The Glenn Beck Program - Best of The Program | Guests: Thomas W. King & Carrie Severino | 9/21/20

Episode Date: September 21, 2020

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away late last week. As Trump prepares to nominate her successor, Glenn reviews just how liberal she was and why we must fill the seat (Sen. Mike Lee, anybody?). Attorney Thomas W. King III joins with the latest on his fight against Pennsylvania’s coronavirus lockdown orders. Judicial Crisis Network president Carrie Severino gives her take on whether the GOP can confirm a new justice by the election and who might be a good pick. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, podcasters. What a show today actually was a really fun show. And, you know, you never know what to expect these days. It could be, okay, we're all going to die. Or like today, I think a fun show, even though we're all going to die. We tell you all that you need to know about what the House and the senator saying, what the Democrats, what the far left is saying, what the president is planning on doing. And we talked to Kerry Severino from judicial crisis. and the Judicial Network.

And she said some really positive and encouraging things. We can get this done. There's no excuse to not get this done by Election Day. 33 days for O'Connor. Ginsburg, it was only a 42-day process. 19 days for Stevens. It can be done. And all of these guys have already had their FBI vetting.

They've been seen by the Senate before. They've testified in front of the Senate. it so we can we can go and Donald Trump tells us we'll go by Saturday. Find out all about it on today's podcast. You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program. I think we just need to start with first of all the president finding out while being asked a question by the press. He comes right off of the stage from a rally and they're playing.

If you don't know this already, it wasn't. It wasn't something they added, but he comes right off the stage and everything, I mean, seeing it, I'm like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, wait, what is he going to say? Everything that he said is exactly what you've ever wanted from Donald Trump. Listen. Walks up to the press. She just died? Wow. I didn't know that.

I just, you're telling me now for the first time. She led an amazing life. What else can you say? She was an amazing woman. Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life. I'm actually sad to hear that. I have sad to hear that. Thank you very much.

So absolutely true and fantastic. Now, I don't believe he didn't know because he had to, you know, he had to tell him to up the morphine just to push. No, I'm kidding. But that is the way the president should have reacted. I think that's the way everybody reacted. I was out to dinner with a bunch of friends on Friday, and none of us were wearing masks.

I mean, we wore a mask while we were standing up to come in and out. But then when we sat down, they said we could take our masks off, which made total sense. It's a COVID-free zone when you're sitting at a restaurant table. Yeah, right, right, right, right. So anyway, we were at dinner. and my first reaction was, oh, no. Oh, no.

Oh, not another log on the fire. This is a big, big log. This is the Uel log. This is the third log that Doc Brown put into the steam engine right before it went off the bridge. Yeah, that's the last log. This is number three. And so my reaction was that first. And then I told everybody at the table that she had just died.

and everybody did the same thing. That's sad. Sorry to lose her. And especially at this time. And it's not like, we didn't like her rulings. No, I mean,

she was a, you mourn for her family and the people who knew her and you know, I want people to live. I actually respect all human life. So, yeah,

would, would want everyone to be alive. Doesn't seem to be the opinion of a lot of people these days. Oh, I know. But I will say, you know, as a Supreme Court justice, she was obviously terrible.

Well, like I now what makes you say that? And she was on the wrong side of literally every single issue. Okay. Let me just say this. In an interview in 2012, she said that she wouldn't look to the U.S. Constitution if she were drafting a constitution in the year 2012. She said, quote, I might look at the Constitution of South Africa. I mean, that was a deliberate attempt to have fundamental instrument of government that

embraced human rights and have an independent judiciary. Really, I think it's a great piece of work that was done. So she wouldn't look to our constitution. She'd look to South Africa. Also, she called for the sex integration of prisons and reformatories so that conditions of imprisonment, security and housing could be equal. She said, if the grand design of such institutions is to prepare inmates to return to a community as persons equipped to benefit from and contribute to civil society, then perpetuation of a single-sex institution should be rejected. Okay, it's a little out there. I mean, it might cause some problems, but she called for the sex integration of the Boy

Scouts and the Girl Scouts because of the stereotypes of gender roles. She insisted on integrating college fraternity and sorority chapters, having college social societies. She may have missed the point of the sex drive, you know, putting all these people to get. She may have, anyway. Um, she also cast constitutional doubt on the legality of mothers and fathers day as separate holidays because mothers can be fathers and fathers can be mothers, I guess. Hmm.

She asserted the laws against bigamists, persons cohabitating with more than one woman and a woman cohabitating with a bigamist are unconstitutional. Um, I agree with the way they're reading it now. I happen to agree with her on that one. She objected to laws against prostitution, because prostitution as a consensual act between adults is within the zone of privacy protected by recent constitutional decisions. She's right about that,

the way it's being interpreted now. Well, thanks to her, right? She's a big reason it's being interpreted that way. Right. She also said that the concept of a husband, breadwinner, and wife homemaker must be eliminated from the code if it's to reflect an equality principle. She called for comprehensive program of government-supported child care. She also wrote that the Man Act,

listen to this, that punishes those who engage in interstate sex traffic of women and girls, the Man Act that punishes those who engage in interstate estate sex traffic of women and girls, is offensive. Such acts should be considered within the zone of privacy. So she's not exactly... Not my favorite.

She's not my favorite. She's not my favorite. She also found words offensive. And she said these words needed to go from all official documents. A man, woman, manmade, mankind, husband, wife, mother, father, sister, brother, son, daughter, serviceman, longshoreman, postmaster, watchman, seamanship.

And to, man a vessel. I agree with all that except longshoremen. Right. Right. I have a strong disagreement on the longshoreman. And I understand with your history. She, she, she, him, his and hers to be dropped down the memory hole. Had to be replaced by him, he, she, her, him or his hers. Boy, she's out of date, huh? Not only was she very pro-abortion. She was also on the record as opposing what was settled law that the Constitution does not compelred taxpayers to pay for abortions. She said, fully funded abortions should be a constitutional right. Again, I might disagree with her here and there.

Right. She also called for affirmative action hiring quotas for women using the police as an example. She said affirmative action is called for in this situation. So anyway, she's done a lot of things that you disagree with. However, today, today after her death, I think it's important to remember one of her really strong arguments. She said she couldn't imagine Donald Trump back in 2016 getting elected for the country. It could be four years for the court. It could be I don't even want to contemplate that.

So she didn't really like Donald Trump at all. but she did come out in 2016 and make it very, very clear that the sitting president, even a lame duck president in the last months of his term had to fulfill his constitutional duty. And she made a very, very big point about this. Now, I have heard from AOC that her dying wish, which we can't violate. her dying wish is that Donald Trump does not nominate somebody else. Didn't realize the Supreme Court was a make a wish foundation. I did not realize that's how this works.

Well, they're taking her body to Disneyland right now. She wanted to see that one last time. And this was her final wish. That was her make a wish. This one's her final wish. Okay. I was like, really? They're bringing a Disney world?

That's so weird. It's some strange. In 2020, you could be like, like, Okay. I was like, Wow. All right. She's laying in state in the magic castle.

Okay. That's a skirt of this year. I totally bought that. And I'm the one on tranquilizers. Oh, man. This is the best of the Glenn Beck program. Thomas King is the attorney in Pennsylvania that went into court fighting the COVID-19 lockdown. We welcome into the program now.

How are you, sir? Oh, I'm just fine. Thank you, Glenn. I'm honored to be here. Thank you. Congratulations on the win. Tell me about, tell me what you were fighting and how it went. We were fighting the governor of Pennsylvania and the Secretary of Health, like in a lot of places across the country,

decided that it would be a great idea to lock down 13 million Pennsylvanians in their homes and to shut down half of our businesses. put people out of work in order to to on the guys that they were going to protect the public health. They also prohibited people from attending rallies for 250 people or more or any sort of events. Although our governor marched in a protest that had hundreds of people and our health secretary did a secret deal that came out in our case that allowed 20,000 people a day to go to a car show in Carlisle. and they told President Trump he couldn't come to Gettysburg and accept the Republican nomination if he had more than 250 people. Wow. So what happened in the court case?

We were in front of Judge William Stickman in the federal court in the United States District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. And Judge Stickman last week issued a wonderful opinion and order upholding the constitutional rights of Pennsylvanians, striking down their stay-at-home orders, their business closure orders, and their congregate number orders, allowing people to go watch their kids play high school football, have weddings, have political events. And so Pennsylvania, the yoke of the governor and Secretary of Health were lifted by a federal court from our backs and shoulders in Pennsylvania last week.

Are they going to argue and take it up to a higher court? Oh, they are. They've already said that they intend to appeal. Actually, we have until noon today to tell Judge Stickman why he should not stay the order. And so after I get off this interview, we're going to be filing with Judge Stickman and telling him to stick to his guns and do not issue a stay. We hope that we're successful. And Pennsylvania is they're breathing some breath of freedom here today, Glenn.

There's some frightening things happening in Pennsylvania now with the vote that is coming up. You're looking now, it's going in through your highest court on, they're trying to get this cleared through the court to be able to say, you don't need a postmark for your mail-in ballot until the Friday after the election. There's no way people will. You think that they will rule against it? They already have, and it's worse than that. They've okayed putting in these collection bins,

much of which is being funded by Mark Zuckerberg. $250 million was put into a very small charity that he's now using to try to fund the, the blue cities and counties to put in these boxes and really to obviate what have been years and years of election along Pennsylvania. Our Supreme Court has already ruled that recently this past week, they've ruled that they're going to be able to count ballots three days after the presidential election. And they're going to collect these things in bins, so there's not going to be any postmarks on most of these ballots. So it's really abominable. I look for almost instantaneous challenges.

I suspect that the House of Representatives will file a challenge here and that will be in federal court, not in the state Supreme Court, where the Democrats hold a five to two majority in our state Supreme Court. Because this won't, this won't, Americans won't accept things like that. I mean, you know, the rest of the country, Pennsylvaniaans might, but the rest of the country, won't. If you didn't play by the rules and you can just throw things in with even without a

postmark, you know, three, up to three days after the election, who's going to, who's going to believe that's real? Well, I don't believe it's real. And I don't think, I don't think most Pennsylvanians think it's real. But it is certainly where we are today. And this, this so-called new normal, you know, when Judge Thickman said, there is no new normal under the Pennsylvania, under the United States Constitution. There is no new normal. We have a constitution and that's what we have to abide by. It's bad news, Glenn. It's really bad news. I don't think I don't think people are going to stand for it. Are good attorneys who are on the right? Are they volunteering their time to fight and to monitor and to be there to be able to file the other side? Because we know the

the left has attorneys already assigned all over the country yeah we have lots of we have lots of legal power we have uh just from our case we've received uh literally dozens and dozens of offers and calls um and so we also know that in pennsylvania we have terrific lawyers uh representing uh the republican party and the people in this particular fight. So I look forward to a real battle here over these recent pronouncements from the Supreme Court. All right. Let me just take you back one last question on Pennsylvania, the ruling that happened last week with you, where you got a judge to say these things are unconstitutional.

You can't lock the people up like this for COVID. if the judge grants the stay, then that means it goes to the higher court, right? No. Well, whether he grants the stay or not, it's going to go to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and the Virgin Islands. And so it'll go to that court, which is the court right below the U.S. Supreme Court. But what does he have to rule so you can start to, open things up?

He just has to deny the stay up. Deny the stay. Yeah, and that's today. Now, they can also file again for a stay in the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. So we'll see what happens there as well. Okay. Thank you very much, Thomas. I appreciate it.

Thomas King, attorney for the Pennsylvania counties that were fighting COVID-19. You're listening to the best of the Glendek program. You said you'll make the announcement this week. Can you tell us more about that? Will it be the beginning of the week? What day? I think it'll be on Friday or Saturday. It looks like we will have probably services on Thursday or Friday. As I understand it, I think in all due respect, we should wait until the services are over for Justice Ginsburg.

And so we're looking probably at Friday or maybe Saturday. So I think that's nice. I would imagine that there are some radicals out there going, well, just don't bury her for a month because we can make it in time. And I think it's really important that the Republicans and the president do this. We have Kerry Severino on with us. She is the president of judicial crisis. And we wanted to talk to her. And I guess, I guess, Kerry, the first question is, do we have enough time to confirm a SCOTUS replacement before the election? The answer is yes, absolutely. You look at like Justice O'Connor, she was confirmed

33 days after her nomination was submitted, and she was unanimously confirmed. You have Justice Ginsburg herself, 42 days, again, almost unanimously, and Justice Stevens, 19 days. Now, that was, you know, that was, you know, a couple decades ago, but we can totally do it. And what's interesting is all of these women that the president is looking at, they have been recently confirmed by the Senate, and I think all with bipartisan majority. So the Senate has seen them recently, their information, like their background file from the FBI, all is almost up to date already. I think there's not a lot standing the way of moving forward.

We already know, you know, even the senators are familiar with all of these not potential nominees already. Okay. So he said he had a list of five, but three of them we know. Are you familiar with those three female judges? Yes. Yeah. The three that we hear a lot about are Amy Coney Barrett.

Obviously, everyone remembers her dog, Milds Lively Within You moment with Senator Feinstein last year, those anti-Catholic attacks that went on. She held her own with grace under pressure. She's the mother of seven, including two children who were adopted from Haiti. Just a really inspiring story in her life. Barbara Lagoa, who had spent over a decade in the Florida state courts now is on the 11th Circuit, thanks to Donald Trump. She is the daughter of Cuban immigrants who really speaks eloquently about her own parents desire to come here

because they wanted their children to grow up in a nation of laws, not a tyrannical government. And so she's very committed to making sure that the role of a judge is to just interpret the law, not make it up. And then Allison Rushing is someone else, the president mentioned. She's a Fourth Circuit nominee. She is someone who has a distinguished legal career. She clerked for Justice Thomas, like I did. She also came under fire, like Barrett, during her confirmation process because she'd been involved in the group Alliance defending freedom, which stands for religious freedom and things like that.

So she understands also what it's like to be attacked for your faith. So the one that I mean, let's just play politics here for a second. Then I'll quickly switch to Constitution. But the one who makes sense, I think, on both sides politically and also with the Constitution is Barbara Lagoa. I mean, the background of her being Cuban, she's from Florida, Cuban, and then more importantly, being the first American generation. I think those people get it much more than any. else, and I think that that's a strong vote for her on sticking to the Constitution. Would you agree, or all three of them that way?

Who's the best on holding to the Constitution, do you think? You know, the great thing about these final short-listers that we're hearing about, honestly, I think all of them would be outstanding. I could put my feel of approval on all of them in terms of what I've seen of their record on the court. So that's really encouraging. Yeah, they all have slightly different stories, but I think. think all have inspiring stories. And it's interesting. They're going to all, thankfully, very much

diverge from where Justice Ginsburg would be in terms of her jurisprudence, right? But I do think they carry on that same tradition of being strong women, you know, being path-breaking in many ways. You know, in particular, when you think of Barrett, you know, doing all this with seven kids, how many, how many mothers of seven do you know who are that accomplished in her field and have risen that far? Lagoa, obviously, with her, your inspiring story of. of coming here and being the first generation. So these are people who can really fit into that legacy nicely in terms of all of the best things, I think, about Justice Ginsburg of her strength and her courage.

Do you see any of these fitting a Scalia or a Thomas kind of standard? That's the reason they're on the list, right? I mean, you've got people like Barrett, who was a Scalia clerk, and I've heard one of his favorite clerks, rushing was a. Thomas Clerk and Lagoa didn't clerk for either one, but I love that there was a mean that went around right after she was nominated. It said Lagoa, it's Spanish for Clarence Thomas. And that's really how I think a lot of the conservative movement in Florida views her.

I don't think she has as much, you know, known as much nationally. But so I think all of them, that's the reason they're picked, is this approach to the law where you look first and foremost at what the text said. It's not what I wish it said. It's not what I think in 2020. to say it's what did our elected representatives pass? What does the Constitution itself actually say? And then, you know, let the chips fall where they may. And if it's not the result you want, go back to Congress and fix it. So, you know, we're just concerned. I think all Americans are just

concerned that we would have another Roberts pick that. Oh, yes. You know, that's been devastating. Right. Well, that's why I think what you're seeing, and this is something that all of Trump's list was really chosen with Robert in mind. When, when, when, uh, Molly, Hemingway and I were working on a book on the Kavanaugh nomination, Justice on Trial, we learned that part of his vetting process was trying to find like the anti-Robberts, someone who they thought would be strong in the face of pressure. That's why it's so exciting to see people, for example, you know, like the Barrett or the Russian, who got pressure during their confirmation process and nonetheless stood up to it.

You know, Lagoa has had, she already on the 11th Circuit has had people trying to launch politically motivated recusal campaigns, and she stood firm. She's like, no, I don't have to recuse in this case. This is an important case. I'm going to sit on it. So you have to have someone who has illustrated in their career that they've got that spine. And what's exciting is all these women have shown they have spines and steel. But Lagoa is the only one that hasn't been already in front of a hearing, right?

He confirmed to the 11th Circuit by the Senate. So all three of them have been confirmed by, this Senate, well, or this is the previous Senate, but within the Trump administration. So again, all of their, you know, their vetting has been recently updated. They have been, they've gone through that kind of harrowing process once recently. So I feel like, you know, we're talking about people all of whom are ready, well, if you can ever be ready for what we expect is coming. Because we know that, you know, the Kavanaugh nomination was crazy. I don't know how you make it crazier, but I know that there's Democrats right now having brainstorming session trying to figure out.

But you're a little boy that cried wolf. I mean, you do that a second time. I think that galvanized the country. A lot of people changed their view of what was going on in the Democratic Party because of that. And to have that kind of an outrageous scene again, I think would be devastating to the Democrats. Yeah, I know. I think you're exactly right. They totally overstepped.

And I think it really hurt them. Yet somehow, you know, when you look at all the stuff going on, they don't seem to have gotten that message. There's, I think that the radical edge of the party is, you know, is going crazy. And they're kind of setting themselves on fire sometimes literally in ways that I don't think is what most Americans is certainly not independence. And, you know, the moderate wing of the Democratic Party wants to see. So, you know, have at it. Overstep again. Let's see how that works for it.

Is there anything in their records that that has been drug out, that, you know, could be expanded. Have you seen anything that is bad, or not bad, but just like, oh, geez, that's there. And they had to explain it, but it could be made up into something bigger. Have you seen any trouble or weak spots in any of these people? Well, there's certainly stuff in their records that's going to get controversy, but I think generally it's controversy for all the right reasons. It's going, oh, my gosh, how could you have, you know,

there's cases where they've all ruled and someone's going to go, well, that's a really sympathetic plaintiff and their answer, which is the right answer, you know what? That's what the law said, and I don't write the law. That's not my job as a judge. So what I have seen is, of course, you're going to get controversy, but I think it's going to be the right kind of controversy on these nominees that we're looking at, and that's really excited. Now, they have, none of them that's had case in every single area of law. No one has. But I think we have a lot of really, you know, these are all people with, with records that we can look at. And that's what, that's what it has to come down to is you look at the objective record that they have. So you can see how they really perform

on the bench. Is there anything that the Democrats can do seeing that the Senate is controlled by the Republicans and a lot of weenie Republicans? But is there anything that the Senate can do, the Democrats can do, to stop this dead in its tracks? Is there any trick, you know, in the parliamentary rules to be able to stop this? Or can Mitch McConnell, if he can keep his crowd to together proceed. I think if he's got 50 votes, he can do it because we got, we got the vice president, and I hope he gets more than 50 votes. But, you know, obviously, I am not a Senate rules expert.

That stuff is crazy. It's really involved. I'm sure they're out there brainstorming. Again, trying to find some hole. But if they couldn't do it for Kavanaugh, I don't think they're going to be able to find it now. And, you know, we'll see crazy stuff going on, like where they, remember even during the first Kavanaugh hearing where they tried to.

just talk over Chairman Grassley, it's an hour to get through a 10 and open. Stuff like that, you know, made for TV little moments. Right. But I don't think they actually, at the end of the day, are going to have the vote. And last question. As they go through and you're looking and saying, you know, they need to have 50. We're going to lose Romney, which would bring us to 50.

We've got the two that have already said they're not on board. And then if you lose Romney, you're at 50, is there any. anybody else that you're concerned that might go? Do you watch any of that stuff? You know, it's hard to keep track. I know there's people who they don't want to have a vote now or whatever. I do think it's going to be hard when you are looking at one of these women in the face and you see the outstanding role models that they are, the path-breaking careers that they've led.

I think it's going to be hard to come to a point and say, yeah, I don't think this person deserves the vote. So, you know, we'll see. I think Leader McConnell knows better than anyone where his votes are. he's going to be in charge of how to navigate this to the Senate. He did it for Gorsuch. He did it for Kavanaugh. Those are really controversial. I'm confident he can do that again.

That's great. Well, I feel so much better talking to you. Let's please stay in touch because I'm going to need to stay in a happy mood. And I think America needs to. Kerry, thank you very much for your analysis. Appreciate it.