Ingraham: The Democrats' democracy problem
Democrats invested in impeachment are angry with America.
This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," September 30, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
LAURA INGRAHAM, HOST: I'm Laura Ingraham. This is "The Ingraham Angle" from Washington tonight.
So who is the whistleblower? And what could their identity reveal about the origins of this whole controversy? Oh, boy! Tonight I'm going to speak to a former CIA analyst and whistleblower himself, who says he has the answers.
Also tonight, Congressman Devin Nunes just sent a letter to the Intel Community Inspector General demanding answers about how secondhand information was used to kick up this whole ordeal. And could the entire impeachment push ruin the Democrats in the eyes of the American voters? Corey Lewandowski and Victor Davis Hanson will tell us.
But first, Democrats' democracy problem. That's the focus of tonight's Angle.
It was nice to get out of Washington last week even if it was only for a few days in Chicago. Oh, another city run by liberals. Well, getting out of the New York/Washington Acela corridor, it always reminds me that Americans are generally a lot fairer, smarter, and more practical-minded than a lot of the bigwigs in politics and the media, especially in so-called flyover country. They have a pretty keen sense of what matters, where the solutions might be found, and what's not working.
A lot of folks approached me - well, no pies were thrown, thank goodness - but they approached me with comments like these. Laura, what's with all the craziness in Washington? Is this going to hurt the economy? Why don't they just let the voters decide next November? This is absurd.
Well, obviously it's not a scientific survey. I'm not contending that it is. But these comments did get me thinking. And I've come to the sad conclusion that Democrats, they're basically done with democracy, at least when it delivers results they don't like.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HILLARY CLINTON (D), FORMER UNITED STATES SECRETARY OF STATE: He knows he's an illegitimate President. He knows. He knows that there were a bunch of different reasons why the election turned out the way it did.
It was like applying for a job and getting 66 million letters of recommendation and losing to a corrupt human tornado.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Think about it. This is a woman whose State Department office was a revolving door of foreign donors to the Clinton Foundation. And by the way, whose campaign funded the phony Russian dossier that led to the Mueller investigation? And she is alleging an illegitimate outcome? Is she kidding me? Now, she may not be Commander-in-Chief, but I hereby dub her sour-grapes-in-chief.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CLINTON: This wasn't on the level. I don't know that we'll ever know everything that happened, but clearly we know a lot and are learning more every day, and history will probably sort it all out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, last May, one political historian, Allan Lichtman, who by the way has correctly predicted the last nine elections, said something that House Democrats seem to have taken to heart.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Trump is it, in 2020, unless what?
ALLAN LICHTMAN, PROFESSOR, AMERICAN UNIVERSITY: Unless the Democrats grow a spine and do their Constitutional duty and move into an impeachment inquiry. And I think the evidence will show ultimately an impeachment.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, in 2016, remember, nearly 63 million Americans turned out for Trump, and he beat Hillary by 74 electoral votes. The left cannot take that risk again. They are not so confident. Even if they can't actually remove him from office with a Senate conviction, they want an impeachment vote by year's end to smear him. It may be they think tip the balance with some independent voters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. AL GREEN (D-TX): If we don't do this rather quickly, the public is going to turn on us. They are not going to side with us if we did not side with justice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, the key to understanding the current impeachment mania is anger. Now, they are not just angry, the Democrats, with Trump or his policies. Many of them are angry with America. They don't care if impeachment is bad for the country, if it's going to hurt our economy, or even the President's ability to conduct foreign policy.
Why don't they care? Because they think we're basically a racist country that hasn't made amends. They think we're destroying the environment. They think our history is one long narrative of victimization. They think much of our patriotic tradition, our art, our music, our monuments are all symbols of oppression and ignorance. They think we're a nation founded by evil white men from whom we have basically nothing to learn. They think that our electoral system that it even allowed Trump to win just confirmed, in their minds, that the system has to be scrapped altogether.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BETO O'ROURKE (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Let's abolish the Electoral College.
MAYOR PETE BUTTIGIEG (D-IN) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The Electoral College needs to go.
SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN (D-MA) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Get rid of the Electoral College.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Again, well, for now, they may trust voters in places like New York and California. They don't trust them in places like South Carolina or Michigan. This is why they cannot let Trump's record on the economy or in foreign policy stand on its own. Not because they care. What a wit, by the way, about Ukraine or because they really think Trump is conspiring with another country to rig the 2020 election? They don't think any of that.
In fact, I'd argue that impeachment for this nothing-burger phone call is itself a form of Democrat election interference. And by the way, the Democrats are fine with using impeachment as a political weapon. Oh, boy, are they fine! Because they see impeachment as a way to punish not only Trump, but us. After all, we elected him.
Remember, they called us deplorables. We're clinging to our guns and our religion. And when Obama said, punish your enemies, he was talking about you. Cory Booker, last week, used the word "despicable" to describe Trump voters.
The left now is so radical that they believe any election result is crooked if it doesn't advance what they consider to be legitimate social justice causes. In other words, if you win and you're a conservative, you really haven't won, you've stolen the election, always. Stacey Abrams has played this cynical game since she lost the governorship of Georgia.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STACEY ABRAMS (D), FORMER GEORGIA HOUSE REPRESENTATIVE: It was not a free and fair election.
I think the election was stolen from the people of Georgia.
Concession needs to say something is right and true and proper.
Sometimes the law does not do what it should.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: By the way, she almost always says this and is unchallenged. Abrams was too liberal for Georgia. That's why she lost. Period.
Look, they know that at the end of the day, their policies of open borders, massive wealth confiscation, reparations, ending the fossil fuel industry altogether are deeply unpopular with the American people. And they also know those policies will result in a lower standard of living for most Americans. But they don't care. The fact that we are the richest and most powerful country in the world isn't a badge of honor for them. It's a badge of shame. It's OK if it all comes down. In 2020, they must win by any means necessary.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GREEN: To defeat him at the polls would do history a disservice, would do our nation a disservice. He's called harm to society. We need to do something about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Their choice to weaponize impeachment is all the proof you need of their aversion to Democratic rule. It's the same impulse, by the way, that drives them to want to cede authority to the U.N. The World Trade Organization, why they once - they once favored the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Paris climate accord. It's also why they rely so heavily on life tenure judges to legislate from the bench on everything from immigration to abortion. Take the issues away from the American people.
Again, they can't trust the voters. The Nancy-Ocasio-Pelosi democrats see the voters as speed bumps on the way to the progressive promise land. But watch out, kids, because these speed bumps have spikes. And if your party stays on this anti-democratic road, you won't just lose a tire, you're going to blow an axle. And that's THE ANGLE.
In moments, we're going to debate just how much the Democrats are risking with this ridiculous impeachment push and how it's turning off a wide swath of American voters. But first, here to respond to the tactics is Sol Wisenberg, Former Whitewater Deputy Independent Counsel, Fox News contributor.
Sol, the Democrats clearly believe they have an impeachable offense on their hands. Do you agree?
SOL WISENBERG, FORMER DEPUTY INDEPENDENT COUNSEL & FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: No, I don't agree. This phone call alone even connected with the timeline. As I think you know, I think the phone call was a mistake, but the idea that in and of itself it's an impeachable offense I think is a joke.
INGRAHAM: Yes. Mistakes aren't high crimes and misdemeanors. If things can be interpreted ways by some people, especially people who don't like you politically, that's not what the threshold would be considered by our framers or throughout our democratic tradition.
WISENBERG: I'll go beyond that. Even if you consider the call a betrayal of the public trust or in some sense corrupt, in and of itself it is not enough and the framers would not have thought it to be enough to merit impeachment.
INGRAHAM: If - someone put it this way the other day. Does Joe Biden get immunity from scrutiny or investigation because he is running for President by this current administration? It's almost like people say, well, he's running for President, you can't investigate him. So, is that - is that - can that be right? Because that'd be a pretty neat trick. If you run for President, you can never be investigated.
WISENBERG: Well, the disturbing thing to me is that he's been given immunity by large segments of the media. And they didn't have to do it that way. They can say, you know what, what Vice President Biden's son did was profoundly troubling, was something that we should eradicate him. We should look at this, and let's look at President Trump as well. But they can't even bring themselves to say that. They have to say they were cleared. Well, cleared by who? What is he talking about?
INGRAHAM: "The Wall Street Journal" has a really terrific piece just published, I believe, tonight about the Clintons and the Ukraine - Hillary Clinton and Ukraine. We'll get into that later.
But Sol, here's what the "Associated Press" reported today. "Democrats are driving the proceedings toward what some hope is a vote to impeach, or indict, Trump by year's end." Using the language "indict," Sol, tell us about that - that choice word.
WISENBERG: The House can't do that, Laura.
INGRAHAM: Right. Well, the "Associated Press," apparently (inaudible).
WISENBERG: Only a federal prosecutor, only the Department of Justice can bring an indictment. They have to take it to a federal grand jury, and they both have to agree on that. So, whoever wrote that needs a little basic training in civics.
INGRAHAM: Here's some developments regarding the Attorney General, Bill Barr. You and I know him quite well. Headlined here from today's "Washington Post." "Attorney General Barr personally asked foreign officials to aid inquiry into CIA, FBI activities in 2016." Another one, "Trump pressed Australian leader to help Barr investigate Mueller's inquiry origins." And then, "We stand ready to provide you with all the relevant information to support your inquiries. This was from the Australian Ambassador." Any problems there?
WISENBERG: Not as far as AG Barr is concerned. My understanding is AG Barr has appointed or delegated John Durham, a widely respected U.S. Attorney in Connecticut, widely respected by both parties, to head up the investigation of the intelligence operation against President Trump in the election. It's totally appropriate for him to meet with foreign leaders, AG Barr, and say, this is my man, John Durham, we would appreciate it if you would cooperate with him, he's running an investigation.
INGRAHAM: You know they're bringing it up, clearly, to try to tar Barr--
WISENBERG: Well, I believe a central point of this whole exercise, in addition to going after the President, a very central point is to neutralize Barr--
INGRAHAM: And Durham. And Durham and Horowitz perhaps.
WISENBERG: --because the AG has gone to great lengths again to take a person who has an impeccable reputation. So this is really - I mean, really from the beginning when it became clear that Barr was competent and had integrity and was protecting the President. It's been all about destroying Barr--
INGRAHAM: Destroying reputations along the way. They're trying to do with Pompeo. It's not - it doesn't surprise me at all that Pompeo was on that call. It was in the room when the President - and now they're saying, well, he was supposed to be the adult in the room. So now, Pompeo should be thrown over - I mean, to me, it's one big smear machine, trying to smear all these people who frankly have all had impeccable records in public service.
WISENBERG: Well, let's learn the facts. The Democrats want to hold an impeachment hearing. Let's learn the facts about that. I have an open mind. Let's see what happened on the call. Probably if it's like a lot of the President's discussions, Pompeo may not have had any idea what the President was going to say.
INGRAHAM: It's freewheeling. But it's freewheeling--
WISENBERG: Yes.
INGRAHAM: --that I've got to say, the bottom line is, there is a lot about Joe Biden's involvement in Ukraine, as the Journal writes tonight, that we don't know that there is an aggressive lack of curiosity that's developed - that wasn't always there, but it's developed among the American media, which is staggering for people who are supposed to be interested in getting at the truth.
WISENBERG: I agree with you. But that doesn't change the fact that the people who are disturbed by the phone call say, this is money that's been - very important money for an ally, money for defense that's been appropriated by the Congress and approved, and it shouldn't be made contingent upon something like--
INGRAHAM: I didn't--
(CROSSTALK)
WISENBERG: --the Biden--
INGRAHAM: --there was contingent on and--
WISENBERG: Well, that's the--
INGRAHAM: --the transcript.
WISENBERG: Well, that's the argument.
INGRAHAM: But you're making the Schiff argument. You're reading stuff into there--
WISENBERG: I'm not - no, no.
INGRAHAM: --that's not there.
WISENBERG: I'm not--
(CROSSTALK)
INGRAHAM: Schiff is making stuff up, saying it was a parity. Nancy Pelosi did the same thing last night on "60 Minutes."
WISENBERG: What I'm saying is it's legitimate to look into that issue. The Democrats want to look into it. Let the chips fall where they may.
INGRAHAM: But are you disturbed that they're making up things and saying the President said, help me out in the election? He never said that. Pelosi is repeating things on "60 Minutes" last night. She doesn't even get challenged.
WISENBERG: It's completely false. It's an inference that they make, and he never says it at all. So I am concerned about that. And that's the problem. They always overplay their hand. There's no need to do that.
INGRAHAM: Are you worried about Rudy - the subpoena on Rudy? Is there anything problematic there for him?
WISENBERG: I'm only worried about it - I'm not - I don't know what he said and what he did, but I'm only worried about it in the sense that as a private citizen, his ability to invoke an executive type of privilege is much weaker than somebody who is in the executive branch.
INGRAHAM: An attorney-client privilege?
WISENBERG: He's got an attorney-client privilege, but probably not for conversations that he has with a foreign leader. He doesn't represent the foreign leader. So I hope that there is nothing there because he's going to have a much harder time exerting a privilege.
INGRAHAM: Sol, great to see you in Washington.
WISENBERG: Great to be here.
INGRAHAM: Thank you so much.
And three GOP congressmen are pressing the Intel Community IG for answers on why the requirements for whistleblower complaints - we're going to get in that - into that with Sol, but we have no time - were changed. They claim that the IG removed the requirement for whistleblowers to have firsthand knowledge of that alleged wrongdoing.
Now, the complaint against Trump is based completely on secondhand accounts. Quote, "The timing of the removal of the firsthand information requirement raises questions about potential connections to this whistleblower's complaint and potential criminality in the handling of these matters."
Joining me now, one of the letter's signatories, House Intel Committee Ranking Member, Devin Nunes.
Congressman, the IG tonight pushing back against your claims saying the whistleblower did present firsthand information. Quote, "The whistleblower stated on the form that he or she possess both firsthand and other information. The ICIG reviewed the info provided as well as other information gathered and determined that the complaint was both urgent and that it appeared credible." So what's your response?
REP. DEVIN NUNES (R-CA): Well, I'm glad that we finally have a response from the IG. Remember, this leaked out last Friday. The DNI refused to respond to it. So finally, because of the pressure we've put on this morning, we're getting an answer from the Inspector General.
But I would say this, Laura. I haven't seen any evidence of that. So if he has firsthand knowledge, he or she has firsthand knowledge, what is that - where is that evidence? Just because the IG said so, they haven't provided us that evidence.
And furthermore, he didn't answer anything in that three-page press release, the questions that we asked in our letter today. So he has until Thursday to provide us the facts, the evidence, the emails. Why did they - because they admit that they changed this regulation. OK? This guideline, they changed it because of this whistleblower. He admits it in his own press release. So the mainstream media is trying to cover this up.
The Inspector General, he may be happy with the press he reads in the mainstream media, but come Thursday, if he doesn't provide the actual evidence, all the communications, we will see him on Friday and we will interview him on this. And as we said, we think this is very suspicious between the changing of the guidelines and the leaks that there is some criminality involved in this.
INGRAHAM: Well, "The Washington Post," I believe, is giving you - is that right? Giving you four Pinocchios though for the claim?
NUNES: Yes. What that's - they do that every day. Right? I mean, we have two sets of media in this country. You have the mainstream media and then you have the media that's actually trying to get to the truth--
(CROSSTALK)
INGRAHAM: Well, the rules were either changed or not? I mean, the rules were either changed or not? That's an objective question, is it not? So the--
NUNES: And they were changed. It's a fact. He admits - he admits in his three-page response today, a press release, that they did in fact change it because of this whistleblower.
INGRAHAM: Congressman, what I'm very concerned about is the purposeful misstatement - and this is done with malign purpose - misstatement, mischaracterization of what the President actually said in that call, which was about our relationship, our friendship, the money we spend, Europe is not giving enough money, Germany is not ponying up, mentions the stuff, talk to Rudy, interested in some - people are worried about this - what happened in 2016. But Nancy Pelosi took a page - I referenced this with Sol earlier - about - from what - Adam Schiff's book in her interview with "60 Minutes." Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): It's wrong for a President to say that he wants another head of state to create something negative about his possible political opponent to his own advantage at the expense of our national security, his oath of office to the Constitution and this integrity of our elections.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: OK. Congressman, if this is an impeachable transgression contrary to what our Constitutional law expert has said, why do they keep making up details about the transcript? Why?
NUNES: They have to make it up because there is no evidence there. This was all concocted. OK? They are rushing to impeachment. They want to get impeachment done before December. Why? Because they know if they go into next year and drive the country through it, it will continue to be a loser. Right? So they have to move fast.
One thing they learned with the Mueller probe is that the longer it's set out there, it started to rot, it started to smell, and likely a lot of those people are going to be in trouble. This, they want to move fast, they want to come in hot, and they want to get this done. They've got the media whipped up into a frenzy. They're getting the--
INGRAHAM: Yes.
NUNES: --base whipped up into a frenzy. This is about raising money. They're going to have to impeach because they've promised their base, or the base will be demoralized in the fall.
INGRAHAM: Yes. Congressman, we--
NUNES: So they basically block themselves in.
INGRAHAM: Yes. Yes. Congressman, I have another theory. A lot of these swing Democrats wrongly think this is going to prevent them from getting primaried by a AOC-plus-three type candidate. This is like their insurance policy from getting primaried for the left. They're making a bad miscalculation--
(CROSSTALK)
NUNES: You have that, Laura, not - well, you have that - there's actually two different--
INGRAHAM: Yes. We've got to go.
NUNES: --groups of members. You have--
INGRAHAM: Yes.
NUNES: --those that are in the swing districts, but you also have--
INGRAHAM: Yes.
NUNES: --veterans who are being challenged by the AOCs of the world.
INGRAHAM: Oh, yes. Bingo. Just like Crowley was by AOC. Congressman, thanks so much.
Coming up, the left is hyping a new impeachment poll, but shouldn't they be? If anything, it shows the country is not at all ready for impeachment mania. Corey Lewandowski, Victor Davis Hanson dissect the media narrative, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Democrats and the media have been working overtime to change the narrative on impeachment. And they're hyping two new polls to claim victory. First, a new CBS poll showing 55 percent of Americans back the House impeachment inquiry, but the same poll also found 53 percent of voters see this as a Democrat attempt to hurt Trump's 2020 bid.
Second, while a Quinnipiac poll shows 47 percent support impeachment, it also finds 56 percent of voters believing that lawmakers supporting it are doing so based on partisan politics, not the facts.
So, contrary to the media narrative, are Americans really clamoring for an impeachment fight? No way.
Here to discuss, Corey Lewandowski, former Trump campaign manager; Victor Davis Hanson also, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution.
All right, Corey. The left is going gaga on these polls. You and I have been on this town for way too long and politics for way too long. What are they doing here in cherry-picking their factoid in this poll and one in that poll?
COREY LEWANDOWSKI, TRUMP 2016 CAMPAIGN MANAGER: Well, Laura, you remember this in the 2016 election. I just want to remind your viewers tonight, in October 17 of 2016, CBS News said, head-to-head matchup, Hillary Clinton defeats Donald Trump 51-to-40 in a complete blowout. Obviously, three weeks later, Donald Trump wins the election.
And so, look, these polls are driven by what they think the actual American people want to see. So they're trying to set the narrative. The media is no longer just reporting the news. They're making the news. And what they want to do, in my opinion, is they want to get the American people behind this impeachment by saying "Americans support this by and large. This is something that we all want. So, go ahead, Democrats, move forward, you have their support." It's all going to backfire.
INGRAHAM: VDH, are they doing the media the usual poll-shuffle here? It's like with Brexit. You keep polling until you get the results you want. I mean, people voted for Brexit 2016 still don't have Brexit. They want to do another vote. It's like they do this all the time. But this is--
VICTOR DAVIS HANSON, HOOVER INSTITUTION SENIOR FELLOW: Yes.
INGRAHAM: They think it's going to be useful to them. Do they not?
HANSON: They do, and they always use the word "inquiry," not impeachment. Americans are for inquiring about anything but not impeaching the President. And Nancy Pelosi, I can see what - tactically, she thinks she did something smart because she gave in to this left-wing base, AOC. She's got an election coming up that she thinks Trump is going to win. Time is running out. But this is one of the stupidest things in political history.
Strategically, long-term, because what she has done, she's taken out the frontrunner in the Democratic Party, Joe Biden, who was polling strongest against Trump. You can't use the word "Ukraine" without bringing in Biden's name. And then there's so many known-unknowns. We don't know the extent of Biden in Ukraine. We don't know the extent of Hunter Biden in China. All of that is going to come out with the release of documents.
Who knows what the Chinese or the Ukrainians are going to say. We don't know the whistleblower. Who is she? Who is he, who - who is he? If he comes in before a Congressional committee under oath and I ask him, have you talked to Adam Schiff, have you talked to Adam Schiff's lawyers, have you talked to the DNC? Did you have lawyers help you? When did you submit this? And then we have these ongoing investigations. We've got Attorney General Barr talking to foreign countries. We've got John Huber. We've got John Durham. We've got the--
INGRAHAM: Horowitz. Yes, we've got a lot. Yes.
HANSON: Horowitz. And these are - these are all volatile.
INGRAHAM: We're going to find out where this all ends up. Yes. Well, Pelosi--
HANSON: This is not a stable news cycle. It's not.
INGRAHAM: Yes. They think they can game it all out, Corey. And Pelosi was pressed on this. Back to our point about whether they think it's a good deal. She's pressed on this, but she's worried that it's going to hurt Democrats since she tried to take the high road. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Getting into the next election cycle, do you have any anxiety at all about any of the stuff we're talking about or anything that we're not talking about impacting your ability to hold control of the House in 2020?
PELOSI: Doesn't matter.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It doesn't matter.
PELOSI: Our first responsibility is to protect and defend the Constitution.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
(APPLAUSE)
PELOSI: I mean, we will win again with our Democratic majority in the House.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Corey, she's not thinking politics at all. It's all high-minded inquiry.
LEWANDOWSKI: Of course, it is. And to what Victor Davis Hanson just said about Joe Biden, taking a frontrunner out, he's absolutely right. Look, I just received from our friends at (inaudible), the Freedom of Information request, which are the emails of Victoria Nuland at the State Department of Joe Biden's meeting in 2016 with the Prime Minister of Ukraine. You know what it is, Laura? This is it right here. 100 percent redacted. This is the next one. It says, "All." The rest, 100 percent redacted. The possible deliverables for the Prime Minister's meeting with the Vice President, 100 percent redacted. 100 percent redacted.
INGRAHAM: Those have a lot of blanks on there. Maybe it was really top- secret, Corey.
LEWANDOWSKI: This is - this is all--
INGRAHAM: Come on.
LEWANDOWSKI: This is all information that Joe Biden has to answer to because what we know is he used his position of influence to try and save his son, to end an investigation, and that's what this is really about. The Democrats don't want to actually work (ph) for Donald Trump. They want to first destroy Joe Biden and use that as a cudgel to go after and impeach the President of the United States.
INGRAHAM: Yes. I mean, even - Victor, even like - I think it was "Politico" back in mid-2017. They were starting to talk - Ken Vogel wrote a piece - starting to talk about, well, Biden, they never did have to answer these questions about the Ukraine, like his son making all of this money over there. And they kind of danced around and they thought, I think, it would all go away or something. Right? But those facts--
LEWANDOWSKI: Now, that was--
INGRAHAM: --are going to have to come out. And Hunter Biden will have to emerge from hiding. I don't know where he is, but maybe he is with Hillary's emails, they're all having dinner together. I don't know. But he's going to have to emerge at some point.
VICTOR DAVIS HANSON, HOOVER INSTITUTION: Yes. All you have to do is read "The Atlantic" or "The New Yorker" and they provide the evidence that he acted unethically. And another known, it's a known known is actually coming up. We have nine more of these Democratic debates. Every time they get on stage and they argue about taking guns away, or shouldn't argue -- they all agree on it, basically -- or veritable infanticide, reparations, Trump's polls go up three, four points.
And so they understood that gradually they were eroding any idea that they were moderate, and we've got nine more to come. And Nancy Pelosi is going to be conducting an impeachment hearing on TV, an inquiry maybe, and then they're going to have these Democrats debates and people are going to say whatever Donald Trump did, he's the only thing between us and socialism.
INGRAHAM: We are going to have you both back when all that happens, if it happens, but panel, thank you very much, both of you. And I want to read those redacted e-mails from Corey. There's a lot of blank boxes there.
Coming up, the Biden campaign begging news networks to blacklist Rudy G., but that won't end his Ukraine troubles. Robert Ray, Kevin Brock explain why Biden and his team should be very worried about one of the DOJ's ongoing investigations we just talked about, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: PolitiFact found no evidence to support the idea that Joe Biden advocated with his son's interests in mind.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No evidence of wrongdoing has emerged.
JULIAN CASTRO, (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't believe for a second that Joe Biden or his family or anything except honorable and honest.
SEN. CORY BOOKER, (D-NJ) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's laughable that Joe Biden has done anything wrong.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You still have a bunch of wackos out there who believe this nonsense.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Wackos, deplorables, despicables, that is the real echo chamber.
No evidence, Biden didn't do anything wrong. Well, despite what the left may want, Biden's Ukraine trouble are just beginning. They are not going away anytime soon. Former Attorney General Mike Mukasey reminds us that in a new "Wall Street Journal" op-ed titled John Durham's Ukrainian leads, what the prosecutor has found may be quite different from what the Democrats are looking for.
Joining me now, Kevin Brock, former assistant FBI director, and Robert Ray, former Whitewater independent counsel. Kevin, let's start with you. What can you tell us about U.S. Attorney John Durham's investigation ongoing regarding Ukraine?
KEVIN BROCK, FORMER FBI ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF INTELLIGENCE: As you know, Attorney General Barr asked the U.S. Attorney Durham to look into the origins of the counterintelligence investigation against the Trump campaign. And Attorney General Barr is absolutely correct to be asking for assistance for that investigation.
The indicators, and we have discussed this many times on your show, Laura, the indicators are that James Comey and his cabal on the floor of the FBI initiated that investigation outside Attorney General guidelines. They may have abused other policies and procedures by targeting U.S. citizens with sources, confidential sources, completely outside of the guidelines. This is what Mr. Durham is looking at, and some of these tentacles go overseas.
They go into England, they go into other countries.
INGRAHAM: Australia.
BROCK: Yes, Australia. So asking for cooperation in this investigation is entirely prudent and correct.
INGRAHAM: Yes. it would make sense that the A.G. is going to call ahead of a U.S. attorney who most people wouldn't know who he was. So all of that, anyone who has any experience in government knows that that would be fine.
And Robert, to you, the media, they are in denial about Ukraine's involvement in the 2016 meddling.
ROBERT RAY, FORMER WHITEWATER INDEPENDENT COUNSEL: Right.
INGRAHAM: But here's what "Politico" reported. I alluded to it earlier in 2017. "Ukrainian efforts to sabotage Trump backfire." This is "Politico." "Kiev officials are scrambling to make amends with the president-elect after quietly working to boost Clinton." Robert, the media seem really intent on disregarding even their own reporting here.
RAY: All it shows is that CNN and MSNBC got the Democratic Party's talking points. They're not really serious about an investigation. And so far, politically, what they've said is essentially impeach, recuse, and malign.
They have tried that with regard to, and they are going to try that with regard to the president. They have tried to encourage the attorney general to recuse and undermine his credibility.
And then the final thing is to malign any legitimate investigation looking into the Ukrainian connection as part of the investigation about the origins of the Russia investigation that led to the investigation of the president and the appointment of a special counsel.
And the great news here is that be careful what you ask for, because the avalanche is coming. In October, Michael Horowitz is likely to release his report. And in the midst of all of that, there will be likely referrals to the Department of Justice for prosecution. And at the same time John Durham is conducting an investigation, and the attorney general is dead serious about the fact that he is going to get to the bottom of this, which is an entirely legitimate theme. And as you suggest, Laura, that does not mean that the former Vice President Joe Biden who is a current presidential candidate is immune from legitimate investigation.
INGRAHAM: I want to go to you, Kevin, because that point is so important.
And doesn't seem reminiscent of what happened in the lead-up to Mueller?
There are leaks, other leaks. This is how the deep state operates. And I think Robert is exactly right. The effort here is when all these investigations come to fruition, reports come out, oh, no, we have already gone over that. That's fruit of the poisonous Trump tree. That's what they want to say, and that would be a huge disservice to anyone who supposedly cares, both of you, about election interference, because it was done at the hands of the Clintons, Ukraine, and all these other foreign powers that didn't want someone like Donald Trump to win. He was a great disruptor. Kevin?
BROCK: Yes. They are starting to use terms like "conspiracy theory" that Barr is looking into. This has to be done. It is vitally important for this country to get to the bottom of whether or not the agencies of the executive branch, the FBI, the CIA, misused their authorities, or used by leadership in those agencies to misuse those authorities, and to launch an illicit counterintelligence investigation. We have to know the truth on that.
INGRAHAM: Robert, Rudy Giuliani also dropped something that didn't get a lot of notice during his interview on ABC yesterday.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RUDY GIULIANI, PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: How about if I tell you over the next week four more of these will come out from four other prosecutors?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And they will all be investigated. Meantime --
GIULIANI: No, no, George, they won't be, because they've been online for six months. And the Washington press will not accept the fact that Joe Biden may have done something.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Robert, how many affidavits will it take for the media to cover this story? It's like a lightbulb joke.
RAY: Laura, on this one, this is where I disagree with Rudy. My answer to that is, it will be investigated now. And like your prior guest, Sol Wisenberg said, one of my former colleagues, I'm not going to prejudge the outcome. This is what we have investigations for. I care deeply about legitimate law enforcement investigations that are conducted on a nonpartisan basis. And Michael Mukasey in the op-ed that you reference assures us based on reputation that John Durham enjoys in both political parties that he is a professional and he is going to find out some answers.
INGRAHAM: And by the way, just to wrap this up, Tucker Carlson unearthed a little nugget. I want to put it up on the screen. It's a picture of Joe Biden golfing with Devon Archer, the Ukrainian gas company exec back in 2014. Is that Hunter on the right? I think so, right? Yes, that's Hunter, Joe, and the Ukrainian gas company. Joe has been very interested, guys, in the Ukraine for a long, long time, OK, including who is bogeying and who is getting the hole-in-one.
RAY: I'm sure they were talking about fracking.
INGRAHAM: It's all copacetic. All right, gentlemen, thank you so much.
And our next guest tonight is a former CIA analyst and, I love this, a whistleblower himself. Now, he claims to know who is behind the complaint, who they were close to in the Obama administration, and most importantly, what it says about the legitimacy of all of it, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: The Democrats impeachment case against Trump hinges on secondhand allegations from an anonymous whistleblower and the intel community. So who is this whistleblower, and is he or she working alone?
Joining me now is Kevin Shipp, a former CIA analyst and a whistleblower himself. All right, Kevin, we obviously don't want to out the whistleblower. Well, we're not going to do that. But you say you know a troubling association he or she has with the former Obama official. And how do you know, or how do you think you know who it is? Explain.
KEVIN SHIPP, FORMER CIA WHISTLEBLOWER: Hi, Laura. Thanks for having me.
I wrote several analytical reports with the CIA, and I was a classifying authority, and I can tell you with certainty that this person, man or lady, is not a whistleblower. They're a leaker.
And if you read the statement, which I'm not convinced that the leaker actually wrote, but if you read the statement, it is based on absolutely nothing but hearsay and terrible accusations against the president of the United States that are not substantiated by anything even in the statement.
The so-called whistleblower says 12 times that he had no direct evidence to what he is saying, 18 times that he overheard the evidence from, quote- unquote, several U.S. government officials, never mentioning their name or their identities at all.
And Laura, if this was a court case, as you know, based on hearsay, the judge would throw it out. Also, if we examine this whistleblower's statements, I think it's pretty clear at least to me that it was not written by the whistleblower.
INGRAHAM: That's obvious.
SHIPP: I think it was written by attorneys.
INGRAHAM: You don't have to work for the CIA to know that. That was written by some lawyer on the Hill or someone else, or her lawyer who knows how to file these things.
But I want to get back to the Obama connection.
SHIPP: Sure.
INGRAHAM: I think this is very important. Why do you think the connection must go back to Obama folks, because why?
SHIPP: For example, this whistleblower was detailed to the White House with access to these transcripts, these presidential transcripts, and he was detailed by the then director of the CIA, John Brennan, who we know was at the center of the soft coup against the president of the United States.
So that in itself I think needs to be looked into.
And most alarmingly, at least to me, having been in the CIA, is the fact that the whistleblower complaint form properly prohibited hearsay information, as it should. And yet secretly, without anybody knowing it, the whistleblower complaint form was changed and altered to allow, unbelievably, hearsay, in other words second or third party information for this kind of complaint. We know now that that was done in August of 2019, and we know --
INGRAHAM: You know what they are claiming, I'm sorry to interrupt.
SHIPP: Yes, sure. Go ahead.
INGRAHAM: But they're claiming that she said she had both firsthand and secondhand concerns or information, which was not how it was originally reported, not from what I see in the complaint itself. But I've got to say, I agree with you on the way it's characterized. We have a pool in the office. I'm betting -- you're betting it's a guy. I bet it's a girl, a lady. That's my guess. I don't know why, it's just a hunch.
SHIPP: I tend to agree.
INGRAHAM: It's just my hunch.
Trump told reporters today that he wants to find out the identity of the whistleblower. It sent the media into an absolute frothy frenzy. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you now know who the whistleblower is, sir?
DONALD TRUMP, (R) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We are trying to find out about a whistleblower.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Serious concerns about the safety of him or her.
President Trump has attacked and threatened that person.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president, by saying he wants to meet and presumably out the whistleblower, is suggesting a violation of the law.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Witness tampering, it's also a violation of the whistleblower act.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Kevin, your reaction?
SHIPP: Yes. In the first place, this is not a whistleblower. Again, it's a leaker. And what they slyly did is they took this plant with false information and they put him or her under the cover of the whistleblower statute so they couldn't be investigated and it couldn't be pursued. And that obviously was a deep state operation to put out false accusations against Donald Trump using the whistleblower statute after changing it.
And it's just another attempt, in my view, to impeach President Donald Trump.
INGRAHAM: This is, again, Schumer, that line of Schumer's keeps coming back. The deep state wants to get you, they'll find a way to get you. And Trump was a disrupter, and they didn't like the fact that he was a disrupter. Kevin, fascinating analysis. I know -- everyone's dying to know who it is because we kind of want to know if there are any political motivations there.
SHIPP: Oh, yes.
INGRAHAM: We appreciate it.
SHIPP: Thank you, Laura.
INGRAHAM: Coming up, the same day that we held our Chicago town hall, Democrat Mayor Lori Lightfoot sent her police department a memo outlining dangerous restrictions on cooperating with ICE. Tom Homan has a message for the mayor. You don't want to miss that.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Believe it or not, the impeachment obsession isn't the only thing happening in the news. There's a lot of really important stuff happening. We held a townhall in Chicago last Friday. If you didn't see it, you've got to DVR the show if you're out. We exposed the city's failed Democrat leadership, and we heard from residents themselves about what they really want from their leaders.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need economic opportunities, and I think that's what's been missing from the Democratic platform.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Making sure that they replace their guns with hammers, making sure that they get jobs and opportunities and contracts.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My son was viciously taken from me, burnt alive in the garbage. And no mother's should have to deal with that.
INGRAHAM: And it's a $15,000 reward?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes.
INGRAHAM: It's $20,000 now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: That brings me to our next story, one we touched on Friday night, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot's dangerous hatred, and I'm going to say it, hatred for ICE. Today FOX News exclusively obtained an internal Chicago PD memo dated September 27th, the same day we were there, and the memo says that effective immediately, all officers must leave the scene of an apprehension if asked by federal agents to assist with arresting or detaining immigrants.
Joining me is Tom Homan, former acting ICE director. Tom, we thought Rahm Emanuel was bad in Chicago. But Mayor Lightfoot is giving him a run for his money as far as standing up for criminal aliens, against her own and over her own constituents, I might add.
TOM HOMAN, FORMER ACTING ICE DIRECTOR: Look, she didn't do her homework.
Ninety percent of everybody ICE arrests in the streets are criminals.
They're public safety threats. So to instruct her law enforcement officers not to assist ICE officers in keeping her community safe is disgusting.
And her use of the word "racism" during that press event, I'm sick and tired of this Democratic leadership whether it's in Congress -- I was called a bigot during my testimony -- mayors of cities using the term "racism" toward the men and women of ICE who are simply enforcing a law, arresting people here in violation of federal law that were ordered removed by a federal lodge. There's nothing racist about it, but they can't argue the facts, so they throw that term out. And it's disgusting. I'm sick and tired of listening to them throwing that out every time.
INGRAHAM: It's just admitting you can't argue the point. You might as well just say I give up. I give up. I can't argue the point, you are a racist. People I think all across the country are getting really sick of it, tired of it. And because you mentioned Mayor Lightfoot's comments, let's let our viewers listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR LORI LIGHTFOOT, (D) CHICAGO: We are not going to tolerate letting ICE terrorize our immigrants and refugee communities. We will never, ever succumb to the racist, xenophobic rhetoric of ICE. We will continue to ban ICE from having access to any CPD databases. We will not allow any CPD officer to cooperate with anything related to ICE and its immigration raids.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: I have a question. Are all of those Hispanic ICE officials and African-American ICE officials, are they racist you, Mayor Lightfoot? Wow.
HOMAN: It's ridiculous. When has been OK for members of Congress and mayors of big cities -- I thought hate groups were something they wanted to legislate against. But in my last couple of testimonies on the Hill, her comments, members of the Democratic Party has created their own hate groups against law enforcement, specifically Border Patrol and ICE. And Mayor Lightfoot needs to know this. ICE has arrested thousands of public safety threats of her streets that they release from their sanctuary jails that reoffended against U.S. citizens. You're welcome. It would be nice if you just say thank you, ICE, for keeping my community safe.
But I want to leave this one message. I've got to make this one message.
When this happened in Oakland, I promised the officers of Oakland that ICE would never turn their back on them even though they were told not to work with us. ICE will never turn their back on the Chicago Police Department.
I'm not an ICE director anymore, but I talked to the ICE director today, Matt Albence, and he agreed with me. We will never turn our back on another law enforcement agency.
INGRAHAM: Mayor Lightfoot, I hope you're watching, or one of your pals tells you to tune in. That was a message you must not forget.
When we come back, left-wing politicians sucking up to China.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Communist Party wants to stay in power in China, and they listen to the public. When the public says, I can't breathe the air, Xi Jinping is not a dictator. He has to satisfy his constituents or he's not going to survive.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's not a dictator?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, he has a constituency to answer to.
No government survives without the will of the majority of its people. OK?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The idea that the government is responsible to sort of a Democratic expression of fresh air, clean air --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, come on, of course, they are.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Hey. Just as a constituency. They have to vote for him.
Unbelievable.
Well, that's all the time we have tonight.
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