Rep. Cuellar: Progressive Democrats don't have the vision of most Americans
Progressives look to challenge moderates in Democratic primaries; reaction from Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar.
This is a rush transcript from "Your World," July 16, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
NEIL CAVUTO, ANCHOR: You're looking live at the White House, familiar building, where the president and Republican leaders will soon be meeting this hour, this as his feud with those four freshman Democrats continues to intensify, and the House debates a resolution condemning his comments.
Welcome, everybody. I'm Neil Cavuto.
My thanks first to Charles Payne for filling in while I was out.
But, man oh, man, what did he leave me? I'm gone a couple of days, and all hell breaks loose.
Let's go to John Roberts at the White House, where all of this will soon be going down -- John.
JOHN ROBERTS, CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: And with that vote looming at some point in the House later on tonight, because of the desktop now over what Nancy Pelosi said on the floor of the House just a short time ago, the president has got a little bit of extra time now in his back pocket to be able to try to get solidarity with his Republican colleagues in Congress and get them to vote against this resolution.
As he was in the Cabinet Room today meeting with his Cabinet, the president seem to be focused on policy. He allowed the cameras to stay there for more than an hour while Ben Carson and Alex Azar and Jared Kushner all spoke about big policy agenda items.
And then the president almost reluctantly weighing in on the four congresswomen, called the so-called Squad, and the fallout from his tweet on Sunday. The president now trying to get away from that tweet and put the onus on those four congresswomen and things that they have said and their policies, try to flip the script here and turn the tables.
Listen to what the president said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT: You look at what they have said. I have clips right here, the most vile, horrible statements about our country, about Israel, about others. It's up to them.
Can do what they want. They can leave, they can stay, but they should love our country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: And the president keeping up that drumbeat on Twitter in a tweet this morning referring to his Sunday tweet that started all of this, saying -- quote -- "Those tweets were not racist. I don't have a racist bone in my body. This should be a vote on the filthy language, statements and lies told by the Democrat congresswomen who I truly believe, based on their actions, hate our country."
To that, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, one of the four members of the Squad, tweeted back: "You're right, Mr. President, you don't have a racist bone in your body. You have a racist mind in your head and a racist heart in your chest. That's why you violate the rights of children and tell the congresswoman who represents your home borough to go back to my country."
Clearly, between the Democrats in Congress and Republicans in Congress, there is a difference of opinion as well. Nancy Pelosi believing what the president said was racist, which is why she wants a vote on that resolution to condemn that tweet on Sunday.
Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader, on the other hand, does not think that the president's comments were racist, and that the focus does need to be on the policies pursued by those four congresswomen.
Listen to Pelosi first and then McConnell.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY PELOSI, D-CALIF.: Every single member of this institution, Democratic and Republican, to join us in condemning the president's racist tweets.
To do anything less would be a shocking rejection of our values and a shameful abdication of our oath of office.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL, R-KY: The president is not a racist. And I think the tone of all of this is not good for the country.
But it's coming from all different ideological points of view. That's the point. To single out any segment of this, I think, is a mistake.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERTS: So what the Republicans, the president in particular, are trying do at this point, Neil, is they are trying to paint these four congresswomen, which the president labels the radical left, as the power brokers in the Democratic Party, and that Nancy Pelosi is either powerless or too scared to confront them.
Remember, last week, Nancy Pelosi was having a huge feud with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. The president came to Nancy Pelosi his defense, and then for some reason thought that he would throw a hand grenade in the whole works on Sunday and turn the attention back on him.
So now he's trying to make it look as though these are the four people who are controlling the Democratic Party and that if you vote Democrat in 2020, that's what you're going to get, that band of left-wing socialism.
Don't know if he can make that stick, but we will see how he does with the vote tonight -- Neil.
CAVUTO: All right, thank you, my friend, John Roberts at the White House.
Well, as John pointed out, the former Vice President Joe Biden is holding campaign events in Iowa, saying that the president should go home in response to some of those tweets.
Peter Doocy with more on that from Kingsley -- Peter.
PETER DOOCY, CORRESPONDENT: Neil, as President Trump vies for four more years, Joe Biden is here in Iowa saying that he might tell the president to drop and give him 10 if the president ever questions Joe Biden's mental or physical capabilities.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOSEPH BIDEN, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I said, come on, Donald. Come on, man. How many pushups you want to do here?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DOOCY: Biden still has to beat a lot of Democrats in primaries and caucuses before he'd find himself on a stage with the incumbent president.
But Trump is still the central focus of the Biden campaign. And now Biden is using sharp language to try and condemn those recent tweets directed at Democrats in the House urging them to think about leaving the country.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: There's never been a president in American history who's been as so openly racist and divisive as this man.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DOOCY: Iowa is a place that President Trump carried easily in 2016 in the general election, but this isn't the general election. Biden right now is running in a primary and he's trying to impress progressives -- Neil.
CAVUTO: All right, Peter, thank you very much.
Let's just say that the president's tweets are all anyone is talking about. Pity, because there's plenty of good economic news that most, at least today, were not talking about, including retail sales soaring in June, and company earnings, though still early in the process, handily beating estimates for the latest quarter, and a string of records for the Dow, even though we were denied one today.
It's the tweets that everyone is focused on today. Bad timing for a president for whom the markets and the economy have been his greatest strengths.
To former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer, Democratic strategist Roger Fisk, and market watcher Courtney Dominguez.
Courtney, end it with you, begin with you.
How much is this sidetrack on -- on the tweets, getting apart from racist charges and all, hurting what would otherwise be a pretty solid message he could crow about and indeed tweet about?
COURTNEY DOMINGUEZ, PAYNE CAPITAL MANAGEMENT: Yes, I think, to your point, Neil, there's so much good data on the economy right now, I think investors are going to be able to overlook any tweets that are happening or any kind of major headlines.
At the end of the day, the consumer is still really strong. And we're seeing that with all the data that's continuing to come out. And are consumers going to stop spending money because of these tweets? I highly doubt it. And I really think that we're going to continue to see this economy go strong going forward.
CAVUTO: Indeed.
But nothing seems to be stopping the president raising money and all of this, and we will get into that in just a second, Ari. But there is this notion that when the president has something good going for him, something happens to sort of disrupt it.
And I'm wondering whether he can be his own worst enemy on occasions like this.
ARI FLEISCHER, CONTRIBUTOR: Well, and, actually, he's been on a pretty good roll of late. This has been unusual, at least recently, for him to put out a tweet like this.
And it was inappropriate. I think this tweet was offensive. I wish he hadn't done it.
And, politically, Neil, I have got to say that this was -- came out at a time when there was a bonfire growing between these four progressive congresswomen and Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and the president acted like a fire extinguisher and put out that bonfire and united the Democratic Party.
So, politically, it was wrong. But just in terms of the tone from the president, I found it inappropriate.
CAVUTO: When I'm looking at this, Roger, I'm thinking that Democrats could seize on this and, all of a sudden say, all right, this is a gift to us, because now, well, we're not talking about the good economic news. We're not talking about the markets. We're not talking about record low unemployment rates and all the things that the president could genuinely crow about.
And that's a net gain for them. Is it?
ROGER FISK, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: Yes.
I mean, first off, thanks so much for having me.
Look, as recently as Friday, when the president was heading off to some critical states in the -- in the Midwest and the Upper Midwest that he flipped. And what does he do right before he takes off from the White House? He stands on the South Lawn with someone who's leaving his Cabinet.
The person has to stand there for 30 or 40 minutes while he talks on a wide range of issues, and basically stomps all over the political message that he's going to head out to those critical states to try to convey.
So he basically gotten his own way. And you can even look at the midterms, where he had very similar economic news to where we are right now, and decided to make the last 45 days about immigration.
He is -- the only thing he likes talking about more than what he does right is what he thinks people are doing wrong. And he gets in his own way time and time again.
CAVUTO: Well, it's too early to say, I think, as you touched on, Courtney, whether it's going to hurt him in the polls. I mean, he has been inching up a little bit. He still trails some of the prominent Democrats, but, again, as many of you have reminded me, way, way too early.
So none of this seems to be measurably hurting him here. But there is a sense with him -- and, Courtney, I don't know if you agree -- this is what we get. This is the guy who speaks his mind, says things that strike many as offensive, and then some, but it doesn't hurt his economic performance, doesn't hurt the kind of stuff that he believes and Republicans believe will ultimately help them triumph again.
What do you think of that?
DOMINGUEZ: Yes, I think it's going to be -- I can't really speak on the politics of it and what's going to happen in the election, but when I look at the economy going forward, I do continue to -- continue to see really strong news.
Something we're not talking about, which we have been for many weeks, and we're all a little sick of, is things like the trade war with China.
CAVUTO: Right.
DOMINGUEZ: And as some of those other things get figured out, that can even be a higher catalyst to bring the markets further. And as a good economy leads up to the election, I can see that being a positive sign, but I'm very bullish on where the economy is going.
I don't see any true signs of a recession in the near future.
CAVUTO: All right, guys, I want to thank you very much for allowing for breaking news here, because the president's campaign, if indeed it is hurting with this controversy, has a funny way of showing it.
A stunning $108 million raised by the Republican National Committee in the second quarter, largely on behalf of president of the United States. That is more than the top five Democratic presidential candidates combined for the same period.
To GOP donor Hal Lambert.
Now, Hal, a lot of this was prior to obviously these latest tweets the president had, but it is a reflection that controversies that nevertheless stick with him are not hurting him when it comes to raising money, huh?
HAL LAMBERT, POINT BRIDGE CAPITAL: Absolutely not.
I mean, it was an amazing fund-raising quarter. In fact, it was $20 million more, almost $25 million more, than what President Obama raised during the same period of his presidency. So amazing fund-raising numbers.
The large-dollar donors are all in. The small-dollar people are all in. We have got over 700,000 donors on the small-dollar side. And it's an amazing quarter.
And, look, you have got Ronna McDaniel and Tommy Hicks, the co-chairs of the RNC, and then you have got Todd Ricketts, who is the finance chair. And they're working together amazingly well. It's very well organized.
And then you have got Don Jr. that's a real help in the fund-raising category. I mean, he's working California this week, at the same time President Trump's going to be in New Jersey, so you're able to raise money simultaneously across the country, because of Don Jr. And Kimberly Guilfoyle will be out there as well.
It's been an amazing run, and it's continuing.
CAVUTO: Where will a lot of those proceeds be allocated? Do you know?
I mean, we talk about the battleground states. We tend to focus on polls that give this national disadvantage that the president's at right now, but forget the fact that he scored his victory, his electoral vote victory, largely as a result of flipping Democratic largely industrial states Republican.
How's he doing? And will those resources go to those states?
LAMBERT: Sure.
There's going to be a lot of resources in historically blue states. So the Rust Belt is going to get a lot of attention. But you know what? There was $123 million cash on hand at the end of this quarter. So we're going to go into next year, after the primaries, and after we get through the convention, we're going to have hundreds of millions of dollars in cash on hand and a fully funded campaign, fully staffed up, much different than 2016.
And the Democrats, quite frankly, are going to probably come out of that with very little cash on hand after a bruising presidential primary. And they're going to be at a real disadvantage going into 2020.
CAVUTO: Do you know how much effort, Hal, is being poured into winning over Hispanic voters?
I ask because Hispanic homeownership just hit an all-time high in this country's history. That's really remarkable. And I'm wondering how much credit the president will get for that and how much Hispanic support he might be able to get from that. What do you think?
LAMBERT: Oh, I think quite a bit.
I mean, there's Hispanic coalitions forming around the country that support Trump. President Trump's been the best president in history for Hispanics in this country. And you know what? It's -- when you hear about illegal and legal, what President Trump talks about a lot is illegal immigration.
People view that as mostly Hispanic and negative Hispanic. And that's not the case. President Trump's very pro-Hispanic. And the Hispanics that are here legally in this country, many of them support Trump.
I wouldn't be surprised if he gets a much higher percentage than he even did the first time he ran. And I think the Hispanic community is really going to support President Trump this time. It's going to be one of the big surprises I think you see to come out of 2020. And the Democrats are going to be really confused by it.
CAVUTO: Yes, it is still early, as you remind me. Anything can happen. But, again, some of those inroads he's made with some of these groups could come back to help him out. But it's still way early. We shall see.
Thank you, Hal, very, very much.
LAMBERT: Thank you.
CAVUTO: Now, what have I told you it really wasn't a tweet about some Democratic congresswomen that whacked the president today, but something he said about China today?
We share, you will care -- after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We have a long way to go as far as tariffs where China is concerned, if we want. We have another $325 billion that we can put a tariff on, if we want.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CAVUTO: All right, those comments were enough to prevent another record today, although it was close. It was kind of like a wash today.
But after one record after another here, the fact of the matter is, we have this China economy thing to worry about, growing at its slowest pace in some 27 years.
Now, China slamming the president for linking their slowdown to the trade war.
We have got Charlie Gasparino with us and market watcher Gary Kaltbaum.
Gary, one of the things that the president was essential saying -- I know it's been echoed a number of times -- they need a deal more than we need to deal.
This weak economic news out of China seems to confirm that they need something.
GARY KALTBAUM, CONTRIBUTOR: We have been hearing that for a while.
But China -- that's what matters most -- doesn't seem to believe they need to make a deal. And I just don't think one has happened. I feel like this is almost Brexit at this point in time, that we keep hearing we're weeks away, then it's months away, then now that -- he's talking tariffs again.
And, again, the good news is the market I don't think is listening anymore, because we were supposed to get European car tariffs. That was pulled. We were supposed to get Mexican tariffs. That was pulled.
So I think we're OK. And I think the market is more or less looking at the easy money right now. And you can see what the markets doing, which is very, very strong. And now even the industrials and economically sensitive areas are starting to kick into gear.
CAVUTO: Charlie, I'm wondering, was the fact that the president raised the possibility of expanding the tariffs to an additional $325 billion worth of goods from China, which would essentially now include pretty much everything from China, and it was like a shrug from the markets?
I mean, down a little bit, but as Gary was pointing out, records every day here. What do you make of it?
CHARLIE GASPARINO, SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, listen, the markets trade off of -- I mean, listen, at bottom, the markets trade on corporate earnings, right?
If corporate earnings are strong, stocks will go up. The bet right now in the market is that corporate earnings are strong, largely because of the tax cuts and deregulation, and lower interest rates, or at least stable -- stabilizing rates at this very low level.
He's not going to -- Jerome Powell is not going to raise rates, and that is net positive for corporate earnings. What we don't know is what has already been done with trade or whether tariffs on China will in the future slow down the economy for the 2020 election.
And here's the thing, I think, that -- just to throw this out there. Chairman Xi, whatever his title is, the Chinese -- Donald Trump's Chinese counterpart doesn't have to run for reelection. He's a dictator for life, or as long as they know -- until they kill him or whatever, right, or poison his tea.
Donald Trump has to run in 2020. If we do have an economic slowdown because of trade, that will be an issue. And add trade is the one fly in the ointment of this economy.
And there's just no doubt about that. That doesn't mean it's going to happen. It's just I can't tell you and a lot of economists can't tell you whether the stimulus from the tax cuts and deregulation and low interest rates will overwhelm the trade stuff.
The market right now is betting it will. But who knows?
CAVUTO: Yes.
Gary Kaltbaum, I'm wondering how you advise clients here, because there's - - as race -- what, we're 10 percent or so away on the Dow from 30000, unheard of level, if you think about it, but not that much of a leap in the scheme of things.
How do you advise clients in the middle of a run-up like this, and what some are calling a melt-up like this, maybe courtesy of the Federal Reserve and lower interest rates?
KALTBAUM: Trend is your friend. It's a cliche, but it really does work on Wall Street.
And when you have the Fed in your corner, that's also worked. Neil, you can time the bottom in the market at the end of December, early January to the day they sent out somebody from the Fed to float the fact that they were going from raising rates to patience.
And you can time to the day the last bottom we had about a month ago going from patience to lowering rates. So leave no doubt that's what the markets been looking at.
And, really, I believe the markets been hanging on for 10 years with easy money. And it's not just here. Neil, there's $13 trillion of negative yielding debt around the globe. Around the globe, they're easing like crazy. China just put a trillion dollars into the system.
Europe, with negative rates, just announced they're going to go even lower negative rates. And I think markets just love it, until they don't. Right now, I'm a big believer in price and markets acting fine.
GASPARINO: Well, we have an inverted yield curve, don't we, or something close to that?
CAVUTO: Oh, there you go. There's our ratings juggernaut moment.
(CROSSTALK)
GASPARINO: But that does tell you something.
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: Thank you, my friend. That just did it. Click, click, click, click, click, click.
(LAUGHTER)
CAVUTO: All right.
Oh, yes, and, by the way, did I tell you about another blackout that could be coming in New York? Yes.
After this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: It could happen again, maybe this weekend.
New York utility Con Ed warning that more blackouts could be coming, as temperatures start soaring, by Saturday in the Big Apple, maybe as high as 100 degrees, for a city that might not be able to handle the big energy bite that comes with it.
Former White House and Pentagon official Douglas MacKinnon says last week's mini-blackout might have just been a sign of things to come.
Very good to have you, Doug.
I was surprised of this, because, memory serves me right, the more recent blackout occurred in normal temperatures, in the 80s or whatever. They seem to be signaling -- that is Con Ed -- that you're really putting a strain on these systems when you get up to 95, 100 degrees.
So they almost seem to be saying, prepare yourself. Should they?
DOUGLAS MACKINNON, FORMER WHITE HOUSE AND PENTAGON OFFICIAL: Well, I think this is a very serious subject, a deadly subject, Neil, that nobody takes seriously, unfortunately.
CAVUTO: Right.
MACKINNON: And I think one of the things -- President Trump is succeeding across the board, in many ways because of his real-world business experience. He really is a business guy. He really is an infrastructure guy.
And oh, by the way, he's a New York City guy. And I think if he's smart -- and he is -- he can use this, the last blackout last weekend, as an example of what's wrong with the national infrastructure.
I mean, our grid, our national grid, Neil, is really a joke. It's decrepit. It's old. Parts of it are over 50 years old. And I think, again, what happened in New York is an example.
And so, for President Trump, hold New York City accountable, hold Con Ed accountable, hold Mayor de Blasio accountable, and say, lookit, we have to fix this, but, more importantly, this is an example of what's going to happen across the country if we don't get ahead of this.
CAVUTO: And it's not that it hasn't happened enough. I mean, even just a few years back in this city, where we had much of the country because of just this grid connection, up to a quarter to a third getting shutdown at various parts of the day, do you think something like that could happen?
MACKINNON: Well, it will.
And, matter of fact, as you know, in 2003 in Ohio, a tree branch literally fell on a transmission line, and 50 million people in the Northeast and in Canada lost power because of that in cascading blackouts.
CAVUTO: Wow.
MACKINNON: And, again, this is one of these things where our system, Neil, was corrupt and decrepit and old 20 years ago.
But guess what? Twenty years ago, we didn't have the Russians trying to hack our system. We didn't have the Chinese trying to hack our system or the North Koreans or cyber-extortionists. And now we do. And the system is so vulnerable, so old, and it really is.
This is a national security issue. This is an economic issue. This is a health care issue. And, unfortunately, nobody ever wants to pay attention to it, until the day it happens.
CAVUTO: Obviously, it's a big amount of money committed up front. But, as you point out, the more you put off, the more expensive that will likely become.
Now New York Governor Cuomo has already cited Con Ed as a problem in all that, but it's not as if you can get another utility in here willy-nilly and swap them out. I mean, so what has to be done?
MACKINNON: Well, I think what has to be done is, every major politician in the country has to pay attention to it, starting with President Trump, because this is a natural -- national infrastructure and national security issue.
And for too many years, basically, every president, every governor, every mayor has kicked this can down the road. Well, guess what? We have run out a road on this issue. We really have. And one of these days -- again, a blackout for two days is an inconvenience, Neil, but what if we have a blackout for two weeks, for three weeks, for a month in a regional area?
CAVUTO: Absolutely.
MACKINNON: All of a sudden, you go from an inconvenience to scenes out of the movie "The Purge."
I mean, this is a deadly serious issue that nobody pays attention to, until it actually happens.
CAVUTO: Yes, and we were lucky in the last go-round, but we might be the next one.
Doug, thank you very, very much.
MACKINNON: You bet, Neil. Thanks so much.
CAVUTO: All right.
And you thought those progressive Democrats were only going after the president. Oh, to be a moderate Democrat whose biggest sin was and is trying to work with the president.
Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar on that -- after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: The Squad isn't going after just the president. Those four freshman Democratic congresswomen have also set their sights on Democrats who work with the president, or try to.
Meet one of them after this.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: All right, meeting put off.
You're looking live in the White House right now, where the president was to have had a meeting about a half-hour ago. That's when it was originally scheduled, with Republican leaders, presumably to deal with the fallout from these tweets.
He's been criticized by some Republicans, hardly all, but that meeting now put off indefinitely. So, when we get any news on that, we will pass it along.
Meanwhile, Wall Street Journal Editorial Board member, FOX News contributor Bill McGurn with us right now on the back and forth, on playing the race card, and who's a racist and all of that.
It's really a great piece. I urge you, if you don't have the opportunity now to read today's Wall Street Journal, to get it.
But one of the key issues you raise, Bill, is that, far too often, we fall back into the race card trap.
BILL MCGURN, CONTRIBUTOR: Right.
Look, traditionally, the race card is something used against Republicans, right?
CAVUTO: Right.
MCGURN: And it's being used against Donald Trump right now.
But what's interesting about 2020 is the emergence of progressive Democrats using it against other more moderate Democrats.
CAVUTO: And only slightly moderate.
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: By comparison, yes.
MCGURN: But, I mean, Joe Biden was called a racist for working with segregationists and busing.
And, I mean, it's nonsense to call a man who served the first African- American president loyally as his number two, to call him a racist. Ms. Pelosi was accused of picking on these four because of their color.
I mean, that's ridiculous on the other hand. So the charges are completely unfair, but there's a certain justice to them, because most of these people, including Joe Biden and Mrs. Pelosi, indulge in the same kind of...
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: Well, they have used it themselves.
MCGURN: Yes.
CAVUTO: You talk about the MAGA hat controversy itself, you said, is racist.
MCGURN: Right.
CAVUTO: Everyone who wears it.
"Now she is hoping" -- referring to Nancy Pelosi -- "to drown out her intraparty feud with an upstart progressive wing by seeing who can shout the loudest that the president is a racist."
To what end?
MCGURN: Right.
And look at -- and Joe Biden. I mean, it's hard to feel sorry for him. Right now, we're in the game of everyone in the media is going to Republicans saying, do you think the president is racist, was this tweet racist?
I don't recall people doing that when Joe Biden said that Mitt Romney, equally guiltless, was going to put black people in chains.
CAVUTO: I remember that. I remember that: He's going to put you all in chains.
MCGURN: Or when he told Al Sharpton on the radio that the only possible reason Republicans had for wanting voter I.D. laws is because they don't want black folks to vote.
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: And now, as you point out, the Democrats are kissing his ring.
MCGURN: Right. Right.
You reap what you sow.
CAVUTO: So where does this go? Because I always think, must everything devolve into racism?
MCGURN: Right.
CAVUTO: If you're challenging even an African-American leader, you're a racist. If you're challenging something that includes African-Americans, you're racist, or Hispanics, and on and on and on.
Why can't things be accepted on face value that maybe you have a problem with the issues they're espousing?
MCGURN: Right, and get into substance.
So, look, I think we're going to have a few days of the Trump hate fest, where he put out this tweet, and everyone's attacking him, including some Republicans.
But I think for -- the dynamics are, this stuff is self-destructive, as you say. It's inherently -- and it's going to come back. And these people eat their own.
And the progressives, they haven't apologized for a thing, right, what they have said. They have said some pretty vile things.
CAVUTO: A couple of them have used the F-word and others in describing the president. That gets a pass.
MCGURN: No, but I mean to their own.
CAVUTO: To their own.
MCGURN: To Ms. Pelosi, to the attacks on Biden. No one's really apologized for that.
And it's because I think they accept that logic. And the Democrats...
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: Who is accepting the logic?
MCGURN: The progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
CAVUTO: Right.
MCGURN: I mean, if you're going to make race the issue and identity politics, well, then you have a bunch of old white guys running the Democratic Party. Sooner or later, it's going to turn on them, and Mrs. Pelosi, who's an old white woman.
CAVUTO: But should the president be more attuned to that than he is?
MCGURN: Yes.
(CROSSTALK)
CAVUTO: The way -- it was a clumsy wording, to put it mildly, and even Tim Scott, senator, has said they're racially offensive, Mitt Romney, destructive, demeaning.
Susan Collins, who is in a battle of her own...
(CROSSTALK)
MCGURN: I sort of put it in the category of worse than a crime, a blunder.
The Democrats were attacking themselves. Some people think that the president is doing this, it was a master strategy, because he makes it harder for Mrs. Pelosi and Joe Biden and the others to attack this -- this much more radical wing of the Democratic Party.
I don't know. I think he could have -- I think he could have done that without that kind of schoolyard taunt and love it or leave. It was very inadvisable, because it puts..
CAVUTO: But it hurt him. It hurt his otherwise good message, right?
MCGURN: Yes. I'm not sure it's going to hurt him in the long run.
But I think it does -- it does put pressure on the people who support him in the Senate and in the House. They're going to now have to vote on this resolution.
So it's unnecessary.
CAVUTO: Or even do the Susan Collins things, where she criticizes both.
MCGURN: Right. Joni Ernst, right.
CAVUTO: Right.
MCGURN: So why put the -- why -- it doesn't gain you anything. Why do that?
CAVUTO: All right.
MCGURN: And I think Lindsey Graham said it the best. He had a very long comment about what these people have said, like calling our border guards, likening them to concentration camp officers.
CAVUTO: Incredible.
MCGURN: But he said the president should aim higher.
CAVUTO: Yes, I always remember things when they were calling people Nazis. Shouldn't we save that for the Nazis? I mean, save it for them.
MCGURN: Right. Absolutely.
CAVUTO: It's a great piece. I urge you to read it, just because it steps way, way back to say the lunacy has gotten out of control.
As we were talking, I just want to pass along some news of a 4.3-magnitude earthquake that hit Contra Costa County, California. That would be at 1:11 p.m. today, so about three hours and 20 minutes ago.
No reports of any tremors afterwards or how much damage has been reported. But, of course, over the last couple of weeks in California, we have seen no fewer than three major earthquakes now having occurred, and one, of course, over the weekend hitting Seattle, Washington, as well.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: It's the Squad vs. the mod, as in moderate Texas Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar, whose biggest sin, at least with these four Democratic progressive freshmen, is his willingness to work with the other side.
Joining me now, Texas Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar.
Congressman, good to have you.
REP. HENRY CUELLAR, D-TX: How are you?
CAVUTO: I'm fine, sir.
You have been targeted by this group that includes Congresswoman Ocasio- Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar, and Ayanna Pressley, to be primaried, that you have not done the party any service.
What do you think of that?
CUELLAR: Well, certainly, I mean, it's this group called the Justice Democrats, I think, are not Democrats, quite honestly. They're socialists.
And they -- they want to impose their vision to Texas. And we certainly know that, in Texas, our vision is very different from what this social -- what I call this Justice Democrats, which are really socialists -- they're not really Democrats.
CAVUTO: So, do you feel that they're unfairly targeting you? Are they going after other moderates?
I mean, there's even some debate as to whether all four of them have a thing to get you thrown out because you're too moderate. How do you describe it?
CUELLAR: Well, I don't know if it's these four individuals.
I do know it's this Justice -- what I call -- quote -- "Justice Democrats."
CAVUTO: Right.
CUELLAR: But I do know that they are going after different folks.
For example, they're going after Juan Vargas. These are Justice Democrats. And the reason they're going after him is because he's -- he has a very strong pro-Israel voting record. And that's just -- just amazing that they're targeting him.
They're going after Jim Costa also. They're going after Lacy Clay.
CAVUTO: Right.
CUELLAR: They're going after other folks.
But, again, their vision is not the vision of most Americans.
CAVUTO: Now, up until this dustup over the president's tweets, Congressman, much of the attention was focused on this group's battle with Nancy Pelosi, as she had characterized them as really speaking for themselves and not the overall party or the 40 some-odd congressmen who -- Democrats -- who gained control of the House.
Do you agree with that, that they're -- they're not really as powerful or as influential, certainly within the House, as they make themselves out to be?
CUELLAR: Well, certainly.
If I was going to say, who's going to win a debate, it certainly would be Nancy Pelosi. She knows how to count votes, and that's what counts here in Congress. You got to be able to count votes to get the job done.
Can you get to 218? And that's the key to having a successful legislative career here in D.C.
CAVUTO: Now, those four, I believe, to a woman, voted against the $4.6 billion emergency funding at the border that I believe you voted for.
And that is something that sticks in their craw, that that emboldens ICE and all these other agencies that will be dealing with these migrants there. And that's something they couldn't tolerate.
Nancy Pelosi said that wasn't her cup of tea, the package itself, but it did get immediate help to these kids. Was that your position?
CUELLAR: It's interesting.
If you look at, behind the scenes, what happened, when the House Appropriation members -- and I'm a part of that committee -- when we were talking to the Senate, when we were working on the Harvey disaster bill, we actually were working with them.
For example, I was able to get that $30 million reimbursement for the nonprofits and the churches that are doing so much at the border. They're putting money out of their pocket.
So we were working with them. We got a lot of the language there. So when the bill came out, I looked at it, and that bill had a lot of things that we had looked at.
When they say that there's no protocols or no rules and we gave the president a blank check, that is not correct, because there are protocols that Homeland has. There are protocols that ICE has. There's protocols that the Health and Human Services have.
There's language that my -- that I have added there to make sure that we have transparency and protection for the migrant -- the migrant kids.
And, in fact, in the -- own appropriation bill, the Senate bill that came over, there's even additional language there for protection. So there was no blank checks -- blank check written to anybody. And that's why I supported that particular bill.
CAVUTO: Congressman, thank you very much. Good catching up with you.
CUELLAR: Thank you so much.
CAVUTO: All right, in the meantime, North Korea's at it again, warning that it could resume nuclear tests.
Now what do we do?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: All right, we know what you said about the president, but those words will be struck down from being in the record in the House from her comments on the president.
Chad Pergram on the significance of something that just happened moments ago -- Chad.
CHAD PERGRAM, SENIOR CAPITOL HILL PRODUCER: This is a rather extraordinary scene on the House floor, where the words of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi were challenged by Republicans to be out of order, saying that they -- she broke the rules of decorum in referring to the president of the United States.
They had a long time out here trying to figure out what to do, because this is pretty extraordinary to have that sort of a charge made against the speaker of the House.
Just within the past couple of minutes, the House majority leader, Steny Hoyer, has come to the floor. And he has in fact ruled her words to be out of order. He cited a precedent from 1984, May 15, 1984, when Newt Gingrich, then a backbencher, challenged them Speaker Tip O'Neill, saying his words were out of order, and Tip O'Neill was penalized.
And so what's going on right now on the House floor is, the House is voting to strike her words from the record. Usually, when someone's words are stricken from the record, Neil, they are prevented from speaking on the House floor for the rest of the day.
So the fact that we have had this on the House floor involving the speaker of the House, this has been so supercharged, this resolution condemning the president for racism, according to the text of the resolution. This is a big deal.
And it should be no surprise that they got into this major kerfuffle on the House floor today.
CAVUTO: Did Democrats vote for this as well?
PERGRAM: Well, I'm looking right now on this. So far, there are no -- no Democrats who have voted to strike her words from the record.
So, in other words, if they don't vote for that, then her words are allowed to stand. And that's the issue. Doug Collins, Republican from Georgia, he made the charge, saying, OK, we should take down her words.
Taking down words is the equivalent of pulling someone over for speeding. Then they have to go back and say, were your words within the realm of parliamentary conduct or not?
Steny Hoyer said they were not. And so Doug Collins then asked for a vote to strike her words from the record. And so it's up to the Democrats now. And right now, Pelosi's words will be allowed to stay if they vote with her. And that's what's going down on the floor right now, Neil.
CAVUTO: What a mess.
All right, Chad, thank you very, very much.
PERGRAM: Thank you.
CAVUTO: And any other day, this would have been a big item, the North Koreans looking at sort of regrouping on that whole nuclear thing.
Retired Four-Star General Jack Keane us right now.
General, they seem to be taunting the administration.
JACK KEANE, SENIOR STRATEGIC ANALYST: Yes, I think it's much about negotiating leverage here, Neil, is what the North Koreans are suggesting.
I mean, we have canceled six-plus major exercises since President Trump said he wanted to take major exercises off the table. And there are smaller ones taking place to maintain some proficiency between the United States' troops and the South Korean troops.
And that's what this exercise largely is.
CAVUTO: And they didn't like that, right? They didn't like that we were even entertaining it and said, if that were the case -- so, what do we do?
KEANE: They have not specifically objected to the other smaller exercises that we have been conducting.
So I think this is probably a little bit of a surprise here. I do think that negotiations will go forward, that the South Koreans have just come out with an economic report on North Korea, and how devastating the sanctions are impacting the country, going back and comparing it to the worst days of famine that the country has had.
So there's serious, serious crippling of what's taking place in North Korea. The president is going to keep those sanctions on. That's what brought them to the negotiating table back in Singapore initially. And I think these negotiations will take place here.
However, Neil, there has been a major change in the administration. They wanted North Korea to give up all of their weapons, nuclear and ballistic missiles, and then we would provide some sanction relief.
I think where we are now, the administration knows that there has to be a step-by-step process here. It's unrealistic for the North Koreans to put all of that on the table at once. And, obviously, they haven't even come close to doing any of it.
So I think the negotiations will get started at the working level, and hopefully some progress.
CAVUTO: We will watch it closely. General, thank you very, very much.
I apologize for the breaking news, including the significance of this day 50 years ago, when Apollo 11 lifted off for the moon. Four days later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would be walking on it.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CAVUTO: The pursuit of the moon 15 years ago today, as Apollo 11 lifted off. Four days later, we'd be walking on that moon.
And part of it, according to my next guest, was the pursuit of something called the common good, our shared interests of humanity.
"The Mission of a Lifetime" author Basil Hero joins us right now.
Basil, very good to have you.
We forget that. I like how you put that in perspective, that that was a common element.
BASIL HERO, AUTHOR, "THE MISSION OF A LIFETIME": It was, Neil.
And thank you for having me.
It's fascinating, when you look at the Apollo 11 taking off, to think that there were 5.6 million parts on the -- what they called the stack, OK, which included the command module, the service module, and, of course, the lunar module, which landed, and then everything, of course, and the Saturn V rocket.
CAVUTO: Right.
HERO: And the engineers strove for something called the 99.9 percent reliability rate, the triple nines, which meant that, if 0.1 percent things went wrong, you had 5,600 parts which could potentially fail.
So it took a lot of guts to be able to sit on top of that rocket and...
CAVUTO: And to absorb the risk, right? I mean, we remember from the Apollo 1 fire in January '67, that still within, what, two-and-a-half years, we'd make it to the moon, we'd complete the goal of John F. Kennedy.
HERO: Sure.
CAVUTO: That would have been unthinkable.
HERO: It would have been unthinkable.
And you're absolutely correct. What they -- what all of the astronauts told me in my interviews for the book was that they said that the common good and believing in something greater than oneself, in addition to duty, honor, country, is what sustained them as they were on their missions.
And I think that's something that gets lost today, as does, frankly, the management miracle that took place in that seven-and-a-half-year period to get these guys on the moon.
As Jeff Bezos told me -- and he has his Blue Origin aerospace company.
CAVUTO: Right.
HERO: We pulled that way forward from where it should have been in terms of the -- of the engineering technology and the management technology that we had.
So they pioneered what we know today as the flat organization, where they really wanted to eliminate as many layers as possible between the engineers at the lowest rung and management to make sure that they could surface, A, good ideas, but also mistakes in real time.
CAVUTO: Amazing.
Basil Hero, sorry for all the breaking news.
"The Mission of a Lifetime," a great perspective on all of that and sacrifice and echoing John Kennedy's dream to have a man on the moon by the end of the decade, simply because he said it was worth the challenge.
Content and Programming Copyright 2019 Fox News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2019 ASC Services II Media, LLC. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of ASC Services II Media, LLC. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox