Bonus: Government Opens Today-Sparks Democrat Civil War - Verdict with Ted Cruz

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Because what's driving the delays in cancellations is that a lot of the air traffic controllers and TSA agents have been calling in sick. Maybe that immediately turns around on Thursday, but that depends upon the decision of 50,000 TSA agents and 14,000 air traffic controllers. And the FAA is not going to return to full capacity flights until we have sufficient numbers of controllers in the air traffic control room to ensure that people are flying safely. That's going to be a really important part of the equation, as you described it there. And it's a smart way that I think what we've really seen as true leadership from the Transportation Secretary on that issue. And the Trump administration to make sure, hey, yeah, there's some delays, but we're going to make sure you're safe in the skies. And that is one of the caveats to all of this, is at least you know that someone's kind of looking out for your well-being. And look, there's one party just playing pure politics, trying to hurt people. There's another that's playing defense and trying to protect you. That is... I think the takeaway from this shutdown. I think that's right. We also saw that the president called for $10,000 bonuses for the air traffic controllers who worked during the shutdown. I think that's a great policy. I think that that makes an awful lot of sense. I would like to see the law change so that air traffic controllers get paid whether there's a shutdown or not. As you know, I voted multiple times for Ron Johnson's legislation that would pay all essential employees so that you don't have federal workers forced to come in and work, but not to get a paycheck, because that's what drives things like the sickouts and people not showing up. And so I think it would make... perfect sense to have written as a matter of law that regardless of whether there's a shutdown, soldiers and sailors and airmen and Marines and FBI agents and Border Patrol agents and ICE agents and air traffic controllers and TSA agents and everyone who is essential who is required to work, they get paid. The problem has been that Democrats have voted against that over and over and over again. I don't really see that changing because Look, one of the consequences of this, we have funded three appropriations bills. We've funded the agricultural appropriations bill that includes the programs for farmers and ranchers. That includes SNAP. So food stamps is funded. All of that's funded for a year. So there won't be a shutdown on that going forward. We have also funded military construction and the VA. So that's really important both for construction projects at military bases across the country. And that's a job. driver and it's important for our military defense. That's funded for a year. And the VA, obviously caring for our veterans is critically important. That's funded for a year. So that's good news. It means the next shutdown will have a smaller impact because those three appropriations will continue. But the continuing resolution we passed expires January 30th. And I got to say, I will be very surprised if the Democrats don't force another shutdown on January 30th. These battles have not gone away, but they're at least delayed till January 30th. We may be right back with the same problem with flight delays if the Democrats do it again.

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This last cycle, we flipped Dade County Red. It is a Republican county, Republicans won, multiple elections up and down the slate. There was a lot of energy there tonight. But I got to say, Ben, I started by telling everyone, I said last night I was on the floor of the Senate. Bernie Sanders was screaming. Elizabeth Warren led out an angry war hoop. Cory Booker. curled up in a ball. Adam Schiff was pounding and Chuck Schumer was crying. And that's not exactly right, but I said, you know what? All of that says it was a great day for America. The Democrats were consuming each other because there were eight Democrats that finally, after 42 days, showed the courage to say, enough is enough. Let's reopen the government. And the Democrats turned on each other with a viciousness. That is truly extraordinary. So here was a major story in the Washington Post. Headline, Democrats push for a ruthlessly pragmatic approach to counter Trump. And here's what the Post reported. The fury at eight Democratic-aligned senators who voted with Republicans to end the longest-ever government shutdown highlights the dramatic shift in the Democratic Party less than a year into President Trump's second term. As voters and lawmakers argue that the party needs to adopt a more ruthless tactics to counter the president and claw its way back to power. So listen, the Democrats are saying the longest shutdown in history wasn't ruthless enough. It needs to be worse. Post continues. The reaction to the two votes on Sunday and Monday, which provide a pathway for the government to reopen after more than 40 days, was fierce. Representative Ro Khanna, Democrat from California, called for Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to be replaced, suggesting he was an ineffective leader, even though Chuck Schumer opposed the government funding measures. So Chuck Schumer voted no, but it doesn't matter. They want to throw them out anyway. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat New York, blasted the eight senators and said the House Democrats would not support a government funding bill that did not include the health care measures the party is demanded. So today. The Democrats, presumably, all or virtually all, are going to vote to keep the shutdown going. Now, I fully expect House Republicans will provide the votes needed to send this to the president. But here's what the post continues. Democratic advocacy groups, politically vulnerable lawmakers, potential 28 presidential candidates and voters all followed suit, lambasting those in the party they saw as caving. The desire for Democrats to hold firm, despite the pain inflicted by the shutdown, even though the party's prior posture was that shutdowns are self-destructive,

was the latest sign that the party has decided it must adopt an altogether different playbook given Trump's willingness to resort to unprecedented measures to consolidate and maintain powers. Rather than try to uphold norms, as the president shatters them, they have decided to fight Trump with tactics they previously disdained, and they have excoriated those who have stood in the way, whether on redistricting or candidates with problematic pasts. And here's one of my colleagues, Chris Van Hollen, one of the more liberal Democrats, quote, early on, there were not enough members of Congress who recognized the magnitude of the threat Donald Trump poses to our democracy and constitution. That has changed. Chris Van Hollen said that there were a few senators in what he has dubbed the, quote, no business as usual caucus at the beginning of Trump's term, but it has since grown dramatically in response to energy from the party's base. Quote, the lesson is there is power in unity and in members of Congress working in partnership with the grassroots community. This is why so many people are feeling let down at this moment because that unity was important. This is the reaction on the Democrat side. They are. Chuck Schumer is besieged from all sides, and he started this shutdown. We had a shutdown to begin with. This is a civil war. Let's be clear. And that's part of what I got to ask you about is there are Democrats now that are basically like off with his head and leadership. They want him gone. They're publicly saying that. They're saying this is the end of him. He has done. MSNBC said it multiple times. CNN commentators are the same thing. Like he's done. They've got to get rid of him. His career's over. This goes back to being held hostage by the Marxist, the Socialist, and the communists of the Democratic Party now. They didn't police them. Now they're running the party and they're anarchists. And Chuck Schumer shut down the government for the longest period in history of this country. And that wasn't good enough for them. And he still voted no on reopening it. So he shut it down for the longest in history. He voted no consistently. And yet they're still off with his head. It really is the crazies are driving the Democrat Party. And look, if you don't believe me, Maybe you will believe John Fetterman. I want you to listen to this exchange. Senator John Fetterman, Democrat from Pennsylvania, was on the view. And Sonny, you know, one of the left-wing hosts there, comes after him and comes after him hard. Listen to her unhinged question and then listen to John Fetterman's response. Well, Senator Bernie Sanders said the vote was a horrific mistake. Governor Gavin Newsom called it pathetic and a surrender. Poll after poll found more Americans on both sides of the aisle blaming Republicans. Even Marjorie Taylor Greene blamed the GOP. As you mentioned, Democrats had big wins last week, so you had momentum. Why give in now? Why bring a butter knife to a gunfight? Are you willing to gamble? that the GOP will negotiate on health care in good faith once the government reopens because if that gamble is wrong, half a million Pennsylvanians that you represent, their health care costs will skyrocket if you are wrong. And I believe you are wrong.

It rose up about 10 years ago. The Democrats did nothing. They looked the other way. And it's now taken over their party. And John Fetterman is a massive outlier because he is genuinely pro-Israel. He is vocally pro-Israel. And the radicals in the Democrat Party hate him for that. And again, if you don't believe me, listen to what John Fetterman said on exactly this topic. You are not Jewish, at least as far as I know. I don't know. Feel free to come out to me right now. But you have been one of the most outspoken. It's beyond Washington. It's beyond politicians. You have been one of the most outspoken people in American life on the issue of anti-Semitism. Why is this issue so important to you? Ironically, I did that 23 in me. I'm 97% German and 3% Neanderthal. And it's like maybe it's ironic that a big German guy from Pennsylvania who's been very absolutely devoted to Israel. and to experience the kind of anti-Semitism in my life. I mean, you know what, you know, the tree of life. I mean, that's where you're from, too. Absolutely appalling. And my heart breaks for what the Jewish communities suffered, especially after 10-7. I've had the honor of meeting, you know, members of the hostages, former people that were kept underground for 500 days. I mean, those are heroes. I've met with widows. their husbands were lost in the Gaza War and they have eight children, raising eight children by their own. That's a hero for all of it. So for me, it's heartbreaking. And that's been what's so difficult for me is like being devotion to Israel becoming increasingly incompatible with being a proud Democrat now too. And that's put me at odds. And the things that put me at odds have all converged at the same time. You know, the Gaza War, peace deal and then we move right into a shutdown you know like now democrats might not be allowed to to hold these views and i'm not changing my party and you know run the numbers run the numbers you know i'm you would find that i'm a i'm a democrat You know, he is a Democrat, but you've walked past his Senate office countless times. I've walked past it probably dozens of times when I'm up in D.C. And he had all the hostage pictures up in his front office, which I thought was incredible. Look, he has been genuinely courageous and sincerely courageous on Israel. And it's earned the absolute ire hatred animosity venom of the radical left in the Democrat Party. I mean, you heard what he just said there, that being pro-Israel is becoming incompatible with being a proud Democrat. I mean, that's a...

That's a tragic statement. I wish that statement were not true, but it is the biggest reason why their radicals hate him. And much of, you know, when he was first elected and he came into office, he had had a stroke during the campaign. And the stroke was very debilitating. When John showed up, The stroke really limited, like when I first met him, what the stroke did is it limited his ability to process auditory input. So you would talk to him and his brain was not able to process the words he was hearing. And so he would carry with him an iPad that had a translator because it just, this is one of the consequences that can be from a stroke, is your ability to process words that you hear. Your brain just can't put them together. So you would talk and he would read it. But when he first got there, you would talk to him and he would literally, he was not able to understand what you were saying. And I mean, it hurt your heart. I mean, this is a very bright man. The man's a Harvard graduate, but he had a medical issue. that he had real consequences. Early on, the Democrats all circled around him and said, you know, he's perfectly capable. There are no issues whatsoever because they assumed he would be a left-wing Democrat. That's what they expected of him. That was not a crazy expectation going in. And then... when he started standing up, particularly on Israel, standing up and defying the pro-Hamas caucus, you started seeing the Democrats leaking and planning stories and really attacking his mental capability. And the irony is, look, you heard in those exchanges, he's now able to have a conversation. He's still... is a little halting in his communication. And I think that's some of the aftermath of the stroke. But the difference is night and day. You can now have a conversation and he can hear you in a way that when he showed up in the Senate, he was not able to. And yet, Democrats are running to reporters to plant negative stories attacking him. Many of his colleagues want to drive him out of the party. at least on the Republican side, I like John and I think consistently all the Republicans are just trying to be nice to them. By the way, they did the same thing to Joe Manchin. They did the same thing to Kirsten Sinema. They succeeded in driving both of them out of the party because they want no dissent. You must obey and follow orders or they'll do everything they can to drive you out. And to be honest, both cinema and mansion, I think Republicans were much nicer to than Democrats were. And the consequence was they were both driven out of the party.

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Senators will not be paid so long as federal workers are not being paid. And as you know, I voluntarily did that. So I have not taken a paycheck for the entire length of this shutdown. I sent a written letter to the Secretary of the Senate saying, hold my paycheck. I'm not going to be paid as long as they're federal workers who are not being paid. So whenever the, at some point, I'll get my paychecks from the last 40 days in the next, presumably few days, whenever the other federal workers do. I don't know when that will come. But. Many, and I think most of the Democrats did not do that. They continued taking their paychecks throughout, which was an incredible hypocrisy. And so Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was pushing really hard for saying, look, no senator should get paid while there's a shutdown. He wanted a vote. When we were taking this up and voting on it, he wanted a separate amendment vote on that. And it was a challenge because the Democrats. were refusing to give that amendment vote and saying, if you get that amendment vote, then we want a bunch of amendment votes. And so everything was paralyzed. And it could have delayed, instead of the Senate voting Monday night, it could have delayed till Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday. And I and many others were really concerned. If it delayed till Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday for the Senate to vote, one or more of the eight Democrats would get cold feet and flip. And so actually the way it got resolved is I went to John Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s office and he and I are good friends. And I said, look, can we work something out? Because he was really mad. He was frustrated that he couldn't get his vote. I said, can we work something out that lets us... vote to reopen the government and get you what you want. And so we cut an agreement that next week, the Rules Committee on which I serve is going to vote on John Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s resolution. And I think we're going to vote it out of the Rules Committee and put it on the Senate floor and we'll vote on the Senate floor right after Thanksgiving on Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s provision. And I ask him, look, would you be willing to accept a vote on this that it's separate that doesn't delay? the overall funding bill because if we delay it if one of these democrats get cold feet we could have another week two three four weeks of shutdown and none of us want that and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. he was he was angry but but he said yes he would agree to that i'm really glad john did that that was the right thing but he's fighting for something he really believes in so i i was able to go to leadership and say look You guys need to commit to have the vote in the Rules Committee and the vote on the floor, and leadership did make that commitment. And that was the pivotal piece that got us to a vote Monday night to reopen the government. 30 days from now.

What do you think the fallout's going to actually be? I think people are so fast to get back to normal. The holidays are coming. I think that's going to be something where people are just like, all right, everything's fine. My normal chaos, as long as we don't have chaos in the sky is outside of the normal chaos when it comes to Thanksgiving or Christmas travel, I'm good. We're pretty selfish as a people now. Let's just be honest about it. So it's a lot of it is, hey, if it doesn't affect me, is it really happening? This happens now, and is there going to be fallout or account? on either side. Yeah, look, people will remember what impacted themselves and their families. So if your food stamps got delayed, you'll remember that. That will have made a real difference. If your paycheck got delayed, that will impact. You know, I was having a conversation with the Capitol Police officer yesterday, and this was a Capitol Police officer, who was a veteran, had been around a while, and he was talking about how they were giving. grief to like some of the rookies who were brand new. He said there was a class straight out of the academy who started like two days before the shutdown. And you know, these are all really, you know, young men and women 22, 23 years old. And this is like their first job. And suddenly they're not getting paid. And he did say the veteran capital police officers were, we're. basically giving grief to the young rookies and being like, oh, you're new to this game and, you know, shutdowns are part of working for the federal government. But, you know, a lot of these young guys don't have much savings, so they were a little bit shell-shocked from it. Those folks will remember. But most Americans, if it didn't impact you, the biggest way that a lot of Americans were impacted was flight delays and flight delays and cancellations, the people who had their trip to visit their mom canceled, the trip to go to a funeral in the family, the trip to go on family vacation, the trip to go on a work trip. People will be annoyed at that now. Look, it's November. We'll move into Thanksgiving. I think by Thanksgiving, the air traffic will be back to normal, so it won't be an additional burden, and then we'll get into Christmas and the holidays. And do I think by December 1... The shutdown's going to be front and center in anyone's mind. Not really. But then we're going to get to January 30th. And I mentioned in the last podcast, it was really important that we had the continuing resolution. There was a big push to get it to expire on like December 21st. Yeah. That was a terrible idea because often if government funding expires right before Christmas. Look, obviously every member of Congress wants to get home to be with their family for Christmas. That's natural. You know, most of us have kids. You want to be with your kids for Christmas. That leads frequently to really bad deals. There's an old phrase that jet fumes get in the air, that people are really anxious to get out of town so they'll agree to horrible deals. So the conservatives, I was pressing hard, do not end it right before Christmas. We need to go into January so we don't have. that pressure pushing people to make a bad deal. And thankfully, and I'll give John Thune credit. John Thune leaned in and said, we're going until January 30th. That's what's in there. We will have this same fight at the end of January, but that at least gives us some more time and some more time to deal with it.

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Come get it at APU. One of the things that's coming out of the shutdown that I do think is interesting, and I did not see this coming. Maybe you did, but this was not on my bingo card for government shutdown conversations after the fact. And that is the outrageous subsidies of Obamacare. It was called the Affordable Care Act. We now know that it's anything but affordable. Even yesterday on TV on Navarro said, well, you know, we know that premiums have gone up 100, 200, 300%, and that's why we need the government open, as she described it, and why we need to fix this. She just said, the problem. And I'm like, you guys told us this was going to be affordable. It is not affordable. Not only that, I think at some point it's pretty clear. It's not sustainable. And so this is like for me, Social Security 2.0 issue, right? Sustainability and solvency. This is now, I think, given a gift to fiscal responsibility that people are talking about just how crazy these subsidies are. We're talking about trillions we've spent. Yeah, look, you go back to when I filibustered on the Senate floor against Obamacare, and I spoke for 21 hours straight. You may recall red green eggs and ham, which a lot of people forget why I read green eggs and ham. The reason is at the time my daughters were three and five years old. And whenever I was at home, I would read them bedtime stories. And so it was their bedtime. I was talking for 21 hours. It was their bedtime. So we called home and told them turn on the TV, and I read them green eggs and ham on TV. And my favorite picture, you've seen it, Ben, that hangs in my Senate office in D.C. is the two girls, they're both in matching pajamas, which at three and five they could do at 15 and 17 were well past the stage of matching pajamas. But they're in matching pajamas. And Catherine, the three-year-old, she has her hand on the TV and she's looking at it in wonderment as her daddy's reading her, Dr. Seuss, on television. And Caroline, and you know my girls really well, Caroline is the eldest and I love her, but she's a cynical kid. Not much her dad does impresses her. And in that picture, she is laughing. That was very accurate, by the way. Very accurate. Oh, no, no. It's there are a few things better for humility than being a parent because your kids really, if you're starting to get a big head, your kids are really good for bringing you down to earth. Yep. But this picture, Caroline at age five, she's cracking up laughing. And it's why I love this picture because there's just joy in her face. And when I came home after the filibuster, at age five, she had her arms crossed. And she said, okay, dad, that was cool. And it was like, yes. Finally. Like those victories. It took, it took me talking for 21 hours to get a cool. Yeah. So in that filibuster. I laid out exactly what has happened, that premiums are going to skyrocket. Remember, Barack Obama promised that Obamacare would cut the average family's premiums by $2,500. Yeah. It has massively increased the average family's premiums instead. And there's a reason for that. What Obamacare did is drastically reduced the choices people had and forced people into more expensive plans. It basically outlawed.

less expensive plans and and and economics 101 supply and demand when when you when you shrink supply and you also mandate demand which obamacare initially had the individual mandate that forced people to buy the combination of that drives prices through the roof now we repealed the individual mandate and i was the one who led the fight to do that so we successfully repealed the individual madnate under the original obamacare If you lacked the income to be able to afford health care, the consequence of that is the IRS would fine you. So you'd have an insult to injury. You didn't have the money to pay for health insurance and the IRS came and fined you. It was idiotic. policy. Thankfully, we repealed that, and that was in 2017, a fight I led and won. So that aspect of Obamacare has gone away, but the limiting the choices has not. And what Obamacare does, it's basically built on an invisible cross subsidy, where, listen, if you're young and healthy, It's not very expensive to insure you because insurance is all about actuarial risk and young healthy people. You know, some young healthy people get cancer, getting a nasty car accident, but it's statistically speaking quite unlikely. And so it's pretty cheap to ensure a young healthy person. If you're older and sicker, it's more expensive to insure you. And what Obamacare did... Is it mandated that essentially the young, healthy people pay higher premiums to subsidize the older, sicker people? Now, one of the weird things that's backwards about this, if you look during the course of a person's life, typically they earn more and accumulate more in savings as they get older so it's literally reverse robin hood they were robbing from the poor to give to the rich is what obamacare did and it was based and and you look at the architects of obamacare they thought young people were too stupid to know that their premiums were being doubled and tripled and being used to subsidize older and sicker people. I think the whole thing is cynical as hell. And so what I've argued for for 13 years is let people buy the insurance they want, let young healthy people buy low cost, inexpensive insurance. And then for people that are really, really old or really sick. We can subsidize them directly, but don't do it through an individual, invisible cross subsidy where you're basically screwing people who aren't aware they're getting screwed. All of which is to say, why are insurance premium skyrocketing? Because Obamacare, that was the predictable outcome of Obamacare. It wasn't just predictable. It was predicted, and I stood in the Senate floor and predicted it 13 years ago.

You know, it's interesting if you look at the takeaway here, it took 40 days, longest shutdown in government history. And it seems that Democrats are just saying, we'll kick the can down the road a couple months. We may have another government shut down. We're going to keep holding the American people hostage. We're not learning from any of this. And this is a scary way that the government's being run right now. But this is what happens when you have the extreme left, who is hellbent. on hurting Americans to get their way when they don't win an election. And that's what this is really all about for them. We'll keep you update on all of it. Don't forget. Rage is not an agenda. Anger is not an agenda. Hate is not an agenda. And unfortunately, on the far left in the Democrat Party, that is what they are for is rage, hate, and anger. And we're going to see more chaos. We're going to see more holding the American people hostage because it's a direct... outgrowth of that rage and hate and anger. Yeah, amen to that. Don't forget we do this show Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. So hit that subscribe or auto download button so that you can get this show and not miss any of the episodes. We've been talking a lot about the government shutdown. We're going to get into some other big issues as well. Moving forward, that I can promise you. So make sure you download a verdict with Ted Cruz and grab my podcast, the Ben Ferguson podcast on those in-between days. I'll keep you up to end on what's going on as well there. And we'll see you back here Friday morning. Saturday, July 25th. I know I will be the best walk away in the world. An undefeated phenom. Bad man is a rising star. And a frightening force. What a win for Shabil Fais. Ascend on the nation's capital to fight for gold. Thad, the silverback jeans. Silverback nation makes them noise. versus Shemil Musayev. All it's over! For the PFL well-to-weight world title. On Real! Saturday, July 25th and 10 p.m. Eastern on ESPN. Vital doesn't always mean visible. Across America, advanced technology is working behind the scenes, strengthening our nation. It protects our warfighters, advances life-saving health care, combat cyber threats, and defends the critical infrastructure that keeps our country moving. At GDIT, we power the systems that help America operate, connect, and stay secure. Every hour, every mission, every day. GDIT, behind America's invisible advantage. If you're someone who's tracking your sleep, your steps, and your macros, then you already know that what you eat is kind of everything. You should also know that Sprouts Farmer's Market can help make eating for longevity easier. Sprouts has all the high-quality, nutrient-dense, organic foods and cutting-edge supplements you need. So whether you're focused on protein, gut health, or optimizing how you feel day-to-day, it's all there. And here's what no other grocery store can offer. An in-store wellness expert to help you find exactly what you need. So whether you're after longevity or on any other health journey, it's easier at Sprout's Farmer's Market.

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