The Gravy Train is OVER-Trump Cutting Billions that was Funding the Left-wing Activists, NPR CEO gives Disastrous Congressional Testimony & Signalgate Dem Attack Fails
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Good Monday morning. It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you. Senator, it's nice as always to be chatting with you. And this was a very interesting week for the Democrats, whose secret weapon has always been use the media to Jedi mind trick the American people. Seems to not be working. And they could also be losing their funding when it comes to NPR and their propaganda and PBS.

Well, the gravy train is over. And I got to say, we're two and a half months into the Trump administration, and we have never seen such a concerted onslaught on the entire wall of legislation.

left-wing control, the elites of left-wing control, and in particular going after the money. What Doge is doing, what Trump is doing, what Elon is doing, is going after the billions and billions of funding, whether at USAID, whether at EPA, whether throughout the administration, that are funding the entire apparatus of the left wing. And that is proving incredibly effective. It is sorely needed. And it is causing absolute

chaos and panic and terror. Not only that, we saw truly catastrophic testimony from the head of NPR before the House. NPR and PBS are both hard left propaganda networks funded by the taxpayers, and they're both on the chopping blocks. And the left is panicking because, again, the gravy train is over. And what we're seeing among Democrats right now

is chaos, is fear, is absolute disarray and panic. And the Democrats are scattering. We're going to break all of that down.

And finally, the Democrats' big attempt, the media's big attempt to take down President Trump in these first couple of months was Signalgate. Signalgate, they thought, okay, we've got him. We can take you down. The entire national security team, it was breathlessly reported on every TV station around the clock. Democrats called for resignations. Every one of them went out and bought pearls just so they could clutch those pearls.

And yet the polling has come through now and the president's approval ratings remain historically strong. Signalgate has failed despite the Democrats and the media's full court press. Yeah, it really is incredible. And we're going to dive into all of that as well. I want to talk to you real quick about the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews after more than a year of war, terror and pain in Israel. The need for security essentials and support for first responders is still critical.

Israel must be prepared for the next attack, wherever it may come from, as Israel is surrounded by enemies on all sides. That is where the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews has supported and will continue to support the people of Israel with life-saving security essentials. And your gift today will help save lives by providing bomb shelters,

armored security vehicles, armored ambulances, firefighting equipment, flat jackets, and bulletproof vests, and so much more. Your generous donation today will help ensure the people of Israel are safe and secure in the days to come as threats of terror remain imminent. So give a gift to bless Israel and her people by visiting supportifcj.org. That's one word, supportifcj.org.

That's 888-488-IFCJ, 888-488-4325 or supportifcj.org. All right, so Senator, let's start with something. And again, this goes back to money is power. The Democratic Party has figured this out. They've exploited it to their advantage. And they're going to do it again.

And there was a very interesting article that was written about the money and the shutting off of that valve by Donald Trump, by government funded patronage networks. Explain this to everybody listening. Well, it's an article that was in The Daily Signal and it's entitled How Trump is Decimating the Left's Patronage Networks by Jarrett Stepman. I want to read the beginning of it because it's really, I think, quite powerful.

President Donald Trump has launched a political counter-revolution in the early days of his second presidency. One of the most profound ways he's doing this is by effectively cutting off the left's massive government-funded patronage networks.

What's making Trump's move so effective is that many of these networks are based on government functions that long ago either waned in usefulness or have completely abandoned their purpose. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin appeared on One America News Wednesday and explained how the left has insidiously transformed the federal government into a Democratic Party funding apparatus.

Zeldin explained how the EPA under the Biden administration was used as a slush fund to give money to activists. Quote, the EPA was absolutely being used to push out this green slush fund to their friends, Zeldin said. Quote, Biden, by design, the director of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund leaves one of these NGOs, goes to work for the Biden administration to design this whole setup, and

and then sees his former employer get $5 billion. Zeldin said the scheme applied to contracts, large and small, to both green, non-governmental organization executives and to low-level activists.

The EPA has been acting as a conduit to transfer huge amounts of taxpayer money to the left's base. Quote, are we providing clean air, land and water? Zeldin asked rhetorically. This wasn't money spent towards remediating environmental issue. This was money going through their friends. Indeed, it was. Zeldin has canceled hundreds of contracts worth $1.5 billion dollars.

that we're tabbed to go essentially to left-wing activist networks focused on, quote, environmental justice. Democrats are apoplectic about the move, of course. Big surprise. Zeldin is going hard on other climate change initiatives, too, where the big money is at stake for the less green client network. This is only the tip of the iceberg. One of the real misunderstandings,

about the modern administrative state was demolished in recent years is that it's operated by nonpartisan experts. Instead, it is now a funding stream. And this is me talking and not the article. And it's a funding stream for the left. And understand what's what's going on.

whether it was USAID, whether it was the EPA, whether it was every single department, the Department of Education, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Justice, every cabinet agency, what the left has done is taken these funding spigots.

and spent billions and billions of dollars funding all of their friends, funding all of the attack apparatus. If you wonder why things seem sometimes so skewed left and right, a big part of the reason is the left has been addicted to this funding. But Ben, that's what's so powerful about cutting it off. Listen, the right...

You know, when conservatives are in power, when Republicans are in power, we don't do this. We don't fund our buddies, and I'm glad we don't. I don't want us to. But one strength of that is that means conservative organizations are not addicted to the government cash. We're not suckling at the teat of the federal government. The left right now, they don't know what to do because their entire ecosystem, everybody, and understand,

This is from the big senior poobahs to the most junior green haired left wing radical who dropped out of school. They're all dependent on the government money. And it's why, you know, when you and I interviewed Elon Musk and he was saying, you know, I asked him, why do they hate you so much? And if you remember his answer, he said, well.

I'm taking away their goodies. I'm taking away their money. This is what's fundamentally happening. Well, and the way you said it is exactly the way he was just kind of like, look, they're in deep trouble because they don't know how to operate on their own without it.

And if you take it away, then it can literally disappear. And also their reach disappears overnight. That is so powerful. Make it on your own, but not with my tax dollars subsidizing your radical agenda. That's exactly right. Let me read a little more of this Daily Signal article. Like many of the federal government's projects, USAID is in many ways a relic of a bygone era when the U.S. aimed to stop the influence of communism around the globe.

Sometime after the fall of the USSR, it became a vehicle to fund various leftist projects around the globe with little relation to U.S. national interest. In fact, many of these projects were downright loathed in countries that weren't too pleased with the U.S. government funding pride parades in their capital city.

The Trump administration is also pulling the plug on the unofficially established Church of the Left, too. They are withdrawing, or threatening to withdraw, hundreds of millions of dollars in grant money directed at colleges and universities that fail to protect their students from anti-Semitism on campus. They are threatening schools with removing even more funds if they continue their illegal, racially discriminatory DEI programs, too.

And one might add that the problem goes far beyond anti-Semitism and DEI. American universities, which have in many cases become hedge funds with schools attached, are increasingly failing to serve the public good. Much of what they call vital quote-unquote research...

is bogus. In addition, there's no question that taxpayer-funded research grants allow universities to fund their obnoxious humanities departments that are politically monolithic at nearly every school. They are in the business of gatekeeping the American elite and turning out generations of activists who not only run the show on campus, but populate newsrooms, corporate boardrooms, and government institutions.

Want to know what nearly everyone who runs an elite institution sounds the same, spouts the same dogmas and went along with every insanity of the 2020 Great Awakening? There's your source. And this is fundamentally what is going on, that Trump is targeting the power at the source. He's targeting the money. That is a big, big deal.

Which brings us to another aspect of this, and that was what happened in Congress last week with NPR CEO and PBS CEO there in front of Congress having to deal with what Doge is doing, which is cutting waste, fraud and abuse.

And it did not go very well for the CEOs. It reminded me an awful lot, Senator, of when those the presidents of the Ivy League schools had to come and answer questions about anti-Semitism on college campuses.

after the attacks on Israel, and people were just in shock how radical they were and how they were not stopping it. It was very reminiscent of that with NPR CEO, very arrogant, PBS CEO, very arrogant, like, this is what we do. We take your money, we put out propaganda, so sue us. That's what we've been doing forever.

Well, and Catherine Marr, who's the CEO of NPR, is arrogant, drippingly arrogant. She is hard left. And it was exactly like it. You're right. The president of Harvard, the president of Penn, both of whom lost their jobs over their arrogant, out of touch testimony before the House where she is.

Look, she's a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. She worked for UNICEF. She worked for the National Democratic Institute. She worked for the World Bank and Access Now. She worked for Wikimedia Foundation. She joined the Atlantic Council. She was part of the Department of State's Foreign Affairs Policy Board. She is a hard leftist. But look, don't take my word for it.

Listen to it out of her own mouth, and I want you to listen in particular for this back and forth with Brandon Gill. Brandon Gill is a freshman House member from Texas. He's a good friend. I campaigned hard for Brandon. I endorsed him in the primary. Brandon is a rising star in the House. And just listen to this back and forth as he questions her and hangs her on her own petard with her own words. Give a listen.

Do you believe that America is addicted to white supremacy? I believe that I tweeted that. And as I've said earlier, I believe much of my thinking has evolved over the last half decade. It is. OK, stop, stop, stop, stop. I want you to notice something she says there. Much of my thinking has evolved over the last half decade. Ben, what's a half decade?

Five years. That would be five years. Doesn't a half decade sound long? I believe much of my thinking has evolved over the last half decade. Oh, crap. What I said five years ago. Oh, no, that's a real problem. Run away. Run away. All right. Go back to what he's playing with. It has evolved. I just like that comment. Her idiocy only gets worse. It made me laugh. As soon as I heard, I was like, this is not going well. Keep listening. It gets worse. Why did you tweet that? I don't recall the exact context, sir. So I wouldn't be able to say.

Okay. Do you believe that America believes in black plunder and white democracy? I don't believe that, sir. You tweeted that in reference to a book you were reading at the time, apparently, The Case for Reparations. I don't think I've ever read that book, sir. You tweeted about it. You said you took a day off to fully read The Case for Reparations. You put that on Twitter in January of 2020.

I apologize. I don't recall that I did. I have no doubt that your tweet there is correct, but I don't recall that. Okay. Do you believe that white people inherently feel superior to other races? I do not. You don't? You tweeted something to that effect. You said, I grew up feeling superior. Ha, how white of me. Why did you tweet that? I think I was probably reflecting on what it was to be white.

to grow up in an environment where I had lots of advantages. It sounds like you're saying that white people feel superior. I don't believe that anybody feels that way, sir. I was just reflecting on my own experiences. Do you think that white people should pay reparations? I have never said that, sir.

Yes, you did. You said it in January of 2020. You tweeted, yes, the North, yes, all of us, yes, America, yes, our original collective sin and unpaid debt, yes, reparations, yes, on this day. I don't believe that was a reference to fiscal reparations, sir. What kind of reparations was it a reference to? I think it was just a reference to the idea that we all owe much to the people who came before us. That's a bizarre way to frame what you tweeted, right?

Okay, how many how much reparations have you personally paid? Sir, I don't believe that I've ever paid reparations. Okay, just for everybody else. I'm not asking anyone seems to be what you're suggesting.

Do you believe that looting is morally wrong? I believe that looting is illegal and I refer to it as counterproductive. I think it should be prosecuted. Do you believe it's morally wrong though? Of course. Of course. Then why did you refer to it as counterproductive? It's a very different way to describe it. It is both morally wrong and counterproductive as well as being illegal. You tweeted, it's hard to be mad about protests in reference to the BLM protests not prioritizing the private property of a system of oppression.

You didn't condemn the looting. You said that it was counterproductive. NPR also promoted a book called In Defense of Looting. Do you think that that's an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars? I'm unfamiliar with that book, sir, and I don't believe that was at my time at NPR. You tweeted that you read that book, but...

I don't believe that I did read that. It's amazing. She tweeted that she read the book. She's like, I don't believe that I ever read that book. So you're either lying now or you're lying, what, a half a decade ago, if she likes to describe it. Right, Senator? Look, that is a crushingly effective cross-examination. And if you look at...

She is running away from everything she's ever said, everything she's ever believed, because it is indefensible. When she says, you know, she claimed on Twitter she took an entire day off to read a book on reparations. It was so important that she devoted a day of her. And now she has no recollection. I'm sorry. I you know, this this will be before you were watching TV. But but there was an old series. You ever watch Hogan's Heroes? Yeah. Oh, gosh. Yes. OK. Well, do you remember Sergeant Schultz?

Yes. Sergeant Schultz, he would say, I see nothing. I hear nothing. That is that is Catherine Moore. She sees nothing. She hears nothing. And yet this is someone charged with spending millions of taxpayer dollars running what is a left wing propaganda network. You know, her statement, I've never called for reparations.

I got to say, Brandon, I think does a fabulous job. Well, yes, you did. Let me read you the tweet. And she says, reparations, yes. Oh, oh, well, well, other than when I called for reparations, but I haven't called for it other than when I've called for it. But no, no, it's not fiscal reparations. It's, I mean, repairing the tires on their cars. Those are the reparations. I mean, it...

She has no answer because her answer is she desperately wants to run away from everything she has ever said or done. But let me actually, let's actually go to something else that she said and did, which is, what do you think she has cited as the number one challenge that is facing journalism right now?

Knowing this woman, have no idea. Okay. Here is a quote from her at a panel at the Atlantic Council Research Lab. Quote, the number one challenge that we see here is, of course,

the First Amendment in the United States. It's so on brand for her that it's almost unbelievable. A woman who says that she believes in the public and radio and free speech says that's the real problem is the First Amendment. In fact, Senator, here's the NPR CEO in her own words saying exactly that.

The number one challenge here that we see is, of course, the First Amendment in the United States is a fairly robust problem.

protection of rights, and that is a protection of rights both for platforms, which I actually think is very important that platforms have those rights to be able to regulate what kind of content they want on their sites. But it also means that it is a little bit tricky to really address some of the real challenges of where does bad information come from and sort of the influence peddlers who have made a real market economy around it.

I mean, you listen to her and it's just amazing. If we could just do what we want and get rid of everything we don't want and silence anybody that says that is disagreeing with us and everything would be fine in media and with our government. Right. We could just control everybody and shut everybody down. We don't like that is the NPR CEO saying it.

Look, the left believes in censorship. They don't believe in journalism. They don't believe in media. They believe in propaganda. And you and I on this podcast covered last year a story that was written in the free press by Yuri Berliner, and it was in April of 24, and it was entitled...

I've been at NPR for 25 years. Here's how we lost America's trust. And I just want to read the beginning of it again, because we did a good chunk of a podcast just on this story. But it really sets up the absolute disaster that is NPR today. Here's how Uri Billiner began. You know the stereotype of the NPR lister, an EV driving, wordle playing, tote bag carrying coastal elite. It doesn't precisely describe me, but it's not far off.

I'm Sarah Lawrence educated, was raised by a lesbian peace activist mother. I drive a Subaru and Spotify says my listening habits are most similar to people in Berkeley. I fit the NPR mold. I'll cop to that. So when I got a job here 25 years ago, I never looked back. As a senior editor on the business desk where news is always breaking, we've covered up people's in the workplace, supermarket prices, social media and A.I.,

It's true NPR always had a liberal bent, but during most of my tenure here, an open-minded, curious culture prevailed. We were nerdy, not knee-jerk activists or scolding. In recent years, however, that has changed. Today, those who listen to NPR or read its coverage online find something different. The distilled worldview of a very small segment of the U.S. population. If you are a conservative, you will read this and say, duh, it's always been this way.

But it hasn't. For decades, since its founding in 1970, a wide swath of America turned into NPR for reliable journalism and gorgeous audio pieces with birds singing in the Amazon. Millions came to us for conversations that exposed us to voices around the country and the world radically different from our own, engaging precisely because they were unguarded and unpredictable. No image generated more pride within NPR than the farmer listening to Morning Edition from his or her tractor at sunrise.

Back in 2011, although NPR's audiences tilted a bit to the left, it still bore a resemblance to America at large. 26% of listeners described themselves as conservative, 23% as middle-of-the-road, and 37% as liberal. By 2023, the picture was completely different.

Thank you.

predictably, we don't have an audience that reflects America. So you see where we are with this. It's very clear that she was exposed for what she believes and just how radical. You even had a congressman, William Timmons, who was asking her a basic question about, hey, you claim that you guys aren't biased. And he asked her about her editorial board. I want people to hear what she said about her editorial board members. Listen.

You're a rabid progressive. Like, do you not think it's a problem that your political leanings make it seem to the American people that you're not biased and you're not doing your job? Because you agree that your job is to have journalistic integrity, right?

Absolutely, but there is a strong firewall between the newsroom and anything that I do. Let's talk about the newsroom. You have 87 registered Democrats, not a single Republican in your editor boards. I mean, how does that work to give us the perception that you're doing your job of actually delivering unbiased information? I would agree with you that that number is a concern if it is accurate. I do believe that we need to have journalists who represent the full breadth of the American society so that we can report well for all Americans. Well, I...

I think that you are failing. I realize you've only been there for a year, but I just really think that while it is a small portion of your budget, you very much should expect to restructure your revenue streams because I don't think that NPR is necessarily worth saving. I love this. I don't think NPR is necessarily worth saving. The fact that their editorial board has 87 members says,

All of them registered Democrats. Senator, there's not even independents or like non-registered people on their board. You don't apparently become an editorial board member unless you are a card-carrying Democrat. Even independents be damned. Forget Republicans. You got zero. NPR is blatantly partisan and balanced. That's obvious. But then the question becomes...

Okay, what happens next? We know it. We've confirmed it. We've witnessed it. We heard her testimony. I don't think she's going to lose her job over this, but will she actually lose our taxpayer dollars that are funding them?

Well, and the stat of the 87 registered Democrats actually comes from that article that Uri Berliner wrote in the Free Press. And he wrote last year, he said, quote,

So on May 3rd, 2021, I presented the findings at an all hands editorial staff meeting. Now, note that this is a senior editor at NPR who's reporting this. Here's what he writes. The response was when I suggested we had a diversity problem with a score of 87 Democrats and zero Republicans. The response wasn't hostile. It was worse. I was met with profound indifference.

I got a few messages from surprised, curious colleagues, but the messages were of the, oh, wow, that's weird variety, as if the lopsided tally was a random anomaly rather than a critical failure of our diversity North Star. In a follow-up email exchange, a top NPR news executive told me that she had been skewered for bringing up diversity of thought when she arrived at NPR. So she said, I want to be careful how we discuss this publicly.

Look, NPR is nothing but a left-wing propaganda outlet. PBS is the same. And the very best witness to demonstrate this is Catherine Marr, who is an absolute zealot.

She's someone who, when Tim Waltz said, let's put tampons in boys' bathrooms, I'm sure Catherine Marr said, oh, you hero, you social justice warrior. That's the world she's coming from. She's someone who I suspect only refers to Latinx because Latinos and Latinas do not exist in her elite, left-wing, blinkered, bizarre world. And you know what?

Catherine Moore is entitled to her opinions. I will defend her right to spout inanities for the rest of her life.

I just don't want to pay for them. And I don't think you should have to pay for them. If she wants to spout idiocies, she needs to find some left wing billionaire to pay for her. It shouldn't be the American taxpayers forced to subsidize her efforts at propaganda. So will we actually have the funding of these two platforms? What is your best guess now after these hearings were so clear?

Look, I very much hope so. This gets to the $64,000 question coming out of all of Doge, which is how much of what Doge is doing right now will be memorialized in legislation that Congress can pass. And that is an open question right now, Ben, because anything that goes through what's called regular order in the Senate means that it takes 60 votes to pass, which means that Democrats can block it.

And so we will try to use exceptions to the filibuster rule, the most important of which is is budget reconciliation to do as much of that as possible. But I don't know if Congress will succeed on getting the job done. I certainly hope so. And I can tell you this. I'm fighting tooth and nail to make it happen.

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Which, Senator, brings us to another story, and it may have been one of the biggest fails that we've seen in a long time from the media. They grabbed on to what they described as signal gate. They were demanding that people resign or be fired by the president. That was never going to happen. But really what it was, they were hoping that the American people would turn on Donald Trump. It would tank his approval rating and stop the momentum with Doge and everything else.

It turns out the American people actually care more about killing terrorists than they do about who's on a signal chat. And CBS poll numbers are proving that to be true. Well, you know, the left is not subtle. The Democrats and the media, they tell you exactly what they're doing. And they're all monolithic because they believe in censorship. They believe in propaganda. Every one of them says exactly the same thing 100 percent of the time. And listen, it's clear they hate Donald Trump.

They want to destroy him. They hate everything he's doing. And they looked at this signal text thread as their big chance. This was going to be their Russia, Russia, Russia. They were going to use it to go after the president, to go after every one of his appointees. And so we've seen for the better part of a week,

breathless coverage in the media. Every Democrat demanding investigations, demanding firings. You know, one of the funniest was Eric Swalwell, who even among left-wing nutcases managed to really stand out. You know, he tweeted out, every person on the signal thread should be fired. Yeah, okay, I'm sure that's a great idea there. The Vice President, Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, every national security official in the entire administration. Okay, sure, I know why you want that. I understand, but

By the way, isn't that the same guy that slept with a spy? I just want to make sure I get the connection here, right? Isn't that the same guy? I don't know why you'd hold that against him. Okay, got it. Yeah, that's a little rich from that guy, but keep going. Look...

They wanted to destroy Trump and they were convinced this this was their this was their opportunity. And look, you and I did did a podcast immediately after this broke where we pointed out, yeah, it was a screw up.

to include the editor of The Atlantic on it. That was a mistake. It was an embarrassing mistake. But the underlying substance of the text exchange was great. It was actually the president and the national security team taking out terrorists who were attacking Americans, who had been attacking American shipping lanes, who Biden had ignored and done nothing, and who had been driving up costs for American consumers because it was so expensive to get through the Suez Canal. And President Trump said,

open up the shipping lanes, take out the Houthi radical Islamic terrorists. And they did, and it was an incredible success. So the substance of it was all strong and successful, but yet the media and the Democrats thought, aha, we finally got through this mistake, the way to go after Trump. Well...

On Sunday, CBS released a new poll, and it turns out their entire attack on Signalgate failed. CBS polls shows 50% of Americans approve of Donald Trump, 50% disapprove. In other words, their entire effort to take him down failed utterly.

Gotta love it. Don't forget we do this show Monday, Wednesday, Friday. Hit that subscribe or auto-download button and share this podcast, please. You can text it to your friends. You can put it on X or on Facebook or on Instagram. Make sure you get it out there so other people hear what we're doing. And the Senator and I will see you back here on Wednesday morning.

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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.