The Daily Signal - Warning From Rep. Moran: A Harris Administration Would Be ‘Biden-Plus'

Episode Date: July 25, 2024

If she wins the Democratic nomination and is elected president, a Kamala Harris administration would be “Biden-plus,” a Texas congressman says.  A Harris administration would mean a further “move towards socialism and a more liberal government,” says Rep. Nathaniel Moran, R-Texas, adding, “and that's further away from that conservative value system, that conservative foundation that we want to see restored back in our government.”   One day after kicking off her campaign for president, Harris on Wednesday chose to skip Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress. Harris' absence was a “snubbing,” according to Moran. Vice presidents typically preside over such joint sessions. It's a “big deal,” the Texas lawmaker said, for “one of our most strategic allies, in a moment of history, where they are under siege by Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iran, besieged at every, every point in their country,” to travel to the U.S. and speak to Congress. Harris’ decision to skip the speech “shows little support on the Democratic side for Israel.”  Instead, Harris spoke at the biennial Zeta Phi Beta sorority national convention in Indianapolis. Her office said the speech was scheduled before Netanyahu’s address to Congress was planned. Moran joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss Harris’ record as President Joe Biden's “border czar,” and what issues are most on the minds of voters ahead of the November presidential election.  Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Thursday, July 25th. I'm Virginia Allen. Congressman Nathaniel Moran says that a Harris administration would not look much different than a Biden administration. The congressman joins the show today to both explain why he thinks Harris is going to be the Democrat nominee and how she would lead differently or maybe not so differently from President Joe Biden. We also discuss Harris' record as Borders are. He, by the way, gives her an F as Borders are. And he explains how that crisis has really influenced his constituents in the state of Texas. Stay tuned for my conversation with Congressman Moran after this.

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Well, it is my distinct privilege to welcome to the show today. Congressman Nathaniel Moran of Texas. Congressman, thank you so much for being here. Good morning, Virginia. It's great to be with you this morning. And thanks for having me over to Heritage. and thank you guys for all that you do. I hear at the Heritage Foundation through Heritage Action and through The Daily Signal.

Oh, well, it's our pleasure, and it's our pleasure to get to have individuals like yourself over here to talk about the state of play. There is no shortage of things happening in our country right now. Congressman Director Chedal of the Secret Service, she resigned on Tuesday, and multiple members of Congress had called for her resignation shortly after, right after she resigned. you wrote on X, Secret Service Director Cheetos's resignation is an appropriate first step of accountability for the botched protection of President Trump on July 13th when a would-be assassin sought to take his life in Pennsylvania. But this is just the first step. So if that was the first step, what needs to happen now?

What's the second step? Well, we need to continue with the investigation. I know the speaker and the minority leader have set up this small task force. But indeed, we've got just a few answers through our agencies. up to this point. We need full and complete understanding of where the breakdown was logistically and operationally in preparing for this event on the 13th and then actually facilitating that event on the 13th because the security of those that are going through our democratic process that are running for office is of utmost importance in this nation.

So we got very little substantive answers from Cheetah on Monday, which is why I think she was forced out by Tuesday. We need to understand how do we make sure this doesn't happen again for any candidate of any party. It's simply not acceptable. There was a fascinating dynamic that we saw play out when Cheeto testified before Congress, and that was that there was unity between Republicans and Democrats that were both in agreement of there has been a major failure on the part of the Secret Service. Do you think that show of unity is an indication of maybe a broader desire for unity among members of Congress that we may see more of in the coming month? I would probably say no. I would like to say yes. Certainly we don't

have to have uniformity of thought when it comes to the dialogue of those heavy political issues that we have to decide as Republicans and Democrats and the policies that we're trying to put in place. But we do need to have unity on certain issues. And you saw that on Monday. I don't know that it's the beginning of a lot of unity on policy issues moving forward. But when you're talking about the safety of those in the political process, there's no question. And Democrats, I think, saw this early on that nobody could defend what happened in Pennsylvania on July 13th. There's no way to defend it because the common person stepping back, me not on the House Oversight Committee, stepping back seeing the videos from everyday Americans from that day and hearing the testimonies

of those that were there, immediately you knew there were high security failures. And you asked the question how? I mean, how could that happen? Some of these answers seem very basic. She wouldn't give us any answers on Monday, but we know as the public looking from the outside end, that there were some failures that day. They need to be corrected. Certainly were. And that's something that like I said, across the aisle, there's agreement on that. We have seen, obviously, Giedel's not the only one to make a huge announcement in recent days. President Joe Biden announced that he is stepping out of the race. He made that announcement on Sunday. What do you think President Biden's legacy will be? Well, as a conservative, I think his legacy is devastating for the United States because

what we've seen over the last three and a half years is really the dilution of the sovereignty of the United States, both in our physical borders and in our strength around the world. We've shown weakness at every edge of the world. And it started with him, really, with Afghanistan, withdraw, and as a result of that, then you saw totalitarian regimes in China and Iran and Russia and North Korea become more aggressive around the world against our allies because they knew that we were weak, and they knew that we would not respond in the manner that we should respond. When you had President Trump in place, a very strong president, those totalitarian regimes

did not press those issues. Why? Because they were respectful of the strength in the Oval Office. We haven't had that strength. So I think his legacy is going to be one of weakness. It's going to be one of not adhering to the rule of law. One of having the weaponization of government go after individuals who politically disagree with him. That's what his Department of Justice has done for the last three and a half years.

And then one of really diluting that sovereignty of the United States and the standing of the United States around the world. And the standing of the U.S. in this world is critical to preserving democracy, not just here, but democratic institutions and countries around the world and for our long-term national security. Just think, let's just take Iran, for example. We were so weak in a response, I think, to the October 7th attacks, and we have continued to be weak in our response in our standing with Israel that Iran continues to press, and now they're on the precipice of having a nuclear weapon.

Well, who do you think they're going to come after? I mean, they hate Israel, no question. but right behind Israel is the United States. So we cannot just afford to say, well, we've got an ocean between us and them. We're good. We're fine. Let's stick our head in the sand. We can't do that.

We have to be strong around the world. Vice President Kamala Harris has likely, is likely going to be the Democrat nominee. She appears to have received enough delegates to be that nominee, to be that candidate. What did you make of Vice President Kamala Harris not attending the speech? of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. Yeah, it was horrible because it sends a signal, I think, to our greatest and most strategic ally in the Middle East that there's going to be some question about whether or not she's going to stand with Israel if elected. We know she's advocated for more and more pro-Hamas and anti-Israel policies over the past three and a half years.

and she's been very weak when it comes to standing with Israel. And this is just another signal of that being the case if she is elected in November. If I were out there as a member of the American public that counted the strategic alliance between the U.S. and Israel as something that was very important, I would be concerned about her being elected to the presidency and how she's going to behave when the matters come, when the rubber meets the road. What kind of message does it send not only to Netanyahu, but also to the Israeli people for her to not attend that speech? Yeah, it's snubbing her nose at the democratic process in Israel because he was democratically elected. He's the leader of Israel. It is a really big deal to have somebody in a joint session of Congress, especially somebody who is from one of our most strategic allies in a moment of history where they are under siege by Hezbollah, Hamas, and Iran besieged it.

every point in their country and for her to decline to just go on a campaign trip. And then, frankly, for the Democrats to go through a litany of people before they found somebody that was even willing to be there. And that was Senator Cardin from Maryland, who's not up for re-election. Now you're really getting down the list of people. And that shows little support on the Democratic side for Israel. Are you fully confident that Harris will be the Democrat Party's candidate? or do you think there's still chance we might see a dark horse arise?

Well, they keep talking about an open process, but frankly, the coronation has already happened. We've seen that. And she's co-opted all the money that Biden took. I find it really interesting that we're talking about the Democratic Party, Big D Democratic Party, who purports to be the defender of small D Democratic principles. But in a back room, the party bosses decided overnight, she's going to be the nominee when 14 million plus, individuals on the Democratic primary or caucus process said, no, we want President Biden to be the nominee. That doesn't seem very democratic to me.

Yeah. Let's say she is the candidate. Let's say she gets elected. Would a Harris administration look any different from a Biden administration? I don't think so. It's probably going to look worse because, you know, she was the borders are. The biggest issue we faced in this last term was trying to undo the horrible border policies of president. Biden, but she was the coordinated or designated borders are at the time, wouldn't ever go down to the

border for months and months and months, but even so has stood side by side with President Biden and his policies in that regard. She has said openly, she really wants open immigration for anybody to enter this country. And that's insanity. That's madness to me to say we're not going to respect the sovereign borders of the United States and the rule of law and the process that we put in place through the legislative process to say, here's how you can legally come into the country. Here's how you can legally become a citizen. Here's how you can legally gain the right to work in this country. And for those people that are trying to go through that process appropriately, for her to stand on the other side and say, you know, anybody that wants to come in can come

in. It's horrible. She stood against fracking. She stood against so many other issues to a greater degree than Biden has, that I think the American people will see a Biden plus when it comes to the move towards socialism and a more liberal government. And that's further away from that conservative value system, that conservative foundation that we want to see restored back in our government. Biden plus. Wow. If you had to grade her as borders are, how would you grade her? Can I give her less than an F? That's what I would really like to do because both Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have gone out of their way to make sure that they have executive orders and policies and orders in place that undo the great and successful work that

President Trump did while he was president to try to secure our border. And you see it in the numbers. I mean, we're spending more money today on border security than we did under the Trump administration. So it's not a matter of money. It's a matter of failed policies and failed will. They simply do not want to secure the. border. I'm convinced of that. And for a long period of time, until 2012, most of the folks

encountered at the southern border, 85% were from Mexico. Now it's down to about 35%. We're seeing people come across that southern border from more than 100 countries, more than 30 countries with ties to terrorism. We've had more than 30,000 Chinese nationals come across the southern border in the last year. And you're looking at those numbers and saying, now why are people from these countries that are adverse to us finding their way through the southern border. And what are they doing here? And who are they? I've got a lot of questions that need to be answered.

And frankly, it gives me a lot of concern about the security of our domestic well-being. You recently wrote a piece for Fox News titled America's K-12 schools have been overwhelmed, abandoned in Biden's out-of-control border crisis. What exactly do you mean by this that the schools have been abandoned and overwhelmed by the border crisis? I'm on education workforce, which is why I focused on really the education implications of the failed border security policies. And as you look around the United States, it doesn't matter if you're in Texas or if you're in Denver where they've spent tens and tens of millions of dollars because of illegal immigrants there in Denver or in Massachusetts, you can see the implications on the local level. We talk a lot about the federal money that's spent and the federal problems as a result of illegal immigration. But consider the school systems. They are funded primarily by local.

tax dollars. And now you've got individuals, individual school districts that are having to build a hundred million dollar facilities for new buildings. You're having to house immigrants in existing facilities. You're having to hire translators that aren't available, frankly, for all the people that are here. In Cleveland, Texas, north of Houston, we went from 4,000 individuals in that school district in 2014 to about 11,000 in 2022. And now by 2026, expect to go to 22,000. students. You're looking at just over a decade going from 4,000 to 22,000 students. And that's because of a huge illegal immigrant colonization in that county. And it's really an invasion. And it has overwhelmed the local community and turned it upside down. And the local taxpayers are the ones bearing the

burden for that to about $150 billion in a year, the implications of illegal immigration, according to the House Budget Committee, and that's something that our taxpayers cannot bear. Plus, we're filling up our emergency rooms. We're filling up those, you know, we're having social services that are being provided to illegal immigrants where now our own American citizens are having to take a backseat, having to veterans getting kicked out of housing so that in favor of illegal immigrants, it's despicable. When you talk to your constituents in Texas about the issues that they're most concerned

about specifically around this election, is the border pretty high up there? Are there other issues that are top of their mind? Borders are always at the top of the list because even in Northeast Texas where I am, we have problems with gang-related activities. We have problems with fentanyl. We have problems with, again, the emergency room issues and our school districts continuing to grow and having to bear that burden, providing those services to folks that are coming illegally.

So you see it just like you see in the northern states and in the Midwest. States, it doesn't matter where you're at in the United States now. Everybody knows you're, everybody's a border state now. So they're very concerned about that. But what they're also concerned about is the fiscal cliff that we're on. They're concerned about the debt. They're concerned about spending, out-of-control spending. They're concerned not just about the amount of spending, but the type of spending. Where are we directing that spending? That's very important. I talked on the local level when I was a county judge always about the type of spending that we're doing. So if we get the type right, we're probably going to get the amount right.

If we're as efficient as we can and do the things that the taxpayers expect us to do and need us to do and keep it as limited as possible, we'll keep the tax burden as low as possible because ultimately that's what we need to enhance liberty in individual lives and in business lives. During the month of August, Congress is out and you'll be going back to your home state. What will the message be that you'll be taking to your constituents? The message is really a message of hope because this year is an election year. We have the hope for the turning of where we're at. We were determined to change the direction of the Biden administration.

We've been determined to do that. We've been defiant over the past couple of years of trying to resist as a Republican party and as a conservative member of the Republican Party resist those policies, bad policies of the Biden administration. But now we really see this election in November as almost an election of destiny. when we saw what happened to President Trump and how close he came to losing his life on July 13th and the fact that he didn't. I mean, I got to believe there's a little bit of divine destiny in that. And I have hope for America. And that is the message that I always try to talk to folks about is, look, as bad as things are, there's always hope.

And there's always hope because there are some great people in this country. And I have faith in them. I do not have faith in government at all. But I have faith in the citizens of this country to make great decisions, to treat each other the way we grew up learning how to treat each other under that Judeo-Christian ethic, and to work hard and to achieve their American dream. And each one of us should have that American dream. I think that we're all called to do something very special in this life

and that God created us for that purpose. And government should get out of the way and let people fulfill those dreams. I think there's so much wisdom in that because the sooner we can learn not to put too much faith in government, the sooner we can protect ourselves from a lot of hurt and pain and anguish. Absolutely. Congressman, thank you for your time today. I really appreciate you joining. Virginia, it's been a pleasure.

Thank you for having me. And with that, that's going to do it for today's episode. Thanks so much for joining us here on the Daily Signal podcast. Hit that subscribe button so you never miss out on new shows, whether our morning interview editions or our afternoon top news show, where we bring you the headlines of the day. These are the stories that you need to know. Stay informed in what's happening in our world. We'll see you right back here at 5 for top news.

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