CAUGHT: Vance, Rubio Admit Their Attacks On Speech Mean US NOT A Free Country In Old Video

Summary

Bulwark Takes: CAUGHT – Vance, Rubio Admit Their Attacks On Speech Mean US Not A Free Country In Old Video
Release Date: April 17, 2025

Hosts:

• Tim Moa
• Sarah Longwell

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Introduction

In the April 17, 2025 episode of "Bulwark Takes," hosts Tim Moa and Sarah Longwell delve into a controversial revelation involving prominent Republican figures. The episode centers on newly discovered videos of GOP members—specifically J.D. Vance and Marco Rubio—where they critique the erosion of free speech in the United States, a stance that starkly contrasts with their current political actions under the Trump administration. This episode explores the implications of these contradictions, particularly in light of the administration's efforts to revoke Harvard University's tax-exempt status.

Trump Administration's Attack on Harvard's Tax-Exempt Status

The episode opens with Tim Moa introducing the main topic: the Trump administration's recent request to the IRS to revoke Harvard University's tax-exempt status. The rationale behind this move is Harvard's handling of protests, particularly those related to Gaza, as well as its diversity practices (DEI initiatives). Tim sets the stage by highlighting the gravity of this action, suggesting it could signal a broader crackdown on organizations perceived as politically left-leaning.

[00:00] Tim Moa: "The Trump administration has asked the IRS top attorney to revoke Harvard's tax exempt status because of its handling of the protests, the Gaza protests, as well as their diversity practices or dei."

Historical Context: Republican Stance on IRS Overreach

Sarah Longwell provides historical context, drawing parallels to the Obama administration's IRS targeting scandal involving Tea Party groups. She reminisces about the Republican outcry during that period, emphasizing how figures like Marsha Blackburn, John Thune, and Lindsey Graham vocally opposed the IRS's misuse for political targeting.

[00:53] Sarah Longwell: "There are some big players today and some particularly interesting clips that come from Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Charshit poster in chief, J.D."

Exposing the Contradictions: Old Videos of GOP Leaders

The core of the episode revolves around the revelation of old video clips where Republican leaders explicitly condemn the use of governmental power to suppress dissent. These clips are juxtaposed against their current support—or at least acquiescence—to actions that undermine free speech and target specific organizations based on political leanings.

J.D. Vance's Contradictory Stance

J.D. Vance, now a prominent figure in the Trump administration, is showcased making strong statements about the importance of protecting free speech and opposing governmental overreach.

[02:31] J.D. Vance: "If the IRS can go after you because of what you think or what you believe or what you do, we'd no longer live in a free country. That's what this is all about."

Tim Moa highlights the irony in Vance's current position, suggesting that by advocating against IRS overreach, Vance inadvertently positions himself as endorsing authoritarian measures.

[02:50] Tim Moa: "If the IRS can go after you because of what you think or what you believe or what you do, we no longer live in a free country. So by JD's own standard, we currently no longer live in a free country."

Ted Cruz's Silent Contradiction

Ted Cruz is examined next. In old clips, Cruz advocates vehemently against the misuse of federal agencies for partisan purposes, emphasizing the need for rule of law over political vendettas.

[08:31] J.D. Vance: "If we are going to respect rule of law, the apparatus of the federal government cannot and should not be used as a partisan tool to bludgeon your enemies."

However, Sarah points out Cruz's inaction in the present context, where he has been a staunch ally of the Trump administration's retaliatory policies.

[09:17] Sarah Longwell: "He has not spoken out. ... Ted Cruz has been such a sidekick to a president who ran specifically on a retaliation platform, which is what this is."

Marco Rubio's Shift in Rhetoric

Marco Rubio's earlier statements are also scrutinized. In past remarks, Rubio expressed alarm over governmental overreach akin to practices seen in authoritarian regimes, underscoring America's foundational principles of limited government.

[10:16] Marco Rubio: "Is this still America? ... when you read a headline that a powerful government agency is targeting people because of their political views, that's the kind of headline you read from other countries, not here in America."

Tim Moa critiques Rubio's current role as Secretary of State, suggesting that his actions now mirror the very authoritarian behaviors he once condemned.

[11:08] Tim Moa: "He [Rubio] has made a choice to embrace the tinpot dictatorship and to embrace the fact that we are gonna act in the ways that you only used to see in the third world."

Implications for American Democracy

The hosts discuss the broader implications of these contradictions. By actively participating in or failing to oppose actions that undermine free speech and target organizations based on political beliefs, these Republican leaders are betraying foundational American values.

[14:04] Sarah Longwell: "They were right about that then, and they are wrong now."

Tim emphasizes the severity of the situation, pointing out that when leaders openly admit that such actions are indicative of a loss of freedom, yet partake in them, it signifies a profound threat to democracy.

[14:04] Tim Moa: "That's in their own words. This is what they're doing."

Conclusion: Upholding Democratic Principles

The episode concludes with a strong reaffirmation of the importance of maintaining the rule of law and protecting free speech. Tim and Sarah urge listeners to recognize the hypocrisy and take action to safeguard democratic institutions from partisan abuse.

[14:55] Tim Moa: "Very, very wrong."

Sarah adds a final thought on the necessity of resisting governmental overreach, regardless of political affiliation.

[14:55] Sarah Longwell: "It is wrong for the government to go after the tax exempt status of organizations that they think who are... advocating for a policy position that the government finds distasteful. But that is living in a free country."

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Key Takeaways:

• Historical Inconsistencies: The episode highlights the stark differences between Republican leaders' past advocacy for protecting free speech and their current support or indifference towards policies that threaten it.

• Authoritarian Tendencies: Actions such as attempting to revoke Harvard's tax-exempt status based on political behavior are framed as authoritarian moves that undermine democratic principles.

• Hypocrisy in Leadership: The hosts argue that Republican leaders like J.D. Vance, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio exhibit hypocrisy by endorsing policies that contradict their earlier statements about safeguarding American freedoms.

• Call to Action: Tim Moa and Sarah Longwell emphasize the need for vigilance and resistance against political misuse of governmental power to preserve the integrity of American democracy.

Notable Quotes:

• J.D. Vance (02:31): "If the IRS can go after you because of what you think or what you believe or what you do, we'd no longer live in a free country."

• Marco Rubio (10:16): "Is this still America? ... that's the kind of headline you read from other countries, not here in America."

• Sarah Longwell (14:04): "They were right about that then, and they are wrong now."

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Conclusion

This episode of "Bulwark Takes" serves as a critical examination of the evolving political landscape within the Republican Party. By juxtaposing past advocacies with present actions, Tim Moa and Sarah Longwell shed light on the potential erosion of democratic values. The discussion underscores the importance of accountability and consistency in upholding the freedoms that define the United States.

Transcript

[Tim Moa]

Hey, everybody, it's Tim Moa from the Bulwark here with my bestie, Sarah Longwell, publisher of the Bulwark. And Sarah's team has found some extremely revealing video of Trump Cabinet officials, Trump's vice president, that is relevant to the big news of the day with regards to the administration trying to strip tax exempt status from Harvard. So before I let Sarah explain it to you, just real quick. The Trump administration has asked the IRS top attorney to revoke Harvard's tax exempt status because of its handling of the protests, the Gaza protests, as well as their diversity practices or dei. Sarah, talk to us about, like, what the implications of this are before we get to these videos that everybody's got to stick around for.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, so here's the thing. This is a Barry Rubin special. But you know, Tim, you like me because you and I have known each other now for a million years. We all used to do kind of like oppo research on the Republican side.

[Tim Moa]

Yeah.

[Sarah Longwell]

And so I remember when these Republicans were going on TV constantly to talk about the Obama administration who they thought were unfairly targeting Tea Party groups. And this became like a pretty big scandal. They held hearings about it. Ultimately, no. You know, I think James Comey was the head of the FBI at the time. They all declined to sort of, there wasn't enough evidence to actually prosecute anybody. But Republicans were calling for prosecutions. And I remember this. And so my team just, it was, and it was so easy. So many of them went on television on Fox News and other places to talk about how under no circumstances could the IRS to revoke people's tax exempt status or otherwise target people who were being accused of wrong think or wrong speech. And you know, when as we were going through the clips and it's everybody like it is Marsha Blackburn, it is John Thune. But there are some people, I mean, Lindsey Graham's all over the place talking about it, but there are some big players today and some particularly interesting clips that come from Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Charshit poster in chief, J.D.

[Tim Moa]

Vance.

[Sarah Longwell]

I don't know if you want to.

[Tim Moa]

Run through some of that nice shitposter in Chief with J.D. vance. I've got to start. Well, you know, you're usually supposed to save the best for last, but the JD One is so delicious and I'm so annoyed with him today, we're going to have to start with him. Here is JD Vance a couple of years ago.

[J.D. Vance]

This is about whether we have functional constitutional government in this country. If the IRS can go after you because of what you think or what you believe or what you do, we'd no longer live in a free country. That's what this is all about. And if you think they're not gonna eventually use it against your politics, whatever they might be, it's ridiculous. They certainly will.

[Tim Moa]

All right, so I just wanna put a finer point on this one for you, Sarah. If the IRS can go after you because of what you think or what you believe or what you do, we no longer live in a free country. So by JD's own standard, we currently no longer live in a free country. He's the vice president of an authoritarian country. By the standard, yes.

[Sarah Longwell]

And can I just say so like the, we don't have to go so deep on what the issue was way back in the Obama years versus now, but I do want to say like that was a question of whether or not were these, was the IRS giving undue scrutiny to groups that were affiliated with the Tea Party?

[Tim Moa]

Yep.

[Sarah Longwell]

This is like a full on revocation. Like if that was the end of American democracy, what they're doing now, and this is, let me tell you what, Harvard is just the beginning. Harvard, because Harvard refused to do like Columbia, they rolled over. Lots of people have been rolling over. But there's a lot of rumors about how they're going to start going after 501c3 tax exempt organizations of all kinds that are perceived to be on the left. And so just so you know their position, people who are still in Congress and still in positions of power, one of them is actually our Secretary of State. These people believed that that kind of behavior was third world, end of democracy stuff.

[Tim Moa]

This contrast is such a good point also. Right. Because you know, the government is unwieldy. You know, I remember that, I, I remember the general strokes of this IRS scandal during the Obama era. And it's like, you know, again, that's not good. If you have like a mid level bureaucrat, you know, in one of these agencies, particularly the irs, who's like, you know, I'm going to give extra scrutiny, I'm going to really target this group because I think they're noxious or because I looked at their filing and something smells bad. Like again, like this is not good. You know, there should be investigative reporting. People should look into that, like that behavior versus the President of the United States, you know, dictating to the IRS attorney, you have to remove the tax status of this group. Because I don't like the way that they're, they're acting or I don't like the way that they're, they're dealing with speech issues or you have to go target and look into the finances of these other groups because I see them as hostile to me. I, you know, just to put a fine upon what you said like that, like that directive makes this so much worse than what they were talking about as far as the end of democracy. Because that like, accusation never came up. There was never, no, at no point to everybody say, Barack Obama is telling the IRS to do this. There was a lot of like, implication or like, you know, there's some gray area, but there was never any like evidence of that or really even like a clear accusation of it.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, they certainly, because actually, just because I've spent the days watching these clips, I know that they were kind of saying like this, this tone is set at the top is how they were doing it. Right. It was things like that. What they didn't have is just a full on bleat from the President of the United States saying, like, I'm taking away their tax exempt status because they're like radical left, you know, people. And so they don't deserve it. And we're like, oh, okay, so it's not, it's Trump is not even I, Trump, I, I sometimes I just really wanted to be a fly on the wall when Trump's lawyers see these things that come through. Because if he, he was originally trying to keep it in the realm of like, we're going to remove, you're not going to get federal funding anymore.

[Tim Moa]

Right.

[Sarah Longwell]

You know, whatever. But now it's like, no, no, we're going to yank their tax exempt status. And it's because of this political stuff. And if, look, I don't want to bore people with the Finer points of C3 tax status law, but I will say if you are a 501c3 nonprofit, as many universities and sort of organizations are, that deal with a lot of policy issues, what you can't do is overt politicking. Right? You can't say elect this person or don't elect this person.

[Tim Moa]

Harvard endorses Kamala Harris. You can't do this.

[Sarah Longwell]

Harvard cannot do that. And so there are real rules around 501c3s. And so I don't know if going back, you know, and looking at the way that some of the stuff, like the Tea Party Express stuff was very clearly affiliated with sort of a political movement. And so that is one of the ways you can get caught up is like, you've got to make sure and lots of people do this and you have lawyers that are there to make sure that the way that you're doing things is, stays in the realm of sort of research, research and education and doesn't go into direct advocacy. Okay, so that's the distinction, is the direct advocacy. And so Harvard, he's not accusing them of direct advocacy. He's just saying, like, their feelings represent liberal ideology.

[Tim Moa]

You're not hiring enough conservatives.

[Sarah Longwell]

That's right. He's not making a direct accusation of like, they're actually doing political stuff, because that's what I'm pretty sure. I bet Harvard is quite careful about all of this, as are most groups with this status.

[Tim Moa]

All right, we have a couple other clips I want to show you. We've all. We all know that J.D. vance is a shape shifting phony and it's snide and obnoxious, is one of the most least appealing people in all of public life. But there are principled conservatives out there like Ted Cruz. Let's see what Ted Cruz had to say.

[J.D. Vance]

I can also assure you that were this a Republican president, a Republican Attorney general, and a Republican irs, that we're targeting Democrats, I at least would speak out just as vigorously against it. Because if we are going to respect rule of law, the apparatus of the federal government cannot and should not be used as a partisan tool to bludgeon your enemies.

[Tim Moa]

There it was, clear as day, if a Republican president did something like this, he would at least speak out just as vigorously against it. Sarah, I know your team's been monitoring. What has Ted Cruz said about this so far today?

[Sarah Longwell]

Well, I know this is going to come as a huge shock to you, but he has not spoken out. And it's weird because he says in here that he can assure us. I don't know. I don't feel assured in this moment. And it's like. But they're right, you know, if we're going to respect the rule of law, the apparatus of the federal government cannot and should not be used as a partisan tool to bludgeon your enemies. Which is interesting then, that Ted Cruz has been such a sidekick to a president who ran specifically on a retaliation platform, which is what this is.

[Tim Moa]

Yeah, it is interesting. Well, we'll just see. Maybe Rafael Cruz will surprise us tomorrow. Okay, we've got one more that I want to show you. As you mentioned, there are a bunch of them. Just don't worry that John Thune, since he's the Senate Majority Leader, is out there because he's John Thune. His kind of milquetoast Integrid comment, but we should watch Marco Rubio looking quite a bit more youthful and with smaller ears, weighing in on this a few years ago.

[Marco Rubio]

Is this still America? Is one of the first things I asked myself when I saw what was happening. When you read a headline that a powerful government agency is targeting people because of their political views, that's the kind of headline you read from other countries, not here in America. So you're absolutely right when you state it that way. That is the concern that so many of us have. I want you all to know how deeply committed I continue to be to this issue, because to me, it's a fundamental issue of our constitutional rights. One of the things that separates America from the rest of the world is that our founders knew from history that no matter who's in charge of government, if that government gets too big and too powerful, it will abuse that power. Well, we're seeing evidence of that here now with the irs. We need to remember our constitutional founding principles of limited government, because they are the right thing to do for our country. They're a distinguishing feature of this land, and we can never afford to lose that. And I will be tireless in stating that case over and over again to anyone that will listen.

[Tim Moa]

These are typically the things you see in the Third World, says Marco Rubio. And, you know, I guess to steal a line from my buddy Pablo Torre, in some ways he's right. Because while we've been exporting refugees to El Salvador, it seems like we're importing El Salvadoran values and policies to America. So in a lot of ways, Marco is more right than he thought there. But the Secretary of State now seems essentially happy to be the point. The lead diplomat for a country with Third World values now. Right. I mean, I don't. I almost don't know if this is hypocrisy. He seems to be owning this.

[Sarah Longwell]

Yeah, I mean, well, I do think it's. Is it hypocrisy? Not exactly. Because you're right, the embrace, they. They know what they're doing. Like, you could show this to Marco Rubio. You can this to J.D. vance. I mean, J.D. vance was saying that. That he was already a US senators. That clip is only a couple years old. Marco Rubio is obviously saying this back in. I don't know.

[Tim Moa]

Yeah, the mid-2013-14 or something.

[Sarah Longwell]

But still, you'd think that they would feel a certain amount of shame. And in fact, we've always done this in our shop, like back when they were, you know, when we were trying to Defend the special counsel. We were playing all this stuff about from Republicans talking about how you had to take the special counsel seriously and you know, whatever impeachment things around impeachment. So their hypocrisy is pretty. You could used to be able to embarrass them with some of this stuff in a way that I think now it's fun to find them because it's such a stark contrast to what they're doing at the moment. But I don't think they feel shame about it. Like, they know Marco Rubio knows. There's a million clips of him speaking in stark contrast to the way he behaves today. And he's just decided, yolo, I'm Secretary of State. And like I sometimes it looks like his soul is leaving his body when he's around. But like he, like he knows what he's doing and these are not gonna, he's gonna be like, yeah, well, joke's on you guys that never, none of this ever mattered to me.

[Tim Moa]

Yeah, he's made a choice to embrace the tinpot dictatorship and to embrace the fact that we are gonna act in the ways that you only used to see in the third world. As he said 10 years ago, it's a sad choice, but it is pretty noteworthy. And it's something that as this story, it was worth doing a video on because as the story continues to evolve, as you pointed out, Harvard is not the end of the story. This is going to continue to come. It's important to remember and know and have these clips, which is if they're going to do this, they're doing something that the vice President has said you don't do in a free country and that the Secretary of State has said you only see in a third world country. And so when people are like, oh, you're overstating it when you use authoritarianism or threats on democracy or what like they're saying it, it's in there. It's in their own words. This is what they're doing. And any final thoughts on this, Sarah?

[Sarah Longwell]

Only that it's such like I always have this feeling when I watch the old videos of them. Yeah, they were right then, right? Like they were right. The federal government should not. And this is the. At this time when I remember this stuff happening, you know, it was hard to figure out exactly what like definitely was going on and how like widespread. But I certainly think that it is wrong for the government to go after the tank tax exempt status of organizations that they think who are. They're not actually guilty of doing politics. They are just guilty of leaning right or left or advocating for a policy position that the government finds distasteful. But that is living in a free country. And they were right about that then, and they are wrong now.

[Tim Moa]

Very, very wrong. All right, that's Sarah Longwell. Subscribe to the feed. We'll be back soon. Appreciate y'all. Peace.