This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," February 1, 2017. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SEAN HANNITY, HOST: Welcome back to "Hannity." So liberal snowflakes all across America -- they're in full freak-out mode over President Trump, including our friend, the co-host of "The View," Whoopi Goldberg, who actually compared President Trump to the Taliban? Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WHOOPI GOLDBERG, "THE VIEW": We have a leader who has repeatedly demeaned women, wants to defund organizations that benefit women, calling on the media to shut up, specifically wants to give preferential treatment based on religion. Are these values really much different than the Taliban's?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Now, while Whoopi was comparing President Trump to a group of Islamic radicals, the Trump administration is working hard to defeat Islamic extremism. And today, they put the rogue regime in Tehran on notice. And here's national security adviser Michael Flynn. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GEN. MICHAEL FLYNN (RET.), NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: President Trump has severely criticized the various agreements reached between Iran and the Obama administration, as well as the United Nations, as being weak and ineffective. Instead of being thankful to the United States in these agreements, Iran is now feeling emboldened. As of today, we are officially putting Iran on notice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Putting Iran on notice. Joining us now, deputy assistant to the president Dr. Sebastian Gorka.
Dr. Gorka, it was something I will never be able to wrap my mind around, and that was President Obama negotiating with the number one state sponsor of terrorism, paying a ransom to them, and similarly paying all of the billions of dollars that he gave them and allowing them to continue to spin their centrifuges.
How do you -- how should Iran interpret that threat? Because to me, that's a line in the sand. And there's a new president in town that I would take more seriously than Obama's red line as relates to Syria.
SEBASTIAN GORKA, DEPUTY ASST. TO THE PRESIDENT: Sean, I think the message is deadly clear to our enemies and our adversaries. We don't have a national security team made out of 28-year-old grad school students who have degrees in fictional writing.
We have a very serious national security team. We have a national security adviser who was the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency who almost single-handedly revolutionized the way we exploit intelligence in the battlefield. We have a set of principals such as General Kelly, General Mattis, who are now in civilian suits running the agencies that protect America.
And today, we sent a very clear message. We recognize that Iran isn't just another country. It's not Belgium. It's not Trinidad and Tobago. It is a state sponsor of terrorism that is destabilizing the region. And for the liberals out there, they're actually in flagrant contravention of the United Nations Security Council resolution on ballistic missiles.
HANNITY: See, if I were Iran, the mullahs of Iran, I would listen to Donald Trump, and we see how Donald Trump is. And we see his defense team, of which you are a big part of. And I would interpret that to mean that if they do this one more time, then I would expect the United States -- probably partnering, interestingly enough, with countries like Israel, maybe even the Saudis, maybe the Egyptians, maybe even the Jordanians and others and taking out these nuclear sites once and for all.
Do you think they're smart enough to understand that there's a new sheriff in town?
GORKA: The trouble with Iran, Sean, is it's a combination of two deadly things. Dictatorships are bad enough. But this isn't just a dictatorship, this is a theocratic dictatorship. These are people who at the top level believe in the Occultation of the Hidden Imam and that the Apocalypse may be just around the corner, and they want to make it happen even faster.
So I can't talk for the mullahs in Iran, and -- but we wish to support those people who are under the heel of individuals such as these theocratic dictators.
HANNITY: You know...
GORKA: So we have to send a message, and I think the message was sent.
HANNITY: I think a line was drawn. It's going to be very interesting to see the difference between a Trump administration and an Obama administration.
Let me go back to Whoopi Goldberg comparing the president to the Taliban, just like on her show, they have talked about women building walls around their body parts and "electile dysfunction" about women that wouldn't sleep with their husbands because they voted for Donald Trump.
Well, what you make of all of that and some of this other rhetoric coming out from the left? I want your interpretation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MADONNA, SINGER: I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House.
ASHLEY JUDD, ACTOR: I am a nasty woman!
(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)
JUDD: I am not as nasty as a man who looks like he bathes in Cheeto dust. I am not as nasty as your own daughter being your favorite sex symbol, like your wet dream infused with your own genes. We are here to be nasty! I'm nasty like my bloodstains on my bed sheets!
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: What do you make of this leftist liberal Obama-Hillary-supporting freakout every day? Does it matter? Should it matter?
GORKA: We are the greatest nation on God's earth, and part of that is the freedom of speech. So everybody has the right to do this as long as they are not inciting violence. That's a very important line.
HANNITY: Thinking about blowing up the White House? Is that inciting violence?
GORKA: If it gets more concrete than that, then yes. And measures have to be taken in terms of investigating whether that's just empty rhetoric or something more than that.
But the fact is, it's just a symptom of the last eight years, Sean. There is this left-wing media, this elite Hollywood -- or what did Ben Rhodes call it, an echo chamber that he was proud of leveraging. But it doesn't represent the backbone of this nation that elected Donald J. Trump to protect them.
So they're just disconnected. For the left, reality is optional. But there's a man who wants to protect all Americans, and that's why things such as the executive measure on immigration is so incredibly important.
HANNITY: All right, Dr. Gorka, always good to see you. Thank you, sir.
And coming up, conservatives -- they're very happy with President Trump's nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. Jay Sekulow and former colleagues of Judge Gorsuch -- they're here with reaction.
And also tonight...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, D-FLA.: He believe that he was elected as a dictator. There is an advise and consent role for the United States Senate, and that is what they are doing. He doesn't just get to have his nominations rubber-stamped.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: The left -- they go way down into the gutter to smear President Trump. We'll show you more of their attacks.
Also, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy will weigh in. Will Republicans in the House support the Trump agenda?
Also my one-on-one debate interview with Dr. Cornel West as we continue.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: And welcome back to "Hannity." President Trump has now been in office for only 13 days, but the whining and smearing from the Democratic side of the aisle -- well, it's already reaching a fever pitch. That includes former DNC chair Congresswoman Schultz calling the president a dictator. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: The president's tweet this morning was very interesting and telling because it shows that he believes that he was elected as a dictator. There is an advise and consent role for the United States Senate, and that is what they are doing. He doesn't just get to have his nominations rubber-stamped.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But what are the issues? Because if you look at President Barack...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Now, while Wasserman Schultz is saying that, former VP candidate Senator Tim Kaine is vowing to fight President Trump around every corner, literally. Watch this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. TIM KAINE, D-VA., FMR. VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We are so excited that the American public is energized to speak out against the abuses of this administration.
The way we get outside the bubble is we take advantage of this tremendous public outcry against the administration. What we've got to do is fight in Congress, fight in the courts, fight in the streets, fight on line, fight at the ballot box. And now there's momentum to be able to do this...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Obstruct, obstruct, obstruct. So much for Democrats and their bipartisan efforts.
Joining us now is House majority leader Congressman Kevin McCarthy. All that to me is predictable but irrelevant in this sense, Congressman.
You guys have the White House. You have the House of Representatives and you have the U.S. Senate, a majority. Do -- are you confident that the things that Donald Trump ran on -- extreme vetting, originalists to the court, 15 percent corporate tax rate, lower taxes for the middle class, for business, for everybody that pays taxes, energy independence, education back to the states, fixing a broken VA system, all these things, building up our military -- is there any agenda item of Trump that either, A, you don't think is conservative, or B, you don't think the House will support? And building a wall, by the way.
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY, R-CALIF., MAJORITY LEADER: No, there's none. And if you watch what we have been doing, working very closely with this president -- and I think if you watch what this president has done, he's done a tremendous job already. And that's not just a conservative agenda, that's an American agenda. That's an agenda that everybody can get behind.
And what's so frustrating, Sean, is, is not only are they just fighting, if you watched the protest at the Supreme Court last night, they had signs with not even knowing who he was going to nominate.
HANNITY: Already pre-made.
MCCARTHY: It said "oppose," and then they wrote the name in afterwards.
(CROSSTALK)
HANNITY: Some were already pre-made that actually had Neil Gorsuch's name on it, which was pretty funny. You know -- but there's a lot of people that went all in for Trump. They saw a distance among Republicans in the House and Senate during the election.
Why was that? And has Donald Trump -- have people been changing their minds based on the first 13 days of a lot of action?
MCCARTHY: Well, that is true. And you and I had that conversation a lot during the campaign, that you and I know that Trump and I worked very closely together, and others did not. But since Trump was elected, I saw a uniting of not only just the Republican Party but others because what Donald Trump did -- Donald Trump listened to a voice across this country that others were not listening to.
And he was disrupting Washington, and that made some people uncomfortable, but rightfully so. But look what he has done. He has done tremendous picks of individuals coming forward to serve in his cabinet. He put forth to the American public who he would select to the Supreme Court, put a list out there. And I will tell you, Neil Gorsuch is probably one of the most qualified people ever to be nominated for the Supreme Court. In 2006, he was unanimously approved in the Senate. And now some of those same senators are saying they could not vote for him? That's appalling. And Democrats are not even showing up to committee to hear to put forth these cabinet members? That is appalling to me as well.
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: It's interesting. I got a high ranking Republican that knows about the economic plan. If it is laid out the way it was explained to me, it would be everything I think the economy needs to be fixed. I have two questions. In the interim, that time between when Donald Trump was elected and sworn in as president, the Republican Congress raised the debt over a $9.7 trillion over a 10 year period of time, and there's talk about $1 trillion infrastructure spending plan. That scares me as a conservative that wants to live within our means, balance budgets. Do you have any concerns about any of those two things? Why did that happen?
MCCARTHY: I have a real concern about that. And that same time that we had Barack Obama as president, Republicans in the House were laying out a budget that actually balanced and paid off the debt, something the Democrats didn't --
HANNITY: Then why raise the debt ceiling $10 trillion?
MCCARTHY: In the process of where you go, you're going to see that we are not going to be able to do that. We actually paid the debt off.
Now, listen, what you are able to do -- when you raise the debt ceiling, that's actually paying for stuff that has already been spent. So when you're looking at the new president, those are things that have already been committed to. So you expect with Donald Trump going forward, you've got to give him some breathing room. It's like taking over a bad company. You have to give him some extended money to actually retool the company, grow, and get out of it.
That's why, one, the first thing we're doing, regulation reform. Barack Obama added 15 King James Bibles of regulation to America. That has held back business.
HANNITY: It's been eight years, and I know there are nine separate plans, I know they are similar in a lot of ways as it relates to replacing ObamaCare. How is it that the Republicans didn't have a replacement ready and they are scrambling in every way and it's scaring a lot of people? Why wasn't that plan written?
MCCARTHY: We had numerous plans and we had numerous ideas. We are not scrambling. Watch when we go forward. And the one thing that you have to have -- if you read ObamaCare, there are 1,400 pages, and one of the strongest elements in ObamaCare gives a great deal amount of power to the secretary of Health and Human Services.
HANNITY: A lot of discretion there. That's huge.
MCCARTHY: Once Tom Price gets in, that's what we need inside, a cabinet member.
HANNITY: All right, Congressman, you're one of the few guys in leadership that will even take my calls. I appreciate it. Thank you for being with us.
And coming up next tonight right here on "Hannity."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We need safer communities and we are going to do that with law enforcement. We are going to make it safe. We're going to make it much better than it is right now. Right now it's terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: The president vowing to fix America's inner cities during an event honoring African-American history month. That was at the White House earlier today. Dr. Cornel West and I, a classic "Hannity" shoot-out coming up.
And then later --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The White House must die. The White House must die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: That sounds like a threat to me. Anyway, an anti-Trump protest that allegedly took place in Seattle over the weekend shows just how out of the control the alt radical left really is. We are going to play you that shocking tape. It will blow you away, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: Welcome back to "Hannity." So conservatives are very happy with President Trump's pick for Supreme Court. Today Judge Gorsuch, he met with Vice President Mike Pence and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Capitol Hill. Joining us right now from the American Center for Law and Justice, Jay Sekulow, and two former law clerks for Neil Gorsuch, and that's Jamil Jaffer is with us and Janie Nitze is with us. All right, guys, good to see you. Let's talk a little bit, if I can, and talking about -- Janie, let's talk about what you know about him. What kind of man was he?
JANIE NITZE, FORMER LAW CLEAR FOR JUDGE NEIL GORSUCH: Sure. He is an incredible bid. I think folks have already spoken a lot about his academic credentials, which are of course impeccable, and his intellectual prowess. I can speak to what it was like being a clerk for him, which is clerks come to judge's at an impressionable age. They're coming out of law school, and I just had the great fortune to clerk for someone who had a deep reverence for the constitution and the rule law that we saw on a daily basis, someone who thought that the judiciary was not a place for politics. It was a place for enforcing the words of statutes, the words of the constitution. And finally just a man who is incredibly kind, decent, really a great boss overall.
HANNITY: And Jamil, what was your impression working with him?
JAMIL JAFFER, FORMER LAW CLEAR FOR JUDGE NEIL GORSUCH: I actually was one of his first law clerks, and it was a really neat experience because he was 38 when he first got confirmed to the bench. I was 30 years old. He was a young man. And he's a great guy. One of the things I think that gets lost in this whole when we talk about his impeccable credentials and Columbia and Harvard and Oxford is he is a normal guy. He loves to fly fish, he's a skier. He's an outdoorsman. He's a person you want to get a beer with.
HANNITY: That is always the test for a politician. Is this a guy you would like to sit down and have it beer with?
Jay Sekulow, you've watched the reactions today. Some Democrats up in 2018 seem to be leaning at least a little bit towards allowing an up or down vote and allowing cloture and not forcing the Republicans to go nuclear. But I suspect what we said last night will be true. I think the Democrats are going to dig their heels in. They're going to be the obstructionist they have been since Donald Trump was been elected. Your thoughts?
JAY SEKULOW, AMERICAN CENTER FOR LAW AND JUSTICE: Well, Sean, like I said last night we don't have the luxury to not assume that's going to happen. You have to look at these Supreme Court nominees and realize when you're in a nomination fight as critical as this one is -- they all are, but this one in particular, you've got a fight on your hands.
Look, you've heard the Democratic leadership today, they are wavering. But I will tell you the public interest groups, Alliance for Justice, People for the American Way, Planned Parenthood, they are spending tens of millions of dollars to try to discredit a judge that has not only impeccable credentials but has a decade-long track record on the court of appeals. And as I've said, I've had the privilege of having a case that was before him, so I have seen his judicial work firsthand.
HANNITY: I don't think there's anybody you haven't argued before. How many times have you argued before the Supreme Court?
SEKULOW: Twelve times before the Supreme Court, but countless times before courts of appeals. And Sean, the reality is, they can say whatever they want, but this is a judge whose writings are clear, concise, and if you want to call it within the mainstream of judicial thought. And when I say mainstream, I put it in quotes. This is a made up phrase by those that are trying to discredit someone that they know nothing about. And if they would have bothered to read the opinions, they'd realize they'd going to have a time on their hands. Let me say it this way, Sean. When they start asking the questions at the hearing, do you think that they are going to trip up Judge Neil Gorsuch? I don't think so.
HANNITY: All right, Jamil, Janie, and of course, Jay Sekulow, good to see you all. And thanks for being with us tonight, appreciate it.
And coming up next tonight on "Hannity."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The White House must die. The White House -- White House. They must go
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: A disturbing anti-Trump protest allegedly in Seattle shows just how low the left is going. Does that sound like a threat to you? We will play it for you later.
And I go one-on-one with the one and only Dr. Cornel West a "Hannity" shoot-out straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: Welcome back to "Hannity." So earlier today President Trump held a meeting at the White House in honor of African-American history month. The president spoke about the pressing needs of the African-American community. Let's take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We are going to need better schools and we need them soon. We need more jobs. We need better wages, a lot better wages. We're going to work very hard in the inner city, Ben is going to be doing that. It's one of the big things we will be looking at. We need safer communities and we are going to do that with law enforcement. We're going to make it safe. We're going to make it much better than it is right now. Right now it is terrible.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: And last night I went one on one with Harvard University professor Dr. Cornel West about President Trump's plan to improve the country's inner cities and much more. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
HANNITY: All right, here's what I want to ask you, because you and I -- you agree that Obama was weak, that Obama was timid, and that Obama never got things done for people that you and I care about. True?
DR. CORNEL WEST, HARVARD UNIVERSITY: I wanted him to be more bold when it comes to defending poor and working people as opposed to being bold defending Wall Street and the Wall Street executives go to jail for crimes --
HANNITY: He had a prime opportunity. Since he was president, lowest labor participation rate since the '70s. We had 12 million more, 13 million more Americans on food stamps, 8 million more on poverty, lowest home ownership rate in 51 years.
WEST: He had a good record when it comes to producing jobs. The problem was that 94 percent of the jobs were low-paying, contingent, and precarious.
HANNITY: So you give me a hard time about Donald Trump, and I'm looking at Carrier, Ford. I'm looking at Alibaba, Fiat Chrysler, all these companies and others, SunCon, $7 billion investment. He's getting ready 75 percent of regulation. He's dropping the corporate tax 15 percent. He's allowing multinational corporation to repatriate money at a very low rate so they'll build factories and manufacturing centers.
Now, those jobs are going to be in Detroit, Cleveland, Philly, Milwaukee. How great is that?
WEST: But the billionaires in his cabinet, with his pro-corporate policies in which the profits still must be so high, that is part of his incentives to bring them back. Yes, there may have been more jobs.
HANNITY: What's wrong with profit?
WEST: When it's driven by corporate greed it doesn't allow workers to have jobs with a living wage, this is the problem.
HANNITY: Here's what I want. This is where people ask, how are we good friends? We're good friends for this reason, that we have the same goal here. I am sick and tired of having the lowest labor participation rate, 15 million Americans in poverty, 43 million Americans on food stamps.
WEST: I agree.
HANNITY: Because of Obama's policies.
WEST: It was not just Obama. It was Bush, it was Clinton. It goes all the way down.
HANNITY: Let's talk about the present. We have a president now that is doing everything he can do to get rid of regulations, lower taxes, to help businesses invest, build factories, manufacturing centers, and the pipes for the pipeline. And I would think Cornel West says that's awesome because those people need jobs.
WEST: No, but the problem is, you lower the taxes, you have fewer revenues going into make sure the poor and working people are both treated --
HANNITY: No. You lower the taxes the companies have more money to invest.
WEST: How many trillions of dollars have these corporation in the Cayman Islands and other places. It's tax evasion. You think lowering taxes means all that money is going to come back? No way.
HANNITY: Trump is allowing multinational corporations to bring their money back at a very low rate and with the purpose of incentivizing them to build here.
WEST: But he's already promising the lowering of the regulations. That means what, lower quality products.
HANNITY: No, no, no.
WEST: Oh, yes, indeed. You lower regulations, corporate greed runs amok. Do you think that lower regulation on Wall Street is going to generate more economic --
HANNITY: I'm not worried about Wall Street. You know what I'm worried about?
WEST: We ought to be worried about Wall Street.
HANNITY: Let me tell you what I'm worried about. How about those people in poverty, on food stamps, and out of work.
WEST: There's a connection.
HANNITY: Did you ever get a job from a poor person?
WEST: It depends on what the poor person was doing.
HANNITY: Name one time in your life you got a job from somebody that has no money.
WEST: I worked in McDonald's for a number of years. And the person who ran McDonald's did not have that much. I'm talking about the person who is the manager.
HANNITY: Not the manager. The owner --
WEST: The owner -- this is where your faith in capitalism that is unfettered is different than my critique of capitalism that believes that the priority ought to be to employing working people.
HANNITY: We just had an experiment with socialism, redistribution, spreading the wealth around, and what do we have? Millions more in poverty, millions more on food stamps. Why can't you understand socialism, redistribution does not work?
WEST: Let me tell you this. What is happened in the last 40 years is a massive redistribution from the wealth from poor and working people to the well-to-do. When 25 years ago, the top one percent had about 28 percent of the wealth. Today they've got about 42 percent of the wealth. That is redistribution upward, upward, upward.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HANNITY: And up next tonight right here on "Hannity."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The White House must die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: The anti-Trump protest that allegedly took place in Seattle over the weekend reveals just how low the alt radical left will go. We're going to play this extreme tape and more straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: Welcome back to "Hannity." So the alt radical left continues to sink to new lows. According to reports, anti-Trump protesters, they gathered in Seattle this weekend and were caught on tape, listen to this, saying this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Give you -- money, your -- house, your property, we need it -- all.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The White House must die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Really? The White House must die? We're told that might have had Black Lives Matter members in it. And that leads to tonight's "Question of the Day." Do Democrats like Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, people that sought out Black Lives Matter and the group in their endorsement and support and they went to visit President Obama in the White House at the time, do Democrats need to distance themselves from radicals like this and the anti-Trump movement? We want to hear from you. Go to Facebook.com/SeanHannity, @SeanHannity on Twitter, let us know what you think.
Quick programming note. Tomorrow I will be traveling to our nation's capital to interview Vice President Mike Pence at the White House. The sit-down will air tomorrow night at 10:00 eastern. We hope we'll see you there then. Thanks for being with us.
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