Leader McCarthy and Rep. Banks respond to Pelosi's desperate bipartisan block
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Rep. Jim Banks join 'The Ingraham Angle' to discuss Pelosi's Jan. 6 committee charade: 'this was a political sham'
This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," July 19, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: I'm Laura Ingraham. This is THE INGRAHAM ANGLE from Washington tonight.
Congressman Kevin McCarthy and Jim Banks will be here in moments with their exclusive reaction to Pelosi's January 6 hatchet job. Plus, Candace Owens, Mollie Hemingway, and Raymond Arroyo. But first, Nancy, the insurrectionist. That's the focus of tonight's ANGLE.
Now, while Nancy Pelosi licks designer ice-cream in Pacific Heights, she still fights like a gutter rat from Baltimore. She uses her speaker's gavel like a hammer against any dissent. And Republicans who don't bow down are pounded as heartless Nazis.
When she calls for bipartisanship, what Nancy really is saying is I need more GOP peers who hate Trump. It's not an exaggeration at all to say that loathing Trump is the glue that holds her caucus together.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STENY HOYER, HOUSE MAJORITY LEADER: Donald John Trump brought shame and dishonor to the office of the President of the United States.
REP. MAXINE WATERS (D-CA): This President has spent four years abusing his power, lying, embracing authoritarianism, radicalizing his supporters against democracy.
REP. ADAM SCHIFF (D-CA): America has been through a Civil War, World Wars, a great depression, pandemics, McCarthyism, and now a Trumpist and white nationalist insurrection.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Now, this is why by the way she says no to an investigation on COVID origins, but yes to a committee to investigate January 6. As if we aren't already spending millions of dollars on a massive Justice Department criminal investigation into January 6.
Well, she pledged by partisanship, but, of course, it was all a lie. True to form she stacked it with vicious Trump hating Democrats like Adam Schiff and Trump-hating Republican, Liz Cheney.
Now, Pelosi gave House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy his own chance to propose committee members, which he did. But because Pelosi wants total control over the proceedings, she vetoed the two most effective Republican members, people who know how to get to the truth, Congressman Jim Jordan and Jim banks. I say it's all a badge of honor.
Oh, Kevin McCarthy made the smart move today to pull every Republican member off the committee denying Pelosi the sheen of bipartisanship for what's obviously a purely political exercise.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): House Democrats must answer this question. Why are you allowing a lame duck speaker to destroy this institution? This is the people's house, not Pelosi's house. Destroy an institution for your own political gain? America expects more and deserves more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Now, of course, the entire exercise is a sham. Now, I wouldn't be surprised at all if they think the report had already been drafted. I can imagine. Chapter one, Trump incited the insurrection. Chapter two, Trump supporters on social media helped drive the violence. Chapter three, the Capitol Police infiltrated by Trump's supporters missed obvious signs. Chapter four, must flag potential threats online before they even act on those threats. Number five, must spend billions to beef up security and limit public access to the Capitol if at all possible.
Now, for some time, it's been obvious to most fair minded Americans that Democrats need January 6 and 2022 as much as they needed the pandemic in 2020. They're not problems to be solved. They're crises to exploit.
Don't you remember all the promises, vote for Joe and he'll end COVID and restore calm. He'll unite the country. Of course, anti-Americanism in schools and racial politics are killing his unity pledge. Their fearmongering about the Delta variant and their dumb defund the police stuff is spurring a crime wave. Whoops, no calm there.
Instead of bringing the country together, Democrats are choosing to rip it wide open. With this death grip they have on January 6 and their obsession with rooting out domestic extremism, they're proving themselves to be wholly unworthy of governing. They are not advancing the interests of America, they're dragging us down and weakening us on the world stage, which Biden talked about tonight.
Now for its part, the Biden administration is doing a lot to already harass and intimidate Americans who supported Donald Trump and who just happened to be at the Capitol that day.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL HUEPER, TARGETED BY FBI OVER JAN 6 ATTENDANCE: I get up, come around the corner, and I hear somebody barking hands up, FBI. Come around the corner I've got six or seven guns pointed right at me.
BRIAN GRADY, TARGETED BY FBI OVER JAN 6 ATTENDANCE: We're from the FBI, and we're looking for Brian Grady. I'm like, well, here I am. Honestly, I've just felt violated by the FBI.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Now, this man, Paul Hodgkins, was sentenced to eight months in federal prison for trespassing in the Capitol. There's no evidence that he assaulted or threatened anyone. He merely walked around.
Now, while America is experiencing a surge of devastating violence nationwide, our DOJ is devoting millions and millions of dollars and hundreds of agents to keeping that story of January 6 alive. Now, as THE ANGLE has repeatedly said, we've reiterated, criminal activity should be punished, whatever the politics of the people carrying it out. But the Democrats rather blase attitude toward last summer's BLM rights expose their true motivations.
Now, let's not forget what was done by the bail fund backed by Kamala Harris. The difference, of course, is that January 6 happened to be a huge gift to the Democrats. So they intend to milk it for every last ounce of political benefit they can get. And their implicit message throughout all of this is Republicans who supported Trump are terrorists. Democrats who oppose Trump are patriots.
Well, so far in their dragnet, they've arrested 535 people, issued 900 search warrants, have 15,000 hours of surveillance and body-worn camera footage, confiscated 1600 electronic devices, and issued 80,000 reports. Now they've issued sophisticated (inaudible) facial recognition technology and poured over thousands of exhibits. And still the FBI are pleading with the public to help ID more than 300 more suspects.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTOPHER WRAY, DIRECTOR, FBI: This is a very ongoing investigation and there's a lot more to come.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is one of the largest investigations in the history of this country. Is that correct, sir?
WRAY: Certainly, it's one of the most far reaching and extensive that I can think of.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Now for the past year, Democrats have done everything in their power to keep the country locked down for as long as possible. They'd like to do it again if they could. But now they want to lock us into the January 6 narrative for as long as possible, like nothing else is happening in the world.
During the campaign, THE ANGLE repeatedly warned that if Democrats won the election, they'd become more, not less radicalized. And that is precisely what we're seeing happening. They know that they're probably going to lose the house in 2022, so right now they're trying to force through every item on Bernie Sanders' wishlist with the help of a few GOP collaborators.
They hope the ghost of January 6 will save them though. It won't. No reasonable person thinks that what happened on January 6 was, as Biden said, the worst attack in the Capitol since the Civil War. Come on, guys. Buffalo head guy was poised to take over the U.S. government, are you kidding me?
We've had many protests, many riots in American history, we had many last year that were far worse than this. There was never any change that the government - chance that the government would be overthrown, that democracy was going to be stopped by these people. But the Democrats don't care about the facts. They lied about how Police died there. They covered up who shot Ashley Babbitt, and they're still refusing to release thousands of hours of video from inside and outside the Capitol.
Now, we don't know why, perhaps because some of it may frustrate their preferred narrative. We don't know. Democrats' credibility though, is shot, for many reasons. Their four-year witch hunt against the Trump presidency, as they showcase their own slime balls like Eric Swalwell, please. Their ongoing efforts to undermine U.S. border security by allowing a million migrants into the country during a pandemic, but they're supposed to be all for law and order.
In their grand conspiracy claims, my personal favorite was this alleged Republican plot to kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer. More on that in a moment.
Tonight, Biden's team set Biden out to do his Uncle Joe act on CNN where he bragged about how his determination to reach out to both sides and get back to normal. But that rhetoric has no connection to the reality on the ground in Washington.
Here on the nation's Capitol, the Democratic Party has no interest in bipartisanship. They're following Nancy Pelosi and her efforts to poison the well, to accuse Republicans of fascism, and otherwise drive their opponents from public life. By standing up to Pelosi and her efforts to pack the January 6 commission, House Republicans with the usual exception of Liz Cheney, struck a blow for common sense and show that commission for the kangaroo court. It undoubtedly will be.
Republicans have to keep showing that Democrats have a radical agenda to change this country forever. And we have to mobilize for new elections that will shut down that agenda once and for all. And that's THE ANGLE.
Joining me now, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy; and Indiana Congressman Jim Banks, who was slated to be the GOP Chair of the January 6 committee until earlier today. Congressman Banks, you actually held a call I understand with your Democrat counterpart last night. But tonight you're out.
REP. JIM BANKS (R-IN): That's right.
INGRAHAM: Now, what does this tell America about what this committee really is?
BANKS: Yes, Laura. This tells us everything we already knew that this was a political sham from the very beginning. I called the chairman yesterday and told him I look forward to working with them. I had a few questions for him about what Republicans would be allowed to do if we could call our own witnesses, some tough questions for him. He hemmed and hawed. And now today I understand why they never intended to work with us to begin with. This was a political sham from the beginning. They proved it today.
They knew that Jim Jordan and I would ask the tough questions that they didn't want to answer about the systemic breakdown of security at the Capitol on January six. And ultimately, who's responsible for that, the Speaker of the House, they don't want to go there. They knew we were going to ask the tough questions and that's why they blocked us from the committee.
INGRAHAM: Now, Leader McCarthy, on CNN they have this big event tonight with Biden. But before that, your old pal Van Jones chimed in about your decision to pull out of this commission. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
VAN JONES, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Kevin McCarthy put Nancy Pelosi in an untenable position. This was a poison pill move. If you're trying to put together a bipartisan commission, you have to put people on the commission who are serious about the mission of the commission. When you go and get people who have already discredited the commission, we've had nothing but a show, a kangaroo court.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Your response?
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): Think about who she's objecting to? Jim Banks, who is a naval officer, who defended our nation in Afghanistan, and is chair of the largest conference, our caucus inside our conference; Jim Jordan, who is the ranking Republican on judiciary that has the jurisdiction over this, who has been on select committees, she decides that they're not worthy? Never in the history of Congress and the Select Committee, I checked with the historian, has this ever taken place where the one party decides who's all on the committee.
Look, I don't like who she puts on, from Adam Schiff, who lied to the American public; Raskin who wanted to impeach the president on day one, who objected to the electors about President Trump. But I respect her ability to do that. Why is Nancy Pelosi so afraid of the truth coming out? We cannot afford to have a speaker like this.
INGRAHAM: Well, as mentioned, Joe Biden, he was on CNN moments ago and was asked about the January 6 Commission. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I don't care if you think I'm Satan reincarnated. The fact is, you can't look at that television to say nothing happened on a 6th. You can't listen to people who say this was a peaceful march. No, I'm serious. Think about it. Think of the things being said.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Congressman Banks, all emotionalism, no facts, no one said nothing happened. That's a typical Biden dodge and, of course, all the lemmings over at CNN, just like, oh, thank you, so brilliant. It's ridiculous.
BANKS: It is ridiculous. And it's just as ridiculous as the fact that nobody has answered to this day, no Democrat has been willing to go where we wanted to go, which was to ask the questions about, why on January 6 we were so ill prepared for something that for a tragic incident that happened at the Capitol when we knew three weeks prior to January 6, we had intelligence that told us something was going to happen that day.
I met with the head of the Capitol Police Union today, Laura, and I talked to him about his views on January 6. He said they weren't prepared for that day by their leadership, they weren't equipped and given the right equipment to take care of what would happen on that day, they weren't trained for what happened that day.
I called on Bennie Thompson, the chairman of this committee to bring the head of the Capitol Police Union to the hearing next Tuesday and hear from him, someone who represents the ranking file Capitol Police officers. They don't want to go there because they know that if they go there and ask - that if we would have asked those tough questions at the end of the day, Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House is responsible for that lack of leadership, the systemic breakdown of security of the Capitol, they don't want to talk about it.
INGRAHAM: Congressman McCarthy, where do we go from here? Where does this go from here? I mean, that this is all political. It is so obvious. This is all, Republicans are terrorists, Democrats are patriots. They want to roll this right into 2022. They know they're going to lose the house. But they're going to try to tag Republicans with this going forward. It's obvious.
MCCARTHY: It's obvious. It's a sham. It's a sham committee. For six months, Pelosi has played nothing but politics with this. The Senate had two bipartisan committees to investigate this and already put out two reports. They knew on December 14, there was a problem. The people in charge of parking knew more than the individuals they did to - try to protect the Capitol Police. The National Guard were in Washington, DC, but were not allowed on the Capitol. They had them correcting parking, our traffic, instead of being at the Capitol. Who made that decision why they couldn't be there?
INGRAHAM: Why was it made, Congressman? Why was that decision made, do you think? I mean, it's odd. There is a lot of people think this is very strange.
MCCARTHY: It's very strange. But when we had a 9/11 Commission, they didn't look at just what happened on 9/11, they looked at what built up to 9/11. That's what we requested. Let's understand what built up through the summer when the riots were going on and the National Guard were there and Nancy Pelosi was criticizing because they were at the Lincoln Memorial protecting it.
Was their decision made by the speaker not to have the National Guard at the Capitol that day? When they found the IEDs earlier in the day, why didn't they bring the FBI in and others? Why were the riot gear stuck in a bus, locked in a bus away from the Capitol Police officers who needed them? They put them in harm's way. And why is this speaker so afraid of the tough questions?
Look, she is a lame duck speaker. The Democrat policies has brought us crime throughout the city, opened up a border that now we have terrorists, and fit in all more than 300 percent. We now have inflation because the runaway spending. If your people really want to make a fundamental change, we need to go to takethehouse.com and make sure we stop all these politics, and really make sure the next century is the American Century.
INGRAHAM: Congressmen, great to see you both. Thank you for joining us.
And last October, six men were arrested in that alleged plot to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer. The reaction to the news and motives was predictable.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. GARY PETERS (D-MI): It is rise of domestic terrorism, of white supremacist, of anti-government groups. We saw it firsthand in Michigan.
ELIZABETH NEUMANN, FORMER HOMELAND SECURITY OFFICIAL: The most significant lethal threat that we face in our homeland today is from white supremacists and anti-government extremists on the right.
GOV. GRETCHEN WHITMER (D-MI): There are our fellow Americans who are intent on terrorizing and hurting their fellow Americans. And we need to call it domestic terrorism.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: The truth was something far different. FBI informants were not just integral to the plot, they ended up hatching the entire thing. According to BuzzFeed, "Informants, acting under the direction of the FBI did more than just passively observe and report on the actions of the suspects. Instead, they had a hand in nearly every aspect of the alleged plot, starting with its inception."
But it gets even worse. The FBI at the center of the plot was just accused of jumping on his wife in bed and smashing her head against a nightstand after a dispute stemming from a swingers' party that occurred. Oh, my gosh, just happened on Monday. It was just reported today.
Here now Mollie Hemingway, senior editor at the Federalist, Fox News contributor. Mollie, given the FBI's track record of politicizing investigations we saw with Donald Trump, and now with this, and this place in this case being looks like a sham setup. Perhaps, we should have suspected this all along and should continue to ask tough questions about other things, other big issues.
MOLLIE HEMINGWAY, SENIOR EDITOR, THE FEDERALIST: Well, I think that people who've been following how the FBI disrupts so-called terrorist plots had an idea that this might be the case, because this has been the standard operating procedure really going back to the Global War on Terror, where the FBI would encourage disaffected, lonely, young Muslim man to do something and then arrest him once he agreed to take part in the plot. It's not good. You should never agree to do anything bad even if you're being so led by a rogue, or by an FBI agent.
But that's a big difference than actually detecting threats and disrupting them, and we have had so many instances in recent years where the FBI was told about people who ended up shooting up a school, or causing another mass murder where they didn't do anything. And meanwhile, they're the bulk of these plots that are ludicrous that are announced just before an election in a very fraught year. All while they are doing their normal politicized operations, where they let Democrats get away with anything and they go after Republicans to within an inch of their life.
INGRAHAM: Yes. Mollie, given what we just talked about with this January 6 committee and all the questions that remain, all the videotape that hasn't been revealed, released, the Ashley Babbitt shooting, it's no wonder that people are like, Wait a second, this a coup, an insurrection, you're calling this a coup.
The FBI is saying, it's the biggest thing that ever happened in the history of the country. That's why so many people have questions about this. They have hurt their credibility across the board on a myriad of issues.
HEMINGWAY: Right. And I think most Americans, whether the riot is done by people on the right or people on the left, they want people held accountable. What is so difficult for people to understand right now is that all of America endured a summer of unspeakable violence, where the White House was besieged, where federal courthouses were under attack, where Police precincts were taken over, where people's houses and businesses were burned to the ground, dozens of people were killed.
And the FBI was nowhere to be found in this operation. They weren't infiltrating leftist groups like Antifa that were organizing these things across the country. They did nothing to stop it. They - everyone stood down. If anybody tried to do anything about it, they were treated horribly by the powers that be.
And then when this happens on January 6, it turns out we have all sorts of tools to go after people and destroy their lives and keep them in confinement before their trial, and then do these very high sentences after the fact and dramatic - make dramatic claims about it. It's not that people don't want people held accountable for any riot, it's that we can see how if you're on the left, you can get away with pretty much anything. Anything. And if you're on the right, you can have this situation that, like the previous leader was just talking about, Nancy Pelosi was responsible for security there. She didn't provide the security. And it just - it doesn't make sense for a lot of people. I don't think.
INGRAHAM: Mollie, great to see. Thank you. And why was the Biden administration promoting an activist group's handbook, telling investigators to disrupt whiteness. Candace Owens is here on that. Plus, last week, we told you Joe Biden wants to place an eco-terrorist in his administration. I kid you not, but we have an important update, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Now, here's how the Biden Department of Education was hoping to use your tax dollars. They put together a handbook with guidance for school reopening. Now, in it they included recommendations on how schools should spend billions of dollars from that American rescue plan that we didn't need. Now, among the plans promoted, well, the abolitionist teaching networks guide for racial justice and abolitionist's social and emotional learning. Now, it advocates for teachers to "disrupt whiteness", and other forms of oppression.
Now when they got caught the DOE released a statement that the citation was included in error, but who the heck believes that. Here now is Candace Owens, founder of Blexit, host of the Candace Owens Show. Candace, your reaction to this? I think - I thought I had seen it all, Candace, but I hadn't.
CANDACE OWENS, "THE CANDACE OWENS SHOW" HOST: Absolutely, have not seen it all. And there will be more to come, I can promise you that, Laura. Listen, the Biden administration got caught red handed and I want to be very clear about what their intentions are, because we all know that Joseph Biden does not care about race.
His record when he was a senator tells us everything that we need to know about him and his opinion about black people. And his true opinion of black Americans is that we are the dumbest part of the population. He believes that black Americans are the easy pawns. His administration believes that they keep stroking racial tensions, they can turn Black Americans into permanent soldiers for their policies.
And what they're really trying to do is replace hard academics. I'm talking about engineering, mathematics, all that stuff is now a form of white supremacy. They don't want kids to get the right answer, they want them to focus on, you said it, Laura, emotional learning, right? Because emotional learning is not rational learning.
People that learn emotionally don't tend to go off and become successful individuals, rather, who that learn emotionally turned to become angry, radical Antifa, throwing BLM burning individuals. And those people are very easily targeted by the government. That is what Biden regime wants. They really want people to do whatever they say, to be angry pawns for their government schemes.
INGRAHAM: Well, Candace, I can't tell you how many diversity, equity and inclusion positions if you just do a random search online, which I did today, so many companies are looking for DEI officers. It's the biggest scam going, you have instant job security, and you can never get fired. I guess unless you actually treat people just as equals without regard to race, then you'll probably be fine.
OWENS: Right. That's exactly right. And by the way, that's antithetical to free markets and capitalism, eventually that will die out because you can't just hire people because of the way that they look. I mean, another company will come around, they'll hire people because of what they know and your company will lose against them. It's a ridiculous policy that people are doing to really capitulate with the Black Lives Matter radical movement that went after all of these businesses. I think that will stop.
But I don't think this watering down of the education system is going to stop. Actually I think we're just seeing the beginning of it. And it's unfortunate. People need to realize that right now in American society, and this is a fact, I read it in a Thomas Sowell book, we've never handed out more degrees ever in American society, and yet we've never produce kids that are this dumb.
And I mean this by statistic. I'm talking about by standardized test scores, these kids are not becoming smarter, and yet they are getting more and more degrees, and that's by design. They want these kids to be convinced of their own rationality, be convinced that they are so smart, and then be shocked when they can't make any money, because he actually can't make that money as a gender studies or an LGBT studies major for four years.
That's just not what society needs. I need somebody to fix my A.C., not to come over and tell me that there are 26,000 genders and you can be nonbinary. So these kids end up angry, they think they're mad at capitalism, they think they're mad at free markets. What they should be mad at are Democrats.
INGRAHAM: Candace, have you really not seen how much Ibram Kendi makes per appearance. He does like a 20 minute Zoom, he gets $20,000. So some of them do make a lot of money on the DEI stuff and the BLM stuff, but that's a point well said. Candace, your point is, keep them dumb in school with CRT, maybe keep them numb on pot, dumb on -- we've got it all set now. It's all going to work out perfectly. Great to see you tonight.
All right, and last week, we brought you the story of Tracy Stone-Manning, Biden's pick to lead the Bureau of Land Management. When she was a grad student, she was a member of the environmental group Earth First. That's linked to an ecoterrorism case back in 1989. The Biden administration has named domestic terrorism as a great threat facing the nation. So you'd think that maybe would put Stone-Manning's nomination and deputy. Well, not quite.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Senate Republicans have been calling on the president to withdraw the nominee to lead the Bureau of Land Management, Tracy Stone- Manning, over connections to a tree-spiking incident in 1989.
JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: He stands by his nominee and looks forward to her getting confirmed.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Here now, the Republican ranking on the Energy Committee overseeing the nom is Wyoming Senator John Barrasso. All right, Senator, Stone-Manning lied about this incident and her confirmation hearing, and still the so-called moderates, Manchin, Sinema, Kelly, it looks like they are going to vote yes.
SEN. JOHN BARRASSO, (R-WY) SENATE ENERGY COMMITTEE RANKING MEMBER: She is unfit to oversee the public lands of the United States. She was involved as a ringleader in this eco-terrorism, this tree-spiking, 500 pounds of spikes into trees in a national forest. And you say, what do these spikes look like. Here is one of them right now. This is what these spikes look like. They are big, long, can do significant damage, and especially if one of these is struck by a logger or a firefighter, or even a sawmill, where a blade, a saw, a blade would strike this, that could break, kill the person. People have been terribly injured with this sort of thing.
So here she is, she covered it up for four years until she was caught. And then she caught a plea deal and testified against others who went to prison. But spikes like this are still in trees in the national forest. People are still at risk. And since she testified, folks have come forward to say she lied under oath to the United States Senate. She is not trustworthy.
INGRAHAM: Well, you knew Joe Biden. He's a senator, got along with people. Tonight at his town hall and on CNN, he talked about his old friendship with Strom Thurmond and invoked Arlen Specter, and so forth. He is a real bipartisan guy, Senator Barrasso. Do you think in what you've seen, this nomination been one of the examples, that this is a real bipartisan administration that really wants to work with you all? Is that what you think?
BARRASSO: No, not at all. If we're going to vote on this in committee tomorrow, every Republican is voting no. Every Republican sent President Biden a letter to say withdraw her nomination. Democrats are going to have to decide by themselves. You mentioned Mark Kelly from Arizona, Catherine Cortez Masto from Nevada, another senator from a state with lots of public lands. Everyone is going to be held accountable for their vote.
And Tracy Stone-Manning continues to try to cover up what she's done. But the people that have come forward, one is the special agent, federal investigator, who did this case, who has received death threats as a result of it, and he has come forward to say, she lied. The other person that came forward to say she lied was one of the criminals who went to jail. So we have both the cop and the criminal saying she lied.
INGRAHAM: Senator, this is another radical populating the administration. I hope the Republicans stand firm on this infrastructure scam as well. We'll be watching. Thank you.
Now, Disney unveils its take on Joe Biden. How close is it to reality? Well, if that CNN townhall from tonight was any indication, it was pretty darn close. Raymond Arroyo has it, "Seen and Unseen" next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: It's time for our "Seen and Unseen" segment where we expose the big cultural stories of the day. For that we turn to FOX News contributor Raymond Arroyo. Raymond, Biden had a townhall tonight. I have to confess, I did watch a few minutes here and there. What happened?
RAYMOND ARROYO, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Then you know he spent most of his time filibustering. He told old stories and trotted out a lot of those old campaign lines. He made no news, Laura, but he did leave an impression.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The question is whether or not we should be in a position where you are -- why can't the experts say, we know that this virus is, in fact -- it's going to be -- or excuse me, we know why all the drugs approved or not temporarily approved, but permanently approved.
This is not who we are. Everybody talks about now this virus, this --
Not a joke, not a joke. Now, you may not like me, and that's you're right.
Let me finish the question -- the answer.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ARROYO: Laura, not a joke. Look, I mean this, I'm serious, not a joke, this was a disaster. It was almost as if he took all of the old lines and campaign slogans that he had rehearsed over 48 years, shook them in a bag, and just dumped them on Don Lemon and this audience. By the way, there were protests at this Mount St. Joseph University, a Catholic university, where Joe Biden appeared. Not everybody was happy about him being there.
INGRAHAM: Raymond, he did like to say a lot, seriously, I'm serious. I'm not being facetious here. I'm not kidding.
ARROYO: And that fact is, the fact is these are little crutches when he can't quite recall or he's having difficulties.
INGRAHAM: Look, look, I'm going to get myself in trouble here, Raymond. What next?
ARROYO: This townhall was almost like a coming attractions reel for Walt Disney Company. They are giving the public their first glimpse of their new animatronic Joe Biden.
(LAUGHTER)
ARROYO: The robot will be the centerpiece of Disney's Hall of the Presidents.
INGRAHAM: No.
ARROYO: And I'm not kidding, Laura. I'm serious here. And though he looks like Jim Carrey at "Closing Time," they've captured the spirit of Biden, I think.
INGRAHAM: Oh, no!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Yes, I just want you to know that, folks, -- you know --
But all kidding aside, I'm not joking.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ARROYO: Disney actually hasn't released that audio yet, Laura, but if they are going for authenticity, it will sound and look something like that, with lots of pauses, and Ron Klain giving stage directions just off out of the wings there. You have to admit, it's better than the Donald Trump animatronic, which bears a striking resemblance to Hillary Clinton after shock treatments. Or perhaps that's Hillary upon seeing the 2016 election results.
INGRAHAM: You can't even see it. I can't even see it on the screen.
ARROYO: The close-up is really frightening. Yes, that's the moving. You've got to see it close up. It's really scary.
INGRAHAM: Go back to the Biden pic. Who is was that on the left here?
ARROYO: Look at that on the left. I think that's supposed to be James Buchanan, or it could be President Christopher Lloyd as Doc Brown. Very, very similar there.
INGRAHAM: What the heck?
ARROYO: It might be time for Disney to hire some Madame Tussauds' sculptors, Laura. These guys seem a little remedial to my eye.
INGRAHAM: I think there has to be more diversity, equity, and inclusion in that. They should make up presidents, make up new presidents that never existed to make it really equitable.
ARROYO: Disney Parks went to great pains to say they are also adding a pair of aviators, I'm not kidding, to the side table next to Biden. I hope they add a lot of notecards in his hands, which might also be appropriate.
INGRAHAM: Raymond, I'm looking more carefully at that picture, and I do see one of those Hunter Biden paintings hanging in the background.
ARROYO: Is that a blow pipe behind the --
INGRAHAM: Worth every penny of the $500,000 for that painting.
Raymond, let's move on to the Olympics before we go. The U.S. soccer team lost badly in their first game, and what else?
ARROYO: After they took a knee. They took a knee as a protest for racial justice. They lost three to nothing against Sweden, Laura. They may want to spend more time coordinating their game rather than planning their public protest. People don't watch the Olympics for stage protests. They watch for the sport. And this team, you can see, they were not happy. Megan Rapinoe looked like someone had stolen her purple hair dye. She was not happy today.
INGRAHAM: It comes across as ungrateful, ungracious, and, frankly, aggressively predictable. It is tedious. Grow up. You have a great country, appreciate it. Raymond, thank you.
ARROYO: Thank you.
INGRAHAM: They didn't even run, they walked out. That was the reaction from an L.A. Police Department spokesperson to the latest brazen shoplifting crime. Now, we'll show you that latest video that has everyone asking, is California slowly dying? Stay there.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Now, it turns out that the left's obsession with social justice has produced policies that destroy social justice. Now, take the incubator for all the chaos in California. That was the scene at a T.J. Maxx. That was just outside of L.A. yesterday. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That looks great.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: They're going camping? No, they're going shoplifting. Why do those criminals feel so emboldened? A 2014 referendum called Prop 47 lowered criminal sentences on crimes such as shoplifting, and with police forces either depleted or just beaten down by anti-cop rhetoric, the cases have exploded. Many of the same people who probably supported this at the time, they're finally speaking out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It goes on from morning to night every single day over and over and over again.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They're literally just taking it from the store. They're taking it, grabbing it, and running.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You don't feel safe.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been in this Bay Area 20 years. I've never seen this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Here now, Heather Mac Donald, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of "The War on Cops." Heather, what is this going to lead to?
HEATHER MAC DONALD, AUTHOR, "THE WAR ON COPS": Here is the perfect symbol of where California is right now, Laura. Walgreens in San Francisco has closed 17 stores. Target has cut back to its hours at five stores. Why? Because management does not want to accost shoplifters for fear that they will be accused of racial profiling, and it knows that even if it does try to apprehend these shoplifters, the system will not respond because the criminal justice system does not want to be accused of racial disparate impact.
So you have the good guys, those who are providing vital services, those who are providing jobs, rolling over, playing dead, and ceding territory to the bad guys. But a civilization that doesn't have the will to enforce basic norms of decency and respect is not going to remain civilized for long. It's going to descend into a state of anarchy.
And let me just add this, Laura, because the left keeps telling us these are crimes of poverty and need. None of this is a crime of poverty. These are crimes of greed and entitlement. All of these thieves, all of these gangbangers, all of these drive-by shooters, have smartphones that they use to flash their gang signals on.
And they are also crimes of violence. Last week, an employee at Rite Aid in Los Angeles was killed trying to apprehend two shoplifters. So this is going completely out of control.
INGRAHAM: Heather, I saw a something -- yes, I saw a posting, I can't remember if it was on Facebook or Instagram, reacting to this. And there was a debate between a bunch of people, and one woman said, well, what's your problem, to this guy. It was an outrage. And she said, this is our moment of reparations. Is that fueling some of this as well?
MAC DONALD: Absolutely. We have a whole education system that is teaching minorities that they live in an illegitimate system. There is race hatred going on. There is no question that this is viewed as retaliation for the ongoing white supremacy. That white supremacy idea, Laura, is completely falls. There's not a single mainstream institution in this country that is not bending itself into knots trying to hire and promote as many minorities as possible. Nevertheless, white supremacy, fighting it is the theme of the Biden administration. Things are going to get worse before they get better unless people stand up and defend the basic decency of this country and defend the rule of law.
INGRAHAM: They're just going to shut all the stores, and they'll be nothing in the cities, period. They'll be all boarded up, and then they can all celebrate, all their wonderful utopia they have created. Heather, thank you.
Now, a Rock and Roll hall of famer says he will cancel any concerts were the venue demands vaccine requirements. Find out who it was, or it is, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: Well, two days after U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced vaccine passports will be mandatory at crowded venues beginning in September, legendary singer and guitarist extraordinaire Eric Clapton said this. "I feel honor bound to make an announcement of my own. I wish to say that I will not perform on any stage where there is a discriminated audience present." That's what being a real rebel in today's society is. Kudos, Mr. Clapton.
Gutfeld next.
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