Morning Wire - More Classified Docs Found & Debt Ceiling Battle | 1.16.23

Episode Date: January 16, 2023

A fourth batch of classified documents are found at President Biden’s Delaware home, the debt ceiling approaches new heights, and Republicans move towards banning pediatric gender transitioning treatment in several states. Get the facts first on Morning Wire.  Get 10% off your first order or Coffee Club subscription with code WIRE: https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/ "Get priority access! Go to https://www.masterworks.com and use promo code ‘MORNING WIRE’ **“net returns” refers to the annualized internal rate of return net of all fees and costs, calculated from the offering closing date to the sale date. IRR may not be indicative of Masterworks paintings not yet sold and past performance is not indicative of future results. See important Reg A disclosures: https://masterworks.com/cd Masterworks’ offerings are filed with the SEC, view all past and current offerings at https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-edgar?company=masterworks&match=&filenum=&State=&Country=&SIC=&myowner=exclude&action=getcompany or https://sec.gov/" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Biden's lawyers announced that a fourth batch of classified documents were found in the president's Delaware residents, a revelation that followed the appointment of a special counsel. We have been fully cooperating with the Department of Justice, and now we will be doing the same with the special counsel's office. What do we know so far about the investigation? And how is the White House responding to the growing scandal? I'm Daily Wire editor-in-chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, January 16th, happy M-O-West. Okay, Day. This is Morning Wire. The federal government is expected to hit the $31.4 trillion debt ceiling this week, and President Biden is demanding that the Republican-led House raised the limit with no strings attached. But GOP leaders say not so fast.

The American people are demanding that we use every tool in the toolbox to eliminate reckless spending. And Republicans in Congress and individual states are moving to ban gender transition treatments for children. We break down the actions being taken by both parties across the country. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

Black Rifle Coffee has expanded their team of active duty service members, veterans, and veteran family members. All thanks to your support. This year alone, they were able to donate 120,000 bags of coffee to veterans and first responders. If you want to continue supporting this incredible company, go to black riflecoffee.com and use promo code Wire for 10% off your purchase and your first coffee club or That's black rifle coffee.com promo code wire. Black Rifle Coffee, America's Coffee. Over the weekend, it was revealed that a fourth trove of classified documents was found at President Biden's home in Wilmington, Delaware.

The discovery was made just hours after Attorney General Merrick Garland tapped a special counsel to look into the affair. Joining us to discuss is Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce. So, Tim, this is a rapidly developing story. First, walk us through the various batches of classified documents that have been revealed so for? Sure. In the past week, we've learned of four separate occasions where classified documents have been discovered at either Biden's private office in D.C. or his Wilmington home. The first discovery was made on November 2nd, less than a week before the 2022 midterms. Biden's team says one of his

personal attorneys found 10 classified documents stored in what was described as a locked closet in the office Biden had used at the Penn Biden Center, a D.C. think tank affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania. Biden's lawyers reportedly turned the documents over to the National Archives, and the Department of Justice launched an inquiry into the incident shortly after. Attorney General Garland tapped John Lash, who was a Trump-appointed District Attorney in Chicago, to look into the incident on November 14th. A month later, on December 20th, Biden's attorneys found a second set of documents stashed in the garage of the president's home in Wilmington, Delaware. Those documents have been turned over to Lash as well. But none of this was reported by the press until

last week. What happened that caused this all to come out? That's a good question. CBS News, News, broke the first story about the documents found at the Penn Biden Center on January 9th, but it's not clear how they got the scoop. It was later reported that Biden's legal team went back to Delaware and searched the president's houses in Roebuth Beach and Wilmington again. On Thursday, the attorneys reported to Lash that they had found a single document with classified markings in President Biden's study at his Wilmington home. Later that same day, the White House released a statement confirming that finding and the garage documents found in December. Also that day, Garland appointed former U.S. District Attorney Robert Herr as special counsel to take over the Justice Department investigation into the classified documents.

On Saturday, White House counsel Richard Sauber said that he had found five more documents at Biden's Wilmington home. He said he found them Thursday evening when he was working with Justice Department officials to hand over the missing document that was found in the president's study. All right, so the elephant in the room obviously is the fact that Trump's home, a former president's home, was raided over classified documents. and now we have a former vice president with classified documents. Right. Biden was vocally critical of Trump's handling of those documents. So for Biden to have a similar scandal now is ripe for charges of hypocrisy at the very least. It's even more unflattering that all this started before the election, but we didn't learn about it until much later.

Former Clinton advisor David Gergen said Friday that Biden could get creamed politically over this. Here's some of what he said on CNN last week. It's very, very big, not legally, but politically, it's very, very big. deal. You know, this is a president who was marching upward for the first time in his presidency. The fears that people like me have about how old is he going to govern well, those fears will be dissipated if he were able to stay on that track. But now along comes this gigantic story, which was totally unexpected, and it's knocked that, the knock for six, the original plan. I think they've done a wonderful job being cooperative with the government, and they've done it,

quote, by the book, as they were saying. But I don't think sitting there, hunkering down now. They're just acting like it's not out there as they go strategy. According to former assistant U.S. attorney Andrew McCarthy, the Biden administration's handling the Trump saga forced Biden into a corner over his own document scandal. Here's what McCarthy told Fox News this weekend. The conflict of interest that's inherent in the special counsel situation is when the justice department has to investigate its own administration and in particular its own president. But obviously what happened here is Garland and probably Biden expected that Trump was going to be charged in connection with the Mar-a-Lago documents, and they wanted to distance themselves from that decision or at least project the illusion that they would distance from it.

And that was the purpose of having that special counsel. And of course, because they did that, the next domino is if you have an investigation of Biden and you have these explosive revelations, he really didn't have any choice at that point. And how are Democrats in Congress reacting to all this? So far, there's been bipartisan agreement that the classified documents related to Biden need a closer look. Democratic Congressman Adam Schiff said Sunday that there could be important national security risks associated with those papers. Here's some of what he said. We have asked for an assessment in the intelligence community of the Mar-a-Lago documents. I think we ought to get that same assessment of the documents found in the think tank as well as the home of President Biden.

Well, we'll see what new details this week brings. Tim, thanks for coming on. Sure, anytime. That was DailyWires, Tim Pierce. Coming up, the battle over the debt ceiling comes to a head. Last year, the S&P 500 ended its worst year since 2008. In fact, Bank of America expects zero returns in 2023. But Masterworks just handed back a 35% net return to their investors.

You see, with Masterworks, you can invest in fine art from legends like Picasso and Banksy. Their last three sales delivered over 10, 13, and 35% in returns. Go to masterworks.com and use promo code MorningWire for priority access. That's masterworks.com promo code morningwire. See important disclosures at masterworks.com slash CD. This week, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is calling on Congress to raise the nation's debt limit before the ceiling is reached on Thursday. But Republican leaders in the House say they won't support raising the limit without

spending cuts elsewhere, prompting a high-stakes stalemate. in Washington. Here with the details is Daily Wire Senior Editor Cabot Phillips. So Cabot, first, catch us up to speed on how we got here. Well, back in December of 2021, Congress raised the ceiling by $2.5 trillion to a total of $31.4 trillion. But that only ended up buying a little over a year as we're already approaching the limit again. On Friday, Treasury Secretary Jeanette Yellen sent a letter to Congress saying that at current spending rates, we'd hit the ceiling by this Thursday. She warned that, quote, failure to meet the government's obligations would cause irreparable harm to the U.S. economy, the livelihoods of all Americans, and global financial

stability. Now, what happens if a deal is not reached before that deadline on Thursday? So if the limit isn't raised before we hit it, the Treasury Department is authorized to begin taking what they refer to as extraordinary measures to try and avoid defaulting on the government's financial obligations. Those are basically just accounting maneuvers that include prematurely cashing out bonds, halting payments to government pension funds, basically just finding money from elsewhere. That should buy us enough funding to get to June, at which point without a new agreement, the Treasury would be unable to come up with the funds to basically pay America's bills, and we would default on our debt.

Now, what sort of precedent is there for us? Is it normal for us to just keep raising the debt ceiling? Well, we've never defaulted on our debt, but we did last hit the ceiling back in 2011. And there was pretty significant fallout. Markets took a tumble domestically and abroad. Retirement savings were impacted. and for the first time ever, our government's credit limit was downgraded. Ultimately, a deal was reached and we didn't end up defaulting on our debt,

but the Treasury Department says our economy took months to recover. Now, typically there's not much of a question over whether the ceiling will be raised. It's been done about 100 times since World War II. Congress simply ups the limit and keeps on going. But this time is different. Why? Exactly. Because there's so much urgency in Washington to avoid defaulting, Republicans know that their new majority in the House gives them leverage,

and they want to use that leverage to see serious spending cuts and reforms before they agree to raise the limit. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has proposed a spending cap that will reduce overall government spending before raising that limit. Here's Republican Jason Smith, chair of the powerful Ways and Means Committee in the House on Fox News. We have to have fiscal reforms moving forward. We cannot just give an unlimited credit card. And Senator Rick Scott, for example, said, quote, I look forward to working with House Republicans so we can stop caving to the Democrats, finally end Biden's raging inflation crisis and bring fiscal sanity back to Washington.

But that does still require an agreement with Democrats in the Senate and perhaps more importantly with President Biden. And according to the White House, he's not interested in negotiating. Here's Press Secretary Corrine Jim Pierre on Friday. It's not and should not be a political football. This is not political gameship. And this should be done without conditions. And because Congress is so evenly split, Democrats are hoping they can convince a few

moderate Republicans to vote with them to raise the limit without any other reforms attached. That mentality from the White House has really angered Republicans who point to the fact that back in 2019, President Trump was willing to work out a similar deal with Nancy Pelosi that allowed for increased defense spending to appease Republicans and increase domestic funding for Democrats. So now the question becomes whether Democrats agree to a similar deal like that, where they meet Republican demands, or if Democrats will be able to raise the limit without the support of most Republicans.

All right. Well, interesting week ahead. Cabot, thanks for reporting. That was Daily Wire Senior Editor, Cabot Phillips. Republicans in several states kicked off the new year with a slew of legislation aimed at outlawing controversial puberty blockers and trans surgeries for children. Here discuss these red state laws and the Democratic response is Daily Wire reporter Amanda Presta Giacomo. So Amanda, what can you tell us about these legislative efforts? Hey, John. Well, there are literally dozens of new GOP-backed bills for this coming legislative session. aimed at shielding children from what Republicans say is irreversible damage by way of so-called gender-affirming care. Specifically, lawmakers want to tie penalties to doctors who give puberty blockers or trans surgeries to minors. One Oklahoma bill actually bumps that age to under 26 years old,

using the argument that these procedures can be irreversible and a person's brain doesn't stop developing until around 25. In Texas, lawmakers want to classify the medical transitioning of kids as a form of child abuse. And in states like Alabama and Arkansas, there are already laws on the book seeking to protect kids from these practices. I spoke to Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Council Matt Sharp about these laws,

and he made the point that they can also protect medical professionals. What we see a lot is these doctors saying the pressure that they feel to prescribe puberty blockers with across-sex hormones, even though they've got their own questions about the safety and efficacy of them. Now, the Biden administration has not shied away from the transgender issue at all. In fact, they've made it one of their priorities.

Should we expect legal challenges from the feds? Yes, and actually, the Biden DOJ has already intervened in a case called Bow versus Marshall. That's a challenge to Alabama's Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act, which bans puberty blockers and trans surgeries on minors. Listeners might remember that President Biden promised back in March that his administration would fight GOP-back trans bills and encouraged parents to, quote, affirm, their children in their trans identity. To parents of transgender children, affirming your child's identity

of one of the most powerful things you can do to keep them safe and healthy. Now, aside from these legal challenges, we're also seeing blue states move forward with their own legislative response. Tell us about that. Sure. The most clear example of this is California's SB 107,

which just went into effect. Democratic lawmakers argue such legislation provides refuge for kids who identify as trans by blocking out-of-state laws. Minnesota Democrats are pushing forward with a very similar bill that seeks to give the state jurisdiction and child custody cases involving parents who bring their children to the state for transgender services. Conservatives, to put it bluntly, have been horrified by these laws,

saying they open the door to children not only receiving these controversial services, but perhaps doing so without parental consent. Sharp told us those fears are not unfounded in his view. It could completely exclude parents. if you had just a family member or someone that facilitated taking a kid to California and said, hey, we'll get you out there, we'll get you away from your parents so you can get these cross-sex hormones. California would essentially say, sorry, we're going to take jurisdiction, we're going to completely exclude you parents from this and facilitate the minors getting

access to these harmful drugs and procedures. Well, clearly two very divergent fronts opening up here on this issue. Amanda, thanks for reporting. That was Daily Wire reporter, Amanda Presta Giacomo. Another story we're tracking this week. A plane making a 27-minute flight to a Nepal tourist town crashed into a gorge on Sunday while attempting to land at a new airport. More than 60 of the 72 people aboard died. Well, that's all the time we've got this morning.

Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back this afternoon with more of the news you need to know.