In the Oval Office, BIGGEST Stock Market Surge in History, plus Mexico Stealing our Water & Trump Fights Back
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got to see it trust me you'll be hooked follow formula e live on roku next race miami april 12th hey clay if there was a summer camp for critical thinking we'd be the chief counselors those jellyheads in june would be intellectual warriors by august be a lot of fun too some bill and ted's excellent adventure references thrown in this podcast like a daily dose of that minus the campfires archery and pranking the girls the

Bonafide boot camp for critical thinking. You can get in on it for free at the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Just search our names, Clay and Bach, listen and subscribe. Welcome to this verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. And Senator, it was a very exciting day. You spent some time with the president today in the Oval Office, even got a nice little challenge coin as well.

So I did. I spent about two hours in the Oval with President Trump today. And today was a very significant day. So let's start. Yesterday was a phenomenal day. Yesterday, President Trump paused the tariffs that he announced last week on April 2nd. And at the same time, he jacked up the tariffs on China. The combination of those activities produced the greatest single-day increase in the stock market

in the history of the United States of America. Now, this week I've spent a lot of time talking to President Trump. We're going to break that down. We're going to talk about the impacts of that. We're going to talk about the backstory of why the president did that and what to expect next. We're also going to talk about something the president did this evening. You and I are talking, it is right now, 1225 a.m. Thursday night.

And we're in the same place. This usually doesn't happen. We're in the same time zone right now. We're both in D.C. Why are we in D.C.? Because in a half hour, I'm going to be on the Senate floor. We have votes starting at 1 a.m. So the Democrats are so angry. They hate Trump so much that they are blocking the nomination for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And so, look, I'm going to commend Republicans in the Senate. We're saying, all right, screw you.

Because they're objecting, they could delay the vote until tomorrow. Tomorrow is now today because it's past midnight. So we're like, fine, we'll do it. We'll just hang out until 9 a.m. Let's go. By the way, if the Democrats had agreed, we could have left at like 6 p.m. on Thursday. But no.

They're going to drag all 100 senators to the floor at one in the morning. By the way, we've got senators in their 80s. We've got senators in their 90s. I do not envy the guy who has that job to wake up the senator because, you know, they're asleep. Yeah, look, this is where it helps being a night owl. To be honest, I'm much happier doing a 1 a.m. vote than if they did a 6 a.m. vote. I'd be really pissed because I, as you know, I 100 percent believe you.

I've seen you in the morning. By the way, I will say this. So you and I record the pod. We record it often at 10 p.m. or 11 p.m. Let's keep going up. Or midnight. There we go. Now we're getting into reality. That's much more. So the pod two days ago, we finished at 2.30 in the morning. Yes. And I will say I'm glad you used to do a morning radio show. What time did your morning radio show start? 7 a.m. is when it started. So I had to be up in like...

Up and at him. Thank the Lord I don't do it anymore. You had to be awake. You had to be conscious. I had to be awake. I had to have coffee. I had to know what was going on. You had to be educated. You had to presumably say something charming and funny. And intelligent. If someone's going to listen to you. Can't wing it for two hours. And I got to say, when I was keeping up until 2 and 3 in the morning, and you were getting up at 6, 6.30. Yep.

I actually felt an enormous degree of guilt. I'm like, I'm killing Ben. You were on your way. It was the easiest way to get rid of me. I don't want to kill you, Ben. I appreciate that. I want to give you grief and abuse you, but I don't want you dead. I just want you being loudly made fun of. There's a reason why they took me off that show one day. There's a reason. And your boss in the iHeart world, Julie, she said, all right,

Ben, I'm sparing you from the morning show. 100%. Because we've decided that a dead Ben would be a bad thing. That is how I know my life is valued on this earth right now. There you go. So tonight also, Donald Trump leaned in and engaged on an issue that may sound esoteric, but it's actually a big deal, which is Mexican water. Mexico has been stealing...

massive amounts of water from Texas. This is an issue I've been leading the fight on a very long time, and it's had an enormously harmful impact on Texas farmers. I've been leading the fight against it, and tonight the president, at my behest,

leaned in vigorously and said, Mexico, you will provide the water that you have committed by treaty to provide or else they're going to be very serious penalties, tariffs and sanctions. It's a big deal. And I would use those two words. He did. As you and I are sitting here at 1225 a.m.,

The Mexican government is freaking out. And you know what's going to happen? They're going to provide the farmers of South Texas the water. I'm going to walk you through the backstory of that. It is fascinating in terms of how international diplomacy has played out and the advantage of a strong president who actually fights for America.

versus the incredibly weak and ineffective president we had for the last four years. Yeah, it's a really cool story. We'll talk about that. Plus, just like what happens in the Oval, the trinkets. The trinkets are impressive. We'll tell you about that in a moment. I want to tell you, though, real quick about the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews. Because of amazing people just like you, we are standing with the people in Israel right now who are still under attack.

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That's 888-488-IFCJ. That's 888-488-IFCJ. Or online at supportifcj.org. That's one word, supportifcj.org. All right, so let's just start with a little bit of color here. I got to say one of the most fun things about going to the Oval Office is

is Donald Trump loves having guests. Yes. And the swag that you leave with is just the most incredible level of swag. And he pays for it out of his own pocket. He does. It's not the taxpayers. So when I went in the first time, it was in the last in 45 in those years.

And they asked if I would come up for State of the Union and prep and that. And I was there the day of the State of the Union. And at the end, he's like, Ferguson, he's like, I know you got three boys at home. What do you need? And I'm like, Mr. President, whatever, you know, if you'd sign. He's like, no, no, come over here. And he walks you around the corner into the room. He has this like full swag room.

And he's like, three different hats for the boys, signs them. He's like, now one of your son plays golf. He signs a Pro V1 ball for him. Then he gives me another sleeve. Then he gives me a golf towel. And then he's like, and you're laughing because you're in the Oval Office. And you're like, I'm going to walk out of here. Like with all this stuff. To be fair, you're not in the Oval. Well, no, you're outside of it. But when you walk back in, you're like holding all this stuff in the Oval. You're in the little office next to the Oval. Yes, where the swag room is. And what happened in that little room was,

Which is one of his favorite stories. He's like, you know where you are right now. 25 years. Yeah, he's like, you know where you are right now? And I'm like, where am I right now? This is where Monica Lewinsky... Did not have sex with that man. But shall we say...

I don't know. Okay. I think I did it perfectly there. I'm trying to find a way to say this. Yeah. And this is where Bill Clinton did not have sexual relations with that woman, quote unquote, but may have. But it's also where the blue dress got sullied. There you go. That's a great way of putting it. And it would be in that room. And you kind of look around and it's sort of little and it's now filled with, if you can imagine...

Make America Great Again hats, the 45-47. I mean, it's legit. And he has all these shells full of swag, and he says, hey, what do you want? Take whatever you want. And by the way, there's nothing in there that you can buy. So it's either from there or you don't. It's not. And he pays for it all. He's paying for it himself. But he's like, what do you want? You want like they had gigantic MAGA hats that are like twice the size of a normal hat.

The one that Elon Musk wore that kind of made it famous. A lot of people remember he put it on. He was like, so he actually pointed that out. So that's the one Elon wears. Yeah.

So, and it's got all this stuff. He's got, it's cool stuff. And by the way, the VIP gift is what I was told, which I think we can confirm is true, is the cufflinks. So he looked at me, he's like, Ferguson, you need this. Can't buy these anywhere. And he hands them to me. It's presidential cufflinks. They're amazing. I still have them this day. You've got a pair now as well. So I do. And I've had a couple of presidential cufflinks in the past. Yeah. But.

But these are really... These are the coolest. These are really damn cool. And I will say his challenge coins. So in the military and in law enforcement, people carry challenge coins. Yep. And they're typically about the size of a silver dollar. And so if you come to my office, you've been to my office, I have one entire display of military challenge coins. And I probably got, I don't know, 200 of them that as I've traveled the world... They give them to you. They give them to you. It's awesome. Yeah. And then I have another display of law enforcement challenge coins. So...

police officers, law enforcement. And so the two are, one's behind my desk, the military is behind my desk, and the other is on the other end of my office, like kind of across my desk. So they're normally about the size of a silver dollar.

Trump this evening gave me two challenge coins he's had made. And his challenge coins are literally 300% the size of a Chinese coin. It is like the size of the tariff he put on Chinese goods. It's the size of a pancake. Yeah, it's a coaster. It's a coaster. It's a coaster. It's a coaster. That's exactly like. It is a straight up coaster. And he has one that's sort of gold and fancy. And then he has another that is gun metal. And he said, actually, these are more popular because it's like military gun metal. Yeah.

And it's present in the United States and a really cool coin. I love it. That's the fun part about it. And you were there, by the way, for something that was not making big headlines, but it deals with crypto. And we're going to talk about this in another pod. Yeah, no, that's exactly right. I was there for a bill signing. So legislation that I introduced to...

to repeal an incredibly abusive regulation from the Biden administration that harmed the crypto industry. And I got it passed through Congress. The president signed it into law. And so I've been there for a number of bill signings of legislation I passed. But it's always cool because you're passing legislation. The president signed it. Suddenly it becomes law. Did you get to keep the pen? He loves giving away the Sharpie. Yes. And it's not a Sharpie.

It is much like the challenge coin. It's huge. It is huge. It is probably 300% the size of a Sharp. Yeah, it's like oversized. So when he signed my boy's hats, he goes, here's the pen. Take the pen home. And I still have the pen at my desk. It's like...

It's got the and it's got the Trump gold signature on the side. Yeah. So so I'll end up in my office framing that signing pen because it's legislation that I passed that's really significant. And in my office, I have a bunch of different pieces of legislation signed and a number of them are signed are framed with the signing pen. So I was there for that. But look, a couple of things. One, we talked a lot about tariffs and let's rewind two days ago. Yep.

So we have talked in this last week, we've had two podcasts entirely devoted to the Trump tariffs. We had one, our Friday podcast, right after the tariffs came out, 100% of the podcast was on the tariffs. And then our Monday podcast, we talked about two competing camps in the Trump administration. We talked about angels and devils that were on President Trump's shoulders.

The angels were urging the president, use the leverage of the tariffs you've announced to fight for lower tariffs across the world to expand market access for America. I emphatically agree with that side. The devils, and there are voices in the administration, they want to see massive tariffs in perpetuity from America and every other country. I think that's a terrible outcome. So we did Monday's podcast. We did a deep dive on that. So I will tell you, you and I are sitting here Thursday night.

Tuesday night, I spent an hour on the phone with President Trump and I had several other senators there and we were urging him. What I was saying is, listen, the market is in free fall. That's dangerous. People are freaking out. Sure.

And my advice to him, and I said I did Hannity Tuesday night, and so I said this on Hannity, and so this is not secret advice. I said it on Fox News to the whole country. I said my advice is cut a deal now. Pick one or two countries. Cut a deal now. I don't care what countries they are. Pick one. Pick two. And cut a deal where they slash their tariffs massively and we slash our tariffs massively. I said I think that will calm the market down enormously. That will assuage people.

that we are headed to a world with much lower tariffs, which by the way, as I told him, if 30 days, 60 days, 90 days from now, we have a world where every country on earth has massively lower tariffs and American farmers and ranchers and small businesses and manufacturers are able to export all over the world, that will be an historic win, like an unprecedented win for American workers and American jobs. So that's what I'm urging him.

We spent an hour on the phone. And I got to say, look, President Trump, sometimes when you're urging him to do something, he can push back. And in that call, he was kind of pushing back and popping back. And he's saying, look, these tariffs are great. We're raising a ton of money. What's the problem? Spent an hour. But then on Wednesday, the president put out an announcement at lunchtime. And his announcement was twofold. Number one, he said he was pausing online.

All of the reciprocal tariffs he had announced on April 2nd. For 90 days. For 90 days. Which is enough time to get deals done. And number two...

He said he was jacking up the tariffs on China even more. He said to 125,000, although it's actually 125 percent. Yeah, but it's actually 145 percent because there's an additional 20 percent that he had announced as a penalty for their role in fentanyl smuggling into this country. Yep. So the total tariffs against China are 145 percent.

Now, he announced that, I'll tell you, on Wednesday, I was in the Senate Republican lunch. All the Senate Republican senators, we have lunch together every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. The middle of the lunch, Rick Scott, who hosts the Wednesday lunch, Rick Scott looked at his phone and announced, hey, the president's just paused all the tariffs and increased the tariffs on China. There wasn't exactly a round of applause. But close. Pretty damn close. There was literally a palpable sense of relief.

And what is striking is the market within minutes exploded and stocks soared up. So tonight when I was in the Oval, I said, Mr. President, as a result of your decision yesterday, you produced the single largest increase in the stock market in one day in the history of the United States of America.

That's a good day. That is a massive day. And so I will say the pause is important. I hope over these next 90 days, I hope what we see is, as we talked about on Monday's pod, there are two paths, massively reducing tariffs for everyone or keeping tariffs in perpetuity.

Over the next 90 days, I hope we see announcement after announcement after announcement of our trading partners, all of whom have come running to President Trump saying, we want to cut a deal. And to be clear, none of this would have happened without the April 2nd announcement.

None of it. Well, and Scott Bissett, by the way, said this at the White House when they announced this. He walked out and he said, this is all about leverage, which is what the president said. Take a listen. It was the president's decision to wait until today. And again, as I've said in the past, no one creates leverage for himself like President Trump.

And he said that, by the way, at the point when the Dow was up 2000 points. Right. So he just announced it walks out there. And then Caroline Leavitt also was a reminder like, hey, we're letting the rest of the world off the hook. But when it comes to China, we're not. She said this is the same press conference. And as you all know, the president just put out a statement announcing an additional tariff on China. The tariff on China will now go up to one hundred and twenty five percent.

because China imprudently decided to retaliate against the United States. And as I said at the podium yesterday, when you punch at the United States of America, President Trump is going to punch back harder. In that same vein, we have had more than 75 countries from around the world reach out to President Trump and his team here at the White House to negotiate better trade deals for the American worker. We have been overwhelmingly

with the amount of requests from countries around the world. I'll let the secretary speak to that. We will continue with the tailor-made negotiations that I spoke about yesterday. In the meantime, there will be a 90-day pause on the reciprocal tariffs as these negotiations are ongoing. And the tariff level will be brought down to a universal 10% tariff. I mean, you listen to them and I think it's pretty clear. By the way, I will say this. Caroline Leavitt, I know really well. Yeah. She's a good friend. So Caroline ran for Congress in New Hampshire.

And she was running for Congress. If I remember correctly, she was 25 years old. Yeah. And by the way, the Constitution, the minimum age for a member of Congress is 25 years old. Yep. On the House side, yep. Yep. Member of Congress is 25, a senator is 30, and the president must be 35. That's what the Constitution lays out.

So Caroline was running in New Hampshire. As you know, I raised a ton of money for Caroline. Yep. I believe, if I remember correctly, north of $100,000 to support her campaign. And I flew to New Hampshire and campaigned with her. She was a great presidential candidate. She was a great candidate. And by the way, I told the president that tonight. I said, look, she's kicking ass as your press secretary. But she was a fabulous – and the coolest part, we did a huge rally and she rocked it. It was a lot of energy and excitement. Yeah.

And then we went afterwards to a bar. I think it was a VFW bar, if I remember correctly. And there were like several hundred, mostly veterans. And we were having a beer with them and they loved her. It was really cool. It was like a fun. It was after the event, hanging out, having a beer with a bunch of New Hampshire veterans. And it was like a great moment. Now she ended up, she won the primary.

She did not win the general, although I pointed out to her tonight, I said, look, that didn't work out, even though you were a great candidate. But I said, you know what?

You'd rather do the job you have now than being a freshman house member. Oh, biggest blessing in disguise. Because if she was in the house, she would have done that job. She would be the press secretary right now. It's amazing how those things happen in your life when you're like, you want something so bad and then you don't get it. And then you're like, man, if I would have gotten that, look at what I would have missed. You know the country western song, some of God's greatest gifts are unanswered prayers? Yeah. Oh, yeah. And there have been multiple steps in my life where I desperately wanted something.

I didn't get it. I was crestfallen. I was frustrated. I used to keep, all right, this is going to be sort of a weird admission. When I was in high school and college, I literally kept a file folder. And by the way, for all of you under 30, you don't know what a file folder is. But I had like a file cabinet with a folder. You know what it was called? What? Failures.

How many were in there? A lot. Okay. So look, I was someone, I tried for things, I applied for things. I wanted to be a Rhodes Scholar. I applied for the Rhodes Scholarship. I didn't get it. I was really, I was like, damn, I'd really like to be a Rhodes Scholar. I'm pissed I didn't get it. Yeah. But, all right, I think it's 10th grade. Okay, this is, okay, I'm sort of embarrassed. Like, you guys know me.

Ben's a jock. He was like a cool kid and like, you know. I tried hard. I tried hard. Although, to be fair, is a tennis player really a jock? Well, you know. It's a sort of wussy jock. In the SEC, it is. I mean, it's not a linebacker. In the SEC, it is. But like a tennis player, you're wearing like a white eyes on. Like it's not the same. We had some good swag. We had some good swag.

we had some nice Nike swag. Like they, we did it right. I'm just saying you were division one. It's not basketball. It's not baseball. I'll give you that. I will give you dunk. No, I cannot dunk. I played hoops with you. I knew the answer. Yeah. Yeah. I cannot. Um, but,

I wasn't going for Rhodes Scholar, I can promise you that. And I didn't have a briefcase. You had a briefcase. That's what we're really getting at here. No, I didn't have a briefcase. No, I'm sorry. I'm not Alex P. Keaton, which no one knows who that was, but he was Michael J. Fox in Family Ties. Amazing show. But, all right, so in 10th grade, I was sitting there in class with my classmates, and they were talking about, like, applying to a scholarship. Yeah. And several of my classmates said, well, no, no, I'm not going to apply. And I said, well, why not?

And they said, well, if I apply, I might get rejected. And I don't want to fail, so I'm not going to do it. Yeah. And you're like, screw that. I'm going for all of it. And I wrote a poem in 10th grade, which I don't have, but I'm going to try to remember it. I don't know that I can remember it exactly. But imagine a dreamer walking off a cliff with hopes and aspirations. Many would say his steps were foolish. And yet all the great inventors...

discoverers and achievers would say nothing ventured, nothing gained. And here's another element to complicate the matter. What if the walker learned to fly? And this is me as a geeky 15-year-old

Writing a poem. Writing a poem. It just inspired me. Like, if you don't walk off a cliff... That was before ChatGBT, so you didn't even steal it from anybody. Like, if you don't walk off a cliff, you ain't growing wings. Okay, fair point. And so, I literally had a whole folder of failures, things I tried to do that I did not accomplish. But if you are... To use another great hero of mine, Teddy Roosevelt. Yeah. You know, TR gave a great commencement speech about being in the arena, the man who is marred by blood and...

and mud in the arena and not one of those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat. Nor defeat. And so... I forget where I'm going on this. No, you're talking about failures. You're talking about Caroline Leavitt failing at going for Congress. Yes, which was a blessing for her. And now it's the biggest thing in her life. So you're saying count your failures because they can be your blessings later in life. If you have no failures...

You've done nothing. I just want to prove that right now to my wife how good of a listener I am because I just saved that whole story right there. I just want credit for that moment. Anyway, continue. Is she going to buy that? I don't know. We'll see if she listens to the show because if she doesn't listen, we're both going to know. Well, look, I will say what happened on tariffs. Wednesday was a massive day, number one, for the market and for a huge surge.

But number two, the 90 days we have an opportunity. This is not hyperbole. President Trump could achieve the greatest victory for jobs and economic growth, certainly in our lifetimes and maybe in the history of America.

Now, well, and you read between the tea leaves here like there does seem to be a strategy here. And this is some of the genius I do have to think of that I give credit for that a lot of people miss on President Trump. It seems like he's saying, hey, rest of the world, I want to get along with you.

I'm going to bust China. They're taking advantage of us. They're stealing our intellectual property. It's a national security issue. We witnessed what we witnessed during COVID with them as a nation. I want everybody else to succeed, and we're going to make sure they don't have all of this leverage over not just us, but other partners in the world. Yes, but look, the two things I've been urging President Trump for a long time on trade to focus on.

are number one, focus on China. I am all for pounding the living daylights out of China. You know, when I arrived in the Senate 13 years ago, what I said then

is China poses the single largest geopolitical threat to the United States over the next hundred years. Amen. Now, Ben, when I arrived, that was a lonely voice. Almost nobody agreed with me. Every Democrat disagreed with me, and most of the Republicans disagreed with me.

They looked at China and they saw nothing but dollar signs as far as the eye could see. Now, the world has changed. I think a lot more people have opened their eyes to the danger, to the peril. China is fighting a thousand year war against the United States.

And that's not hyperbole. I mean, that's that's really how they look at it. And everything we can do to de-link our economy from China is a good step. So so I've urged President Trump, you can't focus on China too much. The more you can bring jobs out of China, the more you can bring our critical infrastructure out of China, the more you can bring pharmaceuticals out of China, the more you can bring.

semiconductors out of China. Everything we depend upon, China is coming after us. And this is national security things we depend on. It is national security, it's economic security. This is a fundamental battle. So I am all for focusing on China. But the other principle, reciprocity. Look, I don't want to be overly optimistic, as we mentioned on Monday's podcast. You want to go back and listen to it about angels and devils. There are really vocal,

and outspoken voices in the administration who don't want the president to lower tariffs in other countries. They want tariffs to be high and there forever. And they want the revenue. Look, tariffs are producing about two and a half billion dollars a day in revenues. Now, the point I made to the president, where are those revenues coming from? Tariffs are taxes. They're coming from American consumers. So, yes, it's producing a lot of money.

But I would much rather lower the barriers to other countries and let our farmers and ranchers and small businesses and manufacturers export the hell out of it. Because I think American businesses can beat every company on earth if there's a fair playing field. If most of the countries we trade with, there's not a fair playing field. And so this opportunity and listen, President Trump's negotiation strategy is in some ways simple.

He walks up to people, he smacks them in the head with a two by four, and then he backs up and negotiates from that. Yeah. And it has proven to be an incredibly effective negotiation strategy. So I will say I'm really, really glad about Wednesday's pause announcement. It produced, as I noted, the biggest single day increase in the stock market in history.

And I hope the next 90 days we will see deal after deal after deal slashing tariffs and opening markets to American producers. Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying something like that in the cabinet meeting when he said this about the president. And also he said...

which I think was interesting. He said, and I'm going to quote him. He said, one of the most important things you'll achieve in your presidency is reordering the world in a proper way. For more than 31 years, multiple administrations have allowed the Chinese to de-industrialize this country, to take away jobs and factories and pillars of our national strength. Like this is from a secretary of state who's saying this is the ballgame. Yes.

And the national security saying this is the ballgame. And then producers are saying this is the ballgame. And American workers are saying this is the ballgame. I've never seen a moment politically where so many different factions are all seem to be aligned and understanding this.

This threat, which is in fact is China. And so you look at this next 90 days. It's very important and there's got to be deals done. When do you think we'll start to see deals and momentum? Because it's all about momentum, right? You get one with Vietnam or you get one with Taiwan or you get one with Malaysia or India or wherever it is, right? And you start going country by country. When will we start to see that? Because that's what the market's now looking for. Yeah, look. So what I urged the president Tuesday night is negotiate a deal fast. Okay.

I said, I don't care what country. Just get one on the books. Get one and have it be a massive reduction on both sides because that will assuage people. Okay, this is the path we're going down. When you have 70 plus countries that are seeking to negotiate deals, that takes a little bit of time. That's complicated. Yes. And so I really like the 90-day pause because it gives you 90 days to negotiate deals. And so I hope...

In the next 90 days, we see deal after deal after deal. And I think it'll build momentum. So you think in weeks we'll start seeing the first ones? I don't know. I don't know if it'll be weeks or 30 to 60 days. I don't know how long it takes. 90 days gives us time to do it right. 90 days gives us time to do it right. And...

I have a high level of confidence that in the next 90 days we will see a bunch of them. How quickly? Given the 90-day pause, there's not the urgency. What I was urging, what I said on Hannity is do it now. Don't wait a week. Like, do it tomorrow because, frankly, the market's freaking out and you don't want people's 401ks to go to crap. And so I think there was real value to moving quickly. The pause essentially buys you time.

to then negotiate the deals. And I hope that's what they're going to do. It is Ryan here. And I have a question for you. What do you do when you win? Like, are you a fist pumper, a woohooer, a hand clapper, a high fiver? If you want to hone in on those winning moves, check out Chumba Casino. Choose from hundreds of social casino style games for your chance to redeem serious cash prizes. There are new game releases weekly, plus free daily bonuses. So don't wait. Start having the most fun ever.

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The best way to understand all sides of an issue is to know all sides of an issue. Can't get that in the mainstream media, which is why you've got to listen to some Clay and Buck for another point of view. Buck, why are you going third person? Because, Clay, I think this ad is running in places that might not exactly align with all of our politics or even know who we are. It's impossible. But...

Maybe if it's true, I bet if they did listen, they'd end up agreeing with us on at least one issue, even if they secretly won't admit it. Well, the only way they're going to find out is if they download the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show podcast on the iHeartRadio app or wherever they get their pods. We're easy to find, unlike your wife at Costco.

Clay, you speak the truth, but we're already losing people. I think I gained one or two just now. In case you haven't noticed, we like to have a lot of fun as well as talk about what's going on in the world. Come hang with us today and every day at Clay and Buck. Download the iHeartRadio app, search out those names, Clay Travis, Buck Sexton, and come hang.

All right, before you go to this vote at one o'clock in the morning, not a joke, I want to ask you about this other, I would just say insane news because I can't believe that they've been allowed to do it for so long. And that is that is Mexico voting.

stealing water, which is suffocating farmers. Specifically, it's happening in Texas, and it's making farming industry collapse and farmers disappearing from areas because there is no water. So let me give you the background, because this is a really important issue. It's important in Texas, but it's important to the country, which is there's a water treaty that we signed with Mexico in 1944, the Mexican Water Treaty of 1944.

It obligates Mexico to provide 350,000 acre feet of water a year to South Texas. That's over a five-year period. Okay. For the last five years, Mexico has been openly and brazenly violating the treaty. They've not been providing the water. They are right now in this five-year period, 1.3 million acre feet in arrears.

water they have not provided that they've committed by treaty to provide. Now, what are they doing? They're diverting that water that should go to South Texas farmers under the treaty to Mexican farmers. And a couple of things are happening. So in South Texas, there is a massive drought going on. It is doing enormous damage to farmers. And when I spent a lot of time in South Texas and the damage to farmers is

We're seeing a lot of South Texas farmers that are taking half of their acreage out of production. They're shutting down half of their farms. Just because they don't have the water to do it. Right. They're laying off thousands of workers. So there was one sugar mill in all of Texas. Last year, it shut down. Because of water? And it shut down because the sugar farmers did not have the water to raise the sugar.

And it's gone. And Mexico, on the other side, is green as can be. It is green as can be. The Mexican farmers are prospering. They're literally stealing our water. And by the way, like President Trump talks a lot about foreign countries taking advantage of America. This is a great example. This is literally the Mexican government stealing our water. And did Joe Biden do anything to stop this? Zero. And he knew about it. So he knew about it. So I've engaged...

This issue I started engaging about two years ago. And I started engaging when I was down in South Texas and I did a roundtable with farmers. And they raised this issue to me. And two years ago, I didn't know what the water tree of 1944 was. And they explained it to me. And at the time, they were really worried we're going to lose our sugar mill if this doesn't change. And I said, look, I think I can help. I'm going to lean in. And I began leaning in aggressively. I forced a vote on the Senate floor.

on an amendment to direct the State Department to use every lever point we have to force Mexico to comply with the water treaty. I got a majority of the Senate, a bipartisan majority, and then there's a water commissioner for the United States. I leaned in with the water commissioner and said, look, the Senate has spoken, a bipartisan majority, and here's the fundamental problem.

Joe Biden didn't give a damn about this. So I desperately tried to get the Biden administration to exert leverage. And they just didn't care.

Now, by the way, leverage for Donald Trump at this point was him saying, hey, I'm coming after you with with tariffs or sanctions. So do the right thing now before I have to do that. And they know he means it. Unlike even if you had that same statement from Joe Biden, he wasn't going to do anything. So in South Texas, cities are also facing massive drought. You're literally facing the cities not having enough water for their citizens because Mexico is stealing the water.

And so I leaned in. I could not get the Biden administration to do a damn thing. In December, as part of the continuing resolution, I authored legislation that got adopted that provided $280 million in emergency relief for Texas farmers because they're going broke. And we're talking about generational farms, farms that have been three, four generations who are being bankrupted because their government is not enforcing the treaty and they're being starved of water. And so...

Several weeks ago, I went down to South Texas with Brooke Rollins. Brooke Rollins is the Secretary of Agriculture. Brooke has been a good friend of mine for 25 years. She's a Texan. She's the first Texan in the history of the country to be the Secretary of Agriculture. She's also the first Secretary of Agriculture ever to go to the Rio Grande Valley. Wow. And she came to the valley at my request. I asked her, come down with me. Yeah. And we did...

We did a press conference, number one, where she announced, I've got $280 million I'm giving to South Texas farmers because your federal government has been screwing you by not getting the water back and Mexico is starving you. But we also did a roundtable. We did a roundtable with farmers where Brooke and I talked with the farmers. And the Rio Grande Valley has been bright blue for 100 years. In 2024, the Rio Grande Valley flipped red.

I won the Valley and Donald Trump won the Valley. Incredible. That has never happened. I won Hispanic statewide in Texas by six points. That's never happened. I have spent an enormous amount of time and millions of dollars in the Valley trying to flip the Valley Red because I saw the potential there. And so I think I've invested more than any elected official in Texas in terms of turning the Valley Red. Well, I got to say, sitting there at that round table, you got farmers and ranchers and you're just asking them, look over the last four years,

Did Joe Biden do a damn thing for you? No. And that's how you turn this. And what I told them is I said, listen, if there's one thing you know about Donald Trump, he will stand up to foreign countries and fight for you. And I made that commitment. And frankly, look, these are voters who their entire lives have voted Democrat. Their parents voted Democrat. Their grandparents voted Democrat. Their great grandparents voted Democrat.

And this last election, for the first time, they pulled the lever for Republicans. Going down there and saying, look, we're fighting for you. We're going to get you the damn water is one of the ways you lock those votes. And it's a generational shift for Texas. By the way, this is the first time for verdict.

They've just opened the vote. They're only keeping it open for 15 minutes. So I'm going to go momentarily. You're going to go momentarily, which means actually it's about 12 minutes because I'm a couple minutes behind. This is why I love doing verdict because this is how it really works in the insanity of the Senate. So I will say this. I called President Trump a week ago and I said, Mr. President, it would make a huge difference if you leaned in personally with the president of Mexico and said, provide us the water. Yeah, knock it off. And he said, I'll tell you what.

I'll send a truth social post. And so I worked with him on the wording of it. And tonight when I was in the Oval, I said, Mr. President, can you send that truth post? Yeah. He sent it tonight. I'm going to read it to you. Here's what President Trump sent this evening. Mexico owes Texas 1.3 million acre feet of water under the 1944 Water Treaty. But Mexico is unfortunately violating their treaty obligation.

This is very unfair and it is hurting South Texas farmers very badly. Last year, the only sugar mill in Texas closed because Mexico has been stealing the water from Texas farmers. Ted Cruz has been leading the fight to get South Texas the water it is owed. But Sleepy Joe refused to lift a finger to help the farmers. This ends now.

I will make sure that Mexico doesn't violate our treaties and doesn't hurt our Texas farmers. Just last month, I halted water shipments to Tijuana until Mexico complies with the 1944 water treaty. My agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, is standing up for Texas farmers, and we will keep escalating consequences, including tariffs and maybe even sanctions.

until Mexico honors the treaty and gives Texas the water they are owed. And gives Texas the water they are owed is in all caps. There you go. That tweet got sent out tonight. I'll tell you, in just within an hour of that tweet going out, the president of Mexico sent out a tweet saying, we're going to fix this, we're going to fix this, and the Mexican government is freaking out.

That's what it looks like when you have a president who is fighting for America. Joe Biden could have done that for four years, but he didn't give a flip about farmers in South Texas going out of business. The president's tweet, and I can tell you Mexico is in the process now of negotiating with the State Department to provide for the water.

We're going to get the water, and that's a great, great victory for Texas and America. Go vote. You're on the clock now. I love it. Don't forget, we do a show Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Sometimes it's like 1 in the morning. You're going to run and vote right now. We'll see you back here on, what is today? Thursday, Wednesday? What is today? It's just they're all running together now. Today's Thursday. So this is Friday. So the weekend review will be on Saturday. So there you go, which isn't like a day if you're looking at when we're recording this. We'll see you then. Share this wherever you are on social media, and we'll see you back here on Saturday.

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You know how we're always talking about what's next? Well, I've found it. It's called Formula E. Forget everything you think you know about racing. This isn't just cars going fast. It's like a supercomputer on wheels. The tech is insane. And the drivers? They're like chess grandmasters at 200 miles per hour. You've

Got to see it. Trust me. You'll be hooked. Follow Formula E live on Roku. Next race, Miami, April 12th. Hey, Clay, if there was a summer camp for critical thinking, we'd be the chief counselors. Those jellyheads in June would be intellectual warriors by August. Be a lot of fun, too. Some Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure references thrown in. This podcast, like a daily dose of that, minus the campfires, archery, and pranking the girls.

the bonafide boot camp for critical thinking. You can get in on it for free at the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Just search our names, Clay and Bach, listen and subscribe.