Gingrich: Bernie Sanders is the true Democratic Party
Former House speaker and Fox News contributor Newt Gingrich shares his thoughts on the 2020 presidential race and Democratic primary race.
This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," February 21, 2020. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
MICHAEL LOFTUS, COMEDIAN: Can we just say that right now? He's Mike Dyson. We should bring the old timey hook and just get him off the stage.
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST, "TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT": That would be good. Michael Loftus, thank you.
That's it for us tonight. Have the best weekend. We'll see you next week (ph).
(MUSIC)
DAN BONGINO, FOX NEWS HOST: Welcome to the special edition of HANNITY: Trump Versus the Left.
Tonight, we're just 256 days away from the presidential election and the Democratic Party is going broke. According to the latest data, the DNC is less than $10 million cash on hand. In contrast, the RNC has nearly $80 million.
Meanwhile, the 2020 candidates aren't faring much better. While President Trump builds a massive war chest, his potential opponents are hemorrhaging money on the campaign trail. Of course, none of this matters to billionaire Mike Bloomberg who is literally trying to buy the race.
Bloomberg has so much money. He's actually paying ordinary Americans to say nice things about him online. But that's not all. His latest spending spree involves a series of weird billboards, including one that attacks the president for how his steaks are prepared, and another one that reads, quote, Donald Trump cheats at golf. Mike Bloomberg doesn't.
It's real. We're not messing with you.
As you can see, money can buy a lot of things but it can't buy a sense of humor or charisma. Apparently, it can't even buy good debate prep. And after Bloomberg's pathetic performance at this week's debate, Bernie Sanders is piling on.
Check this out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you surprised by how unprepared he seemed for some very basic, obvious questions at a debate, in Nevada?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Yes, I was, I was. And, you know, if that's what happened in a Democratic debate, you know, I think it's quite likely that Trump will chew him up and spit him out
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: That's 78-year-old devout socialist now has a real path to winning the nomination -- frightening. That is if he can get past the rigged DNC convention that's ready to do anything and everything to stop him.
Joining us now with more is FOX News contributor and former speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich.
Mr. Speaker, thanks a lot for joining us tonight.
The Democrats have tried this before. You've seen the McGovern candidacy, the Dukakis candidacy, the Mondale candidacy. And, Mr. Speaker, they all have one thing in common, going down in flames with this radical agreement that they had.
Has the country changed that much that Bernie Sanders can actually have a shot at being president of the United States?
NEWT GINGRICH, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, look, I think we're a country that elected an actor who made movies with chimpanzees. We elected a nuclear engineer, a peanut farmer. We elected a guy from Arkansas who had no particular claim to be ready to be president.
So, you know, a wide range of people have won the presidency. And I think those of us who watch in amazement as Donald Trump wiped out 16 competitors before taking on Clinton and beating her, I don't want to be presumptive. So I would say that Sanders has a very distance possibility of winning. But it's a much greater likelihood of taking the entire Democratic ticket down, ending Pelosi's speakership.
He's the greatest gift to Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader in the House, you could possibly hope for, because Sanders really is the true Democratic Party. He represents all of the big government ideas, all the radicalism, all of the weird foreign policy that is just at the heart of the Democratic Party. And I think that the contrast between President Trump and his record, particularly on the economy, but just in general.
I mean, think about the Trump judges and then ask, you know, can Sanders give us a list of people he would nominate to the Supreme Court? They would all be radicals. So, it could end up being one of the great historic campaigns in American history.
BONGINO: Well, I think -- you know, given that the McGovern candidacy, and like I said, Dukakis and Mondale went down in flames in an era where we didn't have FOX News and have any kind of alternative media. You know, if you didn't hear from Walter Cronkite or David Brinkley, it didn't happen.
Now, we have this alternate media environment where facts actually matter. I just can't envision a candidacy like Sanders, if he were to getting the nod, surviving, given the fact, Mr. Speaker, that it's going to get out there, that his name is on a bill that would quite literally cancel people's insurance plan.
I mean, as we saw with the Culinary Union fight in Nevada, this isn't even popular with union Democrats who can't stand Bernie Sanders' ideas. I mean, this has got to be a problem for him if he were to win the nomination
GINGRICH: Well, I think a lot -- a lot of Democrats, including Mayor Bloomberg, have been trying to make that case. But the challenge here is something very different. Bernie Sanders essentially is a bumper sticker. It is a "gosh, I love a nice future where I didn't have to pay back my student loans, where all -- everything was free, where somebody took care of me. And Sanders represents in that sense a sort of a myth. And it's very hard to fight a myth with facts.
Now, everybody who is open to facts will peel away, ultimately, and a campaign which laid out what Sanders really would mean I think would be devastating. But if you look -- I'm working on a new book for this summer, laying out the choice on this campaign.
And I'm devoting an entire chapter to what I'm calling the radical 200 in the House, because if you're start going down the list, you know, this isn't five or 10 or 15 people. This isn't AOC and "The Squad". The entire Democratic Party is marching off of a left wing cliff and doing so with bills -- there's a bill, for example, that would raise the FICA tax and your Social Security tax by 19 percent, and it has 206 Democrats signed on.
I mean, something is going on in our party where they've all touched with reality.
BONGINO: Yes, I think the problem I have with, personally, is Bernie Sanders is a fraud. He's lying to people. He keeps talking about this mythical idea of Democratic socialism. There's no such thing.
And he keeps citing examples, Mr. Speaker, that don't exist. He keeps saying, in other words, he keeps citing Denmark and Scandinavian countries. We need to be more socialist like the Danes.
Well, when you actually ask people in Denmark, like the one of the foreign leaders, Lars Rasmussen, who was actually offended by the characterization of Denmark. They're a market economy. It doesn't work, and he's making this up.
He's a genuine radical but he's using non-radical examples like Denmark and Scandinavia to sell ideas. I believe he really believes it, hard socialism, not just Democratic socialism nonsense he keeps talking about it
GINGRICH: Look, anybody who honeymoons in the Soviet Union and who said that John F. Kennedy made him sick because Kennedy refused to work with Fidel Castro -- you go back through Sanders' entire career, and he's very hard left. He's somewhere between a genuine communist and a very, very hard core socialist.
But, he's also been around for a long time. He's learned the game. He's pretty good at shading things.
The problem he's going to have, as any Democrat will have, is when you run into Donald Trump, you run into somebody who is willing to go head on, who uses the power of the enormous his Twitter following, which is larger than the three networks combined, and I think that ultimately, as I said a while ago, Bernie Sanders literally could be exactly the choice the country should face because then we have the real debate.
I mean, do you want to go down the road of Zimbabwe and Venezuela and every -- Cuba, every failed centralized state in the world? Or do you want to continue creating jobs, have the best economy we've ever had, lowest unemployment rate for African-Americans and Latinos?
You know, that's a pretty clear choice. And it will be healthy for America to get it out in the open.
BONGINO: No, I agree. Let's duke it out. Let's have that fight.
Speaker Gingrich, thanks a lot. Really appreciate it.
GINGRICH: Great. Great to be with you.
BONGINO: In just a few short hours, the Nevada will be under way.
Joining us now with the very latest from Las Vegas is Jacqui Heinrich.
Jacqui, what do you got for us?
JACQUI HEINRICH, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Dan, a lot of candidates campaigning here in Nevada. We're at a Bernie Sanders event right now. And tomorrow is really critical especially for the candidates who underperformed in Iowa and New Hampshire, especially former Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren. Neither of them clear the threshold of delegates there.
Biden's been relying on a firewall of support from black voters in South Carolina to resuscitate his campaign, but if he doesn't do well here in Nevada, he could shake that support, and Warren needs to capitalize on a record of fund-raising after a very strong debate performance on Wednesday where she sparred with a former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, taking him to task over sexism allegation. Today, he agreed to release three women from nondisclosure agreements following a few days of criticism.
Meantime the caucuses could provide a bigger edge for Senator Bernie Sanders who has the biggest donor base of any campaign, and he's neck and neck with former Mayor Pete Buttigieg in terms of delegates after Iowa and New Hampshire.
Buttigieg needs a comeback and Senator Amy Klobuchar needs to make her mark. Now, of course, anxiety looms over technology the state party plans to use to administer the caucuses and factor in early votes which is a first for this state. Today, the Nevada Democrats sent a memo to the campaign saying they're going to scrap a Google form they plan to use to report the results and instead use a phone-based system sparking concern among some of the campaigns. And it is, by the way, the second time they shifted gears after the Iowa caucus results imploded when their app melted down -- Dan.
BONGINO: Wow, what a mess. Jacqui, thanks a lot.
Well, less than one day until the Nevada caucus, a brand new scandal is emerging for the flailing Joe Biden campaign.
According to a new report from "The New York Times", Biden recently told the story on the campaign trail about being arrested in South Africa in the 1970s while on his way to visit Nelson Mandela. Well, there's a small problem with that, there's no evidence this ever happened. In fact, one former congressman who traveled with Biden to South Africa told, "The Times", quote, no, I was never arrested and I don't think he was either.
The Biden campaign continues to implode right before our eyes.
Meanwhile, the Trump campaign is gaining momentum, and during a huge rally in Las Vegas, President Trump had a few choice words for the Democrats who want to take his job. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Mini Mike so far has spent almost $500 million in order to get embarrassed by Pocahontas. And she's mean, isn't she? Did you see that? Do you see the anger on her face, that nervous energy like a jumping up and down, she's a mess.
Bernie is too emotional. He's screaming, going crazy.
And Biden is angry. Biden is angry, everything's anger, gee -- ha ha ha. And that's what happens when you can't get the words out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: Joining us now with reaction is former White House press secretary and FOX News contributor, Ari Fleischer, former California Congressman Darrell Issa, and from "The Wall Street Journal", Kimberly Strassel.
Ari, I'll go to you first. This has been just a disastrous few weeks for the Democrats. The Iowa caucus meltdown, rumors of a Nevada caucus meltdown that hasn't even happened yet, they can't seem to figure out how to phone bank, they still haven't figured out how to use Microsoft Excel to count votes. Apparently, we have what looks like another Russia hoax 2.0.
I mean, I had to write this down a list. There were so many of these debacles that happened.
You know, I get it, the news cycle is quick. I don't want to be hyperbolic and people could forget about this next week. But this does kind of dent the image of the Democrats, does it not, as efficient government planners that are going to manage our health care, and they can't even get a spreadsheet down. I mean, I'm not crazy, right?
ARI FLEISCHER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, I'm looking forward to Nevada tomorrow. I can't wait to see if they take out an abacus to figure out where the vote goes.
(LAUGHTER)
FLEISCHER: Look, I mean, the Democrats are returning to their roots, which was the party that can -- that it's made no sense and couldn't get anything done. That's used to be the rap on the Democrats.
Along came Bill Clinton, he started to change their image and they look like they want to restore your old McGovernite image, but also the party of incompetence.
I'm starting to feel sorry for Joe Biden.
BONGINO: Yes.
FLEISCHER: I read that story and it's just so hard to imagine what was going through Joe's mind. Why would he have made that up? Is it true? But if it's true, why have we never heard about it for 30 years?
It's a sad ending for Joe Biden, and you just have to feel that it's inevitable now.
BONGINO: Yes, you know, Congressman, I -- I'm with Ari on that, and I know it's probably not the PC thing where, the -- you know, you want to get people fired up in your party, but it has been a mess for Biden. I mean, this was a guy on the left who could have left an icon, one of the more popular leftist presidents, Barack Obama. He was his vice president.
He jumps back in the fray, clearly unprepared. As a guy who's been through a race when you were running for Congress, every two years, you're used to this. He was clearly not ready for this, forgetting what state he's in, telling stories that don't make any sense, changing positions on things. It's just been a disaster.
And for a guy who was supposed to be the safe pick, he's starting to look really unsafe right now for everybody that donated to his campaign.
DARRELL ISSA, FORMER CALIFORNIA CONGRESSMAN: Well, you're exactly right. One of the challenges is, he tried to be, quote, the nice guy.
He's not from the nice guy party. The nice guy wing of the Democratic Party is gone, and so, he's faced with the situation in which the party faithful wants a Pocahontas. They want somebody who is Bernie Sanders.
And then the rank-and-file, the people he thinks he represents, they want somebody like him but 20 years younger and a little more organized and just maybe, just maybe a little more honest about his background.
BONGINO: Yes.
Kimberley, I'm a great admirer of your work on spygate, by the way. You were -- I mean, you just were fantastic.
KIMBERLEY STRASSEL, THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Thank you.
BONGINO: You're op-eds in "The Wall Street Journal", you really miss the case if you weren't reading her stuff.
STRASSEL: And you.
BONGINO: Oh, well, thank you. I'm -- you were -- you provided a lot of good tips along the way.
But I've been reading some of your recent stuff too about the campaign. Bernie Sanders seemed particularly frazzled the other day when he was called out by Michael Bloomberg and what have been -- might have been Bloomberg's only good moment of the debate, on this fact that Bernie Sanders is, in fact, a millionaire.
And, conveniently, when he used to rail against millionaires and billionaires, he's now sliced the millionaire part out, and he's focusing solely on billionaires. This is an obvious -- almost Alinsky-ite tactic. It was one of Alinsky's rules, forced their own rules on them, and clearly, Bernie being a socialist going to have a problem with this question once this tax returns come out.
STRASSEL: Well, and don't you wish that there have been more moments like this. Look, Bernie Sanders is sitting there just waiting for someone to tear into these proposals that are divorced from economic reality, from a lot of the inconsistencies within his campaign. And this is Bloomberg's opportunity.
Now, I think the sad thing is people are talking about whether or not he's at risk because of his record or because of his wealth, the Bloomberg campaign is instead going to hinge on whether or not he seeks to define himself away from the rest of this field, and in particular Bernie Sanders.
And so, he had that good line. But unfortunately, Bloomberg since he's officially declared, he's been rushing to join the pack with a $5 trillion tax hike and new financial regulations.
BONGINO: Yes.
STRASSEL: That's not the way to win the nomination. The way is to do what he did to Bernie on the stage and say, look, people, some of this is just ridiculous. The party has lost its way. We need a candidate who's sane and who can talk about these issues and a more comprehensive level and I -- we'll see if you can do that.
That's going to be the test though for Mike Bloomberg.
BONGINO: You know, I agree with you, and I think we're looking at it all on the panel rationally, saying, you know, where's that John Delaney lane? For those who ask, who was John Delaney, I ran against him for congressman, he was running for president and went on stage and said, the math here is ridiculous, guys, and gaining a little bit of traction for a half a moment.
But, Ari, is there space anymore in this modern Democrat Party for that? I mean, people forget, it was Bill Clinton who gave the State of the Union speech and said the era of big government is over. That was a Bill Clinton speech.
You said that now and the Democrat Party be run out of the party.
FLEISCHER: Look, here's the problem that Democrats have today and it's a big one, the Gallup polled this question, do you consider yourself the liberal Democrat? They asked that of Democrats.
When Clinton was president in '94, only 25 percent of the Democrats called themselves liberal. Today, 51 percent. The majority view themselves as liberal.
And that used to be a word that Democrats ran for them because they knew they couldn't get elected. Now, you can't get nominated if you don't consider yourself a liberal -- to the point now where Bernie, the socialist, actually is in the lead and likely is going to win the nomination.
This is a terrible problem that Democrats have because if it takes liberalism to win a nomination. It also means liberalism likely loses a general election, and that's where the Democrats are brought themselves.
BONGINO: Congressman, I got about a minute --
ISSA: Ari -
BONGINO: Yes, go ahead, I'm sorry.
ISSA: Yes, go ahead.
(CROSSTALK)
BONGINO: Sorry, I want to get your take on it.
ISSA: OK.
BONGINO: So, you have, in every election, you have like a safe pick an outsider pick and a radical pick. The problem I see with this election for the Democrats is every one of those lanes is led by a candidate who doesn't marry up the brand.
Biden's not safe. Buttigieg isn't an outsider, and Bernie is a fake radical. He's a millionaire, who has three homes or a summer camp as he calls it.
This is a real branding problem for them once they get past this primary, is it not?
ISSA: It absolutely is, and one of the challenges is, let's assume they had one or two of those lanes they could cover, they're all up against the same Donald Trump, the same President Trump who was taken from them the working Democrat, the African-American Democrat or independent who now has a better job and seeing a pay raise, the Hispanic who may not have believed in Donald Trump's theory but now realizes his streets are safer and his kids are getting jobs, and education is improving.
They don't have a plan to deal with the Democrats that have defected and will continue defecting to President Trump.
BONGINO: Kimberley, can I get a quick answer from you? I got about 30 seconds left.
Do you see this new Russia hoax 2.0 that's already developing problems with this "New York Times" narrative (ph), do you see this as a result of potentially disastrous Democrat debate and some leaks from the Democrats in the committee to change the narrative away from their problems? Could that have something to do with it?
STRASSEL: Of course, but don't you wish they'd come up with a new hoax? I mean --
BONGINO: Yes, we would think, right?
STRASSEL: You can only run these plays like 70 times before the American public gets wise to ‘em, right? And so, you know, I think they need to change up the script just a little bit.
BONGINO: I think we can all agree on that.
Ari, Darrell, Kimberley, thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate it.
Coming up, the left is gearing up for a brand new Russia witch hunt again. You won't believe what they're saying now.
Stay with us. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BONGINO: Now with Democrats' elections hopes imploding, they're retreating to more Russian conspiracy theories, ahead of 2020.
And following a dubious "New York Times" report about election interference that partners in the media mob are going all in on collusion hoax 2.0. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's really all an effort to squash any information at all about a Russian cyberattack on our 2020 election, because if the Russians are attacking our election processes and they're doing so to benefit Donald Trump, I think, frankly, the president welcomes it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're all at it again, and so, is the president, it's all happening all over again like it did in 2016.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are learning tonight that Vladimir Putin is stepping up his election interference.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The president is a Russian operative. That sounds like the description of a bad Hollywood screenplay but it is real, and it is Vladimir Putin's greatest achievement.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: It never ends, folks. It never ends.
But just like every other one of their so-called bombshells, the story has major flaws and misinformation. For example, a national security official speaking to CNN's Jake Tapper poured cold water on the report, explaining that the intelligence doesn't even say that the Russians are trying to help Trump.
But, of course, Democrats aren't letting facts get in the way of another one of their anti-Trump narratives. Hillary Clinton tweeted, quote: Putin's puppet is at it again, taking Russian help for himself. It is unbelievable.
And get this, the Democratic Russian collusion delusion is now being aimed at Bernie Sanders too following a report that Russia is allegedly trying to aid his campaign too.
And earlier today, President Trump weighed in on the left's Russia obsession. Take a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I was told that was happening, I was told a week ago. They said, you know, they're trying to start a rumor, it's disinformation. These people are crazy. That's all they think about. They don't think about the country. They don't think about jobs. They don't think about lowering your drug costs, infrastructure. These people are crazy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: Now, this all comes as Democrats and their media mobs stenographers continue to ignore the real 2016 election scandal, and the real deep state abuse of power, that lied about the dirty Russian dossier, that lied to the FISA court and lied to the American people about Trump in Russia and it had real impacts.
Just listen to former deputy national security adviser K.T. McFarland, describing how the collusion hoax put her through hell. Take a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX NEWS HOST: But for two years, your life went on hold, you had to pay lawyers.
K.T. MCFARLAND, FORMER DEPUTY NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: I went through hell. I mean, they showed up -- the FBI showed up at my house unannounced. I was all by myself, they come in and I said, do I need a lawyer for anything? I've never met with any Russians, I've never dealt with any Russians. Well, we can't tell you not to get a lawyer, but we just wanted a little bit of information.
The whole time, they were setting me up for a forgery trap.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: That was Attorney General Barr and John Durham inched closer and closer to truth and justice. The Washington swamp is devolving into a complete panic.
Just look at how Obama A.G. Eric Holder snapped on reporter Paul Sperry over his report about serious irregularities in the McCabe probe. Holder tweeted, this is incredible: Why don't you shut the hell up? Before adding, quote: People like you want to use the justice system for political reasons are both dangerous and ignorant -- Eric Holder tweeted that, think about that for a minute.
Joining me now for reaction is author of "Defending the Constitution", Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, along with the author of "Witch Hunt", FOX News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett, and FOX News contributor Sara Carter.
Gregg, I'll go to you first. Here we are again. I mean, we were kind of laughing a few -- I can't believe they're trotting this out again.
GREGG JARRETT, FOX NEWS LEGAL ANALYST: Yes.
BONGINO: Obviously, this is the symptom of Durham closing in on the truth and the two takeaways from this Durham report are going to be that the case was the dossier the entire time, that this Papadopoulos tip is a fake story and that, secondly, they no later the FBI than January of 2019, they know, it's fake, that it's all a hoax.
I mean, it's -- where's -- what's your take on that?
JARRETT: Yes, and I love the clips you played. I mean, Lawrence O'Donnell last night saying Trump is a Russian asset or agent. You know, thank God Trump said, you like gone with a wind and not Dr. Zhivago.
You know, they will never let go of the Russia hoax. And "The New York Times" and almost nothing that you read in "New York Times" isn't slanted by bias that's liberal an anti-Trump narrative got it wrong fundamentally. They misreported that the Russians prefer Trump. That's not what the intelligence said.
But they borrowed it almost word-for-word directly from the intelligence community assessment report on the 2016 election. I was cited in my book, I regretted today, it's almost word-for-word, the same thing.
Look, Americans are smart, maybe a few of them bought into the Russia hoax until it was debunked by the Mueller report. They're not going to buy into the Russia hoax volume 2.
BONGINO: Alan, question for you. I mean, this is just the police state type nonsense here, is it not? I mean, these intelligence community leaks, and I never thought these words would leave my mouth here, but I actually feel bad for the Sanders campaign here. I mean, this is -- unbelievably, it takes a briefing -- a briefing that leaks magically immediately to "The Washington Post", and at the same thing that happened to Trump.
I mean, this is incredible. This is supposed to be our intelligence community here and it seems what they're doing is everything but intelligence, not all, but someone at the top doing this with political motives somewhere, is doing a lot of damage out there.
ALAN DERSHOWITZ, HARVARD LAW PROFESSOR: Look, I believe and I believed since I was a college student, that Russians have always -- the Soviet Union and now Russia, tries to sow discontent in the United States, tries to divide people. I don't think they care who wins the election. They love what happened in Iowa. They're looking forward to maybe a problem in Nevada. They loved what happened in 2000 when we had to go to the Supreme Court, to resolve the election, anything that sows discord among Americans is good for the Russians.
But the idea that an American president is a Russian agent or that the Russians really have a preference for who gets elected president and that that preference is actually reflected in the result really does sound more like science fiction or perhaps CNN reporting.
I have to tell you about CNN -- CNN actually doctored a recording of my answer to a question in the United States Senate. They doctored a recording. They left out the critical statement before. They left out critical statement after. They doctored it, so much for CNN.
And you see, you just can't trust anything that's on that station. And then they had people saying, oh, Dershowitz thinks you can shoot your opponent if you're the president -- just putting forth some of the worst lies about me and other people. So forget about CNN when it comes to truth.
BONGINO: Well, journalism unfortunately died a long time ago over there.
Sara, your work on the whole spygate probe along with Gregg has been incredible.
But I do believe as we were talking about before earlier in the earlier segment with Kim Strassel, they're really in a panic over where Durham is clearly starting to uncover here.
And I believe for the purposes of this segment, the two key takeaways, a lot of them, the two key takeaways are this case was always the dossier. The Papadopoulos story is a complete look squirrel moment. They opened up a case and spied on a presidential candidate because of a fake paid for a political document and they invented a cover story.
And I want to just hit two key dates with you. July 5th, they said they didn't open the case until July 31st, but on July 5th, their meeting with Steele, the FBI in London and conveniently right before they open up the case, Christopher Steele's meeting with Nellie Ohr and Bruce Ohr from Fusion GPS, and on the Justice Department. This is not a coincidence.
SARA CARTER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: No, it's not a coincidence and this is what Durham is investigating and you know as well as I do, Dan, that they're looking even further back into 2015.
And I want to make one quick point and they're looking at the money. That's what they're going to do. They're going to follow the money. They're going to follow the intelligence. They're going to go wherever that takes them, but a quick point and I agree with Alan Dershowitz on this -- Russia wants to sow chaos, right?
And think about this -- they don't even need to worry about the Kremlin, the GRU or their agents. They have their agents right here in the United States that are buying their chaos hook, line and sinker. They just put something out there, and then we see the Democrats, we see the anti-Trump media, and everybody just on board dishing out disinformation coming straight from Russia. That includes Hillary Clinton, John Brennan, Eric Holder and everybody else in the media, Chris O'Donnell, that wants to dish out rush disinformation.
So if there's anybody on Russia's like payroll so to speak, it's them. It's not anybody around Donald Trump.
BONGINO: But, Sara, the real shame of this is we had at one point, a nonpartisan IC, intelligence community, that could referee all this stuff. And now, again not all, but sadly due to people like Brennan, Comey, Clapper and people at the top, reputations for these communities, the intelligence community, has been so tarnished, nobody knows what to believe anymore.
CARTER: That's right, and that's the tragedy here because the American people deserves better.
DERSHOWITZ: That's the problem with America, nobody knows what to believe. That's the problem.
CARTER: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
JARRETT: And you know what was especially insidious --
DERSHOWITZ: I agree. It's so difficult today to figure out what the truth is.
JARRETT: -- about the intelligence community is, according to Admiral Mike Rodgers, who was NSA director --
BONGINO: That's right.
JARRETT: -- he eventually spilled the beans that they used the dossier as part of the intelligence community assessment.
BONGINO: Yes.
JARRETT: And it would turn out to be fabricated and phony, and the FBI learned about it the very month Trump is inaugurated and they concealed it from the American people.
BONGINO: And renewed two more FISAs, after it, by the way.
JARRETT: That's right.
CARTER: That's right.
BONGINO: Alan, Gregg, Sara, thank you.
Up next, some of the most shocking statements ever uttered by Democratic presidential candidates. You won't believe the tape we're about to show you. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BONGINO: Welcome to this "Hannity" special, Trump versus left.
While the president is working hard to help the country, the left is working hard to tear it down, and their extreme positions are alienating Americans. Last night, during a CNN town hall, Joe Biden showed his ignorance about firearms and declared war on your Second Amendment rights. Take a look at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I made a commitment that I'm going to do everything in my power in office or out of office to get those assault weapons off the street which I've done once already, and to get those clips that have multiple bullets in them not for sale, not be able to sell silencers, all those things. I'm the only guy that's beaten the gun manufacturers. I'm only -- the only guy that's beaten the NRA nationally and I did it twice, nationally.
And, gun manufacturers, I'm coming for you. Period.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: And the full-time hate Trump media is no better. "The View" attacked President Trump after he pushed for Hollywood to return to making movies like "Gone with the Wind" during last night's rally.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOY BEHAR, HOST, "THE VIEW": Yes, let's bring back the good old days, yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, let's get birth of the nation back in there because we'll have enough of that kind of kowtowing and conning.
What's interesting --
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDNTIFIED FEMALE: I think that's why he's upset. I think that when he saw the name "Parasite", the movie, he thought it was the Trump family film.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: Joining us now with reaction is FOX News contributor, Johnny Joey Jones, FOX News contributor Rachel Campos Duffy, and from "The Hill", Joe Concha.
Johnny, I'll go with you. Always good to see you. So, listen the Dems in the past, they've always been good at hiding their true positions, you know, running on hopey-changey, and all that stuff. They're never telling you what they really wanted, which is your money, your health care, your kids' education, your freedom, liberty, guns and everything else.
But in this election, they're actually being honest about this stuff. Should this scare us?
JOHNNY JOEY JONES, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: You know, they don't know where to turn it, especially with Joe Biden, who's going to vote for him? Bernie Sanders actually has a base. You know, the parallels between the way Trump came to be president, the way Bernie's trying to, are there. Joe Biden understands he's the Jeb Bush in the mix, and what is he going to do?
But, listen, this lack of understanding, this lack of knowledge about the Second Amendment is something that people all over this country to include where Bernie Sanders is from Vermont, the way they use guns, they know guns, and when they hear someone like Joe Biden who's the vice president of the United States completely mislabel and mispronouncing and misinformed about guns, the last thing they want is someone writing policy to take those guns away, because they don't understand.
BONGINO: You know, Rachel, I think Donald Trump is a unique opportunity here, with both black and Hispanic voters, to seismically change politics for the Republican Party. If he moves the needle just a little bit with those two blocks of voters, this could change politics forever. I mean, think about things he stood for, school choice, criminal justice, whether you agree with them or not, these are things with resonating communities that haven't heard our message in the past.
Do you see the same dynamic in this election?
RACHEL CAMPOS-DUFFY, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Absolutely. You know, I always thought he had a really great chance with Hispanics, because Hispanics are very responsive to so many of his economic messages. I really didn't know or believe that he could do what he has done within the African-American community. I mean, we had the first African-American president ever and he couldn't get criminal justice reform over the -- over the finish line, and here Donald Trump did.
And I think that many, many black people are paying attention to that, and school choice is huge. I mean, you saw what happened at the State of the Union when that little girl stood up. The left, the media elites, they didn't pay attention, but plenty of moms and dads and in schools or their kids are trapped in schools that are not performing, they paid attention to that.
BONGINO: You know, Joe, I brought up earlier with Speaker Gingrich in an earlier interview on the show, the media ecosystem now is completely different. This is not the David Brinkley, Walter Cronkite, even Tom Brokaw you're aware of, they didn't say it, it didn't happen. You now have this channel, you have all kinds of alternative media out there, social media, the message -- the way to spread a message is geometrically larger than it was years ago.
The reason I ask you that is these candidates taking these radical fringe positions -- give us your guns, give us your kids, give us your money, that's not going to work in the general election, but they're not going to be able to run away from it. It's going to be on YouTube, it's going to be everywhere. It's not going to be easy to make go away any more.
JOE CONCHA, THE HILL: Checks and balances, Dan, right?
I mean, as you mentioned, FOX News appeals to that niche audience out there in the country, which is half the country, right? And then you have social media and the Paul Reveres that are on there as well.
For Joe Biden, to start saying that he's going to be going after guns, let me just read you one Gallup poll question on the matter that just came out recently, do you think there should or should not be a law that would ban the possession of handguns especially by police -- except by police, excuse me -- and other authorized persons. Twenty-nine percent say yes, 70 percent say no, you should not ban handguns or take away people's guns in a capacity. It is a losing issue.
As for another clip that you played from "The View" with Michael Eric Dyson, where he says, that, OK, gone with the wind. You know, when the president evokes that, that's racist.
There was a time last year, MSNBC, CNN used the word racist or racism 4,100 times, not in a year, not in a month, in one week July 14th through the 21st.
So, when we hear this whole thing that, yes, the president's saying because it's a dog whistle because it's racist, I think it's lost its impact at this point and it's why many odds makers right now have him as a prohibitive favorite to win reelection because Democrats don't have a bumper sticker message of optimism, what are you going to do to make people's lives better? There's nothing really to run on at this point from what I've seen, Dan.
BONGINO: Yes. Well, their two bedrock messages, have been class warfare and identity politics, and now, we're seeing it turned on.
CAMPOS-DUFFY: Yes.
BONGINO: Bloomberg and Biden and others.
Thanks a lot, guys. We really appreciate it.
CAMPOS-DUFFY: Absolutely.
BONGINO: Coming up, a stunning trend that could spell doom for the Democrats. We'll tell you about it, coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BONGINO: Welcome back to the "Hannity" special: Trump versus the left.
While the Dems destroy themselves and their party is in utter disarray, a record GOP field is taking shape to take on socialist Democrats across the country. And one of the radical squad's ringleaders, AOC, is managing to irritate even sympathetic lefties like Whoopi Goldberg, on "The View". Check this out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WHOOPI GOLDBERG, HOST, "THE VIEW": I was very happy when you were elected because I thought was a great step in a good direction. And then you lost me, because it felt like you were saying to people like me that I was too old and didn't do enough. It's sort of hear -- it sound like you were dismissing us bothered the hell out of me.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Of course.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She's very upset about it.
GOLDBERG: And I've been very upset about it for a long time.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: Joining us now for reaction, former Trump administration advisor and Republican 2020 congressional candidate, Catalina Lauf, Congressman Andy Biggs, and conservative columnist Jeffrey Lord.
Congressman, I'll go to you first. You know, I'm getting a little bit tired of this crap, can I be honest? There's no such thing as Democratic socialism, OK? Can we cut through the nonsense?
And it's sad that I actually have to applaud Michael Bloomberg who I think it's an awful candidate, but for finally calling this monstrous fraud, Bernie Sanders, out, on this socialism nonsense. He's a millionaire limousine liberal who owns three homes, one on which he calls a summer camp -- I don't know what that means. And hat tip to someone for finally calling that.
There's no such thing as Democratic socialism. I'm sorry. I mean, I'm (ph) like a meltdown on the (ph) -- you know, there's either the government control of the means of production, or you have relatively free markets with taxation.
Isn't it time to start getting -- you start new rules, man, hold them to -- their feet to the fire on this?
REP. ANDY BIGGS (R-AZ): Absolutely right. I mean, you've got two very divergent points of view in America today. You've got this craziness on the left.
And Bernie Sanders, he's beyond a socialist. I'm sorry. His brand of socialism like everybody else up on that stage is authoritarianism, and you add that to socialism, you can figure out what that means. But that's where they are.
And it's a negative, it's terrible, but you've got the free-market system going on with Donald Trump where he's reduced the corporate tax rate, he's done everything he can to boost this economy, and the Democrats are trying to unplug it at every -- at every step of the way.
You have to call it what it is, they want to basically come back in and wreck the economy, and that's the very divergent views that you see between these two parties today, and -- you know, I was pleased to see the Bernie Sanders finally got called out on it, because, you know what, he's got -- he's got more money than he knows what to do with.
BONGINO: You know, Jeffrey, this is frustrating. It must be for you as well.
I want to look at these leftists, these Bernie bros, and just grab them by the ears and say, if you ever cracked a dictionary? Do you know what socialism is?
I mean, you could go to like dictionary.com and check it out. Denmark is not a socialist country. Neither is Sweden or Norway. These are free market economies. They have nanny state governments but it is not socialism.
I'm getting tired of this.
JEFFREY LORD, POLITICAL COLUMNIST: Well, that's right, and notice that Bernie Sanders honeymoon was not spent in Sweden or Denmark. It was spent in Moscow.
BONGINO: Right.
LORD: At the height of the Soviet Union.
BONGINO: Right, incredible.
LORD: And he -- and he -- yes, and he loves to talk about Cuba and all of this sort of thing and how great it was in Nicaragua or this -- when the Sandinistas were there in the ‘80s, how great it was that they had lines for food. Yes, that's really, really terrific.
The good news about this, though, Dan, the president says America is not going to be a socialist country. When I go out and talk to people here, when I give talks myself or whatever, people stop me, they are livid over this. They are determined to reelect this president. They want nothing to do with socialism, and they turn out in droves to put an end to this.
So, you know, this is -- this is sort of driving a reaction here, just like impeachment did, and I think that's probably a good thing.
BONGINO: Yes.
Catalina, congratulations on running for Congress, by the way. I did it. It's tough to put and it takes a lot of guts.
CATALINA LAUF, GOP CONGRESSIONAL CANDIDATE: Thank you.
BONGINO: So, you have my deep respect for that.
But I know this is an interest -- this is an area of interest that's central to your campaign, this socialism bent we've taken with candidates like AOC and the Squad.
What are you going to do though to get the message out about how devastating these ideas are?
LAUF: Well, first of all, let's not sugarcoat the fact that socialism is just one step away from communism. And, you know, look, I'm running in a district that President Trump won in 2016. So, it was a long time held Republicans seat here in Illinois 14, the northern part of the state here, and it was flipped by a Democrat socialist Lauren Underwood, who's an honorary Squad member now.
She campaigned as a moderate, as a lot of these people did back in 2018, but quickly, we realized that they are socialist. And so, what they're doing is they're trying to infiltrate all these districts, especially long- held Republican seats. And so, it has energized, especially, but -- especially by somebody like myself who works for President Trump.
You know, the "America First" agenda is so important and we need to bring it back to these long-held Republican seats, to ensure that we are fighting on the side of freedom. But it's also more important that the GOP has new faces and new perspective now to carry that torch, to really counter-attack these far left, especially women, on the other side of the aisle.
So, head to CatalinaforCongress.com to join our movement, and we hope to have success here in 2020.
BONGINO: Congressman Biggs, just a quick answer for you.
Do you think this Bernie Sanders socialism bent, do you think they have a shot of pulling this out? Does Sanders have a shot at becoming the nominee or will the establishmentarian shut him down?
I think he's going to be their nominee and then you're going to have a potential Nixon-McGovern type ‘72 election outcome. That'd be great, wouldn't it?
BONGINO: All right. We've got to go.
LAUF: Yes.
BONGINO: Thanks a lot for your time. Good luck, Catalina.
LAUF: Thank you.
BONGINO: Straight ahead, the great one, Mark Levin. We'll be right back.
(COMMERIAL BREAK)
BONGINO: Welcome back to this special edition of "Hannity": Trump versus the left.
The great one, Mark Levin, interviewed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and asked him what he has to say about the rise of the radical left in America. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK LEVIN, FOX NEWS HOST: If candidates in the Democrat Party who moved hard left and then when they're called out, they kind of fudge a little bit on their positions and so forth, but several of them are socialists. Do you think that free societies get a little lazy, get used to prosperity, get used to peace and then willing to take a risk and throw it in another direction?
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: The strong and the smart survive, and we have to be strong and smart, because some very bad people can be strong and smart. So, we have to be stronger and smarter.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BONGINO: Be sure to catch Mark's full interview with Prime Minister Netanyahu this Sunday at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, on "Life, Liberty, Levin" right here on the FOX News Channel.
Folks, one more thing before we go: don't ever forget, Democratic socialism, there is no such thing. There is absolutely nothing Democratic about socialism. Please, just look it up in the dictionary.
Unfortunately, that's all the time we have left this evening. As always, thank you for being with us. Make sure to catch my podcast, "The Dan Bongino Show", find that on Apple podcasts and YouTube. Sean will be back here on Monday. Have a really great weekend. Thanks for tuning in. Appreciate it.
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