← The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
Verdict with Ted Cruz: Honoring and Remembering My Tia Sonia
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- [00:00]
Thea Sonia
This is an iHeart podcast.
- [00:02]
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- [00:37]
Michael
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- [01:00]
Odoo Advertiser
Validos.
- [01:03]
Public and Better Picks Advertiser
En los punto Com Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public you can build a multi asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto and now generated assets which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt. From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20% year over year, you can literally type any any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one of a kind index and lets you back test it against the S&P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like EFTs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com podcast and earn an uncapped 1% bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com podcast paid for by Public Investing Brokerage Services by Open to the Public Investing Inc. Member FINRA SIPC Advisor Services by Public Advisors llc. SEC Registered Advisor Generated Assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available@public.com disclosures not everybody can.
- [02:15]
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- [02:45]
Ben Ferguson
Welcome. It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And today is a really special episode of Verdict with Ted Cruz. And Senator, I want you to take it from there. But we're taking a little pause from politics and talking about someone very near and dear to you.
- [03:02]
Michael
Yeah. On Sunday, January 25, my aunt, my Theasonia went to be with the Lord. She and I were incredibly close. My Theasonia was my father's younger sister. My dad, as you know, fought in the Cuban revolution. He was imprisoned and tortured in Cuba by Batista's thugs. My Theosonna was younger than he is and so she was there after the revolution succeeded. She fought in the counter revolution and she was imprisoned and tortured by Castro's thugs. And she's someone who I grew up very close to. I called her my Tia loca, my crazy aunt. She is fiery. She loved liberty, she loved America. She has been ill for the last couple of months. It was not a surprise when she finally went. My cousin Bibi, who is my Thea Sonia's only daughter, has been caring for her. And she passed Sunday morning in Bibi's living room with her family around her, surrounded by family that loved her, that was praying for her. And she's gone to be with the Lord. And so our family is grieving because Theasonia was a larger than life personality. She had an unbelievable heart. She would help anyone. She was extraordinary and she was someone who before she fell ill, we had my Thea Sonia as a guest on Verdict. I wanted her to come on Verdict and tell her story. Tell her story. Growing up in Cuba, seeing the communist revolution, seeing Fidel Castro rise to power and then fighting in the counter revolution, being in a Cuban jail, being tortured in Cuba, coming to America with nothing. And so in honor of my Tia Loca who, who, whom I loved with, with all of my heart, I want to give you the interview we did with my Thea Sonia, an extraordinary warrior for liberty.
- [05:13]
Senator Ted Cruz
Welcome back to Verdict with Ted Cruz. We are joined as ever by the senator and also by the senators. Tia Sonia is. My Spanish is not very good, but I think that was about right. Aunt Sonia.
- [05:24]
Thea Sonia
That is correct.
- [05:25]
Senator Ted Cruz
Thank you. This is in a few days going to be the 58th anniversary of your fleeing the communist regime in Cuba.
- [05:33]
Thea Sonia
That is correct.
- [05:34]
Senator Ted Cruz
And yet we've got the leader of the Democratic Party nomination process is praising the Fidel Castro regime. I think we have the clip. Very opposed to the authoritarian nature of Cuba. But you don't.
- [05:45]
Odoo Advertiser
You got.
- [05:46]
Senator Ted Cruz
It's unfair to simply say everything is bad.
- [05:48]
Michael
You know, when Fidel Castro came into.
- [05:50]
Ben Ferguson
Office, you know what he did?
- [05:51]
Senator Ted Cruz
He had a massive literacy program.
- [05:53]
Ben Ferguson
Is that a bad thing?
- [05:55]
Michael
Listen, Bernie has spent his entire life, his entire career praising communist dictators. But this week, his latest ode to Fidel Castro, frankly, just pissed me off. And this is not a joke. This guy is the front runner for the Democratic nomination to be president, and he sings the praises of Castro and Cuban communism. My dad fled Cuba in 57. My Theasonian was still there. She was a kid. And so she saw the Cuban revolution firsthand, and she ended up fighting against Castro. So, Thea, if you would, I just want you, first of all, tell me what it was like to be in Cuba when the revolution happened, when Castro took over.
- [06:41]
Thea Sonia
Actually, a lot of people were happy because finally somebody was coming in that was praising, we're gonna give you a chance to change hope. We're gonna change things around. Everybody was gonna have whatever they want to. The poor will never be poor. The rich continue to have money, and everybody will be the same. In reality, yes, everybody went the same, but everybody was poor. Everybody went down. Everybody got paid the same amount of money. There was no difference between the poor and the rich. Everybody lost.
- [07:19]
Michael
It's not that everyone was rich. Everyone was poor and suffering and miserable.
- [07:23]
Thea Sonia
And everybody was miserable. Everybody was miserable. What Bernie is saying is bunch of garbage.
- [07:29]
Michael
So you're there. You're a teenager. How old were you?
- [07:33]
Thea Sonia
Probably 16, 15.
- [07:35]
Michael
Okay, so you're seeing this. You're a teenage girl, right? You see what's happening? You see Castro begin executing people.
- [07:44]
Thea Sonia
Yeah, Persecuting people. Nobody could talk. Nobody could say anything. They actually. He trained the people to even be against the family. The sons against the father, the daughters against the family.
- [07:56]
Michael
So how did he do that?
- [07:58]
Thea Sonia
By indoctrinating these people, by telling, we're gonna give you this and that and the other, and it's all gonna be. But you got to tell us what's going on in your house. Who talk against the government. So everything was persecuting one another, especially the older people that actually, we live a good life. Before in Cuba, it was beautiful.
- [08:18]
Michael
What do people face in terms of their friends and neighbors and families spying on them?
- [08:24]
Thea Sonia
You have people in each block. There is somebody that is responsible to keep an eye on you in your house.
- [08:31]
Senator Ted Cruz
So there's a tabletop. There's a spy on every block.
- [08:35]
Thea Sonia
In every block. And they tell you, you keep an eye on every neighbor of this block. So.
- [08:40]
Michael
And what sort of things are they watching for?
- [08:42]
Thea Sonia
They're watching for everything. If you bring anything, maybe I'm going from United States to Cuba, and there's somebody coming in, so we need to wash their house in case they go out and sell in the black market or they do something with what you brought in. So there's somebody's always keeping an eye on you and try to report you. A good thing that happened to Something that happened to me that is very interesting. One of the trips that I went back to Cuba, I wanted to take the kids, some of the kids from there to go fishing. I love fishing. So I went in and tried to rent a boat. And they told me, we can't. We don't rent boats to Cuban people. And I said, you may leave. And I said, look, I have a passport. I have a flight. Leave Friday. Already left. So I'm coming in to take my family on a boat ride. We can't give it to you. We can't rent you a boat. You're Cuban. So.
- [09:39]
Senator Ted Cruz
Because they're so afraid of the.
- [09:40]
Michael
By the way, Michael, if you go there, you can rent a boat. You can rent a boat. She can't rent a boat because she's Cuban, even though she's an American citizen now.
- [09:47]
Thea Sonia
Yes, you're Cuban, so you can't do. There was a boat in the river that my niece wanted to go in. And when we get in to ride the boat with the rest of the people, they say, you all cannot get in. You all are Cuban. And I said, but we're paying with the same money that they're paying. Well, I'm sorry, you can't come in. You're not from another country. You're Cuban. And Cuban people are not allowed.
- [10:13]
Senator Ted Cruz
They're not allowed to leave. No, because they know if they were allowed to leave, they'd all leave.
- [10:18]
Ben Ferguson
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- [12:14]
Senator Ted Cruz
Sonia, how quickly after, as you say, you know, people liked Castro initially, he was promising them the world. How quickly did it turn? I mean, how quickly did it turn?
- [12:27]
Thea Sonia
Right away, right away he immediately starts saying the policies that he want to do. He was going to take things away from the rich, he was going to take things away from the people to give to other. He was to actually take money from you and give it to the poor on the other side. I make my money, I work for what I have. My father worked hard to be where he was. My mother was a great school teacher. She was really was proud of what she was doing. My mother itself was told did she have to teach at the school, a different kind of curriculum. She was told she need to teach about the revolution, Castro, the regime, the things that needed to happen. My mother have to actually pretend that she was losing her mind and she was dismissed immediately.
- [13:18]
Michael
So let me underscore this story and listen. I grew up hearing this story as a kid. I mean, I would sit with my cousin Bebe, who's that is Sonia's daughter. The two of us would sit literally on the floor in the living room and listen to my dad and my theasonia tell us stories about the revolution. And my abuelo and abuela, their parents were there also. So my grandmother, my Abuela, she's a sixth grade teacher. Castro takes over and she's ordered, you must teach communism to the kids. You must indoctrinate. You must brainwash the kids. And my grandmother said she wasn't gonna do it. And so it's funny, my theasonia mentioned something just very mild, but my grandmother pretended she was insane in the classroom. She began literally foaming at the mouth and pretending she was insane. Why? Because she couldn't quit in the Communist dictatorship, she wasn't allowed to quit. And she made the decision she would rather have the stigma, have the shame of people thinking she was a crazy person than be a part of indoctrinating these kids.
- [14:20]
Thea Sonia
That is true. And it was very painful because my mother was a great teacher. It was loved by many people. But you have to play crazy in order to get out of that situation.
- [14:30]
Senator Ted Cruz
But what I want to know is how in Cuba, the public opinion changes very quickly. People see what a monster Castro is, and they start to hate his guts. How is it that in the United States now, so many years on, 58 years on now since you left, you have a presidential candidate, you got a US Senator who's still singing the praises of this guy. What did he miss?
- [14:54]
Thea Sonia
He have not been with the Cuban people. He only if you go there as a Cuban, you go and see somebody, a relative, you're going to see the misery that they live in. They don't know what to put on the table to serve their kids. They don't know how to get. They're going to get the food that they're going to eat tomorrow. If you are going as somebody from another country or as a tourist, you're taking to, you actually become prisoner of the government. They take you where they want you to go. They showed you the model school, they showed you the best hospitals, they showed you the best restaurants.
- [15:29]
Michael
In 1989, Sanders stated, After visiting Cuba, quote, I did not see a hungry child. I did not see any homeless people. Bernie said the Cuban people, quote, had an almost religious affection for Castro.
- [15:44]
Thea Sonia
That is not true. He is lying. He's lying to the people of this country. He is playing on the mind of the younger generation here.
- [15:53]
Michael
He was either himself complicit in the lie, or he was naive enough or ideological enough to let the Castro regime lie to him and say, look at this, this paradise.
- [16:05]
Thea Sonia
They didn't take into what the Cuban people were. Cuban people are starving to death. Cuban people don't have any money to buy anything.
- [16:13]
Michael
So let me take you back, thea, back to 59 back to 60. The revolution succeeded. You begin fighting against Castro. What happened to you as a result? What happened when you started fighting?
- [16:27]
Thea Sonia
Well, I was constantly persecuted. People was looking for me everywhere. They want to take me to prison. They picked me up several times.
- [16:37]
Senator Ted Cruz
So you were pretty clearly fighting against the regime?
- [16:41]
Thea Sonia
Totally against Castro. Yes. Yes.
- [16:43]
Michael
So this is after Castro's taken over, so he's the dictator. So when they picked you up, what happened? What does that mean?
- [16:49]
Thea Sonia
Well, they put you in a room and there was people sitting on the floor, and everybody's, you know, that's where you were, with a whole bunch of people in the floor, and they keep you there for two or three days. My parents did not know where I was. My mother did not know, so she was going crazy trying to find me. My friends, friends that I have, could not even come and find out with my parents, where was I, or what was wrong with me. They were afraid because everybody was persecuted. So it was very difficult to leave. On the Castro regime, when you left.
- [17:27]
Michael
Cuba, it was 62.
- [17:28]
Thea Sonia
You left, right.
- [17:29]
Michael
You've been back a bunch of times, right?
- [17:31]
Thea Sonia
Yes.
- [17:33]
Michael
So when you come back, you usually bring a duffel bag with medicine.
- [17:38]
Thea Sonia
Medicine. I bring food, clothes, sheets, just for relatives, friends, people that need.
- [17:45]
Michael
So they can't get anything.
- [17:47]
Thea Sonia
Nothing? Nothing.
- [17:48]
Michael
She leaves a suitcase. She leaves every bit of clothes she bought. She leaves her underwear and bra, everything, because nobody has underwear there because there's so much poverty. You'll wear like sweatpants, a T shirt and flip flops. That's what she wears. And that's on the plane coming back, right?
- [18:04]
Thea Sonia
That is correct.
- [18:05]
Michael
A lot of people don't understand what is the difference between socialism.
- [18:09]
Thea Sonia
That is correct.
- [18:10]
Michael
Socialism is simply the economic system of communism. Socialism is government ownership of the means of production or distribution. Cuba in the 1950s was the world's number one producer of sugar. Yeah, it had problems. Look, Batista was a corrupt dictator bastard. My father to this day doesn't have his front teeth because Batista's police kicked them in, his guards, his army officers, kicked them in. But what.
- [18:35]
Senator Ted Cruz
What about the universal health care? I mean, we were told by a lot of people in the United States, a lot of left wingers, they say Cuba has some of the best health care in the world and everybody's covered.
- [18:44]
Thea Sonia
I can personally tell you that I went to the doctor there because I have mosquito bites, that it got into infection and they put a shot on me in front of 60 other people that were there waiting for to be seen by a doctor. There's no transportation. There's no gas, so you can't move. Doctors come to your house in a bicycle and they're hungry. They're hungry when they get there. They come to the house to see. Matter of fact, I was in a house visiting and they were trying to see the little girl. He came in a bicycle and I bought some things that there was somebody in the street selling and he said, can I have one?
- [19:22]
Senator Ted Cruz
Probably the most visible sign that Cuba hasn't changed or hasn't progressed is they have those old cars, right?
- [19:30]
Michael
And you know, people like to think that that's sort of quaint and cute that they have cars from the 1950s. The reason they have cars from the 1950s is they can't get anything else.
- [19:39]
Ben Ferguson
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- [20:40]
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Michael
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- [23:05]
Senator Ted Cruz
You know the scary thing about all of this is you've got the experience of it. 58 years of experience since you left Cuba. There are various studies that have come out that show that even the majority of young Americans, millennials and Gen Z now embrace socialism and prefer it to capitalism. Now the bright side, I will say the silver lining is that a much smaller percentage can actually define socialism. So there would seem to be a problem there. But beyond just ignorance, beyond just not knowing what it is, what is drawing young Americans to this evil?
- [23:38]
Thea Sonia
Evil ideology is the word that Dave is giving out the change. They want to see something different. They want to try something new. It doesn't work guys. It does not work. You all of this ambition and giving it to me. There's nothing given to you. You need to work and try to achieve your dream by hard work and by doing what you want to get.
- [24:04]
Senator Ted Cruz
Ahead I mean, I've noticed this with your colleague, Senator Sanders. I mean, he's been talking about this for 50 years and no one listened. But now, only now that he's in his mid-70s, it's. It's catching on. And I even think of this absent Bernie Sanders. Forget about him for a second. It took a long time. People knew that communism, socialism were terrible for so long, and now they don't know that well.
- [24:33]
Michael
And too often they're not taught in schools. What happened? You know how many Bernie supporters know that the Soviet Union killed 20 million people and China killed 77 million people? They don't know that.
- [24:48]
Thea Sonia
No.
- [24:49]
Michael
And so when Bernie defends seems. Look, and I have to admit, I remember in college, a guy who lived down the hall from me had a poster on the wall of Che Guevara.
- [25:00]
Thea Sonia
Yeah.
- [25:01]
Michael
And I went in, I said, hey, that's really cool. That's all you know, Che Guevara was a guerrilla fought with Fidel Castro in Cuba. And I said, hey, that's really cool. That's awesome. Have you thought of maybe putting a poster of Hitler next?
- [25:11]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yeah.
- [25:13]
Michael
And maybe Stalin and Mao, like, if you're going to celebrate people that torture and murder. Actually, Che was amateur.
- [25:20]
Senator Ted Cruz
He was low on the totem pole.
- [25:22]
Michael
But, you know, he was good looking. He had stubble and he was, you know, it. These villains have been glamorized and it's. It's dangerous.
- [25:33]
Senator Ted Cruz
You know, we've talked a lot about the political and the economic side of things, how the government takes all your stuff and then they take power away from you. You are both religious. I notice, Sonia, you have a cross that you're wearing. Obviously, Senator Cruz, one of the big aspects of communism as it's always been practiced is the atheism of it all. And I wonder if there's a relation here that as religiosity in America has declined, as young people are raised more or less without a religion, if maybe that's playing some role in why communism is catching on. You know, one of the great men of the 20th century to defeat communism was the Pope, was Pope John Paul ii.
- [26:11]
Michael
Well, and Pope John Paul II played a profound role of going to Poland and promising that Poland would be free and speaking up. And it was truly, I think, divine providence. They cheered. They said, we want God and Reagan and Margaret Thatcher all at the same time. And I think those three people, more than any human beings on earth, defeated, defeated the Soviet Union and won the Cold War. Mind you, Bernie was rooting for the Soviet Union during all of this, he's.
- [26:42]
Senator Ted Cruz
Not even hiding it that much.
- [26:43]
Michael
Bernie honeymooned in the Soviet Union.
- [26:47]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yeah.
- [26:48]
Michael
Michael, where'd you honeymoon?
- [26:50]
Senator Ted Cruz
I honeymooned in Hawaii, usa.
- [26:52]
Michael
Okay? That's where, like normal people, you go to the beach. You go to Heidi, and I went to St. Thomas. It was beautiful. We were walking along the beach.
- [26:59]
Thea Sonia
We had fun.
- [27:00]
Michael
What kind of crazy ideologue says, sweetheart, I love you so much, let's do a honeymoon in the Soviet Union? You know that clip you play? He says he's no friend of Putin. There's only one person I know on the national stage that honeymooned in the Soviet Union. You know, the Soviet Union killed over 20 million people. This is not cute little faculty. Leftists. If Bernie was a professor at some liberal arts college out in the frozen tundra, who cares? He's just corrupting a few young minds. This is someone who wants to be President of the United States, and he kisses up to and apologizes for totalitarian dictators. And you know who he doesn't praise? Americans.
- [27:44]
Senator Ted Cruz
Right.
- [27:45]
Michael
Like, when have you ever heard him speak as positively about Abraham Lincoln, Right. As he does about Castro and Ortega and Mao and Stalin? Listen, Communism also hates God.
- [27:58]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yeah.
- [27:58]
Michael
If you look at these communist regimes, they persecute faith. They persecute. They prevent people from. The beauty of the First Amendment is it gives everyone the right to choose how to worship what your faith will be. You know, Bernie, when he praised China in the debate this week, somehow when Bernie talked about its great poverty eradication. You don't have to go back to Mao to find the torture and murder. Right now, Today, there are 1 million Uyghurs, a religious and ethnic minority, 1 million in concentration camps in China today. Why is burning. And why are leftists so willing to praise and be proud of regimes that are torturing and murdering people?
- [28:45]
Senator Ted Cruz
Do you think this is part of why they make their appeal successfully, though? Because the thing I notice so much about the socialists in America today is they're all making these very moral arguments. It's about human rights. It's about giving people their right to health care and their right to have a lot of money.
- [29:02]
Michael
Here's a story my grandmother told me. In the schools, you would have Cuban soldiers come in, and this is kindergarten, first grade. And they'd tell the children, they'd say, close your eyes and pray to Jesus for a piece of candy. And the kids would all do it, and they'd open their eyes and there'd be no candy. And then the soldiers would say, close your eyes and pray to Fidel Castro for a piece of candy.
- [29:32]
Senator Ted Cruz
You're kidding me.
- [29:33]
Michael
And the kids would close their eyes and the soldiers would put candy on their desks and they'd open their eyes and there was candy. This is the literacy program Bernie Sanders is praising. This is the indoctrination that my abuela refused to participate in.
- [29:51]
Thea Sonia
And that is true. They actually indoctrinated the people since they were tiny little kids.
- [29:58]
Senator Ted Cruz
Did it work? I mean, did the.
- [30:00]
Thea Sonia
Of course it doesn't work.
- [30:01]
Senator Ted Cruz
It doesn't work because people see reality.
- [30:03]
Thea Sonia
It doesn't work. People, why don't they work? They don't work. Nobody want to work in Cuba. Why do they want to work? They're gonna make the same money that you're making that he's making. Why do I want to do that?
- [30:14]
Senator Ted Cruz
But do they believe the theory? I mean, does the indoctrination end up persuading people?
- [30:19]
Thea Sonia
Actually, they thought that it was gonna be reality. They really blind them to believe what they were saying. But they immediately took the blind off and saying, everybody's in the same boat. We're all hungry.
- [30:33]
Michael
They know they're hungry. They know they're poor. They know they're miserable. They know that hasn't happened.
- [30:38]
Thea Sonia
That's right.
- [30:38]
Michael
I mean, there's a reason people every day risk their lives to flee Cuba.
- [30:43]
Thea Sonia
That's correct.
- [30:44]
Michael
You know. You know, Reagan, in the height of the Cold War, he had a great way of putting it. He said, the thing liberals never seem to notice is on the Berlin Wall, the machine guns all point in one direction, that you didn't get anyone from East Germany saying, or from West Germany saying, I gotta go live in that communist paradise. Right. The way I like to put it, as a Cuban American, is the thing liberals never notice is in Cuba, the rafts are all going one way. Just once I'd like to see Bernie Sanders go hop on a raft in Key West.
- [31:15]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yeah.
- [31:16]
Michael
And head to 90 miles south. And by the way, he's socialized. Medicine, they have it there. It's just you can't get. You can't actually see a doctor. You can't get medicine. You can't get toilet paper.
- [31:28]
Ben Ferguson
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- [32:33]
Senator Ted Cruz
Actually, you know, tying in all of these points on the economic, on the political and on the religious. Communism has been called the God that failed. Right. It was a sort of substitute religion, a substitute God. And it failed. And you saw it fail personally. What was the, what was the biggest shock? I mean what was the biggest despair, the biggest regret when you saw something that you had believed in fail?
- [32:59]
Thea Sonia
Well, the biggest, it was seeing the people suffering for not being able to even get food to put on the plate. It's so basic, the basic things, not being able to work. Because why do you want to work when you don't have anything to buy with you know that money disappear from you immediately and you all know the numbers, but you know, an Average person makes $30 a month.
- [33:29]
Senator Ted Cruz
$30 per month.
- [33:30]
Thea Sonia
$30 per month. Wow. So what are you going to do with that?
- [33:35]
Senator Ted Cruz
Right?
- [33:35]
Thea Sonia
So people are being drinking water. You see the kids, they drink water with sugar to get their stomach full.
- [33:46]
Senator Ted Cruz
It's, it's that, that basic need. It's so interesting that you say that because it's. Communism starts out as this idealistic fantasy, very highfalutin, very high minded literacy programs, all that. And then the reality of the failure is people can't even fill their stomachs.
- [34:01]
Thea Sonia
That is true.
- [34:01]
Michael
Although you know, there is one exception, which is the Communist Party rulers. Look, Fidel Castro lived like a billionaire.
- [34:08]
Senator Ted Cruz
He filled his.
- [34:09]
Michael
And by the way, Putin lives like a billionaire. Maduro and Hugo Chavez before him, they live like billionaires. Communism, when you have all the power at the top. And what does Bernie suggest it would be any different if the government is in charge of everything, every place that has happened, the rulers live like kings and everyone else is miserable.
- [34:33]
Senator Ted Cruz
Right. Well, we did actually get one mailbag question that I think is very much on this topic, which is with the Democratic Party veering so far to the left and embracing these absolutely disgusting positions, hopefully will turn off most of the American people. Should conservatives be happy? Should conservatives be happy that the God that failed is about to fail the Democratic Party?
- [34:55]
Michael
Not necessarily you're not as complacent. I understand people saying, okay, great, Bernie's so extreme, that means Trump will get reelected. I hope Trump gets reelected. I'm working hard, hard to reelect the President. But listen, what is truly terrifying is I think the American people could elect a wild eyed socialist. The media, we're a divided country. If 100,000 votes had flipped in 2016, Hillary Clinton would be the president right now. And Bernie, the media treats him kind of like your crazy uncle. Oh, he's just the crazy uncle. Isn't that cute? He's praising, murdering, torturing communist dictators. Well, this guy believes this stuff, right in his heart and soul. He believes it. His whole life has been dedicated to it. And, and, and I gotta admit, I am. It's all fine and good to celebrate. Unless he ends up winning.
- [35:50]
Senator Ted Cruz
Unless it happens.
- [35:52]
Michael
God help the direction this country goes if that happens.
- [35:54]
Senator Ted Cruz
Well, because you already fled one communist hellhole and this was the great hope as America's the great hope.
- [36:01]
Thea Sonia
There's no place to go.
- [36:02]
Senator Ted Cruz
Where do you go after this?
- [36:04]
Thea Sonia
There is no place to go.
- [36:05]
Ben Ferguson
Senator, what an incredible story and especially so timely with what's happening in Cuba and in Venezuela and Iran and just I hope it inspires others. I hope people will share this. Our thoughts and our prayers are with you and your family. But what an amazing legacy that she has left behind.
- [36:23]
Michael
Well, she has left an amazing legacy, including her daughter Bebe, who is extraordinary. She's like a sister to me, including me. She impacted my life in a very profound way. I will tell you. A couple of weeks ago I went up to see her. She lived in Dallas. I went up to see her and brought Heidi and the girls. And we saw her in the hospital and she was not fully conscious. She was going in and out of consciousness. But I told her, I told her that we got Maduro and I told her Cuba is next, the Cuban communist regime is going to fall next and even kind of coming in and out of consciousness. She smiled the biggest smile. And to have a chance to tell her that and for her to hear that before she goes to be with the Lord. She is truly a warrior for liberty. Theosanya, I love you.
- [37:18]
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- [37:34]
Michael
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Michael
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Michael
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Michael
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- [39:04]
Thea Sonia
This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.