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- [00:00]
Rodney Williams
This is an iHeart podcast.
- [00:04]
Senator Ted Cruz
Hey Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Now I don't know if you've heard, but Mint's Premium Wireless is $15 a month. But I'd like to offer one other perk.
- [00:14]
Ben Ferguson
We have no stores.
- [00:17]
Senator Ted Cruz
That means no small talk. Crazy weather we're having.
- [00:20]
Jim
No it's not.
- [00:21]
Senator Ted Cruz
It's just weather. It is an introvert's dream. Give it a try@mintmobile.com Switch upfront payment.
- [00:28]
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Jim
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- [02:35]
Rodney Williams
I'm Rodney Williams and I'm Travis Holloway, welcome to the wealthbreak podcast, a real conversation about financing. Let's be honest, building wealth doesn't look the same for everyone.
- [02:47]
Ben Ferguson
I feel like sometimes being broke is.
- [02:49]
Senator Ted Cruz
A cycle and that we might have.
- [02:51]
Rodney Williams
To revisit that and we're not stopping at success stories.
- [02:54]
Washable Sofas Advertiser
What happens when it doesn't go right? How do you cope with it?
- [02:58]
Rodney Williams
Because wealth isn't just about money. It's about creating a life where you thrive and help others do the same. Listen to the Wealth Break podcast on the iHeartRadio app.
- [03:10]
Ben Ferguson
Welcome. It is Verdique Center, Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And this episode will be a dual episode my show and send her cruise as well here because we're trying to figure out what the hell's going on. Just like every other American when it comes to is the government open? Is it closed? Center as we are doing this 10 o' clock Eastern. We're recording on Sunday night. You've just left the Senate floor. So where the hell are we now? Because there were some reports like the government's reopened, then it's not reopened. We're heading towards reopening. What is right? What's wrong?
- [03:42]
Senator Ted Cruz
Well, we have really good news, which is the government is in the process of reopening. It's not going to be reopened on Monday, but we got the votes tonight that will start the process of reopening it. We're going to explain exactly what that means, what the, what the deal was and what the timing is going to be and how that's likely to impact you, whether it is going to a national park or going to the Smithsonian or flying on an airplane. What the timing is likely to be. We're also going to talk to you about a bill that I introduced this past week, the deporting Fraudsters bill that is going after illegal immigrants who are fraudulently getting welfare benefits. And right now, fraudulently taking welfare benefits is not a statutory ground for deportation. I'm introducing legislation to change that. We'll explain that all to you.
- [04:30]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah, it's really incredible. I want to take a moment and talk to you about Hillsdale College and something amazing that's happening right now. I am taking a class. I want to say it was a refresher course. It's really been so much more than that. It is about the Constitution. Constitution 101. And Hillsdale College has done an amazing job of allowing people to continue to learn about this country at their own pace. Online now in a brand new six part documentary series, Hillsdale College professors are now teaching you the religious, political, cultural and economic ideas that shape a uniquely American culture during the colonial period. You're going to learn why the idea of liberty, especially religious liberty, inspired the settlers of America to cross the Atlantic. You're going to learn how Americans organize local governments to rule and protect themselves and why America has always been a land where virtue can lead to peace and prosperity. Most of us know that the Declaration of Independence marks the beginning of America as an independent nation. But this Hillsdale course focuses on the forging of the American character that made the revolution possible and why it's more important than ever to remember and reclaim that character today. So here's the part that I love the most. Hillsdale College is doing something amazing. They are offering these courses to you guys listening completely free and it's easy to access. Hillsdale is now offering more than 40 other free online courses, just like the Constitution 101 class taking right now. They of course, on CS Lewis, the stories of the book of Genesis, the rise and the fall of the Roman Republic, and you can even go deeper on the American founding and the Constitution, all for free. How do you get take the classes for free right now. Go to Hillsdale Edu Verdict. Enroll right now. There's no cost. It's easy to get started. That's Hillsdale to enroll for free. Hillsdale Edu Verdict and see all the classes, the 40 plus classes you can take right now for free. All right. So, Senator, there was a lot of excitement earlier Sunday evening. My phone blew up. I'm assuming you were getting the text message, like, oh, great, the government's wide open again. It's going to go back to normal. I wish that was true. You just described as we've got the votes to move forward.
- [07:02]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yep.
- [07:03]
Ben Ferguson
Explain the process because, I mean, even on social media, it was like, the government's reopened. I'm like, not so fast. That's not how this can work. In fact, it could take almost another week in total to get this thing back to where it needs to be.
- [07:17]
Senator Ted Cruz
So, look, the good news is we finally have a deal. And we got the votes that are necessary to reopen the government. So we've had a shutdown, the schumer Shutdown, for 40 days. Yeah, 14 different times. 14 times Republicans have voted to open the government. 14 times Democrats have voted no, have voted to keep the government shut down. Now, remember, the entire reason that we have a shutdown is because under the Senate rules, you need 60 votes to move to proceed to legislation funding the government. We only have 53 Republicans that means we need at least seven Democrats. And unfortunately, Rand votes no on all of these. So we have 52 Republicans to fund the government. So we need eight Democrats. The 14 times we voted over the last 40 days, over and over and over again, we've gotten at most two or three Democrats. Tonight, Sunday, it's just a few minutes after 10pm Sunday night, we finally got the eight Democrats we needed. So the Democrats who voted to reopen the government are Durbin, Hassan, King, Cortez, Masto, Cain, Shaheen, Rosen, and Fetterman. Those are the eight. We got exactly what we needed. We ended up with 60 votes, not 61. So that not at. Not in a sink. Every other Democrat voted no. Keep it shut down. But getting eight is important. And there was a substantive deal. But the substantive deal has several pieces. Number one, there's a continuing resolution that runs through January 30th. So one thing that was really important to me and to a lot of conservatives was that we not have government funding expire right before Christmas. Yeah, often government funding expires right before Christmas. And they use the desire everyone has to go home to their families for the holidays to twist their arms into passing a really bad bill. So this does not end right before Christmas. The CR Instead, the continuing resolution continues until the end of January. That was significant. We also included three appropriation bills in the deals. Now, these are appropriation bills. There are two ways you can fund the government. You can fund the government through an appropriation bill. There are 13 different appropriation bills that fund different cabinet agencies and different major programs.
- [09:35]
Ben Ferguson
Yep.
- [09:36]
Senator Ted Cruz
Those take 60 votes. That's. That's what's called regular order. That's the way the system is supposed to work. And then you can also fund the government through a continuing resolution, also called a CR that just keeps everything the way it was before and maintains the status quo. We ended up doing a combination of both. So in this deal, we have, number one, the ag approach. So that's. That's the agriculture appropriation. That includes the funds that, that farmers rely on, but it also importantly includes snap. It includes food food stamps. So, yeah, one of the consequences of the shutdown was the funding for. For food stamps went away. With this appropriation bill, we will fund the food stamps for an entire year. So that will be taken off the table.
- [10:21]
Ben Ferguson
And by the way, let's be very clear about that. Republicans tried to make sure that even with the government shutdown, that SNAP benefits were continuing and were not stopped. Democrats made damn sure that people did not get their food stamp benefits. During the 40 day longest shutdown in American history. They did that because they thought it was leverage to hurt the poorest among us in America. And that would then give them leverage to get more of the port grill things they wanted for the Democratic programs and initiatives. And they didn't care if you couldn't feed your kids over the last 40 days.
- [10:57]
Senator Ted Cruz
So understand that was the entire Democrat strategy is maximize the pain on the American people because the more pain that they could inflict, they were counting on the media to be dishonest and blame it all on Trump. And so repeatedly this past week, I went back and forth with Democrats repeatedly and their talking points were very simple. They would say, well, you have a Republican president, Republican Senate, Republican House, the shutdown is their fault. And that was it. And they were counting on the dishonest corporate media to tell that lie, what they omitted. And actually I talked about this just this weekend. I spoke on the Senate floor and I said, look, whenever anyone takes an oath to testify in court that they put their hand on the Bible and they pledge to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Well, the Democrats saying that they're failing part number two, the whole truth, because it is true. We have a Republican president, House and Senate. What they're ignoring is the fact that it requires 60 votes and it is the Democrats who force the shutdown because they're the ones that are not voting to keep the government open. This package we took three appropriations bills. The Ag appropriation bill, which is farmers, ranchers and food stamps, the military construction and the VA bill. So that funds, funds our veterans and also gives funds for military construction projects across the country. And then the legislature bill, which among other things, we increase the funding for security for members of Congress. Given the political violence we see, I think that's very important to have more funds to increase security on both sides of the aisle. So that package, those are three appropriation bills that were bipartisan the Democrats had a part in that were passed along with the 30 day CR or not 30 day, the CR2. January 30th.
- [12:45]
Ben Ferguson
January 30th, yeah, yeah.
- [12:48]
Senator Ted Cruz
So all of that is what we got 60 votes for tonight. Now what does that mean tomorrow morning? Does that mean the government is open Monday morning? Unfortunately, no.
- [12:58]
Ben Ferguson
And by the way, there's people are frustrated because they think, well, you guys shut it down quickly, then why can't you just reopen it quickly? And this is how the sausage is made. And that's why I think there's some miscommunication On Sunday night about, oh, the government's like open up. I mean, there was major news outlets like government opening up votes to have it. And they're thinking, all right, well, if I'm flying out Monday or Monday afternoon or Tuesday, there should be no problems at the, at the airport. That's also not true. I want to be very clear about that.
- [13:27]
Senator Ted Cruz
Look, if the Democrats want to be full obstructionist, they could delay opening the government as late as Friday of this week.
- [13:35]
Ben Ferguson
Really?
- [13:36]
Senator Ted Cruz
There are a series of votes. We have to take it under the Senate rules. They can delay thing. They have a right to an intervening day between one vote and another. They can delay things for 30 hours. And so they could drag it out. Even though we have the 60 votes, they could drag it out as late as Friday. My guess is they'll drag it out till Monday or Tuesday. My best guess is the government will open up Tuesday or Wednesday. But we really are dealing with, look, the Bernie Sanders is of the world. By the way, Chuck Schumer voted no because the whole point of this was for him to tell the crazy left he still hates Donald Trump. Now, I don't, I don't think these eight Democrats would have voted yes without Schumer blessing their voting yes. So this was always going to end this.
- [14:24]
Ben Ferguson
I was going to ask you. So getting to the perfect number of eight. And again, this is how the sausage is made. So let's, let's talk about behind the scenes, you guys. The Republicans have been meeting right behind the scenes. You have your normal lunches that you have and your other meetings, and I see you guys on the floor of the Senate talking and you're outside the Senate. I mean, Democrats are doing the same thing when they decide who is in the eight to vote. Yes. Is that strategic based on who needs cover when they're running for office? Is that, I mean, there's some like Fetterman that clearly were leaders on this. Just saying, I think it's wrong to hold the American people hostage. I'm voting to open this thing up. How do they decide on the exact eight and is it literally to the point where they're like, all right, we're going to only give eight and you got to make your argument to us why you should be in the, in the eight and we'll give you that blessing. How does that work?
- [15:15]
Senator Ted Cruz
So I don't know for sure. I will say there were a number of Republicans who were surprised we did not get more than eight. So there were other Democrats who were telling Republicans privately they were going to vote yes to open the government. People like John Ossoff, who's got. He's the most vulnerable Democrat running for reelection in Georgia. He just voted the 15th time to keep the government shut down. You know, Georgia interesting, by the way, Raphael Wardock, the other Georgia senator, did as well. We actually thought there was a real possibility they would both vote tonight to open the government. I don't know what Ossoff's calculus was. Warnock will often vote with Ossoff to give him some political coverage. So we figured that they would go. They would go either both yes or both no. They both voted to keep the government shut down.
- [16:02]
Ben Ferguson
What is the chances two guys like that on. On Tuesday, Wednesday vote yes after they say, all right, well, fine, we're already going to be there. Does that change, you think that eight number, could that change a 10, 12? Or is it pretty much eight is eight?
- [16:15]
Senator Ted Cruz
No. I could easily see on a subsequent vote some additional Democrats. Patty Murray, who is the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, a number of Republicans believe she was going to vote yes. I mentioned we just. We're going to pass three appropriation bills. She played a major hand in drafting those three appropriation bills. And so for appropriators, look, when Chuck Schumer and the Democrats had the majority, do you know how many appropriation bills they passed into law?
- [16:42]
Ben Ferguson
How many?
- [16:43]
Senator Ted Cruz
Zero.
- [16:44]
Ben Ferguson
Wow.
- [16:45]
Senator Ted Cruz
Like, the process was broken. They didn't do appropriations. It's our hope to actually go through the process to have amendments to negotiate it. And that's what these three bills are doing. And yet the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee voted no. Chris Coons, who is widely seen as one of the more moderate Democrats, he voted to keep the government shut down. Alyssa Slotkin from Michigan. Look, Michigan's a purple state. She voted to keep the government shut down. Gary Peters, also from Michigan, retiring. He voted to keep the government to shut down. So there were another half dozen or so that a lot of folks thought we would have a chance at getting their votes, and we did not.
- [17:28]
Ben Ferguson
So when you don't get those votes, we move forward. You said this thing could end up to Friday. You're guessing probably Tuesday. Wednesday the government reopens. How many more votes after tonight? Again, for people that are listening, we're doing this Sunday night at 10:15 right now in D.C. how many people are. How many votes will it take to starting now to get the government actually reopen?
- [17:54]
Senator Ted Cruz
We need to continue to hold 60. But. But we're going to. The underlying terms of the deal have been cut. So I don't expect any of the eight who just voted yes to flip. So I think we've got our 60. But the remaining Democrats can just drag things out and make it painful. I hope they don't. I actually pulled Dick Durbin aside. Durbin. Durbin is retiring. And I mentioned, I always thought this was going to end with retiring Democrats voting to open the government. Durbin did. So now look, he's, he's the number two in leadership among the Democrats. He's Chuck Schumer's right hand buddy's retiring. I told Dick tonight, I said, look, we've got 60 now. It sure would be nice if, like, you guys didn't drag this out unnecessarily till Friday and just the identical outcome will happen. And it just is more painful for everybody. I think there are a lot of Democrats who feel that way. It's why I think we'll end Tuesday or Wednesday. But, but who the heck knows? Now there's another element of this deal that's getting some attention online, which is a commitment to reverse the rifts, the reductions in forces that happened during the shutdown.
- [19:02]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah.
- [19:03]
Senator Ted Cruz
And, and there's some folks online saying, oh, you guys cave, this is terrible. That was, was an offer that, that President Trump made, I think like two weeks ago to the Democrats that has been on the table for them a long, long time. And the White House mate made the decision, okay, if you guys open the government, we agree, we'll offer you that, we'll reverse those rifts. So that was in the deal, but it was a deal that came from the White House that we just agreed. Okay, if that's, if those are the terms that the President wants to cut, we'll back up the president.
- [19:33]
Ben Ferguson
So you go into Monday, you're going to have more meetings throughout the day or explain to me Monday what that looks like.
- [19:40]
Senator Ted Cruz
We're anticipating the first vote probably around noon. And as I said, there could be, we could have done it all tonight if the Democrats had agreed to. In the Senate, you can do anything by unanimous consent. And so if they wanted to open the government tonight, they could have just consented to do one vote and then do the other one next. Do the other one next, the other one next. And we'd be done. Like, you can do that.
- [20:01]
Ben Ferguson
Literally, instead of us recording right now, you guys could actually be voting. And this could have all been Monday morning. The government is open for business. All the FAA guys are back to normal, everybody's getting paid and they're like, now screw it, we'll just wait a few more days. So no one's flying home, right? I mean, you're not flying home tonight, are you?
- [20:20]
Senator Ted Cruz
Nope, Nope. I'm in D.C. i didn't see my family this weekend. I would have loved to have seen my kids. I didn't. I spent most of the time just sitting here waiting for Democrats to finally agree to cut a deal. But it was striking. We could have done it tonight. But to do that, you need unanimous consent. That means you don't need 60, you need 100. That means one person can object and say no, drag it out. I want to burn more time. I want to burn more time. And you have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all the Democrats who are running for president that want to want a spectacle, and so that if they really decide to be just fully obstructionist, they could drag it as late as Friday.
- [21:11]
Ben Ferguson
All right, so one other question. As this is unfolding. When the government opens back up, and let's just use a hypothetical of Wednesday, all right, Wednesday, the government opens up, does that mean that instantly the system is going to go back to normal? I'm saying this to people traveling. You and I have traveled a lot. We've started to see the breakdown of, of, of air traffic control and of having to cancel flights. I've witnessed it traveling internationally and domestically over the last couple of days. You've done it as well. And so when it opens back up, is that like an instant fix, or is that going to take a couple of days to cycle through the system as well? What does travel look like? Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday?
- [21:54]
Senator Ted Cruz
Look, at least travel Monday and Monday and Tuesday. I would expect still really significant delays and really significant cancellations. The reason for those delays and those cancellations, we have roughly 50,000 TSA agents all across the country. Many of them are going into work. None of them are being paid. They all missed their last paycheck, didn't get their last paycheck. We have roughly 14,000 air traffic controllers. Many of them are going into work. None of them are getting paid. They all missed their last paycheck. Listen, if you're a TSA agent, if you're an air traffic controller, typical TSA agent or air traffic controller doesn't have a deep reservoir of savings. I mean, they're under real stress right now. How do I pay my mortgage? How do I pay my rent? How do I pay my bills? And so what is happening with both TSA agents and controllers? They're calling in sick. They're just not showing up. I say, say summer coming into work. The problem is in New York City on Halloween Day, roughly 80% of the controllers called in sick and didn't show up to work. That's Chuck Schumer's hometown, by the way. And so we're seeing with tsa, you had Monday a week ago, the lines in the Houston bush Airport were 2 1/2 to 3 hours line long to get through security because they were, they were so short staffed on TSA agents, they didn't have enough to move people through security. So even if the government opens up tomorrow, you're dealing with the independent decisions of 50,000 TSA agents and 14,000 controllers when they come back to work. And the reason that the FAA has mandated 10% of flights be canceled is they're looking at the data and seeing that these short staffed air traffic controllers, there's an increased risk to safety. So they're saying, all right, if we don't have full staffing, we got to reduce the number of flights. So in a week, do I expect things to go back to normal? Yes, a week after things open up. But it could easily take several days for people to say, okay, I'm going to come back into work. Now, that doesn't happen automatically just by flipping a switch.
- [24:03]
Ben Ferguson
So what you're basically telling me is this week when I'm flying and when you're flying and so many others that listen to the show are flying, we're going to be dealing with this type of chaos because the Democrats decided not to do their job even while doing their job on Sunday night. Right now.
- [24:18]
Senator Ted Cruz
Yes. And by the way, they could have agreed to open it all up tonight. They could have given consent, said, okay, you've got a deal, let's move ahead. And it's now just the obstructionist who, you know, if your flight is canceled tomorrow, you can thank Chuck Schumer and every Democrat senator running for president who's trying to show off to the crazy left. But we will get it open now. But it will take. It'll take.
- [24:45]
Ben Ferguson
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- [25:03]
Senator Ted Cruz
Always.
- [25:04]
Ben Ferguson
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- [27:29]
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- [28:30]
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- [29:00]
Senator Ted Cruz
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- [29:32]
Ben Ferguson
All right, so let's move to another issue in the shutdown and there's been some confusion over it. There's been a lot of fighting over it. It deals with Obamacare, also known as the Affordable Care Act. Democrats decided, and this is some of the history that I do think we need to now explain because there's been so many, so much of a political football on this one that they purposely designed for the subsidies which make Obamacare seem cheaper than it is. Even though your tax dollars are paying for the subsidies to subsidize people's health insurance. They designed it purposely to expire now and that was something that was done by design I'm assuming for this type of fight is am I wrong? And explain what's happening with Obamacare now and moving forward.
- [30:18]
Senator Ted Cruz
Well, look, the other thing Democrats talked about and they claimed they were fighting the shutdown for was to extend Obamacare and in particular during COVID when the Democrats had control of the House and the Senate and the White House, they passed massive subsidies that went straight to giant insurance companies. Went to the didn't go to the people, didn't go to you, but went to insurance companies. Roughly $50 billion worth of subsidies. Just huge corporate welfare and that corporate welfare to the insurance companies expires the end of December. And so part of this deal is Republicans agreed we will have a vote on those, those subsidies the first week of December. Now, by the way, Republicans offered them that we would schedule that vote 40 days ago. So they've had that on the table for 40 days. But we said at the beginning, sure, we'll give you a vote. They're going to lose that vote. They know they're going to lose that vote. But we said, we'll give you that vote. And so we agreed to have that vote. Now, what's the answer? And this is where I want to take folks a little bit behind the scenes to some of the sausage making. So most of the Senate was in D.C. all weekend. We'd all planned to be back home and had many people had fundraisers or political events or family events, and we missed most of them just staying here. So Friday night, I invited a dozen senators out to dinner. And so we went to a local restaurant and got a room together and had a great dinner. And we're laughing and talking and strategizing, saying, look, are the Democrats going to move? So in that dinner, we decided to call President Trump. So we called President Trump, got him on the cell phone, and the president, he was in a good mood, but he was expressing his views emphatically, as he always does.
- [32:09]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah. By the way, for people that have ever done a phone call, like, if you've never gotten to do this, he does not ever hold back when you're talking about the phone. Not a single phone call. You've had a lot more than I have. But when I've had phone calls with him, whether it was in 16 to 20 or now forward, like, he does not hold back at all when you're on the cell phone, on speakerphone as well.
- [32:30]
Senator Ted Cruz
He does not. So one of the things we asked of him Friday night, we said, listen, in this battle with the Democrats over Obamacare, Obamacare is failing. It's a bad program. And if you go back, go back to 2013, 2013, when I did a filibuster against Obamacare, I said at the time, if you remember, Barack Obama promised the American people Obamacare would, would cut the average family's premiums by 2500 a year. Yep. That was a lie. And in fact, they skyrocketed at the time, 5,000 a year. They've skyrocketed a lot more than that. Even the Washington Post has now admitted the editorial page, the Affordable Care act, which is the misleading name of Obamacare, did not make healthcare more Affordable. It caused premiums to skyrocket. So when we had Trump on the phone, we said, look, it would really help if you made the case that what Democrats are fighting for is these massive multibillion dollar corporate welfare payoffs to the health insurance companies instead of empowering consumers. And, look, we want to lower prices. And so we said, in particular, it would really help if you would send a truth. And. And Trump said, great, come up with something. And so I will tell you what the President sent. I had a lot of input in this, and here's what he put out. President Trump said, democrats claim to be working for, quote, the little guy and driving down your health insurance. But the. And the rest of this is, in all caps. Obamacare scam goes straight to their best friends in the insurance industry. They are making a killing. While health coverage only gets worse. If Democrats. If Democrats get their way again, they're in for another huge payday at the expense of the American people. No deal. In all caps, Republicans should give money directly to your personal health savings accounts, all in caps that I expanded in our great big beautiful bill. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Now, this is really important because if you want a really strong, principled, conservative reform to health insurance.
- [34:43]
Ben Ferguson
Yeah.
- [34:44]
Senator Ted Cruz
Expanding health savings accounts so that you give you, the consumer, you, the patient, more control, and instead of sending money to the insurance companies, send it straight to people's health savings accounts. So you can spend it on premiums, you can spend it on deductibles, you can spend it on health care that expands competition and empowers patients, and it lowers prices. The President leaning in with this tweet really helps in this political battle we'll have over the next six weeks, because the outcome he's advocating for is something I've advocated for a long time. And that was a direct result of that dinner on Friday night where we got him on the phone.
- [35:24]
Ben Ferguson
You know, there's one interesting thing that's coming out of this first year of Trump being back in office. It is really empowering the American people. Whether it is the accounts you just talked about, whether it's the Trump accounts that are gonna be coming in this next year that you guys pass to give kids the opportunity to save money and to be able to grow accounts and to build wealth over their lifetime. Like, there is a lot of personal growth and personal excitement that it's Trump is, get the government out of your life. You can do better without it. We want to help you do that. And then the Democrats, like, no, no, no, no, no. Mandanis and others, you should have no control of your life. We want to run the whole damn show from birth to death. Just trust the US Government to be your daddy or your mommy or both. And that's exactly the difference between the Republicans and Democrats right now.
- [36:18]
Senator Ted Cruz
Look, it's a fundamental divide, as you noted. We passed the Trump accounts, as you know. Well, I wrote that legislation.
- [36:24]
Ben Ferguson
Yep.
- [36:25]
Senator Ted Cruz
This has been a major theme that I've been fighting for since the first day I got elected to the Senate. And whether you're talking about health savings accounts, whether you're talking about Trump accounts that are, that are essentially 401k savings accounts for kids, or whether you're talking about school choice and getting tax credits, the unifying theme of all of those is individual choice, empowering you, the individual, rather than government competition and giving you control. That is the fundamental difference between left and right. And President Trump has been a great partner in this. And I'll tell you, as a part of his tweet, he sent out a chart, a chart which I had sent him. But I want you to see the chart. We're going to put it up on, on, on YouTube for anyone that's watching it on YouTube. But it goes through the major health care companies. Their stock performance since Obamacare passed. I'm going to walk through them. Aetna, Obamacare, March 2010 is when it passed Aetna. Stock, stock price was $30.50. Today it's $212. So it's increased 595% since Obamacare passed. Centene, its stock has increased 604%. Molina, its stock has increased 859%. Humana, its stock has increased 490%. Anthem Elevance Health, its stock has increased 414%. Cigna, its stock has increased 822%. And UnitedHealth Group, when Obamacare passed, UnitedHealth stock was $25.66. Today, November 2025, it is $327.74. That is a 1,177% increase. That's what Obamacare did. It massively increased the profits of the health insurance companies. By the way, those health insurance companies overwhelmingly give to Democrats. They give to Chuck Schumer. They give to Hakeem Jeffries and the Democrats because they recognize when Democrats are in power, their profits go through the roof and the American people's premiums skyrocket. What do the Democrats say they wanted to do in this shutdown? Give $50 billion to those same health insurance Companies who profits have skyrocketed. And it's why what the president said is so important. No, we're not going to give money to health insurance companies. Instead, we're going to expand health savings accounts so you, the individual, has control over your own healthcare.
- [39:04]
Ben Ferguson
For the last several weeks, you've heard me talk with Josh Sherrard at Burna and tell stories about people just like you and I and how they've used their burner launcher protect themselves and their families. Now, if you don't know what a burner is, it is a handheld pistol that fires both kinetic rounds and chemical irritants to separate you from an attacker. And it's truly amazing. Now, Josh is back today to share a story about a store owner and how a burner launcher could have really come in handy.
- [39:31]
Josh Sherrard
Yeah, so in Seattle, the owner of a local small business decided to have a sidewalk sale to engage more directly with her community. Well, the day was going great when a male walking down the middle of the street could be seen yelling, streaming and hitting passing cars. This man was clearly suffering from an accident. Cute mental episode when he then approached the store owner, began threatening her. After several failed attempts at de escalating the situation, the woman ultimately tried to go back into the store to try to get to safety. And it was then that the deranged man yelled that he was going to gouge out her eyes and then grabbed her, slammed her to the ground and began choking her. It was only due to several good samaritans that jumped in to pull him off of her that probably saved her life.
- [40:14]
Ben Ferguson
You know, this is a growing trend. Unfortunately, mental health is a is a serious issue. And in areas with larger homeless populations, these individuals affected by this can really get violent. Could burn us still be effective in this case?
- [40:28]
Josh Sherrard
Absolutely. You know, mental health is striking populations all over America and those with mental health issues that also have substance abuse abuse issues are over 1100 times more likely to commit violent crime. And the problem is you never know when that may happen. Burna, especially used with our chemical agent projectiles, will incapacitate even those suffering from those acute mental episodes. So Burna is a great tool to use when you absolutely have no idea that you may need it.
- [40:55]
Ben Ferguson
If you want to find out more about how burner can help you or your family members, it's a great gift with the holidays coming for someone you want to help protect, go to Byrna B Y R N a dot com that's Byrna B Y R N a dot com berna dot com Senator, I also Want to get a little preview of something that you're working on? We're going to do a more expansive show on this. But it's important that people know that even while the government has been shut down, you have been working very hard on other things. One of those things is you have now introduced the quote Deporting Fraudsters act of 2025. And it deals with SNAP and public benefits abuses that is costing the American people millions and millions of dollars. Give us a little preview of this so people know what's been going on.
- [41:44]
Senator Ted Cruz
Look, this is a very simple bill. It is an astonishing fact that right now, welfare fraud, fraudulently taking government assistance benefits is not a deportable offense under the immigration laws. This law will change that and make it a deportable offense. Let me give you some basic statistics. 48% of households headed by illegal immigrants received food related welfare benefits. 48%. Nearly half specifically SNAP. A CIS analysis found that 31% of illegal alien households with children draw SNAP benefits. One in five households getting WIC, women's infants and Children or SNAP is headed by a non citizen. And 96% of the children in those households are us but born. Showing how illegal aliens exploit child based eligibility to access benefits indirectly, the US Department of Agriculture reports 1.76 million non citizens on SNAP in 2023. That is roughly $312 million in taxpayer funds in 2012, or not 2012 rather 2022, it was 1.5 million recipients that cost 222 million. Fraud is rampant. For example, in 2024, $126.8 million was stolen from EBT cards in Texas. 3.7 million people, about 11% of the state relies on SNAP. Every stolen or unlawfully claimed dollar robs a citizen family in genuine need. And According to the CBO, about 200,000 illegal aliens from the surge of alien asylum seekers from 2023 to 2024 already received SNAP growing to 800,000 by 2034, assuming no deportations. A 10 year cost. You said this cost millions. Yeah, the 10 year cost is 15 billion. And so this bill is to target that and say if you're here illegally, you do not have any entitlement to public welfare. And if you access fraudulently access public welfare, that is yet another ground to deport you.
- [44:04]
Ben Ferguson
Now Chuck Schumer is a co sponsor of this bill, right?
- [44:07]
Senator Ted Cruz
No. And I feel confident that Schumer is not just a no, he's a. He's a hell no. Because today's Democrat party it is all for giant health insurance corporations. It is all for, for illegal immigrants. It is all for violent criminals. It is all for men and women's sports. It's all for everyone except the average American citizen trying to work hard and provide for his or her family. And that's exactly backwards.
- [44:34]
Ben Ferguson
It's incredible. Well, as we're doing the show right now at 10:40 at night on Sunday evening, the government still shut down. You're still being held hostage. We're moving in the right direction. Democrats could drag this out even till 4 Friday just to hurt you. If you're traveling this week, you're not alone. Senator Cruz and I are traveling with you. It's gonna, it's gonna suck. That's just the best way I can describe it. But at least hopefully we'll be safe while doing it. Senator and I will see you back here when the government hopefully reopens. We'll be doing a show on it on Wednesday. So hit that subscriber auto download button and grab my podcast, the Ben Ferguson Podcast. On those in between days, I will keep you up to date with whatever is happening. I can promise you that. And we'll see you back here in a couple of days.
- [45:15]
Jim
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- [46:07]
Rodney Williams
I'm Rodney Williams. And I'm Travis Holloway. Welcome to the Wealthbreak podcast, a real conversation about finance. Let's be honest, building wealth doesn't look the same for everyone.
- [46:20]
Ben Ferguson
I feel like sometimes being broke is.
- [46:22]
Senator Ted Cruz
A cycle and that we might have.
- [46:23]
Rodney Williams
To revisit that and we're not stopping at success stories.
- [46:27]
Washable Sofas Advertiser
What happens when it doesn't go right? How do you cope with it?
- [46:30]
Rodney Williams
Because wealth isn't just about money. It's about creating a life where you thrive and help others do the same. Listen to the Wealth Break podcast on the iHeartRadio app.
- [46:42]
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- [47:12]
Senator Ted Cruz
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- [47:29]
Rodney Williams
That's at spinquest.coms P I N Q U-E S T.com Spinquest is a free.
- [47:35]
Senator Ted Cruz
To play social casino void where prohibited. Visit spinquest.com for more details.
- [47:42]
Jim
This is Jim.
- [47:43]
Senator Ted Cruz
Hello.
- [47:43]
Jim
Jim started advertising with iHeartRadio way back.
- [47:46]
Senator Ted Cruz
In April and now I have customers out the door.
- [47:49]
Jim
And this is Sarah.
- [47:51]
Washable Sofas Advertiser
Hi.
- [47:51]
Jim
She started putting a portion of her marketing dollars in podcasting back in June.
- [47:55]
Washable Sofas Advertiser
Business is booming.
- [47:56]
Senator Ted Cruz
That's why I'm working on a Saturday day.
- [47:59]
Jim
Want to be like Jim and Sarah? It's easy. All you have to do is own or manage a business and reach out to iHeart. Get started today at 844-844-IHeart or iheartadvertising. Com.
- [48:12]
Senator Ted Cruz
This is an iHeart podcast.