer to the 45th president of the United States?
The journal says he told them he had offered to answer investigators' questions as long as they agreed to say what area they were looking at ahead of time, but they declined the offer.
Now we got to make a big deal.
A lot of this is showed.
Now, it is a tactic.
Sometimes you do have overzealous prosecutors.
You got to be careful of.
You know, a lot of the legal system I don't like.
I don't like the idea that deals are made all these times.
And I know why prosecutors do it.
And in some cases, they do it for good reasons.
You know, like Sammy the Bull Gravano, guy, you know, admits to killing, I think, what, what, 19 people or something like that.
And then he gets in the federal witness protection program, a get out of jail free card, something of great value if you had committed those crimes, if you, in fact, testify in his case against John Gotti Sr.
And the question then is, okay, well, what do you want me to say?
The guy's an admitted murderer.
Okay, pretty much say anything.
Okay, like the jury, I guess, ultimately determines the credibility, but still, then sometimes you can't even bring up what the deal is.
And so there are certain things, incentives that are created in these political cases that bother me.
And just, you know, do you treat somebody who's high profile in the political world, is there any political ambition behind it?
Or if you go after certain firms that you know will gain notoriety and publicity versus maybe unknown companies that do either the same or far worse.
We also have some other breaking news.
We have new allegations of a massive cover-up by Cuomo on the nursing home total.
And anyway, according to this new information, it's much bigger than anybody knew at the time.
That's next in the other news of the day.
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 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.
What I told people I was making a podcast about Benghazi, nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
It's almost a dirty word, one that connotes conspiracy theory.
Will we ever get the truth about the Benghazi massacre?
Bad faith, political warfare, and, frankly, bullshit.
We kill the ambassador just to cover something up.
You put two and two together.
Was it an overblown distraction or a sinister conspiracy?
Benghazi is a Rosetta Stone for everything that's been going on for the last 20 years.
I'm Leon Nayfak from Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries.
This is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Yes, that's right.
Lock her up.
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
25 to the top of the hour, 800-941.
Sean, last thought on this raid at Giuliani's apartment.
Okay, we're going to talk about, you know, foreign interests and people working on behalf of foreign interests who failed to register as per the FARA Act as foreign agents.
Did Hunter Biden?
We know, according to the emails on his laptop, we know that he's been working for a Chinese investment company with ties to China's military.
We've had a Chinese official bragging during a videotape lecture that Hunter Biden was one of the Americans they've been cultivating to influence U.S. foreign policy.
Hunter Biden hasn't complied with FARA laws, did he or didn't he?
Where's the FBI raid on his mansion in Malibu or his home in Delaware or at the White House, wherever he's hiding out?
800-941 Sean will watch this.
You know, so they got this joint address to Congress.
I haven't heard people referring to it as a State of the Union address, which is a little odd.
But anyway, that's taking place.
Oh, Linda, you have clarity on that?
So I also thought this was odd, and so I looked it up.
And supposedly, the way that it works is a president's first address to Congress is called a first congressional address.
It's not called the State of the Union until they're in office for a year.
It's called the joint congressional address.
That's correct.
Yes.
Okay.
Thank you.
Welcome.
We have a wealth of information.
You just never know.
If you just knew a little bit more about five-year-olds and happy meals, you'd be the perfect person.
We'll get to that later in the show.
Poor kid.
He's never had a happy meal.
Happy meals make kids happy.
They got a toy and everything and you don't even, kids love French fries.
I don't even want to let you know that you can opt out and get fruit instead of French fries because kids love French fries.
French fries are good.
I promise I won't take away the frost.
You don't have to be air-fried either.
And I'm not against healthy eating.
I mostly eat healthy.
I don't have any choice or else I'll be on America's biggest loser.
I look at food and I gain 15 pounds.
It's true.
It's just a fact.
I've watched that show.
By the way, I watched that show with fascinating interest.
Number one, it's sad to see fellow human beings struggle.
And in this case, with obesity, morbid obesity.
And on the other hand, and I watch, you know, over periods of time, people losing hundreds of pounds of weight and how transformational their lives become.
It's a great redemption story to watch.
And those that succeed and the ups and downs and the valleys and the peaks, it's just, it's very human.
And it's, you know, when somebody's successful, I'm like, they're cheering for them.
Like, this is awesome.
So happy for this person, whoever it is.
And I don't understand addiction too much myself.
But anyway, well, one of the things you might hear tonight is Joe Biden is planning to ban menthol cigarettes.
All right.
I don't recommend anybody smoke.
I wouldn't want my kids smoking.
My parents smoked.
When I was young, I smoked, smoked cigars for years.
Yes, I have my jewel that is now infamous, but that never happened.
It just didn't happen.
Just like Joe was blowing, he didn't fall.
He didn't trip three times going up the stairs.
No, the wind blew him over.
That's what we were told.
Why are we banning menthol cigarettes?
Everybody knows the dangers.
You know, who makes the most money on a pack of cigarettes?
Government makes the most money, not the cigarette companies.
And people still want to smoke cigarettes, knowing that it doesn't alter their state of consciousness.
It's not that they're becoming a threat to others.
It's their personal choice, their priority.
They choose to do it.
Why don't we just leave them alone?
You know, we don't need the nanny state on everything.
Can't buy a big gulp, but you can buy two little gulps and make it a big gulp.
It's so stupid.
Anyway, that'll be announced this week, according to CBS News and the Washington Post, citing people familiar with the plan.
You know what this is going to do?
This is going to become a criminal enterprise because people that want their menthol cigarettes, they're now going to be turned into criminals because they'll buy them illegally.
That's what's going to happen.
They just opened up a trade for criminals.
Well, they're decriminalizing weed so they can just pick that up instead.
Yeah, exactly.
That's what an irony, right?
All these states, you know, they're making it legal to smoke weed.
And by the way, you want to talk about secondhand smoke?
You can't walk the streets of New York without that skunk smell.
It smells like a skunk.
It's absolutely repulsive.
It's so it makes me nauseous.
It's so disgusting.
Anyway, the ACLU warned Biden the ban would have serious racial justice implications for people of color and more negative interactions.
Remember the Eric Gardner case?
What happened in that case?
This is where the whole thing is so stupid.
Nothing would have happened in the Eric Gardner case.
Nothing.
They were wasting police resources.
And I'm sure the cops are not blaming them at all.
They're just taking, you know, they got bosses like everybody else.
And so this guy's selling loosey cigarettes.
You might say, what is a loosey?
Well, a pack of cigarettes now in New York is like, what is it, 15, 20 bucks?
I have no idea.
It's 50 cents a pack.
My parents used to send me down to the grocery store to get them packs of cigarettes.
Not supposed to buy them, but I did.
I broke the law.
Home's going to get raided in the next hour.
But anyways, if it's 50 cents a pack, that's 15, 20 bucks.
I mean, it's insane.
And a lot of that money goes to the government.
All right.
So there's still people that smoke.
It's more, people, addiction experts will tell you cigarette smoking, it's more addictive than crack, cocaine, and heroin.
That's how addictive it is.
And anyway, so about 20 million Americans apparently smoke them, according to the FDA.
The ban would not go into effect immediately.
Okay.
How do you think that's going to end?
90% of the House chamber is going to be empty tonight for Biden's address.
Now, don't expect Biden to give a bad speech tonight.
Although this is very weird with 90% empty.
Only 12.5% of seats are going to be filled because of coronavirus pandemic restrictions.
Well, aren't these the same people that told us that we got to get the shot and we're vaccinated, that we're going to have herd immunity and everyone will be protected.
That's what they told us.
Okay, so Congress has all had the opportunity for months, months, months, months, months, months, and months to get vaccinated.
Most of them love to brag.
Are you vaccinated?
I just got vaccinated.
It's like everybody that's famous.
I got COVID.
I don't know.
Am I an anomaly here?
And thinking that my medical information is my medical information.
It's none of your damn business.
Leave me alone.
I'll make the decision between me and my doctor.
I probably would have told people until people started demanding it.
You know, saying, well, Hannity needs to, I can't tell people to get a vaccine.
I'm not their doctor.
I'm urging them to, I can inform them about what I've learned myself and information that I find credible or put on doctors that have varying points of view, whether I disagree or agree.
But ultimately, that decision is going to be individual.
And this, you know, vaccine shaming.
There's now 40 states that literally are fighting and making laws against mandatory vaccinations.
Well, that would be a decision between a doctor and a patient, not the government.
But I'll tell you this.
Now, Joe's going to use words like infrastructure, emergency relief, rebuilding investments in, as he now explains the insanity of all the money that he's wasting here.
Now, Joe Biden, already $2 trillion emergency COVID relief, which wasn't COVID relief, blue state bailout.
He wants now $2 trillion more green new infrastructure deal.
That's mostly going to the environmental lobby, green energy contractors that happen to donate heavily to Democrats.
Probably China will be getting a big part of that too.
And he's going to explain why he wants to borrow another $2 trillion.
You don't have to be an MIT graduate to figure out if you add up the three chunks of his borrowing, it's $5.7 trillion.
The entire federal budget of 2019 was $4.5 trillion.
Nearly a trillion dollars of $4.5 trillion was deficit spending.
The $5.7 trillion cost of borrowing just for Biden just to start.
Guess what that is?
That's Joe Biden's plan to bankrupt America.
That's what you can call it.
We have the Washington Examiner and a Rasmussen survey.
50% have an unfavorable view of Vice President Kamala Harris.
43% expressed a very unfavorable opinion.
Okay, well, she's ignoring the border crisis and doing Joe's job.
Doesn't bode well for her.
You know, but this is going to be, he's going to lay out massive spending plan, his third massive spending plan.
We're going to be bankrupt.
And by the way, guess who's going to pay?
You, we, the American people.
His radical agenda is what it is, as we explained it to you.
And it's not the stuff he ran on.
He's going to say these are all investments, emergency investments, infrastructure investments, investments, investments, investments, investments.
It's not investments.
It's called the power grab.
It's called the biggest power grab in history.
You know, like, for example, killing American energy jobs, ruining energy independence, open borders, amnesty, D.C., Puerto Rico, statehood, demonizing, defunding, dismantling police officers and police, the police in general, packing the Supreme Court, ending the legislative filibuster.
He'll do anything and everything.
It's really the squad that's making all the calls here because they're doing all of the squad's bidding and following their agenda to the T.
I mean, it is, you know, the Houston Rockets owner talked about jobless people prefer the enhanced unemployment benefits than to go to work.
I'm hearing this from everybody.
The CEO of Landry's and owner of the NBA Houston Rockets said Tuesday on CNBC that businesses are having a hard time finding workers because of this enhanced unemployment benefit program that Congress has passed to combat coronavirus and the impact on the economy.
It's discouraging out-of-work Americans from even bothering to look for a job.
He said, yeah, well, you know, things, it's really amazing.
The month of April, we're up 2% in revenue compared to 19, which is the highest in the nation for all of our business.
New York is down 50%.
We have fewer case percentage.
So everybody criticized Governor Abbott for opening up.
And he goes on to say they can't get workers now because of why bother?
They're going to take from this group of people and give it to you.
And promise you, this is the false promises of socialism.
That we're going to guarantee you pre-K through college education, student loan forgiveness.
We're going to take those evil, rascally rich people's money and give it to you.
And we're going to pay for your schooling.
We're going to give you a guaranteed wage, guaranteed government job, guaranteed government healthy food, guaranteed government health care, guaranteed government retirement.
Okay, the same people that screwed up safety and security and law and order in cities, the same people that screwed up our school system, the same people that bankrupted Social Security and Medicare, the same people that said, keep your doctor, keep your plan, and save money, and millions lost their doctors' plans, and everybody's paid about 250% more.
It's the radical far-left agenda of Joe Biden and company here.
And this is real money in your pocket that they're taking away from you.
And it's going to get far worse as time goes on.
Because it's now going to be that they'll create more dependency, more poverty than ever before, unfulfilled promises.
And how much of your freedom do you give up in the name of false security?
$200 billion free preschool for three and four-year-olds.
$109 billion two years free community college.
Increase maximum Pell Grant by $1,400 a student.
$46 billion extra for historically black colleges, universities, and tribal colleges and universities.
Subsidized tuition for families earning less than $125,000 a year.
$9 billion for scholarships, training for teachers.
Got to take care of the teachers' union.
$225 billion subsidized child care.
Now government child care.
Great.
$225 billion to create the National Family Medical Leave Program.
$45 billion to improve schools and meals and benefits.
And I just can keep going.
And billions more for the IRS so that, you know, they'll be coming knocking at your door.
The New York State IRS, they spend more time down in Florida following people to Florida.
Why?
Because that's where people in New York are moving.
And you have to prove your innocence.
You have to prove you're a resident in Florida.
Or else they're going to say, take the money.
By the way, this new allegations of this cover-up by Cuomo, this is getting better.
Bigger, rather, by the minute.
And they're now saying that, in fact, it's much, much larger than they originally thought and that the cover-up is much greater.
New York Times, the effort of Cuomo's office to obscure the pandemic death toll in nursing homes was far greater than previously known.
AIDS repeatedly, AIDS that worked for him, overruling health officials over a span of five months.
By the way, they now say the CDC vaccinated Americans, you don't need a face mask when outdoors in small groups.
That's why 40 states aim to ban mandate vaccines.
We're living in socialist hell right now.
2022, we can't get here soon enough.
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 on Verdict with Ted Cruz now, wherever you get your podcasts.
What I told people, I was making a podcast about Benghazi.
Nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
It's almost a dirty word, one that connotes conspiracy theory.
Will we ever get the truth about the Benghazi massacre?
Bad faith, political warfare, and frankly, bullshit.
We kill the ambassador just to cover something up.
You put two and two together.
Was it an overblown distraction or a sinister conspiracy?
Benghazi is a Rosetta Stone for everything that's been going on for the last 20 years.
I'm Leon Nayfok from Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries.
This is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Yes, that's right.
Lock her up.
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, Leonard Skinner's simple man could mean only one thing, and that is allthingsbilloreilly.com.
And Bill has a big announcement to make, and it's not time, but we're getting very, very close.
It'll be next week.
We're going to have Bill O'Reilly.
He's a non-cupcake interview on this show at Bill O'Reilly because he's releasing, that might end up being after the release of this book, the last book he ever releases.
And it's called, he's had 15 number one bestsellers in his killing series.
And now he is announcing next week's release of Killing the Mob.
And I'm fascinated with all of these mob shows.
I love them all, starting with The Godfather and Goodfellas and Casino.
You name it.
I've seen it.
I can quote half of them myself as I'm watching along because I've watched them so often.
Bill O'Reilly, congratulations.
And I'm dying to get maybe a quick, quick tease of what's in this book.
It sounds pretty exciting.
Well, first of all, it comes out May 4th.
All right, next Tuesday.
I'm sending somebody over to read it to you, Hannity.
No, no, no.
So on the same day, because I said you didn't send me a book.
You said, yes, I did.
And then on one day, same day, I got both of them at the same time.
It would have been nice if you autographed it or something.
Yeah, the mailman stole it to read it and then he gave it to you.
Don't say that.
I love my mailman.
He's the greatest guy in the world.
Here's the best tease on Killing the Mob.
It's the 10th telling book, the most successful nonfiction book series of all time.
About 17 million copies in print of the killing books.
Now, organized crime was in the 1950s and early 60s the most powerful organization in America.
More powerful than the Senate, the House of Representatives, anybody else.
They ran the entertainment industry, the unions.
They bought politicians with big money.
They could do pretty much what they wanted to do because they had something on the head of the FBI, Jay Edgar Hoover.
Now, we can't prove what they have, but we did put in the book the allegations.
Again, I can't prove that Hoover did the things that people allege, but we have to put it in there because there is no doubt that the FBI did not investigate the mob from 1946 when it really started to perk all the way up to Bobby Kennedy.
Bobby Kennedy's the guy that turned it around.
So there is your headline for killing the mob.
It is fascinating.
You know what really is even more fascinating when you think about it?
If you look at states like your beloved state, my soon-to-be former state of New York, and you look at New York State and you look at the laws and you look at the five families that we have all heard about and you look at the years, the Gaudi years, et cetera, et cetera.
I mean, fascinating times.
But it is interesting to see that when it comes to government, what is the lottery system?
How is that really any different than the numbers that the mob allegedly ran, right?
Or how is it now most of the mob, in the early years, they tried to stay away from heroin and drug dealing, right?
Okay.
But they were involved in prostitution, protective services, loan sharking, things like that.
Well, now New York State is heading to the gambling business and the weed-selling business, all in an effort to get more money.
Well, why can't I have my own Hannity lottery?
Why is Bill O'Reilly, if he wanted his own lotto, you couldn't set it up as long as it was legit and real and the money was paid out?
Why can't you compete with that?
Well, the states now are all broke because they've wasted so much of taxpayer money.
They don't have any money.
So now they're doing what the early mob did.
They're into gambling, legalizing prostitution, legalizing narcotics.
State of Oregon legalized hard narcotics.
Remember that.
So if you're caught with heroin or fentanyl, methamphetamine in Oregon, nothing happens to you.
So the mob now, it's a different organized crime.
It's still there.
But they're living in these big mansions out in old Westbury, Long Island, Scarsdale.
You know, there's still five families in New York.
And there are still mob-dominated unions in Detroit and Chicago, in Los Angeles, very active organized crime.
So, but they've changed now.
And we get into that in the book.
But you're absolutely right that our straight professions, our government, says we give up.
We're going to legalize all drugs.
That's what the progressives want.
We're going to legalize all gambling.
We're going to legalize all prostitution.
All the vices that the mob amassed billions of dollars now the straight governments are in.
Interesting, isn't it?
It really is amazing.
And that's their fallback position, I guess, to have their own monopolies in these things.
And by the way, things that I don't particularly believe are good for society.
All right, so Joe's given what I guess is the equivalent of a joint session of Congress State of the Union address tonight.
It's going to be sparsely attended, COVID restrictions in place.
Now, it does raise a question.
If the vaccine, we were told, prevents people from getting or spreading COVID, and everybody in Congress now, for the longest time, has had access to the vaccine or they have antibodies because they already had it.
Why wouldn't they allow the chamber to be full?
Do you agree with that decision?
Yeah, I think they should give the option.
You want to go on in.
You should be able to go in there.
But Biden doesn't want a lot of people there.
I mean, and not many people know this, but he's delivering his speech at 9 p.m. because that's when you're on.
So he wants to go.
I know.
Thank you.
You're the only one that figured that out.
Everything, it seems to me that really the power brokers in D.C., the people whose agenda Joe's following, it's basically the squad.
Well, here's what's going on.
So Biden does what he's told.
We've discussed this before on your program.
He's not going to push back on anything.
Susan Rice comes in and the other guy they have in there, Ron, what's his name?
Klain?
Yeah.
So they come in and go, Mr. President, you know, this is what we want to accomplish.
So Ocasio-Cortez doesn't have any real power.
The power brokers are Pelosi and Schumer.
It's the progressive money that funds all the political action committees on the Democratic side, both state and federal.
And that money is demanding trillions spent on climate change on a theory.
They're demanding socialism instead of capitalism.
And they're demanding a race division, just as there was in the Soviet Union, in China, in Nazi Germany.
Divide the country.
Divide it on skin color and gender.
And then come to the bottom of the corner.
And then listen, rich versus poor.
Black versus white.
I call it the Joe Biden Punish the Achiever tour because that's what it is.
So if you're an evil corporation, it doesn't matter if you're a good corporation.
And both you and I, Hannity, we know there are some evil corporations, and we know there are some greedy billionaires who are terrible, awful people.
I could mention them, but I don't want to get you in trouble.
We know that.
You're such a wise ass.
No, I'm not going to be able to do people yelling at you.
I'll mention it on the no spin news on billorilly.com.
And a plug to boot.
Go ahead.
Okay.
So it's the Joe Biden Punish the Achievers tour.
That's what this four-year administration is.
We're going to punish you if you have made a lot of money honestly or dishonestly.
Although the mob, they deal in cash.
So they don't pay their taxes because it's all cash laundered through Vegas and other places.
But anyway, so I'm saying to myself, why?
What is this?
The highest amount of tax dollars ever received by the federal government was in the year 2019, right after the Trump corporate tax cut.
More money flowed into the U.S. Treasury under Donald Trump before COVID than at any other time in history.
Why?
Because more Americans and more companies and corporations were making money.
And they paid the government what the government asked.
So now Biden says, that's not good enough.
We want to make higher taxes.
What will that do?
That will constrict profits and it will throw people out of work.
And then the tax revenue is actually going to go down, I predict.
And Larry Kudlow agrees with me.
I think you are on sound economic fiscal grounds.
But do you think they care?
Do you think they care that tax revenue will go down?
They don't.
Because it's really rooted in something just a slight hair deeper and you're on to it.
And it's about the power that comes with redistribution.
You know, if you look at, well, there's a lot more people that are middle class or, quote, poor people.
And if we say we're going to take the money from them and we're going to give it to you and it's going to benefit you, by the way, promises that will never be fulfilled anyway.
That is a central tenet in socialism, redistributionism, collectivism, Marxism, whatever you want to call communism, whatever you want to call it, in any manifestation form it's ever taken, Bill O'Reilly.
It has failed.
Promises unfulfilled, more poverty.
And then it's a matter of, well, how much of your personal freedoms did you give up in the name of false security?
Exactly right.
I want everyone to stand up and give Sean Hannity an ovation.
You woke up on the wrong side of the bed today.
Go ahead.
I'm complimenting you.
That is exactly what it is.
You're going to lose personal freedom.
Because in this world, money buys security and protection.
That's what it buys.
Security for your family, protection for you and your family.
If you have assets, you can buy that.
I say it a different way.
I said money is freedom.
Well, it gives you options to travel.
It gives you options to educate.
It gives you options to give to charity, to help other people, as I do and you do.
Okay?
But the government wants to strangle personal freedom because that goes against the big central socialist government that tells you what you can and can't do and how much you can and can't have.
If you look at history, and I come from this as a historian now, not just a pundit, a journalist.
If you look at history and you line up the countries, nobody in China has any personal power, nor in Russia, nor in Cuba.
In Vietnam, they can barely feed themselves.
All right.
In North Korea, there's a famine always.
No one has power under these systems.
Yet, yet, the Democratic Party has thrown in with the socialist viewpoint.
I am really, I have to tell you, the biggest mistake I made was underestimating how powerful the progressive movement was and how weak Joe Biden is.
He's the weakest president ever.
And I'm talking James Buchanan and Millard Fillmore here.
It's shocking.
And as we continue, Bill O'Reilly is with us next week, by the way, gets a non-cupcake interview with the release of his latest book in his killing series, Killing the Mob.
As we continue with Bill O'Reilly, allthingsbilloreilly.com.
Bill, I was not wrong.
I'm not wrong.
He's weak.
He's frail.
He's struggling cognitively.
And I would argue that on any given day, flip a coin, whether he actually knows what day of the week it is.
Well, he's got to stay up late tonight.
His address is going to be fine tonight.
And he's going to have a lot of cliches and platitudes and bumper stickers.
And then it's going to be raw socialism hidden under words like investment and infrastructure and emergency relief.
It's not going to be, oh, we're going to take their money and distribute it.
It's going to be about fairness and paying your fair share.
You know, you and I may end up doing well under Biden's tax policies because all of his rich friends in blue states, they want to get rid of what Donald Trump put in place, which is the allowance for state and local income tax deductions, which, by the way, ended up with people like us paying more money because we were getting a benefit that fiscally responsible politicians didn't have.
We couldn't write off state taxes in New York, which are sky high and property.
I don't even care about that.
okay i'd because i have earned and that's a key word burned enough money to be cured but here's i want every but that's where we get a wrap Okay, real quick.
Hannity and O'Reilly succeeded in America.
That should never have happened.
If you look at Hannity and O'Reilly, there's no way those two guys are great God gave man.
I'm not disagreeing on this point at all.
No.
Bill O'Reilly, next week, you get a non-cupcake interview.
I'm giving you one week to prepare for it.
His new book will be released next week, Killing the Mob.
We'll have more details.
We'll put it up on Hannity.com.
Bookstore is everywhere, Amazon.com, O'Reilly.com.
Thank you, sir, for being with us.
Always appreciate it.
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 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 at Verdict with Ted Cruz Now, wherever you get your podcasts.
What I told people, I was making a podcast about Benghazi.
Nine times out of 10, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
It's almost a dirty word, one that connotes conspiracy theory.
Will we ever get the truth about the Benghazi massacre?
Bad faith, political warfare, and frankly, bullshit.
We kill the ambassador just to cover something up.
You put two and two together.
Was it an overblown distraction or a sinister conspiracy?
Benghazi is a Rosetta Stone for everything that's been going on for the last 20 years.
I'm Leon Nayfak from Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries.
This is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Yes, that's right.
Lock her up.
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, 25 to the top of the hour, 800-941 Sean, you want to be a part of the program.
So last night on Hannity, we had on this LAPD officer, and his name is Deion Joseph.
I mean, the guy was amazing, 25-year veteran of the LAPD.
And in my mind, LeBron James has kind of gotten a pass after doxing in your next, the cop that actually saved the life of this unarmed African-American teenager pinned to a car about to be stabbed to death.
And, you know, it was a half-assed, it wasn't even an apology.
And this was a letter that Officer Deion Joseph wrote to LeBron.
Now, what caught my eye last night as I was interviewing him, because I used to be a huge NBA fan.
I could tell you about the Knicks and Frasier and DeBusher and Bradley and Willis Reed and Wingo on the bench, Earl the Pearl and Frasier.
I mean, this is one of the greatest lineups ever.
I could tell you about the Boston Celtics with Larry Bird and DJ and Parrish and Mikhail and Danny Yinge going up against Showtime and Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
I mean, it just was an amazing time in basketball.
Then the Michael Jordan era, another amazing time in basketball.
I mean, the finals got, what, 5.6, the last game of the finals in the NBA, 5.6 million people.
You know, Michael Jordan, you know, his last day, or one of, I think his last playoff game, it was like 36 or 40 million.
I mean, that's how, that's how much, you know, wokeness has impacted professional sports.
It's not working.
It's not good for anybody.
Anyway, so this guy was a big L.A. Laker fan, and nobody was a bigger L.A. Laker fan than my friend that passed away, Dave Stone.
Man, did he love the Lakers?
El Jim Baylor.
He actually, for years, was the announcer for the Harlem Globetrotters and traveled the globe.
I mean, I sit there captivated hearing these stories for years, loving every one of them.
Anyway, so he's a 25-year LAPD officer, goes to Facebook, addresses LeBron James, said that his stance on policing was off-base and extreme.
He said his tweet that targeted the police officer in Ohio who saved a young woman's life was irresponsible and disturbing.
He wrote, quote, it showed a complete lack of understanding of the challenge of our job in the heat of the moment.
You basically put a target on the back of a human being who had to make a split-second decision to save a life from a deadly attack.
And then he says, instead of apologizing, you just deflected.
You said you took your tweet down because you didn't want it to be used for hate when the tweet itself was the embodiment of hatred, rooted in a lack of understanding of the danger of the situation.
I acknowledge that Joseph did, the officer, like James, he also is tired of African-American people dying and hates racism and hates police brutality.
I would think that's something all good people agree with.
But he said you can't paint 800,000 men and women who are of all races and faiths and sexual orientations, also mothers and fathers and sons and daughters and preachers and coaches and community members and just human with a broad and destructive brush.
And unlike some who have dug in their heels in the belief that police are inherently evil, I think if you yourself actually sat down and had a real, honest, open conversation with a cop, there's a strong chance you may discover we're not the monsters that you have come to believe we are who deserve the hate and disdain that you have.
It's an LAPD officer.
Happens to be African-American.
Shouldn't be relevant, but I'm just pointing it out.
He said that police officers and communities must come together, build bridges to save lives on all sides.
The offer's on the table, LeBron.
No cameras, no fanfare.
Just two men who care talking.
I know it's a long shot, but this division and hatred must stop.
And at the end of the letter, he thanked James for some of the positive things he did, has done over the years.
Anyway, here's a small segment from last night.
I don't want to call him irrational because if I wasn't a police officer and all I saw 24-7 on social media and on the radio was that the police are out to get black people, police hate people of color, and they're repeating that over and over and over again.
I'd probably feel the same way.
So I was LeBron James before I became a police officer.
Wow.
I mean, that conversation with somebody, you know, who's so influential like LeBron, it might go a long way.
All right, 800-941-Sean, our number, let's go to Bernie.
He is in the state of New Joise.
What's up, Bernie?
How are you, sir?
Glad you called.
Boynie from Joysey.
What's going on, man?
How are you?
All right, not too bad.
Hey, listen, from one great American to another, I've got a question for you.
Yes, sir.
You've mentioned earlier this week, and I'm sure you've done before, that Pelosi is bowing to AOC's socialist agenda.
And since she and the squad are kind of the young punks in Congress, why is she so threatened by her?
I think you're asking a great question.
And look, right now it's a six-seat majority of the Democrats in the House.
It's that thin.
Okay.
So the answer to your question is AOC, the leader of the squad, Congresswoman Omar, Tlaib, you know, all the people, pressly that we talk about all the time that have the most radical Green New Deal views.
Okay, they have the power to remove her as speaker at any point.
And Nancy Pelosi, there is no compromise within the squad or these Green New Deal radical socialists on these issues.
You know, if you, if, and I'll give Ocasio-Cortez, Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez, you know, the benefit of the doubt that she really believes what she said over a year ago, that we only have 12 years to save the planet.
Okay, she believes that.
Why would she compromise on that?
She doesn't have to.
And Nancy Pelosi is afraid of her.
Chuck Schumer's afraid that she may challenge him and win in New York for his Senate seat.
And I think that Biden, I don't even, he just does what he's told.
I don't even think he's aware of what day it is half the time.
Anyway, Carol is in Florida.
Hey, Carol, how are you?
Thank you for checking in.
Glad you called.
Thanks, Sean.
Nice to talk to you.
I really appreciate your optimism on the possible success of the Republican Party in 2022.
I think, yeah, we really need that.
But I think we really need to have a conversation first about stopping what happened to the presidential election.
And we really need real reform in election laws, and we need to stop HR1 first.
Because look at what the Dems got away with with the presidential election, and they're going to double down.
They're not going to let up.
Well, HR1 is a doubling and tripling and quadrupling down.
You know, there's a reason Joe Biden, whose state of Delaware has more restrictive voting laws than the new Georgia law by far, is calling it Jim Crow 2.0.
He's doing it.
So how do we light a fire under our conservative leaders to do what Georgia did?
Because now everybody's afraid to do what Georgia did because of the backlash.
See, we're singing from the same hymn, Noel.
And this is what I've been telling people.
The first order of business now, you can't wait till 2022, is to get your state legislatures to fix and ensure integrity and confidence in voting and the results thereafter.
And there are four specific things that need to happen.
Number one is you need voter ID just like they have in Delaware.
Number two, you need signature verification.
Number three, you need chain of custody and maintained with both sides being able to watch a ballot from the moment it's received to the moment that it is opened.
And then you need partisan observers, part number four, to be able to observe the vote counting to ensure the integrity.
Those four things are key to me.
Now, the good news is, is the only thing that we need in Georgia's signature verification added, they need to add that.
The next thing is they're working on bills in Pennsylvania, Arizona, and Michigan and Wisconsin to fix and solve these problems.
You got to put pressure on your local state senators, your state assembly men or women, or state legislators.
And if you do that, that's step number one.
And stop HR1, that's pressure on your United States senators.
Yep, absolutely.
And I would, as you deputized everybody to help out and do these things, I challenge everyone to actually do something.
Don't just complain about it, to do what you said and reach out to your local government and press them to get a backbone and change this before 2022.
Listen, I know some people might want to just check out right now.
It's not the time to check out.
Because if we don't get this fixed, there's no reason having a conversation about 2024.
Exactly.
Because I'm concerned.
I feel like my vote doesn't count.
I feel like it's not going to matter because they cheated.
Well, at the end of the day, we have to do something.
That's where I'm saying to everybody.
I'm deputizing everyone bespoke in the wheel and ensure election integrity and confidence in election results.
It's simple.
Listen, there's really two things that Democrats don't want.
Now, they don't want partisan observers.
They definitely don't want chain of custody, but they really don't want voter ID and signature verification.
Why?
Well, I don't know.
Maybe I'm just suspicious.
I grew up in New York.
I'm not that trusting of people.
I've seen a lot in my life, and I'm a trust-but-verify guy.
And I think if people find a way and have an easy path to cheating, I wouldn't put it beyond people to cheat.
And I think we've got to hold them accountable and keep them honest.
That's all.
It's like if I owned a casino, you know, they have the eye in the sky and you could see every single square inch inside a casino.
I'm a big believer in the eye in the sky theory.
You think, well, nobody would cheat at gambling.
Yeah, well, let's keep people honest and keep an eye on them.
You know, trust but verify, Reagan called it.
All right, Carol.
Thank you.
Good call.
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.
What I told people, I was making a podcast about Benghazi.
Nine times out of ten, they called me a masochist, rolled their eyes, or just asked, why?
Benghazi, the truth became a web of lies.
It's almost a dirty word, one that connotes conspiracy theory.
Will we ever get the truth about the Benghazi massacre?
Bad faith political warfare and, frankly, bullshit.
We kill the ambassador just to cover something up.
You put two and two together.
Was it an overblown distraction or a sinister conspiracy?
Benghazi is a Rosetta Stone for everything that's been going on for the last 20 years.
I'm Leon Napok from Prologue Projects and Pushkin Industries.
This is Fiasco, Benghazi.
What difference at this point does it make?
Yes, that's right.
Lock her up.
Listen to Fiasco, Benghazi, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
All right, back to our busy telephones.
Heidi is in Massachusetts.
What's up, Heidi?
What's up?
How are you?
Glad you called.
Oh, thank you, Sean.
Thank you for taking my call.
I guess I'm calling because I'm frustrated.
I'm frustrated that the Republicans don't fight back.
And what I mean by that is go on the offense and follow through with things that they find.
Like the Democrats are so vocal, like Hunter's laptop.
What happened to Anthony Bobolinski?
What happened to Tara Reed?
What happened with this John Kerry thing that's happening now?
I hope they push and follow through.
What happened to Michael Horowitz?
Where's John Durham?
I mean, I could add to your list.
There is a phenomenon.
Democrats rarely, if ever, break ranks.
Republican fighting never ends.
I mean, Liz Cheney has her own personal agenda now.
She's in leadership in the House, and we hear she wants to run for president.
Okay.
That's something you won't see Democrats do very often, if even at all.
And as it relates to all the issues that you bring up, well, you can blame the media mob.
You can blame big tech.
You can blame the Democratic Party.
And yes, you can blame weak Republicans.
If we can get voter integrity and we can stop the power grab, packing the courts, ending the legislative filibuster, D.C. statehood, if we can hold the line on all of this and get to 2022, Republicans take back the House, they win those seven state seats that I keep talking about, then Republicans will be in a much better position come January 2023.
And then everything will be about 2024 and who's going to run as a Republican and who's going to run as a Democrat.
I think it's a pretty safe bet it's not going to be Joe Biden as the Democrat.
That's my guess as of today.
Is Donald Trump going to run?
I don't know.
He said to me the other day when I interviewed him, first time I'd interviewed him since the election, that he's thinking seriously about it and he's leaving every door open.
Will he?
But regardless of whether he runs or not, the agenda remains the same.
And I keep saying we're the party of liberty and freedom and the Constitution.
We're the party that believes in law and order so every American's safe and secure.
We conservatives, I'm not a Republican, conservatives believe in choice and education.
Conservatives in fundamental foundational principles, including our Constitution, First and Second Amendment.
We believe in low taxes, less bureaucracy, secure borders.
We believe in energy independence, peace through strength, free market solutions for health care, protecting pre-existing conditions, and free and fair trade.
Am I missing anything?
No, it all sounds great.
I don't understand how everybody doesn't feel the same way.
Well, I mean, as a conservative, that's what I've always believed.
There's not one thing on this list that needs to be changed in my view.
And I think that is the America First, Make America Great Again agenda.
And I think if Republicans unite around that agenda, they will win.
If they fight, if they make promises, then follow up and fight.
Learn from Trump.
Trump fought.
The reason so many people like Donald Trump is Trump kept his promises and he fought hard every day and he took crap every day.
If you don't have the stomach for it, don't run for the office.
You know, I could speak.
It's not easy being a public figure, but don't do it if you can't handle it.
Anyway, good call, Heidi.
Great points.
Right on target.
We'll continue.
All right, news rounds up information overload hour 800-941.
Sean, you want to be a part of the program?
We spent a lot of time talking about the left and this lurch towards radicalism that's going on in the country, and it's real.
I mean, it is the most radical agenda in the history of this country.
I mean, it's really that simple.
And, you know, how America deals with this moment is going to forever alter and change the future of this country.
And we better be paying attention.
If you look at Biden's 100 days in office, they've not been good for you, not been good for the country.
Joe Biden said he was all about bipartisanship and unity, unity, unity, right?
Well, he's as radical a socialist as every member of the squad.
And every day we see it.
And of course, with the help and support of the media mob, et cetera, it's just getting worse.
There are a couple of Democrats, though, that are out there that have said, you know what?
You people are being dumb.
And this isn't going to end well.
I can name three of them.
Tulsi Gabbard, you know, she has said, stop the radicalization of everyone and everything.
It is racialism.
We're all children of God.
And she's been taking on the left and her party, and she's hated for it.
I mean, she's hated.
Now, I've known James Carville for many years.
I've debated James Carville on the road many times together.
One thing James Carville is not, he's not crazy.
He acts a little crazy, but he's not.
And he's not dumb.
He's a smart guy, and he understands politics.
And he has talked about at length how wokeness is a problem and how everybody knows it and how it's hard to talk to anybody today.
And I talked to lots of people in the Democratic Party who don't say this, but they don't want to say it out loud.
Large parts of the country view us as an urban, coastal, arrogant party, and a lot gets passed through that filter.
That's real.
I don't give a damn what anyone thinks about it.
It's a real phenomenon, and it's damaging the party brand.
Bill Maher took this head.
He's been taking it head on.
I'm no fan of Bill Maher's, but he's not dumb.
And he's more libertarian, but he's a smart guy.
And when they go to get him canceled, it's not going to be the Sean Hannity's of the world that want his show canceled.
Anyway, he said, you know, why advertisers, why do they love 18 to 34-year-olds in that demographic?
He says on the show, because it's the most gullible.
A third of people under 35 say they favor abolishing the police, not defunding, but getting rid of it altogether, which is less of a policy position than more of a leg tattoo, he said.
36% of millennials think it's a good idea.
Maybe we should try communism.
But much of the world did try communism.
And I know millennials think that doesn't count because they weren't alive when it happened, but it did happen.
And there were people around who remember it.
Here's some more of what he said.
So when you say you're old, you don't get it.
Get what?
Abolish the police and the border patrol and capitalism and cancel Lincoln.
No, I get it.
The problem isn't that I don't get what you're saying or that I'm old.
The problem is that your ideas are stupid.
If you say, let's eat in the bathroom and in the kitchen, yeah, that's a new idea.
But I wouldn't call it interior design.
All right.
He gets it.
What is this going to result in?
I would argue the Republicans taking over the House and having a very good chance in 2022 of winning Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Arizona Senate seats.
That's where I think this is going to end up for the Democratic Party.
It's not going to go very well in the end for them.
Now, is Joe Biden going to be as outspoken as Ocasio-Cortez?
No, he's going to wrap his socialism around the words investment and infrastructure, and he's going to wrap it around emergency relief and need, et cetera.
And he will not be as blatant as his fellow Democrats that seem to lead the party.
Anyway, will he get through tonight's speech, even though he's weak and frail, and we all know he struggles cognitively?
Yeah, he'll get through it because you basically read two lines, people stand and clap.
You get to take a rest, and then you read two more lines and they stand again.
That's how State of the Union addresses go.
You don't need to work too hard to give it.
Anyway, for a quick preview, we have Congressman Kevin Brady of Texas's 8th District.
Anything that I've just said here that you disagree with, sir?
No, Tom, I don't.
And I'll tell you, listening to tonight's speech, what the president should say is I inherited this strong economy and those life-saving vaccines from President Trump.
The border crisis is of my making, and I plan to tax spend and borrow from your children's future because all of that is exactly true.
My guess is we won't hear that.
But the last part is true.
All these proposals tonight is going to be about expanding government control and mandate, taking more from what you earn and giving government control, more control over every aspect of your life.
You know, socialism, I always say this, and I got into this a little bit earlier with O'Reilly.
Socialism, the promises are there.
Everything's going to be free.
We're going to take from this evil group of people over here that have too much, and we're going to give it to you.
And we're going to guarantee and take away all the fears you have in life.
Guaranteed government job, pre-K through college paid for you.
Student loan forgiveness paid for you.
Government wage guaranteed.
Government health care.
How did Obamacare work out?
Free, free, free.
Government retirement, government healthy food, government, government, government.
Okay, the promises.
I don't have any stress in my life ever again because the government's going to do it.
The same government that bankrupted Social Security and Medicare.
The same government that promised to keep your doctor's plan and you're going to save money.
We're all paying 200% or more for health care.
The same government that can't keep law and order in our cities and the same government that fail our kids in the educational system, Congressman.
Yeah, can I tell you a real-life example of this?
You're going to hear it from the president about why there needs to be free paid medical and family leave required of every business in America.
And look, we think companies shouldn't be offering that for their workers, not as a Washington mandate.
It should be tailored to their workers.
But guess what?
If you look at how they finance, it won't be in this bill.
What they're looking at financing that is cutting your payroll.
So you get about a 3% increase in payroll taxes.
So here's in real life.
You got mom and dad both working, each making $50,000.
So just a middle-class family.
They will pay $120,000 out of their paychecks over the life of their career for this free medical paid leave.
Whether they use it or not, they're going to have permanently smaller paychecks.
That sort of drives home exactly the point you just made about free is rarely free when the government's involved.
Now, they're only going to allow, what were you told as a congressman the rules were for tonight?
Because my understanding is there's only going to be about 200 people in the chamber.
Now, if the vaccine, which we've been told by the government, works and every member of Congress and the Senate has had, what, months now of an opportunity to get the vaccine, and most have taken that option, at least publicly, they're saying that they have.
I have no reason to question it, nor do I think it's any of my business to know anyway.
But they have and they've stated so publicly.
So if they're vaccinated, I would assume why the fear of maybe people that chose not to get the vaccination?
And why not allow everybody to go?
Some, it is all political theater.
There's no science to it, as you know, just as there was no threat to security, yet we had the fence and the Commissertina wife around this capital for months.
We've all been vaccinated.
Many of us, like me, have had COVID.
We're wearing masks and we're socially distanced.
And it's foolish to have these rules in place.
And I really think it undermines the whole point of, look, do your job, get vaccinated, start to have a normal life again.
And yet here, Congress is just acts.
This is just political science.
And so I think it undermines the whole point about why you want to get vaccines in the first place.
It's silly.
Well, the point is, is they change their minds like every other day.
Well, now you can be outside without your mask, but you can't be inside with your mask even if you're vaccinated.
I don't know.
I mean, I took certain things out of this, and I'm not sure what these mutations and variants, how they might down the road alter the equation or my thinking on it.
I'm not a doctor.
I don't know individuals' pre-existing conditions, their medical issues that they're dealing with.
I believe, Congressman, in medical privacy.
And I'll tell you this, the one thing that remained constant, although we're seeing signs that it might be changing, is that the most vulnerable to the coronavirus were older people and those with comorbidities or preexisting conditions or compromised immune systems.
And I would just urge people to protect those, that group of people in your life and be thoughtful, knowing about social distancing, masking, et cetera.
Then every other decision, as far as I'm concerned, is up.
You know, people have whatever appetite they have for risk, it's going to be up to them.
I believe in freedom.
We saw this in Texas where, like Florida, we reopened soon.
We opened in phases.
You know, there'd be a flare-up.
We would tamp it down and expand freedom further next go-round and got there.
And as I travel the country, and I was in New York City here a couple weeks ago, watching to see all this, boy, they are, their health and safety isn't any better than the growth in the freedom states, except that you've destroyed all these lives of families, of small businesses, of employees for them.
It's just brutal how people have been treated.
What I noticed in Texas is when the governor lifted mask mandate, common sense sprung up.
You know, people wore them where it made sense.
They didn't when it didn't out in the fields and walking around the neighborhood and running and all that.
And I just think when government sets silly examples, people don't follow it.
I mean, they just don't.
Yeah.
Well, we'll be watching tonight.
Our friend Senator Tim Scott is going to give the rebuttal speech after Biden.
And he's a rising star, has been from day one in the Senate and a great guy and a friend of this program.
And anyway, we appreciate you being with us, Congressman Kevin Brady of Texas.
All right.
Hope you'll check in with us often.
800-941-Sean, you want to be a part of the program.
We'll take calls for the rest of the hour, whatever's on your mind.
All right, back to our busy telephones here as we say hi to Dale is in Florida.
Dale, hi, how are you?
Glad you called.
Well, thank you, Sean.
I just want to let you know that I never got the opportunity to speak to Rush, and it's a pleasure to speak to you, sir.
Listen, nobody can replace him.
We miss him every day.
And what a voice.
He literally educated generations of us.
Incredible.
What an incredible, greatest of all time broadcaster.
One in a million.
One in a billion.
Unbelievable.
But thank you for your kind words.
Thanks for calling.
Thank you.
I wanted to tell you something that happened to us just this weekend.
My daughter graduated from college.
We wanted to celebrate down here in Florida.
So she and her husband flew down and we decided to go to Disney World.
So we spent a wonderful weekend.
Well, it's interesting as we stopped to get dinner.
We stopped at a restaurant.
The parking lot wasn't very full.
So we thought, hey, this will be great.
As we come in, we get told that we'll need to have a seat in the lobby in the waiting area.
So we did.
And we sat there for five or ten minutes.
And next, another group comes through with five or six people.
And the hostess said, oh, it'll be a 30 to 45 minute wait.
Well, they hadn't told us that.
And the people leave.
A couple minutes later, another group comes in.
Same thing repeated.
Well, she looks at us and she says, you know, it'll be a 30 to 45 minute wait.
And we said, okay, well, wait.
When she realized she wasn't getting rid of us, a couple minutes later, we get a table.
As I come in and sit down, I notice there's a couple tables that haven't been cleaned.
My son-in-law at the other end of the table looks and he counts.
He's counting them.
He says, well, I can see six from here that aren't cleaned.
So when the waitress came by, I asked her, I go, what's the situation?
And she said, we cannot get help.
She said, for the past year, we have been understaffed.
They would rather stay home and draw unemployment.
We can't get anyone to work.
We just cannot run the restaurant the way it should be done.
It was surprising to me.
I have six children, taught them all how to work.
They have a fantastic work ethic.
And it just blew my mind as I saw this.
Dale, this is way more common than you think.
We've been chronicling it.
And it's because people are making more to stay home than they would make working.
And that is the danger when it's not about emergency relief for those really in need.
And it's sad to hear that.
I mean, I think one of the best things I did in my life, Dale, is I wash dishes, I bus tables, weighted tables, tended bar, painted houses, hung wallpaper, laid tile, framed houses, you name it, roofing.
I did it.
And I just think real work is good for the soul.
And I think that everybody needs a purpose in life and needs to contribute.
I don't think you can be happy just sitting at home all day.
I don't think it's good for people's minds, bodies, or spirit.
And it's sad.
But if we, if this continues, nobody's, why should you work?
And that's what this whole redistribution model never factors in.
Anyway, great observation.
Congrats on your daughter graduating, by the way.
I bet you're a proud dad.
Absolutely.
Thank you so much.
All right, my friend, 800-941, Sean, quick break.
Your calls, a final half hour straight ahead.
25 to the top of the hour, 800-941, Sean, if you want to be a part of the program.
So, Linda, you think you're skating, I bet you think that I forgot, don't you?
You forget.
I forgot about our poll yesterday.
And we put up a poll question on Hannity.com.
We were discussing McDonald's for some reason.
I don't remember how it came up.
And you know, McDonald's sells roughly three to five billion burgers each year.
That's 5,000 every minute.
Wait, say that number again.
Okay.
McDonald's sells anywhere between 3 and 5 billion burgers every year.
5,000.
Billion with a B. With a B. Billion with a B.
Yeah, B, boy.
I'm just making sure.
You know, I got Radio Weirs Titan.
That just seems like it's B Biden.
There you go.
Anyway.
One of my favorite items on the menu is what's called for kids a happy meal.
Like they got a chicken nugget happy meal.
It includes chicken nuggets.
It includes little small french fries.
And usually you can get like apple juice instead of a soda for your kid if you prefer.
You can even get fruit instead of, I guess, the, I guess, what do you call it?
The french fries, if you want.
Although every kid loves french fries that I know.
Anyway, so, or you can get the cheeseburger happy meal.
Now, why do they call it a happy meal?
Because they also include a toy.
So anyway, we asked the question on Hannity.com.
Should Linda listen to me and get her son, five-year-old Liam, a happy meal from McDonald's?
Because she won't do it.
And I think it's unbelievable.
I think he would love a happy meal, and she won't allow her son to have that experience.
And anyway, so we put up the poll.
Let me see.
I got to put my glasses on.
What are those results they say on the poll?
So you'd be able to see that better if you ate more carrots instead of French fries.
Oh, Oh, 85 to 15.
Yes.
You should take little Liam to get a happy meal to make them happy.
I'll have, you know, I win again.
First of all, I'll have, you know, what everyone in the studio was on your side.
They're not on my side.
Katie is over here giving me this look.
She's like, come on, you got to get them the toy.
That's what they want.
They want the toy.
I'm like, this kid has plenty of toys.
He's fine.
He doesn't need any more toys.
It's the experience.
It's the experience.
Did you take your kids to McDonald's?
I'd like to be a member of this show.
Did your kids go to McDonald's?
Boss?
Sean, she's asking you a question.
Now, listen, my son is a very, both my kids are very healthy eaters.
They're athletes.
I'm sorry.
What was the answer?
The answer is they still occasionally.
But did you take them when they were little?
Did you take them?
Yes, of course I did.
Absolutely.
I'm just checking.
I mean, yes.
I don't understand.
Liam will love it.
And then he's going to say, Mom, Mom, please, you know, can we go back to McDonald's and get a happy meal?
I want a happy meal.
And then you're going to say, well, if you're a good boy, I'll get you a happy meal, but only if you're a good boy.
And that will give you something called leverage over your child.
So when your child wants something badly and you offer it, it's a carrot and a stick.
It helps control their behavior, their impulses that every child has at that age.
I have something else that controls my child.
It's the mom's there.
I've perfected it.
I get to one.
I get to two.
I never get to three.
My son knows.
This is Linda.
I hear her on the phone all the time.
First of all, it works.
Hang on, boss.
Hang on, boss.
Liam, what did mommy say?
What did mommy say?
Liam.
And what does he say?
He repeats me and he stops.
One, two, and then you get to...
Now, Liam, Liam, what did mommy say happens when I get to three?
Liam, Liam, pay attention to mommy.
I got to listen to all this, right?
I'm on hold.
That's right.
Well, you're on.
I'm listening to this.
And it's Liam, one, two.
She never gets to three.
That's right.
Because he knows.
He knows three.
You never get there.
That's right.
He has no idea what three is.
He thinks three is a magical number that never occurs.
He actually told me last night he hates the number three, which I thought was very funny.
Yeah, because you've caused, you've traumatized him.
Oh, so you want me to manipulate him with McDonald's, but three is off the charts.
Now, you got to let him get the french fries instead of the fruit for crying out loud.
Now, listen, I agree with you on that.
Children love french fries.
My son needs, I've never seen, there's something going on between four and eight years old.
Every time I have a play date, anytime the kids are anywhere, french fries is all the kids want.
It's literally the only thing they eat.
I've never seen anything like it.
I'm sure every parent listening is.
So are you going to pledge to take Liam to get him?
You really need to get him two happy meals, one one day and one another day.
Let him try the chicken nugget happy meal, and then you need to try the cheeseburger happy meal.
I will take my son to McDonald's the next time he deserves a special treat, and I will film it, but I guarantee you he doesn't eat the chicken nuggets or the burger.
He'll probably just eat the fries.
And play with the toy.
Probably.
And then the toy will end up broken.
Every kid loves apple juice, right?
Yeah, my son loves apple juice.
All right.
Now, we have a special caller.
You were telling me about this, that we're going to check in with Wendy today.
She had called this program before and in the middle of, you know, the shift show.
And she has a business.
And why don't you tell everybody, pick it up from there?
Yeah, so we've got this, this awesome lady.
Her name is Wendy.
She's from Florida.
She called in.
She's a big fan of the show and of you, of course.
And she's got a great restaurant called Outpost.
And then she carries these ridiculous chocolates.
They're Belgian chocolates called Leonidas.
So out of the kindness of her heart, she sent us two huge boxes of chocolates right before bikini season.
Thank you, Wendy.
And so, you know, everybody in the studio, the whole staff, you know, Russia show, our show, they're all like chomping on it.
Like, these are amazing.
Well, the awesome thing is our audience is so terrific.
And they started calling her restaurant, buying gift cards for first responders.
Even Matt Towery called her.
He's like, yeah, I'll be stopping by.
I'm local.
You know, I mean, it's just, it's just a nice, happy story in the midst of like nothing but negativity that will we ever hear about.
So I thought we'd bring her back and talk to her and just say like just how great it is.
We're so excited that Outpost is doing good in the midst of the pandemic.
All right, Wendy, welcome back to the program.
Now, when you called this program, remind people the moment that you made this call to the show.
Great to have you back, by the way.
Hi, Sean.
Hi, Linda.
Hi, Katie.
Well, I called in because I was listening to you talk to different people about the pandemic and how it's affected everybody's business.
And so I thought, well, you need to talk to me because I have a restaurant I opened in September in the middle of everything and everything shutting down.
And when I spoke with you on the phone, you so graciously asked me the name of my business and my business blew up from there.
I can't thank you all enough.
I remember.
Didn't I say, I want to go to your, I want to go visit your place.
Your place sounds awesome.
What was it?
Was it the waffles?
I can't remember, Wendy.
I remember him freaking out about something you made.
It was, well, yeah, we have a shaggy Belgian.
It's called crystallized Belgian waffles with homemade fried chicken, pork belly on top.
And yeah, it's delicious.
And Sean, you wanted all the Philly cheesesteaks, which we make amazing chili cheesesteaks.
But you did say that you put your ice cubes in your beer.
So all the guys.
Did everybody make fun of me about that?
Oh, yeah.
Big time.
We have a beer school that we're starting here.
And so we want you to come to beer school so you can learn all about the Belgian beers and not put your ice cubes in your beer.
All right.
So all my buddies are into, what do you call?
What are they called?
IPAs.
IPAs, right?
And they're into like, and I buy them.
I actually will order it for them and send it to their house as a gift when they're really into it.
You know, I'm fine with a Coors light, Heineken light.
I don't care.
Bud Light.
I like all that.
And I put ice in my beer.
Beer fills me up, though.
Lately, I've been, I've kind of moved on to Tito's.
Well, well, if you come to Florida and you come here, we will give you all kinds of little samples of beer and you can find one that you like.
So I'll leave nice and wasted so I can go do my shows.
Is that all you want?
Oh, man, I want to do the show that day.
I think we should do it live from Wendy's restaurant.
So, I mean, so this is a horrible thing.
This has happened to so many people.
And what people don't understand, and I do, because I worked in the restaurant business, and my dad was a waiter.
I mean, he worked many, many years every Friday, Saturday, Sunday as a waiter as a second job.
And it's hard work, but the margins, think about this.
By the time you rent your place or buy a piece of land and build the place and you build your bar out and you get your tables set and you get the glasses and the silverware and you stock your bar and then you got to, you know, if you have a menu and you got to get all the ingredients for every item on your menu and then you got to hire a chef and then the dishwasher and then you need other people in the kitchen and then you need preppers and you need waiters and waitresses and bartenders.
Okay, you haven't even made five cents.
And then you're paying your light bill and your insurance bill.
It's the margins are so tiny.
You have to do a massive volume in the food industry, the beverage industry.
You make more money on the booze, but you need high volume to even think about getting back to even.
Never mind making a profit.
Yeah, we do.
Yeah, and you know what we're doing?
We're expanding.
In the middle of all this, we're doing so good with the support of the community.
We have an opportunity to take another 1,000 square feet.
We're putting the chocolate in the front for a store space, and we're doing a private dining room, and then the rest will be still the restaurant.
We're doing a lot of to-goes.
Linda mentioned about we've had so many generous callers calling in.
We did have a couple of people calling and get gift cards for first responders because they don't live in the area.
And then we just had last weekend a family come from Michigan that came route, you know, toward our restaurant because they heard you speaking with me like six weeks ago when we spoke.
Yeah.
So, well, first of all, so your business is doing well.
Are you in the black?
Are you making money now?
Yeah, I mean, we're after Easter, it's slowed down a little bit, but we're doing really well.
And I think because Florida is so open, you know, thank you to Santis again.
But you know what the problem is?
And I've heard you speak about it.
We can't get any help.
The people that we have are amazing.
We have a great group of people that work for us, but just like everywhere, there's help wanted signs everywhere.
And some places like corporate, like there was a Chili's restaurant that wasn't even open until 2 o'clock because they had no staff.
So that's the problem with everyone getting all these stimulus checks and all the unemployment that's at work right now.
We had another caller earlier today talk about the same thing, and you can't even get in a restaurant and the tables aren't even being bussed.
And they have all these customers that they have to turn away, which is terrible.
So tell us, so you're expanding your business.
Tell us the name and location and if people can go visit.
And if we get down there, I forgot what part of Florida you're in, but I'd love to come see your place.
Yep, we're in Clearwater and we're in Clearwater.
It's called Outpost.
Yep, Outpost 611 Eatery and Tap House.
And then Linda mentioned the Leonidas Belgian chocolate.
I get it shipped in every two weeks from Brussels.
And I have about 35 different pralines.
My husband and I are in competition.
He does the beer and I do the chocolate.
And I sell a lot of chocolate, so he's trying to keep up with me.
Okay, if I worked in your business, I'd be 600 pounds and I'd be on TV on that show, The Biggest Loser.
I mean, I wouldn't be able to work in that environment without eating and drinking every minute of every day.
Well, thank God we're running around a lot because between chocolate, good beer, and then a scratch kitchen, we're all in big trouble.
I'll tell you what we're going to do because I love entrepreneurs like you and we're so happy for your success.
We're going to put it up on Hannity.com and I urge our Florida, Clearwater, Tampa, Tampa FLA listeners to head on over and see you and say hi.
Maybe people from Sarasota can swing over.
And Sean, can I make a recommendation?
Maybe instead of sending me a recommendation.
Yeah, instead of sending me the McDonald's for the happy meal, maybe we should take a road trip to Wendy's restaurant and we could have Belgian chocolate.
I'm just saying.
Okay, when we're down in Florida, I'm up for it, but that doesn't get you out of your happy meal bet that you lost.
This poor kid is deprived because you're neurotic about food.
You're not going to believe this.
Wendy, everything.
Did you ever see the show, The Exorcist, the movie?
You remember when Linda Blair's head turns in 360 and she projectile vomits green puke?
Well, that's basically the color of Linda's lunch every day.
Are you talking about it?
Either green puke or puke orange.
Today, for your information, I had a nice salad and with some rolled tuna.
And then I had some Leonidas chocolate, courtesy of Wendy.
So there you go.
Well, that was nice of you, Wendy.
Thanks for taking that.
Thank you, Wendy.
Well, you all have been amazing, and I thank you so much for everything you all do every day.
And Katie, too, she got me through the first interview, and now she just got me through this one.
So thank you.
All right, Wendy, best of luck.
We're going to put it up on Hannity.com.
That's going to wrap things up for today.
We will be on later tonight after Joe Biden gives his joint speech before both houses, with I guess only 90 people in attendance.
And then, of course, Senator Tim Scott and his rebuttal.
We have Jim Jordan, Mark Meadows, also Kayleigh McEnaney, Leo 2.0 Terrell, Larry Elder, Lindsey Graham, Ted Cruz, and much, much more.
Nine Eastern, Hannity, Fox News.
Set your DVR for 11 tonight.
Well, set your DVR for 9.
And we'll be back at our regular time tomorrow.
Anyway, we'll see you later tonight.
Thanks for being with us.
Back here tomorrow.
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