The MeidasTouch Podcast - Republicans Screw Themselves at Live Hearings when Democrats FIGHT BACK

Episode Date: June 19, 2023

MeidasTouch host Ben Meiselas reports on how the congressional hearings set by the GOP backfired in their faces as Democrats took control with powerful messaging. Thanks to Oracle NetSuite! NetSuite is the leading integrated cloud business software suite, including business accounting, ERP, CRM and ecommerce software. Head to NetSuite.com/meidas to get the visibility and control you need to weather any storm! Remember to subscribe to ALL the Meidas Media Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://pod.link/1510240831 Legal AF: https://pod.link/1580828595 The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://pod.link/1595408601 The Influence Continuum: https://pod.link/1603773245 Kremlin File: https://pod.link/1575837599 Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://pod.link/1530639447 The Weekend Show: https://pod.link/1612691018 The Tony Michaels Podcast: https://pod.link/1561049560 American Psyop: https://pod.link/1652143101 Burn the Boats: https://pod.link/1485464343 Majority 54: https://pod.link/1309354521 Political Beatdown: https://pod.link/1669634407 Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://pod.link/1676844320 MAGA Uncovered: https://pod.link/1690214260 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Please gamble responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. I'm Ben Micellis from the Midas Touch Network. MAGA Republicans held a number of hearings that were not intended to help the American people, but simply intended to spread right-wing

extremist messaging to places like Fox and to Newsmax and other right-wing echo chambers. The hearings were called Death by Thousand Regulations, the Biden administration's campaign to bury America in red tape. I suppose the purpose of this hearing was to claim that President Biden is responsible for every single regulation and to attack regulations because we saw how well it went under Donald Trump, where regulations were removed and led to train derailments and bank failures. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. The other hearing that was held by MAGA Republicans called Open Borders, Closed Case, Secretary Mayorkas' Dereliction of duty on the border crisis. And it should be

mentioned that since Donald Trump's failed Title 42 policy has been removed, the crossings at the border have decreased 70% under President Biden's policy. But if you're a MAGA Republican who cares about the facts, and their key witness was the unlawfully acting former Homeland Security Secretary under Donald Trump, Chad Wolf, who a federal judge ruled every single thing he did because he was unlawfully put in his position was completely unlawful in each and every case. But what I like about these hearings is that Democrats continue to push back. Democratic messaging is actually very strong, and I want to highlight that here in this video. So let me show you some of the clips of what went down.

Here is a clip of Democratic Congress member Dan Goldman talking about how this document that MAGA Republicans keep talking about, this FD-1023 form, which is hearsay on top of hearsay, and it is in Russian by a foreign asset that has been rejected over and over and over again, but this is being peddled by the MAGA Republicans. Congress member Dan Goldman, Democrat, basically says, you're just rehashing Rudy Giuliani's bogus allegations. Play this clip. We've heard so much about this FBI 1023 form and how it includes sensational allegations about a massive alleged bribery scheme by President Biden. So I was really eager to read that document this week. Did the majority actually find some actual evidence of wrongdoing by the president? Of course not. But it's even worse than that.

This document that they will not stop talking about is shockingly just a three-year-old secondhand hearsay, uncorroborated rehashing of Rudy Giuliani's bogus allegations that he got from Ukrainian, corrupt Ukrainian officials. Now, we all know that former President Donald Trump was impeached because he tried to extort President Zelensky to announce an investigation into this Ukrainian company, Burisma, that would benefit Trump's political campaign. The theory goes that then-Vice President urged Ukraine to fire its prosecutor general

because he was investigating Burisma and the president wanted to help his son who was on the Burisma board. You know where Giuliani got this information from? That fired prosecutor general himself, the corrupt prosecutor general. And in this next clip, Democratic Congress member Dan Goldman says, look, the Trump DOJ knew about these allegations, but they knew it was baseless because if they thought it was correct, here's what they would have done. They would have appointed a special counsel to investigate it. And they didn't when they got these documents. Play this clip. And you know how we also know? Because the Trump DOJ knew about

these allegations, examined them, and declined to prosecute them. Because if they did prosecute them, they would have had, Bill Barr would have had to appoint a special counsel to investigate the candidate for president, Joe Biden. Chairman Comer has asked why is this committee the only committee that's investigating him? And that's the right question. Why? Because everybody else who's looked at it has found these allegations to be completely bogus. So let's move on and do what the American people sent us here to do. And here where the MAGA Republicans are spreading this conspiracy that Joe Biden, when he was the vice president, was trying to have some policy because of Hunter Biden, whatever the stupid conspiracy is, Democratic Congress member Dan Goldman says

it was official U.S. policy shared by the European Union and others to urge Ukraine to fire the prosecutors because they were not prosecuting corruption. That's what was going on many, many years ago. The prosecutor was in the pocket of Vladimir Putin. I guess MAGA Republicans like that. Here, play this clip. And to be very clear, then Vice President Biden executed official United States foreign policy shared by the EU and the IMF to urge Ukraine to fire the prosecutor general because he was not prosecuting corruption in Ukraine. And there was no Ukrainian investigation into Burisma.

That was a British investigation which collapsed because the corrupt Ukrainian prosecutor general refused to help with it. But don't take my word for it, since what I say is not evidence, because I, like my Republican colleagues, obviously have no firsthand knowledge of what happened in Ukraine in 2016. Instead, we know this from people who do have that knowledge. Numerous State Department officials and members of the intelligence community

who are the country's foremost experts on Russia and Ukraine. Like Masha Yovanovitch, a decorated foreign service official who was the ambassador to Ukraine from 2016 until she was unceremoniously and undeservedly fired by President Trump in the spring of 2019. And Bill Taylor, another former ambassador to Ukraine who took over for Ambassador Yovanovitch. Fiona Hill, one of the country's foremost Russia experts. And George Kent, perhaps the State Department's foremost Ukraine expert, who served as Deputy chief of mission to Ukraine

from 2015 to 2018. He said there was a broad-based consensus that the prosecutor general never prosecuted anyone known for having committed a crime and covered up crimes that were known to have been committed. Let's just compare what we just watched with Lauren Boebert, MAGA Republican, one of the witnesses that the Democrats called and the one the witnesses are called, they take questions from everybody. And this was Lauren Boebert speaking to Sally Katzen. Just to give you a background of who Sally Katzen is, she was a member of the Obama Biden Transition Projects Agency Review Working Group, responsible for the executive office of the Obama-Biden Transition Projects Agency Review Working Group, responsible for the executive office of the president and government operation agencies.

And she held White House positions in the Clinton administration, including as the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. She teaches at NYU School of Law, a very distinguished individual. Compare that to Lauren Boebert, who I guess she had a failed restaurant that gave people diarrhea. I want you to, when bankrupt, I want you to watch this exchange where Lauren Boebert won't even let Sally Katzen answer the question. Play this clip. Would you say that this is an abuse of that separation of power because that rule is not something that Congress has delegated, but the ATF has taken it upon itself to regulate this rule

that they created to make millions of Americans felons. With respect, I was trying to answer your question before you interrupted me to say that the ATF had in each of these instances sufficient statutory authority from Congress and that that any challenges to that. Ms. Katzen, it is my time. So Congress never authorized the ATF to ban pistol braces. Congress never authorized the ATF to do that, to make millions of Americans felons overnight. And so I would go back to your statement that you said in your testimony that these agencies are not free agencies, and they can only do which Congress has delegated to them to do. Congress is not specific. Ms. Katzen, thank you. My time. No, ma'am. It's my

time. Thank you. Oh, I'm sorry. You are not interested in my views. It is my time. Thank you. I'm sorry you're not interested in my views. You stated Congress delegates, but then some officials are quick to condemn the agencies. So Democratic Congress member Jamie Raskin then has to step in and say, can we please have some like civility here? Can we please act like normal human beings here? And the chair, the acting chair of the committee had to remind Lauren Boebert of the rules of civility. Here, play this clip. Emily, home. It may not be a $2.5 million home like yours, but that sounds like a lot of red tape to me. Excuse me.

Do you disagree? I really take that as a personal assumption. Do you disagree? My home. Do you disagree that this was an overreach? I disagree that you're casting aspersions on me or my... Thank you. Mr. Chairman, could we just ask all of our good members to respect the civility and decorum and the integrity of the witnesses who've come forward at their own expense to testify before us today?

An insult is not a substitute for an argument. The chair would advise the members to adhere to the house standard of decorum and proceed in order. Ms. Crockett of Texas is recognized. I know a lot of you watching are entrepreneurs. You run your own business. Heck, I run my own business too. So I know how hard it is to manage your numbers, manage the trends in the market, and budget, well, everything. But not every business is in the dark because of our sponsor today, NetSuite.

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way off so uh oh Jesus okay so this is where we're going to start, Ms. Kaskin. First of all, let me apologize because that was uncalled for. So let me do what she would never do, which is to be an adult in this room or in this chamber. So let me start there. I'm also going to start with some nonsense that she was trying to spew. And unlike Ms. Boebert, I am legally trained and I've passed a few bar exams. And I also legislated before I got here. So I do want to start with correcting the record a little bit. And if you want to add to that, please do. There was conversation about ATF because my colleagues love to talk about their guns, baby.

And I'm from Texas. So let me be clear. I also own firearms. Let me screw Democrats on guns, too. Let me make it clear. I own guns and I'm licensed to carry. That is a regulation. Regulations aren't necessarily bad. It didn't stop me from being able to get a gun. So we were talking about or y'all were talking about the ATF, which I wasn't necessarily bad. It didn't stop me from being able to get a gun. So we were talking about, or y'all were talking about the ATF, which I wasn't going there. I didn't plan to go there. But you know what? I honestly wish the ATF would run amok because we know that seemingly the people that run this chamber don't have the courage to come up with one of the things we've heard is common sense

regulations when it comes to guns. And to be clear, our Constitution, the Second Amendment, anticipates people having common sense. Unfortunately, we have not done that. And unfortunately, it has cost us lives. So when you were testifying a little bit earlier, you talked about unintended consequences and the fact that we are supposed to be able to anticipate that as lawmakers when we are writing laws. Unfortunately, not only have we ignored the unintended consequences, but we've got foreseeable consequences that are continually ignored.

And that is why we are talking about regulation, at least on this side. And here, Democratic Congress member Crockett talks about her state of Texas. Play this clip. So let's talk about my state, because we always got good stuff coming out out of Texas. Unfortunately, my state decided that it didn't want to be a part of the overall national grid because my state did not want to deal with all of the quote-unquote red tape. The cost of that was lives. So we had this winter storm and here it was I was freshly being sworn into the Texas house and I don't know what I'm supposed to do because I started getting calls because there is this thing called climate change. Hello. Nobody's in the chamber on

the other side, but climate change is this real thing. And so in Texas, we had this terrible storm that took place. And even though we are an energy capital, not just in this country, but in the world for clean and dirty energy. Unfortunately, we couldn't keep our own lights on. And it was all because they wanted to avoid red tape. You know what the cost of that was? It was human lives. And I think that that's what being what's being lost. You know what happened in Palestine or East Palestine? the cost was human lives. Unfortunately, seemingly, some people don't want to consider human lives as an actual cost. The only cost that they ever talk about is dollars. Well, let me be clear. I'm not here because of corporate dollars.

I'm here because of people. Back to Democratic Congress member Dan Goldman and his questioning of Chad Wolf, the unlawfully appointed acting former Secretary of Homeland Security, asking him if he supports family separation policy. And then Chad Wolf does what he does best, which is just to lie and say we had no family separation policy. I think that would come as a surprise to MAGA Republicans who cheer the family separation policy on and Donald Trump who brags about that. Play the clip. I want to introduce into the record this inspector general's report on family separation, which includes an email by you to Gene Hamilton, the counselor to the attorney general. So that email had a number of considerations. There was no direction. There was no direct...

So you're saying right here, right now, that you did not support the family separation policy. That was not your question. Is that your testimony? That was not your question. I'm asking it right now. Is that your testimony? We implemented a number of policies in the administration.

I agreed with President Trump when he ended zero tolerance in June, I believe, of 2018. Did you support the family separation policy? Again, we had no family separation policy at the department. Really? The department did not? No, I'm happy to go through this. All right, let's talk about this.

Zero tolerance policy that the department implemented. One sec, one sec. Let's talk about this because the facts are that more than 5,000 children were forcibly separated from their parents at the border. And the reason is because the Department of Justice for the first time used Title VIII, United States Code Section 1325, which makes it a misdemeanor offense to charge anyone crossing without lawful, without papers, etc. That had never been used before because the only point of that is to put parents who are charged with that in jail where they cannot actually be with their families. Now, a federal court in 2018 ended the family separation policy,

which this court determined that there was, because the government's policy, quote, shocks the conscience, unquote, and violates the constitutional right to family integrity. There are still children who were separated at the border from their parents who have not been found because this zero tolerance policy, which ultimately ended up separating parents and children, did not create any mechanism to account for that separation in order to track the children. Now, that clearly, as a judge said, was a violation of the rule of law, an intentional sabotage. Next up, Democratic Congress member Jared Moskowitz, who talks about how we heard this all about big corporations and how big corporations now like regulation.

Just a little public service announcement. If you're mad at big corporations, you don't have to take their money anymore. Here, play this clip. Let's not forget that some of our colleagues, you know, went on camera when Sacha Baron Cohen got into their office and said that they think kindergartners should have guns. We heard that this is all about big corporations, that big corporations now like regulation. Well, by the way, just a little public service announcement. If you're mad at big corporations, you don't have to take their money anymore. That's not like a mandatory thing. Another clip of Congress member Jared Moskowitz pointing out that perhaps what we really need is more regulations regarding former presidents

stealing nuclear codes. Play the clip. And all we want to do is go back to Trump. I mean, every hearing, it's like, ah, if we could just go back to what Trump did, you know, the loser of the 2020 election, the loser of the Georgia Senate races, the loser of the 2018 midterms. By the way, just to jog your memory, the Trump administration finalized more federal rules in the last year of its administration than any other final year of any presidency in American history, more than Obama. I know it's inconvenient timing, but perhaps we actually need more regulation with presidents taking nuclear codes and cuddling with them and showering with them in their homes. Here, Democratic Congress member Eric Swalwell,

just giving the facts about how it was declared that by a federal judge that the former acting secretary of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf, was unlawfully appointed. Play this clip. I've heard the phrase rule of law and accusations that the Biden administration is sabotaging the rule of law. And the title of this hearing is Secretary Mayorkas's dereliction of duty on the border crisis. But I think in contrast to that, it's very interesting to me that the chief witness that the majority has called here, Mr. Wolf, was found on November 14, 2020, by a federal judge to, quote, not lawfully be serving as acting secretary. Not lawfully serving as acting secretary. So a lot of considerations and concerns from my colleague across the aisle about the rule of law, but the witness that they called served unlawfully is the acting secretary of Homeland Security, where an accusation of dereliction of duty is being made

today. In addition to that, again, it's interesting that this is the chief witness that they've called today because on September 17, 2020, the unlawfully serving acting secretary, Mr. Wolf, failed to honor his congressional subpoena. Didn't show up. Skipped the hearing. So you have someone who's acting unlawfully and somebody who skips a congressional subpoena, and we're going to be lectured by the majority about a dereliction of duty of the current lawfully serving Senate-confirmed Secretary of Homeland Security. I think that's interesting and an important perspective that we should have as we consider what's going on at our southern border. In this clip, MAGA Republican James Comer tries to go after AOC, but he kind of botches it and you'll see AOC just so elegantly and forcefully push back. Play this clip. Let's dive in. What we are seeing right now is Republicans trying to roll back a rule on the number of hours that pilots must require in order to train, in order to be licensed.

And I'm amused that the gentlelady is concerned about raising the age, the regulation that limits the age for pilots when there's a shortage of pilots, but they're okay with a president of the United States who's more than 20 years older than the minimum age. Mr. Chairman, since you're referring to me, it's not age, it's training hour time, the number of hours that an individual is training, not the age. Well, part of the regulations, the age as well. And AOC explains that when we're talking about regulations, we're talking about trying to protect people here. Play the clip. And we're hearing the same

arguments from the other side of the aisle saying these these regulations are too onerous, that it's too much of an imposition. But these families have paid the price. They have paid the price. When we see these regulations, and we have heard it themselves, including from the president of the Pilots Association, saying these regulations are written in blood. Food regulations. This committee has overseen PFAS poisoning. Communities that are often low income, that don't have anyone to protect them, rural, urban, inner city,

wherever. They are poisoned when they are not protected, and that is the actual term. People discuss the term regulation. What these are are protections for people, often who have no one else to protect them, who do not have a corporate legal team to protect them, who have endured loss, who have endured disease, fertilities, cancers. This is why we have regulations. Let's go out to the hallway and see what Lindsey Graham is doing. This is Lindsey Graham being asked a question about the special counsel's indictment of Donald Trump.

Here, play this clip. It seems to be selective prosecution. So President Trump has every right to defend himself. I think politically it probably makes him stronger in the primary. If the special counsel indicts President Trump in Washington DC for anything related to January 6th, that will be considered a major outrage by Republicans. Cuz you could convict any Republican of anything in Washington, D.C. And I fear that's where this is going as sort of an insurance policy. And lastly, going to the House floor, this is MAGA Republican Glenn Grothman,

who talks about, he says, it's so offensive for me to even say it. Here, play this clip. I'd like to thank Congresswoman Debbie Lesko for her fight and for our fight regarding gas stoves. What the Biden administration is trying to do with gas stoves is something that has become sadly more and more common from President Biden's party. It doesn't matter to the Hollywood elite, it doesn't matter to the limousine liberals, it doesn't matter to the Silicon Valley billionaires, it doesn't quite frankly matter to the to the welfare classes, but it matters to the middle class as to what their electric or monthly energy bill is. This is part of the Biden administration's effort to shut down gas stoves, which are much cheaper to operate than electric stoves,

is a growing trend towards ignoring the middle class in America. These other groups, I don't think, would know what their electric bill is. And but we have to bring back the gas stoves on the grounds that it will save money for the middle class who does know exactly what their electric bill is. Thank you. Well, make sure you leave a comment in the comment section below. Look, tell me how you feel about these clips, how you think about Democrats pushing back. I think the Democratic messaging is strong here. And, you know, personally, I love covering these hearings because, one, I don't really see any other media covering these hearings. It's important that we all know what's going on. I know you share these videos with family, friends, co-workers, and colleagues

to stay informed about this. And ultimately, we want a meritocracy, right? I mean, setting aside political party, I mean, we want the best team. We want the A team. We want the smartest team, the most intelligent team, the people who are coming up with plans for the American people. And when you see what's going on there, I mean, you could be the judge. Are you team Lauren Boebert? Are you team Dan Goldman? I'll let you make that decision. I'm Ben Micellis from the Midas Touch Network. Hit subscribe. We're on our way to 1.5 million subscribers.

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