'The Five' react to chaos caused by teachers' union 'ambush'
'The Five' panel reacts to Chicago teachers voting to return to remote learning despite potential consequences for children
This is a rush transcript of "The Five" on January 5, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
JESSE WATTERS, FOX NEWS HOST: Hello everybody, I'm Jesse Watters along with Dana Perino, Greg Gutfeld, Judge Jeanine Pirro, and Geraldo Rivera. It's five o'clock in New York City, and this is THE FIVE.
The Chicago teachers unions causing chaos and panic for over 350,000 students after pulling the plug on in-person learning late last night. Thousands of families left scrambling after the union switch back to remote learning because its demands weren't met.
More than 90 percent of Chicago public school employees fully vaxxed but that isn't enough for teachers to do their jobs. Not being at school has all sorts of negative consequences, but don't take my word for it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR LORI LIGHTFOOT (D), CHICAGO: What we should not be doing is allowing city leadership to shut down an entire school system for what? When our district was always remote, our children suffered. There is no disputing that reality, we should not be politicizing the pandemic. That is a mistake. And ultimately hurts our children and families.
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I believe schools should remain open. You know, they have what they need because the American rescue plan we provided the states with 130 billion, with a B, billion dollars to specifically keep our students safe and schools open.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATTERS (on camera): The union is demanding the city spend even more money for a safer work environment, but the city of Chicago already got $2 billion in COVID funds for schools. So, what happened all the money? And then there's the science. You've heard it over and over again. We just got to follow it. Chicago's top doc blasting the unions for not listening.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALLISON ARWADY, COMMISSIONER, CHICAGO DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH: At least among children, we have to think of this as similar to the flu. You add vaccination on top of that, the risk is even lower. And that is what we are seeing right now. We need kids to get vaccinated, but I remain extremely comfortable with children continuing in person education.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATTERS: So, Geraldo, if you are the mayor of Chicago, God help us all, what do you do? Mayor Rivera.
GERALDO RIVERA, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT-AT-LARGE: Well, I think that Lori Lightfoot is absolutely right, Jesse. This is a teachers union ambush. I'm generally pro-union, but this walkout, it was clumsy, it was spiteful, it was absolutely devastating for these children's well-being. Where are they going to eat, some of these families now. I think it's absolutely awful.
What I would do, to answer your specific question, is to dock them their pay for every day they are out. And I would continue the lockout, the virtual lockout that Lori Lightfoot has put in place, Jesse. She is not letting these absent teachers sign on to do their virtual education.
So, they can say these renegade teachers cannot say that they presented themselves for virtual work, because they are not allowed to sign on, dock their pay. This is absolutely cruel what they have done to these children, Jesse.
WATTERS: That's a good idea, Mayor Rivera. Judge Jeanine, the parents' relationship with the teachers has to be destroyed now. I mean, it has to be totally destroyed at this point, January 2022.
JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS HOST: Well, I mean, look, we are in year three of COVID. What do we know? We know that kids are safest when they are at school. We know because when we talked about it for a long time all of the danger, whether it's psychological, mental, whether it is just in terms of emotional. And then scholastic.
All of the harm to children when they are not at school. Domestic violence, child neglect, all of that. We also know that 90 percent of the teachers are vaccinated. We also know, Jesse, as you said, $2 billion to protect the schools.
Now, why are teachers saying it's not safe enough to go to school when they are in one of the most protected environments in the country? I doubt that anything is more protective other than a hospital. It's because the teachers are lazy.
But ask yourself this, for all the teachers who were afraid to go to school, 90 percent of whom are vaccinated among the least affected of our population, children, do they go to Dunkin' Donuts? Do they go to the supermarket? Did they get into an elevator to go to their apartment? Do they get on a bus? Do they go to the barber shop? Are they separating themselves from society at large? Or are they just too lazy to go to work?
And that's what this is. This is an illegal walkout. They should not be paid and it's time for these teachers, and they've collected money by the way, Jesse, for the last three years, it is time for them to knock that paycheck. Call it a day and replace them.
WATTERS: Those are all great points. Dana, where is Michelle Obama? Where is Barack Obama? Jill Biden, doctorate of education, have you seen enough leadership on the national level? To kind of knock some heads together in the city of Chicago to get this thing done?
DANA PERINO, FOX NEWS CO-HOST: Have you -- have you checked Hawaii? That might be one place that you could find them. But this, I was actually going to bring this up. I think that if Biden has an opportunity here to turn something around, --
WATTERS: Yes.
PERINO: -- which we're going to talk about later, if he wants to take it. Right? He has said to them, we gave you the money. Lori Lightfoot is standing there by herself. What I would do if I were Joe Biden is tomorrow after I gave my January 6 commentary at the statutory hall at 9 a.m., I would get on a plane with Dr. Jill Biden, with Miguel Cardona, the secretary of education, with Xavier Becerra. Remember him? The secretary of health and human services?
I think he might be in witness protection for cabinet secretaries. He is nowhere to be found during this entire crisis. And I would go to Chicago, I would stand with Lori Lightfoot. I would have something that says, sort of concrete thing that says, we are going to have a stand here.
Many Democrats across the country realize just how terrible this is and they are worried about it. You know, you had Nicole Hannah Jones of the 1619 Project, saying, she said, hey, we should be able to talk about how teachers should be in the classroom. And it goes on from there.
This is across the board a terrible situation. You know, it's a good thing to think about the future of, perhaps school choice being more widely applicable after something like this. But right now, you have a crisis of parents having to try to homeschool children by Zoom while teachers, who should've been vaccinated, but probably will be willing to go to the bar.
I mean, Jeanine, you are very kind asking if they did all those things that were normal, but what a lot of parents have seen is that some -- check these teachers Instagram accounts that's all I'm saying.
PIRRO: Yes.
WATTERS: Great ideas, all around. Greg, let's see if you can contribute?
GREG GUTFELD, FOX NEWS CO-HOST: This is, you have to look at this from a positive perspective. This is absolutely great news. This is the double destruction of the pandemic and of the teachers unions happening at exactly the same time. right? We now know that the pandemic is over.
The teachers unions pushed us over the cliff. It is going to happen February 1st. This is all going to be behind us. And it's time now to sever the ties with the least competitive entity on the planet since the Washington generals.
Our education -- educational system is just like the Washington generals and that we pay them to lose. The only thing worse is that they are teaching our children to lose. They are going to lose in life because they are falling behind.
We've learned one really important thing from remote learning. No one is remotely learning. This, children are locked in supervised jail time in the schools, all that's missing are three hats and a cot. The school is a prison run by clock watchers and we've now figured this out.
This is an amazing opportunity. I think that we should dive on this. It's all about school choice, it's all about introducing competition into the one place on planet earth besides Cuba and North Korea where competition is seen as obscene. It's time. Blast.
An MSNBC host flipped out on Twitter over a four-year-old not allowed in a restaurant because the four-year-old wasn't vaxxed. So why would an MSNBC anchor gets so pissed off about this? Because it was his kid.
PIRRO: Yes.
GUTFELD: It was his kid. So, it goes to the Gutfeld rule, I mentioned yesterday, nothing bad ever happens until it happens to somebody in the media. And that's what you are seeing right now with unions by their overstepping the loonies of the left. The loonies of the left.
Dana mentioned Hannah Jones, you had the walking head injury known as Joe Lockhart. You've got Lightfoot, who was about 10 years behind us in this matter, finally catching up to us. So once again you see that lag, but now the people that refuse to listen to us are saying, holy crap, it's now my kids. It's now my job. It's now my career. What the f are we going to do?
Well, you should have listened to us because we've been saying this for two years you stupid morons. I have no sympathy for Lori Lightfoot. She should have been there at the beginning because she is the leader. But none of these people are leaders.
It is time for the American public to become the leaders to say we've had enough of this crap. It's over. Our kids, if you are not teaching our kids, we are taking our kids out of the schools. We are not going to pay our damn taxes either.
WATTERS: I didn't think you could top the first three, Greg, but you did it.
GUTFELD: Thanks.
WATTERS: Congratulations. Up next, the big liberal city giving criminals free reign. While the crime crisis is about to get a whole lot worse.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PERINO (on camera): America has seen a spike in crime, but that's not stopping Manhattan's new district attorney from rolling out a plan that will stop prosecuting certain offenses.
Alvin Bragg's new approach includes no prison time for a slew of charges including trespassing, resisting arrest, prostitution, and turnstile jumping to avoid a fare.
On top of that, the new D.A. will be reducing charges for serious crimes like armed robbery. For example, if a thief uses a gun to rob a store but no one gets hurt, it would just be a misdemeanor instead of a felony. Charges will also be slashed for stealing from stores and homes as well as dealing drugs.
Eric Shawn had a chance to talk to the new district attorney today, let's have a listen to that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ERIC SHAWN, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: With these policies give criminals the green light?
ALVIN BRAGG, DISTRICT ATTORNEY, NEW YORK COUNTY: No. I mean, it depends upon your definition of criminal. I (Inaudible) with what's going on right now is working. We've laid out a path that is going to reduce incarceration, reduce violent crime, get people services, make neighborhoods safer, get New York City back up on its feet. It's the rule forward.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PERINO (on camera): Judge, what is your definition of criminal?
PIRRO: My definition of criminal and crime is everything that is identified in the New York State penal law, which is been voted on by the legislature and I want to know who the hell this guy thinks he is.
He was elected as a D.A. The job of the D.A. is to enforce the law. It's not to amend it, it's not to write it, it's not to repeal it. It's to enforce it. This guy doesn't understand what his job is.
And follow me on this, if you want to take a bus and not pay for it, have at it. If you want to keep one of those bikes, those rental bikes, go ahead and keep it. Do you want to not pay for a taxi ride? That's no problem, just jump out.
And to all the business and all the storekeepers in New York City, if a gang comes in with a gun, I don't care if it's an AK-47, an AR-15 or whatever. And there is no risk of genuine risk of serious physical injury or serious physical injury, which means a risk of death. Then they are going to get away with a misdemeanor, which is like stealing a DVD out of a store.
This man is looking to create lawlessness and anarchy in New York City. Let me tell you one more thing, guys. Because I did this for 30 years. This is going to throw us back to the wild west. New York will lose its home values, its business values. Your kids are not safe going to school. You are not safe riding on the streets. There is no traffic crimes that will be prosecuted.
You can drive 120 miles an hour down 6th Avenue and you can't be arrested. And if a cop is getting punched out for making an arrest that guy will not be prosecuted for resisting arrest. This guy Bragg should be -- we ought to start the recall now.
PERINO: Channeling New Yorkers everywhere. Greg, I give you the floor.
GUTFELD: Well, it's -- I wish it was just New York.
PERINO: Yes.
GUTFELD: But you know, and then if there were people watching at home that said, hey, it's not New York, you know, that's --
(CROSSTALK)
PIRRO: Well, he's the D.A. in New York. This guy.
GUTFELD: I understand. I understand.
PIRRO: Right.
GUTFELD: I'm trying to bring up a different point. Which is that, you should be looking at Texas as well where in their largest county there are 150 murders that were committed by violent re-offenders that were out on bond.
So, you can just sit here and talk about the wacky loony left on the coast which is real, but this is spreading --
PERINO: Yes.
GUTFELD: -- like black mold --
PIRRO: Yes.
GUTFELD: -- all over the - all over the country. And it leads me to, why does this keep happening? It's interesting when you look at how the media and the Democrats pay attention to certain types of crime as opposed to others. Crime is now become a political variable for nearly two years.
We were told that there is no riots, right? There was no crime wave, there was no explosion in murder, it was mocked daily on CNN, but then January 6 happens and suddenly, CNN is pro-cop for one day. For one freaking day they were pro-cop.
And why is this happening? It is because your victimization, the average American's victimization is not the media's shared experience. Like I said in the a-block, nor does it validate their political beliefs.
The fact is the guy in a Viking hat validates their political assessments about the people they despise. Therefore, that is more important than thousands of murder victims strewn across this country. We are living in a world where inconsistencies and beliefs about crime are based on political -- on how it helps somebody politically. That's why this stuff still exists.
PERINO: Geraldo, you, I think you know Eric Adams. Do you think that he'll be able to do anything --
RIVERA: I do.
PERINO: -- to mitigate what looks like tend to be a real problem?
RIVERA: I certainly hope so, Dana. I think that Alvin Bragg has not yet cleared any of these things with Mayor Adams, who of course was a former crime busting police captain. So, I personally do not believe this is going to really be the way Manhattan progresses.
I started my legal career in that office. My daughter also worked in the office. My D.A. was Frank Hogan, a crime buster. He was famous for going after the real criminals. Understand this. That a person can come in, the judge referred to it, can come into a store and say all right, against the wall, everybody against the wall. And stick the gun in the person's face, can put them on the floor with their head on the floor and put the guns in the back of their head. Can terrorize them, can be an old lady.
PIRRO: Right.
RIVERA: They can jump the cashier's counter there. And then be charged with a misdemeanor. This is preposterous. This is ridiculous. It defies common sense. It is not common sense. It is the opposite of what Bratton and Kelly did with their broken windows policing.
This is not the way to fight crime, this is the way to encourage anarchy, to bring down property values, to scare the be Jesus out of people. This is horrible bad thinking. I don't know where this person got this notion, but I agree with Greg, and it is like a cancer because it is easy, jails are full, once the antidote to pull jails, you don't put people in jail.
So, you, if you only put people that actually shoot victims in jail, not the ones who menaced them, you are on the road to hell.
PERINO: Jesse, is Alvin Bragg, New York's Larry Krasner from Philadelphia?
WATTERS: Yes, he's Bill de Blasio reincarnated. I thought Bill de Blasio is long gone, but no, he popped up in the body of this kook.
Dana, let me paint a picture for you. Let's just say I'm a male prostitute --
PERINO: OK.
WATTERS: -- in Manhattan. I've got the leather pants real tight, got the nice tight shirt on.
PERINO: OK.
WATTERS: I also been turning tricks on private property. And I got a couple grams of marijuana that I'm selling out the side. Right?
PERINO: OK.
WATTERS: Property owner calls me, tells me to leave, I don't leave so I'm trespassing, now they call 911, the cops show up. What do I do? I run. And I'm fast, Dana, I'm fast. So, there's Sandra Smith. So, this is a long foot pursuit, right? I'm weaving in and out of traffic, causing traffic, chaos, I'm knocking old lady over.
I jumped down to the subway, hop at turnstile, they finally tackle me. I resist. It's a huge problem. The cops are getting scraped up with the struggle. They cuff me, they booked me. I'm not. And the D.A. is going to shelve every single beef right there, five beefs, so I counted, shoved every single beef.
I get out. The next day, point a loaded revolver at a guy's head, take their cash and I also swing some narcotics on the way home. Misdemeanors. I'm out a couple of days, maybe I'll do a week or two.
Not only that, this memo he posted, this communist manifesto basically, he goes you know what? Even three days in jail could jeopardize someone housing. Really? So, sex offender gets to brutalize some teenager and then they get booked, brought in. He doesn't want to keep them on pretrial. He wants to let them walk before trial.
PERINO: Right.
WATTERS: So, then he can re-victimize some other teenager, some sexual predator? This guy is insane. He just cares more about emptying the prisons than protecting the community.
PERINO: Jesse, I don't know if I will ever be able to get that visual out of my mind. Very effective.
(CROSSTALK)
GUTFELD: It suddenly made Jesse way more interesting.
PIRRO: Yes.
GUTFELD: A male prostitute.
(CROSSTALK)
RIVERA: Terrific (Ph).
GUTFELD: Selling drugs on the side.
RIVERA: Are you (Inaudible) later, Jesse?
PIRRO: You know what --
WATTERS: You couldn't accord me, Geraldo.
PIRRO: Normally, you wouldn't run because they are not press -- prosecuting prostitution. You wouldn't have to run.
WATTERS: I think I was running from the drugs. But, yes, good point.
PIRRO: No running (Ph). We are going to run right now. Up next, how Democrats like Nancy Pelosi now begging allies to save Biden's presidency before it's too late.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
PIRRO (on camera): Democrats starting to push the panic button as Joe Biden drags his entire party down the drain. A new poll shows 54 percent of Americans disapprove of the president. And those catastrophic numbers spelling doom and gloom for Dems in the midterm.
Nancy Pelosi is scared and knows a red wave is coming. She is reportedly telling donors that Democrats need to be more boastful about Biden's accomplishments. But more Dems keep heading for the exits. A 25th Democrat will not seek reelection.
All right, I will start with you, Dana. I mean, how is it that the Democrats should be more boastful about Joe Biden's accomplishments? What has he accomplished?
PERINO: Well, I think, look, they will point to several things. Any administration can, even if it's a thin record you'd come up with something. I think one of the things that happened for the Biden administration, he made a huge mistake.
He had a bipartisan infrastructure deal that was right there for the signing, but instead of going for that in April, he decided to link it to the bigger, big huge build back better agenda, which got completely bogged down over the summer, and inflation started rising, and as you saw Afghanistan happened right around there. The poll numbers continue to go down.
If he has signed the bipartisan infrastructure bill, which had pretty good support, I mean, even President Trump wanted to do it, I think he would've done it differently, a little less on the green side of things. But that is what Nancy Pelosi is saying.
Because when you pull people and say, what do you think Biden has accomplished? Nobody has any idea that that infrastructure bill actually got signed. And that is purely the fault of President Biden and the chief of staff, I would say, in terms of the strategy around there.
The other thing is that the CNBC poll that came out that said 72 percent of Americans do not -- disapprove of Biden on inflation. 72 percent, that's a huge number. That means he's losing a slew of Democrats as well.
PIRRO: All right, one of -- before I get off that subject, Jesse, the fact is that she -- Pelosi is saying we need -- the Democrats need to be more boastful, and that they shouldn't use the word transformative when they're talking about Build Back Better. Does she think she's got a chance of getting that passed? I mean, we still have Joe Manchin, as far as I know.
WATTERS: There's a chance if they pass something, it'll be severely watered down. But Joe Biden fell into the donor trap right off the bat. That's when you get into office and you start just doing what the donors want instead of what the people want.
Right off the jump, he opens the border and he whitewashes the Chinese lab leak. Big business love that. Then he cracked out on traditional American energy to pay off the greens. And then he went big with the vax mandates which big pharma loved. What did that do? Totally scrambled the labor market, divided the country, and made everything more expensive.
So, now we didn't get back to normal like he promised. We don't trust him because he had the mission accomplished moment this summer with the virus and the catastrophe in Afghanistan. But the worst thing of all, Judge, is that we don't feel like the President's listening to us.
PIRRO: Right.
WATTERS: We have been screaming about the open border, about crime, about inflation. We've been saying we can't find workers to fill these positions. What does he do? All he talks about is Build Back Better. No one even knows what that means. No one even cares.
And at this point, the guy is basically a joke. He's a joke that even he doesn't get. And I'm talking about -- you know what I'm talking about. Let's go, Brandon.
PIRRO: OK. Well, he said it himself. I guess he agrees with it.
WATTERS: It went right over his head.
PIRRO: Yes. But Geraldo, what does he do? I mean, you know, that press conference yesterday about COVID and Omicron. I mean, I thought he clear things up. I'm more messed up in terms of what they want us to do and not want us to do. What could he do to kind of save whatever possibility -- possible numbers who are afraid of going forward?
RIVERA: That's a great question. What I don't want him to do is to try a Jimmy Carter and talk about the melees in the American people that it's all the Americans people fault that things are so depressing right now. But I think that in fairness, two points.
Number one, politics as you know, Judge, and Dana knows extremely well. Politics is like the tide. It's high tide, low tide, high tide. There's a cycle that you can't break regardless of who you are. It's historic. It repeats itself. Right now, the Democrats are on the tide is going out rapidly. They are going to have a very, very difficult time come November.
Build Back Better, they're arguing whether to say it's transformational. It was -- the way -- to talk about Build Back Better, it's swollen. That's why Manchin and Sinema went against the President. They had the courage to go against because nobody wanted it. Even the people that wanted what was in it said wait a second, what about all this other jelly and all this other smoky stuff that's in there. This is a very, very bad bill.
I think that what the President can do is to stay the course.
PIRRO: Stay the course?
RIVERA: You know, Coronavirus -- it's all about the virus. It's all about fixing this thing. He's got to speak with some determination and some clarity and some lucidity. And --
WATTERS: Geraldo, he didn't do anything today.
(CROSSTALK)
PIRRO: So, then, let me --
WATTERS: He had nothing on his schedule. He just took off the week in Delaware for vacation.
PIRRO: You know, Greg -- let me ask you, Greg.
WATTERS: He didn't do anything today.
PIRRO: 50 percent of America doesn't think he's doing anything good with COVID. Do you agree with Geraldo?
GUTFELD: Well, I think that Joe Biden is the flu-rona, of presidents. He's a sick combination of incompetence --
RIVERA: It's bad. That's bad.
GUTFELD: -- and confusion, and doom. I returned to what I said yesterday which is, you know, when times are tough, leaders are made. But in this case, the Democrat factory stopped producing real leaders. And why is that -- why has that happened? It's because the modern -- the modern Democrat can only do one thing and that is the woke dance, right?
They can call you a racist until they're blue or black in the face. But they can't lead a country in tough times because that's above the identity politics pay grade by focusing on the Twitter rabbit food, the stuff that gets the retweets, and the excitement, and the sweat of identity politics. They forgot how to lead real people in real-time. They forgot what real Americans want.
They become completely brainwashed by what snaps on Twitter. And that's all it is is identity politics, and they've completely just let everything else go to hell.
PIRRO: All right, coming up, Kamala Harris just can't stop embarrassing herself. The latest blunder ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
RIVERA: Pink Floyd criticizing the teacher -- I dedicate that to the teachers union in Chicago. More ridicule coming Kamala Harris' way at the same time the entire nation was transfixed, as you know, by those horrifying images of drivers trapped in the freezing cold and Virginia's I- 95.
The Vice President is getting savaged after tweeting this. "Because of the bipartisan infrastructure law, America is moving again. That's what infrastructure is all about getting people moving."
Well, bad timing. The headaches don't stop there per hour beleaguered VP. Remember all those reports of turmoil in her office, accusations of her being a terrible boss who lashes out while complaining about POTUS giving her all the crummy jobs? Well, she just lost that another top staffer. That makes at least five high-profile departures since the vice president took office a year ago.
But Greg, is it really fair to criticize her for the fact that she tweeted at the same time I-95 was choked up? You know, how could she know? I guess watch TV, but --
GUTFELD: It's so unfair -- it's so unfair these attacks. We all know this is born from a Republican sexual frustration and their obsession with their husband's feet. And I want to know where's AOC? Why isn't he defending her from these sexist attacks?
Look, Kamala is at this at this place in her career where she's going to sink or swim. And unfortunately, there are no lifeguards at the pool wanting to help her. And I'm talking about her allies, because that error that you talked about is easy -- was easily prevented. It would not have occurred if there was somebody on her side who just cared a little bit enough to watch out for her. But nobody even bothers to watch out for her. It says a lot about how they feel about her.
RIVERA: You know, Jesse, I saw some people dressed in your -- in your leather pants in Key West over the holiday. Now, I'm going to think about you in a whole different way.
WATTERS: Please don't.
RIVERA: But you know, she -- how can you blame Kamala Harris for Virginia's incompetence with snow and ice on I-95. They get all concerned they get a half an inch of snow, the whole thing shuts down, and then they forget all about it when the sun comes out. That's not Kamala Harris's fault.
WATTERS: No, but her tweet is her fault. She's the type of person that would order a round of kamikazes on the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, Geraldo.
PERINO: Oh, my God.
WATTERS: It's what she is. She's the kind of person that would ask you hey, how your father's doing? Your father has been dead for 10 years?
RIVERA: Well, that's Joe Biden.
WATTERS: She wears white to a wedding, her phone probably goes off during funerals, you know, if she ever, Geraldo, said the markets doing really great. I would sell. I would sell right then. If she ever said, you know, go out there and break a leg. I would actually think about maybe the fact that I would break my leg.
Geraldo, she went to Vietnam during the Afghanistan crisis. She hired child actors to make herself look more authentic. And then my own personal favorite, she was charging an electric car and she goes, wow, you don't smell any gas. I mean, Lorne Michaels, wake up. You have a skit every Saturday night with this woman right there. It sells itself. Just use her. I would watch.
RIVERA: But Dana isn't Jesse exactly the case of this woman being targeted, the Vice President actually being targeted now?
PERINO: Well, look, so she is the Vice President of the United States, the first woman to be that. She is going to be a target. That's just -- that's going to be the way it is. She just doesn't need to make it so easy.
I think that one Twitter is stupid. Young people that are tweeting for you, you should probably not allow that to happen necessarily. But what was she doing? She was doing what Nancy Pelosi asked. She was being more boastful about the things that the Biden administration had accomplished. And that would be -- well, she was trying to talk about infrastructure.
Not only was there the highway problem, but there were people stuck on an Amtrak train for 30 hours. That got all messed up at the very same time. I think one of the biggest problems with this is that Americans right now do not feel that the White House understands the problems that they are dealing with. And this is just another example of that.
RIVERA: But, Judge, can she win now?
PERINO: Also, I don't blame the -- and also -- can I just say -- I think that the staffer leaving to go be the executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus, that's a promotion and she should be proud of that. She probably helped him get that job. So, I think that that might be a little bit of criticism that's overwrought.
RIVERA: They could have really bragged about that. But, Judge, can she win regardless of what she does now?
PIRRO: Let me tell you something. First of all, she is an embarrassment to women, all right. And I -- it doesn't matter what color she -- no, wait a minute. Let me finish. It doesn't matter what color she is --
RIVERA: That's a little --
PIRRO: -- what identity she is. She's asked serious questions on serious topics in a very serious time in our history. It's a time of great consequence, where there is chaos and anarchy all around us, where we leave men in the foreign country, and then say we're not going to leave behind, and then get the hell out without them -- without bringing them home. And she laughs at every serious question.
And let me tell you something. I don't expect anyone to stand up for her, nor should they. As a woman who was a first in a lot of things, I stood up for myself. If she can't make that case for herself, then she shouldn't be in that position.
And I'll tell you something else. The premise of that Twitter was false. She said because of Build Back Better, America is moving again.
PERINO: Yes, that's true.
PIRRO: There isn't an inch of road that's been paved. There isn't a yard of track that's been laid --
WATTERS: Yes, that's true.
PIRRO: -- because of Build Back Better. She is out of her league, totally, and an embarrassment to women, period.
RIVERA: I can just see the judge now shaking up Kamala Harris. Come on, wake up, VP. Wake up. "THE FASTEST" is up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GUTFELD: Yes, welcome back. Time for "THE FASTEST." First up, the phrase "tastes like chicken" will never be the same. KFC is about to launch a plant-based version of its fried chicken bucket. We got some fake meat here to try. I already took a bite out of mine. Jessie, did you try it yet?
WATTERS: I'm trying it right now?
GUTFELD: I got to say that this is one of those things that doesn't taste like chicken.
WATTERS: It doesn't. It got the crunch though. I was reading on the internet yesterday that Al Gore's money guys are the ones that are behind the fake meat. So, they scare you and say that real meat is going to destroy the planet, and then they sell you the fake meat. That's how it works.
GUTFELD: It's a bait and switch with meat, Judge. Is this an embarrassment to chickens, Judge Jeanine?
PIRRO: If I were a chicken, I'd be embarrassed. This thing stinks. It stinks. I'm not going to eat it.
GUTFELD: It does taste rubber. I know that Geraldo, you don't have --
PIRRO: I'm giving it to my poodle. They'll tell me.
GUTFELD: Yes. Dana --
RIVERA: Your poodle won't eat it.
GUTFELD: It's -- yes, it's less than dog food. That's true. Dana, it's kind of rubbery. Did you try it?
PERINO: I hadn't. I will tell you this. It looks like chicken.
PERINO: Yes.
PERINO: And I think that's very impressive. Because that's part of that battle, right? Because when you have any of these fake things, and you look at it, like, that doesn't look like meat. And then you taste it, but like, I admire them for trying to get on the bandwagon here. And also, it comes with lots of different sauces, so you can drown it --
GUTFELD: Yes.
PERINO: In ranch.
GUTFELD: Right? Drown it.
PIRRO: That's true.
GUTFELD: Drown it like a fake chicken, Geraldo. The real test is would you eat this if you were high? I don't know if I would.
RIVERA: I don't know. I am pretty discerning even the altered consciousness. This is kind of skeevy in my -- in my imagination. I kind of throw out in my mouth, but --
PERINO: It looks like chicken.
PIRRO: I agree.
RIVERA: But it might be -- it might be good. It might be chicken-ish.
GUTFELD: I don't know, man. If it's not --
RIVERA: I'm not ordering it.
GUTFELD: Don't we value food less if it's not killed?
PERINO: No.
PIRRO: No.
PERINO: I think that there's -- I do think there's a move to -- there's going to be a lot of move to this, right? There would be a lot.
GUTFELD: I don't know. I don't even know what it is -- what's in it.
RIVERA: That's good. Different strokes. Different strokes.
GUTFELD: I tried to read the instructions but it just says --
PERINO: You need your glasses?
GUTFELD: You know what?
PIRRO: It's made with plants.
GUTFELD: It's made with plants. It's an insult to plants. All right, "ONE MORE THING" is up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
WATTERS: It's time now for "ONE MORE THING." THE FIVE has made history. We were number one in the fourth quarter of 2021 in total viewers. It's the first time a non-primetime show was ever done that. We beat everybody and we're at 5:00 Eastern. It's crazy.
So, thanks to everybody on this show, everybody that rotated in. Thank you to the viewers. We couldn't have done it without you. And Megan Albano the executive producer, thank you so much.
PERINO: Yes, she's amazing.
WATTERS: And we're just going to continue to keep on trucking. 3.3 million.
PIRRO: She is amazing.
WATTERS: And I think it's got to be more than that. Because when I was down in Florida, I couldn't pay for my own drink. It was unbelievable. All right, Greg, go ahead.
GUTFELD: You're welcome.
WATTERS: Thank you, Greg, especially Greg.
GUTFELD: All right, it's because of quality content like this. Greg's how many nuts part six.
PIRRO: Oh.
GUTFELD: All right, you know how this works. I play the first part, you guess how many nuts are going to be coming your way.
PIRRO: OK.
GUTFELD: Start playing it. Here we go. There's our little fellow. Here we go. Jesse, how many nuts?
WATTERS: Nine?
GUTFELD: Nine. All right, wow, that's a lot of nuts. Dana?
PERINO: 11.
GUTFELD: 11. OK, Geraldo?
RIVERA: Seven.
GUTFELD: Seven. Judge?
RIVERA: I won last time but I didn't see anything.
GUTFELD: Oh, you didn't see anything? Just throw out a number.
PIRRO: Three.
GUTFELD: Three. All right, the answer, let's watch the nuts.
PERINO: One, two, three, four, five --
PIRRO: My TV didn't go that long.
PERINO: -- six, seven -- come on, come on.
WATTERS: Eight.
GUTFELD: Yes.
WATTERS: Yes, I win.
PERINO: Nine.
PIRRO: Wow.
GUTFELD: And that is beating everybody in cable. We could put squirrels eating nuts. CNN is like, why are we doing this?
PERINO: Yes.
WATTERS: I am so proud. I won the nut game. Dana.
PERINO: You bunch of nuts. OK, we I also have stories like this about a hero dog. So, a hiker and his 8-month-old dog, they fell in Croatia. They were hiking. They fell 500 feet on a snowy mountain. And the dog was unharmed but the hiker was very badly injured and unable to move. And get this. An 8-month-old dog, his name is North, crawled on top, kept him warm for 13 hours until rescuers came to the scene.
The hiker was taken to a hospital. He underwent surgery. He calls his dog a miracle. Dogs are great.
WATTERS: Well, they rescued him faster than they did the people stranded on the turnpike.
PIRRO: They're still on the train too.
WATTERS: Jesus. All right, Geraldo.
RIVERA: You know, I am very grateful that I've recovered. I tested negative now for COVID. It's a really a life-affirming experience to finally be negative after --
PERINO: Can you go upstairs now?
RIVERA: There's some rules that I -- here's Geraldo reporting on Geraldo news, my rules for dealing with the Omicron. Number one, don't panic. This too shall pass. Number two, be humble, not angry, count your blessings. Number three, slow down. No matter who you are, the disease must take its course. Remember reading or you could stream. There's a million things you could do. Don't touch any anybody, socially distant, air kisses only, no crowds, isolate and get vaccinated.
WATTERS: I bet air kisses was the hardest one for you, Geraldo. Jeanine Pirro, take us home.
PIRRO: All right, now, I want to tell you about a real woman hero. This is a Navy captain who became the first woman to command the U.S. nuclear carrier. The USS Abraham Lincoln deployed this week from San Diego made history while doing it. The ship set sail under the command of Captain Amy Bauernschmidt. She is the first woman to lead a nuclear carrier in the United States Navy history. I want you to listen to her.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AMY BAUERNSCHMIDT, COMMANDER, USS ABRAHAM LINCOLN: I consider it an honor and privilege as Abraham Lincoln's commanding officer. I'm ready to lead the finest warship in the Navy into the next chapter. We have deployment on top, time to make (INAUDIBLE). Let's get after it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PIRRO: All right, now that's a woman hero. That's a woman who stands up for herself. I'm proud of her. Congratulations.
PERINO: Absolutely.
WATTERS: All right, congratulations. And I still have a little taste in my mouth from that fake meat.
PIRRO: Oh, you do?
WATTERS: "SPECIAL REPORT" is up next with Bret.
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