Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - Stories of Week 5/29: Uvalde Timeline, Police Coverup, Ukraine Strategy, NFT Fraud, & More!

Episode Date: June 3, 2022

Krystal and Saagar discuss the Uvalde timeline, Uvalde fallout, Nassar coverup, stock ban stalls, Uvalde coverup, Ukraine update, and NFT fraud!To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show uncut and 1 hour early visit: https://breakingpoints.supercast.com/To listen to Breaking Points as a podcast, check them out on Apple and SpotifyApple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-points-with-krystal-and-saagar/id1570045623 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4Kbsy61zJSzPxNZZ3PKbXl Merch: https://breaking-points.myshopify.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Your hard-earned money is gonna help us build for the midterms and the upcoming presidential election so we can provide unparalleled coverage of what is sure to be one of the most pivotal moments in American history. So what are you waiting for? Go to BreakingPoints.com to help us out. Good morning, everybody. Happy Monday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. And of course, it is Memorial Day, so we are thinking about those that we lost in all of the wars in American history. So our thoughts very much with them and with our families today. But Crystal, what do we have today? Lots of big updates continuing to come out regarding that horrific

mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas. I mean, every day that goes by, we learn about more unconscionable failures, more lies that were told to us from the beginning. Actually, some admissions of just how catastrophically bad the response was there. So we'll get into all of that. There's also then the political fallout, politicians, how they are responding to that. The president and the first lady made a trip down to Texas in response. We've got some new polling about gun safety measures and what the public might support in that regard. Pretty interesting numbers.

Yes, very interesting, I think. The Parson breakdown is also a little bit surprising, maybe a little bit different than you would think. We're also learning that the Justice Department is not going to charge those FBI agents who completely dropped the ball on that Nassar investigation, pushing it off, allowing him to go on and continue to victimize women and girls. Horrific outcome to this story. So we've got those details for you. And a little bit of friendly fire between some Fox News personalities. We'll bring you that as well as there's a, you know, some people who just want to say whatever law enforcement did, it's fine.

Others are saying, hold on a second, this was not good whatsoever. So we'll tell you about that. And also, guys, we are celebrating a big anniversary here at Breaking Points. This week is one year since the launch of the show. So we want to take a little bit of time, first of all, to say thank you to you guys and also to tell you everything that we've tried to build this year, what our plans are going forward. So we'll save that for the end of the show. But we did want to start with the very latest from that mass shooting in Texas. Authorities now admitting that law enforcement made the wrong call by waiting upwards of an hour to even try to breach the door that those that the madman was behind locked into a classroom massacring children. Let's take a listen to a little bit of that press conference from last week. Hey, with the benefit of hindsight, hey, stand by, stand by,

hey, stand by, hey, stand by, right? I've got it. I've got it. Okay. Hey, for the benefit of hindsight where I'm sitting now, of course it was not the right decision. It was the wrong decision, period. There's no excuse for that. Thank you for doing this, and I do hope you stay here and take as many questions as possible. You say there were 19 officers gathered in the hallway or somewhere. What efforts were made to try and break through that door? You say it was locked.

What efforts were the officers making to try and break through either that door or another door to get inside that classroom? None at that time. The on-scene commander at the time believed that it had transitioned from an active shooter to a barricaded subject. So there were 19 cops standing outside of the door of those classrooms where those kids were being murdered, where they were bleeding to death, in desperate need of medical care. They did not even try to breach the door. And as you see, I mean, they can't even defend it. Yeah, they're just admitting it out loud. They can't even try to defend it.

Same guy who was super triumphant, you know, the day after. He's like, law enforcement. Thank you to law enforcement. He's also the one who lied to all of us, Crystal. Steve McCraw. He's the director of Texas Public Safety. He said that there was an active shooter in Goward, that there was a school resource officer who engaged that shooter.

What do we know now? So resource officer's not even on the scene. And that's just one. I can't even keep track of all the lies now in this story, but that one example of what the hell was happening with the school resource officer, we literally got four different versions of the story. First, the school resource officer was there on the scene. He was chasing, they exchanged gunfire. Then he chased him into the building, but there was no gunfire. Then, well, he didn't chase him into the building, but there was no gunfire. Then, well, he didn't

chase him into the building, but he was there. And then finally we come to learn he wasn't even there at the school. I mean, that's just one example of the lies that we were told about this thing from the beginning. And so there's a little bit of a sense that they've realized they've screwed this thing up so badly that they can't do anything else but admit, yeah, maybe we should have gone in and not waited an hour. And by the way, they would have waited longer. Oh, yeah. The Border Patrol finally said, screw this. We're going in and we're taking this guy out.

Thank God for those guys. Seriously. But because we've been lied to so much about this response, I certainly don't feel like even now we have the whole story. Various news outlets, and I'll get to this in just a minute, have been trying to piece together based on eyewitness accounts, videos that were posted online, surveillance footage, what the authorities are actually saying. Trying to piece together the timeline of how and when this all went down. And the details are just unconscionable. But, you know, maybe one of the most honest things we heard out of all of the spin is the real reason they didn't go in.

Why? They were afraid that they were going to get shot. This is a spokesperson with the Texas Department of Public Safety being pressed on CNN. Take a listen. Correct. The active shooter situation, you want to stop the killing, you want to preserve life. But also, one thing that, of course, the American people need to understand is that officers are making entry into this building. They do not know where the gunman is.

They are hearing gunshots. They are receiving gunshots. At that point, if they proceeded any further not knowing where this suspect was at, they could have been shot. At that point, if they proceeded any further, not knowing where this suspect was at, they could have been shot. They could have been killed. And at that point, that gunman would have the opportunity to kill other people inside that school. Everything else is just spit and rationalization.

They were scared. That's the bottom line. They were afraid you're going to be going deep into your monologue, which is that they violated the basic tenets of active shooter training. They tell you no matter what, if you are the first person on the scene, even if you were the only person on the scene, they say in

no uncertain terms, you have to put your life on the line in order to save children. And I, you know, I really hope, look, I put this out there, which is I'm sympathetic to anybody who doesn't want to do that, but that's a decision to make before you become a cop, not after you become the cop. And federal agents basically have to mount a coup against the on-site commander and say, you know what? You're full of it. We're all going in. And that timeline you alluded to came out yesterday. Let's put this up there on the screen where they talk about 78 long minutes. And this thing, guys, I mean, it is brutal to read because it just goes minute by minute. It shows videos and it shows quotes of police officers who are keeping parents out of the school.

You have parents who are begging the police officers in order to go in. They describe the multiple long minutes, somewhere around 40 minutes, Crystal, that 19 officers were in the hallway being held up before being able to go inside. I mean, the one I just can't get out of my head is this little girl who's inside the classroom who makes three separate 911 calls in which she asks and says, please send the police in. She can hear the police, ask them to come in. You know, also there's a report now that actually from one of the children who was in the room, just to give you an idea of how screwed up the situation is, is that they said, hey, if anybody needs help, yell help. Kid yells help. Gunman is still alive, comes over and shoots that kid and actually kills him. So you have a botched response, not only in terms of the initial

contact, it is clear also that the holdup on that costs lives. That's one of the spin that they're going to try and put out there. It's like, well, everybody was already dead. Apparently that was the justification for the on-site commander. Now I did the justification for the on-site commander. Now, I did some digging into this on-site commander. It is not the Uvalde Police Department. Uvalde ISD, Independent School District, has its own police department. The chief of that police department, which has six officers, yes, six, basically very inexperienced, that was the guy who was in charge. And he's the one who made all these idiot calls and held up Border Patrol and all these other tactical units from even going on inside. So clearly he's not just a fool.

Frankly, I think he should go to prison, but I don't know if the laws work that way. Also, interesting side note, he actually was just elected to the city council, that dude. Oh my god. And I don't think he's been sworn in yet, but yeah, he's elected to the city council. And while certainly the bulk of the blame falls on him, since he made that decision, you know, making this excuse of, oh, it's not an active shooter anymore. This is more akin to a hostage situation. And we just assumed everybody was dead. Well, you're getting 911 calls in from the room. One little girl, as you mentioned multiple times, but there were multiple phone calls placed from inside that room saying, please help us.

So you know for a fact there are people who are alive in that room. Not to mention, I mean, God, the reports are so horrific to imagine. One little girl who survived by smearing herself in the blood of her friends and pretending to be dead. The friend she was laying on top of was initially breathing. And then because the response was so long and she's unable to get medical care, she died. I mean, you had kids who might have been saved who bled out on that classroom floor. Because from that timeline, the gunman entered the building at 1133. Two minutes later, three police officers enter. They don't take him out until 1250, an hour and

20 minutes. And as you said, Sagar, their training guidance that they're supposed to be following, that they were well-trained on. And did, you know, very early. They had multiple recent active shooter drills. This school system had all the latest in terms of surveillance technology. They had dedicated additional resources to this school district police department, six officers across all of their schools. The very first thing that that manual tells you is the number one goal is stop the killing. They say in no uncertain terms, because of the nature of this response, because

of how important it is that you stop the killing of innocent civilians as quickly as possible, it is very likely you may be the only one on the scene. Well, here they were lucky. They had three police officers there and still they don't act. That revelation that they did not even try to get in the door, I just don't even know what to say about that. And the one story I really can't get my head around is there's that woman who was a mother who was placed in handcuffs, who was placed in handcuffs by federal marshals on the scene. Then she was, you know, let go. Then she had time to run into the school. Well, it turns out she wasn't just some local mom.

Crystal, she heard about the shooting, drove 40 miles. So she had the time to drive, hear about the shooting, drive 40 miles, get placed in handcuffs, get out of handcuffs, run into the school, save her own kids. Well, I don't know what the hell these federal marshals are doing all during the time before this gunman is actually killed by police. So you have now verified, by the way, a father was tased by police officers for trying to go get his own kids. A mom was placed in handcuffs

by federal marshals. Also, these feds, you know, what are you doing? Like, once again, you guys are on scene keeping moms out of the school to go get their own kids because apparently you're not doing a good enough job. And also this gunman is still alive during this entire time. Well, and here's the thing. The reason the parents were so desperate to go in is because they weren't doing anything. Yeah, they knew they could see it you know if you are actively engaged trying to take this guy i can understand you don't want parents coming in and interfere of course because not safe for them it confuses the

situation but when you're standing around 19 dudes in the hallway doing jack shit yeah of course if you're a parent of course you're going to do everything you can to go in and get your kids. And how about this detail that was also revealed? So not only is the school resource officer not exchanging gunfire with the gunman going in, not actually there on site whatsoever. When he arrives, he chased a teacher that he was confused, thought was the shooter, which also shows you. I mean, I don't know if you had a school resource officer in your high school growing up. I did as well. I mean, he knew all of us. He was there every day. We all had a relationship. He certainly knew all the teachers. So there are continued, I continue to have a lot of questions. Another question I have is, you know, the gunman kills,

not doesn't kill, shoots his grandmother in the face. She and the neighbors call 911. That house was very close to the school. Apparently she used to work at the school, too. Immediately locked down. When you know you have a gunman on the loose within a mile of the school, that should have been an immediate lockdown. So I have a question about that as well. I mean, there is so much here still, I think, that is being covered up and that we don't know. We are learning more about concerning behavior from the gunman before all of this happened. Let's go ahead and put ABC News up on the screen. They say they spoke with over a dozen people who say the Texas gunman sent them concerning messages online in the days leading up to the shooting. A little bit of this we've covered, but he always seemed to be messaging a bunch of kind of random girls and women that he barely knew,

sending them pictures of this gun and saying things like, I've got a surprise for you and I can't tell you yet. Another thing that was really creepy that he kept telling people is, you know, if you follow me or you add me, I'm going to make you famous, making some comments like that, threatened to rape people online. I mean, all kinds of concerning behavior here ahead of this horrific shooting. It's also come out that he had asked his sister to buy him a gun. The sister had refused. So clearly, you know, every interaction that people had with this dude, they knew that there was something that was really off. Yeah. I mean, and look, you know, for the family, there's still a lot of questions here. I mean, in terms of his personal interactions, it looks, he clearly had a screwed up home life. His mom was a drug addict. His own grandma was trying to evict the mother, but,

you know, with the sister, apparently with his uncle, he'd been on hunting and shooting sprees. You know, with that, there's still not a lot that's come out. His own father has come out and said, oh, this is not who my little boy was. Like, yeah, okay. In terms of how the family is looking to spin it, and I think those people have a lot to answer for in terms of why exactly there were no reports

there. Same, you know, this streaming, I don't know what this thing is. Yubo? It's like a social network for streamers. I'm showing my age here. But basically people- Ella tried to explain it to me. Okay, all right. So there's gamers, and it's like a social network for people who live stream gaming.

Okay, you know, makes, I guess, enough sense. But he was meeting people on this website and had told multiple of them that he basically was planning on carrying out a school shooting, enough so that he was reported also on the site, like users who were gaming with him reported some of his concerning behavior. So I also have a lot of questions for you, Beau. I'm like, did you flag any of these to law enforcement? I mean, I think that the ultimate question here is how well known was he to law enforcement prior to all of this? We know for certain that law enforcement visited his house on multiple occasions, given the fact that so many of these school shooters have previous interactions,

or not even school shooters, mass shooters, have previous interactions with law enforcement, with the FBI, we have to know whether they had an open file, a case, a tip, anything that they can go back and they can crawl through. So that's a major one that we have here. And the final detail, which is just so insane here on the police, you know, you found this. I can't get my head around this. Put it up there on the screen, which is that officials say that law enforcement entities now across the state have actually been called in by the Uvalde police because not just to supplement their police force, but to provide protection to the officers and the mayor following the heavy criticism and the threats. And look, I'm not going to feed the beast here, but the actual incident commander on the scene has not been seen in several days since the actual response here.

And apparently he's receiving a lot of heavy criticism and threats. But I mean, there's just a hell of a lot of irony, Crystal, that whenever they need help, they have to call in the cavalry. And again, I'm not endorsing anything. I don't, you know, let the process play out, et cetera, but just pretty amazing. It's like when they need help, when they need support, oh yeah, then people are coming in order to guard them. But whenever little kids needed them, oh, they're standing out in the hallway doing absolutely nothing. Yeah, they're getting the backup that those kids never them. Oh, they're standing out in the hallway doing absolutely nothing. Yeah, they're getting the backup that those kids never got.

I mean, I think we were talking before we started the show, and I will never be over this. And I think the reason this has touched such a nerve with the nation is not just because of the horrific loss of these young lives, but the thought of how they were abandoned by the people who were supposed to help them. There was one little girl who I was reading said to her family, why did they do this to us? We're good kids. There they are in the room hiding, calling 911. Please help us. I know. And no one for over an hour came to their rescue. And it's just, it's just horrific. It's just horrific. There's just no other words to put to it. I think that's right. Let's go ahead and move on to the fallout segment because this is important. This has touched such a nerve that there is overwhelming political pressure in Texas and across the nation of, hey, we need heads on the spike here in terms of who exactly is responsible for abandoning these children. And the governor has now found himself

especially in a tough spot because he was on the dais praising law enforcement the day after saying, we are so thankful to them. Steve McCraw is telling us all of these lies. Well, now he's coming out and saying, look, I was misled. And just compare his tone from the beginning, where he thanks law enforcement, to the way that he's talking about now, just showing the overwhelming political pressure back in my home state in order to find the people who are responsible and hold them accountable. Let's take a listen. And let me emphasize something that I know you all know. But the reality is, as horrible as what happened, it could have been worse. The reason it was not worse is because law enforcement officials did what they do. They showed amazing courage

by running toward gunfire for the singular purpose of trying to save lives. And it is a fact that because of their quick response, getting on the scene, being able to respond to the gunman and eliminate the gunman, they were able to save lives. Unfortunately, not enough. Short answer, yes, I was misled. I am livid about what happened. I was on this very stage two days ago, and I was telling the public information that had been told to me in a room just a few yards behind where we're located right now. I wrote down hand notes in detail about what everybody in that room told me in sequential order about what happened. And when I came out here on this stage and told the public what happened, it was a recitation of what people in that room told me, whether it be law enforcement officials or non-law enforcement officials, whatever the case may be.

And as everybody has learned, the information that I was given turned out in part to be inaccurate. And I'm absolutely livid about that. Major change in tone there, Crystal. You know, the immediate thing, you know, being emotional there about law enforcement now saying I'm absolutely livid about that. Major change in tone there, Crystal. You know, the immediate thing, you know, being emotional there about law enforcement now saying I'm absolutely livid. But listen, you know, it's nice to be livid. But what I want to know is what the hell are you going to do about it? And to be honest, this does not inspire confidence. The next move, let's put this up there on the screen, which is that the Justice Department is going to review the law enforcement response to the Uvalde mass shooting.

Now, I mean, that sounds nice, but what do you see there on the bottom ticker, which is that we're going to do an entire story today about how the Justice Department is not going to charge the FBI agents, who didn't just botch, but basically criminally covered up the Larry Nassar sexual abuse case. I mean, do we really have faith that the Justice Department is actually going to be able to give any justice to the families here? I think this has to come down to every political level, both Uvalde, the ISD, the city council, along with the governor. I mean, frankly, Steve McCraw should be fired, the Texas head of department safety. I mean, he outright lied to Texas and to the American people about the school resource officer. So either he needs to be fired for not vetting information properly before he delivers that, or the person who gave him that needs to be fired. I mean, at every level, both the cover-up,

the response. Also, I think every single one of these Border Patrol agents, have you not noticed, not one of those guys has been interviewed yet on camera. And I think there's a reason for it, which is that- It'd be pretty interesting to hear what they had to say. So I can tell you, I tapped my network. I reached out to all the people that I know. And nobody's willing to really go on the record and tell me what's going on. But the skinny of it was essentially the contours of what has come out, which is that they got on the scene and they were like, what the hell is going on here? And after a while, they were like, you know what? This guy's a moron. Screw him. And they stormed in there, had to go get the key because they realized there had not been a single attempt

at breaching the door. And they killed him within seconds of entering the door. And by the way, not a single one of them actually was killed. You know, they had a tactical shield, a ballistic shield. All of that had been on scene for, you know, well into the time that they had been there. And eventually they basically revolted against the incident commander. So again, I think the Border Patrol guys, you know, frankly, they need to come out and they need to speak. The head of Border Patrol, I think this is a cover-up, frankly, by the administration also. I mean, the Biden administration declined that first day, Crystal Corrine Jean-Pierre. She declined to issue any call against law enforcement in their initial,

even when it was well aware within the country. I mean, they're so afraid of being tagged of like, oh, you're anti-cop. You got the Republican governor of Texas trashing law enforcement. Anyone who looks at this thing. This is far beyond politics. This is way beyond. They're just so fearful of like, oh, what's the right going to say about this that they can't even find the obvious correct answer that basically everyone in the country is thinking and feeling right now with a couple of notable examples that we're going to get to shortly. But yeah, even the way that they frame this investigation is not confidence-inspiring. They say in this article, the review which is being undertaken at the request of Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin is tasked with providing, quote, an independent account of law enforcement actions and responses that day and to identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare for and respond to active shooter events.

We don't need to, I mean, we know the best practices already. It's exactly what was laid out in that training manual. I mean, sadly, post-Columbine is part of what I'm going into my monologue as well. There's been a lot of money spent by Congress to fund research into what the best response is because in Columbine, there was a delay of about 20 minutes from the time that law enforcement arrived on the scene until when they actually entered the school. And that 20 minutes was considered shocking and unconscionable at the time. But also at the time, there was no fully developed protocol for this. So they were making it up on the fly. After that, there have been federal funds spent hundreds of millions of dollars to train, to develop and disseminate this training.

So we know the lessons. we don't need the lessons learned. We need accountability. And unfortunately, you know, the way that our laws are written and the way that the court has decided, law enforcement isn't actually under a duty to protect. Yeah, I was just about to read that. It's very unlikely that any of these people, I mean, the most accountability they may face is losing their job. But in terms of any sort of criminal negligence, I think it's highly, highly unlikely here. People forget the Supreme Court ruled in 2005 that police do not have a constitutional duty to protect anyone, which, you know, really raises a lot of questions about the social contract whenever you're going to imbue somebody with an immense

amount of power and with the ability to, like, hold military-grade weapons and, you know, automatic rifles and training and all of this qualified immunity that we grant them. I think that within the, I guess, established social contract is, you know, if somebody's shooting up a school, you go in and try to kill that person. And I think that what also is going to be shown here is, you know, these parents don't have recourse. You can't sue these cops for their lack of response. You can't do really anything. And the question now comes, like, what actual accountability can be done? I think the fact that this Uvalde ISD guy still has his job is insane. I mean, he should be immediately. It doesn't even, there's not a question about it. The city council, the mayor, they should be going in, name the three cops who sat on their ass

outside of this and basically fire them. I mean, you are well within your rights in order to do so, but a lot of what's happening here just reeks to me of a coverup and they're waiting for the American public and the media and everybody to move on so that they can issue their stupid little report about, oh, here's exactly what, listen, I mean, we have the broad, it's been a couple of days. We have the broad context of what happened. Right. The spirit of what happened. We have a minute-by-minute account. We don't need a 500-page timeline about what's happened. We need people to be fired, preferably, if possible, to be prosecuted under the full extent of the law. I mean, what's happened here is just an egregious miscarriage, at least in the spirit of what justice is supposed to be about and about what these people are supposed to be doing. Everything that takes time, I mean, these delaying tactics are so typical. I

mean, even the political response here in Washington, like, oh, we're going to go and we're going to try to work in a bipartisan manner. No, the public energy is there right now. The heat is on the issue right now. You know what you need to do. You know what kind of legislation would make a difference in terms of guns. You know what is broadly supported by the American public. We're going to talk about that shortly. And same with the response on the ground here in Texas. You know at this point where the major failures lie. Sure, we would like to know the whole story. I still have a lot of questions. I want to know where the freaking school resource officer was when he was supposed to be at the school.

And they lied, you know, four different times to cover up what exactly happened there. There were basic lies, too, to try to cover their asses about how, oh, he was, the shooter was wearing body armor. Which was meant, I think, to offer an excuse for why they weren't able to shoot and kill this guy to start with. And why they were so fearful of engaging with him because they felt like he was, well, it turned out that wasn't true as well. So there are still a lot of questions here, but you're right. We know broadly where the mass failures lie. They lie with the head of that Uvalde School District Police Department who clearly made the call, hey, we're going to sit on our hands for an hour and let kids bleed out on the classroom floor, try to keep even border patrol who are there saying, what are we doing? Like, why are we standing around here? Let's go for an hour and let kids bleed out on the classroom floor, try to keep even border patrol

who are there saying, what are we doing? Why are we standing around here? Let's go in, trying even to prevent them from acting. We know that. We know where the lies came from, from the spokespeople here, from the leaders of the department. So the fact that any of these people still have their jobs to meet is completely insane. The other piece we wanted to bring you is the president and the first lady did visit Uvalde to meet with families who have a little bit of that that we can show you. You know, this is, for those of you who are just listening, this is the first lady laying a bouquet of flowers at the memorial there in front of the Robb Elementary School sign, along with, you know, a lot of other flowers and pictures. You can see some other local

community members walking there and just contemplating this, what is really something you will never be able to wrap your head around. Let's talk about Larry Nassar, unfortunately. This is just one of those that really harkens back to what we had talked about in our B block, which is that they're kicking it over to the Justice Department to examine Uvalde. How has the Justice Department handled their review of their behavior when it came to Russiagate and also when it came to Larry Nassar? Nassar is the king example of a nonpolitical case in which you really ask yourself,

what the hell is the point of having these people with all of this power? And why are they never held to account? So let's put this up there on the screen. The very same day that they asked the Justice Department to look into Uvalde, the Justice Department, quietly, of course, not taking advantage of what exactly the media environment is, comes out and says they are standing by their decision not to charge the FBI agents who disregarded the gymnastics allegations by the Olympic team that allowed Larry Nassar not only to assault them continually, but to continue to assault dozens of new women. And I'll just remind everyone, you have here a case in which there

were flags and interviews being done by FBI agents in 2015, who then did not record the case, did not do anything about it, did not enforce or investigate Larry Nassar until a newspaper brought to light the allegations against him two years later, then make up statements and record that past interview two years later. This is speaking here specifically about Michaela Maroney, who these FBI agents I'm talking about made up things that she said to try and cover their own ass, saying, no, no, no, we did an interview back in 2015.

They didn't even record it until after it all came out. Publicly, we know that one of the agents himself was trying to get a job with USA Gymnastics and that he was in collusion effectively with the head of that program in order to try and to cover up what was happening here. I mean, it boggles the mind when we're talking about hundreds of little children. You know, there's a common theme, little children failed here by law enforcement that were basically shunted aside for the career ambitions of these two FBI agents in the

Indianapolis field office. And the Justice Department has now had three times in order to make this right that they've looked back. This was an additional external review of the case. And they say, well, under the current guidelines, we simply cannot prosecute these agents. I mean, he made false statements. There are people sitting in jail for doing the exact same thing. And this agent is being let off the hook, having clearly violated the law and worse, failed Michaela Maroney and Simone Biles. I mean, not just, those are the household names. The hundreds of young girls who were molested and abused by this man. So I just think it's a, you know, if you think there's accountability by these people, I don't know what to tell you. It is truly disgusting. And you make the correct point, which is the Justice Department acknowledges that these agents lied. They say it looks like they made false statements, but we don't have enough evidence to bring criminal charges. There's a quote here from a lawyer who represents some of the survivors of his abuse who said, The continued failure by the Department of Justice to criminally charge the FBI agents, USA Gymnastics, and the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee officials who conspired to cover up the largest sex abuse scandal in the history of sport is incomprehensible.

And you have so many layers. You have the FBI agents who delayed and covered up because they were interested in their own careers and because just, I don't know, lazy and incompetent and the one wanted a job with USA Gymnastics, you have that. And then you have all of these higher level bodies, USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic Committee, who they wanted to sweep it under the rug because they just wanted to keep, you know, with their careers and with their industry and making money. So all of these young girls were just, you know, grist for the mill for their industry. And that's how they treated them. I mean, the courage that it took for Michaela Maroney and Simone, all these women to come forward and acknowledge and expose what had happened to them as young girls

is extraordinary. And for that testimony to just basically, I mean, Michaela Maroney made it clear that it was basically dismissed. I mean, the FBI agent said to her, is that all? That's what they said to her. I can't believe, I mean, once again, no accountability. Nobody pays the price for years and years and years of abuse that was completely preventable, could have been stopped. And the people, once again, who were supposed to be the good guys, who were supposed to come in and enforce the law

and stand up for the victims, the survivors here, once again, they completely failed or are interested in themselves not doing the right thing. Yeah, and I do think it's important that we say, you know, the media describes this as a botched investigation. It's not botched. It was criminally covered up by these agents who have, the FBI itself. Remember Michael Flynn and all that? You know, they went after these, I'm not defending the guy, but you know, they said they went after him for a false statements charge. Same with, I mean, Paul Manafort and Rogers, whatever. I mean, my point being that

when they want to, yeah, they'll charge that case all day long, but oh, but here, Paul Manafort and Rogers, whatever. I mean, my point being that when they want to, yeah, they'll charge that case all day long. But oh, but here, no, we can't do that. It's one of our own. I think what's even grosser is they don't even release one of the agents whose name was involved in this. Once again, I mean, these people get all the breaks in the world while the gymnasts and all of them are the ones who are being abused. And by the current count, between the time that they knew about it and the time they did anything about it, there were 120 girls who were being abused. And by the current count, between the time that they knew about it and the time they did anything about it, there were 120 girls who were assaulted by Larry Nett. 120. So just like Uvalde, 120 who pay the price after the actual allegations. So we'll let Michaela

Maroney speak for herself. She testified before Congress back in September. Here's what she had to say. Most of you are probably aware I was molested by the U.S. gymnastics national team and Olympic team doctor Larry Nassar. And in actuality, he turned out to be more of a pedophile than he was a doctor. What I'm trying to bring to your attention today is something incredibly disturbing and illegal. After telling my entire story of abuse to the FBI in the summer of 2015, not only did the FBI not report my abuse, but when they eventually documented my report, 17 months later, they made entirely false claims about what I said. After reading the Office of Inspector General's OIG report, I was shocked and deeply disappointed at this narrative they chose to fabricate.

They chose to lie about what I said and protect a serial child molester rather than protect not only me, but countless others. You know, and Simone Biles, same thing. She had to come out and talk about this. I recommend everybody go watch the Netflix documentary, Athlete A, that goes into the very, very beginning kind of of the initial reports against Nassar. And this one concerns a lot more of USA Gymnastics and how exactly they covered up. But at every institutional level, these girls were failed and just – all anybody wants is accountability here.

I think anybody can at least understand if not forgive, okay, somebody came forward. But this is intentional, like brushing it past. And also it's very clear there was some sexist like we don't believe you. That was a huge part of what Nassar would do is he'd be like, well, these girls, they don't understand. This is a medical procedure. And it took actually a female detective to be like, I think this is bullshit about what exactly he's talking about. So a lot of male detectives didn't believe these clear victims of sexual assault. And I mean, I always think about that one dad who charged and tried to hurt Nassar at the trial. I mean, there are hundreds of those dads out there now.

Kids who suffered under him. Parents. You know, this ruins people's lives forever. And nobody's standing up for them. Disgusting. Disgusting. This is something we've been keeping a real eye on, which is that what's happening right now is what unfortunately we predicted was going to happen.

Now, the stock ban gained a lot of momentum. At one point, it was even possibly going to be included in the President of the United States State of the Union, where he was going to endorse a ban on members of Congress trading stocks. It reached a real national level of consciousness. You have apps and TikToks now about people following congressional stock trades. It has entered popular culture in a way that very, very, very few things in politics ever do. Well, Congress is doing what it does best, which is just, yeah, yeah, sure, I support it, which is what Pelosi said, even though she said it's a free market, we live in a capitalist country. Let's put this up there on the screen from Business Insider, which is that inside the true believers, there is a major frustration that they're trying to run out the clock. Remember, Congress resets at every election, which means that you have to restart from scratch if you haven't been able to pass a law. And what the people who are in charge are saying is that Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer are really putting the brakes on any ability for some of these stock bands to

actually go through Congress. So one of the people behind this, Abigail Spanberger of Virginia, who is not some, you know, like progressive leftist. I can't stand this lady, to be honest with you, but she's good on this one issue. She's like Madam Centrist in the- Yeah, she's, yes, exactly. I mean- Like former, I think like- I think she was in the CIA. Maybe former CIA ghoul. Yeah, I've talked about her. Anyway. Even this lady supports the stockpile.

Okay, well, she says, and again, she's a Democrat, avoids naming Pelosi, but insists that it is being stonewalled, quote, by anyone who has the ability to move it forward. So that's in the House where the Speaker and apparently the chair people of the relevant committees are making sure that this thing doesn't even get a hearing, so that way it doesn't get voted on, so that way it doesn't make it wait to the floor. And therefore, even Pelosi then has to decide whether something that comes to the floor actually gets voted on.

Then, of course, over in the Senate, there's a bunch of Democrats, bipartisan groups also, who have proposed major stock ban legislation. And yet, what they point to is that in the Senate, especially in the current political environment, we are at a place where the committees themselves have not even began to hold hearings on these things. And what they're saying is that it is very clear that there is pressure from the top in order to make sure that these things do not only make it out of committee, but never get voted on. And so I think part of the issue is that there isn't a truly united caucus, because on the one hand, you have Democrats and Republicans who have co-sponsored bills, but on the other, you really just have it so that nobody even close to leadership

is really pushing this stuff. I mean, on the Republican side, right, it's like Josh Hawley, Ben Sasse, they had no connection to leadership. Chip Roy, same thing. I mean, McCarthy hates Chip Roy. And then on the Democrat side, you know, it's even Spanberger, not beloved apparently, at least on this by Pelosi and the others, is Pramila Jayapal, who also, you know, she may take orders, but is not beloved also by Pelosi. A couple things to say about this. So according to this report, it looks like Pelosi is the real problem. Because Schumer doesn't actually even own any stock. I didn't realize that. He's very poor, actually. Yeah, he and his wife both, they, you know, took what was the Biden position too, by the way, when he was in the Senate saying, listen,

I'm not going to trade any stock while I'm here, which is very honorable, but should be required of every member, obviously. And so you have Pelosi, who obviously has a different view. And what they say is, well, yeah, she's publicly expressed openness to a ban. Her quote was, if members want to do that, I'm okay with it. She had initially, as you guys I'm sure recall, had a very different take on this, that this was just the free market and why shouldn't people be able to participate in it. And obviously her husband's, what they describe as frequent, high volume stock trades have fed suspicion that she is not actually interested in addressing the issue. And yet we show you how much Pramila Jayapal has just completely bent the knee and shown complete fealty to Pelosi,

is in some ways Spanberger, Abigail Spanberger, who, as you said, is like a Madam Centrist, went further in criticizing Pelosi than Jayapal does. She says, you take the statements that people make, and you continue to push. She told me she was supportive, so I'm going to take her at her word, Sagar. I mean, it's so embarrassing the way that she has just completely sold out any value or principle because she has some fantasy in her mind that she's going to get some kind of a leadership spot within the Democratic Party

that's never even going to happen. It's really, it's just embarrassing at this point. That's the only way I can put it. And all of this comes against the backdrop of another report that the very limited regulation that we have on stock trading, which is none, it's just like a little bit of transparency around it. Even that, some senators cannot bring themselves to follow the law when it comes to the Stock Act. Let's go ahead and put this report up on the screen. Three more senators violated the Stock Act. At least two more Democrats and a Republican senator failed to report stock transactions last year as a ban on congressional stock trading flounders in a Senate working group. And we get a little bit of insight here, Sagar, into possibly why it is, quote, floundering in that Senate

working group. One of the senators who broke the law violating the Stock Act is Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who has considerable influence over whether the Senate will move this year to limit stock transaction or ownership by its members because he is chair of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, where two of those stock trading reform bills have been referred. Oh, and by the way, the Homeland Security Committee chair, Senator Peters,

reports owning stock in Raytheon, not to mention numerous assets in the fossil fuel industry. So a little peek of why it might be floundering in committee. The really wild one to me is Hickenlooper here. Actually, when you start to read these details, listen to the stuff that John Hickenlooper is up to. Okay, five transactions his household made in 2021. Two sales of between 100K and 250K worth of stock

in the Liberty Broadband Corporation by his spouse. A sale of between 100K and 250K by his Liberty Broadband Corporation by his spouse, a sale of between 100K and 250K by his Liberty Broadband in September. So another sale of between 250 and 500 by his wife in November. Why are they so hard up for cash? Why do they own so much stock even in this company in the first place? Do they have any insider knowledge? Now, what are they putting all this money to use? They are purchasing between 15 and 50K in a Denver bar and music lounge. Now, look, I'm just going to submit this. Should you really have, and this is just as bad as the Trump Hotel stuff. Why, when you are a public official who clearly is extraordinarily wealthy to be selling hundreds of thousands of dollars, nearly a million dollars worth of stock even in a single year in just one private stock,

which isn't even the full sum holdings of your entire net worth. Why are you putting money into a Denver bar and music, a place where you live? I mean, that means that any proceeds then from that go directly into your own pocket. I mean, who's dining at this restaurant? It is like the Trump Hotel thing. It's egregious. It's a smaller scale. Right. But yeah, this gives you a direct way for people to line your pockets directly.

They know that they go to this restaurant, they spend a bunch of money, they know where that's going, they know, you know, if they run up a big enough bill that... And here's another one. What if he uses his campaign dollars to have campaign dinners at his own restaurant?

So then now are you funneling campaign dollars into your own pocket? I mean, is anybody actually going to go and track that? Yeah, I think we all know the answer. So this is why you should just ban it in the first place. If you want to serve in Congress, the least you can do is not own supposed to be a public servant. You're not supposed to be there to cash in, or what did Crenshaw say? Better yourself. By which he meant, get fabulously wealthy off of the backs of the people that you're supposed to represent. Just don't do that. And if that's what you want to do, find another line of work. Absolutely. Good morning, everybody. Happy Thursday.

We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal? Indeed we do. A little bit of court TV here today. Court TV! It's fun stuff. So we have two verdicts and two significant trials that we want to bring to you. Number one, Johnny Depp, Amber Heard. That's right. Listen, we've got to give the people what they want. I mean, so I have been, as a matter of principle, opposed to following in depth what is going on here. So basically, Sagar's going to lay this out. I'm going to ask him some questions. We'll explain

to you what the verdict was and what it all means, if it means anything at all. So we'll talk to you about that. There was also another verdict in the trial of a lawyer, Sussman. This is part of the Durham inquiry. And so we've got those details for you as well. He was Hillary Clinton's lawyer. You guys probably remember some of the details of that. We also have the Department of Justice, the very first charges of someone involved with NFTs of insider trading. This is a wild story. It is actually a really wild story and might be indicative of a larger problem, not only within NFTs, but also within the largely unregulated world of crypto. So we will bring you those details. President Biden out with a big op-ed explaining what he

will and won't do in Ukraine, but then sort of immediately going beyond what he says he won't do. Very odd. Yeah, it is odd. So break all of that down for you. But we wanted to start with more stunning revelations in terms of this horrific shooting in Texas, in Uvalde, Texas. The very latest is that law enforcement seems to be turning on each other. Go ahead and put this piece up on the screen. So the breaking news here from ABC News is the Uvalde PD and Uvalde Independent School District Police Force are no longer cooperating with the Texas Department of Public Safety's investigation into Robb Elementary School shooting. Multiple law enforcement sources tell ABC News. I'll read to you a little bit of this ABC News article. They say, according to

sources, the decision to stop cooperating occurred soon after the director of that Department of Public Safety, Colonel Stephen McCraw, held a news conference Friday during which he said the delayed police entry into the classroom was, quote, the wrong decision and contrary to protocol. Their response from the Uvalde Police Department and the school district is that they have been cooperating with investigators. The chief of the Uvalde CISD police provided an initial interview, but has not responded to a request

for a follow-up interview with the Texas Rangers that was made two days ago. Here's another piece. We had mentioned this before. So the guy who was in charge of the response here, his name is Pete Arredondo. He was the head of the school district police department, which was separate and apart from the local PD. He is the one who was saying, no, this is no longer an active shoot.

This is a hostage situation. So we are going to stand outside of the hallway and hang out here for more than an hour. He is the one who also kept even the border patrol who wanted to go in from actually breaching the doors. He's the one who made the call not even to try to go into that classroom as kids are being shot and dying and bleeding out on the floor. Well, it happened that prior to all of this, he'd actually won election to the local Uvalde City Council. And so he was just sworn in to the city council a week after this mass shooting. They understandably and wisely decided not to have a public ceremony to celebrate his being sworn in. I have a feeling that the people of Uvalde might have a different feeling about whether or not they want him to represent them on the city council at this point. And then the last piece of this part of the story, go ahead and put this last tweet up. There are some questions whether it's the entire Uvalde PD and Uvalde CISD police not cooperating. The other indication is that it's actually just this guy who is not Pete Arradondo, who is not cooperating and is not responding to requests for interviews following that press conference where

the head of Texas Public Safety admitted what was blatantly obvious to anyone with a brain and a heart that their response here was the wrong decision and ultimately absolutely atrocious. Yeah, I don't think that there is any just there. Look, here's what's happened, which is that this guy, Pete Arradondo, is 100 percent in hiding. In fact, you know, a CNN reporter was trying to get on the grounds of Uvalde CISD and they called the cops on the reporter saying that you're going to get arrested for criminal trespassing if you continue to try and stake out an interview. They sure are happy to use the cops for everything and anything except like actually saving children's lives when you have the chance. I mean, happy to use the cops to tase parents and handcuff parents. They called in additional law enforcement to provide extra security for these guys and to remove reporters who are trying to ask questions. But when it came down to them actually serving the function that I know people

thought they were paying their salaries to do, can't do that. It's mystifying. I mean, what you're seeing is a complete cover-up by this guy, Pete Arredondo. And look, he's in serious trouble. I mean, there's no question here that he obviously does not deserve to be the chief of the police department. I think the people of Uvalde should have something to say. Look, I mean, it's up to them. They can decide whether he wants to be on the city council.

But by almost every metric, what's happening in this investigation is just maddening. And, you know, some of the emotion is still raw. But the more that we learn about the lies and just the fakery and how many times law enforcement has screwed this up, it's just insane. Throw this next part up on the screen because this just goes in tandem, which is that, you know, the law enforcement has been telling us over and over again, well, the reason that the Uvalde shooter was able to get into the building was because some elementary school teacher propped the back door open. They said this three separate times, and they said that camera actually confirmed that. Well, now they're saying a source familiar with the investigation says that surveillance video and audio now verifies that actually the teacher removed the rock which was holding the door open and closed it. Quote, she slammed it shut.

So now this raises a whole host of questions. Number one, how the hell was that door open? Because the entire thing was that door was supposed to be locked and an auto lock function, according to everybody who was involved. So either the lock was broken, which, you know, if you're into school hardening and all that, that's a big question. How the hell does that happen? Right. But number two, I mean, here's the other thing. I mean, we know that the grandmother of this shooter used to work at the school. So like, did he have a key or something? He obviously was relatively familiar because he went in through the back door. I mean, did he have perhaps some inside knowledge? But this was a far too cute explanation as to, you know, everyone was like, oh, what a tragedy.

This poor teacher, they must feel as if they have blood on their hands. Well, it seems very clear. I mean, she slammed the door shut. So what happened here? And why are they lying to us? The police threw her under the bus. Yeah, they really did. That's what happened.

And so her lawyer said, no, no, no, this is not what happened. She actually called 911. She saw the wreck. This is according to her lawyer. Yeah. She ran back inside to get her phone to report the accident. She came back out while on the phone with 911. The men at the funeral home yelled, he has a gun.

She saw him jump the fence and he had a gun, so she ran back inside. She kicked the rock away when she went back in because what had been happening is because this was a special awards day, she had left a rock in the door to go back and forth to her car to bring food into the school. She kicks the rock away when she goes back in. She remembers pulling the door closed while telling 911 that he was shooting. She thought the door would lock because that door is always supposed to be locked. It's supposed to auto lock. And this is not just the word of her lawyer. As Sagar already said, this is confirmed by audio and video surveillance evidence. This is, in fact, what happened. So one more blatant, glaring lie that was told to the public that is only now being cleared up by like anonymous law enforcement sources after the fact. And it really

is astonishing. Listen, it's no surprise to me that cops lie. That happens routinely. But the level of deception here of every single detail from the time this mass murderer wrecks his truck until the end of this whole engagement. You know, another thing that came out, remember Sagar, the very early reports were that he had been taken out by one lone, courageous Border Patrol officer. And by the way, I give all the credit to Border Patrol, who finally, after 20 minutes of being stymied by local law enforcement. They were like, screw this, we're going in. Forget that. Like, what are you doing? We are going in. But the story that came out was like this one lone, heroic officer goes in by himself and takes him. That wasn't true either. They had a whole phalanx of, you know, officers who went in, in coordinated fashion, as they should. And at that point, they had 20 plus people out in the hallway. So of course, it makes sense that you wouldn't just be

like, all right, you got the short straw, time for you to go in and take care of business. So it's just another example of how everything about this timeline was wrong. They've had to correct it only upon when their lies are found out. Do they change the narrative? It is truly astonishing to the point that we have followed the story very closely and it is impossible to keep track of every version of the story and every lie that they have told us from the beginning. Yeah. I can't even tell people what exactly the actual investigation is going to bear out. I mean, at first they said the most egregious lie is the school resource officer engaged the gunman outside of the school.

Right. He was not even there. He wasn't even there. And by the way, still nobody knows where he was. So, Mr. Officer, where were you? What exactly are you getting paid for? Very interesting. Okay, then we know that he was outside for 12 minutes

and that five minutes, though, after he arrives on the scene, two cops are already there. And so they kind of chase him into the school. They get wounded in the course of this. So, okay, now we know that. Then there is a some 40, 50-minute-odd gap where kids inside are bleeding to death and calling 911 and begging the cops to come inside. And during that entire period, there are at least 19 agents outside in the hallway who are being held up by this gentleman, the incident commander on the scene, who was the Uvalde CISD police chief, Pete Arnando. Well, he has not – now he's not cooperating with law enforcement.

There has also been lies here. They're like, oh, this teacher, this idiot teacher left the door open. Nope, she actually didn't do that. He jumped – so, I mean, there – look, from every step beginning to the end, there are lies, there are major questions, and I honestly don't know, Crystal. I don't know if we're ever going to get an answer. Do you think I don't trust the FBI in order to tell us exactly what happened here or the Justice Department? Because we also know that federal marshals were on the scene arresting this mom, putting her in handcuffs. You think they're not going to cover up their own

complicity? If the feds were on the scene. You know, it just made me so angry because I was watching this video this morning of these Uvalde CISD cops throwing these reporters off, being like, just so you know, Uvalde put these on his way, and they're going to issue, you know, this guy's like GI Joe'd out, and he's got like a, you know, handgun strapped to his leg and all. And I'm just like, you disgust me.

You're sitting here throwing these media guys off a public sidewalk. Pretending like you're some big tough guy. Because you and your boss didn't actually go in. And so these are the same people, the same types of cops actually were probably on the scene at that day. So, I mean, you just compare their response and then the level of lies. And now they're using their own law enforcement resources to try and cover up what was happening here. I mean, somebody's got to stand up for Texas. I keep saying this, like, will Governor Abbott and Ken Paxton, you know, Governor Abbott has only said one thing. Oh, I'm livid. Okay. I don't care if you're livid. You and Ken Paxton

need to get your asses down there and start investigating this. Fire Steve McCraw, you know, Texas Department of Public Safety. Put him on the camera. Be like, hey, what happened here? Honestly, I mean, somebody in that state, to this day, you know, Ted Cruz, John Cornyn, these guys haven't done anything. Can somebody stand up for these people?

Well, Cornyn did do something. He went and carried water for their lives. Yeah, that's right, that's right. I mean, that was, oh, you know, it's a split-second decision. Oh, a split-second decision over an hour and 20 minutes? Right. That's a split-second? Okay.

You know, the sad thing here, too, is in terms of any sort of criminal liability, I don't think there's anything that they can charge them with. No, there is almost nothing that's going to be happening. You know, I mean, the law does not say that they have any sort of duty to do anything to protect these kids in this situation. And so probably the, you know, the most we'll ever get is if there's some sort of investigation, which, you know, we're all pretty doubtful that we'll get really to the bottom of any of this, and that they lose their jobs. That's the most that might happen out of this. But it just continues to shock me, the level of cowardice, the level of deception, the cover-ups, and now, you know, the main character here, and, you know, I'm sure he's not the only one to blame, but he seems like a pretty key figure in what went wrong on that day, that he now is hiding from the inquiry and refusing interviews and just trying to continue

to deceive people. So I'm seeing here he was actually ambushed kind of this morning by CNN cameras. Oh, yeah. I don't see anything that he actually said. He was confronted by CNN, but nobody's pulling out any quotes. Obviously, this is breaking, like, literally right now. Yeah. There doesn't seem to be any noteworthy poll quotes exactly.

He probably said something along the lines of, yeah, he's declining to answer any questions in his first public comments after he was finally confronted out of the back entrance there by a CNN reporter. Props out to that guy, Shimon, I think is- Shimon Peraz. Yeah, Shimon Prokupes. I think that's his name. Oh, okay. He's been- He's done a very good job. I want to give praise to the individual. He's the one who also pressed them in that press conference where the head of Texas Public Safety admitted that it was the wrong decision. He was also the one that pressed them on what measures were taken to try to get in that door, which forced him to admit nothing. Yeah. We did nothing. So I will say there's one poll quote. He does say he's actually in touch here with the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Well, I seem to have another story about that. What I'm guessing is that when he says that, he probably has a ton of lawyers and that they are speaking on his behalf and declining probably to answer any question. This guy really should be able to be sued. I don't understand how qualified immunity works for CISD cops, but listen, I mean, if there was ever a case for criminal negligence or for involuntary manslaughter, at least in the case of like how OJ Simpson got sued. I mean, these parents, they deserve something. They truly do. This is not right. Indeed. Indeed. All right. There are also big developments with regards to Russia's war on Ukraine. President Biden wrote an op-ed in New York Times. He's been writing a lot of op-eds recently. Let's go ahead and put this up on the screen. And Sagar, I want to read a little bit

of this and then I want to get your reaction to it. So his whole thing here, the headline is, President Biden, what America will and will not do in Ukraine. He says, as the war goes on, I want to be clear about the aims of the U.S. in these efforts. America's goal is straightforward. We want to see a democratic, independent, sovereign, and prosperous Ukraine with the means to deter and defend itself against further aggression. Towards those ends, he says, we'll continue cooperating with our allies and partners on Russian sanctions. Toughest ever imposed on a major economy, we will continue providing Ukraine with advanced weaponry. Keep that thought in mind for a moment. We also continue reinforcing NATO's eastern flank with forces and capabilities from the U.S. and other allies. But then he goes, so that's the portion of the like, what we will do in Ukraine. This is the what we

will not do portion of the op-ed. He says, we do not seek a war between NATO and Russia. As much as I disagree with Mr. Putin and find his actions an outrage, the United States will not try to bring about his ouster in Moscow. A little bit different than some things we've heard from the administration in the past. So long as the United States or our allies are not attacked, we will not be directly engaged in this conflict either by sending American troops to fight in Ukraine or by attacking Russian forces. We are not encouraging or enabling Ukraine to strike beyond its borders. We do not want to prolong the war just to inflict pain on Russia. Again, that goes diametrically against what people like Ron Klain and others in the administration,

and even President Biden himself, have said. He then goes on to say, My principle throughout this crisis has been, quote, nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine. Okay. I will not pressure the Ukrainian government in private or public to make any territorial concessions. It would be wrong and contrary to well-settled principles to do so. There's another part about nuclear weapons I want to get to in a moment.

But first of all, what's your reaction to that portion? Yeah, my reaction is that this is a very nice condensed view, which is just certainly not in line with the rhetoric and many of the actions of the Biden administration. And actually, that is why I find it so confusing, because on the very same day that the op-ed comes out, you're going to be talking about some of this in your monologue. There is a leaked story, both in the NBC News first and then in the Washington Post, about Biden's frustration with his aides for, quote, cleaning up his comments. And actually, one of the things he got most pissed off at his staff about was when they cleaned up his statement saying, by God, this man cannot remain in power, right? That is directly incongruous with that statement here. We do not seek his ouster in Moscow, as much as I may disagree. So he has a direct diametric view in what he said, which we know

from the words of the president, and now the vetted, edited words of the president here in the op-ed. So which is it? What is the policy of the United States? Now, I defer, as always, both under Trump and Biden, that the words of the president are policy. The president of the United States is a democratically elected leader of this country. And so, unfortunately, I think in this case, President Biden has made his preference very clear. Also, there's no indication, actually, that he is pressuring Ukraine in any way in order to seek a peace deal. Now, look. Well, and actually, I mean, part of what he says here basically indicates that. I mean, when he says that I will not pressure the Ukrainian government to make any territorial concessions, it would be wrong and contrary to well-settled principles to

do so. That sounds like a very nice principle to hold to, but what it actually means is that you are not pushing for peace. That puts you on the opposite side of, say, France and Germany. So it's basically the US and the UK. And remember, there was a report from Ukrainian Pravda that when Boris Johnson, prime minister of the UK, went to Kiev, he went specifically to deliver the message that even if you want to negotiate, we are not ready for this war to end. What we want is for you to continue to bleed Russia, to continue to weaken Putin. And that is ultimately our goal in the conflict. That is consistent with leaks that came out of the administration of senior level officials who

said they basically see that as the only end game in sight that goes directly against. I mean, that's consistent with what Biden himself has said now multiple times about he can't remain in power, consistent with what Ron Klain says. We don't want to give Putin an off ramp. So even in the niceties of this op ed, it's made very clear that on the one hand, they say, OK, we don't want a war between NATO and Russia. They continue walking up to the edge of actually being in direct conflict with Russia, by the way, and we'll get to that in a minute. But then they also say we don't actually want to negotiate an end to this. I think there's a way to square it, too, by saying you support Ukraine.

By the way, I do think it's up to the Ukrainians. You know, like they get to decide. It's up to them. They can fight if they want to. If not, whatever territorial concessions, it's literally on them. If they want to fight until the bitter end, you know, that's on you. But what I think what's important that the French and the German are doing, or French and Germany are doing, is they're not pressuring Ukraine, Crystal. They're calling Putin. You know, they're calling Putin and trying to open up the space for Putin actually to come to the table.

I think Biden should get on the phone. Even better, honestly, go meet in a neutral country, whatever, Helsinki, Iceland, wherever those places. I think Reykjavik was technically halfway, and that's where they met during the Cold War. Get everybody together. I'm sure Putin would go at this point. And I do not believe for a second that that would not help the situation. Now everyone's saying, oh, you would benefit Putin. What do you mean? His military is on the rocks. Yeah. Now everyone's saying, oh, you would benefit, you know, Putin and all. What do you mean?

His military is on the rocks. His economy is on the brink. Like, obviously, you know, in terms of the reports that we look at, he's not doing so well from a health perspective. That actually possibly could open up the ground. And maybe you can shake something out and be like, okay, listen, if you withdraw all the way back to the Crimea, then X amount of sanctions don't get taken off, and, you know, X amount of Russian oil can actually continue to be bought. Maybe the German pipeline

doesn't go through, you know, things like that. This is reality. This is what things are looking like. So if we pressured and talked to Russia, that's probably the best way in order to get this done. But that hasn't happened. You know, the United States and Russia have not even had that level of high level communication. I think at the highest level, it's only our defense chiefs talking, which I don't support that. I want the diplomats on the phone. I want the presidents on the phone. Yeah, that's right. Even what you said, though, about we should leave it up to the Ukrainians is a little bit complicated

because the only reason they're in this fight is because of our weaponry. So we shouldn't pretend like we don't have direct interest in what happens here and how long this goes on. The administration has calculated, and it's clear from their words and also from their actions and the advanced weaponry that they continue to escalate and the support they continue to provide, escalating support in terms of intelligence capabilities. It's very clear they have calculated what they think is in the U.S.'s best interest is for this war to continue indefinitely and to sort of bleed Putin dry and hope that he is, you know, somehow loses power, loses his grip on power. Now, first of all, it is not at all a given that whatever would come after Putin would be better than Putin. So keep that in mind. I just fundamentally disagree that that's what is in the U.S.'s best interest. I think what is in the best interest of the U.S. and the world is avoiding the risk of a direct nuclear confrontation. The sooner this war can come

to an end, the sooner we take that risk off the table. And that is why I would go further than what you say in terms of, ah, we'll just let the Ukrainians decide, because we already are so involved and enmeshed in this thing that it's not like we can, I mean, you could take a hands-off approach and say we're not sending anything, but that effectively is, you know, taking the side of we're going to cause this war to end. So we can't really pretend like we're in a position at this point to not have any influence or sway with what the Ukrainians do and what they're able to do. And this is why my position was also against some of the aid package. I don't think we should be providing them a lot of offensive weaponry. And that's actually kind of where, you know, I want them to be able to defend themselves.

And again, look, I don't think you can say that the Ukrainian cause isn't just, you know. Of course, 100%. But this is where I start to get concerned. Let's put this up there on the screen, which is that the Ukrainians have been begging us for these HIMAR rocket systems, these high mobility artillery rocket systems. Now, there are two types, apparently, within the stock of the U.S. military, both the 70 kilometer version and the 300 kilometer version. They were asking us for the 300 kilometer version.

Now, we're giving them the 70, given that we have now gotten, according to them, verbal assurances that they will not be used by Ukraine against targets in Russia, which Russian official Dmitry Medvedev had actually spoken apparently to Biden and made some nuclear sable rattling threats. Where I get concerned is when, why are the Ukrainians asking us for these 300 kilometer weapons if their intent is not to strike into Russia? And the fact that we kind of have to bargain with them and be like, no, guys, we're only going to give you this one, which you can use to defend yourself in the Donbass. I think that's great. I think defending yourself in a war for your territory, but enabling them to strike targets inside of Russia, and we talked about this in our last show, which is if you're the Russians, you're not stupid.

You're like, hey, they can't strike with U.S. weapons inside Russia, so we'll fire from Russia. We're at war with Ukraine. We can just do that. But the diplomatic fallout and the consequences of such actions, especially if Ukraine uses U.S.-provided weapon systems to do so, not just that. Remember, we're in the NATO alliance. Germany is actually giving them a longer range rocket system. The UK also is in possession of this type of technology. So what I'm talking about here is whenever we enable them to offensively strike, and I would

define that not only in terms of a Ukrainian offensive, but also to up the ante in terms of the strategic situation, that's where I'm completely against it. And that's also why the Biden administration decision here, maybe it sounds wise, you know, only giving them 70 kilometers. But again, you know, this is where I get very concerned is the Ukrainians are very cavalier and saying, no, we need a no-fly zone. Remember, they campaigned here in Israel. You know, Zelensky went and pissed off the entire country of Israel by comparing it to the Holocaust. He's been all over the West begging for a no-fly zone. Now he knows he's not going to get that.

And it seems that the next phase of the asking us for weapons is give us these fighter planes, you know, which we would be able to, you know, possibly in order to strike into Russia. Give it these systems which would be able to strike into Russia. And that's where we need to draw a much clearer red line. You know, I mean, we really do need, I think the president should publicly say to Ukraine, we will never give you anything that will be able to strike into Russia. And unfortunately, we're negotiating this all in some back room because it's appearing as some slight, and you have warmongers here in Washington who think that, you know, the way to bolster Ukrainian defense is to give them stuff which they can use in an

offensive way. Right. That is what I'm stuff which they can use in an offensive way. Right. That is what I'm completely against. Completely. Yeah. Agree. Completely against that. And we've also, because this $40 billion aid package was passed so casually, so quickly, with so little public debate, and now with no oversight.

Right. You're just basically trusting the good judgment of Joe Biden. Yes, that's written into law. I think people should really understand that. It's written in the package saying the president has the sole discretionary authority to decide what goes over to Ukraine. So he's, you know, making these trade-offs like, well, I won't give you the super long range. I'll give you like the medium range ones. Okay. And just so you know how significant this is, this is from that article about this weapon system. They say that this is an extraordinarily advanced modern weapon system, much more advanced than anything the Ukrainians or the Russians can currently put on the battlefield.

They describe it as vehicle-mounted launchers that can fire volleys of six guided rockets at a time that land within several feet of their intended target and accuracy unmatched in the artillery duels taking place across the Donbass in eastern Ukraine. The vehicle carrying the launchers can also travel at more than 50 miles per hour. Let's move on to this next one. Tone shift, because this is just a completely nut story and just, I think, an indication of a general vibe shift. I'm going to be talking about the vibe shift a lot in this show. Let's start here. NFTs, Web3, so much of the discourse, YouTube, even our audience we can see in our research. There's a lot of Googling going on for what's happening here.

Well, I can't tell you everything about it. I've done some dabbling. I do not own NFTs. But let's put this up there. Not true. We do own the CNN Plus. Oh, that's right. We still own the CNN NFT. So we should disclose our conflict of interest here. Breaking Points Incorporated owns an NFT. I personally do not own an NFT. We all collectively own the best NFT in the world. Okay. Go ahead. Let's throw this up

there on the screen, which is that now the Department of Justice, and the first of its kind, has charging a former employee of an NFT marketplace charged in the first ever digital asset insider trading scheme. This is extraordinary. Number one, it's in the Southern District of New York, which is one of the hallmarks of the financial crimes within the Department of Justice. Obviously, they represent Manhattan, or they cover the area of Manhattan. Now, the person who was charged here, Nathaniel Chastain, he is not just a former product manager at OpenSea, he is the former head of product. Now, for those who are kind of familiar, OpenSea was the largest NFT marketplace. You can think of it

almost like an eBay or a StockX or something of a collectibles database in order to exchange and to buy NFTs. Now, there was some problems with OpenSea now for a while. There were some NFTs that were stolen, certain other things. But these guys were making absolutely millions of dollars in terms of the board apes and the other NFTs that were exchanging on the platform. Now, Chastain was actually arrested yesterday in New York City and was charged here with insider trading, with wire fraud, and a host of other financial crimes. Let's throw actually this Vice News piece, did a decent job of writing all of this up, which is that Nathan Chastain, who was the former, again, head of product, used insider knowledge to trade NFTs for a profit. And what they point to is that Chastain used his insider knowledge to purchase NFTs from collections that were about to be featured on the marketplace's

homepage for personal financial gain. I mean, that's the easiest thing to consider in the world. You are the head of product. You know which NFTs are about to be on the homepage. You know that you run the largest marketplace. So you buy said NFT or you have a stake in said NFT. And then you put it on the homepage and you watch it skyrocket in value. And because you control when it goes on the marketplace or not, you have a tremendous advantage over the average person who is participating here. This is like, again, if the idea, look, this is why we have regulated stock exchanges. And look, as many problems as we have on the NASDAQ, on the New York

Stock Exchange, you cannot get away with some, this is 1910s era stuff. Well, that's actually a very good point. And what they say here is that his NFTs, he would sell them then for two to five times his initial investment. So his whole game was, I'm going to put this thing on the homepage tomorrow. I'm going to buy it today. Once I feature it, I know the price is going to go up and then I'm going to sell and I'm going to rake it in. And he sought to hide his activity with anonymous crypto wallets and accounts, the DOJ also says. So look, we'll wait for all the details to come out. But this is extraordinarily damning. And it also is consistent. There's, I mean, there is just a lot of fraud and, you know, con artists within the NFT world, especially also within the crypto world. Wall Street Journal did

analysis that suggested that there was also significant insider trading within the crypto world. They did this report that found over six days last August, one crypto wallet amassed a stake of $360,000 worth of, how do you say this, Sagar? G-N-O-S-I-S. Gnosis coins? Yeah, that's Gnosis. A token tied to an effort to build blockchain-based prediction markets. On the seventh day, Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by volume, said in a blog post it would list Gnosis, allowing it to be traded among its users. That, of course, adds legitimacy and liquidity to the token and provides a boost to the trading price.

The price rises sharply from around $300 to $410 within an hour. Then whatever, whoever owns this anonymous wallet sells and makes massive profit. And this is just one example. They found that this routinely happened where you had these extremely well-timed acquisitions and sales that, you know, if you were in a position to know what Binance is going to do, you could certainly be in a position to profit off of it ultimately being listed there. So then this, of course, goes along with the pump and dump schemes that we have seen routinely. You see Madison Cawthorn promoting the Let's Go Brandon coin, and then they're able to profit, and then the whole thing

falls apart. They know that it's about to be picked up as a, or listed as a sponsor for this NASCAR driver. So they pump the thing, they get a bunch of people in, and then they're able to sell before the bottom falls out. So this is just, I mean, you know, the thing that makes me really mad about it is because there are a lot of just ordinary people. Yeah, that's why it pisses me off as well. Who believe in the vision, who have been probably screwed in their financial life a million other ways, think maybe this is the thing that's going to get me ahead, that's going to get me in the game, that's going to get me able to have a little bit of money in my savings account. They get suckered into this with a bunch of lies and promises, and then they just get screwed over.

And it's disgusting. It does very much harken back to the days actually building up to the Great Depression. You had, for the first time, Americans en masse dabbling in the stock market and being sold this bill of goods, very similar. You can't lose. It only goes up and you can buy. There's this amazing thing where you can buy on margin

and like, so you can afford to get in here in a big way. Why wouldn't you do that? You're just leaving free money on the table. That was the rhetoric at the time. And so you had all these retail investors who, you know, prior to that, it had been a very elite game to be involved in the stock market at all. You have them flooding into the zone. And then that's part of, you know, the sort of irrational exuberance of the stock market

that ultimately leads to this is one contributing factor, not the only one, but one contributing factor to this massive crash where people just got absolutely crushed. Yeah, I feel very, very bad for the retail investors. And there are a lot of people, I hear it from normal people all the time. They're like, oh, do you know about SafeMoon? And I'm like, yo, listen, you should really be careful whenever you try and dabble in this stuff. And I've been burned many times, just so people know out there as well. I think what has always been, I think for me, for a lot of people who are on the internet, it's exciting. It feels like you're on the verge of something new.

But I've always known, just given my own knowledge of history and more, that there was a tremendous amount of obviously criminal behavior going on. And I actually think that the worst thing that happened to these people is that they started getting filthy rich. Because that is when the feds are going to start to get involved. And when you have anonymous crypto accounts and more that are worth billions of dollars or hundreds of millions, they're going to come after you. Yeah, but the feds should be involved. Oh, no, I agree with you. They should be involved. No, no, no. I support that, because you shouldn't be allowed to get away with this. And the whole point of having a federal backstop is in guaranteeing integrity of markets. And so that is very lacking, especially in the DeFi, decentralized financial space and more. When you have these stable coins that go to fluctuate down to like 50%,

even though the whole reason you're supposed to invest them is that they're pegged to the US dollar. And there's some protocol which they tell you works, but apparently it doesn't work. The reason why I think that this matters too is there was a dream, I think, that this represented some sort of new financial frontier. But I think the reality that we're beginning to grapple with now that NFT crash has come and gone, let's all be honest, right? Massive crash within the space, Ethereum, Bitcoin, everything is dramatically down just like the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones, is that a lot of these assets, while yes, I believe that they represent a technological change and breakthrough in the ability to have blockchain transactions, which cannot be questioned,

which you could zip to each other, especially on lightning networks and other things, that fundamentally, especially just right now in the United States, like we do need to have the ability to have integrity within the market. Otherwise, normal folks get burned. And especially, this is the other thing I always think about with these guys like Nathan Chastain and others. The amount of documentation that you have to submit to any U.S. financial institution, do you really think you're smart enough to get away with this? They've been burning, what was it, Ross Ulbricht, who did the drug marketplace, I forget what it's called. God, Silk Road, Silk Road. They busted it back in 2013. They were able to bust a Bitcoin wallet. You think they're not going to get you? If you'd sign up for Coinbase or any of these other things, you have to submit your license,

you have to take a selfie and all this stuff. It's just, you're not smarter than the feds. And once you start making millions of dollars like this, like they're going to come after you. And they should, honestly. Yeah, I think it's actually encouraging that they're going after this guy that they're, because there were some questions about like, okay, do we have, do our insider trading laws,

are they going to apply to these new financial sectors? And clearly Southern District of New York is making a very clear stand here that yes, just because it's crypto or NFT is the same laws and rules apply here. Um, Southern District of New York is making a very clear stand here that yes, um, just because it's crypto or NFTs, the same laws and rules apply here. And, and guys, you want them to, um, listen, Lord knows we have our problems with the federal government here, but the biggest problem, if you, if you put crypto and NFTs to the side and you think about our financial markets, like the biggest problems there came from

deregulation. When you had, you know, after the Great Depression, you have this, you know, instituting new rules to make the marketplaces boring. Basically to make the banking system really boring and keep the most speculative parts of it sort of sequestered off from just the normal banking. And that actually was pretty successful. I mean, it had its flaws, that actually was pretty successful. I mean, it had its flaws, but it was pretty successful. It's when we start to deregulate and we make it just this wild casino that anyone can do anything, that's when you end up with the massive crash that we see in 2008 and other crashes before that as well. So you want there to be regulation. You want the feds involved in making sure that there isn't just endemic fraud and scams and insider trading. Because if it's a Wild West kind of a

situation, if it is like a frontier town Wild West kind of situation, well, guess who's going to win and who's going to profit there? It's going to be the people with, you know, who are the most ruthless, who have the least scruples, who are the most immoral, and who are the craftiest fraudsters, not the ones who are creating the most, you know, innovative product that is going to transform the financial system. Yeah, I got to say, I remember being approached about an NFT before we launched, and I just remember thinking, yeah, you know, that's just not it. I'm glad I was right. Camp Shane, one of America's longest-running weight loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. But there were some dark truths behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children.

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