Published February 26, 2019
This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," February 26, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
SEAN HANNITY, HOST: He really is. Great show as always.
All right. Welcome to “Hannity.” It is 9:00 p.m. on the East Coast of the United States, 9:00 a.m. right here in Hanoi. We're in Vietnam where we are broadcasting live for the second straight day.
In just moments, I will speak one-on-one with Univision anchor Jorge Ramos. He was just detained by Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro at the presidential palace, oh, because the dictator couldn't handle the truth about socialism.
An amazing story -- Jorge confronted him about citizen being so desperate. Remember the promise of socialism, pilfering garbage trucks for food. The dictator had Jorge detained, he took his tapes and cell phone, and cameras and we'll have more on the desperate situation in Venezuela and this confrontation.
But tonight, we begin right here in Vietnam. Tomorrow, President Trump will keep off a series of historic meetings with North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un. Both leaders arrived yesterday. The president on Air Force One and Kim Jong-un via a 60-hour train ride. Somebody buy this guy a plane. Maybe it was in the shop getting repaired.
But two years ago, remember that hate-Trump media mob told you, we the people, president, oh, he's leading us to nuclear annihilation. In response to what, North Korea, hostilities, rockets over Japan threatening Guam and the continental U.S., Trump deployed multiple aircraft carrier strike groups in the region. He nicknamed Kim Jong-un a little rocket man. He reminded the despot about America's nuclear superiority.
He squeezed North Korea's only real ally China with tariffs. He deployed strategy called peace through strength. And all while America's left told you the sky was falling, and a nuclear holocaust. Little rocket man, fire and fury, my button is bigger than yours.
This is how the media reacted.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If the idea of a nuclear showdown with North Korea keeps you up at night, I would recommend deleting your Twitter app.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He is not really being cavalier with the threats about nuclear war. He's being cavalier in a way that makes him seem demented.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a message from a person who is not well, from a leader who is not fit for office.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: President Trump is goading Kim Jong-un to test a nuclear missile again, to improve its reliability, to show him wrong. And fundamentally, I think it comes across as two kindergartners who are jostling each other except that each has nuclear weapons.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Too late. After 100,000 Americans die --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: After a nuclear holocaust.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Or after a million die in Seattle.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And that's where we are. This is not an exaggeration.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trump's comments about nuclear weapons have experts worried he could literally inadvertently trigger a catastrophe.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: They said the same thing when Reagan called the former Soviet Union the "evil empire". And per usual, when he challenged Gorbachev, tear down this wall. They are completely wrong again and again and as you might've noticed, there's no nuclear holocaust. In fact, quite the opposite.
What do we see? North Korea completely stopping firing ballistic missiles over Japan, threatening the region, threatening Guam, threatening the continental United States. They returned the remains of U.S. servicemen, brave heroes and died in battle during the Korean War. They agreed to negotiate denuclearization of the entire Korean peninsula. Oh, and hostages will return, a huge deal.
And it's not just North Korea, now, China is being held accountable for its rampant intellectual property theft. Because of the real serious threat of ongoing tariffs, well, guess what? New, better trade deals that help Americans, that help farmers, that help manufacturers, that help our car industry are now on the table.
Despite all of this success, of course, the hate-Trump media mob and Democrats publicly rooting for the president to fail in these upcoming negotiations with Kim Jong-un. We have eight U.S. senators, this is a joke, releasing an open letter to the president bashing him for his diplomatic efforts, insinuating our president is a liar.
Well, let's look at the hate-Trump media mob's obsession with a month's old statement from the president, oh, that he and Kim fell in love during their first encounter. OK, let me translate for anyone in the media who is too stupid to figure it out on their own, who never left the comforts of their little TV studios that are way overpaid.
The president developed a beneficial working relationship with someone we are trying to negotiate with. By the way, if we can stop North Korea from threatening the entire region, that would be a good thing. That's when nuclear annihilation's just a button away if we don't fix it.
So, let's face it, here is a sad reality. We have the left in this country, Democrats, mainstream media, they don't obviously want the president to succeed, not just on this issue. Even when safety and security of the American people is on the line.
This is sick. Their psychotic hatred of this president is more important to them than the well-being of South Koreans, the entire region, and Americans. Now, if that wasn't the case, remember it would fund the wall of the southern border like they were willing to do Obama's second term. When Trump is doing it, it's immoral. If that wasn't the case, they could not have tried to ruin Judge Kavanaugh's life, smear, slander, besmirchment during their botched attempt to block his nomination.
If that wasn't the case, they would not have voted against the born alive bill which would protected living infants who survive the botched abortions, really? Pretty heartless. And all the Democratic presidential candidates in the Senate voted against this bill, all of them.
Now, that brings us to tonight's history lesson. While the left is actively rooting against President Trump because that then gets in the way of the desired power -- well, their own track record in foreign policy has been an absolute disgrace. Frankly, another failure. Their failed strategy can be summed up with two words: international bribery. If only we suck up to dictators and pay them the money, maybe they like us.
1994, then President Bill Clinton bragging about giving North Korea the world in exchange for just a promise not to build the nuke. It didn't last long. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BILL CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENT: This is a good deal for the United States. North Korea will freeze and then dismantle its nuclear program. South Korea and our other allies will be better protected. The entire world will decipher as we slow the spread of nuclear weapons.
South Korea, with support from Japan and other nations, will bear most of the cost of providing North Korea with fuel to make up to the nuclear energy it is losing. And they will pay for alternative power system for North Korea that will allow them to produce electricity while making much order for them to produce nuclear weapons.
The United States and international inspectors will carefully monitor North Korea to make sure it keeps its commitments. Only as it does so will North Korea fully join the community of nations.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: Well, it wasn't a good deal for the American people because North Korea took the money and ran, and today, yes, they have nuclear weapons arsenal. President Trump is now stuck cleaning up his mess.
And, sadly, Obama didn't learn from Clinton's abject foreign policy failures. Remember, 2015, then-President Obama tried to bribe the world's leading sponsor of terrorism with $150 billion in cash and other currency that they dumped on a tarmac in Iran for the mullahs of Iran that say "death to America" and "death to Israel" and burn our flags. What do we get in return? We got a promise again that they wouldn't develop nuclear weapons for a few years.
President Obama called it an unprecedented achievement, and stupidity, but Iran use that money what? We now know to fund terrorism all over the Middle East as proxies of wars all over the place, killing so many innocent humans in the process, killing innocent civilians around the world. Iran still publicly plotting annihilation of Israel, still burning the U.S. flag, still chanting death to America death to Israel.
And Obama's flawed nuclear deal, thankfully because of President Trump, is now totally obsolete. If we don't learn from the past, yes, we are doomed to repeat it. Just like Reagan peace through strength, we can learn from success as well.
That's why the president will ultimately open up the spigot of economic opportunity in North Korea if Kim Jong-un agrees to join the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty which opens up his country to regular unabated checks on his nuclear program. And it will help his people out in the meantime. And he also has to agree to phase out and dismantle all of his nuclear weapons. Accountability, verification, or no deal?
Now, as a country that is learning from our past failures, it's critically important, not just abroad, but right here in America with the United States. Our country, in 2010, when former President Obama's fellow Democrats ran Obamacare down your throat, remember, they made a lot of promises again and again. Keep your doctor, keep your plan and save less and lower drug prices.
Well, a lot of people lost their doctors, lost their plans and everybody is paying more. All Americans will be insured. It didn't happen. Healthcare costs have skyrocketed, some Americans only have one plan, 27 million Americans today still remain uninsured.
Bernie Sanders, Kamala Harris, nearly every far left radical Democrat is pushing Obamacare on steroids, human growth hormone times a million. They're literally calling for every American to lose, you cannot have private health insurance, and let ever so confident federal government, the ones who gave us Obamacare handle it all. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WOLF BLITZER, CNN MODERATOR: Will these people be able to keep their health insurance plans, their private plans through their employers if there is a Medicare for All programs that you endorse?
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS, I-VT: What they will -- what will change in their plans is the color of their card. So instead of having Blue Cross Blue Shield card, instead of having UnitedHealth insurance card, they're going to have a Medicare card.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: All right. The multitrillion-dollar big government takeover just one small part of what is now the radical extremist Democratic socialist 2020 agenda. Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, pushing widespread reparations, also almost every single Democratic candidate right now is backing this insane green new deal.
Free everything for everybody. Free child care, free housing, free health, food, government healthy food, free vacations, free family leave, free health care but you can't have private insurer, free, free, free. Oh, and retirement, and you don't even have to work. Oh, yes, by the way, no more oil, no more gas, no more airplanes, no more cows, no more power cars and the government will rebuild every single building in America for energy efficiency.
Well, all in ten years, by the way, we have our first cost estimate at a meager, oh, up to $94 trillion. Even though the world is to end in 12 years, according to Ocasio-Cortez. Now, this plan would wreck the United States. It would be an unmitigated disaster, nothing but a path to poverty. It would destroy the greatest wealth and innovation producing system that mankind has ever seen, called capitalism.
And that's not all. The radical plans keep coming and coming. It's open borders, eliminate ICE. And if they get their way, only the government gets to have a Second Amendment right.
In fact, as we speak, House Democrats -- they are prepping a bill that would criminalize many gun sales. And let's never forget their unified opposition to living humans surviving abortions. This is a new extreme radical Democratic socialist party. All Democratic senators running for president voted against the Born Alive Survivors Protection Act.
Wow. The most innocent among us. If our government doesn't protect babies, living on their own, what's the point?
All these radical plans, they have one common them: government power. Democrats want to bribe you, we, the American people and take away all your fear, convince you that giving up basic fundamental rights in exchange for security, lofty government promises, and free everything.
Now, it's time tonight we call on everyone in America. Learn from history. Driving dictators and kissing up to them never works.
Socialism always ends in death, property and destruction for all. We will have a lot more coming up in the course of the show.
But first let's preview what is about to go down tomorrow in the nation's swamp. So, while the president is here in Vietnam, the president's former attorney Michael Cohen is going to testify in public. Three days in a row, one, two, three, OK? Tomorrow is the only public one, before the House Oversight Committee. He's going to be drilled by some of the worst Trump haters like Ocasio-Cortez, Congressman Tlaib and others.
Now, keep in mind among other issues, Michael Cohen did plead guilty, lying to Congress. It wasn't long ago the prominent Democrats hated Michael Cohen, called him out repeatedly for being a liar. Now, they were his best friend. Take a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. ERIC SWALWELL, D-CALIF.: As far as Michael Cohen's credibility, Rudy Giuliani described him as a proven liar.
REP. STEVE COHEN, D-TENN.: I think that Michael Cohen, Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump have about the same amount of credibility. They all use at best situational ethics, but a problem more likely, they just lie constantly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANNITY: So, now, Michael Cohen is the Democrats new best friend forever. Sadly, he has been to report to prison inmate to serve multi-year sentence.
And you know what? He and his family have been through an awful lot, frankly health and Democrats, in my opinion, are just shamefully using him as a political prop not to learn anything new but once again bludgeoning President Trump to make him look bad, while he's on the middle of high- stakes, historic negotiations abroad here in Vietnam to keep the world safer.
Whatever happened to politics ending at the water's edge? You know, it is a pretty heartless act by a group of people just pointed by all things Trump. And as of tomorrow, as the kangaroo court plays out on Capitol Hill, President Trump is going to be fighting for America's interest abroad, flying 25 hours to make the world a safer place, keeping the country and the citizens of the United States safe in the process. Pretty despicable.
Joining us now, Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan and California Congressman Devin Nunes.
Good to see you both.
Congressman Jordan, let's start with you.
So, in the middle of what is really important issue for the safety, security of the world, rockets haven't been fired over Japan in 15 months. No more threats to America, Guam, the entire Korean peninsula. Michael Cohen gets front and center coverage by the Democrats. Not one but three days in a row in the middle of these negotiations.
REP. JIM JORDAN, R-OH: Yes, Sean, look, you are exactly right. While the president is working to make the world safer, the Democrats first announced witness of 116th Congress is a guy who was going to prison in two months for lying to Congress. They are giving to the guy who lied to banks, lied to the IRS, lied to all kinds of folks but tomorrow he will get center stage to spread more lies about the commander in chief of our country, again while the commander in chief, while the president of the United States is working to make the world safer and meeting with Kim there in Vietnam.
HANNITY: You know, Congressman Nunes, first of all, why would anybody that has Michael Cohen's interest at heart, why would they allow him to do this at this point? When he's now got to settle, will he potentially put himself in greater jeopardy if he says something that contradicts what he said before? Will there be another investigation or some type of threat? Does he have immunity deal in this case?
REP. DEVIN NUNES, R-CALIF.: Well, Sean, congratulations on being in Vietnam, on a very best occasion, hopefully historical. Tomorrow is going to be Michael Cohen live in front of Jim Jordan's committee. On Thursday, unfortunately, it's going to be behind closed doors in a classified setting.
And one of the challenges we have here is we already had Michael Cohen in. He's been prosecuted. He's been prosecuted for lying to the FBI, pled guilty and -- I'm sorry, lying to Congress. So, why is he testifying behind closed doors for the House Intelligence Committee?
This is not a man who has any classified information whatsoever. And what I'm concerned about is, is they will twist things around. They will take things that happen because they will know what publicly happens tomorrow. And in our committee, they're going to take things, take what they want and selectively leak. So, we'll be dealing with that problem here on Thursday night, I can guarantee you.
HANNITY: Will he be under oath?
JORDAN: Yes, he will be under oath.
Sean, this is the best they got. This is all they've got. And remember, this is step one in their process to go to impeachment and try to remove the president from office.
Understand what happened last week. Last week, in Chairman Jerry Nadler's district, Tom Steyer, mega donor with a town hall to encourage Mr. Nadler to pursue impeachment. Last night in Baltimore, Tom Steyer organized a town hall in Elijah Cumming's district to encourage impeachment.
This is the best they've got, a guy who is going to prison for lying to Congress. This is how they will launch their effort to ultimately getting to impeaching the president. That is how desperate they are. But it starts tomorrow.
HANNITY: While the president is here in Vietnam --
JORDAN: Exactly.
HANNITY: -- you know, trying to negotiate the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. It's really outrageous.
Congressman Nunes, one question. So many people kept asking me. We have been able to slowly unravel this onion, take a layer off the day as it relates to the deep state. We now know James Baker, the general counselor, the top lawyer of the FBI and Comey thought that Hillary should be indicted. We know obstruction would be a slam-dunk case. We're waiting on FISA operation, 302s, interviews, Gang of Eight information.
When are we going to get all of that?
NUNES: So here is what we're doing. We're going to be doing talking about the last phase of our investigation and laying out everything else that we have left to do. We're going to be working with Jim Jordan and Doug Collins. So, Republicans are going to have the task force that we set up in the last Congress continuing.
It's going to take declassification by the president. I think it's going to take full transparency. We have all of this talk whether or not the Mueller report is going to be transparent and going to be released. I have no problem with that as long as it's not the Mueller report. It's all the interviews, any informants that they had --
(CROSSTALK)
HANNITY: Both of you have seen this?
NUNES: We want to know all of that.
HANNITY: Both of you know that Bruce Ohr in August warned everybody, Hillary bought the dossier. It was not verified and corroborated and that Christopher Steele hated President Trump. They signed four times.
(CROSSTALK)
NUNES: Just remember, Sean -- I just want you to remember, Comey and others have said that it wasn't the dossier. The dossier only played a small part of that FISA application.
HANNITY: That's not what Andrew McCabe said. Without a dossier, no FISA.
NUNES: But remember what I've said, it's bad enough that they've used the dossier. The rest of the craft that they used is even worse. And that's what we want declassified.
HANNITY: Jim Jordan, last word.
JORDAN: Bruce Ohr also talked to Andrew Weissmann before he got on the special counsel's team about the bias Christopher Steele had against President Trump when they launched this whole darn thing.
HANNITY: Real quick question, is the Mueller report -- you have seen everything both of you. You would expect it will be anticlimactic and there's no collusion? Do you agree with that assessment, Devin Nunes?
NUNES: Well, I think what you have to see is what the Mueller supporters are continuing at this. So, they're telegraphing already right now that there is nothing that is going to be in there. Look, we know nothing is going to be in there because there was no evidence of collusion and conspiracy. It was ridiculous from the beginning. The only thing they ever had was the information that the Clinton campaign --
JORDAN: Sean, all the way up until the day James Comey is fired, he told us there was still no evidence of any collusion whatsoever. We know there's not going to be any collusion in this final report.
HANNITY: Great, but there was collusion. Hillary bought and paid for Russian lies, and then it was used to stop -- well, first, influence an election in her favor and then later to bludgeon a duly elected president and unseat him -- the biggest abuse of power scandal ever.
Thank you both.
All right. The Democrats is a party of late-term abortion, today, they blocked a bill on infanticide. Newt Gingrich will join us.
And later, Jorge Ramos detained in Venezuela. Thankfully, he's safe. He'll tell his story exclusively, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: All right. So, the Democrats' far left, extreme, radical agenda now on abortion hitting new levels of radicalism.
Quick reminder, by the way, New York passed a law allowing abortion up to the mother's due date. And a barbaric proposal, remember in Virginia nearly succeeded, would have allowed an abortion while a woman begins labor. And remember, disgraced Virginia Democratic governor, Ralph Northam, took it even a step further when describing the process, for letting a baby -- well, first, the baby is going to be born, we'll make the baby comfortable. And then the mother will decide whether or not to resuscitate it or a given medical aid.
Now, Senate Democrats, they have blocked the GOP back born alive bill. That would provide medical care to infants who survive failed abortions. Let's be clear here, that is infanticide, plain and simple. And refusing to care for a child born alive, living independently has the support of all 2020 Democratic Senate hopefuls? But they couldn't be more out of touch with the American people.
Now, President Trump responded. He tweeted out, quote, Senate Democrats just voted against legislation to prevent the killing of newborn infant children. Democratic position on abortion is so extreme, they don't mind literally executing babies after birth.
And added, quote: This will be remembered as one of the most shocking votes in the history of Congress. And it looks like, well, Illinois maybe next. A pro-life group is warning a new proposal will make the state the, quote, abortion capital of America.
This and more on Democratic extremism, former speaker of the house and new host of "Newt's World" podcast. Look at that. It's amazing.
We're very happy to have back, Fox News contributor Newt Gingrich.
I don't even know what to say here. You know, I don't think people could do this to a puppy or a kitten. What they are describing, but they were voting for.
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER SPEAKER OF HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: Well, I think most liberal Democrats would be more upset if you did it to a puppy or a kitten than if you do it to a baby. It's a little hard to understand what has happened psychologically to the Democratic Party that you could add a large group of people. I think all three of the Democratic senators vote in effect to allow the killing of babies who are already born.
The position taken, as you point out, by the governor of Virginia, is that it's really OK because we'll keep the baby comfortable while we decide whether or not to kill it. I mean, this is pure infanticide in a way which is unthinkable in most of the world. And if this was a foreign country and we were describing a foreign country which allowed babies to be killed after they were born, even most liberals would be shocked and horrified.
But what you are seeing right now -- and I don't know whether it is just a natural maturation of the left over the last 40 years or impartially reaction to Trump, on almost on every front, they now feel compelled to rush to the most extreme positions, even if they are crazy. And someone said the other day, they have now become literally the party of death and taxes. And I think there is a lot to that.
And I can't understand on a practical level what they think they are doing. But also, I cannot understand morally. You know, one or two people, yes, but to have every Democratic presidential candidate vote that it is OK to kill babies after they are born puts them in such a small minority, I don't quite see how they think they're going to create a winning campaign.
HANNITY: Mr. Speaker add to that, we're going to get rid of airplanes, cows, we're going to rebuild every home, everything's free - not that the government runs a lot well college and education and jobs and security and vacations and healthy food and health care, but you can't have your own. What has happened here, because the fact that they're so open about these beliefs, to me is political suicide?
GINGRICH: Well, I think what you've had happen is that in a small number of Congressional districts, mostly in the inner-city, a number of people won very tiny margins. If you look at Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, I think that her total share of the vote was 19%, but there was such a small turnout that 19% could elect her.
The various cartoons that are now on the internet describing her in ways they're just funny, fit what's happening. This is a person who doesn't know anything, doesn't seem to want to learn anything. But, frankly, it's not just because she's young, interesting woman, look at Bernie Sanders. Here's a guy who's been around forever. He can't even bring himself to say that Maduro in Venezuela is a dictator.
Now you look at the entire lifetime of apologizing for the Soviet Union, apologizing for Fidel Castro, Bernie Sanders has never met a Left-winger he didn't like. And so you have this whole thing coming together, partially I think a reaction to Hillary Clinton that she was so unacceptable to most liberals that they've gone further to the Left in response, partially in reacting to Donald Trump. Who, again, is from the standpoint of a Left- winger is so unacceptable.
But I'm - I've been around long enough, what I'm reminded of is George McGovern in 1972 and the collapse of the Democratic Party as people began to realize when you go around the country, I don't think there's a single state, not one, in which they can get a majority in favor of killing babies after they're born.
HANNITY: Mr. Speaker, I'm here in Vietnam. I'm in Hanoi. It takes 26 hours to get here. I'm just saying and I'm glad to be here. The President tomorrow will be trying to negotiate - the President ready gotten hostages back, remains back. He has - no more rockets are being fired, I think that's a good thing for the world.
But at the same time the Democrats are holding three days of hearings tomorrow - public, while the president's in the middle of negotiations, putting Michael Cohen out there. Whatever happened to politics ends at the water's edge.
GINGRICH: Look, I think you just have to assume that the Democratic Party has lost any sense of patriotism, any sense of balance, any sense of propriety. And you would think when you when you deal with something like, the Korean War, the nuclear weapons in North Korea, the potential to maybe get a breakthrough. It might work, it may not work. But, boy, it sure a courageous step.
You would think that most of the Democrats would have said, we can do this next week when he comes back home. But it tells you that the bitterness that - the hatred, frankly, is so deep that they can't see beyond their own fratricidal warfare. Very dangerous for the country, I think.
HANNITY: I agree with you. All right, Mr. Speaker, we're going to watch a little scary moment for the country and we appreciate you being with us.
All right, when we come back, not only the Democrats do a Michael Cohen for three days in a row, undermining the President's Summit, but they're also spending all week trying to block President's border emergency declaration. They won't win, Geraldo, Dan Bongino, also Jorge Ramos detained after asking the Venezuelan dictator some tough questions, thankful he's been released. He'll join us, share his story what went down, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: All right. Last week a Massachusetts woman allegedly assaulted a young man in a restaurant. Why? Wearing a Make America Great Again hat. Oh, the great trigger of our day. Turns out, we are now learning the suspect is an illegal immigrant from Brazil now in ICE custody.
Meanwhile, the House just passed a resolution to nullify the President's national emergency declaration. Now goes to the Senate, doesn't look like they will be able to overcome a Presidential Veto.
Joining us now with reaction Fox News Correspondent-at-Large Geraldo Rivera and right here on set in Hanoi, Vietnam, Fox News Contributor Dan Bongino. We'll go to you first. I'm looking at this another thing they're working on this week.
Let's try - if 90% of heroin coming into the country and fentanyl and 4,000 homicides and 10,000 sexual assaults and 130,000 sexual assaults and a 100,000 violent assaults is not an emergency?
DAN BONGINO, CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, I mean, just be candid, you have to be an imbecile to believe there's not an emergency on our Southern border. I mean, either you're not processing right or you're such a political animal that the fact that there is--
You know what's weird about this, Sean, is, when it when it came to the obvious emergency situation where those children tragically died, the Democrats were all over the fact that it was an emergency. But now that - and that was an unquestioned human tragedy. Now that that's passed and it's not to be used for political purposes anymore, now it's not an emergency.
And by the way Trump's got them all smoked on this anyway, between the 1.3 billion allocated the MILCON budget and the Treasury funds he's got. He's already got the 5 billion. They play all they want with all this national emergency stuff.
HANNITY: And everything else they actually funded.
BONGINO: Yes, yes. And everything else - so, he's already got the 5 billion he needs, while they play around.
HANNITY: And Geraldo, the President says, keep building the wall, finish the wall. They've started, they're repairing. Its building, it's being built. Even you recognize that this is--
GERALDO RIVERA, CORRESPONDENT-AT-LARGE: Even me--
HANNITY: --a very important issue.
RIVERA: Even me, you got left behind, when you take Bongino to Vietnam, I get left behind - even me.
HANNITY: Wait a minute, we invited you, if I recall.
RIVERA: Oh, sure. You invited me to the Vietnam restaurant across the street maybe.
HANNITY: Oh, my God.
RIVERA: The President's wall is going to build, Sean. There's no way they can stop it. Put aside the merits of the issue, the President has the power. The Congress can pass this resolution. There is no way they're going to get two-thirds of both the House and the Senate to override a Presidential Veto, unless one of the lawsuits succeeds, and I don't believe that's going to happen either. The wall will be built.
HANNITY: Ultimately it's going to happen. But really this is what they do and the President's here in Vietnam, Geraldo. That coupled with their radical--
RIVERA: Awful.
HANNITY: --New Deal proposals, late-term abortion. Don't you think they're kind of marginalizing themselves?
RIVERA: I'm sick in my stomach that they are scheduling Michael Cohen's testimony for tomorrow. I mean the fact that they are putting this tabloid person, you feel much more sympathetic toward him than I do.
This is a lawyer who has betrayed his client and everything about him just reeks of kind of sleaziness--
HANNITY: Well, where is attorney/client - Geraldo? Where is it?
RIVERA: The President is on - he stands on the cusp of a potential historic breakthrough, reducing the threat of nuclear war on earth, threatening tens of millions of people, MSNBC and CNN barely mentioned Korea, barely mentioned this summit, barely mention the stakes.
HANNITY: Disgraceful. All right, let me--
RIVERA: --just for Michael Cohen, it's awful.
HANNITY: Dan.
BONGINO: It really makes you wonder right now this Cohen thing. What side the Democrats are on? And it really pains me to say that being with - at this historic summit right now.
I mean Geraldo is actually right. We have the potential for a historic nuclear breakthrough with a country who just, what a year ago, was threatening to take out portions of Hawaii and Guam. And we're doing taxicab confessions on Capitol Hill with Michael Cohen, absolutely disgraceful. What side--
HANNITY: Right. This is by - in the end the American people going to--
BONGINO: Sean, the optics here are awful. The foil of--
HANNITY: Does that?
BONGINO: Yes, of course, they're talking taxicab confessions. We're denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula here.
HANNITY: All right, Geraldo, you're invited on every trip moving forward if you didn't get the invitation. All right, up next, Jorge Ramos detained by Venezuela's brutal dictator who didn't like his question. He's going to share that story coming up next. And your e-mail on my scooter right, oh boy, straight ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: All right. As we continue from Hanoi in Vietnam, well yesterday journalist Jorge Ramos and Univision staffers, they were detained at the presidential palace in Venezuela after an interview with Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro.
Now apparently Maduro didn't like the questions that were asked and ended the interview when Jorge Ramos showed him this video of hungry Venezuelans eating out of a garbage truck. After being held for three hours, the group was thankfully released.
Univision News Anchor Jorge Ramos joins us now. First of all, I'm glad you're out. I was nervous about what was happening
JORGE RAMOS, UNIVISION NEWS ANCHOR: I know, Sean.
HANNITY: --and we disagree. But I don't disagree on protecting all Americans, whoever they are, wherever they are, and I said it last night and I mean it. I'm saying it to you personally.
RAMOS: And I want to thank you personally. Sean, I know that we have many differences on immigration and put those differences aside. Because when I needed that support the most, I heard that you were talking about us in Venezuela, and that was incredibly important.
So from the bottom of my heart thank you so much, Sean, thanks so much to Fox News. Because - and on those moments, when you are detained in a dictatorship, when there's no one to help you and you see a tweet or you see a report from Fox News or from an American media, that you're not alone, and we felt that we were not alone. So muchas gracias.
HANNITY: Yes. Listen, we - I'm not great with my - I started in school three years, but it's not great Jorge. Tell everybody what happened, because they took your tapes. By the way, those are real videos of real Venezuelans.
It should be one of the richest countries in the entire world that are eating out of garbage trucks, and that is widespread and I applaud you for calling attention to the suffering of human beings. This isn't politics to me.
RAMOS: It is terrible what's happening right now in Venezuela. There's a humanitarian crisis. The minimum wage, Sean, is $5. Not $5 an hour or $5 a day. $5 a month, that's minimum wage. So that's why there is so much hunger.
We - the interview with Nicolas Maduro, it lasted about 17 minutes. I think was a strong interview. It was all right. But then I show him the kids that you just showed on a garbage truck. And he just couldn't stand it. He stood up he tried to cover the image, so the cameras wouldn't be able to see it.
And then I told him, Mr. Maduro - I didn't call him President. I called him Mr. Maduro. What are you doing? Why don't you answer the questions? What you are doing is what dictators do. And then and then he left.
One of his ministers came back. They confiscated four cameras, Sean. They took our tape cards where we actually store the interviews and then they detain us for two hours. They took away our cell phones.
And at this point - at this point we don't have the cameras, we don't have the interview. And they gave my cell back, although all the cellphones from my colleagues, they're still in Venezuela.
HANNITY: We're having a debate in this country and you - everyone knows we have a well-documented disagreement on immigration and border security and American sovereignty in American law, we'll put that aside.
But I look at a country like Venezuela, all the grandiose promises, "We'll take care of everything, we'll do everything, government, socialism". It fails and I'm just curious, as you see this these arguments being made in our country about 70 percent tax rates, marginal rates, guaranteed education, health care, jobs, security, everything - college.
I'm wondering if you see the dangers as I do, how socialism does almost universally lead to poverty and false promises.
RAMOS: What I saw in Venezuela is that the 20-year-old revolution is started with Hugo Chavez in 1999 has failed completely. You have more than 3 million Venezuelans live in the country. Inflation is 1 million percent. If they pay one bolivar today, it would be a million bolivars in a year from now.
And people are dying. I went to a hospital, Hospital Vargas. And then one woman she had lost a family member and you know why, they didn't have $30 to pay for antibiotics. So the experiment in Venezuela has failed completely.
And you know something? I really appreciate the freedom and the liberties that we have here in the United States. You know we know that that I have my differences with President Trump, but this is the difference. You can criticize the President of the United States and I can go home and nothing happens to me, Sean.
But if I criticize the dictator of Venezuela, they confiscate my cameras, they take my interviews --
HANNITY: Terrible.
RAMOS: They detain me and then they expel me from the country. Those are two big, big differences.
HANNITY: Last thing, I'll add, this is a political point that I'll make. Obama, eight years, 13 million more Americans on food stamps, 8 million more poverty. Obamacare millions lost their doctors, their plans they got one option and everybody paid more. Those are the false promises I think of socialism and the danger.
And under Donald Trump, look at this, record low unemployment for African- Americans, Hispanic-Americans, Asian-Americans, women in the workplace. And I come from very blue-collar roots. I want the forgotten men and women in this country, and frankly the world, to have the blessings of freedom that we take for granted, as I can see here in Vietnam a lot of poverty.
RAMOS: And I understand your political point, and if you allow me, in this case especially for this interview, Sean--
HANNITY: You got about 25 seconds.
RAMOS: I will concentrate on what I saw in Venezuela. And healthcare Venezuela - the socialist heath care in Venezuela is terrible. I mean, I saw this woman who just didn't have enough money for antibiotics. I saw a family whose 15-year-old Christian is dying because they couldn't do blood tests in the hospital.
So they took his blood in a tube and they put it in a glass with ice and they had to take it to another place. And the boy, most likely, will die very soon, simply because they don't have enough medicines. So that's what happening with a revolution - the Venezuelan revolution right now with Nicolas Maduro.
HANNITY: We may disagree on immigration very strongly, but we agree on humanitarian issues and--
RAMOS: We do.
HANNITY: --and the - and poverty and what's happened there. I'm glad you're out. Next time we're going to have another fight. So - but we like you home.
RAMOS: Well, we'll have a fight. And - first - and let me thank the U.S. Department, the State Department and in the American Embassy in Caracas, thanks to them, I'm here today in Miami.
HANNITY: I think you should just say I love Donald Trump and it all be over, it's all good. Welcome home.
RAMOS: Not today. Not today, Sean. Thank you so much. Thank you.
HANNITY: I understand. All right, we're glad you're out. Thank you. Coming up next, big announcement, you don't want to miss. And yes a lot of you had e-mail about my scooter trip, some of it's hilarious, next straight ahead from Vietnam.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HANNITY: All right. Last night we aired footage from my now, I guess, infamous - shows I have a sense of humor, scooter right in Hanoi. Well, some of you had some very strong opinions about that.
One viewer wrote, "Love you Sean. Please be careful with all the traffic. Be safe. Thanks for supporting a President. God bless you and President Trump". Thank you very much.
Dianne remarked, you are - who picked this. I'm not saying this, I'm like - anyway. "Love the glasses. You should wear your hair like that on the show. Edward asked, "Where's your helmet HANNITY?" Sorry no helmets.
And before we go, by the way, we do have a big announcement in that UC Berkeley campus assault case. The University of California has concluded its investigation into the February 19th assault on conservative activist Hayden Williams that the media ignored and is seeking a felony warrant for the identified suspect. If a warrant is issued, police will pursue his arrest. We're going to follow this closely, and of course bring you every update.
Also finally, we do have a big announcement, and make sure to tune in to this program Thursday night one-on-one exclusive interview with President Trump right after his second historic summit with North Korea's Kim Jong- un.
It's an exclusive interview. You'll only see here on HANNITY, and we look forward to that. We also - you would think that the rest of the country would forget about red and blue and forget about conservative, liberal, and Republican, Democrat. Maybe we should really hope for the safety and security of our children and the world that the President succeeds. Not hate him like they do over everything - even if he cured cancer.
All right. Thank you for being with us. We'll never be the hate-Trump Media. Let not your heart be troubled. Laura Ingraham is next.
Laura?
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