Judging Freedom - GOP Path Forward w_ Rep Andy Biggs at 11_30a est

Episode Date: January 10, 2023

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Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. With courses available online 24-7 and monthly start dates, WGU offers maximum flexibility so you can focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, January 10th, 2023. It's about 1130 in the morning here on the east coast of the United States. My guest today is now a household name, Congressman Andy Biggs of Arizona.

Congressman Biggs, as you may recall, led the rebellion in the House of Representatives. I hope I'm not using a word that's too strong, Congressman, in order either to prevent the speakership of Kevin McCarthy or to shape it in a way that it would lean far more toward limited government, maximum individual liberty, balanced budgets, no war of opportunity. The small government that James Madison gave us rather than the monstrosity we have today. Congressman Biggs, always a pleasure, my dear friend. Welcome back to the show. Thank you, Judge. Good to be with you. What was accomplished by the behavior of your courageous gaggle of rebels last week? Well, I would say that there's a couple of levels to look at that, and one would be an effective level. You know, what did it say to the American people? And I think that effectively it said that there are people here fighting for them.

So that's important. The other the other stuff is actually more meaty and we can get into that. But the idea was to at least shape the rules of this place is so that you actually and I hate to use the word democratize, I just would rather say decentralized power away from the center of the cartel and get it spreaded out so that members could actually represent their constituents. Then you'd also have specific policy items, legislation that we really wanted to see promulgated, that they would get a hearing. Some of those are important coming forward. And then also to message to our colleagues that they can join with us as well. And I think that's important because so many of them got so, you know, this became an emotional thing rather than a logical, rational thing. But I think in the end, they like the rules changes themselves. They all recognize it.

I mean, I talked to some people that are on what I would call the opposite spectrum of this conference than where I am. And they said, look, you know, we love the rules. But they were upset. They were more upset with the process to get there. spectrum of this conference than where I am. And they said, look, you know, we love the rules. But they were upset. They were more upset with the process to get there. But it was a necessary process. Otherwise, those rules don't never come about, Judge. You know, and you know this as well or better than I, when Madison and his colleagues crafted the House of Representatives, it was the people's house, and debate was expected, and they weren't intended to be limited by the political whims and needs of one person in power. I mean, does the House of Representatives engage in serious debate, or is it just a question of whipping the votes and how many of the Republicans

can keep in line versus how many of the Democrats can keep in line? What you saw last week was the most robust debates I've seen since I've been here. Most of the time, you know, you don't have an amendment process, right? So if you don't have an amendment process, then the debate process is just a sham. So I've seen it where they've said, okay, 30 minutes for each side. There's 435 of you and each side has 30 minutes to debate? Yes. And that might be for a bill that spends a hundred or one that spends 1.5 trillion dollars and so so you know you want to get down there and there's and there's 50 people on on our side that want to decry it and so so you really you know they don't even have time for everybody part of what would

happen judges if you had an open amendment process there would be self-selection on the priority of legislation that would go forward. They would just simply say, yeah, I think this is kind of an important thing, but there's just no way to get there. And if you couple an open debate process with a single subject, a robust single subject, I think the single subject that came out is not where it needs to be as far as to make it really enforceable. But nonetheless, the intent is there. You're moving there. But if you had a robust, single subject, germane rule, those two rules right there, and the open rule process, what would happen is you would prevent massive omnibus bills, and you would actually start narrowing down the focus of Congress. And by narrowing the focus of Congress, you would actually probably shrink the size and

scope of the federal government, I would hope, and restore us to a more what we would call a federalist system. All right. You mentioned the omnibus bill. You're speaking of this massive, massive monstrosity. I'm being redundant. It was both massive and a monstrosity that Congress passed shortly before Christmas, was 4,100 pages long. It borrowed and spent $1.65 trillion. No human being in either House of Congress read it from end to end. Ron Paul told me you weren't in the Congress at the time. When the Patriot Act was proposed, the House of Representatives was given 15 minutes to read it. I've read it three times. It takes 10 or 12 hours to read because there's

so many other statutes that are amended. Are we still going to have nonsense like that, where leadership just drops a monstrosity on you and says, you got to vote for it? It's too important to take the time to read and understand. Yeah, I am praying not. I mean, that was one of the goals here. I mean, but even, Judge, even a 72-hour rule is not enough time for a 4000 page complex bill that refers literally thousands and thousands of times to additional statutes that you have to get to and find out what that statute does. though, is such an incredible benefit compared to where we were. The old way it was structured under Pelosi, and actually some of the other people, has been basically 24 hours and two minutes because the way they had it set up, the language of the rule. But what was so weird about that is then they'd go ahead and waive it. They would waive the rule and stop amendments and

close the amendment process and and that's where you get nancy pelosi and the obamacare saying well you need to you need to vote for the bill in order to understand what's in the bill and to this day i truly believe not everybody even understands what's in the obamacare uh legislation from what, 12 years ago. Correct. So we hope to stop it. We hope to put an end to that. In the Trump years, I think, behind the president's back, because he was victimized by this, the FBI has become a domestic surveillance agency.

It's more interested in predicting crime by spying on Americans than it is in fighting crime. The Drug Enforcement Administration is the same. This has only gotten worse under Joe Biden. I don't think it's a Republican problem or a Democrat problem. I think it's a cultural problem that started with the Patriot Act and a generation of federal agents coming of age with the culture of spy first and worry about the Fourth Amendment later. Is the House, now controlled by the Republicans, going to investigate the insidious politicization of the intelligence community that occurred behind Trump's back and under Biden's nose. Yes, that's one of the things we were pushing for as well. And we've been told yes. Look, I mean, one of the things, if I were to scan, move my camera, you would see I just pulled up a box of one area of what was going on in 2019. And Judge, you're exactly right. In the judiciary hearing, for instance, under the Democrats, we had a hearing almost every three

weeks on the Russian hoax thing, which originated, quite frankly, because the FBI got a tip from some miscreant who was working for a party. So it's the politicization, as you said. We've been told, and Jim Jordan, who's going to be the chair of the Judiciary Committee, and now there's going to be an independent committee to look at the weaponization as well. We've been told that there's going to be adequate resources, there's going to be, I think it's just an enormous number of investigators to go in and look at this closely. Judge, I think you probably remember this, the last portion of reauthorization in the FISA Act, which is, I want to say it was Section 702, which I think was five years ago, about two weeks after that got reauthorized, which I voted against, all of a sudden the Inspector General comes out with this truckload of abuses under that section of the FISA. Which he sat on and knew about before you guys, you voted against, but before the Congress reauthorized, it might not have reauthorized or

at least would have investigated before it did so, had he revealed in a timely manner what he knew. Yeah. And the point is, this has been going on. There's information out there to get. We need to get all that information and we need to start pulling back. And I think the Patriot Act, the FISA Act, it needs to go away. Absolutely. I mean, FISA is the brainchild of the Church Committee. The Church Committee came about because of the unconstitutional use of the FBI and the CIA by Richard Nixon. Pfizer has made it worse. It's a remedy worse than the disease. Nixon in his wildest imaginings couldn't have thought about what Pfizer has authorized. I hope that this bipartisan committee will get rid of FISA,

get rid of the FISA court, tame the FBI, maybe even get rid of it and let the states investigate crimes, which is what Madison intended. Are my wishes fanciful? Yes and no. I think we're going to... I love you, Congressman. Well, here's the deal. There are people like me who have said, and I've got the heck beat out of me for saying this, that you have to, at bare minimum, reduce the size of the FBI. And there might be one or two things that you need some federal, and I'm not even sure I buy into this, but some federal backup for the states. But the states are intended to be able to enforce and investigate their laws.

We have too many federal laws, too many federal criminal laws and that gives a res on debt for the the fbi etc so i think we've just outgrown it all together and so i say yes and no you're you're it's a fanciful wish because you have people who would like to do something but at the same time there'll be no incentive because in that $1.7 trillion monstrosity, they just committed to give more money to the FBI, build a new headquarters, and give raises to that same group. Well, you actually take away some of the incentive for them to even cooperate with our investigation. They can just say, we're going to blow it out your ear. We'll outweigh you for two years and, and see if, if there's a political change here. That, that is what I find so reprehensible about what those senators did by passing that bill and foisting it on us over here,

because you stop the, any kind of potential constraints on the growth in federal government once again. All right. Last series of questions. Is there a realistic expectation that with the Republican control of the House, the government will stop spending billions in Ukraine? No. No. And I say that with some qualification. As you know, I voted no on this stuff because I don't think that's a national security interest for the U.S., number one.

Number two, the case wasn't made. Number three, I don't think there's ever authority given to do that under the Constitution. Correct. Agreed. Agreed, agreed, agreed. But at the same time, I'm listening to this administration is going to continue to fight a proxy war, because it is a proxy war. They're going to continue to rally the Democrats to support that proxy war. And there's enough war hawks in the United States Congress of both parties to say yes. I mean, the language that Lindsey Graham is putting out there indicates pretty clearly that he wants to, they want U.S. tanks to be on the ground in Ukraine. There's

already, my understanding is already NATO tanks on the ground in Ukraine. I mean, it's just a constant escalation. As we were coming on air, Congressman Biggs, the White House announced that the Pentagon is going to bring Ukrainian troops to the U.S. to train them here how to use equipment so that when they get back to Ukraine, particularly the Patriot missile system, which, as you know from our conversations with our great colleague and mutual friend Colonel Douglas McGregor, takes about 100 human beings to operate one Patriot missile system. They're going to bring them here, federal government expense, house them here, train them here, send them back to Ukraine. You're exactly right. This is a proxy war. I fear that the new Speaker of the House, notwithstanding

the concessions you guys got from him, is in favor of all of this. Am I right? He seems to be. He seems to be a supporter of the Ukraine intervention. And I'll be honest with you, Judge, I would view that probably at least probably a significant plurality, if not a slight majority of my conference is in that same posture. You're speaking of Republicans in the House? Yes. Yes. Well, thank God for the Liberty Caucus. Thank God that at least these debates are out there. And the concept of limited government, which has been dead in America since the Woodrow Wilson years, at least can be debated and discussed and used as an instrument of challenge on the floor of the House. I'll let you go. I think you said you guys are off next week. You all need a good

night's sleep. Congressman Andy Biggs, you are off next week. You all need a good night's sleep. Congressman Andy Biggs, you're always welcome here. It's always a pleasure. Thank you, my dear friend. Hey, thanks, Judge. Appreciate it. Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Resolve to earn your degree in the new year in the Bay with WGU. We'll see you next time. you think by demonstrating mastery of the material you know. Make 2025 the year you focus on your future. Learn more at wgu.edu.