This is a rush transcript from "The Ingraham Angle," September 7, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
INGRAHAM: We're going to dive right in. I'm Laura Ingraham. This is THE INGRAHAM ANGLE from a very busy Washington, so we will get right to it.
Americans stiff arm Fauci. That's the focus of tonight's "Angle".
It felt like we were living in America, again, this weekend, from the fans in Wisconsin.
(CROWD SHOUTING)
INGRAHAM: To the chance at Florida State.
(CROWD SHOUTING)
INGRAHAM: On Saturday and Sunday and even last night with the Ole Miss game, millions across our country were riveted by a sport that tends to bring us all together, talking about college football. And it was evident in stadiums across the country that America is ready to move on from COVID and the fear mongers who want to keep us apart and afraid.
Now, check out this attendance chart. More than 109,000 in Michigan; almost 100,000 at Texas A&M; nearly 86,000 in Nebraska; close to 72,000 in Atlanta for the Alabama Miami game. We have endured 18 months of varying degrees of lockdowns, capacity restrictions, mask rules, business closures, churches and schools being shuttered, concerts and sports canceled.
75 percent of adults have now gotten at least one jab. Untold millions have been naturally immunized through exposure to the virus. Yet of course, they're still treated like pariahs if they don't submit to being vaxxed.
And we've known for most of this pandemic that Americans who are older and compromised need to be really careful that those with high BMI, diabetes, COPD, other chronic conditions are more likely to suffer from it. And that kids are more likely to get severely ill from the flu than they are from COVID. We also need that we need to do a better job at taking zinc and vitamin D on a daily basis. And that getting in better shape is something we cannot put off any longer as a country.
But we also know that we can't let the government to terrify us into isolation. Thank God for the red states that have helped save this economy. Because if you thought Friday's jobs numbers were horrifying, and they were, imagine how much worse that be, if states like Florida and Texas had followed the COVID rules of New York and California.
So at this point, knowing all of this, I think everyone is census over the weekend that everyone's just trying to have fun again, which, of course, makes the left really angry. Dr. Fauci did not approve of all the whooping and hollering.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN HOST: But when you look at crowds like that, you approve of that? Or is that just not smart?
ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NIAID: No, I don't think it's smart. I think when you're dealing particularly in - outdoors is always better than indoors. But even when you have such a congregate setting of people close together, first you should be vaccinated. And when you do have congregate settings, particularly indoors, you should be wearing a mask.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, Fauci, let's face it, he'd prefer it if we were all a lot more like Australia or New Zealand. In other words, lockdown every time three or four cases pop up.
But the fact is, for the past year and a half, it was only a tiny sliver of elites and other professionals who were able to collect their salaries while working remotely. For regular workers, it was kind of business as usual, whether it was grocery store clerks, or people in construction, some retailers, health care workers, obviously. They didn't get to go off to the Caribbean to an island and do Zoom meetings every day and pretend they were in their home office. No, no, the regular folks worked. In fact, they never stopped working.
But now the media and the TV doctors want those same people who worked for the whole pandemic to be miserable in their free time.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANA CABRERA, CNN HOST: I just can't get over the pictures of those outdoor stadiums.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Nobody's wearing masks anymore. And it's hard feeling, like we're alone in this fight.
PETER HOTEZ, DEAN, SCHOOL OF TROPICAL MEDICINE, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: It troubles me that we somehow have decided this is over.
WILLIAM SCHAFFNER, PROFESSOR OF PREVENTIVE MEDICINE, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH POLICY: I would be very surprised if we didn't have outbreaks here and there across the country related to these gatherings.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: On Thursday, Joe Biden is apparently going to deliver another COVID speech where it has - he has some six point plan to announce.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: As we continue to fight the Delta variant, the American rescue plan we passed continues to support families, businesses and communities. States continue to have access to a wide array of support by help for schools that are reopening, help for childcare centers to make them available and affordable, and other resources that help our economy get back to normal.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, Jen Psaki today said that they will be revealing more, not about a rescue plan, but about COVID. Well, my guess is that he's going to talk about boosters and maybe we're going to see more, I don't know, celebrity tiktokers pushing the vaccine.
But as usual, Biden but kind of reminds me of the guy rushing to get in front of a parade that's almost over. Think about it this way. 150,000 more Americans that have died of COVID since Inauguration Day, that's with vaccines available for at least a good chunk of that time. The number was around 400,000 when Trump left office, when vaccines were only beginning to be rolled out.
Well, that's a devastating number. It's been awful. But more awful is losing America to a new normal, which is a medical police state essentially. So in the end, it's kind of earth to Joe. We're done.
We're on to the - I think you're seeing, they're on to the sick, twisted game that the public health sector has been playing on America. We get it now, we see it. We know that the blue states COVID policies didn't really work and they wrecked their economies. We know that liberal governors terrify their residents over a virus that has almost a 99.97 percent survivability for those under the age of 70. And we know when they know that the fallout from this and his other screw ups has caused Biden to suffer huge, huge in the polls.
Perhaps that's the reason why some liberal publications like Vox are realizing, it's time to move beyond the COVID-control state. One problem. Smart governors like Ron DeSantis in Florida; Kristi Noem, South Dakota, they already beat you to it. Same with Bill Lee in Tennessee; Brian Kemp in Georgia, they knew from, what, May of 2020, that to save the state that they have to govern, they were going to have to learn to live with COVID as difficult and as horrible as it is.
It's the experts who wasted the last 18 months moving goalposts only to pretend that we can somehow reach COVID zero. But now that COVID is starting to hurt Biden in the polls, the media is beginning to change its tune. The "Angle" predicted this.
Today, we're moving on to the new crisis. Of course, it's climate change, and justice with COVID, the remedy, means you'll be poorer and less free. And there's always a declared consensus with dissenters villainized and canceled. Same playbook for a power grab. More on that later in the show.
But for now, we can expect the usual gnashing of teeth before and after this weekend's games. They're going to be home games at Alabama, Georgia, LSU, Michigan State, Notre Dame, Clemson, Ohio State and Penn State. That's a lot of people.
Millions of Americans will be happy. Many will be returning to campus after years away. [ph] Alarms. They're going to be tailgating, seeing old friends, singing their college songs, cheering as loudly as they can. Just being together as humans. That's what we need to do. We're not meant to be alone, to be cocooned off from one another.
So it's time to start living again, smartly with common sense. If the rest of you prefer to stay home and shot in, be triple masked with latex gloves, that's your choice. But we're exercising our right to make a different one. And that's the "Angle".
Joining me now is Jason Whitlock, host of "Fearless with Jason Whitlock" on Blaze TV. Jason, great to see you. What was it like this weekend for the country, and for those people, their students and alums and other fans that gathered in stadiums across the country to just celebrate, in the sense, being together?
JASON WHITLOCK, "FEARLESS WITH JASON WHITLOCK" HOST: For me, Laura, and I played college football. I'm a huge college football fan. What we saw this weekend was heartening. It gave me hope.
The American people are starting to wake up. They're tired of being trapped in this game of fear and control that's being played by Fauci and a lot of politicians on the left. And they - the American people are starting to wise up that they're smarter and wiser than corporate media. They're smarter than politicians that play politics with every crisis and every issue, and we're getting back to normal and people are getting comfortable with the fact.
There's no denial of the impact of COVID. But there is that growing reality, we're going to have to learn live and deal with COVID, not live in fear of COVID. So I was very happy to see this. We got to remember these college football stadiums are outside our urban core, in cities, major cities that are more Democratic-controlled.
And so, basically, Laura, and I hate to politicize it, but it's just true. You saw Trump America out in full force at college stadiums. People like Fauci and the people on the left know that college football is a representation of Trump America. And they want to demonize those people, autistic on them. They're not wearing masks. Why are they gathered in large groups?
And, Laura, we've seen it a million times. Every protest, every rioting, looting deal, that was done in the summer of 2020, none of it was - COVID concerns were all disappeared. And that was perfectly fine. But going to a football game and supporting some of our best and brightest athletes, oh, this is terrible. This isn't a good idea.
INGRAHAM: Yes. Well, also, Jason, we've had full stadiums at Fenway and at ballparks across the country. We've had the U.S. Open stadium, was packed. There was - was there any outrage expressed by Fauci - He didn't single out Fenway, or the U.S. Open? Did he?
WHITLOCK: He did not. And, Laura, your show is probably too polite to show it. But there was a lot of anti-Biden chance [ph] castigated across a lot of these college football stadiums.
INGRAHAM: Yes. We'll play. Let's play one of them. Just because, Jason, I wasn't going to play it, because I thought it was kind of naughty. It was a little naughty. But well, I think we can play it, so people know at least what you're talking about. Let's watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(CROWD CHANTING IN UNISON)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: I don't know. Jason, you get some inebriated college students - they are going to chant a lot of things. But, yes, that was four - I counted four stadiums where that chant started.
WHITLOCK: The sentiment is real. People are tired. And this particular segment of America that is tired of the leftist's politics around COVID, around control, around just undermining this country. And Joe Biden represents that part of politics that's doing that. And there's a lot of anti-Joe Biden sentiment among, I think, college football fans. I don't think those are one offs.
And I think they know that we're going to see a lot of that across the country during this college football season, because that fan base is a bit different than the fan bases of professional teams.
INGRAHAM: Oh, no, I was so happy to see those kids at the stadium. It put - I just love seeing them jump around and be college kid. They get to actually be kids. And, look, they've - more dangerous for them to get in a car after a few drinks than it is to be in that stadium. And I think Fauci knows that. Jason, couldn't have thought of someone better to come on the show tonight. Thank you so much.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RAND PAUL (R-KY): Knowing that it's a crime to lie to Congress, do you wish to retract your statement of May 11, where you claimed that the NIH never funded gain-of-function research in Wuhan?
FAUCI: Senator Paul, I have never lied before the Congress. And I do not retract that statement. If anybody was lying here, Senator, it is you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Almost as mad at Rand Paul as he was at the games over the weekend. So, in short, look, Rand Paul was right. Fauci did lie to Congress, because new documents obtained by "The Intercept" show that taxpayer money from Fauci's [ph] NIH ID was funneled to the EcoHealth Alliance run by Peter Daszak. And it studied the risk of bat coronavirus emergence in Wuhan.
Now, part of the proposal admits how dangerous all of it was. Saying, "Fieldwork involves the highest risk of exposure to SARS, or other coronaviruses, while working in caves with high bat density overhead and the potential for fecal dust to be inhaled."
Rutgers molecular biologist Richard Ebright summed it up saying, "The materials confirm that the grant supported the construction in Wuhan of novel chimeric SARS-related coronaviruses that combined a spike gene from one coronavirus with genetic information from another coronavirus, and confirmed the resulting viruses could infect human cells. The documents make it clear that assertions by Collins and Fauci that the NIH did not support gain-of-function research or potential pandemic pathogen enhancement at Wuhan are untruthful." That's a mouthful. But we had to say it.
Joining me now is Senator Tom Cotton, who was the first politician to raise the lab leak theory over 18 months ago. Senator, your take on these new documents.
SEN. TOM COTTON (R-AR): Laura, I've said for months that Tony Fauci should be fired. Now, it's clear that he lied to Congress. So he shouldn't be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
For 18 months, he's been saddling up his moral high horse and clucking his tongue at college kids who want to go celebrate a football game in outdoor stadium on a nice full day, or parents who don't want their kindergarteners have to wear masks their entire lives, telling you you have to wear three masks, when all along he's been lying, not just to Congress, but to the American people about his role in funding the very reckless, dangerous research at a Chinese communist lab that unleashed this pandemic on the world. It is a disgrace. And it's time for Tony Fauci to be held accountable.
INGRAHAM: If you had to rate this as a scandal, what would you rate it as, Senator?
COTTON: One of the biggest scandals in Washington in modern times, I mean, it funded a laboratory that in all likelihood is the source of this once in a century pandemic that has upended so many of our lives. Hundreds of thousands of people are dead, many more have been seriously I'll. Kids have lost a year, now going on a second year of their education; weddings have been postponed; jobs have been lost; businesses have been close, and Tony Fauci all along has been lecturing you while hiding the fact that without proper notification to his political superiors in the executive branch, funded this reckless dangerous research in a Chinese communist lab. And then went to great lengths to try to excuse them.
I always wondering why early on in the pandemic, Tony Fauci insisted there's no way this virus could have come from that lab. It's not just obvious common sense. It broke out just blocks away from the lab where they're studying the coronavirus, where the lady in charge is nicknamed the bat lady. Yet he always insisted, it couldn't be possible. Well, now we know it was to cover his own tracks. It was to conceal what he had done with your tax dollars in incredibly reckless research and a Chinese communist lab.
INGRAHAM: What will happen in the Senate next, Senator?
COTTON: Well, I, for one, I'm going to be looking forward to Tony Fauci's next appearance in the United States Senate. Now, it's no longer just Tony Fauci trying to lecture senators using word games acting like they're the dumb ones, like they're the ones who don't understand basic concepts, like making a virus more transmissible.
When now in his own words and his own emails and the emails are all of his cronies who have been on this gravy train for decades getting your tax dollars and then concealing what it went for. So I for one, I'm looking forward to Tony Fauci's next appearance for the United States Senate. His appearance after that should be at the federal courthouse down the street.
INGRAHAM: How much legal jeopardy is he in from 1 to 10? 10 being the most legal jeopardy.
COTTON: Well, if he were a Trump appointee, Laura, it would be an 11. Let's just say it that way. I mean, he plainly lied to Congress. And it is time for the Department of Justice to investigate Tony Fauci and to hold him accountable to the fullest extent of the law. There is no way you can get around the fact that he has been misleading Congress repeatedly.
INGRAHAM: Yes.
COTTON: In addition to misleading the American people for a year and a half, while he's presumed to lecture them about all their moral failings and stop the spurt of this virus from a lab that he helped fund.
INGRAHAM: Senator, thank you. And he told us we couldn't travel this weekend, that was - it would have been a bad idea to travel this weekend. Oh, please.
Now, the State Department caught lying about the role they played in rescuing Americans from Afghanistan. The congressman behind the effort is here next. Plus, who's on the planes coming out of Afghanistan? Ken Cuccinelli is here next on a shocking report of child brides. Stay there.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: An extraordinary success. Well, that's how the Biden administration describes its Afghanistan airlift. But that's just another lie.
According to The New York Times unclassified reports from the army base in Doha, Qatar, revealed that "single males, including former Afghan Military had become unruly and contraband weapons had been confiscated as tensions in the temporary shelters had flared." The Times went on to report that "Rogue flights landed without manifests. And security vetting of refugees was done in hours or days, rather than months or years."
Now, despite this documented chaos, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Mark Milley said, Don't worry, we got it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GENERAL MARK MILLEY, CHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF: People come in, they're getting their names registered. They're doing the biometrics. They check their irises, they do their fingerprints. They take a full facial photo. They run that against the 20 years of databases that we have. They processed about 30,000 people through here. And they've had, I think - I think they said a couple of hundred or something like that have popped red. I'm very comfortable that these folks are being properly cleared to the FBI.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Joining me now is Ken Cuccinelli, former acting DHS Deputy Secretary, senior fellow at the center for renewing America.
Ken, so he went on and on about, oh no, we got all these databases and we're checking them once, checking them twice, properly cleared through the FBI. So why should Americans be concerned, Ken?
KEN CUCCINELLI, FORMER ACTING DHS DEPUTY SECRETARY: Well, if you remember the statistics about who's coming over, something less than 10 percent of the total evacuated were American citizens, or even potential SIVs. They're throwing around different numbers now to cover their tracks.
And you've got Secretary Mayorkas, who's using cover words like, well, people applying for SIV status. These SIV is the folks who helped us in Afghanistan. Applicants or people who say they helped us in Afghanistan, and we have information on those people. But they're a small portion of the total population. We have very little information in those magnificent databases that general Milley likes to talk about, about the vast majority of people seeking to come to this country. And the Biden administration is letting them in anyway, shoveling them in here in enormous numbers.
INGRAHAM: And the cost of all of this is rarely discussed. But housing allowance.
CUCCINELLI: True.
INGRAHAM: You get a stipend, obviously, immediate ESL classes, kids in public schools. How does this affect local communities that will have to absorb all these individuals, who many of them - most of them never been here, obviously.
CUCCINELLI: Well, they've never been here overwhelmingly, and they're coming from a very different culture, something that's worth discussion by itself. These are not folks prepared to assimilate into the United States in the way that, say, people from Mexico are. This is very different.
And the stipend you mentioned, once people are set up as refugees, which is what most of these people will have to come in as, they get interest free loans from the U.S. government to resettle here. Resettlement agencies get paid, so they have a financial interest in getting these people into the refugee pipeline. They get paid to help resettle them. They qualify for all welfare at the federal level, and they get work permits to compete with the poorest Americans at the lowest end of the economic scale.
INGRAHAM: An, Ken, to your point about the culture, the AP is reporting that U.S. officials are now looking into these reports that in this evacuation from Kabul, where people were just throwing themselves at the mercy of our soldiers, older men were admitted together with young girls that they claimed as their brides, or otherwise, were actually sexually abused. Ken, do we know what we're getting into here?
CUCCINELLI: Yes. Well, I mean, look, there have been for 20 years of our time in Afghanistan, reports within the Military of this sort of child molestation behavior, including boys, not just girls. And the Military command said, Look, it's their country, this is their culture, you need to leave it be.
And so, nothing ever came of it in the relationship between the two countries. But now we're talking about bringing people here and this is a totally different story. And people need to understand that this is not that unusual, what you're describing. Now, I'm not saying it's most relationships, Laura. But it's also, as observed by Military members who've been there during the last 20 years, it's also not rare in Afghanistan. And if this is what the Biden administration wants to bring into this country, they're literally importing significant problems into our communities.
INGRAHAM: Ken, there's so much to unpack. Thank you so much for being here tonight.
CUCCINELLI: There is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You're going to find ways to get them the ones that want to leave to get them out of Afghanistan. We know many of them have family members, many of them want to stay. But the ones that want to leave, we're going to get them out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Well, that's another lie. Because Americans are now relying on private rescue missions to get out of Afghanistan after essentially being stranded by Biden.
Now, one Texas woman Maryam and her three children were blocked repeatedly by the Taliban, from even getting to the Kabul airport. One fighter even pointing a pistol at her head, warning her never to come back, wasn't until my next guest, Texas Congressman Ronny Jackson got involved, alerting a group of vets doing this private mission, rescue mission, they were able to sneak Maryam and her kids out of the country undetected.
Here now is Texas Congressman Ronny Jackson, retired Navy Rear Admiral. Congressman, we've reported on the terrible vetting, non-existent vetting, frankly, that's going on. We've reported on all these other issues with the evacuations. But now this takes the cake. The State Department tries to take credit for very dangerous rescues. What's your message tonight to Tony Blinken and company?
REP. RONNY JACKSON, (R-TX) RETIRED NAVY READ ADMIRAL: Well, it's unbelievable. It's shameful. It is just absolutely unbelievable. These are four citizens from my district, from Texas, from Amarillo, Texas. An Afghan American woman and her three children went over to visit extended family. The husband stayed back to work here. They got over there. They had no idea when they got there at the time that they were going to be trapped behind enemy lines and eventually hunted, basically, by the Taliban and ISIS and abandoned by their own government. But that's exactly what happened.
I found out about it about two weeks ago when the father called my office and told us what was going on. We started frantically trying to call the State Department to find out what we could do with this. We were getting literally nowhere. They were getting nothing from the State Department, no actionable, no useful information that could get them out of there. They were basically being told like everybody else via text message and whatever else, just go to the gate. And if you get to the Taliban checkpoint, just tell them that you are an American citizen. They're going to let you through.
They did this repeatedly every single day for two weeks they went to the gate. It got more and more dangerous every day until eventually, like you said, she had a gun put to her head, the uncle was beaten severely, the 15- year-old was struck in the head. They were fearing for their lives. They were told if come back that they would be killed.
And so once the Americans left, and at one point they were 200 feet from the gate and we could not get the Americans, the embassy to go out and identify them somehow and just get them inside the gate. So it became really obvious that they weren't going to get out of there after the Americans left. It was getting really unsafe.
Luckily, the team that we had on the inside, there were Afghan SIV applicants that had worked with our American troops and security contractors for years, and we had a relationship -- when I say we, I mean the civilian team that we had on the ground. They reached out to them. They moved them around to safehouses every night to keep them home because they found out that their neighbors were being asked where they were at. The Taliban was looking for them.
So we moved them up north. We got them up north on a treacherous route, a 10 hour drive up north, multiple checkpoints, and these --
INGRAHAM: Congressman, congressman, hold on. Tony Blinken was busy thanking the Taliban for helping on these things. So again, your message to him tonight, given everything you know about this case, is what?
JACKSON: My message to him is he is going to testify before our committee on Foreign Affairs next week. I want an explanation what they were thinking. I want an explanation who made that comment. They did nothing to help the citizens from my district. They didn't know anything about it until they were on the border. And it is just shameful that we have to have Americans go in and do what our government is not willing to do or not capable of doing in the Biden administration.
INGRAHAM: Congressman, they promised they were going to get all the Americans out, Biden repeatedly, his people, and they didn't. So it's up to private --
JACKSON: Laura.
INGRAHAM: -- private citizens. Congressman, we have got to roll, but thank you for joining us tonight.
And as Joe Biden attempts to turn the page on his disastrous pullout of Afghanistan, he is trying to change the conversation to climate. Ahead, we're going to expose how he along with the media's help are looking to enact a big, green power grab. Stay there.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: With Biden's domestic agenda imploding and the country humiliated on the world stage, he attempted to flip the script while touring hurricane Ida damage in New York today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Climate change poses an existential threat to our lives, to our economy, and the threat is here. It's not going to get any better. The question, can it get worse?
SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER, (D-NY) SENATE MAJORITY LEADER: We so urgently need, Mr. President, your big and bold, your big and bold build back better plan. We must attack the cancer of climate change that is driving these destructive storms.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: I liked it better when Schumer was dancing. Well, of course what he is talking about is the big green power grab that we've been expecting. Check out how this chart, though, shows that the truth about global disasters is much different. That is the death rate through the 20th century until today. As you can see, it barely registers.
Joining me now is Michael Shellenberger author of "Apocalypse Never." Michael, your response to today's messaging from Biden and company, the storms were really awful, lots of damage, loss of life in the northeast, and thus we have a climate crisis, which means the government has to spend a lot more money.
MICHAEL SHELLENBERGER, AUTHOR, "APOCALYPSE NEVER": That's right. It has turned out that climate change means that you never have to say you're sorry for having failed to do the things that would have prevented lives from being lost. So we have seen this now around the United States. We have seen the governor of California blame the forest fires, which were caused by forest mismanagement, on climate change. We've seen now the mayor of New York and other officials blaming climate change for the floods in New York, even though better infrastructure preparedness, better evacuations would have prevented those deaths.
And we are seeing it on hurricanes. And we see the frequency of hurricanes going down actually. No significant increase in the intensity of hurricanes. But it means that policymakers can get away with really doing nothing and using climate change to advance an agenda to actually make our economy more dependent on weather dependent energy sources like solar and wind which simply don't function during extreme weather events.
INGRAHAM: Michael, there's an interesting statistic that Biden tried to use to justify this climate alarmism. Watch.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, (D) PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: One in every three Americans has been victimized by severe weather. And so folks, we have got to listen to the scientists and the economists and the national security experts. They all tell us this is code red. The nation and the world are in peril.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Michael, victimized.
SHELLENBERGER: That is so bad. That's so bad. I just recently wrote an essay called "Why I am no longer a progressive" because I reject this idea of learned helplessness where somehow we're all victims of the weather. As you pointed out, death from natural disastrous have declined over 90 percent over the last 100 years. We're more resilient than ever. The United Nations when it put out its report a few weeks ago said that nobody is safe. That's absurd. We are safer than ever. We are suffering from safety- ism. A big part of our cultural and political problems stem from this coddling that we have had where we're so safe that we expect that hurricanes can slam into us with no consequences.
The fact of the matter is after Katrina in 2005, the Army Corps of Engineers reconstructed the levees. The levees held really well in New Orleans during the last hurricane. The electrical grid is what needed the backup. And if the focus of Democrats had been more on making our electrical grid more resilient, rather than less resilient to extreme weather, then you would have actually been able to have an electrical grid.
INGRAHAM: I like your point. It's a way to obviate any responsibility for the things that they should do and maybe focus some of you attention at home. Michael, thank you.
He was suspended from the police force after a viral video revealed why he was refusing his state's vaccine mandate. An Oregon story you don't want to miss next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ZACHARY KOWING, SUSPENDED OREGON STATE TROOPER: I have personal and religious reasons as to why I will not take the vaccine, but also the freedom to choose not to. I will likely get fired over this video, but I'm nonetheless exercising my First Amendment right to speak freely. I've fallen in line for over a year with these useless, ineffective mask mandates, and I will no more. I will not sit back and sheepishly watch as those who serve the people of this state given unlawful orders that threaten their livelihoods should they choose not to fall in line.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: That was Oregon state trooper Zachary Kowing. He was suspended after posting that viral video and refusing to get the COVID vaccine despite Governor Kate Brown's mandate. Just days after this suspension, police and firefighters in Oregon filed a massive lawsuit against Brown over these forced vaccinations. Now, state workers who don't get it by October 16th could lose their jobs. No jabs, no jobs. This isn't just, though, happening in Oregon. It's all across the country.
Joining me now exclusively is Trooper Kowing along with his attorney, Dan Thenell. Dan is also leading this suit, by the way, against the governor. Trooper Kowing, we have first responders across the nation who are resistant, clearly, resisting these mandates. Why do you think that is?
ZACHARY KOWING, SUSPENDED OREGON STATE TROOPER: We all swore the same oath, ma'am. We are here to protect the people's rights. And it seems like some may have forgotten that.
INGRAHAM: You're also there to enforce the law, right?
KOWING: That's right.
INGRAHAM: And yet this is not a law. This is an edict handed down by the governor, correct? There hasn't been a law actually passed by the state legislature mandating these vaccines, has there been?
KOWING: That's correct.
INGRAHAM: From a legal standpoint, sir, your client has gone up against the big machine of the big state. What do you think the likelihood of success on the merits of this case given where some of the other jurisprudence has gone?
DAN THENELL, ATTORNEY FOR SUSPENDED TROOPER: So, that is a good question. There is, obviously, authority contrary to the positions that we have taken in the suit. However, the cases that people are citing as that contrary authority are quite distinguishable. They are also quite old. Many people toss around the 1905 Massachusetts case as an opposition to the positions we have taken, but the factual precursors to that suit and the harm to the liberty is quite different in that case versus our case.
There are many, many differences, and frankly, I think one of the strengths of our case is the unique aspects of Oregon statutory law and Oregon constitutional law, which no cases have discussed before.
INGRAHAM: Trooper Kowing, Oregon state police superintendent Terry Davie gave us a statement today saying that the agency "supports the right of employees and Oregonians to their First Amendment rights. I fully understand that all employees won't agree with every decision. However, I do expect them to follow rules, policies, and laws." I assume not every rule, to play devil's advocate here, probably not every rule you are thrilled about having to follow as a trooper given how your hands are tied in various ways because of a long history of jurisprudence, but do you see her point?
KOWING: I do see her point. And there are things that I have had to do that I didn't 100 percent agree with. But when it comes to moral grounds and the rights of our people, that's where we have to draw the line.
INGRAHAM: Dan, do you think that this is going to be replicated, this type of lawsuit across the country given the number of firefighters, teachers, and police troopers like your client, the number who have said, look, we are not anti-vaccine, but either we have the virus, we feel like we have natural immunity, or for other reasons they don't care to get the vaccine. Do you think this is going to be exploding, this literally?
THENELL: So, Laura, I think that is a really -- I'm glad you stressed that, because this is not a lawsuit about the vaccine. It's about telling someone you're going to this vaccine or you're going to lose your job. My hope is that this is replicated. In fact, it will be replicated next week. As you know, the Oregon Fraternal Order of Police was the first entity in Oregon to file this suit. It will be replicated next week by two other groups that I represent.
I really hope the governor and her people will agree to sit down with us and come out, come up with some alternatives to the too drastic ends of this executive order, either get medicine that you don't want to get, or you're going to lose your career. Many of these people will not just lose their jobs. They will lose their career. And I really hope the governor and her people will sit down with us and come up with another two alternatives for these people.
There are thousands of Oregon workers who, I believe, will walk off of the job over this. And --
INGRAHAM: Let me just remind everyone. According to this new "Washington Post"/ABC poll that came out a few days ago, 70 percent of people who are unvaccinated in the workforce say that they will lose their jobs rather than take the medicine. They will walk off of the job. That is 70 percent. If that is anywhere accurate, we have a nursing shortage. We have a police shortage. We have a teacher shortage across this country. That is a big problem. I don't think anyone is really confronting that.
Zachary --
THENELL: Laura --
INGRAHAM: Hold on, I want to ask a final question of Zachary. Zachary, if you were you have to get tested twice a week, would that be amenable to you?
KOWING: Not personally. I don't think that I should have to fight for my job when I haven't anything wrong. We've done just fine so far with the way things have gone. And it's just the law of progression. It's progressed further and further and further. And it needs to stop at some point.
INGRAHAM: Some of the police unions are offering that idea up. Gentlemen, we will following this closely. Thank you so much.
And it's 2021, but Nicolle Wallace is living in a 2017 world. What on earth does that mean? The Last Bite explains next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
INGRAHAM: There's a lot of deranged content on MSNBC daily, but Nicolle Wallace may be stuck now in a time warp.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NICOLLE WALLACE, MSNBC ANCHOR: Want to know how radical today's GOP is? It's so radical that Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the liberals on the court in the Texas abortion ban.
I don't know the legal term, but it sounds a whole lot like collusion between Republican dominated rightwing-centric legislature and the far right members of the United States Supreme Court. Whether it's a crime and whether it's real, maybe Mueller will look into it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
INGRAHAM: Maybe Mueller will look into it? OK. Didn't know he was still looking into things.
Thank you for watching, and remember it's America now and forever. Go to LauraIngraham.com. All that great Freedom Matters gear, you'll love it, American made. And Tunnel to Towers is the charity this month, all in honor, of course, of our great first responders and the anniversary of September 11th.
Thank you for watching. Up next, it is Greg Gutfeld.
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