Former Clinton adviser addresses speculation Hillary could join presidential race

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Former Clinton adviser addresses speculation Hillary could join presidential race

Former Clinton adviser Philippe Reines on Hillary Clinton considering a 2020 run; reaction from 'The Daily Briefing' host Dana Perino.

This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," October 23, 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 about 10 minutes after her general election defeat three years ago, Hillary Clinton appeared to retreat into contemplative seclusion.

She wandered around the woods near her home in Chappaqua, New York looking a little lost. Now, some people made fun of her for doing that, but in fact, it was a promising start. Humiliation can be the beginning of wisdom, because those of us who've been fired in public can tell you.

But the period didn't last long. Before long, Hillary was back on the road for years like the circus. So many cities so many excuses.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The Russians, I say WikiLeaks -- same thing -- dumped the John Podesta e-mails.

I have my complaints about former Director Comey.

They use of my e-mail account was turned into, you know, the biggest scandal since Lord knows when.

They covered it like it was Pearl Harbor.

If you look at Facebook, the vast majority of the news -- news items -- posted were fake.

There's all these stories about you know, guys over in Macedonia who are running these fake news sites.

I inherit nothing from the Democratic Party.

I also think I was the victim of a very broad assumption I was going to win.

You know, if the election had been on October 27, I'd be your President. And it wasn't, it was on October 28, and there was just a lot of funny business going on around that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: The Russians, Facebook, WikiLeaks, Jim Comey, the Macedonians, the Democratic Party itself. Hillary Clinton blamed them all. This was not someone coming to terms with a loss. It was someone refusing to admit one. And in fact, over time that became Hillary's de facto position on the whole thing.

Despite what you may have heard, she didn't really lose the 2016 election at all, she won it. She is the real President right now. This is her reelection campaign.

So as recently as a few months ago, even her fellow Democrats would have laughed privately at that idea. They would have mocked it as delusional. Not anymore.

Now, some of them are taking Hillary more seriously than they have in a long time. An article in yesterday's "New York Times" describes growing panic among Democratic donors. Joe Biden suddenly looks weak and incapable. Much of the rest of the field clearly is too extreme to win a national election.

So, who is going to beat Donald Trump next year? Some in the party are starting to think it could be Hillary Clinton. And clearly this is a thought that has crossed Hillary Clinton's mind. In private, she has expressed her willingness to enter the race. As if to prove it, her personal website just added a policy section.

That doesn't mean she's running, but suddenly, it's clear that she very well could run.

So to judge the likelihood of a 2020 Hillary campaign, we're joined tonight by a man who has served for decades as one of our closest aides, Philippe Reines. Philippe great to see you tonight.

PHILIPPE REINES, FORMER HILLARY CLINTON ADVISER: You too, Tucker.

CARLSON: So I'm assuming what I just said and what we're hearing is true that if she thought she was the best position to beat Donald Trump, she'd get in the race. She is not --

REINES: I would take issue with the Macedonia part. But other than that, you know, she ran for President because she thought she would be the President.

CARLSON: Right.

REINES: If she still thought that now, if she thought she had the best odds of beating Donald Trump, I think she would think about it long and hard. I know --

CARLSON: She's not. She hasn't foreclosed the possibility, I guess.

REINES: No, she has not.

CARLSON: That's what I am saying, too. So really the question, and that doesn't surprise anybody who has followed the Clintons.

REINES: No.

CARLSON: Right. So I guess the question is, has the Democratic Party changed so much in the last three years that it would be possible for Hillary Clinton to get the nomination? So in other words, a lot of Democrats say, well, Hillary Clinton is the real President. It was stolen from or whatever, but at the same time, you think, maybe they've changed and they don't want her anymore. Maybe she's too right wing.

REINES: Well, this is a huge if.

CARLSON: Right.

REINES: But if she would have jumped in for whatever reason, and the party has moved someplace that she hasn't, then she won't get the votes. That's the point of the primary. There are, I guess, still 19 people. There are a few that are in double digits.

If she would have run and people think that she is too left to right to center, whatever you want to call it, that's the beauty of it. They get to vote against whoever they want.

I don't know. She is not running because she has any anxiety about the Democratic field.

CARLSON: Right.

REINES: She really likes a lot of the people running. She knows them well. She thought about some of them for her vice presidency. But there might be a reason that she would be the best person not only to beat Donald Trump, but to govern after Donald Trump, which is a part we don't talk about much.

And look, you can make fun of it all you want, but 65 million people voted for her and that's second more to anyone since Barack Obama.

CARLSON: Oh, no. Listen, you're missing -- I am not making fun of her. Actually --

REINES: I watch Fox and I am confused who is President.

CARLSON: No, no. Hold on. I'm the guy -- we don't talk about her very often.

REINES: Oh, come on. We are talking about her right now.

CARLSON: We are because I think it's so interesting. Hillary Clinton, who I've always thought was at the leftward edge of the Democratic Party, and has been for 50 years since her 1969 speech at Wellesley College, she has been the leftward edge of the Democratic Party.

She denounced Bernie Sanders' Medicare-for-All proposal as a terrible conversation to have. She is like completely against it.

REINES: The lady knows her healthcare. I mean, she was ahead of your time in 1994.

CARLSON: Would she get the nomination if you stood up and said, it is terrible?

REINES: Well, you know what, that's a debate that the party is having right now that, you know, the candidates that are for Medicare-for-All are defending how it would be structured and how to pay for it; and the ones who are against are pressing those questions.

I mean, if it's a healthcare debate, I think I would take that and I put my money on her any time.

CARLSON: Okay, maybe -- but it's not just healthcare actually. So I want to put up on a screen a quote, you tell me who said this. This is from 2015, Kate Steinle, of course, murdered, right, in the Embarcadero down in San Francisco.

Here is Hillary Clinton's response. " ... what should be done is any city should listen to the Department of Homeland Security, which as I understand it, urged them to deport this man again after he got out of prison another time."

"Here's a case where we've deported, with deported, we've deported. He ends up back in our country. And I think the city made a mistake."

"The city made a mistake not to deport someone that the Federal government felt strongly should be deported. I have absolutely no support for a city that ignores the strong evidence that should be acted on."

Whoa. If that's not racism I don't know what is.

REINES: Look, that's not racism.

CARLSON: Of course, it's racism. She wants to deport the guy.

REINES: You know, oh my god, you're thinking deporting people is racist? I mean --

CARLSON: I know for a fact that I personally have been denounced as a racist for using the word deport because he is Latin American. That's -- I don't know if you've been following your party recently. That's racist what she just said.

REINES: Look you know that I played Donald Trump in 2016 when she was practicing for her debate. I threw those quotes at her like anything else. I threw Kate Steinle at her. But look, you know, there is a difference between now and then.

The man now has a record. He has been there for three years and while Make America Great again was really the tagline that got the most attention. He said something else in 2016, which was what do you have to lose? And I think if we now ask ourselves that question, 40 percent of us are going to say, we don't -- we haven't lost anything; we've gained.

Sixty percent of us seem to think that we have lost. And one of those things is immigration, it is people's freedom. And one of the things is healthcare.

CARLSON: So when she says that it is not racist when Trump says it is. Okay, so but that was a couple of years -- that was a few years ago.

REINES: Okay, I think it would be pretty clear if anyone runs against Donald Trump, I don't think it's -- if it's a referendum on racism, I think we're going to have a new President come a year from now.

CARLSON: I don't know. If you have someone who is calling for explicit racial quotas where people are kept out of jobs in schools because of their skin color. That's racism.

REINES: Bottom line here is immigration. And I know you believe that the President's plan on immigration has not worked. It has not gotten anywhere. It is not what you believe it would be.

CARLSON: So let me -- let me ask you this.

REINES: Okay.

CARLSON: This was just last week.

REINES: Yes.

CARLSON: She and her daughter, Chelsea, hawking yet another book. Not rich enough, apparently, with "The Sunday Times" --

REINES: It's a book about women through the ages.

CARLSON: Right. Okay.

REINES: I'll have her send you one.

CARLSON: This is an interview they did with a British publication, "The Sunday Times" and they were asked, the journalist -- Decca Aitkenhead asked the Clintons if someone quote, "with a beard and a penis" never become a woman? To which Chelsea replied emphatically, "Yes, yes, of course. Of course."

To which Hillary looked uneasy and then said this, "Err, I'm just learning about this," she responded, erasing trans people in the process. "It's a very big generational discussion because this is not something I grew up with or ever saw. It's going to take a lot more time and effort to understand what it means to be defining yourself differently." That's transphobia if there ever was transphobia.

REINES: The LGBT community knows where she stands.

CARLSON: What do you think of that?

REINES: The first thing she did ...

CARLSON: Really?

REINES: ... as Secretary of State was she made sure to give passports to people in gay relationships. She made sure that if they had a health problem that we'd fly them back.

CARLSON: Hold on. Their relationships are different from this, okay, everyone likes to bundle this all together. This is a very specific question about trans orthodoxy and Hillary Clinton is like, uh, it makes me uncomfortable. That's creepy. You're not allowed to say that, Philippe.

REINES: Look, well, then this is the thing. If she were to run, which is unlikely. I mean, if you gave me a choice between betting on her running or betting on parable, I probably bet on parable.

But if she were to run, people get to decide. Is she okay --

CARLSON: I am sure she does.

REINES: I know you do. Because this is a whole -- it is a cottage industry. She might -- to some extent she might as well run.

CARLSON: She's become like the most reasonable person in the Democratic Party.

REINES: She is --

CARLSON: That's scary.

REINES: She might be the best person to beat President Pence -- I'm sorry, I meant President Trump.

CARLSON: Philippe Reines, great to see you.

REINES: Great to see you.

CARLSON: Thank you. Dana Perino hosts "The Daily Briefing," of course with Dana Perino. She is also a star in "The Five." She joins us tonight. So --

DANA PERINO, HOST: Tucker, I need some help.

CARLSON: Yes.

PERINO: Because I'm here listening.

CARLSON: Yes.

PERINO: And I don't have a DVR, so I can't rewind. He -- Philippe did not close the door on Hillary Clinton thinking and being open to running in 2020. Do I have that right?

CARLSON: Absolutely not. He was -- we spoke about it before. We talked about it on the show. He is still sitting right here. He is nodding like this. Hillary Clinton -- he is saying she is going to run, but very clearly, under certain circumstances, she would be happy to get in.

PERINO: Well --

CARLSON: What do you think of that.

PERINO: Well, look, so Philippe I know that -- you know he doesn't -- maybe he is not an unofficial spokesperson anymore, but just like if somebody were to say to me would George W. Bush think about running again? And I said -- if I said -- if I said that, then people would take it very seriously.

I think I just feel a little stunned right now, because I thought that this was just, you know, rumor mongering or you had establishment people in the Democratic Party worried that there's nobody in this very large field of which you can't even figure out a way to do two debate stages, to fill all of them in a room that they still think that they have to look around for somebody else.

I just read a story in the magazine called "The Week" that says even Oprah is unhappy, unsatisfied, worried that there's nobody in this field that could beat Donald Trump.

CARLSON: The Hillary thing is totally real. It doesn't mean she'll do it.

PERINO: Yes.

CARLSON: But the possibility is totally real.

PERINO: But I guess, I know -- I just don't know whether if they're wasting our time in thinking about it, because you've got to get on the ballot. And I also do think that Elizabeth Warren might have an opening here.

One of the things that she could do is say, I see what's happening here. The establishment, they're afraid of me. They want to shut off the opportunity for me because they're afraid that I'm going to strip them of their power because I want to change how things are done. I'm going to be the disruptor from the left.

She might be able to figure out a way to get in there and make that argument like President Trump did during the primaries in 2015.

CARLSON: I don't think there's any question about it. So maybe Democratic donors are discovering what Republican donors learned in 2016, which is, you know, you can spend all of your time creating the perfect candidate in the laboratory, but if voters don't want to vote for the person, he is not going to be the nominee.

PERINO: That's right. So you could almost see like a Never Warren movement, right? But that would be coming from the Democrats, if they were willing to do that. But Tucker, another thing that happened today, despite the month that he has had, Joe Biden getting attacked from a few Democrats, but mostly from President Trump, taking a pounding every day.

The new CNN poll that came out today show that he is widening his lead over her and again, go back to those parallels of 2015 and 2016. So the voters are saying, no, we're good here. We're sticking with him even though from like if you're a political pundit -- you think, wow, he is toast. You don't have any money. You don't have any excitement.

The Philly "Inquirer" reported that at a debate watch party last week for Joe Biden, one person showed up, compared to the rallies that President Trump is having, where he has all of this energy and the people are turning out for it. So I feel a little stunned right now.

REINES: Well, we have one big advantage. We already know the chant. It is --

PERINO: What do you mean?

CARLSON: Philippe, what does that mean?

REINES: We already know the chants that are going to be thrown at her. We've had you know, few years head start. But look, I am not official spokesman.

PERINO: But could she -- okay, it's like practically, Philippe, could she get on the ballot?

REINES: I am allowed to stir the pot. I don't know. That's not something to look at --

CARLSON: But you're not the only one stirring the pot. So is she. This is totally real. You've confirmed it. We're going to stop there. Thanks to you both.

REINES: Thank you.

CARLSON: Amazing.

REINES: Bye, Dana.

CARLSON: As Democrats, of course trying to impeach the President, doing it behind closed doors, some Republicans disrupted that effort earlier today. The man in charge of that disruption, Matt Gaetz of Florida joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: If you're going to overturn a democratic election, you probably ought to do it transparently in the open - that might reassure people. But if you think that you're not a conspiracy theorist turned Congressman Adam Schiff of Burbank, California.

Today, Schiff was holding closed-door impeachment hearings on Capitol Hill, a group of Republican Members of Congress, led by Matt Gaetz of Florida showed up and demanded to be let inside. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MATT GAETZ, R-FLA.: ... behind those doors they intend to overturn the results of an American presidential election. We want to know what's going on. We're going to go and see if we can get inside. Let's see if we can get in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Gaetz and other members ultimately delayed today's hearing by about five hours. Congressman Matt Gaetz joins us today in studio. Congressman, thanks so much for coming on.

GAETZ: Good to be with you.

CARLSON: So what was the purpose?

GAETZ: We had the audacity to want to know what in the world was going on behind closed doors where Democrats have engaged in a strategy of secret interviews, selective leaks, theatrical, weird performances of transcripts that never happened, and then lies about whistleblowers.

And so it's reasonable to suggest that we would want more transparency on behalf of the millions of people that we represent.

CARLSON: Do you have a right under congressional rules to demand it?

GAETZ: There are no rules, Tucker. If we had rules, Nancy Pelosi would have put this issue to a vote and established rules like it happened for President Clinton, like it happened for President Nixon.

But the Democrats want to preserve the most like operational flexibility. And so if they're going to have a world with no rules, we've got to stop like thinking that we can use the Marquee of Queensbury rules of engagement when we're fighting against an angry pack of rabid hyenas. And that's what we're facing. And I think the President is right, as Republicans, we need to be tougher and exposing this for the kangaroo court that it is.

CARLSON: Can you impeach the President without holding a vote?

GAETZ: That seems to be the Democratic strategy to date, and really what they're trying to do is to --

CARLSON: Can you pass the laws without voting on them now?

GAETZ: Well, I mean, we appropriate money all the time without voting on it. Just a few people show up in the middle of the night and, you know, spend millions of dollars, but Democrats have learned a lesson from Russia.

In the Russia investigation, they did hold open hearings. We saw Robert Mueller in his failure to adequately defend his report. We saw the Corey Lewandowski hearing, which was just a total disaster for Democrats. And so they've moved away from allowing Republicans to have cross examination, thorough review, check testimony against documents and timelines and they're just trying to use the natural advantage they have with the mainstream media to have secret interviews and selective leaks, and they're trying to pollute the American electorate with these lies about the President.

CARLSON: Is there any way for the rest of us following at home to know what's going on inside?

GAETZ: Members of Congress need to hear from their constituents. The American people need to demand more transparency. And I think, look, regardless of what people think about President Trump, it is a legitimate question to ask, why does President Trump not get the same due process from Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats that Newt Gingrich and the Republicans gave President Clinton?

CARLSON: I mean, how long can this go on?

GAETZ: I think that they don't really want an extended process because they can't withstand any review of the facts for a long period of time. I think we're on a rocket docket to impeachment in the House.

I think impeachment was a functional certainty the moment that Nancy Pelosi grabbed that gavel because the radical left today cannot win a fair debate or a fair election, and so everything is about trying to do platform and destroy those who champion the America First agenda, and we've just got to stop reading and reacting. We've got to be, I think very proactive in terms of exposing this corruption to the country.

CARLSON: Congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida. Thank you very much.

GAETZ: Thank you.

CARLSON: Good to see you tonight. Kim Strassel is, of course on "The Wall Street Journal" Editorial Board, a frequent guest on the show, also has a new book out called "Resistance (At all Costs): How Trump Haters are Breaking America," and she joins us tonight.

Kim, you've spent a lot of time thinking about what's happening right now, and almost writing the predicate to it, really. What do you think is likely to happen?

KIMBERLEY STRASSEL, EDITORIAL BOARD, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Well, we are going forward and Congressman Gaetz just made a really important point, which is -- he was pointing out, some people have pointed out that Nancy Pelosi hasn't held an authorization vote because she wanted to spare her members from having to go down and actually do that, her more moderate and vulnerable members.

CARLSON: Right.

STRASSEL: The dirty little secret is that it allows them to not have any rules. Adam Schiff can do this exactly the way he wants to do it. Look at them, there's nothing -- I mean, they can protest as they were just doing today. But there's nothing they can do to stop it.

So I think the message has got to get out. Look, there are literally -- Steve Scalise's office did a calculation about how many millions of Americans, their elected representatives have not been allowed to see the transcripts from any of these events, have not been allowed to see the facts.

So you have got the majority of the American country whose people that they sent to Washington to do the work of the House have no idea what's going on.

CARLSON: What is the point of this? They can't hope for a conviction, I don't think, particularly if it's openly partisan as it is. So why are they doing this?

STRASSEL: Well, look, I honestly think they're fulfilling a campaign promise, right? I mean, what else can it possibly be? Because they met their progressive base demanding this all along. You had a lot of members who ran on this, and they push Pelosi and push Pelosi and they said, you're going to have to do it or else the base is going to revolt. They're not going to show up to vote next year unless you go out and do this. So that's what they're doing.

But the problem is that the way in which they're doing it, they're guaranteeing they won't get a conviction in the Senate. Because if you actually cared about doing this the right way, you'd be convincing people. And what they're actually doing is giving Republicans in the Senate, and even greater reason to vote against it because they don't know what's going on.

CARLSON: I think that's exactly right. What you just said is exactly right. But if you're going to impeach a President, you'd better convict him or else it could Boomerang as it did with Clinton. I mean, I was there for that.

STRASSEL: Exactly.

CARLSON: Democrats picked up seats in that midterm, it's only happened twice in the way that it did in American history, and it was because of impeachment. So I still don't understand like, what is the point? They're going to hurt themselves with this?

STRASSEL: Well, look, and the process itself is becoming an issue as the Congressman just talked about.

CARLSON: Right.

STRASSEL: When I go out, look, they're doing this in part to gin up their base and get them to go out and vote, but for every person on their side that they're doing, I go out and I talk to an Americans, some people who are not even really huge fans of Donald Trump, but they're getting motivated to vote; much as they did after the Kavanaugh hearing, because they see these radical tactics, and they feel as though they need to register a protest to it. So I'm not quite sure they're helping themselves at all.

CARLSON: No. And they're also turning up the volume, which was high already.

STRASSEL: It's very high.

CARLSON: To such a point that I mean, you're -- the subtitle of your book "Break America," I mean, what is the effect on America?

STRASSEL: Well, look at impeachment. And I've got a chapter in the book on this. If we're going to turn impeachment into a partisan political tool, you are completely contorting the meaning of it.

And you know, the framers thought about not putting impeachment even in the Constitution.

CARLSON: Right.

STRASSEL: Because they were so concerned it would be misused like this. So -- but if you're going to do that, I keep telling people on the liberal side of the aisle, you know, what, one day down on the road, there's going to be a Democratic President and a Republican House, do you really want to set the precedent where the very first thing that happens is Articles of Impeachment are filed against that person? Like this is where we're taking some of these very important tools.

CARLSON: It's not good for the country.

STRASSEL: No.

CARLSON: At all.

STRASSEL: It isn't.

CARLSON: If you don't like him, beat him in the election.

STRASSEL: Right, and it's only year away.

CARLSON: We have 240 years of history of that. Kim Strassel, it's so great to have you in studio. Thank you.

STRASSEL: Thank you. It's great to be here.

CARLSON: Well, they killed the Harvey Weinstein story. They protected Matt Lauer, but NBC's top executives are still sitting in their offices drawing millions of dollars in salary. Why is that? That's next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: So NBC got caught covering up for Harvey Weinstein. Harvey Weinstein. You might think that would be a career-ender for the people who got caught doing it - that would include Noah Oppenheim, the President of NBC News, but no.

We learned yesterday that Oppenheim has, in fact had his contract renewed. How did he do that? How do you get caught covering up for Harvey Weinstein's sex crimes, and then get a brand new million dollar -- multimillion dollar contract?

Well, a new report from "The Daily Beast" provides a hint. It turns out that Oppenheim's wife wrote a couple of books and has a line of baby clothes with "Today" show star Savannah Guthrie, which they have hawked on the air repeatedly. That's odd. I've never seen that arrangement in television ever before.

Guthrie, in turn, has been one of Oppenheim's top defenders over at NBC. And here's another question though. Why was Oppenheim so eager to protect Weinstein? Well, it may not just have been about protecting Matt Lauer. It turns out, Weinstein had something that Oppenheim wanted. Weinstein of course, was immensely powerful in Hollywood.

"The Daily Beast" reports that Oppenheim routinely used his NBC post to advance his second career as a screenwriter. Now, that's not necessarily news. People been watching this show carefully because we told you about it long ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: NBC News had this story months ago, brought to them by their former anchor, Ronan Farrow. The company not only turned the story down, they actively tried to suppress it.

What happened in this case? Well, NBC News President Noah Oppenheim, maybe the key to that question. Oppenheim doesn't just oversee NBC News, he is also a screenwriter who has written several films, apparently profiting from his work in Hollywood, even as he runs the network's news division.

Screenwriters, of course are dependent on film producers, of whom Harvey Weinstein was perhaps the most powerful of all.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So we reported that two years ago. They denied it. It turns out they were lying and we were right. Mike Brest is a Breaking News Reporter for "The Washington Examiner" and he joins us tonight on this story. Mike, thanks so much for coming on.

MIKE BREST, BREAKING NEWS REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Thank you for having me.

CARLSON: It is not normally -- correct me if I'm wrong -- for a network president to have a spouse who enters into a business relationship with one of its anchors and then sells products on the air. Have you ever heard of anything like that before?

BREST: I haven't heard of anything like that.

CARLSON: It seems like that would give rise to conflicts potentially like real conflicts?

BREST: Absolutely, especially in terms of how on air reporting would go when it came down to --

CARLSON: Any kind of issue --

BREST: Any kind of issue related to Hollywood ...

CARLSON: Yes, exactly right.

BREST: ... or even the Harvey Weinstein reporting that we've seen, obviously, with Ronan Farrow's new book.

CARLSON: So all of this adds up to -- I mean, more than just hints of misdeeds, more than just smoke. I mean, there's clearly fire here. Do you think that NBC can continue, that Comcast, the parent company can continue to employ people who are caught doing this?

BREST: It's really hard to see them continuing to push forward with their current executive structure. However, we haven't seen any reason to say they will change it.

CARLSON: Right. So Andy Lack now runs the overall company.

BREST: Yes.

CARLSON: He is 72 years old. Noah Oppenheim is in his early 40s.

BREST: Absolutely.

CARLSON: So the plan apparently is for Lack to serve through the selection through 2020 and then for Oppenheim to ascend to his position.

BREST: Absolutely.

CARLSON: That's the whole deal. What do you think the odds of that happening are?

BREST: It depends on what comes out moving forward. However, it seems pretty unlikely that he will serve into that next position.

CARLSON: You think. How difficult -- I mean, look, NBC is a very liberal place. I worked there, I can tell you. It's obvious. And the people who work there are, you know, a lot of them are nice people, but they're activist liberals. How long until they have a revolt in the newsroom over this?

BREST: Well, so it's very interesting because you see a lot of former NBC staffers or television personalities come out against it. We saw Megyn Kelly do that here.

CARLSON: Yes.

BREST: We even saw Chris Hayes come out on his own show on MSNBC calling for an outside investigation.

CARLSON: That's right.

BREST: However, it seems unclear of anything stronger than that or anything other than a singular event.

CARLSON: Do you think it's a little weird that female news employees who sort of hold themselves up as, you know, champions of women and empowered people, feminists can in effect defend someone who covered for Harvey Weinstein?

BREST: Well, so just to sort of harp on that point, we saw Savannah Guthrie in this latest report who is a business partner of Noah Oppenheim's wife. However, when the Matt Lauer allegations came out earlier in October, we saw Savannah Guthrie on the air express her dismay at the Matt Lauer accusations that came forward, called for an investigation, expressed just sort of how shocking it was that Matt Lauer was accused of rape years ago.

CARLSON: Yes.

BREST: And yet she's still as "The Daily Beast" reported earlier today, has gone on the record and defended Noah Oppenheim and called for him to keep his job.

CARLSON: Yes, I mean, I've always liked Savannah Guthrie, a very nice person, I will say. Anyone who has met her, I think would say the same thing. But it's hard to understand why she is taking this position. Mike, great to see you tonight. Thank you.

BREST: Thank you.

CARLSON: Last night on this program, Ronan Farrow's producer, Rich McHugh explained how he was treated by NBC's leadership.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: At one point you say, Noah Oppenheim was exchanging chirpy texts and GIFs with Harvey Weinstein after killing your investigation into him. I mean, how do you feel about that?

RICH MCHUGH, FORMER NBC PRODUCER: I was pretty upset to learn a lot of that stuff to be honest. You know, I have no animosity against these people. But it's clear to me that, you know, we were lied to over and over and it's just not right especially coming from the news organization.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Despite the growing pile of evidence against them -- Andy Lack and Noah Oppenheim -- they still have their jobs.

Tammy Bruce hosts "Get Tammy Bruce" every weeknight on Fox Nation, every week. We wish it was every week down in Fox Nation. But still worth getting it to see it. She joins us now. So Tammy, what do you make -- what do you make of this? I mean, you're always able to sort of connect the macro themes to today's news. This story seems raddled in of them.

TAMMY BRUCE, FOX NATION HOST: Yes, "The Daily Beast" story I think is very good because it touches on a lot of issues. And your interview with Mr. McHugh last night also was very valuable. Because after everything that this network has gone through, that other networks have gone through, the education that everyone has had about the nature of what can happen in the workplace, but also the education about the importance if you have the power and the security to stand up against an abusive environment.

And so it's one thing to have an abuser and you know that person -- man or woman -- who is doing their thing, but if you are in a position of power and you're not involved, and your job is going to be okay if you can stand up against it and make the workplace better for everyone, if you don't do that, that arguably makes you as bad as the perpetrator or maybe even worse because you're in a position where you can make a change.

And this is where the Savannah Guthrie and Hoda Kotb who has also defended Oppenheim and said to the NBC Universal Chairman, according to "The Daily Beast" that he should keep his job is that we -- one has to wonder, do you only come out if you've been fired? Do you only then condemn someone if there's blood in the water?

It's the challenge and maybe Chris Hayes is the best example in all of our experiences of saying something at the time, when there may be still some risk, but ultimately, it should be the sanitizing effect of sunlight, of people having this conversation and also the internal talent.

Women like Guthrie and Hoda Kotb who are very respected, doing a very good job. I don't know either one of them, instead of defending that, being willing to say, you know what, we can do better.

Because remember, their argument was, oh, you know -- and the same with Harvey Weinstein -- don't bother them because either the ratings will go down or he is so good on the issues and something will be destroyed. Whereas in fact, when Lauer went, the "Today" show ratings went up and never came back down.

CARLSON: Right.

BRUCE: So these are excuses and I think that we all have a role to play and women in particular in the workplace has a special job to speak up.

CARLSON: But there's a theme -- I think that's right. But there's a theme here though, that connects this story to so many other stories in corporate America, which is that no one is ever put -- no one in charge is ever punished for screwing up -- ever?

BRUCE: Well, you know, it's also usually a very small group, right? And the idea and the notion of having other business ventures entwined --

CARLSON: What is that?

BRUCE: Savannah Guthrie doing very good in a business with Noah Oppenheim's wife, it seems like there is an effort -- the same with Weinstein and maybe the Matt Lauer information -- of creating webs that sometimes make it difficult to speak up and say it needs to end, maybe because people get comfortable with the status quo.

CARLSON: Are you kidding? If your boss came to you or my boss came to me and said, oh, would you go into business with my spouse?

BRUCE: Yes.

CARLSON: And use your job to front the business, you would -- I mean, would that make you uncomfortable?

BRUCE: Well, you know, it depends on the nature and look, part of the NBC statement is, this is standard operating procedure. Hosts all the time have books, but not -- this is the News Division, and not the executives of the News Division.

CARLSON: We don't do that at Fox. If I could just -- I mean, not to be self-righteous about it.

BRUCE: That's right.

CARLSON: But like that's crazy.

BRUCE: You know, as talent, when you're forward facing, it's one thing to have a book. It's another thing for executives to use the environment to forward a personal agenda of their own and using a spouse. It makes it very difficult, doesn't it, to then be able to stand up on your own and speak out against it.

CARLSON: Yes. You're the head of the News Division. You're writing movie scripts? It's demented.

BRUCE: It's a web that becomes kind of sick and yet obvious on the surface. At NBC Universal Comcast, they certainly -- someone there should be able to make a better decision.

CARLSON: Yes. You would think so. Tammy, great to see you tonight.

BRUCE: Thank you, dear.

CARLSON: Well, one of the biggest scams we've seen in a long time has been exposed in the business world, but instead of going to prison, the perpetrator is getting nearly $2 billion.

You feel like you've heard that story before? This is a particularly unbelievable story, so stay tuned for that.

Plus, scientists just discovered good news about the ozone layer. Will anyone celebrate it? That's just ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Well, it looks like the end could be near for a company that was once hyped not very long ago as the most valuable startup in the world -- WeWork is the name of it. And earlier this year, the company was valued almost $50 billion. The ever obedient business press often described WeWork as a tech company, but that was never really right.

It was actually a real estate operation of sorts. WeWork bought up office space in big cities and then rented it to individuals or small companies. That's fine, I guess, but it's hardly a revolutionary idea and investors always want more flash.

So the CEO of the company, Adam Neumann posed as a world transforming CEO. He babbled about making himself immortal or becoming the first ever trillionaire or using WeWork to solve world hunger somehow.

When WeWork employees expensed their meals, they were banned from buying meat because of climate.

Meanwhile, Neumann himself bummed around in a $60 million private jet. It was a ploy, of course, but it worked. WeWork attracted billions of dollars in investment based on its rapid growth, but there was no real growth.

In reality, it was always just a bloated office rental company with more expenses than revenue. Neumann, though made millions by buying up properties and then leasing them to his own company.

In other words, WeWork looked a lot like an old fashioned scam. But here's the most dispiriting part, it worked. Softbank, one of WeWork's investors just announced it is paying Newman $1.7 billion to step down as head of the company and give up his voting rights.

For running a sham corporation, Neumann is now a billionaire. His employees, you know the rest of the story, most of them get nothing. In fact, WeWork has postponed thousands of layoffs because it can't even afford to pay employees a severance package.

This new cash infusion from Softbank won't save jobs, instead will allow the company to fire people. It's infuriating, but it's also a metaphor for the broader finance economy. It's a sham that shaft the country for the benefit of a tiny group of people. This is not sustainable. Don't lie to yourself.

And someday when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez becomes President, you'll know why it happened.

In the meantime, Mark Blyth is a Professor of Political Economy at Brown University. We're really happy to have him tonight. So Mark, you've taken a good look at this company. What exactly was the business model here?

MARK BLYTH, PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY, BROWN UNIVERSITY: It's pretty much as you described, Tucker. So I'm going to fly around and I'm going to go to Los Angeles, New York, London, I'm going to find the most expensive buildings I can. I'm going to get into really long leases and spend a ton of money doing them up in these really cool workspaces. And then I'm going to rent them out on a daily basis to people who can't afford their own office. That was pretty much it.

CARLSON: And that's worth --

BLYTH: And yes, I know, no really, that's it.

CARLSON: And that's worth -- so how is that worth billions? I mean, how is that you know, the most over funded startup of the year, if not decade?

BLYTH: It's the same kind of unicorn Silicon Valley tech bubble that we've been suffering for the past decade. It's the same nonsense that brought us Juicero and Theranos and all the rest of it. Apparently, a world of work is fundamentally transformed. We're all modular. None of us need to go to work now. We all need a hot desk and people apparently buy this and chuck billions of dollars at it when it really is just a fantasy.

CARLSON: And a scam, I would say.

BLYTH: It's a scam. Yes, it's totally a scam.

CARLSON: What's so galling though, in previous generations, when you were caught running a Ponzi, or ripping people off, you were punished. Goldbrickers went to jail. These guy -- this guy walked out with $1.7 billion. How did that happen?

BLYTH: It's a really good question. That raises questions about where's the board of Softbank? How can you authorize such a payment? If the guy has basically acquired these as part of a fraud, why are you buying them from him? This is a massive failure, not just of corporate governance, but it's the basics of what we understand if capitalism where risk and reward is balanced, right?

If you basically go to a world whereby it's not just winner takes all, its loser takes everything regardless of the costs; how can you have faith in that system?

CARLSON: Well, you can't. And it's not just this guy who -- and I will give him this, he was quite a great actor. I mean, he was a flamboyant character. But Marissa Mayer at Yahoo had no discernible personality whatsoever presided over like the implosion of that company's value and walked off with more than $100 million. You see this all the time. How long can this continue?

BLYTH: It can continue until basically investors wake up and smell the coffee. It can continue until politicians recognize there is a fundamental problem here. Capitalism works best, and it does work very well sometimes where not just risk and reward are balanced, but basic investment decisions made by lots of different people pay off for lots of different people.

CARLSON: Right.

BLYTH: If you have a world in which you've got a handful of people who have so much money, they are personally too big to fail. They can fail and fail and fail again and invest in stupid stuff that has no value. That's a problem for the whole society.

CARLSON: And then speaking of that problem, what are the chances that WeWork or other another failure like WeWork tanks the broader economy?

BLYTH: It could happen. We worry a lot about things like corporate debt and low interest rates. But come on, if you've got an IPO value of $47 billion, let's assume that this one goes through and then they find out it is a fraud, then what happens if the stock market finds out and everyone starts to dump it? The reverberations could be quite consequential.

And as you also know, there's a lot of this stuff around. Let's remember, Wells Fargo just a little while ago. Let's remember all the other things that have been going on in the background. We kind of get -- this stuff gets normalized and that's really dangerous because that's why people lose faith.

CARLSON: It's true and also, they get radical and we're going to get a radical system unless we get this under control, I believe. Professor, it's great to see you tonight. Thank you for that.

BLYTH: Thank you.

CARLSON: Well, a biological male just dominated the competition at a women's cycling race. Not all women are happy about it. Some are saying the obvious, that's not fair. I will speak to one of them after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Women's sports exist as a separate category for men's sports because of a basic biological reality. Men and women are different physically and in some sports, it would be unfair to force women to compete on the same playing field as men.

For centuries, we have recognized that and for decades in this country, women have benefited from having access to a separate playing field.

But now, the left's gender insanity is destroying that. So last week, Rachel McKinnon, a biological male, won the women's track cycling World Championship and set a world record in doing so.

Now, several current and former women cyclists are coming out to defend their sport, from a takeover by men. Kara Dansky is a Board Member at Women's Liberation Front. We're happy to have her back on the show. So Kara, what is the case they are making that -- and that you are making against what just happened?

KARA DANSKY, BOARD MEMBER, WOMEN'S LIBERATION FRONT: Thank you so much for having me here. And I just want to take brief issue with how you characterize the issue as being from the left because I just want to say there are many Democrats and people who identify as being on the left who are very angry about the takeover of women's sports and how the Democratic Party is handling the gender --

CARLSON: That's a fair point. You are certainly on the left and I was just saying at commercial break, it takes a lot of guts for you to come on the show. So I'm grateful that you have.

DANSKY: Thank you so much for having me.

CARLSON: Of course.

DANSKY: I am a lifelong member of the Democratic Party and many of us cannot get a voice on this issue in most media. So I'm very grateful.

CARLSON: So why is -- I mean, let's just broaden this out. Let's do it right away. This -- if you had told me -- and I have covered politics now for 30 years -- five years ago that there would be a consensus in Washington that you're not allowed to question any of the stuff, I would have said, that's insane.

Today there is that consensus. It's dangerous even to raise questions about it.

DANSKY: Agreed.

CARLSON: What happened?

DANSKY: Agreed. So getting back to the case at hand, as you said, McKinnon is a male cyclist.

CARLSON: Right.

DANSKY: Who on Saturday won a championship in the women's cycling competition in Manchester, England, and there are many feminists, women who are questioning the right of male athletes to compete in women's sports and this seems to be unacceptable for us to take this position. But we will continue to take this position that it is unacceptable for males to compete in women's sports.

It's very important in this country for the purposes of maintaining Title 9 protections for women and girls, which is something that my organization, the Women's Liberation Front cares very much about.

CARLSON: So you're making a pretty straightforward, I think, reality base case. And by doing so you risk physical harm. How did we get to that place so fast?

DANSKY: Physical harm, social ostracization, risk to livelihood. I personally know several women who have been fired from positions for voicing concerns for the rights, privacy and safety of women and girls.

I want to also just make the point that many of your viewers may not understand that there are many people on the political left, including, especially feminists, lesbians, gay men, and bisexual people who are gravely concerned about what the Democratic Party is doing on the topic of gender identity, and pushing the notion that men can be women and women can be men, which is first of all, regressive politically because it aligns with the notion of gender which we want to abolish. But it's also just -- it is inaccurate scientifically.

CARLSON: Yes.

DANSKY: And there are many Democrats who are willing to say this, but many of your viewers may not know that because we are generally subjected to a media blackout.

CARLSON: Boy, you're always welcome on this show. I just never hear from them ever. I never hear anybody say that.

DANSKY: And the reason that you don't hear from them is that those of us on the left -- Democrats -- cannot get a voice on NPR, cannot get a voice in "The New York Times," cannot get a voice in "The Washington Post." We have tried.

WE have said we have a feminist and a gay rights objection to trans -- to the trans movement, to trans ideology -- and no one will hear us, no one will publish us.

CARLSON: It's just -- well, as I said, and I mean it, you're always welcome on the show and I'm glad that you came tonight. Kara, thank you very much.

DANSKY: Appreciated.

CARLSON: That's it for us. I wish we had more time. Tune in every night at eight to the show that's the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and groupthink. DVR it if you can figure out how to do that.

Good night from Washington, D.C. This show will transition 220 miles to the north. In just moments, Sean Hannity will take the helm from New York City. We will see you tomorrow. Have a great night.

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