WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:09.670 Congressman Thomas Massie, thank you for being here. Great to see you. >> Great to see you, Clayton. >> Well, Congressman, the House is preparing to vote on the NDAA tomorrow. 00:00:09.680 --> 00:00:18.270 I want to talk about Epstein and everything else, but first, before we get into the details of that, I want to talk about the NDAA because the big vote tomorrow. What do you believe Americans 00:00:18.280 --> 00:00:26.630 need to understand about what Congress is about to approve right now? Many Americans out national parks, visiting, you know, it's the last hurrah of 00:00:26.640 --> 00:00:35.070 summer, and quietly, sort of buried inside this enormous bill, is section 219, which well, I'll give you the floor on 00:00:35.080 --> 00:00:43.550 what about is what is about to happen in Washington. >> Well, first of all, the NDAA stands for the National Defense Authorization Act, 00:00:43.560 --> 00:00:54.110 and it's one of the few bills that passes every year. I've been here 14 years, there've been 14 NDAAs. So, you can set your clock on the fact that this 00:00:54.120 --> 00:01:04.229 bill will pass. So, anything that gets in it is you know, dangerous as a cocked gun. It's going to become law. Well, this this bill is hundreds of pages 00:01:04.239 --> 00:01:13.470 long. And um you know, in one of those hundreds of pages, it's actually five pages long, is section 219, and it was 00:01:13.480 --> 00:01:22.710 section 224, but it's now section 219. And it calls for the integration of our military technology and the supply 00:01:22.720 --> 00:01:33.150 chains that produce our you know, high-tech military equipment to be integrated with Israel's. Now, we don't have this kind of you know, bilateral 00:01:33.160 --> 00:01:42.910 agreement with any other country in the world, and I would argue that we shouldn't in order to protect our sovereignty and to protect our national secrets. If you 00:01:42.920 --> 00:01:51.950 wanted to share one thing at a time, let's say, you know, we wanted to collaborate on missile defense systems, I think that's fine. The president can 00:01:51.960 --> 00:02:00.270 do that, you know, just by virtue of the of controlling the military, but what they're doing here is legislatively, 00:02:00.280 --> 00:02:08.389 they are appointing a person. I joked that this person will eventually be a cabinet member, but right now it's a lower level position 00:02:08.399 --> 00:02:16.830 who will be in charge of the integration. And and that means that this project will have a lifespan that outlasts the commander-in-chief. 00:02:16.840 --> 00:02:26.150 Regardless of who the next president is, this provision lasts forever. And it's in the National Defense Authorization Act. It's coming to a 00:02:26.160 --> 00:02:34.550 vote. A lot of people have, you know, saw this. I saw this back in June and offered an amendment. By the way, there 00:02:34.560 --> 00:02:43.430 are 1,400 amendments that have been offered to the National Defense Authorization Act here in the House. My amendment was amendment number two. I 00:02:43.440 --> 00:02:53.510 was the second person to offer an amendment to the NDAA, and that's because I saw this troubling provision in there. Now, what they've decided to do is 00:02:53.520 --> 00:03:04.070 they've decided to block my amendment. So, there will be no vote and no debate on section 219 and whether it should be in the NDAA or whether it should not be 00:03:04.080 --> 00:03:12.430 in the NDAA. And today there was a procedural vote that barely passed um here in the House, but it passed on 00:03:12.440 --> 00:03:21.310 party lines. I was the only Republican dissenter ultimately. You know, initially we had about five Republicans who revolted on this vote 00:03:21.320 --> 00:03:30.110 for various reasons, maybe not um associated with section 219, but at the end of the day I was the last Republican standing opposing this procedural 00:03:30.120 --> 00:03:39.390 measure to bring the bill to the floor without a vote on stripping section 219. What will happen is tomorrow there will be a section a vote on final passage of 00:03:39.400 --> 00:03:48.710 the National Defense Authorization Act. It will still have to pass the Senate. It hasn't passed the Senate. Some people are putting their trust in the Senate 00:03:48.720 --> 00:03:57.870 because it failed in the the once. I would tell you never trust the Senate. Stuff over there can stay bottled up for a year and then it can pass within 5 00:03:57.880 --> 00:04:06.070 seconds. They pass bills in the Senate using email. Um so, I would cautioned you not to think that this will get 00:04:06.080 --> 00:04:14.790 stopped in the Senate. But, even if the Senate passes a bill, an NDAA that doesn't have its Section 219 in it, the House and the Senate will conference 00:04:14.800 --> 00:04:25.830 their two bills and it's quite likely that this could survive that conference and become the ultimate law. >> So, if this was I mean it's Israel, but if it was China or Russia, do you think 00:04:25.840 --> 00:04:35.030 that there would be any kind of outrage on Capitol Hill? >> There would be absolute outrage. I mean, even if you take one of our long-time 00:04:35.040 --> 00:04:43.670 allies that has been an ally since before Israel was a country. Let's say it was Great Britain. We don't have this kind of thing codified into law with a 00:04:43.680 --> 00:04:54.030 country like Great Britain. And so, I think it's dangerous to take a country of 10 million people And some people try to say this is analogous to NATO. Well, 00:04:54.040 --> 00:05:03.110 there's no real reciprocity advantage to the country with 350 million people to having this bilateral agreement with a 00:05:03.120 --> 00:05:12.230 country of 10 million people. People. It just it ties you 10 million versus 350 million. It ties 00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:20.350 you into something into engagements Um and when you couple these supply chains, that also makes it problematic to try to 00:05:20.360 --> 00:05:29.750 decouple. >> Can you talk about the mechanics of this? Because, you know, there's a lot of I think maybe misinformation floating around online. You have the Israeli supporters who say this is no big deal 00:05:29.760 --> 00:05:39.510 at all, that this this is our greatest ally. Stop stop stop complaining about this. Others saying that the sky is falling and this will be the end of our sovereignty. So, I'm sure the truth is 00:05:39.520 --> 00:05:48.390 somewhere in between. How do the mechanics work on this? >> Let me tell you how the mechanics work in general in Washington D.C. You give them an inch and they take a mile. Look, 00:05:48.400 --> 00:05:58.030 they've fought a war with Iran for several months now without even so much as as an approval from Congress. We have 00:05:58.040 --> 00:06:08.390 even voted not to have a war in Iran. Positively voted not to have the war in the House and the Senate and they're still having the war. Imagine if you give them an inch and you put something 00:06:08.400 --> 00:06:19.870 into law that appoints a special person in charge of this integration. Something that's not been done before. I can I can assure you the people who drafted this 00:06:19.880 --> 00:06:28.750 tried to expose as little as possible to the American people and even to Congress about what they're really going to do with this. I mean, look at like FISA, a 00:06:28.760 --> 00:06:38.190 bill like FISA. FISA stands for Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, but they're using it on Americans. They're using loopholes. They're using special interpretations of 00:06:38.200 --> 00:06:48.270 the law, secret interpretations of the law that I can't even tell you here on your show. I could go to the floor of the House and tell you, but they'll never let me in a skiff again. So, trust 00:06:48.280 --> 00:06:57.350 me when I tell you that they're not doing this bill, the you know, just as a sense of Congress. They're doing this to get some legal 00:06:57.360 --> 00:07:05.870 hook to do something that's not being done now. Otherwise, they would not ask our permission in Congress to do this. >> Speaker Johnson seems to be totally 00:07:05.880 --> 00:07:14.150 against this provision. He's doing everything he can to prevent it from becoming law in the United States of America. Of course, I'm being 00:07:14.160 --> 00:07:24.070 facetious. It doesn't seem like there's any There's any pushback at all on this. Where is the speaker on this? What has he done to I mean, has there 00:07:24.080 --> 00:07:33.830 been any movement to try to break this out of the NDAA specifically to have a vote specifically on this provision? Put everyone on record about how they want to vote on this? 00:07:33.840 --> 00:07:42.270 >> There's There is one amendment they allowed to change four words in section 219 to remove the words 00:07:42.280 --> 00:07:51.670 integration uh where it occurs in four different places. But the problem with that is it could arguably make section 219 00:07:51.680 --> 00:08:00.390 stronger. If you say if you direct Israel and the United States to work on integration of networks 00:08:00.400 --> 00:08:10.270 and you take out the word integration, you just tell them to work on the networks themselves. To skip the integration part, just go build these things together. And so it could 00:08:10.280 --> 00:08:18.390 arguably make it worse. I think it's kind of a placebo that's been offered. Even that amendment is not going to get its own separate vote. It's going to be 00:08:18.400 --> 00:08:29.630 bundled into 40 other amendments and they'll pass on block or fail on block. And there won't be much if any debate on that amendment. So um so when you ask is 00:08:29.640 --> 00:08:38.510 there any effort to change it, there's no real effort to change it or to modify it or to stop it or even to have a debate on it. >> Where I mean what has happened to 00:08:38.520 --> 00:08:48.670 Republicans? I mean uh well What I I I just I I think about just like a more broadly about our founding fathers. Just been spending, you know, a 00:08:48.680 --> 00:08:57.710 little bit of summer vacation knee-deep in in a lot of that and just thinking, where would the founding fathers be on this issue specifically? >> Well, they they would say you would have 00:08:57.720 --> 00:09:05.829 to debate it. Let me tell you why they want to avoid a debate on this also, Clayton. Because some yahoo can go on the internet and and they can say, 00:09:05.839 --> 00:09:14.990 "Well, Thomas Massie is overstating the case here. It doesn't allow this. It doesn't allow that. Of course we would not do this." But that's a yahoo on the internet. That 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:23.790 could even be somebody in the White House who says that. But if we were to go on the floor of the House of Representatives and I were to ask somebody who was for this bill, does it 00:09:23.800 --> 00:09:32.829 allow this? Does it allow that? Or does it allow this? And I could constrain the legislative intent of this bill by forming it in the debate. Just like when 00:09:32.839 --> 00:09:41.630 we want to go back and see what the founders meant when they talked about the Second Amendment or the First Amendment or the Fourth Amendment or the 10th Amendment or the war powers of 00:09:41.640 --> 00:09:51.190 Congress, we can look at their debates. We can look at the legislative record, okay, when they were debating these things. There will be no record in order 00:09:51.200 --> 00:10:01.870 to know the intent of Congress here. So, I think our founding fathers, first of all, George Washington would be very disappointed that we are entering into an entangling alliance with one country. 00:10:01.880 --> 00:10:11.310 He warned us against that, and so did some of the other founding fathers. But, they'd be even more disappointed that all of Congress has laid down, doesn't 00:10:11.320 --> 00:10:19.510 even want to debate this, and that there'll be no legislative record about the true intent, and therefore no constraints on what this amendment 00:10:19.520 --> 00:10:29.430 actually means. So, you'll have White House counsels from here to infinity who sit over there and write special interpretations of the laws, just like 00:10:29.440 --> 00:10:38.990 Donald Trump's administration has reinterpreted the War Powers Act of 1973 this year, and says that he doesn't have to follow it now. 00:10:39.000 --> 00:10:47.430 Um, you got to go back and look at legislative intent. We'll never know what that was from the authors be- because we never had a debate here in Congress. 00:10:47.440 --> 00:10:55.510 >> You've heard recently number of high-ranking officials inside of Israel, particularly Benjamin Netanyahu, but others um on the defense side of things, 00:10:55.520 --> 00:11:04.150 basically saying we don't want the money from the United States anymore. Um, and if you listen to some of these online influencers as well, who you make 00:11:04.160 --> 00:11:13.950 pilgrimages to Israel and are paid to go there, and they come back and they put all sorts of things on social media, they've all been on the same page with this. Like, we don't want money from the 00:11:13.960 --> 00:11:22.590 United States anymore. So, what do you think is going on here? Is this this idea that we're we're we're we're coupling these countries formally and 00:11:22.600 --> 00:11:31.350 codifying it in law, therefore we don't need your billions that you send separately? >> Well, number one, while we're talking about the current 00:11:31.360 --> 00:11:41.550 topics and things, the are saying in the news that it was just reported today that their finance minister said that Israel didn't want to get involved in the war between the 00:11:41.560 --> 00:11:51.150 ongoing war between Iran and the United States because it's working out just fine for them. Well, that's because we're doing their bidding. We're fighting their war. But the the longer 00:11:51.160 --> 00:11:59.310 term thing outside of the war with Iran that Israel wants is to burrow in like a tick into our 00:11:59.320 --> 00:12:08.710 national defense authorization. They don't want to be called out as a separate line item because they know popularity for foreign aid is going down 00:12:08.720 --> 00:12:17.550 in the United States. Now, maybe not among members of Congress yet because they're influenced by the Israeli lobbyists, but they know their popularity is waning and they know it's 00:12:17.560 --> 00:12:26.470 an exposure to be a separate line item in the appropriations bill. So, they would like to be inside of an appropriations bill where instead of us 00:12:26.480 --> 00:12:36.510 giving them money that it shows up in an appropriation that they then go spend at Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and the other defense contractors, it would just be 00:12:36.520 --> 00:12:46.390 we'd give them the bombs, we give them the material that they need to conduct wars, and we give it to them sort of just transfer it on planes and we write 00:12:46.400 --> 00:12:55.390 that off as our own defense. That's what they would like to have. And that's part of what this amendment this part of what this amendment reflects is a trend to 00:12:55.400 --> 00:13:05.070 try to integrate the two countries' defenses so that they not exposed to the dough, if you will, of looking at our 00:13:05.080 --> 00:13:13.710 own budget and also the public scrutiny of it. Because, you know, there are some moral externalities, let's call it, when 00:13:13.720 --> 00:13:22.350 you're conducting a genocide and the country that's paying for it finds out, they they would like to cut that funding. That's one of the things you 00:13:22.360 --> 00:13:31.950 see. And to that point, I was successful last week in getting a vote on an amendment to the State Department 00:13:31.960 --> 00:13:40.790 funding bill where there's 3.3 billion dollars of foreign aid that goes to Israel. Now, this doesn't include the half a billion dollars that goes to 00:13:40.800 --> 00:13:50.790 their Iron Dome that we subsidize. This is merely for merely This is solely for their offensive weapons. Now, um I I got 00:13:50.800 --> 00:14:00.390 that vote. I was the only Republican to vote for my own amendment. So, when when you hear somebody say they're American first and they're a Republican, ask them, "Well, what the hell did Why the 00:14:00.400 --> 00:14:10.430 hell did you vote against a Massie amendment to send 3.3 billion dollars, more than we spend on our homeless veterans, you spent on Israel's offensive weapons? When did you vote 00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:20.510 against the Massie amendment?" So, ask them that, but among the Repub- or the Democrat conference, there was a big split. Hakeem Jeffries was on the side 00:14:20.520 --> 00:14:29.829 of sending the money to Israel. Nancy Pelosi was on the side of not sending the money to Israel. They both issued competing public statements. And at the 00:14:29.839 --> 00:14:39.150 end of the day, 103 Democrats voted for the Massie amendment to take out the 3.3 billion dollars of offensive weapons 00:14:39.160 --> 00:14:49.790 money to Israel. 98 Democrats voted against it and 10 voted present. I consider that a victory. We had a similar vote on an amendment like this a 00:14:49.800 --> 00:14:58.390 year or two ago, and we only got six votes total. Marjorie Taylor Greene and I were the only Republicans and there were very few Democrats that voted for it. 00:14:58.400 --> 00:15:07.750 But now what's happening is you're seeing as the American public wakes up, this is becoming an issue in primaries. Now, in Republican primaries, 00:15:07.760 --> 00:15:16.030 AIPAC is, you know, ascendant, as you see from my election. AIPAC and the RJC and Miriam Adelson, who was born in Tel 00:15:16.040 --> 00:15:26.190 Aviv, they spent 30 million dollars. They set a record, um in defeating me in a primary, and I think that's got the Republican Party scared and all of my 00:15:26.200 --> 00:15:36.110 colleagues scared and that's why they're afraid to vote against taking even a dime away from Israel. >> Oh, absolutely. And the AI ads that were in many ways effective, I mean, it's 00:15:36.120 --> 00:15:44.470 unbelievable. >> They were effective. Um, a lot of people over the age of 65, which is in Kentucky, that's those are the most 00:15:44.480 --> 00:15:54.510 reliable voters, they were fooled by artificial intelligence ads that were bought by a super PAC funded by Miriam Adelson. They showed me on dates with a, 00:15:54.520 --> 00:16:04.350 um, AOC and Ilhan Omar holding hands with both of them at the same time, said I was caught in a threeple in DC, showed us getting into cabs together, going 00:16:04.360 --> 00:16:13.430 into, uh, hotel lobbies together and even a hotel room with a do not disturb sign on the outside. Really disgusting stuff. When I first 00:16:13.440 --> 00:16:23.550 saw it, I thought it would backfire. I thought people will will know this is ridiculous and they'll be disgusted by it and the fact that these lies are being told and spread this way, but the 00:16:23.560 --> 00:16:33.510 opposite happened. It turns out a lot of people do not know that artificial intelligence is capable of producing lifelike videos like this. So, even with 00:16:33.520 --> 00:16:42.110 the small disclaimer at the bottom that shows up for, you know, 3 seconds that says made with artificial intelligence, a lot of people bought it hook, line, 00:16:42.120 --> 00:16:50.310 and sinker. At least enough for me to lose the election. Um, I you know, what I think's going to happen this fall, people are going to get their minds 00:16:50.320 --> 00:16:59.150 blown when it becomes red versus blue. Um, you know, once once the elections are over, they go back to the Uniparty. This is just a fight for who's going to 00:16:59.160 --> 00:17:08.110 be speaker and who gets to hold the majority of the voting cards of the of the zombies who are going to get elected in November as well. It's It's a fight 00:17:08.120 --> 00:17:16.790 over who gets to be the speaker, um, and who gets to hold those gavels, but, uh, before it merges back into the Uniparty, 00:17:16.800 --> 00:17:25.510 there will be a hell of a fight in November for those gavels and the majority. And it's the AI ads are going to be the wild west. I think they'll try 00:17:25.520 --> 00:17:33.750 to legislate something after that, after the dust settles, but I'm not sure how you do legislate this. >> Right. I I was just about to ask you. It 00:17:33.760 --> 00:17:42.710 seemed like that was the first real salvo, like your election, all of the money that poured into Kentucky was the first real battleground that we got to see AI ads. Um and how they could, you 00:17:42.720 --> 00:17:50.870 know, it's What is the Is it the Mark Twain quote? A lie A lie can spread all the way around the world before truth has a chance to put on his pants. So, 00:17:50.880 --> 00:17:58.910 the damage is already done. Like, oh, the ad is out there. Oh, we're going to pull it. Or NBC says, we didn't know. We're going to pull it a week later. But the damage is then done, right? So, this 00:17:58.920 --> 00:18:08.070 is going to be a disaster come the fall. >> Well, and the other thing is because they put on there a disclaimer that says this is made with AI and this is satire. 00:18:08.080 --> 00:18:18.030 There's almost a safe harbor. So, if you do write a law and say that anything with AI has to disclose that it's AI, that that's just going to provide a safe harbor for people who are going to fool 00:18:18.040 --> 00:18:26.790 the elderly or I mean, even some young people fell for it, frankly. It It does work. >> it's hard to tell. So, I mean, a lot A 00:18:26.800 --> 00:18:35.910 lot of times, though. >> I didn't see the ads, but Nancy Mace told me that in her um governor's race in South Carolina that they used an AI 00:18:35.920 --> 00:18:45.070 ad and showed her on a float in a gay pride parade. And um you know, this It's really going to be the wild west and 00:18:45.080 --> 00:18:53.230 I mean, I'll be sitting back with popcorn uh watching some of these ads cuz I'm not on the ballot in November. >> Tragically. Yeah. 00:18:53.240 --> 00:19:01.830 >> Yeah. We'll see. >> Um before we move on, I I just want to ask you tomorrow. So, the big vote tomorrow, you're a no vote on this. How do you think it's going to shake out in 00:19:01.840 --> 00:19:10.470 the house tomorrow? On the NDAA. >> It's a good question. Um there's a lot more spending in there. Um 00:19:10.480 --> 00:19:21.030 I think most Republicans are going to vote for it. I think every Republican will vote for it. Now, what's interesting though is typically NDAAs, there are some hawks on 00:19:21.040 --> 00:19:30.750 the Democrat side. So, from the Hillary Clinton, the war wing of the Democrat Party, typically vote for the NDAA. And so, if 00:19:30.760 --> 00:19:39.510 you'd asked me to predict a couple years ago what the outcome would be, I'd say, "Well, if Republicans are in the majority, you'll get almost every Republican 00:19:39.520 --> 00:19:48.750 except for a handful and then a smattering of Democrats, maybe four dozen or three dozen." But, what do I think will happen now is maybe what we 00:19:48.760 --> 00:19:57.190 saw in the Senate, which was it was a party-line vote in the Senate for the most part. And that's why it failed in the Senate. They needed 60 votes and 00:19:57.200 --> 00:20:05.830 they couldn't get a bipartisan majority. So, I think it's going to you know, I'm not voting for the NDAA. Probably most 00:20:05.840 --> 00:20:15.230 I would guess probably every Republican except me is going to vote for it. But, they're going to have to answer to their voters. Why did they vote to integrate? They can't say 00:20:15.240 --> 00:20:23.750 you know, later that oh, I didn't know this provision was in there because I'm on your show talking about it. We you know, we had a debate on whether to 00:20:23.760 --> 00:20:32.110 allow this amendment to get a vote or not. People know that this is happening. They can't claim ignorance when they vote for this NDAA. 00:20:32.120 --> 00:20:40.630 >> Yeah, I don't I don't believe they can. Um let's talk about the Epstein Transparency Act. Of course, the first one that rolled out overwhelmingly. Talk about everyone 00:20:40.640 --> 00:20:49.270 being on the same page. One big uniparty voted for that uh your Epstein Files Transparency Act round number one. Yet, 00:20:49.280 --> 00:20:57.390 of course, now the second law that you've put forth. Um how did the Justice Department evade or violate the first law? I know that that's something we've 00:20:57.400 --> 00:21:06.590 talked about before here on the show. And why did you feel it was necessary to bring forth a second Epstein Transparency Act? What problems presented themselves after 00:21:06.600 --> 00:21:16.790 the first one. >> Well, first of all, the first one has been very successful. 3 million files. Look, 00:21:16.800 --> 00:21:25.790 we beat the White House on this. We we beat the DOJ. We beat Pam Bondi. We beat Cash Patel. We beat the fake 00:21:25.800 --> 00:21:34.110 cover-up in the Oversight Committee. We beat all of Mike Johnson's lies to a pulp. They said there were no more documents. All that was left was kitty 00:21:34.120 --> 00:21:42.750 porn. That they had turned over all the documents that could legally be turned over. They told us you couldn't get grand jury material. They told us Howard 00:21:42.760 --> 00:21:51.790 Lutnick told us he never visited Jeffrey Epstein. Um, you know, and here what happened? We got 3 million files. Now, here's the 00:21:51.800 --> 00:22:00.830 problem. There are files missing. We know that the testimony that the victims gave to the FBI, not all of that's been 00:22:00.840 --> 00:22:10.830 released. And the victims can't even get their own testimony back. So, we know that's a failure. We know there are about 3 million documents that the FBI themselves or 00:22:10.840 --> 00:22:20.630 sorry, DOJ themselves reviewed and said, you know, we don't think you need to see these 3 million. We got 6 million documents. We're going to give you 3 million of them. Um, they have overly 00:22:20.640 --> 00:22:30.150 redacted the documents. They're allowed to keep certain things secret, but they went through and redacted every woman's name, whether they were victims or not. And then in 00:22:30.160 --> 00:22:40.470 some cases, unfortunately, they revealed victims' personally identifiable information. But, um, and they've also claimed 00:22:40.480 --> 00:22:48.910 certain common law privileges that don't apply. Okay, they may apply to FOIA, but they don't apply to a law like the Epstein Files Transparency Act. 00:22:48.920 --> 00:22:57.350 Specifically because we said that they have to give us, for instance, their documents that involve decisions on whether to prosecute, decisions on 00:22:57.360 --> 00:23:05.590 whether to investigate. Well, they've withheld those documents over the past year, claiming that they have deliberative process privilege. 00:23:05.600 --> 00:23:14.470 Well, that doesn't apply, but what we've done here in Epstein files transparency act 2.0 is to give us a venue in front 00:23:14.480 --> 00:23:23.230 of the third branch of government to litigate whether the DOJ has complied with the law. So, what does this mean? 00:23:23.240 --> 00:23:31.990 Um we were criticized First of all, we had to fight tooth and nail to get the first bill passed. And then once it passed, people started saying, "Well, it 00:23:32.000 --> 00:23:41.150 could have been better. You could have done this. Why didn't you do that?" >> Right. >> And so and so we've incorporated some of that. And some of that was feedback was offered 00:23:41.160 --> 00:23:49.510 earnestly and was good feedback. We got it from the victims' lawyers. We got it from the Attorney General in New Mexico. 00:23:49.520 --> 00:23:58.710 And so here's what we did with it. We said that, for instance, the Attorney General in New Mexico, that's where Zorro Ranch is. That's where so many of 00:23:58.720 --> 00:24:08.390 Epstein's crimes and the crimes of his co-conspirators were committed. And those can be prosecuted under state law. But Todd Blanche is not cooperating. 00:24:08.400 --> 00:24:16.870 It's It's bad enough that Todd Blanche won't do his job or that Kash Patel won't do his job. But in in cases where 00:24:16.880 --> 00:24:27.390 state attorneys general want to bring criminal, you know, suits or criminal cases against perpetrators under state 00:24:27.400 --> 00:24:37.070 law and in state courts, the DOJ always cooperates, but they're not cooperating in this instance. So, one of the things we do in this bill is we give the 00:24:37.080 --> 00:24:48.510 attorneys general of the various states the right to get access to these files if they're prosecuting crimes. And that seems like a no-brainer, um but 00:24:48.520 --> 00:24:56.830 honestly, it didn't occur to me that the Attorney General of the United States wouldn't prosecute these crimes once it was obvious that they needed to be 00:24:56.840 --> 00:25:06.390 prosecuted. So, we're giving an alternate path for criminal prosecutions. We're also giving the victims standing in these to go to 00:25:06.400 --> 00:25:14.630 court. And we've said you don't have to go to the district the US District Court in Washington, D.C. which always favors 00:25:14.640 --> 00:25:23.790 the deep state, okay? You if you're a victim, your venue is the US District Court that you live in, okay? And if 00:25:23.800 --> 00:25:31.950 you're a congressman, we give congressman standing to sue the Attorney General in order to enforce this law if the Attorney General is not complied 00:25:31.960 --> 00:25:39.990 with the law. Why is this important? Because it's so hard to get standing in front of a court in front of a federal 00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:48.790 court when you're trying to sue the federal government. So, we're making it explicit in this law that you have standing for victims, congressmen, and 00:25:48.800 --> 00:25:56.910 attorneys general of the various states. We're also saying that you don't have these common law privileges the things that you assert to keep from releasing 00:25:56.920 --> 00:26:05.230 documents under FOIA Freedom of Information Act do not apply to the Epstein Files Transparency Act. So, that's another important thing 00:26:05.240 --> 00:26:14.750 that's in there. And I think it's really important. So, we we introduced this Ro Khanna and I on the one-year anniversary of introduction of 00:26:14.760 --> 00:26:23.590 the Epstein Files Transparency Act part one. And after seven legislative days elapse, which puts us after the August 00:26:23.600 --> 00:26:31.790 recess, puts us into September, we can start collecting those signatures again for the discharge petition. And this is a thing that's unique to the House. 00:26:31.800 --> 00:26:39.870 People ask me, "Why don't you run for the Senate?" And I said, "Well, they don't have a discharge petition in the Senate." Do you realize if I were in the Senate, I couldn't have got the Epstein 00:26:39.880 --> 00:26:50.550 Files Transparency Act passed. And so, that's why I want to stay here in the House because we have a good chance of getting to 218 again and getting part two passed, putting more teeth into the 00:26:50.560 --> 00:27:00.350 original bill, and getting actual prosecutions. >> So, after everything that you've personally reviewed, including unredacted material, what do you think 00:27:00.360 --> 00:27:08.630 are the most important questions that remain unanswered? Like, who who financed Epstein? Who participated in the multi-state trafficking operation? 00:27:08.640 --> 00:27:17.830 Was blackmail involved? What about the potential children buried outside of Zoro Ranch? I mean, like, what stands out to you as like maybe your top three things that 00:27:17.840 --> 00:27:26.110 you want answers on? >> The top thing is is why did they fail to investigate these things? Why did they 00:27:26.120 --> 00:27:34.350 fail to indict individuals? And we know they had discussions about this. In 2008, why did Jeffrey Epstein get such a 00:27:34.360 --> 00:27:44.390 light sentence? Now, Acosta said, or allegedly said, that he was told this was that Epstein was attached to intelligence and that he should back 00:27:44.400 --> 00:27:55.110 off. And you just most recently have J.D. Vance saying that he will always believe that Epstein was attached or involved with US intelligence and 00:27:55.120 --> 00:28:04.070 with Israeli intelligence. So, if the vice president believes it, if the guy who was in charge of indicting Epstein in 00:28:04.080 --> 00:28:14.550 2008 and gave him such a light sentence believed it, if we've got all these documents that show that Epstein met with Obama's CIA director, at This These 00:28:14.560 --> 00:28:22.750 are facts, right? These are are borne out even before the Epstein files came out, the big tranche of them, we knew 00:28:22.760 --> 00:28:31.270 these things. So, my questions would be what were his connections to the government? What are in the other 3 million files that Todd Blanche hasn't 00:28:31.280 --> 00:28:40.550 released? Why did they put some files out and then pull them back never to be released again? Now, you may say, "Well, those internet sleuths, they archived 00:28:40.560 --> 00:28:49.350 those files when they were out there before the DOJ pulled them back." Yeah, but the The hasn't put them back, which means I can't even go over to the DOJ 00:28:49.360 --> 00:28:57.990 and see beyond the redactions of those files that they have pulled back. They need to put those files back out there. But, the number one question is 00:28:58.000 --> 00:29:07.190 why didn't they investigate people like Leon Black and Jes Staley? What And there's enough stuff in the files that 00:29:07.200 --> 00:29:16.790 you can see to warrant an investigation. And then why did they go from listing Leslie Wexner as a co-conspirator in a child sex 00:29:16.800 --> 00:29:25.910 trafficking case and Leslie Groff, Epstein's right-hand woman, why did they decide not to prosecute them? 00:29:25.920 --> 00:29:34.510 Um those are the questions. Those are the most important questions and I think that's a threat if you pull on it, you'll you'll learn a lot more about Epstein. 00:29:34.520 --> 00:29:44.270 >> Do you think So, what do you think's I just can't wrap my head around how Todd Blanche is sitting on 3 million of these documents still? Um and they're compelled to release them 00:29:44.280 --> 00:29:52.590 under the original Epstein transparency act. Still sitting on them. What do you think's in those 3 million that they're scared to show us? 00:29:52.600 --> 00:30:00.790 >> Um more connections to to political figures. Like, it's convenient that they've allowed the things that have 00:30:00.800 --> 00:30:11.350 caused the prince of England to to lose his title, the British ambassador to the United States to lose his title, former prime minister of Norway to get um 00:30:11.360 --> 00:30:20.630 arrested or indicted, former minister of culture from France to get arrested or indicted or investigated, the CEO of the World 00:30:20.640 --> 00:30:29.870 Economic Forum had to step down, yet they've not released a single thing that has caused an indictment or resignation of a US politician. 00:30:29.880 --> 00:30:38.990 That And Jeffrey Epstein was a US citizen who operated in US territory. Even Epstein Island was in the the US Virgin Islands. 00:30:39.000 --> 00:30:47.510 It was still It still happened on American soil, if you will. And then finally, so much we don't know about Zorro Ranch. 00:30:47.520 --> 00:30:55.830 >> Yes. That can be uncovered. There's still evidence out there. The books that Jeffrey Epstein read and kept are still 00:30:55.840 --> 00:31:04.430 on the bookshelves there. >> I've seen pictures of them. The paintings are still on the walls. And you know, get out there like the New 00:31:04.440 --> 00:31:13.310 Mexico Attorney General wants to and investigate that, but make sure that you've got the access to the files so that when it comes time to indict and 00:31:13.320 --> 00:31:21.710 convict, you can make it stick. >> Do you believe that in that 3 million tranche of documents, there would be something significant against President 00:31:21.720 --> 00:31:29.790 Trump? I mean, he's he's said publicly that he Well, he said he told Marjorie Taylor Greene not publicly, but he told her and she's revealed it since then 00:31:29.800 --> 00:31:38.550 that there are things in those documents which would embarrass his friends. Um do you think that that's a big piece of this? 00:31:38.560 --> 00:31:47.270 >> I think it is. I mean, his friends could include man the first lady. Uh look, she obviously got nervous enough 00:31:47.280 --> 00:31:55.390 to do a press conference that nobody authorized on her own at some point. And I think because she thought more was 00:31:55.400 --> 00:32:04.790 going to come out and then that got squashed. I don't think that was just spontaneous. She woke up one day and said, "I need to do this press conference." And I agree with her. In 00:32:04.800 --> 00:32:13.270 the press conference, she said, "Epstein did not act alone." And I mean, if that's not a call for 00:32:13.280 --> 00:32:23.630 releasing more of the files, I don't know what is. Um so, I think there are a a lot more things that are are going to embarrass individuals like Howard Lutnick and show 00:32:23.640 --> 00:32:33.430 us the connections and the finances. There may be lots of money that gets unwound because of this. >> Man, that Melania press conference. We were live during when that happened and 00:32:33.440 --> 00:32:42.590 we were hearing from sources at the White House they had no idea that that it was about to unfold that the president wasn't aware of it. Uh and it just kind of gets swept under the 00:32:42.600 --> 00:32:51.790 rug. Like no more discussion about this Melania story. It just kind of disappeared. >> It's interesting how things can get memory hold here in Washington, D.C. 00:32:51.800 --> 00:33:00.430 >> Crazy. I'm looking at a bizarre book. Yeah, I I know Oh my god. I bet you could write you know, you could like Shelby Foote it would be like a 00:33:00.440 --> 00:33:08.870 10-volume series on like the Civil War that you could write on this. Congressman, before I get you out of here, I just got to ask you about the Save America Act. So, 00:33:08.880 --> 00:33:17.670 a lot of people saying that this is now the fake Save America Act. And maybe you can unpack what this is right now, where this stands, the idea that 00:33:17.680 --> 00:33:26.790 oh, you'd have to show proof of citizenship in order to be able to vote. Sound great. Well, why can't Republicans pass this bill? But now it seems like it's completely shifted. Where are things 00:33:26.800 --> 00:33:35.750 sitting with the Save America Act? And is it now lumped fully together with the NDAA? >> Well, where do we start? Let's start with 00:33:35.760 --> 00:33:45.030 this. It's a weapon of mass destruction. Now, before everybody says, "Oh, Massie doesn't want secure elections. He wants the illegals to vote." Blah, blah, blah. 00:33:45.040 --> 00:33:54.230 I'm for I'm for what's in the Save Am Act Save America Act. I voted for the Save America Act. You should have to be These are common sense things that 00:33:54.240 --> 00:34:03.870 nobody can deny. Although some Democrats will try to deny them. You got to be an American citizen to vote in in national elections. Can you vote for your 00:34:03.880 --> 00:34:12.430 homeowners association as an illegal alien? I don't know. That's not what the Save Act deals with. The Save Act deals with national elections. To register to 00:34:12.440 --> 00:34:21.470 vote in a national election, got to be a US citizen, and you got to show proof of identification to vote. Those Those are things that are common sense. Now, let's 00:34:21.480 --> 00:34:29.550 get Now, let's move on from there. And they're codified in a bill that should become law. But here's the thing. The Republicans have no plan, and 00:34:29.560 --> 00:34:37.629 they've never had a plan for passing it. Because they This is kind of like the repeal of Obamacare. It polls really 00:34:37.639 --> 00:34:46.550 well. It gets the base energized. It brings over independents. And if they ever didn't have it as a club to beat Democrats over the head, they wouldn't 00:34:46.560 --> 00:34:58.510 know what to do. And so there is no plan to pass the Save America Act. Every effort to do it has has a plan to fail even when it starts. 00:34:58.520 --> 00:35:06.750 And I can give you the most recent example. They want to combine the In this rule, this is how they got so 00:35:06.760 --> 00:35:17.830 many people to vote for a rule that didn't allow a vote on Section 219 in the NDAA. The same resolution that dictates how the NDA will be debated and 00:35:17.840 --> 00:35:27.590 what amendments will be allowed has this watered-down version of the Save Act in it that's going to be attached to a reconciliation process, which is really 00:35:27.600 --> 00:35:35.750 just a slush fund for the Iran war and some payments to farmers to cover their troubles that have been caused by the 00:35:35.760 --> 00:35:44.750 Iran war. And they're going to send it over so they because they mix this Save Act in that big amalgam of legislation 00:35:44.760 --> 00:35:52.790 and say they've got a chance. It's like Dumb and Dumber. So you say there's a chance. So they say there's a chance with the Senate Parliamentarian. 00:35:52.800 --> 00:36:02.830 And they're going to send it over there. But best case, what they're sending over is a bribe to bribe states to do what the Save America Act would have forced 00:36:02.840 --> 00:36:12.510 them to do. Now the states that are going to comply are the states that do it already and they're going to take the check and it's going to be free money. And the states that don't do it and 00:36:12.520 --> 00:36:22.470 don't want to do it because maybe their elections for governor or state reps or even congressmen depend on a system that's broken, they're not going to 00:36:22.480 --> 00:36:34.030 they're not going to take the bribe to do the right thing. They've got more money and interest tied up in doing the wrong thing. So, it's not going to do what you want. And even if it did, it 00:36:34.040 --> 00:36:42.790 ain't going to happen before November. So, it's and meanwhile, so everybody on 00:36:42.800 --> 00:36:51.790 X and Facebook and Fox is talking about the Save Act and they're not paying attention to the fact that we've we've 00:36:51.800 --> 00:36:59.830 run up $3.3 trillion of debt in the 18 months that we've controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House. And 00:36:59.840 --> 00:37:08.830 over 2 trillion of that debt has happened since the big beautiful bill passed. I will be replaying my speeches on the night that the big beautiful bill 00:37:08.840 --> 00:37:17.750 passed. I I said, "This is not like the the Titanic, you know, going toward the iceberg. We're 00:37:17.760 --> 00:37:26.110 actually putting more coal in the boiler and setting a course for the iceberg with the big beautiful bill. Because I said then, even though this 00:37:26.120 --> 00:37:34.950 reconciliation process is meant to help balance the budget, this is going to break the budget. You can't simultaneously cut taxes and increase 00:37:34.960 --> 00:37:43.870 spending by hundreds of billions of dollars and think that's going to turn out well. It's not and it hasn't turned out well. And so, what do we have to 00:37:43.880 --> 00:37:52.030 show for it? Massive inflation. You can you buy you go My wife and I went and had breakfast the 00:37:52.040 --> 00:38:00.870 other day. And we bought two, you know, like breakfast sandwiches and two drinks, 40 bucks. Like, 00:38:00.880 --> 00:38:09.750 this is you know, these are things that used to be sandwiches that used to be three or four bucks a piece and a coffee was two bucks a piece. Things are 00:38:09.760 --> 00:38:18.430 getting way out of hand. And the you know, up here they're telling you it's the Save Act. It's the Save Act. And meanwhile, they're causing 00:38:18.440 --> 00:38:27.430 all this inflation, a a suffering. You The inflation comes through the excessive spending and then borrowing it, competing with private markets for 00:38:27.440 --> 00:38:38.310 the borrowing of money, which drives up interest rates, which makes it harder to buy a house. And then but it also comes from just the wars overseas. They don't 00:38:38.320 --> 00:38:47.190 want you to know that those high prices in the grocery store and at the gas pump are the result of the policies here in Washington, D.C. over the last 18 00:38:47.200 --> 00:38:55.390 months. They want you thinking about the SAVE Act. And they have no They're so insincere. There are a few of my colleagues 00:38:55.400 --> 00:39:04.950 that get duped. Like there are people I serve with who really think They're like Lucy and the football. They really think They got a plan. This week it's going to 00:39:04.960 --> 00:39:13.910 happen. We're going to get John Thune. Man, we're going to put him in such a pickle. He's going to turn around and say, "I am so sorry. Here's your SAVE 00:39:13.920 --> 00:39:23.870 Act." He This is never going to happen. I laugh. I tell them each week how their plan is going to fail. Like for instance, last week the plan was, "Well, 00:39:23.880 --> 00:39:32.590 let's attach the SAVE Act to this State Department funding bill. As soon as it passes, it gets merged with the State Department funding bill, and man, 00:39:32.600 --> 00:39:40.670 that'll really put John Thune on a on a the hot spot." No. Guess what? This week it Their plan didn't even last a week. 00:39:40.680 --> 00:39:49.430 This week they say, "You know what? Instead of doing those pesky separate appropriations bills, we're going to do a continuing resolution. In fact, we're going to vote on it this week, and that 00:39:49.440 --> 00:39:57.990 continuing resolution will go until December, until after the election." So, if you have a continuing resolution that funds all of government, John Thune 00:39:58.000 --> 00:40:07.270 doesn't need to pass the State Department funding bill that has the SAVE Act attached to it. And And so, you could try to give my 00:40:07.280 --> 00:40:15.350 colleagues a pass and say, "Well, they believed it could happen." But you got to quit giving them a pass because 00:40:15.360 --> 00:40:24.830 nobody can get fooled this many times in a row and you got some senators over there too who keep harping on the save act as if they can get the save act passed. It 00:40:24.840 --> 00:40:34.390 ain't going to happen and it definitely ain't going to happen in time for this election. And but it'll give Republicans something to blame when they lose the midterms. 00:40:34.400 --> 00:40:43.110 >> Yeah, I mean they can't even pass a repeal of daylight saving time for crying out loud. Something we all hate. Well, I you 00:40:43.120 --> 00:40:51.230 know, I mean come on. You have so many people Now, what I I've never met anyone that likes it and we still can't manage to get maybe through the house. It's 00:40:51.240 --> 00:41:00.270 going to you know, I I don't know if it's going to ever happen. >> let me let me admit something here on the show. My main thing is quit changing the time, okay? I I want to quit 00:41:00.280 --> 00:41:09.070 changing the time. Pick one. I'm actually okay with either one. That after we passed one in the house, my wife was the first to inform me that 00:41:09.080 --> 00:41:17.950 the house version set it on the wrong time that we should we shouldn't have set it on permanent daylight savings time. We should have set it on the other. 00:41:17.960 --> 00:41:27.390 And I'm like, "Ah, it sounds kind of woo-woo." And and being the engineer I am I went and went and looked at the data and then I asked Grok, "Well, have 00:41:27.400 --> 00:41:36.223 there been studies near time zone changes like that would prove this out?" And Grok's like, "Actually, there have been and you should 00:41:36.233 --> 00:41:46.350 >> [laughter] >> you should have set the clock the other way." So, okay, I'll take the blame for voting for a bill that set it to the wrong time but I also want the credit for voting for a 00:41:46.360 --> 00:41:55.870 bill that that quit changing the clocks cuz most people want to quit changing the clocks. I think it's ridiculous especially when we've all got phones in 00:41:55.880 --> 00:42:04.630 our pockets now and you could you could start school whenever you want. You could start work whenever you want. The employer can. I'm not saying you show up whenever you want. You better show up 00:42:04.640 --> 00:42:13.110 when your boss says. But, these these things can all be changed and if you go look at a lot of other countries, they don't change the time. They don't change 00:42:13.120 --> 00:42:21.790 the time in Russia. They don't change the time in China because they they it's an idea so stupid the Russians don't do it. 00:42:21.800 --> 00:42:32.350 >> Yeah. >> That's what That's what Dick Army used to say about ethanol, I think. >> Oh, brother. Well, good luck tomorrow on 00:42:32.360 --> 00:42:40.430 this NDAA. Um I Yeah, I don't understand. I don't know how we put this genie back in the bottle without the total destruction of the US 00:42:40.440 --> 00:42:48.470 dollar um in our infrastructure. I don't see how it's sustainable beyond the 30 trillion that we're sitting in debt and the amount of money that we're paying on 00:42:48.480 --> 00:42:58.710 interest payments now on that debt. It's This is how This is how This is how empires collapse. >> Well, Clayton, there's 00:42:58.720 --> 00:43:07.150 while you're being red-pilled, it sounds like black-pill um to me and I'm sorry cuz there there are three pills you got to 00:43:07.160 --> 00:43:16.190 take this week. One is the NDAA and we we they just took away our chance to take section 219 out 00:43:16.200 --> 00:43:25.470 of it. So, it's an all-or-nothing proposition and that vote probably happens tomorrow. But then there's also going to be a vote on a CR, which is a continuing 00:43:25.480 --> 00:43:34.510 resolution, which will fund all of government without cutting a dime. No doge, sorry. No doge. It will fund everything that 00:43:34.520 --> 00:43:43.550 we've been funding until after the election, which means you can't force the Senate to do anything by attaching something to a spending bill. The The 00:43:43.560 --> 00:43:52.470 Senate's over there salivating for the CR. And then the third thing that they're going to do is this budget reconciliation. It's a parliamentary tool that was meant 00:43:52.480 --> 00:44:01.190 to help us balance the budget, but now they've turned it into an extra appropriation bill every year, whether it's Republican or Democrat, 00:44:01.200 --> 00:44:09.310 and this one is a slush fund. It's another 80 billion dollars plus for the war in Iran. Now, they won't say that. They're saying they're strengthening our 00:44:09.320 --> 00:44:18.750 own military. What they're doing is replenishing the stocks that we've already disposed of in Iran. And so, there's an $80 00:44:18.760 --> 00:44:28.430 like almost $90 fund in there for the military, which includes the $12 of payments to farmers who suffered from 00:44:28.440 --> 00:44:37.710 high inflation and high fuel because of the war in Iran. And then the $10 is in that reconciliation bill to try to bribe the states into doing something that 00:44:37.720 --> 00:44:46.950 looks like the save act, which will just mean free money to the states that are already doing the right thing and no money to the states that will keep doing 00:44:46.960 --> 00:44:55.470 the wrong thing. >> So stupid not even the Russians would do it. >> Yes. >> Oh my gosh. >> [sighs and gasps] >> I Now that's why I see so many people on 00:44:55.480 --> 00:45:05.870 X they're just like, "I'm just I'm I'm I'm I'm throwing in the towel. I'm just I'm throwing in the towel. Like we've been duped so many times, Congressman. It's just it's it's enough already. Um 00:45:05.880 --> 00:45:13.990 Uh I think that's why people are calling for some sort of a massive third party if we could ever have one. I don't know. Uh final thoughts, Congressman. I'll get you out of here. 00:45:14.000 --> 00:45:22.310 >> Well, well, the primaries are for the most part over. I think there's some going on in Florida where you where you might have a chance to do some sorting. 00:45:22.320 --> 00:45:32.430 Um but you know, if you're if we're going to have these two parties, there needs to be sorting within the parties. People need to be more uh informed about 00:45:32.440 --> 00:45:43.110 what their own members of Congress are doing. And that's what I've been trying to do over the last 14 years. They're finally They finally decided to shoot the messenger. Um which is fine. I'm surprised I got 00:45:43.120 --> 00:45:53.230 away with this this much truth-telling for 14 years. I felt like a cat that's had 14 lives instead of nine lives. I'd never expected to get this far. It's 00:45:53.240 --> 00:46:02.910 kind of like when Cool Hand Luke, you know, goes over the fence. Shaking the tree, boss. You You know, um I always turned off the end of that 00:46:02.920 --> 00:46:12.270 movie because I I always wanted to think that Cool Hand Luke always, you know, got away and escaped. But the the ending didn't turn out well for him, but he was 00:46:12.280 --> 00:46:20.910 always a free spirit. Um, I think there'll be somebody who'll step up and take my place in 6 months. And it may be 00:46:20.920 --> 00:46:29.830 somebody who's here already, who's just in the shadow too much. Um, maybe there's only room for one guy who's going to tell everything 00:46:29.840 --> 00:46:40.230 like it is. And um, I'm hopeful there'll be somebody up here explaining what's really going on when I'm no longer here. But in the meantime, I've got 5 months 00:46:40.240 --> 00:46:49.150 left. I regret to inform you that's only about 36 legislative days in in Congress people work days, right? Um, but I'm 00:46:49.160 --> 00:46:57.310 going to make the most of it. And you're going to want me back on your show because there will be more to talk about. >> Well, you're welcome anytime, Congressman. Thank you for fighting the 00:46:57.320 --> 00:47:05.950 good fight. And good luck tomorrow, and we'll see how this all shakes out over this brief remainder of this legislative session. Congressman, great to see you 00:47:05.960 --> 00:47:14.910 as always. Thank you so much. >> Thanks, Clayton. Good to see you. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much for watching Redacted. We'd love for you to subscribe to the channel. It's totally free. If you want 00:47:14.920 --> 00:47:24.350 to follow us or subscribe, and if we brought you any value at all, please consider sharing this video with a friend or a loved one on social media. Thanks so much, and we'll see you next 00:47:24.360 --> 00:47:26.720 time.