Bill de Blasio: Our tax dollars incentivize companies to get rid of American workers in favor of automation
Democratic presidential candidate and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio discusses automation, the state of NYC under his leadership and his bid for the presidency on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.'
This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," September 5, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
TUCKER CARLSON, HOST: Good evening and welcome to "Tucker Carlson Tonight."
For years now on this program, we have had some unkind words for Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York. We described de Blasio as among other things, stupid, a pothead and the worst mayor in the history of cities.
But it turns out Bill de Blasio does not hold a grudge. We learned this yesterday when he called us out of the blue for a friendly conversation. And now tonight, he is going to be appearing on this show live. Stay tuned. He is up in just a minute.
But first tonight, it was an act really of wanton cruelty committed against defenseless television viewers. Last night, CNN subjected its tiny audience to what it described as a Climate Change Town Hall. The thing went on for seven hours. That's a long time.
In fact, that's so long that climate predictions made at the start of the evening could have been proven wrong by the end. An entire species of polar bear might have become extinct by the third commercial break. It's a long time.
And yet in the name of science, a few hearty souls attempted to watch the entire thing. Now, we can't say with certainty what happened to them, though of course they're in our prayers, but at least one of them lapsed into total unconsciousness. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: ... say enough of having the oil industry, the fossil fuel industry, right all our laws in this area and no more -- no more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: He was the lucky one. If he was sleeping deeply enough, he might have missed CNN asking Julian Castro what his administration would do to fight, quote, "environmental racism." We're not making that up, but that's just the tip of the rapidly melting iceberg.
Though it was billed as a show about the environment, in fact last night was really an exercise in sweaty moral posturing. At times the evening became so strident that even the candidates on stage couldn't keep up with it all.
Cory Booker, for example, he tried to reassure viewers that Democrats don't really want to take people's meat away. Apparently, he had forgotten that Kamala Harris had just called for that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. CORY BOOKER (D-NJ), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I hear about it all the time, "Booker wants to take away your hamburger." Well that is the kind of lies and fear-mongering that they spread out there that somehow the Democrats want to get rid of hamburgers.
TEXT: Earlier in the night ...
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: But would you support changing the dietary guidelines?
SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D-CA), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Yes.
BURNETT: You know, the food pyramid.
HARRIS: Yes.
BURNETT: To reduce red meat specifically?
HARRIS: Yes, I would.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: So Kamala Harris had been thinking a lot about what you eat and she thinks you eat too much red meat and she plans to do something about it once she is elected God, that and a number of other things.
In fact, there are quite a few things in America that Kamala Harris plans to ban immediately.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JESSIE BLUEDORN, CLIMATE ACTIVIST: Will you commit to implementing a federal ban on fracking your first day in office, adding the United States to the list of countries who have banned this devastating practice?
HARRIS: There's no question I'm in favor of banning fracking, so yes.
BURNETT: So would you ban offshore drilling?
HARRIS: Yes, and I've again, worked on that.
BURNETT: Plastic straws are a big thing right now --
HARRIS: Yes --
BURNETT: Do you ban plastic straws?
HARRIS: I think we should, yes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Banning drinking straws. I mean, it is mindless and annoying. If you actually cared about plastic pollution and you should care about plastic pollution because it's horrifying, you would punish China for China plastics into the ocean, but of course, no one on the left wants to do that because they're busy sucking up to China.
But banning fracking? Now, that's just demented. Our energy sector is the single most successful part of the entire American economy. It's one of the only things propping up our trade balance right now. It's been a savior of last resort for rural areas devastated by globalization. Kamala Harris doesn't care about any of that. She probably doesn't even know.
When you're a soulless demagogue bent on acquiring power at all cost, details are not relevant. All you see is yourself at the finish line -- arms in the air. Ambition is a powerful drug and yet if we're being honest about it, Harris was not even close to the least appealing candidate on the stage last night. That award goes, without question to Father Pete Buttigieg, the Patron Saint of South Bend, Indiana.
Father Buttigieg launched into a sermon last night that would have made Jonathan Edwards proud. Sinners in the hands of an angry climate God.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PETE BUTTIGIEG, (D-IN), MAYOR, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: You know, if you believe that God is watching as poison is being belched into the air of creation, and people are being harmed by it, countries are at risk of vanishing in low-lying areas, what do you suppose God think of that? I bet he thinks it's messed up.
At least one way of talking about this is that it's a kind of sin.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: You shudder to think of the torments waiting for you in Father Pete's Episcopalian version of hell. Imagine him lecturing you superciliously for eternity, wagging his little fingers in your face, bragging about his virtue. It's enough to make you want to obey.
Father Pete though fears no such judgment, at the very same time, he is yelling at you about belching poison into the air of creation. Father Pete himself is likely to be sipping Perrier at 50,000 feet in the leased Gulfstream.
According to an Associated Press report, Buttigieg flies on climate destroying private jets more than any other Democratic candidate in the race right now. How can that be? We asked the Buttigieg Campaign that question today and they responded. Here's their response quote, "We fly commercial as often as possible and only fly non-commercial when the schedule dictates." Non-commercial -- oh that makes sense. The schedule dictates it.
So when it's convenient, Father Buttigieg follows his own Commandments. The rest of the time when the schedule dictates, he is happy to belch poison into the air of creation.
So you're not allowed to drink from a plastic straw, that's immoral, but Father Pete gets to keep his private plane. So no wonder rich people love climate activism. For them, it's all upside. It's not so great for everyone else unfortunately. For poor people in the third world, it's going to be especially tough.
We're not going to be allowed to have as many children as they would like. Watch Bernie Sanders explain.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTHA READYOFF, TEACHER: Empowering women and educating everyone on the need to curb population growth seems a reasonable campaign to enact. Would you be courageous enough to discuss this issue and make it a key feature of a plan to address climate catastrophe?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Well, Martha, the answer is yes. And the answer has everything to do with the fact that women in the United States of America, by the way, have a right to control their own bodies and make reproductive decisions.
(APPLAUSE)
And the Mexico City Agreement, which denies American aid to those organizations around the world that are -- that allow women to have abortions or even get involved in birth control to me is totally absurd.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Oh, there you go. Sanders says it right out loud. The Africans are having too many babies, we're going to have to make sure those Africans have more abortions. We're going to pay for African abortions.
We're also by the way going to have to control what people eat, how they travel and where, what they do for a living. We're going to have control every detail of their formerly personal lives. We're in charge now of everything. That's the message. I suddenly realize, none of this has much to do with the environment.
Justin Haskins is the Editorial Director of the Heartland Institute and he joins us tonight. Justin, thanks for coming on. So once again, if you really were concerned about climate change, your emphasis might be on the behavior of other countries, it might be on reforestation, which I think most normal people would be in favor of strongly. I certainly would be.
But instead, I notice a theme throughout all of these proposals which is they're all about control and empowering the people making the proposals. Am I missing something?
JUSTIN HASKINS, EDITORIAL DIRECTOR, HEARTLAND INSTITUTE: No, you're not missing anything. This is all about authoritarianism. The theme --
CARLSON: Yes.
HASKINS: The stated them might have been climate change, but the actual theme was authoritarianism. That's what this was all about. Force control and manipulation.
If you really cared about the environment, I mean, you really cared about it, the last thing that you would want to do ...
CARLSON: And I do.
HASKINS: ... is to have -- the last thing you would want to do is control the entire or have the entire country run on solar and wind because if you had the entire country running on solar and wind, you would need a landmass the size of the State of California. How many millions of acres of land? How many millions of trees? How many millions of animals would we have to kill in order to make that reality happen?
So in order to save the planet, we're supposed to destroy the planet? That's the message that we're getting now. This is not about climate change. It is not about environmentalism, it's never been about that. It's about force, control and manipulation.
CARLSON: I don't get the sense that any of these people ever go outside, like when was last time they went camping? Do they know anything? I'm serious. Do they know anything about the environment? Are they interested at all? Do they ever spend time there? Really?
HASKINS: Well, if you look at Bernie Sanders, it doesn't seem like he does, probably. But the truth is, they don't care about that, Tucker. They don't care about it.
CARLSON: That is very obvious.
HASKINS: All they care about is increasing their own power, expanding the power of the ruling class. That's what this has been about for 50 years. They've been making climate change predictions for 50 years.
They've talked about the global population crisis, global cooling, how we're going to be running out of food. None of these things have happened. But they keep making the predictions because they believe that if they make them enough, people will listen to them and give them enough power over our lives so that they can control virtually every aspect of society. That's the point of this.
CARLSON: Wait. You're holding them accountable of their predictions. That would make you a denier.
So for example, I read this today, 19 years ago, the United Nations predicted -- officially predicted that by the year -- that by present, Bangladesh would be largely underwater. There are many predictions like that. It's not. Why is no one who makes those predictions -- Al Gore included -- ever held to account for them?
HASKINS: To be perfectly honest, because many people in the media and academia and elsewhere have been kind of colluding together in order to make sure that regular people don't find out about it unless they watch shows like this.
Unless they're watching TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT or Fox News or something, they don't learn the truth about these things. They're told that there is a climate crisis, that it's going to be a disaster and that if they don't vote for a Democrat, God who's going to save us all from climate catastrophe.
We're all going to die in in 20 years or 30 years or 40 years and then when 20 years or 30 years or 40 years comes along and we're not all dead, they say, "We'll just wait another 10 years and we'll all be dead." And they keep doing this over and over and over again.
CARLSON: That's exactly right. What's so truly infuriating is that those of us who deeply care about the natural world and the environment who mean it and really do, watch as these people make our country dirtier -- much dirtier -- and nobody says anything about it.
And then they lecture us as if they have moral standing on the environment? They don't know anything about the environment. It's disgusting. It's infuriating. Justin, thank you for putting that in perspective.
HASKINS: Thanks, Tucker.
CARLSON: I'll calm down as we move into our next guest. CNN hosts left no doubt about their political views on the question last night. Hurricanes has happened for as long as the Earth has had weather, but on CNN they were treated like something brand new caused by Donald Trump. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: We're seeing storms that are intensifying and that's just one sign of the dangerous world that scientists tell us we're entering if humans don't cut carbon pollution in half in the next 11 years.
BURNETT: Think bigger fires in the West or deadlier heat wave, supercharged storms like the one we've seen now, Hurricane Dorian.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: We're seeing firsthand the effects of climate change as a powerful Atlantic hurricane is sitting right now off the coast of Florida.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: Chris Plante hosts "The Chris Plante Show" on the radio. For many years he worked at the cable news network and he joins us tonight. Chris, you look over there and there's a collection of people not one of whom with an IQ over 100. Nobody with a background in science lecturing us about things they don't understand at all and I can't help but think it's purely political.
CHRIS PLANTE, RADIO SHOW HOST, THE CHRIS PLANTE SHOW: You can't help but think that? What a cynic you've become, honestly. That was just good journalism. That was award-winning journalism.
It was -- look, they did everything they were supposed to do. They adopted the lexicon of the Democratic Party and the weather apocalypse crowd. The weather-palooza, seven hours of it with I think every anchor on CNN showcased at one time or another.
They had Magilla Gorilla there, you know, Fredo Cuomo who proves every time he gets the chance that he doesn't know anything. But they can faithfully parrot the party line.
You saw even the graphics had the climate crisis and the word crisis in red and it was all very frightening and it's an existential threat and we have only 11 years because some nameless and faceless group of the United Nations who aren't really scientists at all came up with a report that we treat as the new Bible because you know as Voltaire predicted, when you kill God, it will be necessary to create him again. And they've created God and it is them. We will be happy to know that it is them.
Look CNN last night, they gifted everything to the Democrats so that they could -- they really, I guess -- they should ask questions. They should ask some hardball questions, which they of course did not do.
They could have done things like you mentioned the UN report with Bangladesh being underwater by now. I have a story from 1989 in the last century, the headline is "UN Predicts Disaster if Global Warming Not Checked by the Year 2000."
It was a ten-year timeline in 1989 and if we didn't fix it by the year 2000, disaster would be everywhere. It would be the apocalypse. And your last guest, Justin is a hundred percent right, they keep updating the apocalypse.
And it was, when I was a teenager, it was the coming Ice Age and armadillos were fleeing.
CARLSON: I remember that.
PLANTE: Because they knew -- you remember the armadillos were fleeing because they knew the ice was coming. We didn't know if the armadillos --
CARLSON: They were the polar bears of their time.
PLANTE: They really were. They were. They were the armadillos in a coal mine.
Now, look, CNN did what they always do. It was a climate-palooza. CNN was in on the joke. They carried the party line one hundred percent of the way. There are a lot of questions you could ask about whether you really believe that if you make these changes, the storm off the East Coast would be smaller. There would be fewer hurricanes.
Were there any questions like that at all? The trillions and trillions of dollars, the really radical and extreme ideas and so many of them. None of this questioned, the budget was never questioned. None of it was ever questioned. It was classic.
CARLSON: It was perfect in that way. I really -- it really won for the time capsule. Chris Plante, it is great to see tonight. Thank you.
PLANTE: Thanks, Tucker.
CARLSON: Joe Biden was also there tonight. He is the purported Democratic frontrunner. He didn't say much about global warming that was interesting, not more interesting than the story he himself created by being there.
It wasn't good. At one point while trying to answer a question, Biden seemed to lose his train of thought completely.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: ... that saves billions of gallons of gasoline -- I mean, billions of -- two point -- I think it's $2.3 billion worth of -- excuse me, $500 billion in savings and two-point- something billion metric tons of CO2 going into the air.
And so there's a whole range of things that are going on now in terms of, you know -- anyway, I'm taking too long. Sorry.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CARLSON: It's almost mean to put that on TV and I am being honest, we feel a little bit bad about it. He is running for President though and that was on television live last night, so there you go.
And then as if that wasn't concerning enough, Biden appeared to have blood coming out of one of his eyes. Should we be worried about him?
Dr. Marc Siegel is a Fox Medical Contributor and he joins us tonight. Doctor, thanks very much for coming on.
MARC SIEGEL, FOX NEWS MEDICAL CONTRIBUTOR: Hi, Tucker.
CARLSON: So, first to the more dramatic news. Biden did have blood in his eye? What might that have been?
SIEGEL: Now that's the more dramatic -- and by the way, of course, I haven't examined him. I'm not as physician, but that appears to me as he something called a subconjunctival hemorrhage, which sounds worse than it is. It's a blood vessel leaking just below the eye and usually it's benign, it goes away on its own and it's nothing to worry about.
Now as you get older, it can have something to do with high blood pressure or bleeding problems or circulatory problems, but most of the time, no.
So that in itself looked worse than it probably was, but it does -- the other clip you showed, Tucker, where he appeared confused, that's been happening with increasing amounts, where he forgot -- seems to forget what state he is in or the timeline of the Parkland school shooting.
Things like that are really concerning to me, and again, I don't know the answer to why that is happening, but I want to point something out. He had those aneurysms clipped surgically back in 1988. You know what happened in 1990? We developed a new technique to do that where we went in through the artery itself which was a miracle, a change.
Now, we do these procedures with something called a coil which we put in right through the artery into the brain. It's a miraculous technological advancement. He didn't have that.
He had a great surgeon who says that he is fine now, but I've looked at studies from 2000 and 2006 and again, I'm not necessarily talking about him, I'm talking about a patient who the procedure he had with a one- centimeter aneurysm, with some leaking into the brain.
Down the line, you can see quite often, cognitive changes. Problems with thinking, problems with concentration, problems with orientation. So that's on my mind that that's something that might be something we would consider. We don't know if it's true in his case.
CARLSON: No.
SIEGEL: But I am seeing what looks like it could be problems with thinking, orientation and memory. So I am concerned.
CARLSON: I've got to say, and I mean this with sincerity, it evokes sympathy in me. You know, I know that that that'll be me someday, anyway. Dr. Siegel, great to see you tonight. Thank you.
SIEGEL: Well, the man has been through a lot, Tucker. He has been through a lot.
CARLSON: He has.
SIEGEL: And he is a very courageous -- so --
CARLSON: No, I agree. I just want to be clear we're not mocking him actually.
SIEGEL: Absolutely.
CARLSON: I feel bad about it. Good to see you.
SIEGEL: Me, too. Thanks, Tucker.
CARLSON: Well, we have mocked the Mayor of New York, Bill de Blasio and then yesterday, he called us and said that he has got a new policy idea that we might be interested in talking about. It turns out we are, and it's not entirely crazy. Bill de Blasio joins us right after the break.
Also, Hurricane Dorian hitting the Carolinas tonight as we speak. We are tracking that storm, and of course, we will bring you those developments throughout the hour.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: So in the three or so years the show has been on the air, we've taken a bunch of different positions on a bunch of different topics, but one thing we've always been consistent about from the first day until today is making fun of Bill de Blasio, the Mayor of New York -- on every topic. If you watch this show, you'll know.
Then the other day, it came to our attention that de Blasio has raised an issue that too few in either party are talking about. It's the question of automation. He has got a piece in "WIRED" magazine on it.
De Blasio, as you as you know is also running for President. Something else we've made fun of. But his position on automation really struck us is pretty interesting, so yesterday, we arranged a phone call and we talked about a very friendly conversation, invited Mayor de Blasio to come on the show to talk about that and other things and he was gracious enough to respond.
And so we're happy to have Mayor Bill de Blasio join us tonight live. Mr. Mayor, thanks a lot for coming on.
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Thank you, Tucker and I appreciate that you care deeply about this issue of automation because it's bearing down on all of us.
CARLSON: It is, it is and my praise of you on this question is totally sincere. Very few people are taking this seriously. Andrew Yang is one of them, you're another. I can't think of many others who are and so God bless you.
So you're basically saying that companies ought to have to -- and I'm not sure how much of this I agree with, but I think I'm phrasing this correctly. You say companies ought to have to bear some of the cost of helping workers transition to something else when they lay them off in favor of robots.
DE BLASIO: That's right. Tucker, right now, let's just get the magnitude clear for all your viewers.
Middle-class Americans, working-class Americans whose jobs are not going to be there if we don't do something different. Because right now, the recent estimate I saw, 36 million jobs that could be made obsolete. We're talking as early as 2030 -- 12 years ahead. Eleven to twelve years from now.
So here's the reality. Right now, in fact the Federal Tax Code rewards companies that invest in the kind of technology that actually sheds jobs, destroys jobs.
Our tax dollars are helping companies -- incentivizing companies to get rid of more and more American workers. So my plan is simple, it says, end that. We're talking about hundreds of billions of dollars that we could use to actually address our bigger issues in this country and employ a lot of people.
CARLSON: I am completely with you on that one right there. I'm sure there's a lot of details we disagree on, but I agree with you on that, for sure.
DE BLASIO: And by the way, South Korea is doing that right now. They recognize that if they don't stop incentivizing companies, a lot of times these companies are making the decision simply because it's better for their tax reality rather than what's better for working people or even productivity.
The second point of my plan is, let's institute something -- Bill Gates actually was the first one I think to call for -- which is a quote unquote "robot tax." It says simply, you know a worker pays income tax. You take away millions and millions of workers, that's a lot less revenue to take care of all the things we need in our society and it means of course, millions and millions of people who don't have a livelihood.
I believe in work. I think you do, too. I believe we need a future that's based on work. So if a company is going to put thousands of people out of work, they should bear responsibility for making sure that those folks get a new job, either in the same company or elsewhere.
But that tax is both an incentive to keep people on the job in a good way, in a productive way, it also provides money to help foster from the Federal level the kinds of things we need a lot more of. We need a lot more investment in renewable energy and recycling and environmental restitution. There's all sorts of this.
CARLSON: Well, let me ask you this question though, okay, so I'm not sure I think of the second, but I don't think it's totally crazy. You know, I am happy to read and think about it more. So we're together up until this point, but if you really believe that automation is a threat to low-skilled jobs, why are you for mass immigration?
What are all of these people going to do, we're importing with your help?
DE BLASIO: Look, Tucker, I'm not finished on the point about what we're trying to achieve here and I certainly want to answer that question, it's an important one. Let's just be clear about the central point here.
Right now, there is no American strategy, no Federal government strategy to address automation and it could be the single most disruptive force in our society that we've ever experienced.
If you talk about tens of millions of working-class and middle-class Americans who no longer have work or the prospect of work, that's unacceptable.
So the Federal government has to step up. There is no strategy now. There's no candidate in my opinion who is offering a coherent strategy. I respect Andrew Yang for raising the issue.
CARLSON: So I agree. I would say that immigration -- immigration is a close second as a force to transforming the country and the two are at cross-purposes. So immigrants come here overwhelmingly to work in low- skilled jobs, a lot of those jobs no matter how hard we try are going away. This is crazy, why are we doing this?
DE BLASIO: Well let's face it, there's a huge number of jobs right now and let's take agriculture as an obvious example. We're in the worst of all worlds. We don't have enough workers to do the work among the people already in this country and we don't have a coherent immigration system including something as obvious as a guest worker program, a legal guest worker program.
CARLSON: Okay, but Ag is a small sector.
DE BLASIO: That could actually take this some place.
CARLSON: Okay, Ag is -- and that's a separate debate. I disagree but that's not -- I mean, the much bigger picture is jobs in the service sector are going away that immigrants fill. We continue to import immigrants at over a million a year, why are we doing that?
DE BLASIO: Although I appreciate your point, the magnitude here speaks otherwise. Again, let's take that number of 36 million and there are estimates that go a lot farther than that, Tucker.
CARLSON: Right, I know.
DE BLASIO: We're not talking about -- we're not talking about the impact to immigration compared to that. We're talking about something absolutely seismic and imagine, I think you and I share this concern. I bet a huge percentage of your viewers do, too.
How do we have a threat to our security, to our stability as a country, to our social fabric and there's no strategy whatsoever? In fact, the recent tax legislation made it worse. Encouraged companies to lay off more workers and to put the money into new machines.
CARLSON: So what you're saying -- and I agree with you -- is that we have this massive problem that everyone is ignoring and I want on that point to transition to the city that you run -- New York, where I was yesterday.
The city is dirty and it's getting dirtier. One of my producers told me just yesterday that he was in a crowded subway car and a man dropped his trousers and defecated in the middle of the car and no one did anything about it and that's a metaphor for what's happening.
I go there regularly -- and I have my whole life -- and every time I go under your Mayorship, it is dirtier. There's filth on the sidewalks. Do you notice any of that?
DE BLASIO: Tucker, look here's what's going on in New York City today. We have challenges, no doubt, and I don't accept a situation like that. I'm someone who believes the quality of life has to be addressed aggressively. I believe in quality of life policing, I always have. That kind of situation is unacceptable.
But the big picture is we are the safest big city in America. It is proven statistically time and time again. We have 500,000 new jobs since I became Mayor, the largest number of jobs in our history right now, the strongest economy we've ever had.
We've got problems, unquestionably, but there's also a lot of areas where the city is doing very, very well and the bottom line here is that we're addressing --
CARLSON: Okay, but do you notice it? Okay, but do you -- you endorsed decriminalizing public urination. Why would you want people to urinate?
DE BLASIO: No, no. That's absolutely false. That's absolutely false.
CARLSON: No, it's not false, I was there when you did it.
DE BLASIO: The difference -- we provide. There is a summons -- no, listen. Any offense like that gets a summons. There's a penalty. There's definitely a sanction. We don't believe in that.
CARLSON: You weakened the sanction against public urination and as a result the city smells like urine.
DE BLASIO: We believe in this city. No.
CARLSON: Do you notice that?
DE BLASIO: Tucker, that's not true.
CARLSON: You don't notice it.
DE BLASIO: I go all over New York City all the time. I'm sorry. I've been here for decades and decades. This city is more orderly and cleaner and safer than it has been for many, many years. We got more to do and we're going to keep making it better.
But anyone --
CARLSON: You've got 14,000 more homeless people on the street than the day you took office.
DE BLASIO: That's not true either.
CARLSON: Now, that's not all your fault.
DE BLASIO: That's just not true. It's not true. And the bottom line --
CARLSON: Well, if -- you want to hear the numbers, like, I have them right here.
DE BLASIO: What we have proven --
CARLSON: It's actually a little more than 14 -- it's almost 15. It was 64,060 the day your predecessor left and now it's 76,676.
DE BLASIO: Tucker, we -- obviously, we can reason together. There is a Federal count every year the number of homeless on the street. It is give or take four thousand. There's a lot of people in the shelter system. That's true we're driving down that number. We're driving down the number on the street.
I am not happy even about four thousand people on the street, but it's just nowhere near what you just said. But the difference at what you can see in New York and you see it on safety and you see it on jobs and you see it on a higher graduation rate in our schools is we continue to make progress in the city. We're going to make a lot more. But to the original point of this conversation --
CARLSON: Well, let me just question ask you a concrete question -- let me ask you a concrete question. If I live in New York and there's a homeless man outside my building who defecates on the sidewalk, is defecating on the sidewalk grounds to be arrested in the city?
DE BLASIO: It certainly can be.
CARLSON: He is taken off the sidewalk in front of my house.
DE BLASIO: It certainly can be and anyone who sees something like that --
CARLSON: No, but it's not.
DE BLASIO: No, hold on.
CARLSON: No, can you be arrested if you're living on the sidewalk --
DE BLASIO: Anyone --
CARLSON: Can you be arrested for defecating and prevented from living on that sidewalk?
DE BLASIO: Tucker, anyone who is threat to themselves or others, anyone who violates a law, anyone who is aggressive towards other people, there's a whole host of standards by which someone could be arrested, and we do that, and we'll continue to do that.
But again, the bottom line here is, we're talking about real issues here. But what we should be we should be talking about all the time.
CARLSON: Well, these are real issues.
DE BLASIO: What we should be talking about all the time is the future of working people --
CARLSON: So rat complaint issues -- okay, okay.
DE BLASIO: The future of working people in this country and where you and I started, I'm coming back -- if we don't and we're two of the only people talking about it right now, if we don't deal with the fact that tens of millions of American workers may not have a job and we may have a future without work and our social fabric could be destroyed and that's a threat to American security, if we don't deal with this in this election, we're going to ruin the day.
CARLSON: Amen.
DE BLASIO: We're going to ruin the day.
CARLSON: I couldn't agree more.
DE BLASIO: And I am proposing something that could actually do something about it.
CARLSON: I couldn't agree more and as a non-political, essentially non- partisan person, I am absolutely happy to compliment you with total sincerity on that.
I'm just saying the reality, the actual reality of life in the city that you manage matters. It is the biggest city in our country. I've lived there on and off my whole life. That city is not getting better under your Mayorship.
DE BLASIO: Tucker, I don't know how you look at --
CARLSON: In ways that are measurable.
DE BLASIO: So, unless you don't believe --
CARLSON: I'll give you a perfect example.
DE BLASIO: Unless you don't believe in the NYPD statistics --
CARLSON: Why is the number of rat complaints up dramatically? Okay, that's one statistic.
DE BLASIO: Hold on, Tucker, unless you don't believe the NYPD, which consistently -- we had -- we, yesterday had a press conference. We laid out the crime statistics for this year and crime continues to go down year after year. It's an extraordinary effort by the NYPD using policies and strategies that I've instituted in my administration as part of what's working.
How do you have 500,000 new jobs in six years? How do you have a record number of tourists if it's this horrible, a health scare you're describing?
CARLSON: You are arguing across what I'm saying. You're ignoring what I am saying.
DE BLASIO: No.
CARLSON: Okay, so if the city is doing so well, then you have a net inflow of people into New York City, oh no, just the opposite. You lost 40,000 people in the last year. Net loss of 40,000 people.
DE BLASIO: We have 8.6 million residents -- 8.6 million residents -- the highest we've ever had in our history.
CARLSON: Hold on. You lost net 40,000.
DE BLASIO: We have the highest population in our history.
CARLSON: Okay, so is that stat not true?
DE BLASIO: No, we have the highest population in our history. That's what matters. People are investing in this city because it's working.
Tucker, I'm the first to say because I do live here and I feel everything. I've been here for decades and decades. We've got some things to work on, for sure. We've got some areas where we're not where we need to be.
CARLSON: But then let me ask you --
DE BLASIO: But when you go back to the central question, Tucker, do people create hundreds of thousands of new jobs in a place that's not working? I don't think so.
CARLSON: What percentage of New Yorkers would you say support your presidential campaign?
DE BLASIO: Say again?
CARLSON: Most New Yorkers are liberal, so they agree with you on the macro issues. I think if you were to say, "What does Bill de Blasio believe? What does your average New Yorker believe?" There's a lot of overlap, maybe a total overlap.
But if you were to ask your average New Yorker, "Has Bill de Blasio had done such a good job in New York City that he deserves to run the United States of America," what percentage do you think would say, yes?
DE BLASIO: I don't conjecture. I know that they actually got to vote twice 73 percent in my first election, sixty seven percent in my second election.
CARLSON: I know the answer, and it's a tiny -- it's a tiny number and why do you think that is?
DE BLASIO: That's not the question. The question is, when -- especially in a race for President, what have you actually done that makes you able to be President of the United States? I've run the biggest and most complex city in this country.
Again, we have the safest we've ever been, the strongest economy we've ever been. We're the most diverse place and our social fabric is a lot stronger than it was six years ago.
There's a lot I can show you that actually has to do with how you run something and move something forward and where we started, I'm talking about issues related to working people that bluntly neither Democrats nor Republicans talk enough about.
And my whole reason for running for Mayor was to address the issues of working people and that's what we've been able to do here in this city.
CARLSON: So the biggest private-sector employers -- who are the biggest private-sector employers in New York City?
DE BLASIO: Chase Manhattan is one great example.
CARLSON: Yes, Chase is number one. JPMorgan Chase.
DE BLASIO: JPMorgan Chase. I am using the old phrase.
CARLSON: Does the leader -- does the leader -- so they would obviously -- I mean, they're the biggest private sector employer in the city that you run, the biggest city in America.
So obviously, the head of that company, Jamie Dimon must be a huge supporter of yours and a big donor to your presidential campaign because you've made the city so much better.
DE BLASIO: Tucker, you know this logic pattern just doesn't hold. The question is this, you've got a bunch of people running for President.
CARLSON: Does he? Oh, he doesn't support you at all. Well, why is that, I wonder?
DE BLASIO: Because we have different views and I respect him, but we have different views. And by the way, a CEO of a major financial institution is the last kind of person I think would support me because I believe we have to be tougher on Wall Street. I believe we have to stand up for working people. I believe we need to tax the wealthy a lot more than we are.
CARLSON: It's the biggest employer in your city.
DE BLASIO: I am a progressive who cares about working people. Why would you think the CEO of a bank ...
CARLSON: I care about working people, too.
DE BLASIO: ... would support someone like me that is concerned about working people, middle class people, not the one percent.
CARLSON: Because you're the Mayor -- hold on, let me - I'll answer your question -- because you're the mayor of the city and they have tens of thousands of employees living in your city.
At some level, it is not ideological. I don't think that Jamie Dimon, the head of the company is a conservative, he is not. It is not about the ideology, it's not about the banks, it's about whether you're making the city better.
DE BLASIO: Please. Look I know him and I respect him and I think he often speaks about important issues, but we have a very different worldview, and it doesn't surprise me that he would not support someone who wants to tax the wealthy a lot more and wants to challenge Wall Street and believes that we've got to do a lot more for working people in this country. That's what I am about.
CARLSON: Then name a big private sector employer in New York City who supports you. Name one big private sector employer -- just one.
DE BLASIO: Here is the question, Tucker --
CARLSON: Can you name one?
DE BLASIO: Tucker, I just don't play these games. I don't play these games.
CARLSON: It's not a game, it's a question.
DE BLASIO: Here is the question. The Democratic Party for too long has been way too cozy with donors with Wall Street, with folks who actually ...
CARLSON: I agree with that.
DE BLASIO: ... create a lot of our problems. When the whole reason we're having a good conversation on automation ...
CARLSON: That is true.
DE BLASIO: ... is I don't care about what those donors think, I don't care about what folks in Silicon Valley who are trying to justify that technology somehow is going to save us all. You know they are resting their laurels on the universal basic income and this is another fallacy, Tucker, UBI, maybe it's part of a solution in some way, shape or form, but what I fear about that kind of idea is it is a crutch.
It's a way for a bunch of people who are going to make a huge amount of money ...
CARLSON: I agree.
DE BLASIO: ... just to make their own consciousness feel better, but what it's going to lead to ...
CARLSON: That is true.
DE BLASIO: ... is a future without work and the last thing we need --
CARLSON: Yes.
DE BLASIO: I'm a progressive, I'm a Democrat. I believe in work. And I believe work gives people a lot of value, a lot of meaning and we need to protect work in this country and there's a whole lot of wealthy people who are happy to run all the way to the bank and leave working people behind, and then they'll say, "Oh you sit at home and we'll send you a check."
CARLSON: I agree with you.
DE BLASIO: That's ridiculous.
CARLSON: And you're right, and by the way, if you've ever known inherited money people, they're the unhappiest people in America, so obviously you don't want to encourage indolence.
Quick final question --
DE BLASIO: Yes.
CARLSON: How can you take an SUV to the gym and back everyday and say that you're really worried about climate change?
DE BLASIO: It's a Chrysler Pacifica --
CARLSON: I know it's a petty question, but it has bugged me for years.
DE BLASIO: It's a Pacifica, it's a hybrid electric. It's not an SUV first of all, but it's -- look, I come from a neighborhood --
CARLSON: No, it's got a gas engine in, ain't it?
DE BLASIO: I come from a neighborhood, I go back to my neighborhood all the time. It's the way to me that I stay connected to people that I am able to have a routine that allows me to be 24/7 the best mayor I can be --
CARLSON: But should the climate have to pay the cost for that?
DE BLASIO: Oh come on. It's a few miles.
CARLSON: Oh come on?
DE BLASIO: And Tucker, here's the great part about all of this.
CARLSON: What do you mean, oh come on?
DE BLASIO: If I took a subway anywhere --
CARLSON: I am going to use that the next time I get lectured about climate change, "Oh come on."
DE BLASIO: No, no. The point is, wherever I go, if I take a subway, the cars follow me for security reasons. Any way you slice it, I'm doing what's going to help me be the best that I can be for the people of this city and that's why I'm proud to say, this is a city -- the safest big city in America. A city that's moving forward in so many ways.
But if we don't get these bigger issues right and I've got to tell you, you could be Mayor and you can feel like, "Wow, I'm mayor. I'm able to do things." But if Washington doesn't address the kinds of things that cities and states can't do, if Washington doesn't address this automation issue, we're all screwed. We're all screwed.
CARLSON: Yes, I think that's --
DE BLASIO: And this better be a 2020 issue and it's not right now.
CARLSON: I think that's right. I didn't even ask you --
DE BLASIO: It is not a 2020 issue and we need to make it a 2020 issue.
CARLSON: Well, I didn't even ask you about whether you're going to stay in the race. We're going to take a quick break. Will you stay there? I want to ask you, are you going to keep running for President?
DE BLASIO: I'm always happy to talk about it.
CARLSON: We'll be right back. Thanks, Mr. Mayor.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Welcome back. We're returning to our unexpected, but I think genuinely interesting conversation with the Mayor of New York City, Bill de Blasio who, if you watch the show, you know has been someone we've attacked a lot, but is gracious enough to come on and have a real conversation with us, and we're grateful for that.
Mr. Mayor, thanks a lot for coming back. I want to ask you about whether you're going to stay in the presidential race? There was a "New York Times" piece that said you might not, but before I do, I want to ask you about one of your policy positions on firearms.
You have said that you're for mandatory buybacks of semi-automatic rifles, so there are tens of millions of these rifles in circulation now and presumably some large number of people won't feel like selling them to the government. What do you do with those people?
DE BLASIO: Well, it's a good question, Tucker. Look, I think if you get to the point which we have to in this country where we ban assault weapons, we've seen the horrifying impact.
And Tucker, let me make it very human for you. I run the biggest school system in America, 1.1 million kids. We're doing active shooter drills regularly now. I hear from parents all the time, I go to Town Hall meetings, they're more worried now about their kids than I've ever seen because they really think an active shooter situation could happen because it's become a norm in this country and obviously that almost always involves assault weapons.
We've got to end the availability of assault weapons in this country, so I think if there was a ban on assault weapons and there was a buyback program, the vast majority of people I think would do the smart thing and they would sell them back.
I don't have a specific answer for you, I think it's a good question --
CARLSON: But millions, but hold on -- millions wouldn't, so but you know, you would have law-abiding people like me and like a lot of people I know who have hunting rifles that fall under assault weapon category and the cops would show up and say, "Give us your gun," and they would say "no" and you would have unfortunately, tragically, you would have cases of violence. Are you -- are you okay with that? That is inevitable.
DE BLASIO: No, again, Tucker, I am being honest -- I am being honest with you. I think anyone in public life should say, you know when we think we have an answer or whether there's something we still have to work out.
What I know is this, we cannot have assault weapons in our society. We've seen the devastating impact. They need to be banned and that means by definition, you don't leave millions and millions of them out there. The buyback is the obvious approach.
How we deal with someone that doesn't want to participate with the buyback, that's something we have to resolve going forward. But to me, the logic to start with is --
CARLSON: Do you have a definition of assault weapon? I mean because a lot of deer rifles would qualify as an assault weapon. Would those be taken, too?
DE BLASIO: Look, I think the fact is that I'm someone who understands under the Second Amendment there are going to be plenty of appropriate weapons that people can use for self-defense, for hunting, if they're sportsmen, if they're marksmen there's all sorts of weapons that still would qualify for people to have.
But the military-grade assault weapons those just don't belong in the hands everyday people.
CARLSON: Would you subject your bodyguards to the same limitations as other American citizens?
DE BLASIO: Again, Tucker, I respect you, but that's a question that makes no sense whatsoever. You're have sworn law enforcement officers --
CARLSON: Of course it does. If I can't have -- of course, it does, I've got a family just as you do. I have a lot of threats against me just as you do --
DE BLASIO: Sworn law enforcement officers who are here to protect all of us.
CARLSON: Hold on, slow down. You get free bodyguards --
DE BLASIO: No, no, no, no.
CARLSON: I don't know. No, no, no. No. Your bodyguards living at your house --
DE BLASIO: I am only going --
CARLSON: Don't no, no, no me Mr. Mayor.
DE BLASIO: By definition -- by definition, if you're a public servant --
CARLSON: You've got bodyguards living at your house, I know some of the bodyguards living at your house, okay and they've got magazines that I can't protect my family with. Does that bother you as a champion of the little guy?
DE BLASIO: Tucker, someone who serves in public service for a limited period of time and in this society we're living in, I hate to say it but public servants are vulnerable to violence in a different way and our law enforcement officers --
CARLSON: Yes, a lot of us are vulnerable to violence.
DE BLASIO: Absolutely, but our law enforcement officers are there to protect all of us and they need the weaponry they need.
CARLSON: Does it bother you that you get certain guns to protect yourself and your family, but I can't use those to protect my family?
DE BLASIO: I think it's a question that doesn't make any sense because I've spent ...
CARLSON: It makes sense to me.
DE BLASIO: ... my whole life. Listen, I've spent my whole life until very recently an average citizen with no different protection than you or any other American for a very brief period of my life by serving in a role where they provide it.
CARLSON: Well, how about when you leave office? Will you pledge not to allow your bodyguards to carry ...
DE BLASIO: I won't even have bodyguards.
CARLSON: ... any weapon that you would -- oh, of course you would. Yes, you will.
DE BLASIO: I don't plan on having -- no, no. You don't have to have bodyguards when you're --
CARLSON: Oh, yes you will.
DE BLASIO: I don't want to.
CARLSON: Your bodyguards are outside our building right now, but you're saying -- but I just want you to say, when you leave office you will not allow anybody in your orbit to carry a weapon that you would ban. The rest of us would --
DE BLASIO: Tucker, I don't intend to have bodyguards, but the point is, let's go back to what we were talking about. There should not be assault weapons endangering children in America. Period.
And with whatever we have to do to get that done, we need to do it.
CARLSON: Law-abiding citizens like me are not endangering children, okay, so if I can't protect my family with a gun, I don't think you should be able to protect your family with the same gun.
DE BLASIO: So, you don't think the assault weapons used in these horrible massacres are a problem in this country? I think they are. I think we've seen children killed in their schools with these assault weapons and it has to end.
CARLSON: But let me ask you -- it's horrifying by lunatics. The guns didn't do it, the people did it. I couldn't agree with you more.
DE BLASIO: And they should not be easily available to so many people and they are, they just are and it has to end. It has to end.
CARLSON: But people in power shouldn't have special exemptions like the ones you're giving yourself.
DE BLASIO: I just don't -- there are law enforcement, law enforcement needs the weaponry they need in general, but assault weapons do not belong in the hands of the civilians.
CARLSON: But let me ask you, are you planning -- okay, all right. Well, okay, are you planning to stay in the race? "The New York Times" reported that you were considering pulling out, what's the state of that?
DE BLASIO: Yes, I've said very clearly, my goal is to get into those next debates and that's a month away until that cutoff period. I'm going to get ideas out there like the discussion we're having on automation.
I'm going to put ideas out there that I think are going to be meaningful to people and if more and more people vote with their feet and provide donations and anyone who hears these ideas and like them, go to billdeblasio.com, even a one dollar donation helps me to get into the next debates for presenting ideas like this that actually could change things for working people.
I think the more I get out there with that, the more chances are that I can get into those October debates.
CARLSON: Do you think -- there was a report the other day saying that you worked a total of seven hours in a month in the City of New York.
DE BLASIO: Ridiculous.
CARLSON: Do you think your shortchanging -- that's not true?
DE BLASIO: No, it is ridiculous. It's not even true.
CARLSON: How can you run a city of eight million and run for President at the same time? Like honestly, can you? Are you Superman?
DE BLASIO: Let me tell you something, so the question is -- you're raising a very, very important question, who should be President of the United States, someone who actually runs a big complicated place and has been able to move it forward or people who don't run anything.
So I am running, this is my sixth year, I've put together a strong team. We've been able to put up real serious foundational changes in the city, safest big city in America, most jobs we've ever had, highest graduation rate we've ever had. I can show you a bunch of other examples. I'm doing all of that --
CARLSON: Most public urination we've ever had.
DE BLASIO: I am running for President of the United States is true and that takes some real time and energy, but I'm able to as a CEO keep making sure that my agencies are doing their jobs, the people I put in charge, doing just what any CEO in the world does -- public sector or private sector -- and that's actually qualifies you to be President of the United States that you know how to run something as big and complex as this city is a good warm-up for the much bigger job.
CARLSON: I'll tell you what, it puts you in good graces with me anyway, having the stones to come on the show, and good for you. I respect that. I disagree with most of what you say, but I do respect that.
DE BLASIO: You know what, Tucker? We should never be afraid. We should never be afraid to have a real dialogue and a real debate with each other regardless of views and I've also said, I have real differences with some of what I think this network stands for, but I also respect the millions and millions of people watch this network, working Americans, middle-class Americans ...
CARLSON: That's true.
DE BLASIO: ... and I say as a progressive and a Democrat, I think we need to vie for every one of those votes and we need to show people respect of going on a network that they watch and offering ideas and say we care about you and we want your votes. We want to show you something we think will make your lives better and this automation issue is a good point.
You're talking about it. A lot of other people aren't talking about it, so even though you and I obviously disagree on a lot of stuff, I give you credit, you're talking about a big issue that needs to be every day in this dialogue, every day in this debate.
If we're not talking about automation, we are not actually talking about the honest future for working people in this country.
CARLSON: Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City. Mr. Mayor, thank you. Come back any time.
DE BLASIO: Thank you, Tucker.
CARLSON: Well not long ago, Antifa put the journalist, Andy Ngo in the hospital. Now, "Rolling Stone" magazine says, Ngo is actually the villain, Antifa are his victims. Andy Ngo joins us next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CARLSON: Washington unfortunately is brimming with fake journalists who pretend to be brave dissidents -- all of them grovel to the powerful -- every single one of them. Suck ups.
Andy Ngo is not one of those. He is actually a journalist and for his coverage of Antifa's activities in Portland, Oregon, he was doused at first with a milkshake. Obviously an assault they were supposed to laugh at, but it's not funny if you think about it.
Later, he was put in the hospital with a brain hemorrhage. So if anyone deserves to be considered a victim of political violence, its Andy Ngo because he was a victim of political violence, but in a new piece, "Rolling Stone" magazine argues that actually Antifa are the victims and Ngo is responsible for quote demonizing them. Probably one of the dumbest, most repulsive articles I've seen in a long time.
Andy Ngo joins us tonight. What do you think of this piece, Andy?
ANDY NGO, JOURNALIST: Well, Tucker part of what makes Antifa such a potent movement is that they can depend on their fellow travelers in the media to provide them consistent favorable coverage.
These same writers and journalists are trying to basically finish the job that Antifa started back in June when they beat and robbed me and tried to intimidate me permanently into silence.
CARLSON: I mean, they're not hiding it like the woman who wrote this piece is endorsing violence. I mean there is kind of out of the closet in favor of political violence.
NGO: What's been fascinating and a bit surreal is to watch the whole machine of left-wing media work to amplify the claims of an anonymous Antifa activist who made the false and defamatory claims that I am party to a violent criminal conspiracy with right-wingers. That's absolutely untrue.
It started originally with a left-wing blog and then was amplified in Media Matters, "Rolling Stones," "Daily Beast," so on and so forth.
CARLSON: Yes, I mean, I hope the rest of us don't lie to ourselves about what's happening here because it's getting increasingly obvious and you're one of its first victims.
Andy Ngo, I wish we had more time with you, but thank you very much for coming on. Appreciate it.
NGO: My pleasure.
CARLSON: So we lost a lot of the show tonight because of our extended interview with the Mayor of New York City. "Final Exam" was among the things we lost, but we're going to bring it back tomorrow. The can't-miss matchup, Jesse Watters versus Judge Jeanine. You have to wait for tomorrow night for that, 8:00 p.m., Friday and every night. The show that's the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and groupthink.
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