← The 47 Morning Update with Ben Ferguson
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- [00:02]
Ben Ferguson
Welcome. It is a fabulous day in America. It's verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And Senator Donald Trump trumped them all. The Democrats, the globalists, the deep state, the fake news, the fake polls, even the assassins. And now we have a very different day in America.
- [00:23]
Ted Cruz
It is an extraordinary day in America. You and I are here at 1:11pm on Wednesday, right after the election. And last night was simply a spectacular night. It was an election that defied all the pundits, that defied all the analysts, and that transforms America and transforms the world. I'm reminded of 1984. It's morning in America again. It is that again. I believe God has answered our prayers for our nation. And I am so grateful Donald Trump has been reelected president in what has to be the most remarkable comeback in political history. I'm also very, very grateful that Republicans have taken a majority of the Senate and we got a real chance at it being a sizable majority in the Senate. That included me getting reelected, which didn't suck at all. And we'll talk about that as well. And it looks like we've got a real shot at Republicans holding the House. That, that is the one that is not clear and determined right now. But, but hopefully we will hold the House as well. That'll make a big, big difference if we do. It is an incredible day.
- [01:41]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, it really is. And we get to finally talk about your race. I'll explain that in a moment. Let me tell you about chalk real quick. If you're a guy and you are sick and tired of feeling tired, maybe you want to work out. Maybe you just feel like you're fatigued all the time, well, guess what, you're not alone. A little over a year ago, I ended up getting a lot of blood work done. And I said, all right, I got to get in shape. I had, I had my cholesterol that was too high. I felt fatigued. I felt tired all the time. And that is when I got the chalk. Male vitality stack. Now, since I started, I am down over 70 pounds. Not only am I sleeping better, I have so much more energy because men's testosterone levels are off a cliff, historically at an all time low. And that is where chalk comes in. Choq. They are helping real American men, just like you, take back your right to proudly maximize your masculinity by boosting testosterone levels up to 20% over 90 days. Now, if you've never tried chalk, I want you to save money and I want you to try it. And if you'll want, if you're tired of feeling sick and tired, then get chalk right now. It has game changing effects on your energy, on your focus and your mood. So maximize your masculinity today@chalk.choq.com use the code BEN for a massive discount on any subscription. For Life choq.com promo code BEN for lifetime savings on any subscription. Limited time offer. Subscriptions are cancelable at any time center. There's just one headline that I do have to start with because this is just such a fun one for me. And we can explain why we haven't actually talked about your race on on Verdict. Cause everywhere I go people are like, why are you guys not talking about this race against Allred? And I can explain it in person. I couldn't talk about on the show. You couldn't either. But let's just put it in perspective here. Republicans were closer to flipping New York then Democrats were to flipping Texas. Even though the entire Democratic machine came after you and tried to unseat you, that didn't work. It was a massive victory for you last night. Almost a ten point victory. Congratulations. A million vote difference between you and your opponent. So let's just tell people for a second here why this is something we haven't talked about here.
- [04:05]
Ted Cruz
Yeah, look, we had an incredible victory in my race last night. You and I were both at the victory party past three in the morning. It was a remarkable outcome. And regular listeners of the podcast, you guys have noticed that a word I have never once said on this podcast is all red. I've never mentioned Colin Allred. I've never talked about my race even once. We have talked about issues. We talk about issues a lot. We have talked about the presidential race, we've talked about Senate races, we've talked about other races, but we have never talked about my race. And that was because if we had talked about my race on this podcast, it would have prompted complaints to the fec. I don't think they would have succeeded, but it would have prompted complaints. And we decided that we didn't want to unnecessarily give a basis for a complaint. And so we just didn't talk about the race at all. I gotta say it was mildly schizophrenic, however, because I'd go and do any other interview, I'd go on Fox News, I'd go on talk radio, I'd go do something else, I'd go on a different show and I'd talk about my race all the time because I was in the middle of the race.
- [05:08]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, yeah, you get to go on my show and we could talk about it, but not on Verdict.
- [05:13]
Ted Cruz
And I know our listeners found that odd. And it was just. It was avoiding any potential legal peril. We just didn't talk about it. But now that it's over, the race is done, and wow, what a night we had last night. As you noted, we won by nearly 10 points. We won by a million votes. I mean, it was an extraordinary victory. It was a victory across the board. And one of the amazing, amazing outcomes was what happened in South Texas and what happened with Hispanics. And NBC News is reporting that I won Hispanics statewide by six points. That is a big, big deal. You want to talk about a transformation? And we saw South Texas counties and a region of the state that has been bright blue for 100 years is rapidly, rapidly turning red. We had major victories throughout South Texas. To win Hispanic statewide by 6 points is transformational. And I believe what we did in South Texas with this election and what Donald Trump did in South Texas with this election, I think is generationally transformative. And in fact, my prediction is in the next year, we will see many, many elected South Texas Democrats switching parties, leaving their party and joining the Republican Party. And I think once it starts, it's not gonna be one or two. It's gonna be an avalanche. I think they're all looking around and you hear these conversations down in the valley. Wait, are we all Republicans now? And it is. It's a big, big deal for Texas. And it's a big deal nationally.
- [07:05]
Ben Ferguson
It's nationally as well. And I want to go back to something that happened, and it goes back to what we've talked about here. Why Donald Trump won last night, why you won last night came down to the basic issues, which is it's the economy, stupid. It is safety. It is about saying yes. Our kids, instead of having to say no, whether that's when you go to the grocery store or if they want to go outside in front of your house and play. These were the basic issues. And the elitists in the media and the Harris campaign refused to stop dictating to Americans and actually listen to Americans. And you went all over the state and we listened to voters, and what their concerns were was, I don't feel like I'm secure. I don't feel like that we're heading the right direction. I don't feel like my kids are safe. I don't feel like my grandparents or my parents are safe. And I want to live in a. In a society where I can say yes, to my kids at the grocery store, yes to going to events, yes to having that birthday party instead of saying no, no, no all the way. And as Fox News described it, they said the most important issue facing the country with exit poll data was the economy. 39% said was economy. 20% then said it was immigration, which also deals with fentanyl and deals with the crime. Here's how they described it.
- [08:29]
Unnamed Analyst
Whose voter analysis could tell the story of this night and tell the story of the election? Just a reminder, different than exit polls, we ask voters, over 120,000 of them, all over the country, all 50 states leading up to and on election day, different from exit polls. And right now, I can start to begin to give you our key findings and takeaways from what we ask voters. This is really to give you an idea of not only how they voted, but why. Early in the evening, we can't reveal how they broke down into the candidates, but we can reveal how they're feeling. We asked about the direction of the country. This number is key. Those who feel like the country right now is moving in the wrong direction, 7 out of 10American voters. This is 10 points higher than it was in 2020, just four years ago. If you were to break this down. Also, new technology, our heat map. You can see some of those darker areas on the heat map, especially those Sunbelt states. This is where they don't like how the country is heading or where it's heading. And that is could be very revealing as we continue to watch the election results throughout the night. Another top finding. We know the economy has been key and Americans just haven't been feeling good about their finances. We asked about their family's financial situation. And look at this. While 13% say they're getting ahead, 56% holding steady, 31% of respondents said they feel like they're falling behind. That's more than 3 in 10 voters. Also, perspective, that's 13 points worse than it was just four years ago when it was at 18%.
- [10:06]
Ben Ferguson
You listen to that, senator, and it's the economy, stupid. That is what mattered. And the Democrats did not listen to the American people.
- [10:14]
Ted Cruz
Well, it was certainly the economy, but more broadly, it was also it was the border. It was inflation. It was safety and crime, and it was chaos. I mean, listen, the Biden Harris record is a train wreck. Everything they've done, there's a reason Kamala never talked about anything they've done. She ran as the change candidate because she sure as heck couldn't run on her record. And you Know what the American people said? To hell with that. We want change. As you just played 7 in 10Americans said we want to change the path we're on. Well, we just did. And you look at the results of Trump's win, the seven swing states as we sit here today at now 1:22pm Trump has won five of those seven swing states. He won North Carolina. He flipped Georgia. Georgia went for Biden. This time it went for Trump. He flipped Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania went for Biden. This time it went for Trump. He flipped Wisconsin. It had previously gone for Biden. This time it went for Trump and he flipped Michigan. Previously it went for Biden. This time it went for Trump. And right now Trump is leading in Arizona and Nevada, the other two. So they haven't called those states yet. But there's a very real possibility that Trump will win seven out of seven swing states, winning everywhere. The current count is he has 291 electoral votes. He only needs 270 to win. Kamala Harris has 223. And I'll tell you, every bit as astonishing and powerful and transformational is Trump won the popular vote as of the current count by nearly 5 million votes. The current count according to CNN is 71,883,795 votes for Trump and 67,006,864 votes for Kamala. That is 50.9% compared to 47.4%. That is historic. A big, big transformation and it is changing America. The stock market is exploding, going crazy. Bitcoin is soaring like people are jubilant and it is changing the world.
- [12:30]
Ben Ferguson
And the reason why they're jubilant is because they understand now what's coming back. No, no one is in in uncertainty. In is what causes markets to to have instability. Everyone, not just and also crazy ass.
- [12:44]
Ted Cruz
Socialists destroying your companies, taxing you out of existence, putting in crushing regulations that destroy your ability to make a profit. All of that hurts too.
- [12:53]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, but you look at where we are, I don't know if we've ever had this moment before where it is so crystal clear the agenda of Donald Trump that it's going to be brought to Washington D.C. there is a clear mandate to drain the swamp. There's a clear mandate to change the way government works. There's a clear mandate to work with Congress on securing the border. There's a clear mandate in the Senate. It looks like there's gonna be a clear mandate in the House. And there's a mandate that obviously investors are responding to. There's also a clear mandate that's coming to the border and other countries and the Middle east and oil and gas and all of these things. And that's the reason why I think you're seeing these massive gains on Wall street is there's just a moment today where Americans took a deep breath. They went out and they voted. They declared what they wanted. Damn be the media and their lack of influence and trying to lie to you, trying to take out Trump. As we mentioned the beginning, there is a mandate now to go back to what this country looked like in 2016 when Donald Trump went in the White House, except this time it's even more clear what he's going to do.
- [13:58]
Ted Cruz
Well, and we're going to see a number of big changes early on. The biggest thing that we will see immediately is the border. And I have said this before, but I'm going to say it again. We will secure the border and it's going to be fast. It's not going to take a year, and I don't think it's going to take six months. I think we will do it in January and February. And the reason I say that is that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris did all this damage through unilateral executive action, which means Trump can undo it through unilateral executive action. And the most important determinant is what happens when you arrest an illegal immigrant. And if you put them on a plane and you fly them home, the numbers plummet and they plummet immediately. And on January 20th, that's gonna happen. And in fact, I think we're gonna see the numbers. We may see the numbers fall even before Trump has sworn in, although there might also be a surge in November and December. I am worried that we'll see a surge of illegals trying to rush across the border right before Trump gets here. But as soon as Trump is in office, we are going to see the border be secured. You were at our election night party last night. We had a packed house. We had north of a thousand people there, incredible energy. In the middle of my victory speech, the crowd began chanting, build the wall, build the wall. To which I responded, we will. We are going to do that. Now, whether Congress goes along is a different question because the Democrats are still going to have enough votes in the Senate to filibuster legislation. And it will be interesting to see if congressional Democrats have learned anything from this ass kicking. Let's be clear, that's what this election was, was an ass kicking across the board. And I'll be very Curious. Next week I'll be in D.C. i'll see my colleagues. I'll be very curious if any Democrats are looking around going maybe being wild eyed, leftist, communist, America hating lunatics is not a path to victory. I don't know if they'll say that or not. They might double down and, you know, you know, start, you know, dig in even harder. I don't know. They do hate Trump's guts. So they're probably just losing their minds right now.
- [16:14]
Ben Ferguson
Well, they're losing their minds on social media. And by the way, didn't the Democrats want to get rid of the filibuster? Can we go back to that just for a second?
- [16:20]
Ted Cruz
Oh, they absolutely did. Now they all love it. Now, I will say let's not take for granted that we know the outcome in the House and that right now is the most consequential question. That is outstanding, Ben. It is a big, big difference whether Republicans, whether we keep the majority in the House or we lose it. And the House is still very much in the balance. It could go either way. Mike Johnson, the Speaker, is saying that he thinks that we'll hold on to the House, that the votes are there, but there's still a bunch of ra places that are outstanding. We don't know right now. And let me tell you why it's such a big deal. Let's say the Democrats take a majority in the House by one vote. I don't want that to be the case, but if that happens, it decreases by a factor of 100. What we can accomplish in the next two years, and here is why, because I mentioned securing the border, Trump can do that unilaterally. We'll also see big national security victories. I think we will see in the next year both of the wars come to an end. I think the Ukraine war will come to an end. Russia will suffer a loss. There'll be some negotiated outcome that is a loss for Russia, but it will end. And I believe the war in Israel will end as well. And Israel will defeat Hamas as a result of that. All of that Trump can do essentially unilaterally as commander in chief. However, for legislation to pass, you got to get it through the House and Senate. And the big kahuna is the 2017 tax cuts that are expiring. Most of them are expiring. Next year, if we have both the House and Senate, we will be able to take up what is called budget reconciliation. Budget reconciliation. The most important thing about that is it is an avenue around the filibuster. So it is a way that we can pass budget and tax and economic legislation without the Democrats being able to stop it. And so if we have the House, we'll do a budget reconciliation. We will extend the tax cuts. I think we'll make them bigger and bolder. And beyond that, I think we will see serious reg reforms. I think we will see advances on energy. I think budget reconciliation opens a lot of legislative victories. If we can do it. If the Democrats have the House even by one vote, they'll refuse to do reconciliation. And so it will mean, look, we'll have to negotiate something on the tax cuts. But they become. The economic policy becomes massively less good if the Democrats have the House. So I am hopeful that we have it. I hope we actually have a decent majority in the House, although I think that's probably unlikely. I think it is. If we have a majority, I think it is likely that it's going to be an excruciatingly small majority in the House. So that'll be frustrating and have its own challenges. But it is a binary flip of the switch. If the Democrats have the House, our ability to legislate grinds to a halt.
- [19:25]
Ben Ferguson
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- [22:08]
Ted Cruz
I think you're exactly right. It turns out it is a bad electoral strategy to insult and condescend and treat the voters like crap. And that's what the Democrats look. In the last two weeks, you had Kamala Harris launch their strategy of calling Donald Trump Hitler. You then had Joe Biden calling half of America pieces of garbage. And you then had Mark Cuban, on behalf of Kamala Harris, her top surrogate, go out and insult women and say there are no smart and strong women voting for Donald Trump. That combination. Look, I gotta tell you, I've run in a lot of elections. I've never found that insulting the voters is a smart electoral strategy. And it was a little bizarre to see the Democrats go all in on that.
- [22:55]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, it didn't work and it was a failure there. Let's talk about what happens in the Senate because I think this goes back to how important it was with your race and the fact that you were able to win by such a large margin over already. There was an incredible amount of money. We didn't get to talk about this on Verdict as we mentioned earlier, but there was an incredible amount of money. And Chuck Schumer, you were his number one target. They came after you. They basically kind of pulled away from this race a little bit financially after you just wiped him during the debate. Congratulations on that. Something we didn't get to talk about on the show, but if people are bored and they're junkies like I am and you want to watch one hell of a debate, go watch Senator Cruz. And they all were. Debate, it was unbelievable. And that shifted the race financially. But the amount of money that came in from outside to try to turn Texas into a liberal state. But at the end of the day, Republicans are closer to flipping New York than Texas. And that is a data point as well that I think you gotta look at.
- [23:55]
Ted Cruz
Yeah, no, no, that's exactly right. I will say the debate, the debate was ridiculous fun. I loved that debate. I had a lot of fun doing it and I think it went well. I will look this race, Chuck Schumer was explicit that I was his number one target in the country. And they flooded cash into the state of Texas. This race was the single most expensive Senate race in the entire country. It will end up being nearly a quarter billion dollars, nearly $250 million will have been spent on both sides in this race. That ain't cheap. Schumer poured well over 100 million into the race. And I gotta say, one of my more fun things that I enjoyed doing last night at the election night speech is I took the opportunity to thank Schumer. I said, thanks, Chuck. We may have won a couple more Senate seats tonight because you wasted so much money in the state of Texas. So I appreciate that. And it, I gotta say, I guarantee you there's some Democrats who are second guessing that, who are questioning, did that make any sense just to pour the money into Texas and lose the states they lost?
- [25:12]
Ben Ferguson
You talk about the Senate agenda moving forward. Obviously the border's gonna be something very quick. But there are some new ideas that have come out of this Trump campaign that connected with voters. A great example is Elon Musk and Trump talking about, hey, retired people should be completely tax exempt. They've already paid their taxes. We need to stop taxing Social Security benefits. Some of these common sense things. What are the chances that some of these ideas that connected with the American people. No taxes on tips is another example. Will turn into a reality if we have the House and Senate, or is that still gonna be a really tough thing to get done?
- [25:49]
Ted Cruz
Look, if we have the House, I think we'll get it done. No taxes on tips. I'm the author of that legislation in the Senate. When I introduced it, it was interesting. It's bipartisan legislation. Both of the Democrat senators from Nevada joined almost immediately. They told me 25% of the workers in Nevada are tipped workers. And so they jumped on immediately. If we have the House. I think it will be part of the tax cuts. No taxes on tips. I also think we'll get it done. No taxes on Social Security. That is a little bit harder to do because in terms of the budgetary cost, it's not cheap. And so the negotiations back and forth, there'll be some bumps on that. But the President is pushing for it. I'm strongly in favor of it. I think we'll get it done as part of the tax cuts. Both of those are big, big important policy ideas. And listen, in terms of the Senate, let's break down where we stand on the Senate right now. So we went into last night with the Democrats having a 51, 49 majority. As of right now, Republicans have 52. So we have three pickups that are clear. One of them is West Virginia. We KNEW that was 100%. And so Jim justice, the governor, is going to now be the senator. He's going to replace Joe Manchin. The Democrats basically conceded West Virginia once. Joe Manchin wasn't running. There wasn't a Democrat alive who could win West Virginia. They conceded that. The two others that we have won are Montana and Ohio. Montana was John Tester. Montana's a bright red state and Tim Sheehy just beat Tester. That's a victory we thought was quite likely and it happened. Montana is too red a state to be represented by a Democrat. Ohio, likewise, Sherrod Brown was beaten by Bernie Moreno last night. That's a great victory. That was a hard fought victory. I'll tell you. Sherrod Brown and Jon Tester are two of the very best politicians in the country. You don't get elected counter to the way your state generally votes unless you're really, really talented. And you know Jon Tester, with a flat top haircut and eight figures, he seemed like a big old fat Montana rancher that just was a regular guy and it got him elected even when Trump was carrying the state and Republicans were carrying the state in past years. Same's true in Ohio where Sherrod Brown seemed like just a regular guy at the union hall. And there were voters in Ohio that were voting Donald Trump. Sherrod Brown. Now, both Brown and Tester vote like communists. They vote like Chuck Schumer. But they're very good character actors. And when they're back at home, they pretended not to. Those two victories ensure that we have the majority in the Senate. And then on top of that, right now we have four other possibilities. We had one hard loss. We did not win Wisconsin. We were Leading a good chunk of the night. Eric Hovdi was narrowly leading Tammy Baldwin. Wisconsin's now been called for the Democrats. So assuming those numbers are right, it looks like we did not win Wisconsin in the Senate, although Trump won Wisconsin in the presidential. Right now we have a shot at winning Pennsylvania, Michigan, Nevada and Arizona. And all of those are uncalled right now. And here are the numbers. Pennsylvania, right now, Dave McCormick, the Republican, is leading 48.9% to 48.5%. So it's really, really close. Michigan, Michigan, right now, the Democrat is leading 48.6% to 48.3%. So we are down by 0.3%. Both Pennsylvania and Michigan, 97% of the vote is in Nevada. Nevada right now, the Republican Sam Brown is leading 47.5% to 47%. That would be a flip if we won Nevada. 88% of the vote is in there. And then Arizona. Arizona right now, this is probably the, it's the furthest distance we have to have to climb. The Democrat is leading 50.4% to 47.7%. So it's, so it's three points that we need to pick up, almost three points. Now only 63% of the vote is in in Arizona. And it's Maricopa county, it's the suburbs of Phoenix that are still counting. So look, it is certainly possible that we win Arizona. Trump has won Arizona, but three points is a bigger margin to close than the other states. And so all four of those, we're gonna wait and see.
- [30:36]
Ben Ferguson
Let's talk finally about the takeaways from the media. And I'll go back to what I said earlier. Donald Trump trumped them all. He trumped the Democrats, he trumped the globalists, he trumped the deep state, he trumped the news media. They're still having meltdowns. This morning, the View, the girls on the View, the ladies on the View came out wearing black like it was a funeral mental health crisis. MSNBC's O'Donnell trashes the founding Fathers, called the Electoral College voter suppression. This morning, Joy Reid at MSNBC said, Florida, extreme right wing fascist state now officially Van Jones came out and started playing the race card and the gender card. Jon Stewart had a total meltdown on his show. And this is just what we're seeing in the moments after a Trump victory. It's like they didn't learn their lesson. I mean, you would think they would take away and go, okay, what did we do wrong? They're not stopping.
- [31:39]
Ted Cruz
You know, look, we'll, we'll see what happens. I think there right now there's a lot of blaming of Kamala for being a terrible candidate. There's a lot of blaming of Joe Biden for having been essentially unconscious for several years. I don't see the Democrats right now taking responsibility for, gosh, we advocated an agenda that was horrible for America. You know, there used to be Senate moderates among the Democrats. I don't know of any Senate moderates left. The only two arguable ones were Joe Manchin and Kirsten Cinema. They're both gone. And so that dynamic, you know, you look at, I would love to see some Democrats recalibrate and say let's move to the middle. But I think right now they're just emoting. They're just engaged in a combination of rage and shock and disbelief. Look, you know, you and I talked about Mark Halperin, who used to be the head of political news at abc, did an interview with Tucker Carlson where Halperin said that he thought there would be real mental health crises and violence from the left if Trump won, that he was laying out the case that those of us not afflicted with Trump derangement syndrome do not understand just how much of a meltdown this will be. Look, I hope we don't go there, but, but I do think I don't see many Democrats willing to repent and change their ways.
- [33:24]
Ben Ferguson
No, I couldn't agree with you more. I want to ask you another question also about Elon Musk in just a second. But first let me tell you about my friends over at Burna. If you want to be able to protect yourself and your family, but maybe you work at a place where you can't carry a firearm or maybe you have a child that's 18 or a mother or grandmother doesn't feel comfortable carrying a gun. Well, you've got to check out Burna. Now I have this and I'm a gun owner. I had to pull the trigger and use a firearm to protect my life. But I love knowing that a burner is an option. Now. It is a less lethal pistol launcher Burner can save two lives and it is a great compliment to owning a firearm. If you or your family is in a situation where you feel threatened, then you can start with less lethal. It is legal in all 50 states. There are no permits or background checks needed. And I own this. And I got them from my wife, my sister in law, my mother in law, my mom and my sister. The burner is the answer because it's designed to be easily used by all age groups 18 and older. The Burner launcher has powerful deterrents like tear gas and kinetic rounds. With a 65 foot range, one shot can incapacitate attackers for up to 40 minutes. It is used by government agencies and law enforcement around the country. And more than a half million units have been sold with more than 14,000 four and a half star reviews. So if you want to know that you can always protect yourself and you want to have options, especially for young people 18, older, maybe you've got a daughter that's living by herself. Visit Berna. That's B y r n a.com verdict you're going to get 10 off your purchase by r n a.com verdict for 10 off your purchase, that's burner.com verdict 10 off by rna.com all right, let me ask you this question. You've actually met and chatted with Elon Musk. There is something different that's happening right now, and that's the people around Trump. There's a very good chance that Elon Musk could be involved in the, in the Trump administration. On a real level, we see him bring in people like RFK Jr. We see him bringing in different minds that traditional, you know, politicians have not done. How significant could it be to have a guy like Elon Musk coming in and looking at like, you know, accountability and efficiency with the United States government, which is clearly bloated. And this is something he's really good at.
- [36:04]
Ted Cruz
Yeah, look, Elon is extraordinary. I know him well. He's become a friend. I've spent a lot of time with Elon. I'll tell you that. They're smart people you encounter in life. Elon is next level. I mean, there's just, the guy is friggin brilliant and he knows how to run a company like you look at the incredible success he has, whether it's Tesla, whether it's SpaceX, whether it's the boring company, whether it is X. Like he has an ability to run a. And by the way, many of those companies are like really precise manufacturers. You look at SpaceX where they're manufacturing rocket ships with precision within a tenth of an inch or less. I mean, it is. And I've been down to their factory in Boca Chica, down by Brownsville in the southern tip of Texas. I mean, it is remarkable. They're churning out a rocket ship a month and they just built it out of nothing. I mean, it is, it's incredible. And Elon is all in. We saw him pour himself into this election at the end, I think it made a difference. I think he made a difference in Pennsylvania where he really devoted a lot of time and energy and money and personal credibility. And I think it will be significant his impact on the federal government. Now there are structural impediments to having efficiency in government. And so I don't think people should think we're suddenly gonna be in nirvana and everything will be solved. Because in a company, Elon can walk in and fire anyone he wants. And by the way, when he bought Twitter, he fired a whole bunch of the folks there and all the woke radicals. He basically said, bye, bye, you're out of here. The federal government, that is much, much harder to do. You've got civil service protections that enables career bureaucrats to burrow in. I think we will see the Trump administration take on the career bureaucracy in a way that has never ever happened before. That's a big deal. I expect Elon to play an important role in that. But I don't want to understate the legal barriers, the bureaucratic barriers that it is not like just coming into a company where you have the ability to give anyone a pink slip. The bureaucracy will fight back. And by the way, in the first Trump term, we saw the deep state wage war on Donald Trump. I very much hope the team coming in understands much, much better just how dangerous the foe is they're facing of the radical leftist who burrowed into the federal government and that they're better prepared and ready to take them on.
- [38:47]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, no doubt about it. And by the way, his saving free speech by buying X just so people know how biased that I would say the media is. And I'm talking about the media, you have control over Facebook. We were comparing last night many conservative influencers and Senator, you're going to find this interesting. From October 9th through November 5th, the reach that I had on Facebook was down 83.6% as a conservative on Facebook in the month leading up to election day. And there were quite a few other conservatives. I was talking earlier with Meghan McCain about this and we opened up our analytics, our insights on our public pages, and again, I'm looking at it right now. 83.6%. That's how much they turned off the faucet to free speech of conservative influencers on Facebook, on Meta, on Instagram, in the last 30 days before the election. So the liberals had free flow of intel and information and their side and conservatives were throttled almost 85%. I just think that's interesting to see what Elon Musk did Save freedom of speech on X. He didn't do that there. He let everybody talk. God bless America when it comes to that. Your final thoughts to all the listeners of Verdict, all those that came out and voted for you. I know you want to say something to them as well.
- [40:21]
Ted Cruz
Look to the listeners of Verdict. You guys are amazing. You're the most informed, you're the most engaged. You care about our nation. You're fighting to save our nation and everyone in Texas who worked so unbelievably hard. Look, this was a battle, I believe, about keeping Texas, Texas, my race, the money, the media, everything that came in against us. If you live in Texas, by the way, thank God the ads are over. I mean, you couldn't turn on your TV without every second or third ad being an attack ad. Just hammering the living daylights out of me and the people of Texas. I'll tell you, it was inspirational. You came out on the road with me. We did a 53 stop bus tour all across the state of Texas, over 9,000 miles we covered. We did rallies everywhere. And it was incredible. The people. And you're just ordinary people, students, senior citizens, single moms, Hispanics, African Americans, just Texans standing up and saying, we want to keep Texas, Texas. We want low taxes, low and reasonable regulations, lots of jobs. We want security, we want the border secure. We want to support law enforcement, we want criminals in jail. We want, we want to defend our freedom. We want free speech, religious liberty, the second Amendment. All of that was on the ballot last night. And I want to say it is breathtaking. The Texans that came out for me and nationally, the people who supported the campaign, who contributed to the campaign, thank you, thank you, thank you. And the people who supported Donald Trump, who supported Senate candidates and House candidates across the country, you helped change America and I believe pull it back from the brink of destruction. And I just want to say thank you to the incredible patriots who together saved America last night.
- [42:13]
Ben Ferguson
I will say this too. The work just is just begun. I promise you we're going to be fighting hard for you guys. This is just the beginning. Don't forget we do the show Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Share this podcast wherever you can on social media, especially now that it works for conservatives again. Share it, share it everywhere. And don't forget, grab my podcast, the Ben Ferguson Podcast. I'll keep you up to date on up to date on those in between days as well. So grab that and the center and I will see you back here on Friday morning.