WASHINGTON—Yesterday, United States Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN), a member of the Senate Appropriations and Foreign Relations Committees and former U.S. Ambassador to Japan, joined The Chris Salcedo Show on Newsmax to discuss the weaponization of government under former Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, attacks on pro-life Americans and parents, and Senator Chuck Schumer’s political games that are prolonging the government shutdown.
Partial Transcript
Hagerty on weaponization of government under Obama and Biden: “This is the first time, since January 20th of this year, that Republicans have held the Senate, the House, and the White House. We’re finally in a position to deal with the travesty of the Barack Obama administration, the Joe Biden administration, and the weaponization of government that has taken place. Going back to 2016, at that point, I was a private citizen, but I was the finance chair for President [Donald] Trump. I came into Trump Tower the day after the election to help him with the transition. I was surveilled there by the FBI–the Obama FBI–using a false Russia dossier as the foundation. Roll forward now, under the Biden administration, you’ve got Jack Smith coming in in 2023 after his offensive raid in Mar-a-Lago. This weaponization of government and illegal attack was decided after indicting President Trump, that they’re going to come after eight senators and a congressman. We just learned this last night. This is totally intolerable.”
Hagerty on corruption at DOJ and FBI leadership: “The American public’s trust in these institutions, like the FBI, has been totally crushed. The rank and file of the FBI in Memphis are doing a wonderful job, but the leadership has corruption at its core. Merrick Garland hired Jack Smith. These people need to be held to account, and that has not been the case to date. People need to be perp-walked for what happened here: constitutional violations, legal violations. We’ve got to get to the bottom of it, address it, and restore trust.”
Hagerty on Biden’s attacks on conservatives: “They went into my home state of Tennessee. They arrested and prosecuted pro-life people just because they were in the vicinity of an abortion clinic. Think about what happened to parents when they had the gall to go to school board meetings and question the graphic material being taught to their children. Teachers were coaching their children on how to transition without even talking to the parents. The fact that they prosecuted Catholics in America. It has gotten so far beyond the pale. Now, President Trump has come into the White House. He has made it a clear point: we’re going to open this up and expose it. With new leadership, we’re going to see major change. We’re going to expose this and prosecute these people to the fullest extent of the law. Accountability has been long overdue under Democrats. Now is the time.”
Hagerty on Schumer’s shutdown politics: “The Democrats are now saying they have a special march planned in Washington, DC, a week from Saturday. They seem to want to keep the government shut down so Chuck Schumer can go and say, ‘I’m railing against Donald Trump,’ and take part in this protester’s march. The radicals influencing the Democratic Party are pushing them to keep the government shut down.”
Hagerty on the cost of Schumer’s shutdown: “We’ll have missed payroll for federal workers, we’ll have missed payroll for our military, and benefits are running out. This is all because Chuck Schumer wants to prove that he is standing up to Donald Trump. He’s trying to reposition himself in New York–because today, if a primary were held in the Democratic Party in New York, AOC would beat Chuck Schumer. He’s doing this at a cost of $400 million per day to the American taxpayer. We’re already in the single-digit billions. Let’s see how far Chuck Schumer will damage the economy and our nation just for his own political good.”
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