The Rod and Greg Show: Were Trump Assassinations Staged? Plus, Senator Mike Lee on SAVE Act

E. Ray and I and even Abby were treated to a little photo today of Rod with... jelly bean and what is jelly bean well jelly bean is a alligator there's a really cute picture now not like a giant alligator this was kind of like a little pet alligator so that might give you a hint where in the you know where's waldo where's rod anyway jelly bean is an alligator and uh and i don't know if it's coming home or if it's going to be the official pet of the rod and gregg show i would love that actually that would be kind of fun But anyway, welcome to the show, folks. We have a PowerPack show for you today. There is so much going on. I've got, we've got guests coming in studio. We have Representative Troy Shelley. He's going to, he's a state representative. He has cracked the nut. He will speak in the most basic terms about this grift, we call, you know, carbon credits. And that's that whole green energy scam going on. He has done so much research on this. And I've been speaking privately with Representative Troy Shelley about this issue for quite some time. And he does have a great way to just bottom line how much money these people have made, how much money they try to make doing this and why this is just a cottage industry. And you'll learn more when he comes. He's going to be here in studio in the first hour here. We're also going to be speaking with Cheryl Schumley. She has got an opinion piece in the Washington Times talking about the Democrats how their entire message going into the midterms is about power. It's about taking it away from Trump, about taking it away from Republicans and seizing it for themselves. That's actually their narrative. Not really issues that they would look to hopefully gain power, but power for the sake of power. We're going to talk to her, speak to her about her editorial. I think it's good. Also, second hour. We're going to be speaking with Guy Sharaki. No, if you remember him, but he is a frequent contributor and guest on our program. He is a thought leader, does political commentary in the state of Pennsylvania, also has a nationally syndicated column, talks about politics of the day. A small world when I was just 18 years old and worked in the Bush Quail, 1988 presidential campaign fresh out of high school for the Pennsylvania State Office. got to work with guy shiraki so he's been around and uh you know i don't even think he's 10 years old than me but maybe but anyway i've known him for a long long time and he always has i think powerful insight we're going to talk about this uh disturbing stat i think you heard it yesterday i was waiting till we could get guy on the program to talk about this 40 percent of democrats uh believe that the attempted assassination of President Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, was staged. And if you get into the details of that assassination attempt, to think that that was staged, you have to really leave reality behind because of the other circumstances surrounding that assassination attempt. But we're going to talk to the guy about that. That happened in Pennsylvania. We're going to talk to him. That kind of hits close to home.

Talk about the circumstances where that could even be contemplated. I think it's a disturbing stat 40%. Actually, I hope to maybe go to you as listeners and maybe get your engage from you. And if you're a Democrat, when we get in that 5 o'clock hour after we do the interview with Guy, if you're a Democrat and you think that that assassination attempt in Butler was staged, you get to go to the front of the line on this program today. We want to hear from you right away. We want to know what you're seeing, that we're not. Okay, and also in a 6 o'clock hour, great. We're going to have a great interview with our own Senator Mike Lee, who's fighting the good fight on the Save America Act. We're going to get a status report from him on that. What's going on in the Senate? Are we going to ever have the talking filibuster, if not getting rid of the filibuster? Are we going to get anything? Because we can't get the Save Act, I don't think, with 60 votes in the Senate. So. Is anything being done on that front, we're going to find out as we speak with our own Senator Mike Lee. And also, Colleen, senior legal fellow from the Heritage Foundation, former deputy assistant of Secretary of Defense. We're going to talk about the SCOTUS, the Supreme Court backing Alabama's efforts to redistrict. The decision on the Voter Rights Act is having broad and appropriate... ramifications in that federal judges for decades now have been forcing state legislatures to draw these majority minority majority districts in their respective states now that that has been deemed racist and unconstitutional and should not be based on race it gives these legislatures the ability to draw them as they once did and so you see a lot of that movement happening across the country in alabama needed to clear a legal hurdle with the Supreme Court did that and are now well on their way of redistricting. So as you can hear, we got a lot to discuss on the program today. So you won't want to miss one of these hours. Now, if you do, we always load this up. ERA loads up every day's show as a podcast. So if you have the IHeart Radio app and you have the KNRS as your number one preset. make the Rod and Greg show podcast, your number two on the preset dial, and you can hear any portions that you might miss. So I want to do right now, though, I want to congratulate every single one of you. Yesterday, I was unable to access our Talk Back Live, and I regret it because so many, so many good, good, good comments about the topic we took yesterday in the 5 o'clock hour, and that was Politico's big, big story. that Senator John Curtis was seriously considering, is seriously considering a run for governor. And I went to you, the listeners, I said, what do we think about this? And our calls came in and great number, and we did not get to the Talk Back Live call. So if you left a Talk Back Live message and you didn't hear it yesterday, don't let that have a chilling effect on using that app. I've got it up now. I've got it ready to go. So when we use the Talk Back app this time, if you're a listener and you use it, We'll get to your comments here on the show. But the comments mirror, ladies and gentlemen, what you heard yesterday on the show. And I got to tell you, I think that you are opinion leaders. I think that the collective wisdom of this audience, as I have been saying, carries weight. It does with me. I know that I want to hear from you. I think the show's always better when you, the listeners, get to weigh in and engage. It's always a better show. It's always more informative.

Well, I think maybe if Senator John Curtis himself was not listening to the show, then somebody in his universe was. Because today, it looks like he's maybe making a pivot. It says Senator John Curtis responds to reports that he might jump into the Utah governor's race. He says that he's very happy where he is. He says he's in the right place right now. So you know how we talked about he was going to take this 250 mile? hike and he's going to meditate and pray and really kind of mull it over whether he should maybe that 250 mile hike is on hold because right now it seems like he's pulling back pretty hard and he hasn't ruled it out so i know a lot of you are thinking well he tipped his hand too early maybe that's true but he is trying to walk back much of what was in that political article which did really did say that it wasn't if he was going to do it but that he was he was really gearing up for a run. And he wasn't going, it even said in the article, he's not going to cede or the early ground and the early space to any other challenger. He'll be getting in sooner than later. And so I think that maybe there was some response from that. Maybe he didn't like it. Maybe he thinks that's not the strongest strategy. But whatever it is, I think that probably what happened is someone in his universe heard the Rod and Greg show. And I don't think they heard glowing reviews of this decision. And so I think you. I think you, the listeners, helped him walk that back a little bit. So congrats to you for doing that. I think that's good news. And I'm telling you, if you look at all of our comments, listen to the calls and you look at the Talk Back Live comments, I think, again, I think there was a message sent. It might have been heard. Okay, so look, when we come back, we're going to go to a break right now. When we come back, we're going to listen, we're going to speak with Cheryl Chumley. She has an opinion piece. She is the opinion editor of the Washington Times. Dems want power, not principles. Very interesting discussion. We'll get into that discussion when we come back from the break. You're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 105.9 can't arrest. And right now we have joining us on the program, Cheryl Chumley. She's the online opinion editor for the Washington Times. And Cheryl, welcome to the Rod and Greg show. Hey, it's great to be with you. Thank you for having me. Okay, so I want you to walk our listeners through your editorial because I think it's so spot on. But I want to read the headline and give you at least my take. Democrats too focused on power, not platforms, never principles. Now, I would argue that the principles lead to a platform and that that platform compels people's decision making and it could lead to elections and power. You're saying in this op-ed that the power equals power. Which leads to more power. And it looks like they're just really interested in getting into office as kind of the pitch to the American people. Maybe share with our listeners, what is it about the Democrats that are just focused on power and not really sharing any ideas?

Yeah, I would say since Bill Clinton days, the Democrat Party has sort of lost its moral compass, its governing compass. Not saying Bill Clinton was moral and great for the country, but he didn't hate the country. And it just seems like, you know, Barack Obama ushered in this new form of Democrat Party where they just seek power for themselves. So they have forgotten the idea of humble service to the people. Right? They are our employees technically, but they don't care about any of that. They don't care about the country. They don't care about doing right by the country. It all seems geared toward. building their own power, their own party's power, and they're fulfilling their own personal political ambitions. So, Cheryl, to what end? I hear what you're saying, and I agree. I think that the ends justifies the means and everything that they're doing. I mean, there is no consistency. I mean, they'll be outraged one minute and they'll do the exact same thing and say it's the right thing to do the next minute. But to what end? What are they after with all this power? Power for what purpose? Yeah, see, that's a really good question, right? Because after a while, you start thinking, well, where does this get them? Right? Like, what good is it? Well, for Democrats, and if you look at the polling and surveys, there is factual evidence to support this. The Democrats have largely become the party of secularists and atheists. Their idea of God is not God as we think of God. But their idea of God is political power. It's what you get done on this earth. It's after this, there is nothing to them. So gathering power and advancing their political messaging is what they think their entire lives are about. And you can see this in some of their movements. Look at it in the environmental movement, right? It was all the radical environmentalism becomes their God, their green God. Look at it in... in how they fight for the transgender issues and the idea that a boy can become a girl and a girl a boy just by going through some surgical procedures and dressing differently. These are all things that those of sane thinking and those who understand that there is actually a creator and an afterlife where there's accountability, reject out of hand. But the Democrats don't because they think this is it. They think. Power is it, and that's all they live for. You know, what's weighing on my mind is we come to the 250th anniversary of the birth of our nation, do they love America? Do they want to protect it, promote it, or do they think it's a bad place that needs a complete redo? Yeah, I've been saying in writing for a long time that modern day Democrats do not like America, that they actively seek to destroy America from within. That's not to say that there aren't some good Democrats out there, even in Congress and political offices, right? We all know people who vote Democrat and they think that some of the Democrats today in leadership are crazy. But.

Where are those voices, right? Where are those in the leadership positions of the Democrat Party who are representing the more moderate factions of their party party? If you look at what the Democrat leadership is calling for and those with the loudest voices in the party are calling for, the only conclusion is that they hate America and they want to destroy it. Because if he wanted to destroy this country, you would do what these loudmouthed Democrats are doing. I agree with you. So let me ask you this. What's on the front of everyone's mind right now are costs. The gas is going up and up and up. I paid over $5 a gallon today. Groceries are expensive. But if you go back to the Biden administration, when they were talking about the high price of gasoline, they were saying you're going to have to get over it because we've got to get rid of. oil and gas and we got to get to an electric vehicle. So this is kind of a necessary pain that you're going through. They weren't apologetic about it. What you see in the Trump administration, you saw that the prices were going down. Then we had this conflict in Iran. So my question is if in the midterms, if people are unhappy because of the struggles that we face at the gas pump or at the grocery store, is there any? semblance of evidence out there that the Democrats would lower gas prices, that they would fight to not see a grocery so expensive at the store. Would anything that people are upset about going into the midterms improve with the Democrat leaders that we're hearing from today? Well, no, right? And I think that's rhetorical. I'm sure you do what I was going to say. Well, if you had one idea, if you could give me one, I was going to take it. I'd take it and run with it if there was one guy out there. Yeah. Yeah, that's grasping at straw, I think, with this batch of Democrats. Yes. Look, not just Joe Biden, but under Barack Obama, too. And it's not just that they want to raise gas prices because of their inflationary economics, but it's also because they truly don't think that American citizens need to drive, right? Their whole smart growth model, their whole anti-driving carbon emissions, don't take a plane, walk. ride your bike instead of driving. All that's built on the idea that they don't like Americans driving cars because they think it damages their god of environmentalism once again. So, yeah, there's no evidence that a Democrat in the White House would manage to lower fuel costs or oil costs. At least with this president, there's a reason why our gas prices are high. And as soon as this turmoil with Iran ends, gas prices will go back down again. So you note in your editorial that James Carville, who helped get Bill Clinton elected, and he's been the raging cage, and he's out there. He's one of those opinion leaders on the left. He said in one of his rants recently, you know, if we get the majorities, we need to make Puerto Rico estate, Washington, D.C. estate. That'll give you four senators. We need to pack the Supreme Court to 13 justices so we can undo everything that we don't like that's been done. But he said something interesting. He said, you don't run on that. You don't talk about it. You just do it. Do it in secret. That is startling when you hear someone like him say something like that. And I think it is the quiet part out he has said out loud that they've been saying amongst themselves. Do you see a day where that could succeed? Do you think that kind of cynicism could ever succeed here in the United States?

Yeah. I mean, if you look at how the socialism has taken over the Democrat Party, it did so under guise of calling it progressivism or democratic progressivism, right? Or democratic socialism. They didn't call it socialism. And so for 20, 25 years now, socialism has really taken root and spread in the Democrat Party. It was just called something else until they got to the point where... Socialism became more acceptable to the American public because of the dumb and down in our school system and the generation that came out was taught to see capitalism as an evil and embrace socialism as a good. So now they're open about it. So to answer your question, yes, I do think that what James Carville warned or said. suggested taking place could in fact be successful because we have a history of it being successful. Well, then more people need to read your op-ed so this doesn't happen. Cheryl, thank you for joining me on the program. I'm sure. Appreciate your work and thanks for sharing it with us. Thank you so much. Have a good one. Thank you. That's Cheryl Schumley. She is the online opinion editor of the Washington Times. Democrats, too focused on power, not platforms, and never principles. Okay, folks, when we come back, we're going to have Representative Troy Shelley with us. State Representative, we're going to talk about this carbon credit scam going on and this Green Energy deal. When we come back after the break, you're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 1059, Canterress. State Representative. Troy Shelley. Now, folks, the good representative sat me down one day. And I don't know how long ago this was represented where you did this. And you showed me, you have a PowerPoint. You showed me what this, this carbon credit, whole pretend economic, I'm just going to call it scam, what it is. And it just, I've heard it referred to, but I've never really known. And we, this issue continues to come up. We've had a, we have a, we have a, Utah Senator John Curtis, who wants to keep talking about green issues and climate issues. So as briefly as we can, before we get into the carbon credit, maybe the economy of it, maybe you can explain what it is, what is this carbon credit concept? Perfect. Yeah, let's talk about it. So, so the, you know, try now. Sorry, let's see. No? Are we on? Okay. All right. Okay. So, sorry about that. Carbon credits. Let me just give you a quick snapshot of how this works. So we all know trees. do photosynthesis, right? So with the photosynthesis, it takes carbon dioxide in, it captures the carbon and releases the oxygen. So that's the basic parameter of how carbon dioxide works. So what has happened is in this black market, underground world market, they have found a way to monetize this carbon capture.

And so they'll do it through photosynthesis or they track it through photosynthesis or carbon injection or carbon sequestration. Sometimes they pump it into underground aquifers or they'll put it in cement, whatever. Every. ton of carbon dioxide that goes into a carbon sink. So that's what they, once you remove it from the atmosphere, it's called a carbon sink. Every ton that goes into a carbon sink is issued a digital ID number by the United Nations through the IPCC. And there's a document. It's called the Kyoto Protocol that tracks who owns... that credit for removing the carbon dioxide and then those credits get accumulated and uh and individuals can own those credits and before there was kind of just a market driven uh what's the value of a credit yes but in the big beautiful bill they actually established the value of the credit which i i wish they would have left it alone but they didn't so now there's a value to a carbon credit And so let's just say, for example, we have all of these forest service up on, you know, all the mountain, the trees and the fora and everything that's up there. Well, they all take in carbon dioxide. Well, our federal government sells the credit for those trees absorbing the carbon dioxide. We don't count it in Utah because they may count it in Jakarta. Why would they do that? They sell it. They sell it. They sell it. They transfer. So they say here is something that's absorbing carbon dioxide and it does this and we then sell that as a credit. Yes. So Utah cannot claim that because the federal government or some individuals inside of there, someone who understands the system sells the carbon credit and gets the credit for it. So how big of a global market? If you're talking to your car, you're talking about a global market. It is a global market. So here's kind of the two sides of it. There's a cap and trade, which means you cannot increase your carbon dioxide output unless you buy carbon credits in order to increase your carbon dioxide output. The United States is not a cap and trade state. So if we want to build industry, we build industry. And we obviously have pollution control and stuff like that. But if we take industry, for example, a power plant that... burns coal, if they were to shut that power plant completely off, someone could take those credits from shutting that power plant down and they could sell it. In fact, here's an example. They sell it to Japan. Japan turns around and loans money because now there's money involved in the transfer.

They loan money to Jakarta, and they say, we will borrow you enough money to build a coal-fired power plant in Jakarta, but you also have to buy our carbon credits, and then we'll take payments back. And so they've kind of doubled up the cost. Is that because Japan is a cap-and-do they exercise that cap-and-trade? Correct. Yeah, good clarification. Yeah, they do cap-and-trade. So the United States doesn't. We can generate the carbon. But we, but we, but we don't, we don't, our economy is not based on it, but Japan and other, what other countries? No, and, and we have, we have some states in the United States who do cap and trade. California is one of them. Of course, California is one of them. Of course, yes. No surprise, I guess. Any of their twins, yes. Yes. Okay, I can, sorry, time for a break. Can you stay on to. You bet. Okay. So we're going to go to a break, but you want to hang on. This next segment, we're going to get into who's profiting from this, where it's going, what countries are participating in states. And if there's any future, I want you to tell me, is this a scam exposed or do we have more of this coming? Okay, when we come back, we're going to talk more about this with state representative, Troy Shelley, on Utah's Talk Radio 105.9. Canter S. Carbon credits. This is an economy. We've talked a little bit about what produces it, whether it's our forest, it's natural, or it's fossil fuels and how they create carbon dioxide. But you have a case study maybe to share about how this is monetized and how this market actually works. Yeah, maybe I can take a second and just kind of simplify it. Let's say that everybody in the state of Utah is allocated a thousand gallons of water to water their lawn in a year. And somebody has zero scape, so they're not going to use that water. So they turn around and they can sell their extra water to their neighbor who can then use more than their thousand gallons. That's kind of how the carbon credit trade works. So that's like an analogy. Right. Yeah. So give us a real life example of where... carbon dioxide was being produced, it was captured, maybe stopped somehow, whether it's shutting down a coal-fired power plant or whatever they may do. Let's take Geneva Steel as an example. Okay, yeah, Utah County. So Geneva Steel, back in the day when they were producing their steel, the air in Utah County was stinky, disgusting, yellow, brown, green, whatever color it is. After Geneva Steel shut down... then the air got clean. But Utah County can't say, hey, our air is clean because a power company in Southern California purchased the right to say that in the San Fernando Valley. So then they come out and they say, look, we have reduced particulate matter in the atmosphere by X number of tons per year. Don't you like our air? Because they purchased those credits that were the shutting down of Geneva Steel in Utah County. That created a credit for not polluting anymore, which they purchased to have the right to say, we've done that. Yes, and that's specifically on Geneva Steel's spreadsheet when they sold out.

So that was that's part of the money coming in and part of the revenue they received. So how big is this economy? What does this? Because I was thinking that as we're seeing that this green whole climate issue is more of a scam than real, that carbon credits and maybe cap and trade economies would kind of falter. What's the prospect look like? I don't think it's going to falter because there's too much money behind it. There's trillions of dollars behind it, and it's a world economy, and those in the know are making a whole lot of money off of this. They're buying carbon credits. Each carbon credit... is given a digital number. That is so key to understand because they can actually convert those digital numbers into, say, Ethereum. So, Representative, I have a question. So it never made sense to me why, say Utah Power or Pacific Corps, they were looking to shut down. a coal-fired power plant. Really without having a replacement to where you could turn off one switch and turn the next one on and you're generating enough power, they were ready to turn that off without its replacement in-hand ready to go. And I thought, why would you do that? It seems to me to be a, you would lose money if you did that. It sounds to me like what you're saying is just the shutting down of that coal-fired power plant without generating any new power actually could create. A windfall of money. So let me run through. And I'm not saying specific to IPP or any others. But IPP. They burn 14,000 tons of coal a day. Each ton of coal produces two and a half tons of CO2. That's 3,500 tons a day. Market value, $85 a ton. That's over a 25 life expectancy. That's $2.714 billion in carbon credit value alone, aside from any assets of the plant. So they're actually profiting if they shut it down without even having a power replacement. Yeah, and I just use them as an example because there could be other power plants that do that. But yeah, it's enormous amounts of money. Troy Shelley, State Representative District 66, that's right. Juwab, Sam Pete County. And the corner of Utah County. The corner of Utah County. Keep up the good work. And thank you for joining us on the show. We appreciate it. Thank you. All right, folks. When we come back, we're going to speak with Guy Sharaki. He has a great take on this. I don't know if you've heard this stat. 40% of Democrats polled, according to the Washington Post, I believe, say that they think the Butler attempted assassination of President Trump was staged. It was not real. We're going to talk to Guy Sharaki. He's in Pennsylvania.

We're going to talk to him about that issue, about Democrats and the state of play. When we come back after the break, you're not going to want to miss it. You're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 1059, KNRS. I held this one off because I had hoped that we'd be able to speak with our next guest about this issue. I don't know that you've, maybe you've seen, I think you probably have, this disturbing poll that came out that 42% of Democrats believe that the assassination attempt on President Trump was in fact staged. Joining us on the show, Guy Sharaki, he's a political commentator, contributor to Real Clear Pennsylvania, also a contributor to Broad and Liberty. Guy, thank you for joining the show. 40% of Democrats are saying the Butler shooting was staged. What do you make of this, I think, derange belief by so many Democrats? Yeah, I think it's a lot of what we discussed in some of my other appearances, and that is it's no longer just difference of opinions. It's that we have different values, different priorities, but most of all different facts. The country, I mean, the good and the bad is there's so many different news sources from when we grew up and there were maybe three or four. There's so many is that we live in our own bubbles. And so many people, unfortunately, get exposed not only to not hearing the other side, but to having their ideas reinforced. And it also allows them to hear some of the more extreme or crazy ideas. So to me, it's a frightening thing. Because it was clear as day. It happened live. But it really speaks to the bigger issue, which is it's not just that we have party differences. We really have priority differences, value differences. But those differences are being shaped and reinforced by different facts. It happened live. The president was shot at. Corey Campantor was killed. The fact that 42% of Democrats think it was staged or somehow fake. is unbelievable, but it speaks to the polarized world where we live and get information from and why it's so hard to bridge the divide. So I know that we're using the word facts, air quotes, and we're using it lightly. But I can't even get my head around how one would think that that's a stage event, given what you just mentioned, that a retired firefighter was killed. He was killed. So there's real bullets. The action's live, or was that part of the stage as well? And that person's actually running around healthy today. Are they aware that someone was killed at Butler that day? Is that part of their decision tree, that they know that fact? Or do they hear something that doesn't even put that into the equation for them? Yeah, I think you're approaching it with a level of logic and compassion that's unfortunately been taken out. I mean, I think for a lot of people...

On both sides, but especially on the left where, you know, they used to joke about Trump derangement syndrome, but I think it is a genuine thing for many Americans. It is who they think about. They see everything through that prism of President Trump, and therefore they are predisposed to believe the worst. So when you raise logical issues like there were thousands and tens of thousands of people there. There were police officers. There were Secret Service. There was a man who died. There were four others who were injured. There were reporters of all stripes of all across the ideological spectrum from the Associated Press to CNN to Fox News that were there. The idea that somehow this was staged or fake or fraudulent. It can't be, right? And it defies logic. But I think, again, it speaks to not only this division, but this unfortunate hatred that I think is somewhat new to politics. We've had disagreements with this sort of abject hatred that some have towards the president where they are just predisposed to believe the worst, the worst motivations, the worst facts. And look, if you... have the benefit or the misfortune of spending any time on social media and just going through Facebook, Instagram, or X. You can just see things that are just out of this world. Again, not that reasonable people disagree on whether things like the war in Iran is a good idea or a bad idea or a necessary idea. But you just see repeated facts that just defy logic that didn't not only didn't happen but are harmful. So you're introducing a level of logic that right now it's like sometimes when friends or... colleagues or even spouses get into that rage. The problem is there are millions of Americans, Greg, that are just constantly in that state of rage. And they are willing to believe anything. And unfortunately, they're willing to believe the worst, which clouds their judgment. Yeah, so that's, so you're, you're describing it. So I was trying to describe this to someone that's maybe apolitical, and they, they were confronted with this data, and they feel like they know what happened in Butler, and they just couldn't get their heads around why anyone would conclude that that was a staged event. And I said, my answer was, there is such a hatred towards President Trump. that anything, any fact, any detail that would put him in a sympathetic place, you would feel sympathy for him or see him being mistreated, the hatred and the vitriol is so strong. They reject it. They reject it out of hand. My question to you is, does that sentiment, does this own set of facts that just don't really touch necessarily reality, does that continue on in 28 to the next Republican nominee? Is this just the new state of play?

that's a formula for disaster and rage. And, you know, as a citizen, I'm troubled by it. And as a person of faith, I'm troubled by it. There are millions of Americans walking around with rage. And it's just, it's just not healthy. And, you know, I don't know who the Republican. I don't know who the Republicans could nominate would change that because if at the end of the day your world is, you know, Mother Jay Jones Magazine, you know, Twitter, you know, and MS now, you may never see Marco Rubio or JD Vance or Ron DeSantis or whomever in a positive light. And I don't know what changes your heart and mind if you never hear an alternative view. The other part, Greg, is this. I think it's an important point. is that when it comes to the media, conservatives are in the minority. So folks like you and I are exposed to alternative views, in fact, feel indoctrinated. I think when you're a conservative, you live in a world of ABC and CNN. You go to the airport and CNN's on. So we often see, read, and hear about conflicting points of view. New media, new analytics allow some people to never hear an alternative. Somehow we need some smart people. The Elon Musk Musks of the world have to figure a way where you know what the audience wants, but when it comes to ID, is there's some way that you actually get exposed to things that are different, and that's one way to break down the tension. Exactly right, Guy. Thank you for joining us on the program. Thanks for your analysis. And I do think, I think we're down to that very thing. People have, it used to be, you're entitled to your opinion, but not your own set of facts. I think we do. I think there's a large portion of this country that operates under facts that I use that air quotes aren't facts, but are there reality? Okay, folks, we're going to go to a break. This is the question I want to pose to you. And by the way, if you're a Democrat and you're listening to this show and you think that the Butler assassination attempt of President Trump was staged. You will go front to the line. You will be the first call we take. E. Ray will take you. Whatever number you come in, we will, if you do a talk back live, we'll play it right away. I want to hear from anyone of our listeners who may think that the, the Butler assassination attempt was staged. I want to hear from you. If you don't think it's staged, tell me how you think this mind virus even began or if it's going to continue or what your take is with 42%. Being willing to admit it, let alone think it. They were willing to admit that they believe that this is the case. We want to take your calls when we come back and comments. 888-5708010 is the number to call. We'll take your calls and comments when we come back after the break. You're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 1059. K&RS. I'm Citizen Hughes. Rod is out this week. I am flying solo. And we're rolling right along.

We just finished an interview with Guy Sharaki. He is a, we've had him on the show a number of times. He's, he is from Pennsylvania. He does a lot of political commentary in the state of Pennsylvania as well as around the country. Talking about how there is just this division in America between Republicans, Democrats, and I would argue common sense everyday Americans and the base of what we consider the Democrats. 42% of in a poll that just came out yesterday. 42% of Democrats believe that the, that the Butler assassination attempt on President Trump's life was staged. Now, to believe that, you also have to either believe that a man, the retired firefighter was killed as part of this stage or that that was fake as well. In this poll, they asked about some of the other assassination attempts. You've got, you've got, what, 35% of the same respondents who believe that the assassination attempt at the correspondence dinner, the media dinner, 34% believe the assassination attempt at the White House correspondence dinner was also staged. Well, if that was staged, everybody in that room, if you're a White House correspondence was like regime media. And that seems a bit of a bridge too far as well. You know, the question I'm posing, first off, if you're listening to this show, there must be some Democrats that listen to the show. If you're a Democrat and you think it was staged, any of the assassination attempts, it seems like there's at least a good third that want to maintain that there's, that all of them were the one that was in Mar-a-Lago as well was staged. But if you believe that that's the case, I'd love you to call. The show, 888-570-801010 would be the number to call. And walk us through it. Walk us through what we're missing here, that these were clearly staged, or one of them was a clearly staged attempt, and it was done to foster sympathy for the president and a way to manipulate the electorate to support him in an election. I'm assuming that's why Democrats think it's staged, or 42% of them do. But if you do not believe that that's the case, and I'm not one of those people, I'm curious just what you think about a statistic like that, that 42% of Democrats believe that that was staged. I think it's a window into the soul of today's Democrat. I think that there is just such a true hatred and a vitriolic. attitude towards this president and the Republican Party. Folks, if you think this is just all reserved and specifically only for President Trump, I don't think that's the case. I think that any, whoever the next presidential nominee on the Republican side is will receive the same hate, the same type of just opposition in every way without arguing issues. This will just be. whatever that person says, they will assume the opposite position. And I wonder how you, how do you bring a country together if you have some people that will take things that just aren't even arguable and make them the case in their minds? Here's a question. You know, you ever see, I love the question in campaigns.

Did you vote for President Trump? And look, if they did or didn't, that's, that's a, that'll be informative. But somebody, a candidate who will answer that question honestly is a, is also a tell. Because if they're in a room, especially if you're in Utah, you don't know how many people actually like Trump or not. But when you're asked that question, if they can't say I did or didn't, if they can't answer that quickly and honestly. That's a window into their soul. I think every single Democratic candidate, especially in this plus 24 dirty Diana Gibson, Judge Gibson drawn district stolen from us, the one of the four we have, that's a plus 24% Kamala Harris district. I think every single one of those candidates should be asked the question, do you think the assassination attempt in Butler was staged? And make them answer, make them put it on the record. Maybe this poll is wrong. Maybe there aren't Democrats that think this, but 42% is a pretty hefty number and sizable a portion. So I think that every single Democrat candidate down ticket should be asked a simple question about the assassination attempt in Butler of President Trump. Do you think that was real or was it staged? And make them say. I think that that would be illuminating. I'm interested in what you think. What's your take on that? 888-570-801010 is the number to call. There's always the talkback live option as well. You go to the app. There's a red microphone there. You can press the button. It gives you a countdown, and you can leave us a take. I messed this up yesterday, and we had some great comments. I got an idea. We have a listener that has a great idea about those talkbacks from yesterday, maybe for a Friday show. I got it now. I'm on top of it. I won't be missing it if you send it in today. So if you have that, please send it in. We're going to talk about this more and some other issues that have been going on today through the news. When we come back after the break, you're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 105.9. Can't rest. I've asked for you, our smartest listening audience in all the land, to opine. We've also said that we'll go straight to the front line, anyone who would like to call in and explain if they do think themselves that this was a staged event. So. Going straight to the phones, let's go to Rex, who is in Sandy. Rex, thank you for joining us on The Rod and Greg Show. Yeah, Greg. So when you watch the video, you see the Secret Service, they stand up and they huddle around him. They don't rush him off the podium like every other incident. When you watch the Secret Service, as soon as there's a threat, shot or not, they get him off the platform. Just like the correspondence dinner, they rush him off the stage. They don't stand around and huddle around him. Now, we're hunters here in Utah, right? A shot's fired. They don't know what caliber gun it is. Anyone who hunts is going to tell you a 300 wind mag is going to blow right through Secret Service body armor and kill your target. You don't leave someone up on an elevated platform there for however many seconds it was so they can get a photo. That makes zero sense. Okay, Rex. And you get this amazing photo. When your guy is being shot at. And yeah, if we all know, just like a 30-ought six round is not going to embed itself in Charlie Kirk's neck. How many of your listeners believe that was staged? But.

There's no way Butler could have been staged. So, Rex, here, those, you have brought up points that I think, I think maybe lead to the incompetence of the Secret Service. But to that point, you've got this retired firefighter, Corey Compreator, anyway, I don't know how to say his last name, but he was, he was killed in this. Do you think that that staged event included killing someone else and I think injuring others that were in attendance? I think Israel to get their guy in office and look what he's done for them is willing to kill. the alleged shooter and anyone in the audience to get their guy in office, absolutely. Well, there is a take, Rex. Thank you for calling. Thanks for sharing that. I don't concur. I don't think that that was a... Now, look, Rex brings up some good points about why on earth did the Secret Service act the way they did. But you can even look at this last, and maybe this is another, this would be fodder for another staged one at the White House Correspondence Dinner. But watching... how the Secret Service is acting in those moments. I think they are, they do make you wonder, and Rex concludes that they, they act so irresponsibly that it must have been staged. I would argue that they act so irresponsibly that they're incompetent. And we've had, like, we've had Jason Chaffetz, who was part, you know, he was part of the, uh, oversight committee in the house and he's been warning presidents since he said george w bush uh that the secret service are not prepared as they once were to handle these things and that they're and that it's just it's lacking and we've heard this from a security specialist as well so i think that i think that what that shows and rex brings up very good points about what is so disturbing about that moment but i don't think that that killing that retired firefighter, injuring the other people that were on the stage, what happened there? It's a bridge too far to argue that that was a staged event. I think that, but I don't think it was a shining moment for the Secret Service at all. We got a talkback message. Let me go to see if we get this. Hey, what's out, Greg? This is Ryan in South Jim Jordan. Doing a great job with Rod being gone. But speaking about this like the stage, like the Butler event, and there are a lot of other things that I talk to people about where it reminds me of the greens guy with Jesse Kelly. You just can't have a normal conversation about facts with them. Keep up the great work, bud. Thank you, Ryan. So this is what I think. I think that it should be asked. I think that the reason why it rubs Democrats wrong, and even Rex mentioned this, it's the iconic picture of him saying fight, fight, fight after he's been hit in the ear. He's bleeding. You can see the blood. And without regard to how the Secret Service acted, it reacted and didn't do it right, it is.

That moment in time is iconic. It will never be forgotten. It's historic in it. And I'm not speaking for Rex here, but for the Democrats, and he might be a Democrat, I don't know, but I'm not speaking for him. But for Democrats who believe that stage, it is that, it's that image they can't live with. It's that image that they can't believe actually happened. And so it's a denial in my mind. Let's go back to the phones and let's go to, let's go to, Let's go to Reed and Salt Lake City. Reed. Thank you for holding. Welcome to the Rodding Greg Show. Hi, Greg. With all the respect to Rex, there's absolutely no way on Earth. It's the same type of conspiracy theory that people say we didn't land on the moon. I've heard the crazy thing that the 9-11, the attack on the towers was an inside job and all that. I think people sometimes on the JFK assassination, weird screwball conspiracy theories will always abound by people who desperately don't want to believe the truth because it hurts their narrative. And this is the one thing. They talked about they rush them off the stage. That is absolutely 100% wrong. On the stage... You, I mean, you rush on the stage. You are a better target. You're walking away from least you have a podium to protect you and things like that. You take a shot to the guy. And what happens is if he's behind the podium or you're putting down and you fall on top of him in an outdoor environment, that's the first thing you do. And to say that somehow, oh, they didn't rush him off the stage. Yeah, it's like if you're deer and they're hunting you. Yeah, so if you get shot out, the first thing you do is I'm going to stay behind the tree or something like that, but you don't run out on that are not out in the open because that makes sense. No, that's absolutely absurd. Thank you, Reed. I appreciate the take. I think you speak for me. Look, I don't know all the logistics and all the, how that should happen in that moment. I don't think what we saw was the greatest example, but I think Reed brings up good points that you don't. You don't rush them out necessarily when you don't know where those bullets are flying. And those bulls were flying past them and killed one individual, injured others. It was a very, a very chaotic moment. Okay, we're going to go to a break. When we come back, if you'll hang on, we have some calls. We want you to hang on. We'll come back to your calls and we come back after the break. When we come back, and you're listening to Utah's Talk Radio, 105.9, can't arrest. Let's go to Trevor, who's from West Jim Jordan, waiting on the line. Trevor, welcome to the Rod and Greg Show. Hi, Greg. Great job. But, you know, most Republicans believed that Butler was staged, but it was staged to get Trump shot. It's inconceivable that kid got on the roof and took those shots without anybody knowing about it. Everybody knows it was the, whether it was the FBI or the CIA helped him out. To think that Israel would shoot at Trump's head to get him elected is the most ridiculous stupid thing I've ever heard. You know, you bring up a good point, Trevor. I appreciate to call. Thank you for calling in. You know, the one thing we did say after that had happened is, boy, it didn't look like the urgency was there. It looked like we heard that they were under staff. The comms for the Secret Service seemed to be lacking as well in terms of communication with the local law enforcement.

We all wondered, you know, what was going on in the Biden administration and the Secret Service during those visits? Was that again, were they just slow walking it and not caring? Or was it worse than that? I think you bring up some great points. Let's go to the talk back live comments and have a listen. Hey, it's David from Utah. Sorry, from Eagle Mountain. The Democrats think that it is... Something as far as a conspiracy that Donald Trump rigged it himself. Well, that's something that they would do. So it makes sense to that. It makes perfect sense. And who knows what kind of drugs they're on half the time anyway. Just look at some of them and see. That's a good point. Let's go. We have another. Let's have a listen. Hey, what's up, Greg? This is Ryan in South Jim Jordan. Doing a great job with Rod being gone. But speaking about this, like... I did that one already. Let's go to this one. Okay, Greg. If we buy into the idea that it was staged, who was the president at the time? It was Biden. You have to assume that Biden and Harris were okay with this because who does the Secret Service roll up to? And the CIA, the FBI, are they all incompetent? None of these guys were like, hey, if it was Israel, maybe we should look into this a little bit. Like, you have to be an idiot. So these are really good comments because they're saying to the Democrats, 42% of you think at stage, who do you think, if it was even in the realm of possibility? Who would that be? Would it be the guy that's in charge at the time? Would it be President Biden's crew? Would they be the ones that are thinking this? Let's have another listen. Hey Greg, supposing that conspiracy theory is real, the insinuation is that Trump's team or his people were the ones who staged it. And when I play that out in my head, it seems incredible that they would take a chance like that that came within inches of actually taking the former president's life. That to me is kind of absurd. I'm with you. I don't think it was staged. I actually think you saw either incompetence or horribly, if it's the case and it should be a crime indifference from the Biden administration's, you know, agencies and in the Secret Service then. If you remember the woman that was in charge, she wanted to blame everyone but herself. It was not a moment of leadership. It was not a profile and courage when she went to testify in Congress. But 42% of the Democrats... to hate that image of the president telling the people in the crowd to fight, fight, fight, for them to think that that was staged and staged by Trump himself or his campaign. It's lunacy. All right, folks, when we come back, we're going to talk with Cully Stimson about the Supreme Court decision that backs Alabama's redistricting. You're not going to want to miss it. You're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 105.9. Can't arrest.

We're going to switch gears a little bit. Talk about a recent Supreme Court decision that backs Alabama's redistricting effort. Joining us on the program, Cully Stimson, Senior Legal Fellow from the Heritage Foundation, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for detainee affairs and a noted counterterrorism expert. I think you need to have a counterterrorism expert on the show. If you're going to talk about the Supreme Court lately, it seems to be crossfire going everywhere. Kelly, thank you for joining us on the program. Tell us about this recent case by the Supreme Court decided for Alabama. Does it look different than Louisiana? Is there something different here? Why did Alabama even have to go to the Supreme Court? Yeah, let me talk about the big picture and then narrow quickly down to Alabama. You know under the Elections Clause of the Constitution, the states decide the time, manner, and places of elections. And so federal elections aren't run from the top of the federal government down. The states actually decide the time, manner, and places of elections. And the states, every 10 years, are supposed to, based on the census, redistrict if they gain or lose population. And they have to apportion those districts evenly so that the congress, men, and women in that state have essentially the same number of people in their population. When this kickoff began to start redistricting mid-decade, Alabama didn't want to be left out in the cold, so they started to redistrict. But in the meantime, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in a decision called Louisiana versus Calais. And they held that Section 2, the Voting Rights Act, did not require, and in fact it was unconstitutional to use race. when constructing congressional districts. And it was an unconstitutional gerrymander, which comes from the guy named Elbridge Jerry back in the day in Massachusetts, uh, to create congressional districts. So you cannot create congressional districts by creating majority minority congressional districts by using race. So Alabama's, uh, congressional map used race. And so their case made it up to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court ultimately said, like in Alabama, like the Supreme Court of Virginia did in Virginia, like a lot of these other states now, you have to go back to the drawing board and you can't use race for your congressional maps. And so when they redid the maps and they didn't use race, then they uphold that. And you're going to see this, Greg, happening not only at the state level, because I think that's where most of the discussion is happening, but we're already seeing. Starting three days ago, municipal and city elections. being challenged because of their districts that were carved up by race. And so this is the Lawyerful Employment Act and you're starting to see a lot of litigation. So, Kelly, let me ask you this question. Is it the case that federal judges or the judicial branch generally kept demanding that these state legislatures go back to the drawing board to create these minority majority districts?

Or was this something? So, for example, in Alabama, they had two minority majority districts. I think their original map had only one. But is it the judiciary that keeps telling them to go back to the drawing board and creates these solid, solid Democrat minority majority districts? Or is it something that was baked in the cake when they were redistricting as a state? Yeah, it's really the heart of the matter. It's a great question. The Voting Rights Act of 65 has a section, none more sections. One of them is section two. And that has been interpreted over the years by various federal courts. uh, and relying on a Supreme court decision, uh, called jingles, uh, which has a three part test to ultimately require a majority, minority district. Um, and so it was a warped interpretation of, uh, what the voting rights act really required and section two required, uh, because the voting rights act is like the constitution is colorblind. It's a big difference between having the opportunity to vote, which the 15th Amendment guaranteed for everybody and the Voting Rights Acts over the years, hoped for and try to implement, versus being able to get somebody of your race elected, guaranteed. That is unconstitutional. The former is what we strive for through the Voting Rights Act. And so you're right. I mean, the answer was embedded in your question that federal district court judges and ultimately circuit court judges have found that you are required to use race to carve up and create these bizarre Rorschach shaped congressional districts so that... essentially minority voters could have a minority candidate and vote for that person versus just the opportunity to vote. So this is, so you've laid that out so well. So we know that, that Alabama, Louisiana aren't the only two states that have had to go through this process, have had judges that have made them. So process wise, we have a midterm coming up pretty quick. I mean, it's, it's, it's, we're in the election cycle right now. What does, well, all these states that have had these districts really, I've been told there's as many as 40 out there. Will they all have to go to the Supreme Court to kind of be given the go-ahead nod to maybe get their legislature, state legislatures to redraw? Do you see more of that happening? And if it doesn't require the state, the U.S. Supreme Court to do it, is it something we should just be seeing happening organically around the country? So I have...

Little confidence that you're going to see a tsunami of Supreme Court cases saying, we meant what we said in Calais. We meant what we said in Calais. We meant what we said in Calais. So what's going to happen is, yes, various states are now going to redraw their districts and not use race in the apportionment and drawing up of their congressional districts. When those new maps are challenged, ultimately one hopes that inferior federal courts will apply Calais and say, no, this math passes muster, does not pass constitutional muster, or yes, that does pass constitutional muster. And so, but I also think, Greg, and you're already seen this, municipalities have carved up local districts. using race to create majority minority districts. And you're already seeing a lawsuit by the Public Interest Legal Foundation in the Chicago area, challenging their districts. And you're going to see a whole host of them at the lower level. But you're not going to have the Supreme Court said, no, we said, we meant what we said. We meant what we said. We meant what we said. Because the court just won't take up those cases. Remember, the court only hears 70 cases per year. And about five, six thousand. suits get filed saying please please please take my case but they only grant cert in about 70 cases a year so here's a here's a funny one that i don't understand so virginia you know under this was if i understand the state supreme court made a decision a process decision saying that you didn't follow the law on the dates and when you have to have these things done and what the election day is when you're you're putting it before we voters it was a process decision it looks like they're taking that case to the to our supreme court given the way they've ruled having nothing to do with race, really. This is a process question. Why would Virginia look to do that? Do I have my information wrong? Are they not doing it? Because I don't understand why the state of Virginia not happy with their state Supreme Court decision thinks they're going to find a friendlier reception at the U.S. Supreme Court. Well, let's go back to eighth grade civics real quick. I don't want to bring back bad memories. Yeah, it is bad memories for me. I think most people tend to forget some of the basics from eighth grade civics. And that is, if a state Supreme Court, and there are 50 of them, decides an issue based on state constitutional grounds, and there's no federal hook, there is no oversight by the U.S. Supreme Court or federal courts if there's no federal question. And here the Supreme Court. uh, of the Commonwealth of Virginia, where I live, uh, ruled based on article seven, section one of the state constitution that deals with how you amend the constitution. You guys in Utah have, uh, a process under article 22, section one of your state constitution that lays out how the constitution can be, uh, amended there. But the key line in this opinion, which was 46 pages, is on page 10. They say, to amend the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, quote, an amendment or amendments to this constitution may be proposed in the Senate or House of Delegates us.

the other body. And if the same shall be agreed to by a majority of the members elected to each of the two houses, such proposed amendment or amendments shall be referred to the General Assembly, that's both bodies, at his first regular session held after the next general election of members of the House of Delegates. It's essentially a two-byte rule. Right. You propose an amendment. the House or Senate proposes it, the voters get to look at it, hear about it, then there's a new election for new members and new delegates, and then you put it to the voters and they try to pass it. It gives the voters a chance. Remember, this is the state of Madison and Jefferson. Right. And so they wanted it to be slow. They wanted the passions to cool. Yes. And so what happened in this case was, you know, we don't have election day in our Commonwealth anymore. We really don't have it in this country anymore. We have election months. And here, voting on page 11 to 12, it says, voting in the general election to the House of Delegates began on September 19, 2025 and ended on Election Day, November 4th, 2025. The General Assembly voted for the first time to propose the Constitutional Amendment to the electorate on Halloween, 2025. By that date, over 1.3 million votes had been cast in the general election. which was approximately 40% of the total vote for the election cycle. In other words, there had not been an intervening election. Right. And the Democrat elected Attorney General, Jay Jones, who wanted to murder his opponent's kids. I remember that. This is what he said. You remember that. This is offhand comment, sure. Said to the Supreme Court of Virginia, you do not have the legal right. to intervene while these voting for this constitutional amendment is taking place. And so to your other question, will the Supreme Court take this case? Not a chance. I have a better chance playing for the jazz than that case does. And I'm, I'm a reformed old soccer player. So remember, it takes four votes of four Supreme Court justices to grant cert. They're not going to get four votes to take it, and there's no federal question. Colley, this is incredibly informative. You've walked us through the process, and thank you very much for doing so. There's a lot going on out there right now, and I think you've bottom-lined it for us. Thank you for joining us on the program. Thanks for having me. That's Kelly Culley Stimson. He is the senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, former, as I said, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for detainee affairs and noted counterterrorism expert. And I would add to that state constitution of Virginia expert as well. Okay, folks, we're going to come to a break. When we come back, we're going to talk about this and some other issues coming that have happened today. You're not going to want to miss it. You're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 105.9 canter us. Flying solo this week, Rod's on vacation.

And we were just talking about the redistricting. Alabama went to the Supreme Court, said, hey, we have this pending case. We want to get back to the drawing board as we had done as a legislative body. But the courts have said to many states that you have to have these minority, majority districts. And you see them. And what was described by our last guest are these shaped districts that have nothing to do with communities of common interest. They are just really done by race and only race. In Utah, where we don't have as strong of a or as large of a minority population, but you do have different party affiliation. You don't get into that game or you don't have a federal judge that's going to interrupt what the legislature does, even though we have a state judge that by party affiliation and Democrats, she herself didn't tell the state legislature to draw a new map. She just drew one herself. She became a Marigo Vespucci. She became a mapmaker. And it is somehow stuck, which is a violation of our state constitution. But I want to talk about, so you're seeing these states that are going through this, Tennessee. is going through a redistricting process right now. And folks, if you're the Democrats, and we've been talking about this today, whether it's 42% of Democrats that think that the attempted assassination of Trump was staged because they cannot stand, that image of him standing up, telling the people to fight, whatever it may be, they ignore. A lot of our callers pointed out, well, as Biden was on the clock, was it him that did it? They don't consider that. I believe, and I'm going to make the case, and I don't think this is a two-way streeter that's of both sides conversation. The Democrats are more specifically the leftists, the elitist, the leftists. They go to violence first. You look at the Tesla takedown. You look at if they can stop a process, if they can create chaos, people get afraid. And when people are afraid, it compels behavior. And what that behavior is is what they're trying to force by making people afraid. They want you to pull back. Get away from, not do what you were about to do by creating violence, by creating chaos. Well, the state house in Tennessee, I visited the state house before I have, when I was a member of the legislature, I visited with the Speaker of the House there in Tennessee. They had a, they had bedlam. in the state house, in the state capital. They had protesters that were there to, for one reason only, and that was to stop the legislature in the state legislature from being able to redistrict. They were in a special session to do it. What was extraordinary about this experience was that the minority party, the Democrats that were in the House, participated with and attempted to block the special session. from their colleagues that were Republicans at their state capital. There were fires being set inside that building. There was, I'll just list some of the things that are having, blocking the aisles so that House members couldn't go on the floor. They're interlocking their arms, trying to keep people from being able to move inside the floor to be able to speak to the microphone.

They were using prohibited props and noisemakers to cause chaos and disruption on the House floor. There are House rules of order that are followed by all House members to keep a body deliberative and keep the work of the people going. They were just demonstrating a lack of respect towards the fellow members. They were attacking members of law enforcement that the minority party was. So I bring all this up to say that when you're the presiding officer of a legislative body like a Speaker of the House. You don't have a lot of tools. I mean, there might be some laws they're breaking, but if you're breaking the rules of the House, there's only so much that a speaker can do as a consequence to that. Well, in state of Tennessee, it was just issued today. The Speaker of the House has informed the minority of caucus, all the Democrats in the caucus, because without exception, all of them participate in this attempt to stop the process on their floor. The Speaker has taken away all of their standing committee assignments. They are all no longer members of the committees, standing committees, subcommittees, those responsibilities that the Speaker, by the way, appoints to each member, what committees they serve on. All of those committee assignments have been taken away. There are roles that every duly elected member on the floor will have to vote. But to the extent that they participate in the committees, in an extraordinary move. The Speaker has let the minority party in Tennessee know that those committee assignments are, have been taken from them and that they're not on those committees any longer. That might sound extreme, but as a Speaker of the House, you don't have any other levers. There's not a lot you can do other than the assignments that you give members of the House to fulfill during their term of service. So that came out today. That is about as extreme as I've seen. I've never seen an entire... Democrat or minority caucus by the Speaker, presiding officer of the House, make that decision. But it's been made today. And that's made news. That's just to highlight the kind of chaos that is being used to try and compel people to behave a certain way out of fear. And you can't do it. You have to stand up like Tennessee did it. It's not a nice moment. It's not a pleasant moment. There will be a lot of commentary about this decision made. But you've got to protect your rules. There has to be rules in that process that you respect. Whether you like what's going on or not, there are rules. Okay, folks, when we come back, we have more. We have an important interview with Senator Mike Lee. We're going to talk about that Save America Act and whether we got a shot at getting that pass. I know we all want it done. We'll talk to him when we come back after the break. You're listening to Utah's talk radio 105.9 can't arrest. Senator Lee, he is like... And so many people appreciate our Utah Senators, Senior Senator Lee, because of the Save America Act, all that he is doing to get this on the Senate floor to get this voted on as midterms come close. And by the way, folks, this isn't a Republican Democrat issue. Everybody says you have ID to vote to make sure everyone's legal when they vote. So your vote doesn't get canceled out. Joining us on the program, Senator Mike Lee. Senator, look, I guess Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Maybe, you know, she said this a while ago, but it's getting a lot of play right now that she herself supports getting rid of the filibuster or at least going to a talking filibuster. Is this some kind of reverse psychology she's using? Is she trying to work against you by saying she likes it so then Republicans will instinctively not like it?

You know, it's not terribly surprising that she would take that position. This has been a commonly held view of members of the House of Representatives for a long time. They don't have the filibuster rule in the House of Representatives. A lot of them consider it archaic, outdated, and they've got a point. Until quite recently, I defended the filibuster. The problem is that we're showing no signs of being willing. to employ it in the manner in which it was designed to function. It is supposed to protect debate. Instead, it's being used to foreclose debate and to make it irrelevant. So yeah, it's not terribly surprising that she is a Democratic lawmaker in the House of Representatives would take that position. I believe she took that position when Democrats were in the majorities in both chambers and Biden was in the White House. So that was not terribly surprising. What is surprising and somewhat stunning is the number of Republican senators like me who have recently come around to the view that it's probably doing us more harm than good. It is at least doing more harm than good to stick with what I call the zombie filibuster, where we have the worst of both worlds. We have the impediments of the filibuster without it being used in a manner that protects actual debate. And my approach is that we can take one of two solutions to this problem. The first would be my preference, which would be we enforce the talking filibuster. If you want a filibuster something, you have to actually stand up and speak. But if we're not willing to do that, then we ought to just nuke it because it's not performing as designed. And I can confirm to our listening audience that I was in the company of you and President Trump. When he was here in Utah, we were going back to Air Force One, and he brought it up and looked at you and said, why do we still have this? And I heard you defend the filibuster with my own ears. And at that time, I understand why. But it begs the question. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, no, this was in December of 2017. You and I were riding with him from the state capital in Salt Lake down to the airport where we met up with that Air Force One. And that was fun, by the way. One of the best parts of that day was watching you, Greg Hughes, walk around Air Force One. You were like a kid in the candy store. It was great. I was. Yeah, I think I. somewhat persuaded him that day that there was a that there were plenty of good reasons to keep it and back then there still were but the abuse of it has gotten so much more pronounced since then and the signals that we're going to employ it in the way that serves the original purpose for which it was designed appear now so distant, remote, and unlikely to transpire that I'm no longer on board with keeping it no matter what. So that begs the question about the status of the Save America Act, your important bill, you've got support in America without regard to party. This is such a intuitive and smart piece of legislation that you need ID.

to be able to show that you're legally allowed to vote or that you can vote. It looks like the filibuster is the firewall that is stopping this bill from passage. So what's the update on the Save America Act? Tell me that you see some light at the end of the tunnel. Look, I see some potential for light at the end of the tunnel. Right now we've got a couple of somewhat time-pressing matters that we've got to deal with. Um, fully funding ICE and border patrol is a priority right now. So they can arrest and purport, um, uh, these violent criminals that Democrats desperately want to keep in the country. Um, we've also got a deal in the next few weeks with FISA 702 and this stop government spying on law abiding Americans without a warrant. Once those two things are done, which they will be over the next few weeks, I hope and expect, and I'm going to demand that we get back to debating the Save America Act. If they want the filibuster, that's fine, but they should have to speak while doing it. And if we put it on the floor and said, we'll continue debating it until it passes, they will eventually grow tired, tired enough perhaps to exhaust the right to speak under Rule 19 of the Senate rules, or even if they don't do that, even if they're just physically exhausted and we don't enforce Rule 19, then alternatively, they will start looking for face-saving amendments to make to it, and amendments to resolve whatever lingering concerns they've got. We could get it passed. how the Senate passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, exactly that way, and it worked, and it would work here. Yeah, it sounds like you're describing a legislative process to me. It sounds familiar to me, having served in a state legislative body. That's kind of how it seems to work. So the talking filibuster, I think you're right. I think that's, that is the way to do it. It's how it was originally conceived. Let me switch gears for a second because I saw a statistic that's hard for me to believe, but as many as 40% of Democrats polled believe that the Butler assassination attempt was staged. First, I can't believe people would think that, let alone admit it out loud. What's the state of, I don't know, whether it's the Senate, Washington, D.C. or this country, if 40% of Republicans believe that the attempted assassination of the President Trump in Butler was a staged event. What's your takeaway from that? Well, look, 42% of Democrats, nearly half of that party, I believe that the Trump assassination attempts in Butler was staged. And this is them characteristically believing the least plausible explanation of Butler that it was somehow. staged. Now, what is it, uh, Occam's razor that said that the simplest explanation is often the most plausible one. This is the opposite of whatever that is. Instead of Occam's razor, we'll call that one, I don't know, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez razor or something like that. I like that. I'm going to use that.

Look, there is not a scintilla of truth to that story, Greg. There's nothing there. It's not just that that is not the simplest, most plausible explanation. It's that that is an explanation for which there is zero evidence, zero corroborating circumstantial facts, nothing. How would you have a bullet grazed the side of your head? Just because you... turned it in a fraction of a second and thereby escaped death. That doesn't make any sense. That would require Trump to somehow convince a mentally disturbed radical leftist to pretend to assassinate him, being extremely cautious to make sure that the bullet would graze only his ear. and then take a shot to the face to help Trump win the election. This is utterly absurd. They're actually insulting and demeaning themselves more than anyone else by making this. So denial of left-wing political violence fuels it. uh cole allen the would be white house correspondence dinner assassin himself spread conspiracy theories and denials of the butler pennsylvania shooting and then he went on to try it for himself this is disgraceful so you know and i think that it is i think it shows a derangement that's beyond belief because i try to take what they're saying okay let's say that it wasn't a bullet maybe it was just like a you know some they just put blood on his ear and to make it look like that was the case. Somebody died. A retired firefighter died and was shot and killed. Is that part of a staged event? Do they think that homicide is part of a staged event or was the was the person that died? Was he part? Was that stage as well? I just don't see how forget about what's the most complicated answer. I don't even understand how they can, it just seems delusional to make that case given all the, the, the homicide or the death and the, I don't find any plausible explanation to that kind of theory that this was staged. Does this just show that they're completely untethered from reality? They just don't even have facts that we're sharing one another with one another? Yes. Yes. That's exactly what it means. Because there is no defensible position on this. And, Greg, unless I've missed something, to my knowledge, these people who are spreading this conspiracy theory, haven't even bothered to account for the loss of life that day or answer any of these questions that you've addressed. They just throw it out there and just assume people will go along with it. But these are all reasons why it's an utterly implausible, indefensible theory, and they should be ashamed of themselves for spreading it. Thank you, Senator Lee, and I agree. And I think that Democrats, for all the reasons that are out there and the ones you've explained, it does show there's an unhinged, they don't have any sense of reality. And by the way, I love if Alcom's Razor is the simplest solution, the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Razor, the most bizarre solution is priceless. I love the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Razor. Okay, final segment coming up after we come back from the break, you're listening to Utah's Talk Radio 105-9, Canteress.

You know, finishing up the show, I want to play a clip that I, this was said today. So, you know, Trump is getting all this grief about the ballroom. I mean, this is, if you've ever been to the White House, and if you haven't been to the White House, but you've seen official White House events, a lot of tents, a lot of accommodation of a lot of people in places where they either are out on the grass on the lawn or they put up tents in the wintertime to accommodate the numbers. Well, President Trump is a builder, and we've seen presidents in the past renovate and construct the White House for the times. And it has been overdue that that White House compound or facility hold more people for all the events that are held by the president of the United States. So he's been doing this. And of course, the left has been suing the daylights out of him trying to stop. And so he had a budget. And the media right now are just trying to jump on him to say, your numbers are just higher than you said they would be. And they're just on him about something as... Simple and as pragmatic is making sure that the White House can accommodate the kind of events that any future president, Trump and any future president would. So he's about had it on this. So here it is. So what happened is we have a ballroom that's under budget. It's going up right here. I've doubled the size of it because we obviously need that. And we're right now on budget, under budget, and ahead of schedule. I double the size of it, you dumb person. I double the size of it, you dumb person. You are not a smart person.

You dumb person. You are not a smart person. You dumb person. You are not a smart person. I just think that is the best. He just had it. The man has had it. Okay. So, you know, that's kind of the state of play for the president right now. He's doing this, by the way, this trip to China, it is a who's who. Marco Rubio, Secretary of State had been banned from China back in 2020. Trump said he's coming, so he's there. That band's gone. We'll hear more about that trip when we come back. Thanks for being with me today. Hands up, chin down, eyes forward, answer the bell. We'll see you tomorrow here on the Rod and Greg show.