Republican lawmakers look ahead to House impeachment vote
Reaction and analysis from Reps. Jim Jordan, Tom McClintock, and Ken Buck.
This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," December 17, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
Laura Ingraham, host: I’m Laura Ingraham and this is the Ingraham Angle from another insane Washington tonight. The Democrats’ weak impeachment case was exposed today as the congressional rules committee sent it to the full House. Congressman and Judiciary members Jim Jordan, Ken Buck, and Tom McClintock are all here to respond. Also, senators are now saying, this is my favorite moment of the day, that Mitch McConnell should recuse himself ahead of the Senate trial. Oh, anything else? Alan Dershowitz has something to say about that. Plus, the impeachment push is now losing the support of, wait for it, Democrats. The Ingraham pollsters Rasmussen and McLaughlin tell us why.
And also, tonight, and this was stunning, the court that signed off on all those bogus FISA warrants just dropped a rare rebuke of the FBI and Jim Comey. Sara Carter, Matt Schlapp and Dinesh D’Souza are all here to respond. But first, Pelosi’s three-ringed flop. That’s the focus of tonight’s mini-angle. All right. This impeachment shuffle, I was thinking about it literally on the drive to the studio tonight. It has all the feel of, like, a second-rate traveling circus that camps out in the old fairgrounds of your town but then it never leaves. You have the jugglers, the kind of half-baked jugglers, and kind of un-easy tightrope walkers.
[begin video clip]
Male Speaker: I’m going to reserve any kind of a public judgment --
Male Speaker: I think it’s important that we reserve judgment --
The Press: haven’t you made up your mind on --
Male Speaker: No, I have not.
The Press: -- whether you think -- no?
Male Speaker: I am seeking the facts.
Male Speaker: [unintelligible]
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Oh, wait. He’s about to fall. And then, of course, you have to have the sword swallower.
[begin video clip]
Female Speaker: It may be that voters decide in 2020 that they don’t want me as their representative. I hope that’s not the case. I really do. And I hope that even if people don’t agree with my decision, they see that I based my decision on my personal integrity.
Male Speaker: He’s got a sword.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: The flames were still coming out of her mouth there. Did you see that? It was wild. Then you have the ringmasters. Last week’s? Well, she faltered.
[begin video clip]
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.: I, myself, am not a lawyer. Sometimes I act like one, not as often as I act like a doctor. I practice medicine on the side.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: I still -- I need a total translation of that. And this week, that ringmaster has been replaced by a new one, someone who, I don’t think he could sell a water cooler in the desert.
[begin video clip]
Male Speaker: The American people will be watching. They will be watching. Who is for an open and fair trial? Who is for hiding facts, relevant facts, immediate facts? Who is for covering up?
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: No one’s coming into this tent. He’s, like, trying to get people. “Come on. It’s going to be really cool once you get inside. Fifty cents, anything? Come on --“ And some of the newest acts, they clearly aren’t ready for the big top. Take Jamie Raskin.
[begin video clip]
Male Speaker: President Zelensky, any Ukrainian official ever tell you they felt shaken down?
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md.: Well, there’s lots of evidence in the --
Male Speaker: That’s not what I asked. I said have you got any statements?
Jamie Raskin: No, I’ve never been spoken to.
Male Speaker: Okay. Is there any statement on the record? The last administration, for four years, didn’t provide any military assistance to Ukraine. The idea that 55 days was somehow life and death in this situation, particularly during a period of transition from one government to another, you know, it just -- pretty thin gruel to impeach a president of the United States on.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Raskin kept going over to the side of the -- glasses. Well, for his part, though, Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, he wants to revoke all the permits and shut down the big top flop.
[begin video clip]
Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.: The Senate is meant to act as judge and jury to hear a trial, not to rerun the entire fact-finding investigation because angry partisans rushed sloppily through it. The trajectory that the Democratic leader apparently wants to take us down before he’s even heard opening arguments could set a nightmarish precedent for our institution.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Well, after weeks of the Democrats cheap-o production, Americans are desperate for the show to just be over. Heck, the production is so bad, I wouldn’t be surprised if we had a full-fledged stampede on our hands. Well, away from this abusive spectacle and toward the GOP. And that’s the mini-angle. Joining me now are three congressmen on the House Judiciary Committee, Jim Jordan, Tom McClintock, and Ken Buck. Congressman Jordan, let’s start with you. The articles are expected to hit the floor tomorrow.
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio: [affirmative]
Laura Ingraham: What can Republicans do now?
Jim Jordan: We can continue to point out the truth. All the facts are on the president’s side. They’ve always been on the president’s side and that’s why the Democrats had to resort to this unfair partisan process they conducted in the House. No subpoenas for a Republican, none of our witnesses could be invited to the hearings. In the depositions, Adam Schiff prevented some witnesses from answering Republican questions. All the Democrat questions got answered. And of course, Adam Schiff told us that the whistleblower was going to testify until we all discovered, “Oh, wait a minute, the whistleblower had met with Adam Schiff’s staff.” So, then he wasn’t going to testify. So, this idea that they’re now talking about process concerns in the Senate after what the House Democrats did through this entire three months is just kind of laughable. And I think your angle was right on.
Laura Ingraham: I mean, it really, it just came to me in the car. You always say it’s a circus. But it truly is a circus. But it’s one of those lame -- you know those kind that just didn’t have a lot of money and they kind of had a broken down old elephant.
Male Speaker: [laughs]
Laura Ingraham: And then they had -- but we had those in our town. And you’re just like, “Okay, can we get the real circus? If we’re going to see a circus, we want a good circus.” Congressman McClintock, Nancy Pelosi, I think she -- her gut was against doing this.
Tom McClintock: [affirmative]
Laura Ingraham: And I know she’s not going to say it. She wishes they didn’t walk out onto the edge of this branch. And now they’re about to saw it off.
Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif.: Well, I can’t read minds. But it reminds me a lot of what the Air Force describes as target fixation, when a pilot gets so fixated on a target that he forgets to fly his plane and ends up crashing into a mountain. I think that’s where the Democrats are. And they’re crashing the country into a mountain. I mean, these articles of impeachment are an absolutely travesty. And by the way, I think you owe an apology to America’s circuses comparing them to what’s going on in that building right now.
Male Speaker: [laughs]
Laura Ingraham: Yeah. Well, Congressman Buck, the president is responding to this impending vote. And he did so today with a scathing letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, writing, “History will judge you harshly. As you proceed with this impeachment charade, your legacy will be that of turning the House of Representatives from a revered legislative body into a star chamber of partisan persecution.” Well, here’s now Nancy reacted.
[begin video clip]
The Press: Your reaction to the president’s letter?
Nancy Pelosi: No reaction. It’s ridiculous.
The Press: You have no reaction? Why not?
Nancy Pelosi: I mean, I haven’t really fully read it. We’ve been working. I’ve seen the essence of it, though. And it’s really sick.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: It’s really sick. Congressman?
Rep. Ken Buck, R-Co.: Well, what the president did was lay out the procedural flaws in the House process. And I think that if the bar stays this low for future impeachments, we’re going to have a problem as a country. Because anytime we have a Republican House or a Republican House and Senate and a Democrat president, the Republicans are going to go after the Democrat president if this is where the bar is. It shouldn’t be here.
Laura Ingraham: Now, your colleague Alcee Hastings sure spent a lot of time pontificating on impeachment today.
[begin video clip]
Alcee Hastings: What we have here is a corrupt president that wanted to do something to advance his political circumstances.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Well, a little interesting, slightly, that that congressman back in 1988, Mr. Hastings, was himself impeached when he was a federal judge for bribery and perjury. But like the circus, it keeps coming back up into town. I mean, the same people. He’s only one of eight people ever to be removed from office by a Senate impeachment trial. So, Congressman Jordan, you literally can’t make this up. I saw that and I said, “That can’t -- that actually isn’t --“
Jim Jordan: No.
Laura Ingraham: -- “Alcee Hastings. But I saw -- oh, yeah. It is Alcee.”
Jim Jordan: yeah, it just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Remember what Nancy Pelosi promised on September 24 when she launched the House of Representatives on this crusade? She promised that in the end, it’d be bipartisan. In the end, they would move the American people. When they actually had the hearings, it would move Americans towards their position. And in fact, just the opposite has happened. So much so that when they took the vote on the official enquiry, two Democrats voted with us. And now, one of those Democrats is going to switch and become a Republican. So, they have not made their case because they don’t have the facts on their side.
Laura Ingraham: Now, I read the entire letter. It’s hard-hitting.
Jim Jordan: Yeah.
Laura Ingraham: But a good friend of mine in Florida who’s very politically connected said, “The president is teaching Republicans how to fight.”
Male Speaker: [laughs]
Jim Jordan: I agree.
Laura Ingraham: Like -- like Mitt Romney’s rules of order. And we’re going to be very, “Oh, my dear friend and from New York. We respect you so much, but I have a slight disagreement, a quibble with you.” Like, he’s not going to do that. He’s going to take -- you come at him with a club and he’s going to come at you with something bigger and harder. And Congressman McClintock, they were hammering this letter. I mean, they seized this letter and they must have been like Evelyn Wood speed-readers, because they read this letter and they immediately pounced. Watch.
[begin video clip]
Male Speaker: This afternoon, he sent a six-page hyperbole filled screed. It’s a revealing glimpse into the president’s mind right now.
Male Speaker: This is a tantrum being done on White House letterhead. And senators who read this are going to be concerned about his mental state.
Female Speaker: The letter is more of a midnight rant by the president. And regrettably, it’s filled with lies.
Jake Tapper: Honestly, this is almost like a letter that Kim Jong Un wrote.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: [laughs] I mean, the letter is hard-hitting, but the letter is pretty darn, you know, on point on almost every point. They were trying to distract from the economy, they’re obsessed with getting him, they hate him, they hate the Americans who voted for him.
Tom McClintock: Well, I think that’s a big reason he was elected, not because he talks in smarmy platitudes like politicians, but precisely because he doesn’t. What you get with Donald Trump is the blunt, clear talk of a Manhattan businessman. He says what he means, he means what he says, and I think that a lot of people found that appealing.
Laura Ingraham: Congressman Buck, he says in this letter that the Democrats are the ones who are interfering with the next election. Everything they accuse of him of, they’re, in fact, doing. They’re intolerant; they’re filled with hate; they want to dilute the votes of Americans who will turn out to vote for Trump. They want to remove that choice from the ballot.
Ken Buck: And this is the opening statement that you’re going to see in the Senate, and the president is laying out for the American people what the American people can expect. And if Mitch McConnell shortens the Senate trial, it’s unfortunate because I think the American people are waiting to see the Republican narrative. We haven’t had that opportunity in the House.
Laura Ingraham: I ran into Louie Gohmert in the green room, Congressman Jordan. Louie is up for a fight. I mean, he’s like, “Why are we shutting” -- I get the moderates want to shut this thing down, and my concern as a lawyer to do this stuff is that you never know what you’re going to get.” Like, you know, you think it’s -- it’s like, don’t dig a hole when you’re on top of terra firma here. That’s the only concern, but I kind of want to take it to the wall, too, with these people.
Jim Jordan: Well, we’d all like to hear from the whistleblower, but I trust Mitch McConnel and what the senators are going to do. The facts are -- you know, the facts are on the president’s side. We’ve said this for months now. Four facts have never changed. We have the transcript; there was no linkage, no quid pro quo. We have the two guys on the call, Zelensky and President Trump, saying no pressure, no linkage, no pushing whatsoever. We have the fact Ukraine didn’t know the call -- aid was held up at the time of the call. Most importantly, the Ukrainians did nothing to get the aid released. So, those facts have never changed, will never change. We can focus on that.
Laura Ingraham: They keep saying you’re not arguing the substance.
Jim Jordan: That is the substance. Those are the facts.
Laura Ingraham: They’re like, “Oh, they’re not arguing the substance. Tom McClintock and Ken Buck and Jim Jordan are just talking about process.”
Tom McClintock: Well, let’s talk about the substance for a second. I mean, if you brought a case to a court that charged no actual crimes, but rather pretend crimes, crimes that you made up, those are the two articles of impeachment: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Those are not crimes. Obstruction of Congress means he went to the courts to defend his constitutional prerogatives. Abuse of power means he lawfully exercised his constitutional powers, just in a manner that the Congress --
Laura Ingraham: But no crime first.
Tom McClintock: And present no evidence that would be admissible in a court. It’s all hearsay or, in other words, gossip. That’s what’s supporting their flimsy case of not actual crimes but made-up crimes.
Laura Ingraham: Congressman --
Tom McClintock: This would have been thrown out in an instant.
Laura Ingraham: Congressman Jordan, I heard you’re going to be one of the people arguing. Is that true?
Jim Jordan: That’s up to the White House. I’d be happy to help if they think we can. Look, like I said, the facts are on the president’s side. I’m going to do anything I can to help the president.
Laura Ingraham: Hours of debate tomorrow. It’s going to keep going.
Jim Jordan: Six hours long. Well, an hour over the rule, and then six hours of debate, so --
Laura Ingraham: Coal in all of their stockings. Congressmen, great to see you. Thank you so much for being here tonight.
Jim Jordan: You bet. Thank you, Laura.
Laura Ingraham: And I want to now introduce you to Larry Tribe, Harvard law professor, anti-Trump zealot, and the legal expert that House Democrats consulted with behind closed doors to draft the articles of impeachment. He’s now telling Democrats, quote, “Now that failing to formally impeach Trump would invite foreign intervention in the 2020 election and set a dangerous precedent, another option seems vital to consider: voting for articles of impeachment, but holding off for the time being on actually transmitting them to the Senate.” This is a cute trick. They’re always changing it, right? Joining me now, Alan Dershowitz, Harvard law professor emeritus, pal of Tribe -- you know him well -- author of the book Guilt by Accusation. Alan, Democrats keep kind of -- they’re playing, like, a new trick. A little -- something else is coming out of the hat this time. It’s not a censure; it’s bribery. Then it’s extortion. Then it’s in the court document, but it’s not in the articles, and now it’s, “Well, we’ll have it in our back pocket, and we won’t put our cards on the table.” What about that?
Alan Dershowitz: I can’t think anything more unconstitutional or any greater deprivation of civil liberties than for Congress to impeach a president, to accuse him, and then not bring him to trial, not give him to the opportunity to be vindicated. I could write another book about that called Guilt by Impeachment. Guilt by Accusation -- it’s the same thing. You accuse him. You know what it would be like? It would be as if a prosecutor indicted somebody and said, “But I’m not bringing you to trial. You’re now indicted. You stand indicted, but you have no opportunity to prove your innocence.” You want to hear something interesting? Back in the 1970s, they did that to Richard Nixon. They named him as an unindicted co-conspirator in a criminal case. I was then on the national board of the ACLU. I objected to it, and I asked the ACLU to get involved on Nixon’s behalf to make sure his rights weren’t violated. Look, this impeachment is tearing the country apart, and my friend and colleague Larry Tribe’s idea would tear the country apart even more because it would accuse somebody formally without giving him an opportunity to be vindicated and acquitted. Hamilton and Madison would be turning over in their graves at Larry Tribe’s suggestion.
Laura Ingraham: Well, they’re probably -- there are practically Democrats sleeping with holograms of the Founders. I mean, the Founders are mentioned every five seconds by these folks. Now, Alan, Senator Sherrod Brown -- and this was an amazing interview today, I had to say; I watched it -- said this about McConnell today. [begin video clip]
Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio: I’m not easily shocked by Mitch McConnell. He doesn’t have respect for the institution, although you’d think the majority leader of the U.S. Senate would. But there is increasing talk that he should recuse himself from this trial, and we are supposed to sit there and judge the evidence.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: In other words, he says, you know, McConnell is essentially saying, “This thing is bunk, and we’re not voting for it,” and so he’s not impartial, Alan, so he has to recuse himself now. Okay.
Alan Dershowitz, Harvard professor emeritus: Well, I was involved in the Clinton impeachment, of course, and in the Clinton impeachment exactly the same thing happened. The leaders of the Senate -- the Democratic leaders of the Senate worked very closely with the White House, I know. I saw it; I was there. And so, you know, if you would invent a new way of having impeachment, it would be great as if it was nonpartisan, if all the people in the House were to just listen to the evidence objectively, and all the people in the Senate were to listen. But for the Democrats, after conducting an extraordinarily partisan impeachment, to now say suddenly, “We’re virtuous, and the trial itself has to be without any involvement” -- if McConnell has to recuse himself, so would Adam Schiff have to recuse himself, and Jerry Nadler and all of those, all of the people. Maxine Waters, who called for impeachment on day one --
Laura Ingraham: Oh, no, we need her in there just for comedy’s sake.
Alan Dershowitz: -- others. You know, you can’t have recusal on one side without recusal on the other. Look, this is tearing our country apart.
Laura Ingraham: Okay, Alan --
Alan Dershowitz: I hope we can find some way of bringing us together when this is finally over.
Laura Ingraham: That’s why we’re here, Alan. That’s why we’re on tonight. We’re bringing everyone together. So, Alan, word has it that you are being seriously considered for a role in arguing this case, along with the White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, Jordan, and a few others. How would you guys divide that up? I know you can’t say, or you might not do it, but hypothetically speaking, how would this be divided up?
Alan Dershowitz: Well, I can’t comment on it, obviously, but I think --
Laura Ingraham: Hypothetically speaking, counselor.
Alan Dershowitz: -- if I were to play a role, I would be a kind of amicus curiae, friend of the Senate, friend of the Constitution. I would be arguing not the facts, but the constitutional issues, going back to the Constitutional Convention, to the Federalist Papers, to point out how the Framers did not intend for there to be partisan impeachment, but intended for specific criteria, the four that are laid out, and not the kind of criteria --
Laura Ingraham: Got it.
Alan Dershowitz: -- that have been made up. That would be my role if it were decided that I would play that role, but I can’t comment on whether or not I’ve been asked, or whether or not I would agree to do that. It would be, of course, a great honor.
Laura Ingraham: Whoever would have thought a law professor wouldn’t like a hypothetical? But I gave you a hypothetical. Alan, thanks so much.
Alan Dershowitz: My pleasure.
Laura Ingraham: It’s great to see you tonight. Thanks so much. And disgraced former FBI lawyer Lisa Page; she swears she’s not political, and she’s the victim of a rightwing smear campaign, so naturally she’s giving her first interview to Rachel Maddow. Sara Carter, Matt Schlapp, Dinesh D’Souza sound off on that one and a lot more.
[commercial break]
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Lisa Page, former FBI lawyer: There is no one on this set of facts who has any experience in counterintelligence who would not have made the exact same decision. This is a question about whether Russia is working with a United States person to interfere in our election. We were obligated to figure out whether that was true or not. We were extraordinarily careful not to do anything that would allow this information to get out before we knew what we had.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Of course, that was disgraced former FBI lawyer Lisa Page moments ago showing just how nonpartisan she is. So now everyone would’ve done what she did. First big interview she gave on the Russia collusion’s biggest booster of course, her show Rachel Maddow. Now, she claims to be the victim of a right-wing smear campaign, but her timing is kind of curious. Her return to the public eye comes in the wake of the IG report bombshell that laid out the FBI’s stunning abuse of power to spy on the Trump campaign. Joining me now is Sara Carter, host of the Sara Carter Show on the podcast, and Fox News contributor Matt Schlapp, chairman of the American Conservative Union, and Dinesh D’Souza, conservative author and filmmaker. Sara, why is Page popping up now and why on Maddow?
Sara Carter, Fox News contributor: Well, Page, Lisa Page is actually trying to control the narrative now. These aren’t stupid people. They conducted a very stupid action, but that was only because they believed that Hillary Clinton was going to win the election. They never believed for one moment while they were investigating President Trump and conducting illegal surveillance of Carter Page that they would ever be caught. So, at this point in time, and this is according to my sources, sources that are former FBI, sources that are with the FBI right now, that the players that are being called out in the IG report are trying to control the narrative. Those that haven’t come out publicly that he’s talked about in that report that basically altered documents or misled the FISA court are scrambling now. They’re getting attorneys. They’re trying to figure out how they’re going to handle this and believe me, people are throwing people under the bus right now.
Laura Ingraham: Well, --
Sara Carter: This is what’s happening and so –
Laura Ingraham: This is –
Sara Carter: There’s a lot of movement.
Laura Ingraham: Yeah. This is amazing and Matt, she also talked about the leaked text messages.
Matt Schlapp: She did.
Laura Ingraham: You know, as Trump likes to say the lovebirds. Watch.
[begin video clip]
Lisa Page: I know what it looks like when you’re trying -- when the Department is trying to protect people and protect information, and I know what it looks like when they’re not. There were plenty of ways to fulfill their congressionally mandated oversight responsibility without politicizing our messages, without shoveling them out in the way that they did. My speculation is because this was not a great time for the Justice Department.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Okay. So, they had an insurance policy and they wanted to make sure POTUS was kept informed and don’t -- please don’t let this happen, Peter. Don’t let it -- oh, don’t worry.
Matt Schlapp, ACU chair: So, there’s two points here. The first is the show, the Maddow Show is wall-to-wall there’s all this evidence of Russian collusion. They’re literally still pushing this, Laura. After Bob Mueller did everything -- hired every Democrat he could to try to find the evidence, found no evidence. Second of all, on the text messages the reason why it’s important for the American people and the taxpayers to see it, it wasn’t about their sexual relationship. It was about two high-powered FBI officials talking such never-Trump trash on the elected president of the United States. That’s the part everyone needs to see. It’s like there was a behind-the-scenes effort to, as they said, stop him and the texts prove it.
Laura Ingraham: Yeah. Dinesh, I want to get your reaction to today’s stunning, and of course, as Sara alluded to, it’s related news, the FISA court. Finally. I was wondering when this was going to happen. Orders the FBI to fix national security wiretaps after that damning IG report. The FISA court judge writing, Dinesh, "The frequency with which representations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession and with which they withheld information detrimental to their case calls into question whether information contained in other FBI applications is reliable." Dinesh, how big a deal is this and what does it mean for Lisa Page and all of her protestations tonight?
Dinesh D’Souza, filmmaker: Well, first of all, it’s very clear that these FISA courts rely completely on the files that are put on their desk. I believe that out of hundreds and hundreds of FISA requests the courts have denied almost none of them, maybe one, maybe two. And so clearly the FISA court isn’t really a court in the sense that it’s conducting investigations, hearings, cross examination, none of that. They basically look at the file and they go sure. And now they’ve realized that they have been lied to. Now, while the FISA court doesn’t focus on the issue of bias, and of course the IG himself, Horowitz, said there’s no bias here, I find that an amazing conclusion when you have errors, a lot of them, and they all fall on the same side. When the tennis ball falls once or twice on this side and once or twice on that side, it’s random. It can be incompetence. It could be an accident. But if the tennis ball falls 17 times on the same side of the net, that is prima facie evidence of bias. So, it’s kind of weird to say there have been all these mistakes, they all fall in the same direction, and yet no bias here, guys.
Laura Ingraham: Yeah, but blame the right-wing media because we’re -- I guess we in the right-wing media, we wrote those text messages. That was all us. Now, this is what James Comey said on Fox about getting back to Dinesh and his point about how hard it was to get a FISA warrant.
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James Comey, former FBI director: I was overconfident in the procedures that the FBI and Justice had built over 20 years. I thought they were robust enough. It’s incredibly hard to get a FISA. I was overconfident in those.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: All right. Let’s put up the graphic, Jimmy. Okay, 1081 requests for electronic surveillance under FISA in 2018. One was withdrawn. One was rejected. Approval rate of more than wait for it, 99 percent. Sara, how does Jim Comey -- how does -- how was the man ever FBI director? Trump should’ve fired him on day one.
Sara Carter: On day one he should’ve been fired.
Laura Ingraham: Day one that was a critical, critical -- I wish we could do it over moment.
Sara Carter: He signed the FISA. He is responsible. He was the director of the FBI. He knew very well what was going on there. He was in close communication with Andrew McCabe. We know that Andrew McCabe was in on this, had meetings with Lisa Page, as well as Peter Strzok. They wanted to stop the president. They wanted to coup the president of the United States. This is what they wanted, and this is what they did and Laura, this was not their first rodeo and the FISA court knows that. They know that they probably had applications in there that have been fudged by the FBI. This was supposed to be their top brass. This was supposed to be their top brass. So, how can Comey or Ray say that nobody else has made a mistake when their premiere agents made more than 17 errors on Carter Page.
Laura Ingraham: How does Robert -- how does Christopher Wray stay as head of the FBI here? I mean, how -- I mean, he’s like got a stockpile on the FBI.
Matt Schlapp: It might be somewhat unfair not to Wray but even to others. I think the American people would like to see a wholesale change.
Sara Carter: Right.
Matt Schlapp: In who’s running these agencies because this is completely corrupt. I want to go back to what Dinesh said. If there was no political bias in spying on team Trump, how come only team Trump was spied on? You just brought up all those FISAs. How many Democratic presidential candidates or presidents were spied on? This is just -- I mean, this is obvious what’s happening here. And we just need a wholesale change in leadership.
Laura Ingraham: Can you imagine what Susan Rice, and Samantha Powers, guys, and Ben Rhodes would have said if the shoe were on the other foot?
Sara Carter: Can you imagine what --
Laura Ingraham: What they would be -- they would be chaining themselves to the White House gate.
Matt Schlapp: We weren’t even allowed to attack President Obama without them throwing invectives at us.
Laura Ingraham: Oh, yeah.
[cross talk]
Matt Schlapp: Imagine spying on them.
Sara Carter: We don’t even know who they unmasked, Laura. We don’t even know yet who they unmasked.
Laura Ingraham: Yeah.
Sara Carter: What about the 300 or so unmaskings that occurred with Samantha Powers at the U.N.?
Laura Ingraham: I still want to know about that. I still -- and Dinesh, finally, we’re almost out of time. Dinesh, do you think people are going to jail after this Durham report comes out? Your sense on where this is going?
Dinesh D’Souza: I sure hope so. Because look, you know, they’ve been doing this to us. And it’s amazing how they all get away with it. Everyone seems to be -- there’s no accountability. So, until we do to them what they’ve been doing to us, they’re never going to stop. I think that’s a principle for the Republicans to keep in mind, that we have to ultimately do to them what they’ve been doing to us, else they will keep saying, “Fine, when they other guys come in, they’re always going to say, “Let’s move on.” Then we come in, and we resume our shenanigans.” And so, the breakdown --
Laura Ingraham: Yeah.
Dinesh D’Souza: -- of civility and rule of law in America is because one side has become gangsterized and the other side has put up with it.
Laura Ingraham: All right, guys. Thank you so much. Great to see all of you tonight. Merry Christmas if I don’t see you beforehand.
Matt Schlapp: Merry Christmas.
Sara Carter: Merry Christmas.
Laura Ingraham: And up next, the latest impeachment poll has some really, really bad news for the Democrats. Our all-star pollster panel breaks down what could be the most significant impeachment findings yet. Don’t go away.
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Laura Ingraham: There’s another new impeachment poll out and it’s -- sorry, bad news for the Democrats. A new CNN poll shows overall support for impeachment dropped five points just since November. But more importantly, support among Democrats, they see the writing on the wall, plummeted from 90 percent to 77 percent just last month. Now, that finding may be the most significant polling result to date on impeachment. Here to tell us why that is is Scott Rasmussen, pollster and editor-at-large for Ballotpedia and John McLaughlin, Trump 2020 campaign pollster. All right. Scott, let’s start with you. That is a pretty significant shift among Democrats. What’s driving it?
Scott Rasmussen, pollster: Well, look, I don’t like to get hung up on any one poll. But all the data, not just that CNN poll are showing very clearly that Republicans have won the impeachment debate. Democrats are frustrated because things aren’t going anywhere. WE were told a couple of weeks ago that support for impeachment was going to grow. Republicans were going to come on board. Now the numbers are shifting back the other way. And democrats and everybody else is aware the president is not going to be removed by the Senate. And in fact, probably the most significant finding of all, or the most significant data point of all is not even in a poll, we’re sitting here talking about Democrats who are now at risk for their re-election because of voting for impeachment. That wasn’t the way this was supposed to work out. The writing is on the wall. Republicans won the impeachment battle.
Laura Ingraham: John, that’s pretty definitive from my old pal, Rasmussen here. But Jeff Toobin is a revered CNN legal analyst. He had a real problem with this poll. Watch.
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Jeffrey Toobin, CNN analyst: I don’t believe that pol for one second.
Reporter Question: What part don’t you believe?
Jeffrey Toobin: The 90 to 77 percent. You know, it’s just I don’t believe it. Like, it makes no sense that that number would change like that. Life has shown us that polls are sometimes wrong. That poll is wrong.
Female Speaker: Wow.
Jeffrey Toobin: Just because I said so, okay?
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: But boy, when Fox had a poll out that showed --
John McLaughlin, pollster: Right.
Laura Ingraham: -- [laughs] Trump says it’s wrong, you know, when the Fox poll is bad. But, I mean, it’s not just that poll, Scott is making the point. This is -- you’re interviewing voters in Wisconsin four weeks ago, three weeks ago. They’re like, “Can you guys talk about health care? I mean, we’re sick of this Ukraine thing.”
John McLaughlin: Right. Right. Because those bad media polls are getting bad for them. Every one of the polls that came out today, whether it was CNN, ABC, Quinnipiac, they all under poll Republicans. Can you believe it? They all had less than 30 percent Republicans. Well, we were 33 percent on Election Day in 2016. So, they can’t believe that the polls that they rigged are actually going against them. Because after two weeks of hearings, they bored the country to death. They came up with no evidence, no proof, and all they proved was that Donald Trump is innocent of everything they’re saying. And this is a railroad. It’s all politics and the country’s tired of it. They want to move on to other things. We produced the campaign, the Trump campaign -- through Tony Fabrizio produced the poll in the 30 districts that Democrats now hold because one switched. We already got one that became a Republican because of this. But in that poll, 53 percent opposed the impeachment, only 43 support. And they said their Congress -- member --
Laura Ingraham: Yeah.
John McLaughlin: -- of Congress, only 36 percent said deserve re-election. So, they are big at risk and this is backfiring big time.
Laura Ingraham: All right. So, I think, Scott, they hear Poroshenko, Shokin, Yovanovitch. It’s like your Dr. Zhivago. I mean, like, it’s very complicated [laughs]. It’s, like, it’s a lot of different players. Not saying it’s not important. In general matter, things are important. But I think a lot of this goes down to what they’re seeing now as far as the results of this months and months of discussion of Ukraine, Trump’s beating, and these are national polls. They’re not ever battleground state. But there is a national poll, interesting snapshot, beating every major presidential candidate. We’ll put up the graphic. Here it goes, and this is USA Today’s Suffolk poll. Biden, he’s beating; Bernie Sanders, Warren, Bloomberg, Buttigieg. Some months back, that was not the case. Trump was losing to pretty much every one of those characters. Scott, significant, or just a blip?
Scott Rasmussen: Well, Laura, I think it suggests that all the trends are moving a little bit in the president’s direction. Things are better for him today than they were a month or so ago. Partly, it’s because of what we’ve seen in the Democratic presidential debates, partly it’s the economy, partly it’s the impeachment. But you can’t get overconfident if you’re the president’s team if you want the president to win. Polls about a general election in December of the preceding year aren’t all that predictive, and what they’re telling us is it’s likely to be a close election. If nothing changes, we’re likely to be talking later on election night about places like Wisconsin and Michigan and Pennsylvania, and so I don’t think either side should feel great about this. Right now, compared to a month or two ago, the president is doing a little better.
Laura Ingraham: Scott, I’ll take a bet about the late-night Wisconsin and Michigan, okay? Because we heard that about the parliamentary election in Britain last week. It was going to be right down to the wire, and Boris is, like, popping the champagne at 7:00 p.m. So, I think you’re right, though. Right, John? Don’t get overconfident. You’ve got to be -- the president has got to be very positive, and I’d let the Democrats dissolve themselves. He’s made his case, and I think the public has already spoken.
John McLaughlin: You’re exactly right. We’re running like we’re behind, but in the meantime, the one name you forgot from Ukraine was Biden. Biden used to be the frontrunner. He’s now trailing because he’s collateral damage from this, because everybody sees about him and Hunter. And I’ll tell you what, the only one who thinks she may be a winner on this -- Nancy Pelosi is pushing this. We’ve got to watch out, because if she were to impeach and remove the president and then go after Mike Pence, she becomes president. And when Americans figure that out, this impeachment is dead.
Laura Ingraham: All right, gentlemen --
John McLaughlin: It’s dead on arrival in the Senate.
Laura Ingraham: [laughs] All right, gentlemen, thanks so much. Great to see you both.
John McLaughlin: Thank you.
Scott Rasmussen: Thank you.
Laura Ingraham: And for two years we’ve been beaten over the head about Russian election meddling, but how about the homegrown meddling that the media is ignoring? We’re going to bring you the details. Plus, Bernie Kerik is here with late-breaking developments in that horrific murder of an 18-year-old college student, Tessa Majors. Stay there.
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Male Speaker: Now you have immigrant communities that afraid to even go forward and report crimes.
Male Speaker: Millions living in the shadows, working some of the toughest jobs --
Male Speaker: They live in constant fear because the president is cracking down on illegal immigration.
[end video clip]
Laura Ingraham: Those statements from the Dems in the media -- they’re not just tired; they’re wrong. Remember the rush to impeach President Trump? Remember how it hinged on the conspiracy that the integrity of the 2020 election -- it’s all at stake? Well, Democrats at the state level, though, are actually doing things now to potentially dilute your vote and disenfranchise millions of Americans. New York began handing out driver’s licenses to illegal aliens on Monday. Take a look at that line. It went on and on. The same day, New Jersey passed a law also -- coincidence -- giving illegal aliens the right to drive. Look at this reaction from the supporters and recipients.
[begin video clip]
[cheering]
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Laura Ingraham: Certainly looks like they’re in the shadows. Here with reaction, Tom Homan, former acting ICE director. Tom, Jersey is also poised to license illegal aliens. Supporters say, I guess, it’s going to make the roads safer. They’ll be driving more safely, have to get insurance, and so forth.
Tom Homan, former ICE director: Well, look, this is going to turn into an epidemic, just like sanctuary cities. I think there’s 12 states now issuing driver’s licenses. If the president is watching this tonight, or somebody in the administration is watching it, we need to take a harsher stance now and come fighting. We’re in a fight for our lives in this country, and a privilege like a driver’s license -- you don’t give a privilege to someone that’s in the country illegally. And most of these people that are getting driver’s licenses have had due process, been ordered removed by a federal judge, so not only are they here illegally against federal law, they’re here as a fugitive against the orders of a federal court, and we’re going to reward them with a driver’s license. It’s ridiculous.
Laura Ingraham: Well, wait a second. Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Maxine Waters are saying on Capitol Hill all day long yesterday, all last week, nobody is above the law, Tom Homan. Nobody is above the law.
Tom Homan: Well, according to Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer and the rest of them, illegal aliens are above the law. When the president announced almost a year ago, we were going to do a nationwide operation and look for family groups who’ve had --
Laura Ingraham: They freaked out. Can’t do it.
Tom Homan: They freaked out, because they’re above the law. Even when the federal judge ordered them removed from this country based on laws enacted by Congress, illegal aliens are above the law.
Laura Ingraham: Well, what about -- Trump is supposed to be the toughest guy on illegal immigrants, and you see lines and lines of illegal immigrants in New York. So, you know, you go on Facebook; everybody is like, “Why -- where’s ICE? Where’s ICE?” Line up and say, Guys, you’ve got to --
Tom Homan: Well, like I said, we’ve got to take a tougher stance. And I saw the acting Secretary on Lou Dobbs the other night --
Laura Ingraham: They’re not afraid. They’re not in the shadows.
Tom Homan: -- taking this lightly. We cannot take this lightly. First of all, we don’t even know who these people are. When they go to the DMV, they’re going to show a Mexican matricula ID, which the FBI has done numerous reports saying they’re the most vulnerable to fraud. So, these people are going to be presenting fraudulent foreign identification, and we don’t even know if it’s them. And this law in New York -- it goes beyond just not -- it doesn’t allow them to share their information with ICE, only ICE. They specifically call immigration. And not only that, if ICE actually gets a court order to get the information, within three days they’re supposed to notify the subject of the inquiry so they can let them know ICE is looking for them.
Laura Ingraham: Right.
Tom Homan: --- ICE is looking for them.
Laura Ingraham: Right.
Tom Homan: It’s a direct violation of 8 USC 1373. It’s a direct violation of federal statute.
Laura Ingraham: This administration is falling down, though, on my view on this issue. Maybe it’s the election. Hispanic voters, a lot of them are supporting Trump. I don’t think legal immigrants and American citizens of Hispanic descent like this. We were in El Paso. We did that big show in El Paso. Tens of thousands of people are lined up. One after the other came up to me saying he’s got to be tougher on this immigration.
Tom Homan: I’m with you 100 percent. That’s one of the reasons I’m here. I’m hoping someone’s listening and is going to take hard action fast.
Laura Ingraham: And they’re going to be voting. I don’t care what anyone says. This is also –
Tom Homan: Oh, absolutely.
Laura Ingraham: --- frauding the vote, right, Tom?
Tom Homan: Absolutely.
Laura Ingraham: All right. Tom Homan, thanks so much. Another horrific story coming out of New York. Tessa Majors, a Barnard College freshman, brutally murdered, stabbed to death allegedly by three young teens in New York City. A 13-year-old suspect was in court today charged with second degree murder. Now there’s a frantic manhunt on for another suspect, a 14-year-old who allegedly bolted from a car yesterday on his way to meet with police. On top of the gruesome details there now controversy over information released by the NYPD union chief about what Majors was up to the night she was murdered. Joining me now former NYPD Commissioner Bernie Kerik. Bernie, I read this story the night it happened. It just -- your heart breaks. It is horrific at every level but Ed Mullins, the president of the NYPD sergeant’s benevolent association is being accused of victim blaming. Reports are that the victim was perhaps at some point out there looking to buy marijuana but what do you think about all this?
Bernard Kerik, former NYPD commissioner: Listen. I know what Mullins, you know, and I take him at his word that that’s not what he was doing. He was trying to explain or talk about the mayor’s policies on not locking people up for marijuana. I know the mayor blasted him but I also think that’s because Ed Mullins and the other unions have exposed the mayor for an anti-cop mayor for somebody that has promoted anti-cop rhetoric, for somebody that has emboldened the thugs, for somebody that has supported groups that have bashed the police. So, you know, I don’t want to get into what Mullins said. I think this is a tragedy. I think it’s horrible. It’s reminiscent of what was going on in the city back in the ‘70s, ‘80s, early ‘90s before Rudy Giuliani created the renaissance of New York and Bloomberg followed all the crime reduction strategies. This is something that we have to look at extremely carefully right now because I think the city’s changing. All you have to do is take a walk around the city right now. Rampant homelessness, panhandlers.
Laura Ingraham: I saw it last week.
Bernard Kerik: All the quality of life crimes, quality of life issues that we addressed in the early ‘90s to reduce crime, they’re all back.
Laura Ingraham: They’re coming back.
Bernard Kerik: And they’re coming back fast.
Laura Ingraham: Bernie, the report was that these 13, 14-year-old individuals were -- just decided they were going to go rob people in the park. They just made a decision like let’s go.
Bernard Kerik: Well, listen. This is -- according to a number of reports now, this wasn’t the first one. There were a number of these that happened prior to Ms. Majors that some were reported, some weren’t reported. They came out after the fact. This is an area that obviously there needs to be a bigger police presence. There needs to be more security. And this isn’t the only place in the city this is happening. There are spikes in the violent crime indicators right now. This is something that the police commissioner is looking at, I’m sure, but look, I’m scared to death that the city’s reverting back to where it was prior to 1994.
Laura Ingraham: Oh, yeah. yeah, Bloomberg stop and frisk. I mean, he had to go out and do the mea culpa for that. That’s going to end up getting people hurt as well. I want to show this video real quick. We’re almost out of time. This knife-wielding man was attacking a woman near Park Avenue today. A friend of mine actually alerted me to this in a video and it was posted on Facebook and he was like flying around Park Avenue today just slashing at people. We’re out of time, Bernie, but that’s just one example of what you’re talking about. And thank you for sounding the alarm tonight on this anti-cop rhetoric. Bernie, thanks so much.
Bernard Kerik: Thank you.
Laura Ingraham: And coming up, it’s time for me to answer your questions. Ingraham’s inbox is next.
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Laura Ingraham: Time again for Ingraham’s Inbox. The first email is from Felix who’s writing in from Muskegon, Michigan. "Laura, I was a Mexican citizen until last year and went through hell and back to get my U.S.A. citizenship and now they want to give illegal immigrants license and other rights? B.S. Let me go through the right process. I also used to think I was a Democrat. Not no more. Trump 2020." That sounds like a country music song. All right. That’s all the time we have tonight. Keep the emails coming. We like to read them. Shannon Bream and the fantastic Fox News at Night team, they all can dance, by the way. I know personally.
Shannon Bream, host, ‘Fox News @ Night’: Oh. Please tell me –
Laura Ingraham: Take it from here.
Shannon Bream: --- there’s no video of that? Keep it in the vault.
Laura Ingraham: I won’t say anything more, Shannon. It’s between us hostesses.
Shannon Bream: Hmm. All right, Laura, thank you so much.
Laura Ingraham: Have a good one.
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