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- [00:01]
Michael Knowles
About half an hour ago, the Senate voted to shoot down the Democrats plan to codify Roe vs. Wade into law, pass a radical national abortion bill. About five, 10 minutes ago, Senator Cruz made it to our studio. He is now just getting his microphone on. I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
- [00:27]
Ted Cruz
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- [01:42]
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- [02:54]
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- [04:08]
Michael Knowles
Happening in real time right now. Takes me back to our earliest days on this show during impeachment. You've just come from the Capitol. You've just voted to shoot down this Democrats abortion rights bill. The way this is being reported right now in the Associated Press and msnbc. Is that a GOP led filibuster stopped the abortion bill? Last I checked the vote was 49 in favor, 51 against. Am I crazy? Is this just my legal ignorance or is that not a filibuster?
- [04:41]
Ted Cruz
Yes, stop trying to bring math into it. The fact is a majority of the Senate voted against this radical bill. But the press doesn't like that news, that the real headline should be Bipartisan majority of the Senate rejects radical Pro Abortion bill. That would in fact be the accurate headline. But you know, it's interesting, the other part of the headline, it's not just the filibuster part that is inaccurate, is the part that says codifies Roe. This bill does nothing of the sort. It doesn't. When you read codify's Roe, you think, oh, it goes back to the way things were before the Supreme Court decides the Dobbs case. Well, no, that's not what this bill does. If this bill passed, it would be a radical bill. It would strike down just about every reasonable common sense restriction on abortion that has been enacted the last 49 years under Roe. It's been deemed permissible even already for states to limit late term abortions, for states to restrict taxpayer funding of abortions, for states to require parental consent or parental notification. This Democrat bill strikes all those laws down. This Democrat bill is the unlimited abortion for all bill. Think about it for a minute. That 49 Democrats were happy to vote for that. The only one who voted with the Republicans was Joe Manchin.
- [06:01]
Michael Knowles
The bill couldn't codify Roe because parts of Roe vs Wade have already been overruled. They were overruled by Planned Parenthood v. Casey, which changed some of the reasoning and some of the processes for abortion. And so, you know, this has been an ongoing debate for a long time. Your colleague Senator Elizabeth Warren yesterday said that the Dobbs decision could represent an extremist right wing Supreme Court imposing its views on the American people. Because if Roe vs Wade is overruled, then you'll have a situation where the majority of states will impose severe restrictions on abortion immediately. If the majority of states are gonna impose new restrictions, how is the Supreme Court imposing its views on the people?
- [06:44]
Ted Cruz
This is literally an example where for Democrats and the press, up is down, right is left, everything is backwards and upside down. You have Democrats screaming that overturning Roe is an assault on democracy. In fact, if the Court does overturn Roe, it is a victory for democracy. Roe was an assault on democracy. Roe v. Wade was seven unelected lawyers in black robes saying, you stupid voters don't know how to resolve these issues. Rights, we're not gonna let you do this. Now. For 185 years, literally from the beginning of our country until 1973, questions of abortion were decided by the voters and by the state legislatures that were elected by the voters. Roe said no more. They said, we don't believe in democracy. And the reason Democrats are freaking out right now is, you know, in poker, a tell is when they do something that gives away what their hand is and they're trying to represent something other than what their hand is. Here the Democrats have a tell. Number one, the fact that they're freaking out is a tell that they know their views on abortion are radical and out of touch with the American people. 49 of the Democrats today voted for a law that allows abortion up until the moment of birth. Literally until the child is being born. This Democrat bill would allow abortion. Do you know the latest polling? You know what percent of Americans agree with abortion up until the very instant of birth? 6%.
- [08:12]
Wow.
- [08:13]
6% of Americans agree with the position of 49 out of 50 Democrats. And Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, when she's screaming and ranting and raving, it's because the voters are gonna be allowed to do what they think is right and not be subject to her radical decrees. Now the Democrats have another tell, which is you notice that when they're talking about the Dobbs decision, they very, very quickly say if this decision goes into effect, it will strike down the availability of contraceptives. It will strike down gay marriage and interracial marriage. The New York Times went so far, the editorial board. The New York Times suggested that there are multiple states in the union that if they were allowed to, would ban interracial marriage. What utter garbage. You bigoted, moronic, Manhattan leftist elite, lying sacks of crap.
- [09:15]
Michael Knowles
But how do you really feel?
- [09:16]
Ted Cruz
Yeah, it kind of pisses me off. And I would note, by the way, that these racist leftists of the New York Times, there may be no one on planet earth whom they despise more than Justice Clarence Thomas.
- [09:28]
Michael Knowles
Right.
- [09:29]
Ted Cruz
Who is married to a white woman. He is in an interracial marriage. I suspect Clarence Thomas would be quite surprised if he were doing something to strike down interracial marriage. But the only people who imagine interracial marriage is gonna be struck down is radical leftist because they've never actually met a conservative voter. So they think we're all bigoted Klansmen. But here's the tell on this. When the Democrats and the press are not defending their positions on abortion, it's because they know their positions on abortion are wildly out of the mainstream. So anytime you hear them talking about contraception or marriage, it's cuz they're trying to change the subject.
- [10:11]
Michael Knowles
Well, so this raises a question to me that I do not have an answer to, which is why Would the Democrats bring up this bill? It makes them look extremely foolish. It gives away the whole game. It shows that actually the overruling of Roe is not an assault on democracy. That actually most people don't want this kind of crazy, extreme abortion agenda. Elizabeth Warren admitted it herself in this column in Marie Claire magazine.
- [10:36]
Ted Cruz
Wait, you're reading Marie Claire magazine?
- [10:38]
Michael Knowles
Oh, constantly.
- [10:39]
Ted Cruz
Michael, why are you reading Marie Claire magazine? And what is Marie Claire magazine?
- [10:42]
Michael Knowles
I am so sh. I cannot believe how uncultured you are, Senator. Next you're gonna tell me you don't read Glamour either.
- [10:48]
Ted Cruz
I only read Cosmo for teens because that's fair enough.
- [10:52]
Michael Knowles
So why are they doing this? They've got egg on their face. It looks pathetic. Is it just to appease the base?
- [10:59]
Ted Cruz
You've gotta understand, today's Democrats are captured by the radical activists on every issue. On immigration, they're captured by the open border radicals. On issues of gender, they're captured by the transgender radicals. And on issues of abortion, they actually don't care about the swing voter. They don't care about the American people. They don't care about the soccer mom. They care about the radicals who control the money and control the foot soldiers in the Democratic Party. And here's proof of it. Chuck Schumer could have had a vote today that he would have won a bipartisan majority on. So it's a 50. 50 Senate, 50 Democrats, 50 Republicans. Two of the Republicans, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, have explicitly stated. In fact, they've introduced legislation that would do something like codify Roe. It would take some elements of abortion off the table. It would leave some of the restrictions like partial birth and taxpayer funding and parental consent and parental notification in. It would be more accurately described as codifying Roe than this current radical bill. If Schumer had brought that up, he would have won today, 53 to 47. He would have gotten the 49 Democrats who voted for this. He would have gotten Joe Manchin, who he lost, and he would have gotten two Republicans. Now, it still wouldn't have passed because it would take 60 to go up, but we would have had a vote that was 5347. And the Democrats could accurately say bipartisan majority. The Senate votes to rebuke the court. They don't care. Their radicals don't actually want anything like a middle ground. They are appeasing the crazies.
- [12:50]
Michael Knowles
Well, speaking of the crazies, Senator, I mean, you're kind of seeing this right now in Washington, D.C. and Virginia, which is that the White House is Refusing to condemn the protesters who are showing up not even just to the Supreme Court, which is a questionable practice in and of itself. And we can get to it. They're showing up to the homes of judges where their children sleep, protesting, screaming in residential neighborhoods. The White House is asked about that. What do they do? They shrug their shoulders.
- [13:17]
Ted Cruz
The last pod we talked about how this leak of the Supreme Court decision is an attempt to destroy the Supreme Court. It's an attempt to tear down the rule of law, and it's an attempt to use political pressure to bully the justices into changing their votes. And it really goes right to the heart of the integrity of the institution. This is the next step of that, which is the radicals showing up at the private homes of the justices, trying to intimidate them, trying to frighten them, trying to threaten them. And by the way, it's not just at the homes of the justices. These guys are also showing up at pro life advocacy groups, at pro life pregnancy centers. There was one in Wisconsin that they threw a Molotov cocktail on, that they burned, that they spray painted and vandalized. There was another one in Denton, Texas that they spray painted and vandalized. There were people showing up at Catholic churches across the country and harassing people going to mass on Sunday. I mean, it's just number one, these are vile, evil, bigoted people. I'm sorry. If you go to anyone's church and harass them at church, there is a circle of hell just for you that is contemptuous. Even if you disagree with them, leave them alone at church and leave them alone at home. And I gotta say, the intimidation at the homes of the justices to see Jen Psaki repeatedly refuse to condemn it. It's just peaceful. You know, several hundred angry people outside your house while your children are inside screaming and yelling and cursing at you. That's just peaceful. It's repulsive.
- [14:48]
Michael Knowles
Well, it's also against the law. I mean, you know, you reference the acts of violence at the pro life centers, the pro life pregnancy centers, but obviously that's against the law. It's also against the law to show up to a judge's home. It's right there in the US Code. You know it better than I do. Where are the prosecutions? Where are the handcuffs?
- [15:08]
Ted Cruz
So let's talk about that. The particular federal provision you're talking about is 18 USC section 1507. And it says whoever with the intent of interfering with, obstructing or impeding the administration of justice or with the intent of influencing any judge, juror witness or court officer in the discharge of his duty, pickets or parades in or near a building housing a court of the United States or in or near a building or residence occupied or used by such judge, juror, witness or court officer shall be fined under this title or in prison not more than one year, or both. So they're clearly doing that. They're picketing at the home of a judge with an intent of influencing the judge's decision. It's a straight out federal crime. And Merrick Garland and the corrupt Biden Department of Justice is nowhere to be found. They're not enforcing the law. And this is. It is a form of obstruction of justice. It is trying to get the judge to change their mind, to change their vote, to change their decision. And I'll point out it's not just federal law. Actually. Virginia law likewise has a provision and it is section 18.2 418 and section 18.2 419 of the Code of Virginia that makes it a crime to picket the residence of an individual. And so Virginia, likewise for those justices who live in Virginia. You've got both a federal crime and a crime in Virginia. And this is going to someone's home, I'm gonna suggest is inherently threatening and intimidating. It's one thing to go to the office. Look, there have been protests on the steps of the Supreme Court or actually right below the steps of the Supreme Court from the beginning of our country, from when the Supreme Court building was built and before that in the Capitol. That's perfectly fine. You wanna protest on the Mall, that's perfectly fine. You wanna protest at the public square, that's perfectly fine. There's a reason you go to someone's home. You go to someone's home because that's where they sleep. That's where their children are. That's where their physical safety is.
- [17:16]
Michael Knowles
What do you make of Chuck Schumer saying that? Look, this is the business we've chosen. To quote Hyman Roth and the godf, Chuck Schumer said that he has protesters at his house three, four times a week sometimes. And if the judges didn't want that, well, they're in the wrong line of work.
- [17:34]
Ted Cruz
Well, they are in a different line of work. This is not the business they have chosen. Politics is one thing. And listen, when I ran for office, when Schumer ran for office, part of the job is to be responsive to the people. And that means protests are a perfectly legitimate part of the political process because each of us elected to the Senate, elected to the Congress, are required or have the responsibility of representing our constituents. The justices are not elected representatives. Their responsibilities to the Constitution and to the law. Now, the Democrats think this is the business the justices have chosen. And when Chuck Schumer stood on the steps of the Supreme Court and threatened the justices by name and said, if you decide this decision wrong, you will have unleashed the whirlwind. He was threatening them. And so the job of a politician, the job of a justice, is very different. There's a reason it is a federal criminal offense to do this to a judge, and it's not a federal criminal offense to do this to an elected official because the jobs are different. And you shouldn't be using threats and intimidation to try to change a judicial decision. Now, that being said, I actually think what's happening to elected officials, whether Chuck Schumer or anyone else has gone too far. Look, public service means a lot, but it shouldn't have to entail threats to the safety and lives of your kids. I think it should be treated as a criminal offense protesting a residential neighborhood, that there are time, place and manner restrictions. If a protest is designed to threaten and harass an individual, you can do it at the office, you can do it in the public square, but you shouldn't be allowed to go and harass people at their homes.
- [19:22]
Michael Knowles
I totally agree. There is nothing in the text or spirit of the First Amendment that says you have a right to go to a residential neighborhood and scare a bunch of kids.
- [19:30]
Ted Cruz
Schumer is not my favorite person in the world, but I think he ought to be able to sleep at night without people standing outside screaming. And by the way, he didn't tell you who it is protesting him. It's not conservatives. It's crazy leftists for whom Schumer is not crazy enough. That's the interesting thing. There's another senator who I will not name, who protestors threw a rock through their window that shattered and cut one of their children quite severely from the shattering glass. We are going to see violence. I am very concerned that we may see violence directed at the Supreme Court, at these justices. This is the kind of extreme hatred and violence that the Democrats embrace if it favors their partisan ends.
- [20:18]
Michael Knowles
There is some good news. I mean, one, I think the reason they're doing this is because they're losing in the political arena, and so they're getting desperate. But two, you also, I felt, introduced a great bill on a completely different topic, but. Well, not a completely different topic, actually, because the bill you introduced was about my body, my choice, namely, it was to give American Service members to protect them from being punished for refusing to take the experimental Covid vaccines.
- [20:46]
Ted Cruz
Well, that's right. So the bill I introduced this week is a bill. It's called the allowing military exemptions recognizing individual concerns about new shots act or the Americans Act.
- [20:59]
Michael Knowles
Oh, you, you guys with your acronyms. That is the best acronym I've heard in a long time in legislation.
- [21:07]
Ted Cruz
Well, I'd like to claim credit. I can't. It was the great, great guys on my team that came up with it, but I laughed out loud and said, let's go with it. And the bill. Thirteen other senators joined me in introducing it. And the bill is very simple. The bill would stop the military from firing soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines if they declined to take the COVID vaccine. We're seeing thousands of soldiers and sailors and airmen and marines and coast guardsmen and guardians threatened with being fired. We're seeing cadets at our service academies threatened with being thrown out. We're seeing people in the reserves being thrown out. It is grotesque. It is wrong. It is an abuse of power. This bill says you can't throw anyone out because they declined to get a vaccine. It also says if someone has been thrown out, they can come back in if they want that, it's their choice. If they want to come back in, they can do it. And if they choose not to come back in, if you have discharged them at something less than honorable discharge, that will adjust their discharge status to reflect their actual service. In other words, we shouldn't be weakening our ability to defend this nation, to keep this nation safe because of a political agenda from the left. It's your body, your choice. You ought to be able to decide whether or not to take the COVID vaccine. And this should be a simple common sense bill, which means of course the Democrats are likely to oppose at party line.
- [22:36]
Michael Knowles
Of course you'll notice there'll just be a one hour period where they stop chanting my body, my choice, that is. Well, your bill is up for debate then after they'll of course go right back to it. Before we go, as usual, running late. I do want to get to a few mailbag questions from our wonderful Verdict listeners. You can join. Not you, senator. I think you're already a member. But you, you out there in the tubes land. You can join Verdict plus over at Locals. You can subscrib, get lots of extra content. We've got our friend Liz Wheeler hosts a series there with Senator Cruz cloakroom, and you can submit your questions to the mailbag. So, Senator Rapid Fire Round. First up from Stephen. Very important question, Ted. Michael, how do you take your coffee?
- [23:16]
Ted Cruz
Cream, no sugar. Lots of cream, though.
- [23:19]
Michael Knowles
I like my coffee. Like I. No, I'm not gonna quote that line from Airplanes, but I do take my coffee black.
- [23:25]
Ted Cruz
Great movie.
- [23:26]
Michael Knowles
One of the greatest movies of all time from Rod. Senator, why is the GOP still so focused on the fiscal side of things when voters care about the social side? I don't know. Do you even agree with that premise, Senator?
- [23:38]
Ted Cruz
It depends who in the gop. I think there is a generational difference. I think there are particularly Republicans who've been in Congress a long time who are your kind of traditional. You could call them business Republicans. Or if you want to be more pejorative, you could call them country club Republicans who tend to want to tax a little bit less, spend a little bit more, and run away from the social issues. I actually think those numbers are shrinking. I think more and more people recognize there is a culture war going on and we didn't start it. The left has decided to try to destroy our culture. Look, we have an incoming Supreme Court justice who can't tell you what a woman is. We have Disney that has promised that they will have a gay or transgender character in every movie they put out. By the way, I will note again, when Verdict was on the road, that the one quip I said of parents would like to be able to trust their movies and not have to worry about turning on some movie and seeing Mickey going at it with Pluto. Oh, my goodness. The left lost their mind. I'm sorry. All the in depth constitutional analysis that we may have had in the podcast got dwarfed by the image of one little mouse and one little dog doing unspeakable things.
- [24:58]
Michael Knowles
The libs were titillated. There's no question about it.
- [25:02]
Ted Cruz
Look, culture is where the battle is because they recognize that they destroy our culture, they destroy our country.
- [25:09]
Michael Knowles
There's some overlap, too. I think it was Patrick Deneen who made this point. He said, when you think about the debt, what does that tell you about our culture? What does it tell you that our culture is leaving as an inheritance to the next generation a bunch of debt? The economic part, the fiscal part, has a cultural aspect as well.
- [25:26]
Ted Cruz
So I will tell you, Michael, one of the crueler things that my daughters say to me, my daughters are 11 and 14, and when they think I'm. When they're irritated with me, which is not infrequently, they'll say, okay, Boomer. And it's like, damn it, I am not a Boomer, I am firmly Gen X now. You're a millennial.
- [25:49]
Michael Knowles
Stop insulting me, please.
- [25:52]
Ted Cruz
Look, the boomer generation, the credit card bill they have racked up is the greatest in the history of humanity. One generation, the me generation and their kids and grandkids are gonna be paying for it forever and ever. But I gotta say to my 14 year old, Michael, I'm sorry to tell you, you're a boomer too. She thinks all of us. Boomer is synonymous with way too old. And she puts all of us in that camp.
- [26:22]
Michael Knowles
We're all boomers now. Final question, Senator, before I let you go. This is from Michael, not me, I promise. He says, will the overturning of Roe v. Wade be the issue that causes people to self segregate red states and blue states to the point where a peaceful national divorce would be all that prevents a civil war? We've seen a lot of civil unrest, as they call it, around are we headed towards civil war?
- [26:47]
Ted Cruz
On this issue, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis referred to federalism, the system of 50 states, as laboratories of democracy. We've talked a lot on this podcast about laboratories of democracy. I think it's perfectly healthy if different states have different policies that reflect the values of their residents. Friend of mine is a tech guy, very successful, moved from Northern California to Miami. And I was having brunch with him in Miami. And he described how when his friends from Palo Alto would come visit him in Miami, he'd go out, take him out to dinner, and he'd drive a fancy sports car. Cause he did very well in tech. And he'd park the car on the street and he said his friends from Northern California would freak out, what are you doing parking it on the street? Because what he said is if you park your car on the street in Northern California, it will get broken into, it will get keyed. And I remember thinking that's really bizarre that the simple act of being able to park your car on the street is this flex of like, holy cow. This is what happens when you have a functioning police force and your rights are protected. We will see some self segregation, but idiotic policies like abolishing the police, we'll see the chaos that follows from that. Also, in some ways it reminds me of the Cold War and the countries in Eastern Europe behind the Iron Curtain. And when I was a little kid in the 1970s, my dad owned a seismic data processing company, a small business. And my father and my mother ran together. And he got hired in the late 1970s to install a computer system for the government of Albania, now, Albania was a communist government at the time. And my father at the time was a Canadian citizen. He wasn't an American citizen. They wouldn't hire an American. But because my dad was a Canadian citizen, they would hire him. And so he went over there and you want to talk about, like, frozen in time, poverty, misery, the oppression of the Albanian government. But it was very interesting when my father went there the first time, the Albanian people were told, albania is the only completely electrified country in the world, that no other country on earth has electricity except Albania. We are the only ones with electricity. The second time my father went over there, he met them initially in Munich and then went to Albania. And like two Albanians met him in Munich. They told the Albanians as they left, guess what? There are now two fully electrified countries in the world, Albania and Germany. And it reminds me a little bit of like these deep blue state prisoners who believe that everything being shut down, their schools being shut down, their words being censored, being afraid that their neighbors will get mad at them if they say the wrong thing. The, you know, kind of not knowing what a woman is. I'm not sure people in blue states are aware it's different anywhere else.
- [30:03]
Michael Knowles
I was talking to my relatives in New York, so was my wife, sweet little Elisa, and they said, oh, this, I can't wait until this Covid is over finally. And my wife says, it's been over for us for a while. You're seeing this right now. You're seeing two different visions for the country, frankly. Just look at the abortion protests outside the court. On the one hand, screaming, yelling, nasty people. On the other hand, people praying, serene, well behaved. What kind of country do you want to live in? These are options that we're seeing throughout the culture. We've got to leave it there, Senator. In the meantime, I'm Michael Knowles. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz.
- [30:47]
Ted Cruz
This episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz is being brought to you by Jobs, Freedom and Security pac, a political action committee dedicated to supporting conservative causes, organizations and candidates across the country. In 2022, jobs, freedom and Security PAC plans to donate to conservative candidates running for Congress and help the Republican Party across the nation.