Judging Freedom - Scott Ritter: The DoJ and Me.

Episode Date: August 12, 2024

Scott Ritter: The DoJ and Me.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Monday, August 12th, 2024. Scott Ritter joins us now. Scott, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thanking for taking the time to chat with us. I have many questions to ask you about the latest in Israel and many questions to ask you about the latest in Ukraine and Russia. But before I do, you had an encounter with the FBI in your home last week. Can you tell us about it? Well, I mean, it's more than an encounter.

The FBI executed a search warrant on my home. We lost count at 30, but we think there might have been close to 40 FBI special agents and auxiliary personnel who paid my home a visit. Did they tell you they were coming or did they just show up? I just showed up. Two FBI agents showed up at my door, knocked on it. I went outside and they said they wanted to talk to me. I said, about what? And they said, we have a lot of questions and concerns about your online activity. And I said, really really uh like what and they said well it relates to the foreign agent registration act i said huh um you want to talk about i'm not letting you in my house you know but we can sit out here and talk if you want to uh they said well actually we're coming

in your house and they showed me the search warrant and then suddenly the whole area swarms and they brought out a SWAT team in full tactical gear. And, you know, they're like, we got to clear your house. And I said, guys, I got four dogs behind the door that are worried. And you're not opening this door and going in with a SWAT team because you're not shooting my dogs. And so what's going to happen is put a gun against my head, but I'm going in that house and I'm moving my damn dogs out to the backyard. Then you can do whatever you want. I don't care. And so they were cool. I mean, look, I have to get to the FBI guys. They they're very calm, very professional, very courteous the entire time.

Clearly executing orders that they've been given. And they you know, the search warrant allowed them to come in and seize my electronic devices. I mean, it's very specific about what they can and can't do. You know, so they could seize electronic devices, cell phones, computer storage, electronic, you know, things of that nature. Clearly, they stole they stole everything i mean i'm calling them out right now you guys know what you took they took uh they took gifts they were given to me of a non-electronic nature they took documents beyond the ones that they ended up they took my entire wmd archive you know when i was a weapons inspector in iraq the receipts that allowed me to

stare down the united states and all the other liars who were trying to go to war on Iraq based upon their lies about WMDs. You know, it wasn't just my word that helped me prevail. It was the fact that I had done the job for seven years and I had seven years worth of receipts. None of it's classified. All of it is considered sensitive by the United States, but none of it's classified. You can't give classified information to the United Nations. But they found that down in my basement and they seized that whole thing. 24 boxes, 80,000 pages. And they said, you got to give it back, guys.

You can't have this. And they said, well, we have to review it. I said, OK, but you have to give it back. It's not classified. So they took that. But then they took other things. They took documents out of my dresser. Not my dresser, but my cabinet here. They took documents out of my dresser, not my dresser, but my cabinet here.

They took documents out of my desk. And like I said, they took gifts, things that weren't electronic in nature. I don't know what they think they're doing. I mean, just be honest and put it on the damn receipt, but the receipt doesn't show any of the stuff that's missing. So it's some sort of stupid game they're playing here, but it is what it is. They indicated

it was about Foreign Agent Registration Act, and two FBI agents spent five hours questioning me. And I never asked for a lawyer because I haven't committed a crime. I told them. I said, just tell me what you're looking for. You don't have to do this. Tell me what you're looking for, and I'll take you to it. You know, tell me what you you're looking for and I'll take you to it. You know, tell me what you want to know and I'll let you know. I got nothing to hide here. But they're concerned. It came down to they're concerned about my relationship with the Russian government and that somehow I'm taking direction from the Russian government. They're telling me what to do, what to say. There's some sort of, you you know but the other thing is based upon the

folders that they had this thick where they had all of my emails all of my texts all of my communications i said you guys know everything i mean everything that's going on did they have a search warrant to surveil you that preceded this uh raid on house? They didn't tell me that. They just showed me the texts that they had printed out. You know, clearly, they admitted that they'd been monitoring me for years. I said, how long has this been going on? They said, well, we've been looking at you for years.

I said, okay, I sort of suspected that. I don't care. I have nothing to hide. And, you know, they, but so what clearly is the problem is that there's a pattern of behavior on my part. Going to Russia apparently is not allowed. Meeting with the Russian ambassador is not allowed. It is, of course, there's nothing illegal about it, but under their book, it's not allowed. In writing articles critical of the United States policy on Russia is not allowed.

And when you put all three of those together in their minds or in the minds of the Department of Justice or somebody who complained to the Department of Justice, they're saying, well, you're an agent of Russia. And I said, well, what is a specific example? Show me one thing that you say, this is how we know. They couldn't do it. So it's, in my opinion, and people agree with me, that they're looking for covert communications, that they seize my electronics because they

believe embedded in my electronics are some sort of covert communications capability that was outside what they did. Or they took advantage of being in my home and planted bugs throughout the house. We don't know. We don't care because I've done nothing wrong. I mean, it's a pain in the neck to my family. I mean, it's disconcerting to my wife to have FBI agents show up at her work and start asking her questions. It's disconcerting to my friends who have FBI agents showing up and asking them questions.

It's disconcerting to my colleagues who have FBI agents. The whole idea, it's a smear campaign. Basically, they're creating the impression that I somehow work for the Russian government, and therefore what I write and what I say can't be trusted. And I respectfully told them that they're wrong, and I hope they can clarify this. What we do strongly believe is, first of all, I know they don't have any evidence of me working with the Russian government because I never have worked with or for or on behalf of the Russian government. So they can't have any evidence of that. But we know that the U.S. government can convict on circumstantial evidence. But what's clear is

this, and this is what I've told everybody who are telling me to be afraid, be very afraid. I'm not. I'll tell you why. If they had a cognizable case against me, meaning they had enough circumstantial evidence that they could go to a grand jury and get that ham sandwich indicted, they would have done that. And so when they showed up with the search warrant, they would have arrested me and led me away in handcuffs, processed me and prepare the, you know, the trial. They didn't do that. They came to my house, they issued a search warrant. And normally in FARA cases, they issue letters of inquiry. And this is the other thing. You see, if this was simply, you know, Scott, you may have done something here that we think crossed the line. They issue a letter of inquiry. They think I have covert communications.

They think there's something going on that they can't trust me to be honest about. So that's why they did the raid on the house. They will find nothing because there is nothing. But, you know, normally, like I said, a fair thing, it's not a crime unless I, if I am unwilling to register. Well, I can't register because I haven't done anything wrong, so I'm not going to register. You're not going to register because you're not a foreign agent. A foreign agent takes direction from a foreign power. That's what the statute defines it as. Yeah, but they interpret direction as me having a conversation. For instance, if I initiate

a conversation with Anatoly Antonov about anything, let's say we're talking about arms control, and then we walk away and people say, well, what did Antonov tell you? Well, he told me about the negotiating history between him and Rose Gutmuller and how she lied to him. And then I write an article about that. I took direction from the Russians to write this smearing America. I'm like, no, guys, first of all, I'm a journalist. So get the hell out of my business. And this is an absolute. The FBI and the Department of Justice have no right whatsoever to define journalism and journalistic practices. You know, I have editors at RT. I'm an outside contributing journalist to RT on occasion. It's not a lot. And I have editors who receive my material and we have an editorial relationship.

They don't direct me. Sometimes they correct me. Sometimes they ask follow-on questions as editors are wont to do, but that's not direction. That doesn't fit the statute. The Department of Justice is literally out to lunch on this one, out to lunch. So your beef, of course, is not with the men and women that were in your house, although we know they took far more than the search warrant authorized them. Your beef is with their bosses in the DOJ responding probably to political pressure because of what you've said about Israel and about Ukraine and about Russia started this investigation. Somebody went to a judge with an affidavit or affidavits.

This is according to the search warrant that they went to the judge and they said, you know, in accordance with the affidavits that we have submitted, we have reason to believe that in the house of Scott Ritter is a computer, is a phone. And that if we gain access to the computer and the phone, it will demonstrate this, something. That's the affidavit. I don't have it because it's a sealed affidavit.

They didn't give it to me and they won't talk to me about it. But somebody did that. And here's where I have the problem. That in order to do that, you have to have, it's beyond simply doing analysis. This is politically motivated because an analysis of the available facts could never support probable cause. Somebody had to spin this thing out of control, go wacko and exaggerate and whatever. Here's why I think you're 100% correct. Not because you're my friend and I like you and we work together, but because of the facts in this case. a search warrant or a simple subpoena from a grand jury to the telecom or computer service provider without involving you at all. It's because they think, since they don't know you,

that they can intimidate you by having 40 people show up your house and rip it apart and take what they want. That's what leads me to believe this is politically motivated and totally misguided. A, the government is not supposed to interfere with freedom of speech. B, the government is not allowed to chill the freedom of speech. C, the government doesn't know Scott Ritter because they would know that he can't be intimidated. Who do you think pushed this? Somebody that doesn't like what you're saying about Israel and Hamas or somebody who doesn't like what you're saying about Russia and Ukraine? So this is driven by the National Security Division, which has a very, look, these are the same people that invented Operation Crossfire Hurricane targeting Donald Trump back in 2016. Same division. I just want to point that out.

These are the guys who lied about Michael Flynn. These are the guys who lied about Donald Trump. These are the guys who created Christopher Steele and fabricated all that testimony. Do you think they lied to you? Because unfortunately, the law is so skewed that the FBI can lie to us. But if we lie to them, it's a crime. Do you think they lied to you in the five hours of interrogation? It's possible.

It's possible. I'm sorry, I shouldn't read your comments. There's somebody saying Scott Ritter's afraid of Israel. You don't even know me, pal. I'm not afraid of Israel. I'll stare them down in a heartbeat. Don't read the comments. 99% of the comments are supportive of what we do on this show, which of course includes you. But no, do I think they lied to me? I don't think they told me the whole truth. But they were clearly, I have to say the, the, the two agents, there were uncomfortable pauses because the answers I was giving them weren't the answers they wanted or were expecting. And I kept looking at them and saying, Hey, you guys clearly have something on your mind. You're looking at each other. Just tell me what it is. Talk to me. And then they slowly go in and open up their folders.

And that's when they pulled out the copies of my texts, of my emails that go back two years and all that. And I said, you guys have been at this a long time. They went, yeah, we've been following you a long time. I want to remind everybody the following. The FBI, the House Judiciary Committee, had a hearing last year, or earlier this year, where they found that the FBI, through their legal attache office in Kiev, took instructions from the Ukrainian intelligence service to put pressure on American social media platforms, Twitter, YouTube, others, to shut down accounts that the Ukrainian government found to be offensive, found to be somehow not propagating the Ukrainian. So the FBI already has a track record of working on behalf of Ukraine.

I also want to remind your audience that the United States State Department, using taxpayer funds, helped the Ukrainians create something called the Center for Countering Disinformation that works under the auspices of the presidency of Ukraine. And the first thing they did with the State Department present funding, organizing, and directing is to create a blacklist of Americans who are called information terrorists. I'm on that list. I actually topped out in their weekly and monthly concerns for a while. The most dangerous man in the world to Ukraine was Scott Ritter. And they also, with State Department people present, are on record saying that information terrorists must

be treated as terrorists and arrested, prosecuted, and killed if necessary to stop them. The State Department was there silent. So what I'm trying to tell you is that the State Department is working with the Ukrainian government to silence American voices, an absolute violation of our constitutional rights. So when you say who's behind this, I know for a fact that the State Department and the FBI and the CIA have received reams of information from the Ukrainians complaining about my activities, calling me the most dangerous information terrorist in the world today for Ukraine, and that this has to translate into political pressure on people. So the FARA enforcement unit of the National Security Division of the Department of Justice picked this case up. They've been following me for two years.

They have nothing. Two years, Judge, and they have nothing. They finally were told, because I'm apparently getting too much attention here at home. So they have to smear me. They have to silence me. I'll just say two last things. You'll not find a more patriotic person in America today than me. There's a lot of patriots out there and I support them, but I will take a second seat to nobody. I love this country. I will die for this country. And everything I do today is in defense of this country, including just for the sake of you out there, articulating that America is better off having good relations with Russia, not seeking war with Russia and promoting arms control with Russia. This isn't because I'm pro-Russian. I'm not pro-Russian. I'm pro-American. And these are

all good policies for America. You can disagree with me, but don't you ever say that what I'm doing isn't supporting the country I love and I'll give my life to. And the second thing is, who the hell thinks I can be bought? Do they not know that Paul Wolfowitz in 1998 tried to bribe me with multi-million dollars to lie about Saddam Hussein, invite me into the administration of the future George W. Bush, offer me a job at the Pentagon or the CIA, book contracts, the whole thing. United States government, or at least those who want to be part of it, have put millions of dollars in front of me if I would lie. I don't lie. The truth is my weapon. It's inconvenient sometimes to people, but the notion that I would work on behalf of the Russian government and tell lies or peddle lies is absurd in the extreme.

And that's the two messages I want to send to the Department of Defense. You're going after the wrong guy. I'm more patriotic than you because I give a damn about the Constitution and I can't be bought. And I'm insulted that you ever thought I could be bought. You have known for some time that you were on this hit list because you told our audience about it back in June. Before we get into some substantive things about Russia and Ukraine, were these FBI agents ex-Marines by any chance? I think there's, again, you asked the question. I don't know about any of the ones that were there. I did when they were at the front door and they were saying stuff. I said, I pointed to my doormat, which has a Marine Corps emblem on it. I said, what the hell part of that background do you think would do any of the things you're alleging? They went, oh, no, we respect your Marine Corpsirs from my time as a weapons inspector in Iraq.

In 1995, I famously or infamously intercepted a load of gyros, a shipment of gyros coming from Russia into Iraq through Jordan. And I traveled into Jordan covertly, met with the king and his advisor and persuaded them they have to intercept. They have to raid this warehouse tonight or else the gyros will be in Iraq tomorrow. And they did. And we got all these gyros, but that was just the last shipment. One shipment had gotten through. So we had to go to Iraq. The Iraqis panicked, threw them all into a river and I brought in divers and we went down there and

we got them up. And so I pulled a bunch of these back to bring them in for evaluation. And I kept two of them because we use them as retirement gifts and all that. There's no danger. They're there. But the FBI came in and saw them like, what are these, explosive devices? I said, no, they're gyros. And they brought in a bomb team. I had to x-ray them. But the funny thing is my daughter's fiance is a welder and he graduated from welding school locally and they have different projects. And one of the projects he did was to make a cube. And so he welded this cube together and then he had had some medical issues, you know, and they put those sticky pads on you for your heart with a little metal nipple that you click the thing on. And so he came back from his appointment one day and he stuck a couple of these on that cube.

So now it looks like a steel box with electrode leads on it oh god oh they were freaking out they found this thing and they're like come down the whole swat team i'm not i'm not lying i'm not i'm exactly a couple of the swat team but the bomb squad brought them in hi i'm uh i'm with the u.s army they brought me in because they think there's a bomb downstairs and i'm like there ain't no bomb downstairs. They took me down and they showed it to me. I said, nah, this is just a welding thing. But that just shows the level of paranoia that exists when they go through people's homes. I'm sorry this happened to you.

I believe that you will be exonerated. It's hard for me to believe that a grand jury would even indict you. I think the people that, not the people that came to your house, but the people that dispatched them, names currently unknown to you or to the public are the ones that will have egg on their face. Switching gears, did Ukraine invade Russia at Kursk? Yes, it's an absolute invasion of Russia. Now, we can have a debate whether or not Ukraine is justified. I have to tell you, if I were a Ukrainian general, if that opportunity presented itself,

I'd have to weigh out the long-term risk analysis of that and probably would have said it's not worth it. But the Russians made a mistake. As Opti Aludanov, who's a major general in the Russian army at Chechen, who I know very well, has said repeatedly that the Ministry of Defense lied to itself so long that it started to believe its own lies. And they left an area of Russia undefended and the Ukrainians with NATO assistance found that weak spot. And they came in with the last of their strategic reserves, some of their best units. And they've enjoyed initial success. They've run out of steam, logistically unsupportable, and they're all going to start dying and they will all die eventually. But it's been a huge embarrassment for the Russians and a huge distraction for the Russians. They had to pull troops away that were involved in the Kharkov operation.

They had to bring in reserves that were scheduled to do bigger operations down south. But what they didn't do is take any forces from the Donetsk area, from the Donbass, where every day they're advancing five, six, ten kilometers. The Ukrainian defenses are collapsing. And many in the Ukrainian military are furious because they say, why are you sacrificing 20,000 of our best soldiers in this stupidity for propaganda only exercise that can only end in one thing, all of them dead, when you could have taken that 20,000 and helped us down here where we're getting our butts kicked on a daily basis. Was there, is there, with the exception of fomenting this logistical movement of Russian troops around, was there, is there any military purpose or

significance to the Ukrainian assault on Kursk? Yes. I mean, look, if they succeeded, if they succeeded in pushing in and capturing territory and then digging in and reinforcing, and the Russians were unable to kick them out, now you have the potential for a territory swap, where the Ukrainians say, look, we'll negotiate, we'll give you back Kursk, but you have to give us back some of the territory that you took. And that's a face-saving mechanism for that. The other one is by attacking. If you can disrupt, right now, the Russians are virtually broken through in the Donbass. The Ukrainians don't have any defense left and they're literally just falling back every day in significant distances and there's nothing behind them. If you could launch an attack that required the Russians to divert resources from the Donetsk operation and therefore slow down or stop that

offensive, that's a brilliant strategic victory. And the thing is, you'll never know how the Russians respond unless you try this. So they tried it. And I think, unfortunately for the Ukrainians, this gambit is going to fail and they're going to lose all of these people and all of that equipment. I mean, we're talking, this is their best equipment. This is the M1 tanks, the Leopard tanks, the Bradleys, the Strikers, the HIMARS, the M777s. This is their big punch that they've been holding to defend Kiev. And they committed it to this battle and it's all going bye-bye. Here's what President Putin had to say about this earlier today in Moscow, cut number seven. It seems obvious right now why the Kiev regime refused our proposals to go back to a peaceful resolution. Also, why they denied any peaceful intermediaries

from engaging in this conversation. The Ukrainian government is following the will of the West and its masters in the West. It's the West that's fighting us using the hands of the Ukrainians. They're trying to improve their negotiating positions in the future. But what negotiations could we even talk about with people who are attacking civilians, civilian infrastructure, or trying to create threats for nuclear industry facilities. What is there to even talk about with them? Sounds like he has the same line of thought that you do.

The whole purpose of this was to get an upper hand in negotiating. But why would we talk to somebody that invades our country and is killing civilians? It's even worse for the Ukrainians in this, because the Ukrainians have never been interested in a real negotiation. Dmitry Medvedev, the former president, former prime minister, currently deputy head of the National Security Council, one of the primary advisors to Vladimir Putin. He's got a reputation for being somewhat of a hothead who goes out on social media, maybe plays the bad cop to Putin's good cop. Putin is pretty mad right now. Look at his face. That's the face of a stone cold killer. And Medvedev basically said that, and Apti Al-Adhanov, again, the Russian leader, Russian Chechen leader has said the same thing. You know, this doesn't end with the recapture

or curse, that Ukraine is going to be punished. And this means, frankly, they've lost Sumy, which is the province from where these guys launched. They're going to lose Kharkov. They're going to lose Nepipetrovsk. They're going to lose Kharkov. They're going to lose Nepe Petrovs. They're going to lose Nikolaev. They're going to lose Odessa. This was fatal for the future of Ukraine. The Russians are furious. And when Putin says there will be no negotiation, that means this war ends on Russia's terms. For all the Ukrainians out there who gloat about, oh, we've driven the Russian Navy from Sevostopol well how because the ukrainians are in odessa do you honestly think that russia will ever come up with a peace agreement that allows ukraine to remain in odessa no uh cardical you've lost that because you've

attacked the belgrade sumi you just lost that you may lose kiev too now because the russians have had it up to here so this war you know ab know, Abdel-Eldanov continues to believe that the destruction of the Ukrainian army is going on at such a pace that the war ends this year. But even if it doesn't, this war only ends one way, and that is with the strategic defeat of Ukraine and the strategic defeat of NATO. And, you know, again, this is NATO committing suicide, political, economic, and military suicide. Last question on Russia. Is there now pressure from the Medvedevs, the more right-wing persons in the Kremlin, on President Putin to be more aggressive in the management of the world?

Apparently, my dogs think there are. I don't know if it's the FBI relaunching the raid against the house or something, but somebody's at the door, probably a UPS delivery man. I think reality has come in. Putin has been advising caution. He's a very pragmatic man. And I think the reality is that, no, this only ends one way, and that's with the unconditional surrender of Ukraine after the total defeat of Ukraine at the hands of the Russian forces. How soon do you think we can expect retaliation by Iran for the assassination by the Israeli government of the Hamas leader in Tehran?

If the press reports would be to believe, I'll say this. I have a colleague, a media colleague who I work with, appear on podcasts with, who's based out of Beirut. And we were scheduled to do a podcast tomorrow morning. And this colleague called up and canceled and said, the airplanes are flying over right now. Things are happening. We're all going into the bunker. We're evacuating Beirut. We think it's happening tonight.. I think Iran has had plenty of time to prepare a plan. Hezbollah sort of advertised what's going to happen last night when they launched an attack against Israeli military units in the vicinity of the border, and the Iron Dome just didn't function. Hezbollah hacked it or

somehow disabled it. But this is the reality of Israeli air defense, is it's not going to function. Some estimates show that Iran may launch 1,500 missiles at the same time. That will overwhelm everything that Israel and the United States has. This is a very dangerous situation for Israel because if Iran succeeds, this is the physical destruction of Israel. This means now that this is a dangerous situation for the region because Israel has nuclear weapons. And if the physical destruction of Israel is such that Israel feels its existential survival is at stake, then the so-called Samson option can be kicked in where Israel uses nuclear weapons to ensure that nobody survives Israel's demise. Hezbollah is

ready to go on the offensive in the Galilee. That's the other thing I've been warning people about. If you think this fight just could be a missile fight, you don't know Hezbollah. It's not going to be a fight in southern Lebanon. It's not going to be a fight in Beirut. It's going to be a fight in Haifa. It's going to be a fight in the Galilee. Hezbollah is going to be inside Israel in considerable numbers, 20,000, 30,000 men who are going to be slaughtering the Israelis, taking over Israeli towns and villages, maybe cutting off Haifa. Who knows how far they'll go? This is going to be slaughtering the Israelis, taking over Israeli towns and villages, maybe cutting off Haifa. Who knows how far they'll go? This is going to be a war, if it happens, unlike anything anybody's ever experienced. And it will be devastating for Israel, for the people of Lebanon, for the people of Iran, because Israel still packs the capability to launch

retaliatory strikes. Will Netanyahu get what he wants if what he wants is a war between the United States and Iran? There won't be a war between the United States and Iran. The United States has made that clear. The United States is there to defend Israel, but the United States will not carry out offensive operations against Iran. The United States knows what the consequences will be. We have American forces in Iraq and Syria and Qatar and Kuwait and Bahrain who are extremely vulnerable to Iranian attack. We have no defenses against these attacks. And the Iranians have said, we don't mind if you defend Israel, but if you attack us, we take it all out.

We're in the middle of an election. And this Israeli conflict is not as popular as American politicians would like it to be. And to get America dragged down in a war where we lose hundreds, if not thousands of Americans instantly, When we have aircraft carriers sinking, when we have, you know, ships sinking, and then politicians have to say, how did this happen? Yes, America will rally around the flag, of course, and yes, we'll go to war. But why did this war have to happen? Did we have to lose this many people? Did we have to lose all of this equipment? And why now in the midst of an economic, you know, when we have economic difficulty, are we spending trillions of dollars in a war that didn't have to be fought? No presidential candidate wants to be dealing with those issues. So I don't believe we're going to be getting involved in a war with Iran. I do think we're going to be embarrassed when the Iranians break through our missile defense shield and bring about a lot of death and destruction on Israel. But we'll see. We'll see what happens. I do want to show you a clip from one of your two clips

from one of your least favorite people. Not Lindsey Graham, Senator Tom Cotton. Chris, run one and two back to back. Israel has to strike on occasion at places like hospitals and schools because Hamas uses them for command and control or to fire mortars and rockets. There are civilian casualties in Gaza, no doubt, but those are solely the responsibility of Hamas, not Israel. She refused to preside over the joint session, her only constitutional duty as president of the Senate. She refused to have a meeting in public with them. And she came out and again blamed Israel for the civilian casualties

in Gaza, only emboldening Iran and Iranian-backed terrorists. And what did you have two days later? Hezbollah, another Iranian-backed terrorist, shot in rockets to Israel and blew up children playing ball at a playground. Kamala Harris is naive and she's not prepared to be the commander in chief. God, talk about naive. Tom Cotton is a, I mean, served in the military. He left a law career to go serve. He served in an airborne unit in Iraq. So he had the potential of us.

But Tom Cotton needs to know this. And Tom, if you're listening, listen carefully. If you are on active duty and you executed any of the instructions that you've just said Israel can't do, you would be arrested and prosecuted as a war criminal, stripped of everything and put in jail for the rest of your life. And you know that, you scum. And how dare you sit there and hide behind the title of United States senator, trying to moralize that what Israel's doing is somehow justifiable. If America's not allowed to do it, Israel's not allowed to do it, because that's what international law and the law of war says. Tom Cotton is the most ignorant person out there besides Lindsey Graham, my other favorite senator. But I mean, this was literally the embodiment of ignorance,

stupidity, and absolute, a vacuum of morality. This man has no moral compass. If he can sit there with a straight face and say that Israel has a right to bomb schools and bomb hospitals, America doesn't have that right, pal. Why? Because it's the wrong thing to do. And you're an American who took an oath to help them defend the constitution, and you know better. You're encouraging Israel to commit war crimes that you would not be allowed to commit if you are on active duty. Hypocrite in the extreme. I have to say at the end of this long but gratifying session that our dear friend Ray McGovern is correct when he called you the personification of personal courage. I might take it one step farther and say you are the incarnation of personal courage in a free society.

God bless you, Scott. Stay the way you are. Thank you for being a friend of the show. Thank you for being my friend. And thank you for being so wedded to the truth, come what may. Thanks for having me. Of course. We'll see you again soon.

Wow. And we have a full day coming up for you tomorrow. Bear with me for just a second as I get these, get the schedule out for you. At eight o'clock tomorrow morning, Pepe Escobar, you won't believe the new alliance between China and Palestine. At 12 noon, Professor Lawrence Wilkerson. At two in the afternoon, Matt Ho. At three in the afternoon, Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski. At five in the afternoon, worth waiting for, Professor Jeffrey Sachs. My hat is off to Scott Ritter. He is truly a great man, and I am privileged to be his friend. Judge Napolitano for Judging Freedom. Thank you.