← The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
Dems Refuse to Fully Protect Trump, Israel Explodes Hezbollah Pagers & Dems Cynically Block Legislation Protecting IVF
00:45:46
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- [00:01]
Ted Cruz
Welcome. It is verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And Senator, they can't even keep it together at the White House 48 hours before they continue to call Donald Trump a threat, less than 48 hours after someone tried to kill him. They're now back to the rhetoric of we hate him, you should hate him. He's a threat to our country.
- [00:24]
Ben Ferguson
Look, Democrats sadly are truly unhinged. We saw just a couple of days ago the second assassination attempt on President Donald Trump in 64 days. And yet just a couple of days later, the Democrats are not saying we need to protect Donald Trump. Joe Biden is not saying we need to provide a full presidential detail to protect him. Kamala Harris is not saying protect Donald Trump. Instead, they're doubling down on he's terrible, he's evil, he's a threat. It is disgraceful. Is there no decency? I'm reminded of the McCarthy hearings. Have you no decency, sir? At long last, have you no decency? They will not even stand up and say, we are going to assign Secret Service protection to ensure that neither of the presidential candidates are assassinated. Instead, their hate dominates them. We're also going to talk about an incredible story, a remarkable story, where Israel detonated pagers that had been distributed to Hezbollah terrorists and Hezbollah terrorists ended up being wounded and even in some cases killed. It is an extraordinary story. We're going to talk about that. And finally, we're gonna talk about the vote on the Senate floor that happened this week on in vitro fertilization and how the Democrats cynically engaged in a political move to block my legislation to protect IVF because they wanted to see the American voters and have an issue to campaign on. All of those are issues we're going to get into in today's pod.
- [02:00]
Ted Cruz
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- [04:27]
Peter Doocy
Days since somebody allegedly tried to kill Donald Trump again. And you're here at the podium in the White House briefing room calling him a threat. How many more assassination attempts on Donald Trump until the president and the vice president and you pick a different word to describe Trump other than threat?
- [04:49]
Karine Jean-Pierre
Peter, if anything from this administration, I actually completely disagree with the premise of your question. The question that you're asking it is also incredibly dangerous in the way that you're asking it because American people are watching. And to say that, to say that from an administration who has consistently condemned political violence, from an administration where the president called the former president and was thankful, grateful that he was okay, from an administration who has called out January 6, called out the attack of Paul Pelosi, called out and said we need to lower the temperature after the Butler incident. And now for you to make that kind of comment in your question because your question involved the comment and a statement and you know it is, that is also incredibly dangerous.
- [05:55]
Ted Cruz
When I love at the end she says that is also incredibly dangerous. Okay, so she admitting, yes, we're using dangerous rhetoric. Yes, we are purposely calling Donald Trump a threat. Yes, we're saying to all the crazies up there. Keep up the good work. Two of you've tried. Keep going.
- [06:11]
Ben Ferguson
So, Ben, let me ask you something. Look, that whole answer from Karine Jean Pierre was outrageously offensive. But I want to ask you, what do you make of the two words she uses? The Butler incident. Yeah, that may be one of the most chilling euphemisms I've ever heard. The Butler incident. I mean, she didn't say the attempted assassination of President Trump. She didn't say when an assassin shot President Trump in the head, hit him, and came within a half inch of murdering him. She just says the Butler incident. That is disgraceful. And they cannot bring themselves even to have a moment of graciousness, a moment of civility, a moment of respect for democracy. Look at that same White House press conference. Karine Jean Pierre also referred to Donald Trump as a threat to democracy. Now, that's incendiary rhetoric. It's rhetoric that is obviously designed to continue to encourage people who hate him, to continue to encourage lunatics. And the sad thing is, can they not bring themselves to say, it would be really nice to hear Joe Biden stand up and say, I disagree with Donald Trump. I think his policies are wrong. But what happened this weekend was horrific. It was wrong. It was evil. What happened in Butler, Pennsylvania was horrific. It was wrong. It was evil. And understand there's no place for violence. And we, the Biden Harris administration, we are going to do everything necessary to protect Donald Trump. And that includes look on you and I on this podcast. Two days ago, on Monday, we called for the Biden Harris administration to provide a full presidential Secret Service protection detail to Donald Trump. Given two assassination attempts in 64 days, it is the obvious step. And on Monday, I said, listen, if Kamala Harris has any sense, she would stand up and call for this. Now, sadly, I guess I over overestimated Kamala, overestimated Joe Biden because they're not capable. They hate him so much that they're not capable of saying, this election will be decided by the voters. We will not allow some crazed lunatic to threaten to murder one of the candidates. The voters of America are gonna side and we're gonna do everything necessary to keep them safe. They can't say that because their hatred so consumes who they are.
- [09:04]
Ted Cruz
It's not just them. And I think this is a stark moment because the White House, and for people that don't know how it works, you have a comms team, you have the chief of staff, you have people that meet. They obviously had very clear conversations about Donald Trump and the second assassination attempt on him. And they clearly made the decision for Jean Pierre to go out there and to continue to refer to Donald Trump as a threat to America, a threat to democracy, a threat to our way of life. They didn't want to ratchet down. And so when I see that center, I just have to. Now just be honest with you. I'm like, all right, you. You guys. I mean, do you want him dead? Because you're not giving them protection. You're not trying to stop it. You're not condemning it. You're going out there and you're using the same damn words that got us to this point. So is that the game plan now, like nothing else has worked? So you crazies will keep giving you the words you need to be inspired. Is that how far gone we are in this country, especially on the Democratic side of things?
- [10:09]
Ben Ferguson
Look, I don't want to impute that intention to them, but what I will say is that neither Joe Biden or Kamala Harris is standing up and leading right now. Neither one of them is willing to say, we need the same protection that Trump had when he was president, and frankly, the same protection that he will have when he's reelected president in November. Like, that would be the gracious, the honorable thing. And by the way, it might even help Kamala Harris politically to demonstrate that she's not just a hard leftist partisan. But I just believe that. So, look, I think the hard left, they are so consumed by hate, they really do believe. They believe he's Hitler. They believe he's the devil. And so they can't bring themselves. They can't bring themselves to be honorable and gracious and say, it would be horrible for America, horrible if either of the two presidential candidates were murdered before election day. Look, it would be horrible for America. I don't want. I certainly don't wish any violence on Kamala. I'm glad she has a Secret Service detail. As we talked about on Monday, I pray for Donald Trump's safety. I pray for Joe Biden's safety. I pray for Kamala Harris's safety. But why is it. What is it with this White House, what is it with Democrats that they can't reciprocate and say the same thing?
- [11:38]
Ted Cruz
Well, and even on cnn, they had a former FBI counterterrorism expert on. And he was just telling the truth. He said on cnn, it's the rhetoric that got us here. And this second shooting was clearly, quote, politically motivated. Meaning it's the politics here and the rhetoric being used in the politics. And this was said on cnn. I don't know if this was his last appearance ever, but he did say it once.
- [12:04]
CNN Correspondent
What does the fact that he wanted.
- [12:05]
Ted Cruz
To survive say to you?
- [12:08]
FBI Expert
It says that he's not. First, he's not suicidal. Apparently he wasn't going to take his own life if he was almost being captured. Clearly we saw that he was captured without that. And it tells me that he's probably much more politically motivated. The last shooter in Pennsylvania. I don't want to say his name because I don't want to promote him in any way, but he was clearly a guy that was looking for the notoriety of taking that shot. I would think we're going to find that this guy's extremely politically motivated and that he probably was spurred on by much of the political diatribes that are going on these days, talking about Trump equating him to Hitler and things like that. So I don't think this is the last. We'll see if crazy's out there trying to do this.
- [12:46]
Ted Cruz
He's warning, this is not going to be the last of the crazies if you guys keep it up.
- [12:51]
Ben Ferguson
And the White House couldn't refrain from the horrible and hateful rhetoric for even 48 hours. They're so invested in it. Would it be that hard for them to say, you know what, we don't like Trump's policies. We think they're bad for America, by the way, you and I don't, but they do. And that's legitimate political discourse. But they can't. They have to describe him as an existential threat to our nation. And they have to know that only encourages yet more crazies to do more crazy things. And when you combine that rhetoric with the continued decision. So Joe Biden and Kamala Harris has done nothing, zero to increase the protection around Donald Trump that we know of. They're certainly not out there saying, we will make sure this will never happen again. If you wish harm on, on either of the presidential candidates, you will fail, you will be arrested, you will be shot. You will not succeed. They're not saying that. And that is an incredible dereliction of duty and dereliction of their responsibility.
- [14:00]
Ted Cruz
It's also another part of this story that has really exposed, and I'm not gonna call them a liberal media anymore. I'm just gonna call them the state sponsored media. Cause that's what they are. And what they're now doing is they're victim shaming. Uh, it's, it's the same way that you see people that victim shame an attractive young female after she's sexually assaulted. Like well, if she didn't wear that beautiful dress and, and, and, and, and dress provocatively, dot dot dot. It's victim shaming. And now they're doing what Donald Trump like, well, if Donald Trump wouldn't just you go play golf, then this wouldn't happen. If he wouldn't have outdoor rallies, this wouldn't happen. It's actually his fault that Pete, that he's, that he's getting shot at. This was Joe Scarborough first chance back, right? First time back on TV after someone tried to kill Trump. And what was their conversation talking about victim shaming and mentioning a golf course that had nothing to do with Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach. He used a point about a golf course. I think it was in Virginia.
- [14:58]
Joe Scarborough
Listen, Secret Service showed a new president Donald Trump photos of how you could shoot long range pictures of him while he golfed at his Virginia club and warned that an assassin could kill him the same way. But Trump insisted that the clubs were safe and he was going to keep playing golf despite the fact that his habit quote at the semi public courses put his life at risk for many years.
- [15:27]
CNN Correspondent
Anyone who has had any experience with the Secret Service know that it is in a way, I would say teamwork where the Secret Service can do what they can do. They also have to warn you, right, as to when their job is harder or their job is made impossible.
- [15:47]
Ted Cruz
I mean, let's just victim shame him. It's his fault, folks. He deserves it.
- [15:51]
Ben Ferguson
Well, Ben, to be fair, no other president of the United States has ever in the history of this country played golf. Donald Trump is the only president so reckless and irresponsible as to go to a golf course.
- [16:02]
Ted Cruz
Right, Valid point. Right? No, yeah. And that we've never seen any other president playing golf. Good point.
- [16:08]
Ben Ferguson
Look, look, I want to go back to this. That is friggin absurd. Let's be clear. Gerald Ford went to the golf course repeatedly. Richard Nixon went to the golf course repeatedly. Jimmy Carter went to the golf course. Ronald Reagan went to the golf course. George Herbert Walker Bush went to the golf course. Bill Clinton went to the golf course. Barack Obama went to the golf course. Every president of our lifetimes and before has gone to the golf course. And yet what does MSNBC say? It's his fault. How dare he play golf? Because understand, they're operating in a world where they hate Trump so much that they view the only place he should be safe is in an underground bunker at NORAD in Colorado. Because if he's out in public, that their view is, well, look, he's taking a risk he's gonna be killed. That is like that whole exchange and the line, well, with the Secret Service, it's a back and forth, it's a conversation. Well, you know what? Every other president, they had Secret Service and yet somehow they managed to play golf. Why? Because the Secret Service was able to protect them. Here there is not a sufficient detail to protect Donald Trump. Why? I believe because Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and Alejandro Mayorgas are so political, they do not want to assign the resources necessary to protect Trump. And so that, I gotta say, that exchange just pisses me off.
- [17:34]
Ted Cruz
It's constant and it's, it's constantly happening now. They're not holding back at all. And, and we have a media with a narrative that a, it's his fault and he's a threat to this country. We put together a couple of different montages of, of the left and the rhetoric that they used against him. These are the highest people in our government and the, and the state sponsored media. This is what they said. And I'm going to remind people, here's just some of their biggest words they've used to attack Trump.
- [18:05]
CNN Correspondent
I just don't even know why there aren't uprisings all over the country. And maybe there will be.
- [18:10]
Ben Ferguson
People need to start taking to the streets.
- [18:12]
Ted Cruz
This is a dictator, you know, there.
- [18:15]
Karine Jean-Pierre
Needs to be unrest in the streets.
- [18:16]
CNN Correspondent
For as long as there is unrest in our lives. Enemies of the state.
- [18:20]
Ted Cruz
Show me where it says that protests are supposed to be polite and peaceful. Do something about your dad's immigration practices, you feckless.
- [18:28]
Ben Ferguson
When they go low, we kick.
- [18:30]
Commentator
How do you resist the temptation to run up and wring her neck?
- [18:33]
Ted Cruz
Biggest terror threat in this country is white men. Most of them radicalized right off to the right.
- [18:40]
Commentator
I thought he should have punched him in the face. I said, even if you lost, he insulted your wife. He came down the escalator and called Mexicans rapists and murders. He said, well, what do you think.
- [18:46]
CNN Correspondent
I should have done?
- [18:47]
Commentator
I said, I think you should have punched him in the face and then gotten out of the race. He would have been a hero.
- [18:50]
Ted Cruz
I'd like to punch him in the face. I said, if we were in high school, I'd take you behind the gym and beat the hell out of them. Punch some people. People in the face.
- [18:58]
Ben Ferguson
When was the last time an actor assassinated a president?
- [19:02]
Peter Doocy
They're still going to have to go.
- [19:03]
Ben Ferguson
Out and put a bullet in Donald.
- [19:04]
Ted Cruz
Trump and That's a fact.
- [19:08]
Ben Ferguson
Look, as his character is stabbed to.
- [19:10]
News Anchor
Death, where is John Wilkes Booth when you need him?
- [19:15]
Ted Cruz
Where is John Boogs with when you need him? This has been going on since 16. And you go back and you look at these and you're like, oh yeah, this makes sense. One plus one center equals two. You say this long enough, you do this long enough, there are going to be people that are inspired to do what they're doing against Donald Trump right now. And you got back to D.C. and I have, I want to know how many people there even talking about the fact that clearly Donald Trump doesn't have adequate police, you know, security from the Secret Service. Is anybody outraged about this?
- [19:52]
Ben Ferguson
So the Senate has been back in session for two days. I have not heard a single Democrat talk about it. Not one.
- [19:58]
Ted Cruz
Wow.
- [19:58]
Ben Ferguson
And look, you played that montage. Listen, I heard most of those clips in real time. I heard most of those clips when they were said. I gotta say, hearing him back to back again just is infuriating. It is a level of grotesque rhetoric. And to be clear, there is overheated rhetoric on both sides and I wish both sides would tamp it down some. I think we should keep our disagreements based on issues based on substance. On this podcast, you and I try to keep our focus on policy disagreements. So we talk a lot about, for example, the policy, the egregious policy mistakes of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, open borders, allowing murderers and rapists into this country, allowing potential terrorists in this country. That's all legitimate. Those are policy disagreements. But there's a qualitative difference between that and, you know, what would you just played Where's John Wilkes Booth when you need him? That is a level of poisonousness, a level of toxicity that I think is overwhelmingly on the left. They have convinced themselves that Donald Trump is Hitler. You may disagree with his policies, fine. That's what politics is about. Go make the case to the voters. But calling for his murder and the quote you played there about putting a bullet in him is exactly that. That is way, way, way outside the bounds. And yet they're not going to stop.
- [21:32]
Ted Cruz
As we approach the one year mark of the heroic events of October 7th in Israel, the International fellowship of Christians and Jews is inviting you to join them in flags of fellowship, an opportunity for Christians to remember the victims, honor the heroes and pray for those still held hostage, as well as highlight the unwavering support of Christians for Israel and the Jewish people. On October 6, thousands of Christians will be praying for those impacted by the war. And planting flags across America to honor the victims of October 7th. I want you to join us in letting the world know that Christians stand with Israel. Your generous donation today will not only provide a flag symbolizing your support in churchyards across America, but it will also support the Fellowship's ongoing emergency efforts in the Holy Land. We cannot stay silent and we cannot stay on the sidelines as anti Semitism spreads like wildfire. And in this country and around the world, Israel needs us now. Visit supportifcj.org to stand in solidarity with the Jewish people. That's one word. Support IFCJ.org that supportifcj.org Senator, this next story has a lot to do with the issue of Israel. And rarely do I see a headline come across that. Actually, I'm excited because I feel like this is just one of those headlines where you're like, finally, the good guys win and the bad guys got something that was coming to them in an amazing story in an amazing way. And for people that don't know what we're talking about, hundreds of Hezbollah operatives were injured, simultaneously killed, some of them even killed after pagers, like, I'm talking about old school pagers that they used to communicate when the terrorist organization these cells exploded. And after they got a, a beep, they would, many of them pick up the pager and get it close to their face. And there was a, it looked like it was a legitimate page, we're being told, that came across there from Hezbollah. And, and then the pager exploded and the, the, in these areas, these hotbeds where they have Hezbollah operatives, the hospitals and the pictures coming out of the hospital and the video show countless terrorists screaming and yelling for help in the hospitals. This was an amazing story.
- [24:14]
Ben Ferguson
It really is extraordinary. And the backstory, we're just getting the details. We're going to find out more. But the backstory is apparently that Mossad, which is the equivalent of the CIA in Israel, Mossad, intercepted a shipment of new pagers for Hezbollah months ago. And, and they rigged them with high explosives. And, and in particular, they, they placed an explosive called pentarithrol, tetra nitrate, P, E, T, N, which is incredibly explosive. They placed it inside the batteries of the pagers. So they intercepted them. They were going to Hezbollah and then they trusted Hezbollah. Hey, distribute this to your terrorists. And so Hezbollah put them in the hands of terrorists. Now, look, they're using pagers because they don't want their cell phones to be intercepted. So it's old school. But what Hezbollah didn't realize is that as they were distributing pagers and they were deciding who gets them, I feel confident they were not giving pagers to the newspaper delivery guy. They were not giving pagers to the fruit stand salesmen. They were giving pagers to terrorists. They were giving pagers to people that Hezbollah wanted to be able to page and say, hey, let's commit acts of terrorism. And then once Israel had these pagers distributed yesterday, they exploded them. And one tweak, I'll say you said hundreds of people. Look, the reports are thousands of terrorists who had these pagers explode. And there were multiple fatalities, according to public reports, and there were thousands of injuries. And I gotta say, that is an amazing thing for Israel to simultaneously target Hezbollah terrorists wherever they are. It's whoever Hezbollah gave a pager to, if they had that pager on their body. And I gotta say, by the way, more than a few of them had their pagers in their pants. And without getting too graphic, when they.
- [26:14]
Ted Cruz
Exploded, the memes that were flowing out there in the world were incredible. And the story of this as it was unfolding on tv, I want you to hear this report from fox.
- [26:24]
Fox News Reporter
So at 10:30 here in New York, there is a fasc developing right now in the Middle east, specifically in the country of Lebanon. There are numerous reports moments ago that claim hundreds of Hezbollah members have been seriously injured after the pagers they were using to communicate exploded. Mike Tobin's got more from Tel Aviv to try and tie this together. What do you got now, Mike?
- [26:47]
Ben Ferguson
Hello?
- [26:49]
News Anchor
Well, this is the kind of thing, Bill, that Israel will never confirm, certainly not in the early stages of it. But it's this remarkable development out of Lebanon, where as many as a thousand Hezbollah fighters have suddenly been injured rather seriously, when what we've seen through some of the security video that's coming out so far, the pagers that they were wearing suddenly play an audio message and then explode, resulting in serious injury. And we're talking again. Reuters news agency is saying that as many as a thousand people were injured. So it creates a scene where you've got all of the ambulances scrambling all over Beirut and places south of Beirut to try to deal with the overwhelming number of injured that they have right now. These pagers, apparently, according to three different security sources who were speaking to the Reuters news agency, were the latest wave of pagers that these Hezbollah operatives were getting with the belief that this was secure communication that Israel couldn't tap into whatever they were saying and give up some information. So they were carrying these pagers, apparently, and something came out where you heard this audio signal came out and all of the pagers detonated all at once, which is really a remarkable development, which would minimize collateral damage. It doesn't mean that there is no collateral damage. We're hearing some reports that the Iranian ambassador to Lebanon, an individual named Mujtaba Amani, was among the injured. So you have a very chaotic and dramatic development in Lebanon right now with as many as 1,000 Hezbollah fighters injured, Bill.
- [28:17]
Fox News Reporter
So thank you, Mike, for that. Just stand by one second. Dana. This is a really intriguing story.
- [28:22]
CNN Correspondent
I wanted to ask Mike a question, if you're still there, Mike, was the ambassador holding one of these pages, was it on his person?
- [28:30]
News Anchor
I don't have that information, but as it stands to reason, you could be standing near someone who had one of these small explosions, presumably on their waist, and be injured by it as well.
- [28:39]
CNN Correspondent
But I don't have. What's interesting is this connection, right, between Iran and Hezbollah.
- [28:45]
News Anchor
Well, exactly. I mean, Iran, Hezbollah is the forward deployed army for Iran. It has always been supported by Iran. So presumably they would have contact with each other, whoever the operative is.
- [28:58]
Fox News Reporter
And there's a lot of video coming out on social media right now. We're going to be judicious in how we air that because some of it is graphic, so standby. The hospitals say they're just being overwhelmed throughout the country, especially in the capital city of Beirut. So this is something to watch there.
- [29:14]
Peter Doocy
Mike.
- [29:15]
Ted Cruz
Thank you.
- [29:15]
Fox News Reporter
Get back on it.
- [29:16]
Ted Cruz
By the way, center. I feel bad for like the random dude today that like spilled some, you know, hot water, some boiling water himself, but he has to go to the hospital. He's like, I'm not a terrorist. I'm not a terrorist. I promise. They're like, okay, buddy, sure you're not. No, no. Like this legit normal injury. And then, and then you hear this like, oh yeah, the ambassador from Iran, he got hurt too. A. Did he have the pager? And so he was in direct communication with Hezbollah or was he hanging out with a bunch of terrorists? Either way, it's pretty damning for them. Don't worry. I'm sure the White House won't respond to that and say that's a threat to the world at all. No, they'll just say Donald Trump is.
- [29:54]
Ben Ferguson
Look, the fact that Iran's ambassador to Lebanon, whose name is Majtaba Amani, was injured by an explosion of a pager, it makes transparent what is obvious. Hezbollah and Hamas are both agents of Iran. Iran provides 90% of the funding to Hezbollah. Iran provides 90% of the Funding to Hamas. Iran funded the October 7th death squads that murdered over 1200 Israelis, that raped Israeli women and little girls, and that took multiple Americans hostage and then murdered multiple Americans. And so, at one level, it's not surprising, of course, Iran's ambassador had a damn pager because Hezbollah works for him. But it still makes abundantly clear. I mean, there is something about this response by Israel that. That has a simplicity to it. They trusted Hezbollah to give the pagers to whomever is working for them. So Hezbollah determined who gets killed, who gets serious injuries, who gets body parts blown off. Whoever Hezbollah says we want on a pager whenever we need you. And apparently the ambassador from Iran is among those people who had one of those pagers. And, you know, it is particularly amazing when you consider that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in the past four years have flowed $100 billion to Iran. While Iran is funding Hezbollah, the Biden Harris administration is sending money to them. And this is. It was an amazing military strike by Israel. And in particular, what is so powerful. Look, if you're engaged in warfare, as obviously Israel is, and they're engaged in warfare against Hamas and Gaza, they're engaged in warfare against Hezbollah and Lebanon. But anytime you're engaged in warfare, if you have, say, information that. That a terrorist or multiple terrorists are at a building, and let's say you fire a missile or drop a bomb and you try to kill the terrorists, there are significant risks of collateral damages. And that's true in every war. That's true at all. Warfare. And by the way, it is exponentially more true in this battle because Hamas and Hezbollah both deliberately use human shields. In other words, they locate their terrorists where they're surrounded by civilians because they want. Anytime Israel tries to take out one of the terrorists, they want innocent civilians to be killed so they can use it to demonize Israel. I got to say, this strategy, I've never seen anything like it. It's something out of, like, a James Bond movie or a spy novel where they distribute the pagers. It may come out that there are some relatively small number of people who were innocent bystanders that maybe were right next to someone with a pager and got injured. But presumably the explosions are fairly controlled. And they're designed, if you have a pager in your pants, and it blows up, well, maybe you shouldn't be taking a pager from a terrorist organization who's presumably paging you to murder people. And so it is precisely targeted to take out terrorists in a way that I've never seen before.
- [33:29]
Ted Cruz
I'm sure the UN will come out with a condemning statement. Don't worry, I'm sure because I'm just waiting for it to come out saying, well, they didn't know who exactly had these pagers. I'm sure we'll see all that propaganda that will hit the pages shortly. Let me tell you about blackout coffee. Every day I start my morning with a premium cup of coffee and I start my morning at 7:00 on the radio. I've got to be awake and part of my day is getting up and making sure I've got coffee. I've got to be awake. I've got to be ready to do the news. I got to be able to tell the stories and I can't sound like I'm tired. Well, blackout coffee helps me do that every day with not an average cup of coffee, not even like a good cup of coffee. I'm talking about the best cup of coffee of my life. Now, the reason why I love blackout coffee is because there are, they are an unabashedful hardcore conservative company standing up for conservative values in the coffee space. There are a lot of woke liberal companies. And when I said that, you probably had instantly a couple coffee brands that jumped into your head. Well, that's why I want you to try blackout coffee because once you switch, you're never going back. Now I have to drink coffee in the morning. I also drink some sometimes the afternoon or night, depending on what time we, for example, do the show. And I'll switch to flavored coffee. They have amazing flavored coffee for late afternoon for me. And when you travel, check out their instant coffee as well. So save some money and try blackout coffee. Get a premium cup of coffee from a company that's 100% committed conservative values from the sourcing, the beans, the roasting process, customer support and shipping. They do it all right and they accept no compromise on taste or quality. Blackout Coffee.com verdict that's Blackout Coffee.com verdict Use a coupon code verdict for 20% off your first order. So say big and get great coffee. Blackout Coffee.com verdict Be awake, not woke. That's Blackout Coffee.com verdict Promo code verdict Save 20 off your first order center. There's another really important story and it's not getting as much press as it should. And that's why I think many people actually listen to the show because they get info like this. You may remember if you go backwards, there was a big fake controversy by virtually every Democratic operative. The people running for office, congressmen, senators, on the left, and it was over ivf. Conservatives have been in favor of IVF and protecting IVF for, I mean, as long as I can remember, my kids are in vitro fertilization kids. Without it, I probably wouldn't have kids. And I'm so thankful for the technology. And so when this controversy happened in Alabama, you teamed up with Katie Britt to say, okay, we're going to put our money where our mouth is and make sure that we protect ivf. And there was an opportunity to do that in Congress, and the Democrats stopped it. Why?
- [36:30]
Ben Ferguson
So, look, this story is incredibly revealing of everything that's wrong with Washington and how corrupt a lot of politics is. Start with ivf. You and I both strongly and unequivocally support in vitro fertilization. I think IVF is an incredible medical miracle. It has enabled millions of parents, moms, and dads to have kids that couldn't otherwise have kids. 2% of all live births in America come from IVF. There are over 8 million children born via IVF, including your kids.
- [37:08]
Ted Cruz
Yeah.
- [37:09]
Ben Ferguson
Like, that is an amazing. A very close staffer of mine who is with me most days, we were talking about this issue as I was fighting to defend ivf. And he told me, much to my surprise, he said, you know what? I was born via ivf. I'm an IVF kid.
- [37:24]
Ted Cruz
Wow.
- [37:24]
Ben Ferguson
Like, that's amazing. And I think IVF is extraordinary. Now, following a decision of the Alabama Supreme Court concerning ivf, there was enormous uncertainty, there was enormous fear, and enormous concern that IVF would be in jeopardy. To be clear, in Alabama, when that concern was raised, the state legislature acted incredibly quickly to pass legislation making clear that IVF would be protected in Alabama. So as a real practical matter, I believe there is zero threat to IVF in America. Why? Well, let's take the U.S. senate. In the U.S. senate, there are 100 senators. To the best of my knowledge, all 100 senators support IVF. I do not know of a single senator in either party who opposes ivf. But yet there was genuine concern, there was confusion that IVF might be in jeopardy. And this is where Democrats and the corporate media had an intense political interest to flame that fear and to encourage that confusion. And so as that was happening, I saw that. I was dismayed. And I will tell you so when the Senate's in session, Republican senators, we have lunch every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday together. So all the Republican senators together. And Katie Britt, the senator from Alabama, has become a good friend. She's been a guest on this podcast. She stood up at one lunch. And she gave an impassioned speech to the other Republican senators about how important IVF was and how she was hearing from women and men, although mostly women, but parents, and would be parents across Alabama who were incredibly concerned IVF was in jeopardy. And she said, we've got to protect that. I listened to what she said, and so I went to her and approached her and said, listen, you support ivf, I support ivf. Let's draft legislation that puts a clear, unequivocal protection into federal statutory law to make clear that no state and no local government can ban ivf. Let's find common ground. She agreed. I drafted the legislation. We did it together, we filed it. Now, the Democrats want a fear monger on ivf. So there's a different bill that they call an IVF bill that is. That is introduced by Tammy Duckworth, the very liberal Democrat from Illinois. The Tammy Duckworth, quote, ivf bill is not an IVF bill. It's a radical abortion bill. It would give the Secretary of HHS Health and Human Services broad authority to, under that bill, protect abortion in a vast variety of circumstances. Also, the Duckworth bill explicitly overturns the protections of religious liberty under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. I support ivf, but I certainly don't want to force a physician to participate in IVF if it's against their religious faith. It's not against my religious faith, but if it's against theirs, I respect everyone's religious liberty to decide, okay, I don't want to personally participate in it. And yet the Democrats, they do want to force someone to potentially violate their own religious faith to participate in something that they have moral concerns about. And so yesterday, Chuck Schumer teed up a vote, it's the second time in a couple of months on the Tammy Duckworth bill. Now, the reason he teed up the vote is because he knew it would fail. And it was written in such a way as to be filled with poison pills as to force any Republican with principles who believes in life to vote against it. Because this would empower a Joe Biden or Kamala Harris administration to go after laws protecting unborn children in states across this country. This was an abortion bill. It was not an IVF bill. And it was again, designed to trample religious liberty. So yesterday on the Senate floor, I went to the Senate floor along with Katie Britt, and we tried to pass our IVF bill, and I stood up and gave a speech in support of it. Katie Britt stood up and gave a speech in support of it. And I asked for unanimous consent to pass our bill. And what happened? The Democrats stood up and objected. They said no, we will not allow this to pass. And we had a debate back and forth. And I want to encourage you, if you care about this issue, go listen to the debate, listen to my speech, listen to Katie Britt's speech, and then listen to Patty Murray, the Democrat from Washington state who objected because the entire point of what the Democrats were doing was a purely political exercise. If they actually wanted to protect ivf, all they had to do was very simple, not say two words, not say the words, I object. If they had not said those two words today, the Senate would have unanimously passed my legislation protecting ivf. But from the Democrats perspective, that would have been a catastrophic disaster because if we actually pass a strong statutory protection for ivf, then they can't run millions of dollars of campaign ads scaring voters into saying the mean Republicans want to take away ivf. So they objected to Katie Brits in my legislation because they don't want to protect ivf. And a point that I made in the debate, I said listen, the Democrat bill was drafted deliberately with poison pills. Their objective. They wanted to Republicans to vote no because they don't actually want to pass their bill. What they want to do is force Republicans to vote no so they can run ads saying oh, Republicans are opposed to ivf. That is a lie. Not a single Republican is opposed to ivf. Couple of months ago when we had this debate, one of the people who joined Katie and me on the Senate floor was Roger Marshall. Roger Marshall, Republican senator from Kansas, is a physician, he's an OB GYN who has delivered thousands of babies and he actually has performed IVF procedures for hundreds of parents. He literally was an IVF doctor. And yet the Democrats talking point is an IVF doctor is opposed to ivf. It's absurd. So understand they drafted their bill with poison pills cuz their objective was to make Republicans vote against it. And all but two of us did. My bill and Katie's bill has no poison pills in it. Every Democrat agrees with every word of our bill. There's not a word in it that they disagree with. Their problem is if it passes, the issue they want to run against goes away. And they don't want the issue to go away. And so sadly they objected. And I gotta tell you, this is an example of where the corrupt corporate media matters. When I was giving my speech, when Katie was giving her speech, there were no reporters in the gallery. If you read any of the press coverage, the reporters all said the headlines today were Republicans block bill to protect ivf. And you know what? The corporate media, virtually none of them covered the fact that we had a bill to protect ivf. The Democrats blocked. Part of the reason the Democrats are willing to do that is they know the media will not cover what they're doing.
- [44:59]
Ted Cruz
It's incredible. Go watch the speech. It's up on your Twitter account. I retweeted out as well. So you can grab it either on the center's account or on mine. Ben Ferguson show on on X and and it's there. You you ought to go listen to it. It's incredible. Don't forget we do the show Monday, Wednesday and Friday and and those in between days. Grab my podcast, the Ben Ferguson Podcast. I'll keep you updated on the latest breaking news. Share this show wherever you can on social media. So many of you have been doing that. It's a time of year where we're fighting hard to get info to you. Without you guys, this show doesn't exist and without you guys sharing it, it doesn't reach maximum number of people that needs to reach. So thank you for doing that as well. And the center and I will see you back here on Friday morning.