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US and Mexico reach agreement, proposed tariffs suspended

Dan Bongino wraps up a wild week in news with News Explosion on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.'

This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," June 7, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, HOST: Good evening, and welcome to “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” Happy Friday. There's so much going on these days. Things are so crazy that even some of us who are paid to follow the news for a living forget to stop every once in a while and ask the most obvious questions. And there are a lot of them.

For example, how did the party that hates old straight white men choose as its front runner, one of the oldest straightest, whitest man in American politics? It's kind of remarkable. It's baffling, actually.

Joe Biden, who is that man must be thinking the same thing. Holy smokes, how did this happen? And what can I do not to screw it up? He's a lucky man and he knows it. Watching Biden, you get the feeling he doesn't really know what's going on. He doesn't know the answer to those questions.

Biden is spry and energetic, but he really is from another generation. He was born a year and a half before D-Day. If elected, he would be older on Inauguration Day than our next oldest President Ronald Reagan was when he left office after two terms.

Or put another way, Biden is old enough to be AOC's great grandfather. So when progressive radicals under 30 throw out some new ideological litmus test, Joe Biden doesn't argue with them. He just agrees.

The latest test is about abortion. Since 1976, a law called the Hyde Amendment has prohibited the Federal government from paying for abortions. And for more than 40 years, the law has enjoyed strong popular support overwhelming majority support, including from Joe Biden.

Even people who call themselves pro-choice, understand that it's wrong to use taxpayer dollars to fund something as divisive as abortion. And yet a small group of progressive activists disagree. They know the core political truth, which is that repealing the Hyde Amendment would amount to a massive windfall of taxpayer money for Planned Parenthood. And Planned Parenthood funds democratic campaigns.

So in last year, they successfully bullied virtually every leading Democrat in America into parroting their line. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, D-N.Y., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I will repeal the Hyde Amendment. It's the amendment in law that makes it impossible for low income women to access the care they need.

SEN. CORY BOOKER, D-N.J., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The Hyde Amendment is a direct assault into black and brown communities like the ones I've been representing.

PETE BUTTIGIEG, D-IND., MAYOR, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If you visit our website, you'll see our commitment to repealing the Hyde Amendment.

BETO O'ROURKE, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: As President, I will make sure that we repeal the Hyde Amendment.

SEN. ELIZABETH WARREN, D-MASS., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I don't support the Hyde Amendment and I will lead the fight to have it overturned.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: So pause for a second throughout the rhetoric and try to think through the reasoning. Cory Booker's reasoning, for example, if you can call it reasoning. He is saying that not using tax dollars to prevent black and Hispanic children from being born is called an assault on black and Hispanic neighborhoods.

So for the record, and this is true, Cory Booker has exactly the same position on abortion as the Ku Klux Klan does.

Joe Biden, by contrast, had a different view, until last night. At a speech in Atlanta, Biden announced that he is now in favor of taxpayer funded abortion. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: For many years as U.S. senator, I have -- I've supported the Hyde Amendment like many, many others have.

But circumstances have changed. And I've been struggling with the problems that Hyde now presents. I can't justify leaving millions of women without access to the care they need.

If I believe health care is a right as I do, I can no longer support an amendment that makes that right dependent on someone's zip code.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Well, that was a hostage tape. "The circumstances have changed," says Joe Biden. Which circumstances? Let's be specific.

According to a report today in "The Atlantic," Biden changed his mind after his campaign took a call from Alyssa Milano, the left wing actress and professional unhappy person.

If Alyssa Milano wants taxpayer funded abortion, Joe Biden will deliver it, whatever it takes. Doesn't it make you wonder, though, what wouldn't Biden do? What are his limits? Is there any proposal Joe Biden wouldn't get behind as long as it sounded new and hip and progressive?

If for example, the woke community demanded a ban on heterosexual marriage, would Joe Biden support that? How about transgender animal rights? Is he for those wherever they are?

Where's Joe Biden on a testosterone tax to fight global warming? That sounds progressive, very progressive. How about Federally-funded tampon dispensers in men's rooms? Who would be transphobic to object?

Now, for the record, we made up most of those issues. They're not real, but they sound real. It's 2019. Soon they may be real.

So we called over the Biden campaign today to see where the candidates stand on all of those things. They haven't responded yet.

But if tomorrow morning you wake up and read that Joe Biden has endorsed transgender animal rights, you'll know he really does want to be President. Either that or Alyssa Milano is for them, too.

Mattie Duppler is a senior fellow at the National Taxpayers Union and joins us tonight. Mattie, thanks so much for coming on.

MATTIE DUPPLER, SENIOR FELLOW, NATIONAL TAXPAYERS UNION: Thanks for having me on.

CARLSON: So this is probably without precedent, I think in presidential politics, where Alyssa Milano changes single-handily, apparently changes the front runner's view on a long standing 40-year position.

DUPPLER: And I think Tucker, you and I probably share frustration when Republicans don't learn from mistakes of the past. But Democrats seem to have quite a proclivity for this as well.

I mean, look at what happened under Obama and Biden. By taking hints from the left, by being intrigued by the Hollywood left and saying that the coastal elites were the ones who set policy for us, they decimated Democratic benches. They got rid of basically all Democrats that were in charge across the country over the past eight years when they were in charge.

They put a Republican House in charge or a Republican Senate in charge, and got Donald Trump elected. So if the Democrats want to continue taking cues from the Hollywood elite, and from the coastal elite, that's great, but I think that it will get them more of where we are now, which is Republicans controlling a lot of the different State Houses in this country, and of course, a lot of power here in D.C.

CARLSON: I think that's right. I mean, people are -- I'm pretty -- I'll admit, I'm pretty ideological. I see the world in those terms. But most people aren't that ideological.

DUPPLER: Sure.

CARLSON: And scary wild eyed ideologues really terrify them.

DUPPLER: Well, yes. And I think on the abortion issue, in particular, when it comes to things like the Hyde Amendment, for one, I find it somewhat interesting, given that I'm a Washington, D.C. policy person, and that we have Democratic -- Democrats who are running for President talking about this minute policy issue, that's an appropriations rider every year. I mean, that's pretty wonky stuff.

But the reason Hyde Amendment has been uncontroversial for the better part of half a century is because what it does is it prevents funding of taxpayer abortions. What that means is it prevents taxpayers who are the unwitting beneficiaries of tax policy from having to pay for something that they object to, that they have a conscientious problem with. They don't have to pay for that.

And that has been a Democratic and Republican position for many, many years.

CARLSON: Sure. And as far as I can tell, and we looked at the numbers today, the Hyde Amendment still has overwhelming support from voters. I mean, there's not a groundswell of support from normal people, even pro- choice people.

DUPPLER: Exactly, right. I mean, 55 percent of this country thinks that they are pro-choice, but only 39 percent think that people should be able to have their taxpayer dollar used to fund abortion.

And those numbers fall even more when you talk about forcing medical professionals to perform an abortion against their own objections.

Those are the sorts of things that are at risk here when you start letting taxpayer dollars be used for something that is morally objectionable for broad swathes of this country.

CARLSON: Now, where do you think -- and this is, I mean, this is pure conjecture, because the Biden campaign didn't get back to us to when we asked, but where do you think Joe Biden stands on transgender animal rights?

DUPPLER: I don't know Tucker. But here's the thing. This is -- I can't emphasize enough how radical this shift is from Joe Biden himself in particular.

Remember Obamacare? Remember how that was a BFD according to Joe Biden himself? The price of getting Obamacare done was the Hyde Amendment. There were pro-life Democrats who objected to the fact that there weren't enough protections in the health care law, and they said to President Obama, "We won't vote for it unless we have these protections."

What did President Obama do? Rather than putting in the law, he signed an Executive Order that enshrined the Hyde Amendment applying to Obamacare.

So just in the in the space of the last 10 years, Biden have gone from that being the single most biggest accomplishment of his administration when he was Vice President to saying it is not acceptable.

CARLSON: That is absolutely fascinating. Is anyone attacking Obama for doing that?

DUPPLER: We'll see.

CARLSON: Wow. Interesting. Mattie Duppler, great to see you tonight. Thank you.

DUPPLER: Good to see you, Tucker.

CARLSON: Well, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube have all justified banning users on the grounds that they promote -- conspiracy theories. But of course, they don't have a problem with conspiracy theories. What they care about is suppressing opinions they don't like. Do you need proof?

Well, here's a very good popular conspiracy theory that has been repeated on television day in and day out for months on end. The theory is that the real Governor of the State of Georgia is not Brian Kemp.

Kemp is an imposter, a fraud. Maybe a lizard man wearing a human suit. The real Governor of Georgia is someone completely different, Stacey Abrams. This is a very popular conspiracy theory. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS, D-CALIF., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Without voter suppression, Stacey Abrams would be the Governor of Georgia.

REP. SETH MOULTON, D-MASS., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If this country wasn't racist, Stacey Abrams would be Governor.

BUTTIGIEG: I don't need to tell Georgia about this. Stacey Abrams ought to be the Governor of Georgia. When racially motivated voter suppression is permitted, when districts are drawn so that politicians get to choose their vote, we cannot truly say that we live in a democracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Keep in mind, just as a factual matter, there's no evidence for anything. Not one point you just heard, none. And we looked, nothing personal here, there is no evidence.

But the biggest proponent of this lunatic conspiracy theory is the person at the heart of it, Stacey Abrams.

Last night at a DNC gala, Abrams said this quote, "You don't have the right to vote in the State of Georgia. We have the opportunity to possibly think about maybe being able to participate in the right to vote in the State of Georgia." End quote.

Keep in mind, Stacey Abrams somehow went to Yale, and it is deranged. It doesn't mean smart people can't be demented. I guess, this is a perfect example of it.

Georgia has more registered voters than it's ever had in the history of the State of Georgia, almost seven million. In the 2018 vote, voter turnout was 57 percent. That's an increase of 14 percent over the previous gubernatorial election, okay? 1.4 million extra people voted in Georgia in 2018, compared to four years before in 2014.

It was one of the highest turnout midterm elections in the history of the State of Georgia. Those are the facts about what happened. Racial suppression? Nuts.

So it is a conspiracy theory and is driven by narcissism and entitlement and childish whining, which are the driving forces on the left as you know. It turns out Stacey Abrams lost an election. That's happened before. In fact, it happens to thousands of people every year in America.

But instead of accepting that, she is claiming the entire system is rigged. Again, this is narcissism on parade, and it damages democracy a lot more than any Russian Facebook ads.

So why aren't Twitter and YouTube banning Stacey Abrams and Kamala Harris and that moron, Seth Moulton for pushing this dangerous conspiracy theory? They're against conspiracy theories, right?

So to gets to the bottom of that question, we're joined tonight by Fox News chief national correspondent, Ed Henry. Hey, Ed.

HENRY: Tucker, great to see. I mean, you make some very important points, because when you go through this, there should not be voter suppression. But in fact, in this race, we don't have evidence of it. There should not be voter fraud in Georgia or anywhere else.

If that's what Democrats want, maybe they'll get behind voter ID laws that Republicans have been talking about for a long time. But the bottom line is, beyond all of that, as you say, in every race -- House races, Senate races, gubernatorial races -- the votes are ultimately counted. And at the end, there's a winner and/or a loser. And then everybody moves on. Otherwise, it's dangerous.

And how do I know that? I know that it's a direct threat to democracy if you don't accept the results, because Hillary Clinton told all of that -- all of us that in 2016, at the final debate in Nevada, when Donald Trump seemed to hesitate about whether he'd accept the election results, Hillary Clinton, I'm directly quoting here said, "It's a direct threat to our democracy if you don't accept the election results."

And what's happening here? Whether Stacey Abrams, whether it's Kamala Harris, or Hillary Clinton or herself, who let's face it has been traveling not just around the United States, but around the world, suggesting that the election was robbed from her because of the Russians for the better part of two years or more.

And so she laid the marker down, Hillary Clinton, that it's a direct threat to our democracy if you do not accept election results. She said that. It's in the transcript, you can look it up. And then here we are more than two years later, and Democrats are not accepting the results in Georgia. And if you tell them they're wrong, they say you're racist.

CARLSON: Did you go to Harvard, Ed?

HENRY: No. I can guarantee you, I didn't.

CARLSON: You know, I didn't either. I can actually remember where I went to college, but I'm positive, it wasn't Harvard. It was not an Ivy League school.

This is a much broader question about American society. But I've noticed that some of the least bright people in our public conversation went to Ivy League schools. I'm serious.

So Seth Moulton went to Andover and Harvard. How did that happen? Stacey Abrams went to Yale Law. Chris Cuomo went to Yale undergrad like, this is not on the level. This is not a meritocracy. Can we just be honest about that or no?

HENRY: Well, and let's talk about the bench for the Democratic Party right now because it's interesting. Stacey Abrams is seen as a rising star. She lost the gubernatorial race.

Beto O'Rourke lost the Senate race in Texas, and yet is a winner to Democrats and all of a sudden, remember, I mean, his star has faded a bit, of course, but it was only a couple months ago, he was on the cover of "Vanity Fair" and he was the next great hope, he was the next Obama we were told all because of the hype.

But remember, he lost the Senate race in Texas. Stacey Abrams lost in Georgia and yet they're two of the brightest stars. What does that say about the venture Democrats?

CARLSON: Well, but also he went to Columbia. I'm obsessed. I'm totally obsessed with this. What is going on at the admissions offices in Ivy League schools in letting in people who are demonstrably dumb? We need to get to the bottom of this.

HENRY: We need a “Tucker Carlson Tonight” investigation and I guarantee you, it's coming.

CARLSON: Yes, we do. That's unbelievable. Ed Henry, it's so great to see you. Thank you.

HENRY: Good to see you. Have a good weekend.

CARLSON: Well, the President threatened tariffs last week. They're just days away. Mexico clearly believes it and they are scrambling to reduce illegal immigration. Details after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: If you've ever flown on an airplane, you know the indignities it involves. One of them is you're expected to present a photo ID to board a plane. This is our effort to prevent terrorism and other crimes.

Apparently for the past six months, TSA has been waiving that to help illegal immigrants released from I.C.E. custody fly all over the United States at public expense even before their asylum is approved.

Terry Turchie is a former FBI Deputy Assistant Director of Counterterrorism and joins us tonight. Mr. Turchie, thanks very much for coming on.

TERRY TURCHIE, FORMER FBI DEPUTY ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF COUNTERTERRORISM: Hi, Tucker.

CARLSON: So if you showed up at Washington National Airport or any airport in America and said look, "I don't have an ID and I don't have any money but I'd like the taxpayer to finance a flight across the country." How would they respond?

TURCHIE: Well, I think they'd respond by telling me I wasn't going anywhere, and I wasn't getting on the plane. But like so many other things, like so many other things. And I mean, my wife has been stopped four times now in the last four times we've flown. So she has a lot to say about this.

But security and law enforcement professionals are going to tell you, Tucker that anytime you carve out exceptions to all the security roles, and to all the security technology, then you're going to eventually have trouble, and one of these days will obviously have trouble.

And we are living in a society now where we have judges and politicians who sit behind walls and fences and have guards engaged in guns to protect them. But now we're deciding that we can put people on planes that we don't even know about, they haven't been vetted. We don't know them.

They haven't gotten to the process, or to that part of the process in America yet where we know anything about them. And yet, we're violating our own rules, rules that were put into effect, because 3,000 people were killed in the World Trade Center and we're still fighting the war on terror.

So it's really hard to imagine and hard to figure out that the very government responsible for keeping us safe, actually isn't.

CARLSON: So we don't know their identities necessarily and -- I mean, you spent your whole life in law enforcement, knowing about somebody isn't that the first step to assessing the threat that person may pose?

TURCHIE: Absolutely. And that's the reason for so many of the procedures that have been put in place and so honored for so many years. But now because of immigration, because politicians can't reach decisions about how to deal with this and mounting numbers of people coming across our border, they've decided just get these people out of here.

I mean, judges get in the way, they don't seem to care about this problem, either. They certainly don't care about that security part of it. And so we have a big problem, which is only going to get bigger because no one seems to want to care about the ramifications and consequences of this.

Terrorists are experts in something very important and that is immediately spotting our vulnerabilities. And a concern I've had now for two or three years is that you also see the kind of the dynamics out there and have seen for some time, terrorist organizations are acting much more like Intelligence agencies.

They do surveillance, they do a lot of work to get ready for what they want to do and our vulnerabilities show up. And you can bet they know them long before you and I did. And they knew about this problem long before we did and they're going to take advantage of it one day. And then what are we going to do?

Are we going to have -- the Democratic Party want to impeach the President because he didn't protect the country? I mean, this just gets more unimaginable all the time, and it's hard to know where it's going to end.

CARLSON: Yes, it's nihilism. They just don't care. Terry Turchie, it's an honor to have you on, it always is. Thank you.

TURCHIE: Thanks, Tucker.

CARLSON: Less than a week from now those tariffs, the President has promised to impose on Mexico starting at five percent will be imposed in response to the crisis of the border. Now, there's finally evidence that Mexico -- the Governor of Mexico may be acting to halt the flow of migrants into this country.

Mexico is deploying thousands of its troops along its southern border with Guatemala and it is negotiating a possible deal that would force Central American asylum seekers to settle in Mexico rather than here in the U.S.

Mexican police critically have also arrested a man called Irineo Mujica, he is a U.S.-based activist who helped organize the migrant caravans traveling from Guatemala to the United States.

Hector Garza is Vice President of the National Border Patrol Council, and he joins us tonight. Mr. Garza, thanks very much for coming on.

HECTOR GARZA, VICE PRESIDENT, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL COUNCIL: Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: So give us some perspective on this arrest of this caravan organizer? Who is this guy? What has he been doing? Why was he arrested?

GARZA: So first of all, migrant organizers like Mr. Mujica and Cristobal Sanchez, I wouldn't call them organizers, I will call them smugglers. They're the ones that are responsible for a lot of the pain and suffering and deaths that that have occurred within these migrants, because they've been promising, making false promises to these migrants, that they're going to be able to come to this country and there have been a lot of this.

So these guys are being held accountable because they are to blame for what is happening on our southern border. It's the worst crisis in history.

CARLSON: So that was my next question. So we see these caravans coming north, you know, these long streams of migrants, some of them are clearly desperate to leave their own countries. And it looks organic, like they just one day all decided to come here.

But you're suggesting that really this is being organized by people like Mujica, the one who was arrested?

GARZA: Yes, people like Mujica, groups like Pueblos Sin Fronteras, which means Villages Without Borders. And unfortunately, Mexico is also very complicit in what's happening on the U.S.-Mexico border.

Every single day, these illegal immigrants line up on the U.S.-Mexico border, and in plain daylight, they come across into our border and our agents can't do anything except take them into our processing areas and then release them to our communities.

And it's very, very clear that Congress is not acting. They're not doing their jobs. So President Trump is, he is trying to put upward pressure in Mexico and I think it's going to work.

CARLSON: Interesting. Will it be helped? So do you think it will be helpful the Mexican troops on the Guatemala border?

GARZA: Of course, Mexico has done this before. They've been involved in some of these activities. But for some reason, if you look at back in February and March, Mexico -- the Governor of Mexico like the Federal police, the Federales, they were actually escorting these people into the United States.

They were bringing them in buses. They were escorting them all the way from southern Mexico to the U.S.-Mexico border. So they were aiding and abetting these illegal immigrants to come into the United States.

But with this pressure, we know that it's going to work because it's going to hurt them in the pocketbook. Now, we know that Mexico has a long history of corruption within the government, and once you start hitting their pocketbooks, that's when we're going to start seeing these changes.

CARLSON: Yes, that's -- what she just said, the Federales are escorting migrants to our borders and that they can come here illegally is never covered by American newspapers, as you know infuriatingly.

Very quickly, there's been some debate over who's funding this, these so- called organizers, you're calling them smugglers who have abetted this illegal immigration to our country. They're getting a lot of money from liberals in this country. Do we know who is funding them?

GARZA: So there's a lot of talk about some open border advocates here in the United States. We know that some time back, we saw reports and videos of people that were actually handing out money to these migrants. And this money goes be used so that they can successfully coming to United States and then ask for asylum which we know many times is their fraudulent claims.

So we're glad that President Trump is actually getting serious about the tariffs on Mexico and we know it's going to work. And if Mexico is not going to be a good neighbor, then we encourage President Trump to go up to 25 percent on those tariffs to make sure that we protect our borders and protect our country.

CARLSON: Yes. Maybe we can start indicting some people who are abetting this violation of our laws. Mr. Garza, thank you. That was really interesting. Appreciate it.

GARZA: Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: We've got brand new information tonight on the series of strange deaths and outbreaks of violence that apparently have been occurring in the Dominican Republic and hurting American tourists. We'll tell you after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Well, the news moves fast. Just seconds ago, the President tweeted this, quote, "I am pleased to inform you that the United States of America has reached a signed agreement with Mexico. The tariffs scheduled to be implemented by the U.S. on Monday against Mexico are hereby indefinitely suspended. Mexico in turn has agreed to take strong measures to stem the tide of migration through Mexico into our southern border. This is being done to greatly reduce or eliminate illegal immigration coming from Mexico and into the United States. Details of the agreement will be released shortly by the State Department. Thank you." End quote.

Remarkable. We will continue to follow this deal which if it holds would obviously be a major victory for the administration and for the country.

There are new development tonight involving the mysterious goings on in the Dominican Republic. There are many threads to this story and Trace Gallagher has them all in hand tonight -- Trace.

TRACE GALLAGHER, CORRESPONDENT: And Tucker, we now have detailed autopsy results and the mystery gets even deeper. Remember on May 25th, 41-year-old Miranda Schaup-Werner from Philadelphia checked into the Bahia Principe in La Romana, got a drink from the minibar, collapsed and died.

Five days later, a Maryland couple staying at a sister hotel on the same property were found dead in their room.

Now, the Dominican government says, the three Americans died of internal hemorrhaging, water on the lungs and enlarged hearts. In other words, all three died of the same thing and two died at the same time.

Toxicology reports are still pending, which may shed light on whether they consumed anything that might have led to their deaths.

But one year ago a Colorado couple staying at the same resort got violently ill and when they got back to the U.S., they were diagnosed with being poisoned by a chemical used in a pesticide.

And because of all the headlines, a Maryland woman has new doubts about her husband's death last year in Punta Cana. David Harrison was staying at the Hard Rock Hotel when he got violently ill and passed away and his cause of death. Yes, water in the lungs and a heart attack. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAWN MCCOY, WIFE OF DAVID HARRISON: Me and my son, we were devastated. Because I mean we went down there to celebrate our anniversary to have a vacation and he came home fatherless and I came a widow.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GALLAGHER: Finally, a New York woman who also stayed at the Bahia Principe claims she vomited blood after drinking a minibar soda that had bleach in it. She wrote it off originally as a simple mistake by housekeeping. Now she thinks something more nefarious could be going on -- Tucker.

CARLSON: At this point you don't know. Trace Gallagher, thanks a lot for that. Danny Coulson is a former Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI and he joins us tonight. Mr. Coulson, thanks very much for coming on.

DANNY COULSON, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, FBI: Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: Do you see a pattern here?

COULSON: It doesn't make much sense, does it? This thing doesn't pass the smell test and there needs to be a major investigation here and actually, it would be pretty simple to look into this thing. I hope we get into it. And we'll see what happened.

But it's not -- these people didn't have simultaneous heart attacks. I'm sorry. It doesn't work like that.

CARLSON: So what do you think? I mean, to the extent you're comfortable speculating, what are the range of potential explanations for this?

COULSON: I think environmental is a huge one. I did some work in this part of the world, and the restrictions we have up here in our country on pesticides and cleaning materials are pretty significant. Down there, they're pretty liberal.

There are certain things in pesticides and if you've been to one of these resorts, you know, they spray all the time. And I think that that's a possibility.

But frankly, Tucker, this would be a pretty easy investigation to conduct. If you've been in that part of the world, you know, that their security apparatuses with regard to video surveillance is amazing.

Basically, you're under video coverage by the time you walk out of your room at the resort until you go back in at night. So you have a pretty good record of where people go, what they're doing, is anybody following them around or what's happening. So that's a good place to start.

But the other place, I think, also is the toxicology reports. It's one thing to have fluid in your lungs, but what caused it to get there. And I think we need probably a U.S.-led investigation, and the FBI, by the way, has a presence there. They are in the DR. I was there for a while many, many years ago, and the FBI needs to go investigate. There's jurisdiction to do it.

After the Jonestown Massacre, Congress gave the FBI the authority to investigate the murder of individuals that are U.S. citizens out of the country. So the FBI needs to go down there and do this. And they need to -- they need to do it quickly.

And I will tell you, if I was a person in authority in the DR, I'd want it done because this is going to kill their tourist rate.

I mean, forget the fact that it could be something criminal, but they need to get to the root of it and find out exactly what happened and it would not be that hard, frankly. And I hope they get on it pretty quick, and I hope we find out exactly what happened.

CARLSON: So nobody trusts the police in the DR, especially the locals do not trust the police in DR which is there. They have been pretty vocal about that.

COULSON: No, but they can trust the FBI and there is an FBI presence there. And so the FBI can get a lot of things done there.

CARLSON: Is that possible? Can the FBI just come in and say, "We're doing this investigation?"

COULSON; No, we do it all over the world. Absolutely, it is. And frankly, it's in the interest of their government to find out. If the place is corrupt or not, and they likely are, the government because they depend so much on tourism and American investment that they need to find out what happened and clear it up.

I mean, it gives you a possibility of civil litigation. Yes. But that's certainly better than the alternative. And always, the truth is better. It's better to get the people in there that are professionals and have the resources to do it and let's find out exactly what happened.

I think you're going to find, I'll bet you dinner, it's going to be environmental.

CARLSON: Interesting. That's a horrible idea. The idea that you'd be killed by pesticide in your hotel room is shocking. Mr. Coulson, thank you very much.

COULSON; Thank you, Tucker. It's always a pleasure.

CARLSON: Well, you just heard something is going on in the Dominican Republic and this show would like to find out, so we're launching a joint investigation with our friends over at "Fox and Friends" and sending a team down there to the DR. You'll see our live reports on our morning show on Fox and on this show exclusively. That starts this Monday.

Well, for years, the press had been -- it's probably too strong to say consumed by a desire to destroy the President. Now, they're trying to tell us they're not political actors. Okay, we'll assess after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Robert Mueller says he plans to retire back into private life after his remarks a week ago, but now, former top FBI lawyer says Mueller may have to testify publicly in order to sell the idea of impeaching the President.

Meanwhile, there are new details tonight on a big raise and bonus that the DOJ for some reason gave to its now disgraced official, Bruce Ohr.

Fox Chief Intelligence Correspondent, Catherine Herridge breaks many stories in prime time, and she is here with these - Catherine.

CATHERINE HERRIDGE, CHIEF INTELLIGENCE CORRESPONDENT: Thanks, Tucker. The FBI's former top lawyer told CNN he thinks Mueller would testify without a subpoena and the testimony would help Democrats push for impeachment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JIM BAKER, R STREET INSTITUTE DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL SECURITY AND CYBERSECURITY: Members of Congress could ask reasonable questions of former Director Mueller to get a sense, a clear sense of what it was he was concerned about and help the American people understand. That's what this is really all about at the end of the day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HERRIDGE: But just last week, the Special Counsel told reporters in his only public statement that he doesn't want to testify. He won't go beyond the four corners of the Russia report, and he considers the 448-page report his testimony.

Also these records were released today after Judicial Watch sued the Federal government over a key player who handled the anti-Trump dossier. The record show Justice Department official Bruce Ohr got a $28,000.00 performance bonus while the Russia case was ongoing.

And our reporting found that Ohr acted as a back channel between the dossier author and the FBI. Records also show Nellie Ohr deleting e-mails from her husband's government account.

Nellie Ohr did Russia investigations for the same opposition research firm Fusion GPS that was behind the dossier. During his only congressional testimony, I tried to get Ohr's side of the story.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

HERRIDGE: Mr. Ohr, were you acting alone? Or did you have authority from the Justice Department official? How did your wife benefit from the dossier contract? Did you have a conflict of interest?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HERRIDGE: These newly released records don't show why Ohr got the bonus in 2016. Ohr and his wife have not been returning our requests for comment -- Tucker.

CARLSON: Amazing Catherine Herridge, thanks a lot for that.

HERRIDGE: You're welcome.

CARLSON: Well, since before the inauguration, the entire coastal media apparatus has been in a frenzy designed to bring down the President, but don't worry, they're telling us now, we're not biased, we promise.

At a recent event, "New York Times" Deputy Managing Editor, Rachel Blumenstein said quote, "We are in no way anti-Trump." Just hilarious coming from "The New York Times" but at least now they're sort of trying to prove it.

"The Times" just barred its reporters from appearing on Rachel Maddow's show or Don Lemon's over on CNN, because both are too partisan. Don Lemon is protesting gravely, he is not a partisan he says. Watch him be non- partisan.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: This is "CNN Tonight." I am Don Lemon. Are you listening? The President of the United States is a fraud and a con man.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: That's the nonpartisan Don Lemon. The one who thinks that MAGA hats are racist.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: The MAGA hat carries a certain connotation that provokes a conditioned reaction from many people, especially for marginalized people. When you wear that MAGA hat, you're saying "Build that wall."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Okay, but Don Lemon is not partisan. He just defends violent criminals from Antifa.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: It says it right in the name Antifa -- anti-fascism, which is why they were there fighting. Listen, there's, you know, no organization is perfect. There are some violence. No one condones the violence. But there were different reasons for Antifa and for these neo Nazis to be there.

One, racist, fascist. The other group fighting racist fascist. There is a distinction there.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: That's unbelievable. They say they are against fascism. They can't be fascist. It's in the name.

Don Lemon is a very serious, completely neutral journalist. Watch his most neutral moment recently.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEMON: You know what they say about gambling -- casino gambling, right? The house always wins. Well, not always. Not if it's a Trump casino. Come on. Who loses money at a casino except for the person gambling, not the owner.

Because I'm good enough. I'm smart enough. And doggone, people love me.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Man, that's a weird show. Sean Davis cofounded "The Federalist." We had him on, I think earlier this week. He is great. Came back. Sean Davis, great to see you tonight.

So if you're Don Lemon, there's -- I mean, you know, you host a primetime show. It's okay to have opinions. Why not just admit that you hate Trump and you're a Democratic partisan, which he transparently is, why not just say so?

SEAN DAVIS, COFOUNDER, THE FEDERALIST: Well, I think you've got to cut him some slack. The guy is trying to beat out Spongebob Square Pants reruns on Nickelodeon at night. I mean, what's the guy got to do?

CARLSON: Good point.

DAVIS: You raise a good point, which is that there's nothing wrong with having a perspective and having a point of view. The problem is when you have that and then you lie about it, which is what we see from "The Post" and CNN and "The New York Times" and everyone else, they just not be honest.

And it's not -- I don't know, if it's because they think we're stupid, or they think their audience is stupid. But everyone knows it. They're biased. We know it. They know it. And they know we know it, and it's time for them to just acknowledge it and move on.

CARLSON: Well, that's -- I don't think I've spent a single minute this year being mad at Rachel Maddow. I don't agree with anything she says. But she is pretty straightforward about who she is.

She is a Democratic partisan, and she's the most powerful person in the Democratic Party. That's fine. You know, she's not lying about it. Why - - wouldn't it just be easier? Wouldn't it be better on the conscience? Wouldn't the ratings be higher, if CNN would stop lying about who they are?

DAVIS: Absolutely. And you can actually see it in the ratings. It's why MSNBC does as well as it's been doing is that they're honest about it. They say, "Look, we are left-wing partisans, we're not ashamed of it. And this is our point of view. And here you go."

And yet for some reason, CNN, which in many ways is even more partisan, more deranged, and more delusional than MSNBC wants to pat itself on the back and pretend like they're somehow independent arbiters of facts, when in reality, they're just a bunch of partisan hacks.

CARLSON: It's just interesting, and then they whip around and you know, look at other news organizations like this one and say, "Well, you know, you've got a distinction between news and primetime," which we do have, famously, but they don't.

I mean, it's not at all clear where the reporting starts, and ends and where the opinionizing starts and ends. I mean, it all kind of bleeds together.

DAVIS: Well, that's because so much of the reporting actually is opinionating, and I think that's the really damaging thing that's happening in media now is that the narrative has been made the most important priority, and when you have a narrative you want to push, it doesn't matter if the facts are there or not. You're going to cook up the facts.

And so CNN has decided they have the narrative that orange man bad and bad orange man has to go. And it doesn't matter what reality is, that's what they're going to stick to.

And there's a reason people don't trust them. There's a reason the media's ratings and credibility are in the tank and organizations like CNN, they're primarily responsible for it.

And if they were just honest, if they were just honest about who they are and what they want, I think people would cut them a lot of slack.

CARLSON: I completely agree. It's the lying. It's the cover up. It's the insulting disingenuousness. It's the falseness that just makes you want throw a beer bottle through the TV.

So last thing, if you see Don Lemon, will you tell him to just be who he is and fess up and stop lying.

DAVIS: I see him all the time, so I'll tell him that when I see him again.

CARLSON: Good. I knew you would. Sean Davis. Great to see you tonight. Thank you.

DAVIS: Thank you.

CARLSON: It's the end of the week. We're going to end this week as we end every week with an explosion. "Dan Bongino's News Explosion." The three craziest stories of the last seven days ranked after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: It's the greatest graphic in television. Sorry to brag. It's Friday. It is time for "Dan Bongino's News Explosion." Our favorite former Secret Service agent and New York City cop is here to present his top three stories of the week. Ladies and gentlemen, Dan Bongino joins us.

DAN BONGINO, CONTRIBUTOR: In a tie no less. What do you think, Tucker? Am I looking sharp?

CARLSON: You look great actually.

BONGINO: Thank you. I'm filling in for Sean next. I've got be all fancy and everything. It's totally not my thing, but whatever, I'll just roll with it.

All right, so here my three favorite stories of the week. I want you to know I just did this one on the fly.

Big hashtag winning for the whole MAGA movement and Donald Trump who appears, due to a recent tweet, to have won some concessions from the Mexican government on the immigration crisis on the southern border.

It appears the tariffs that were going to go into effect on Monday, but he had to sign some legal paperwork to have it, you know, that it would have been implemented this weekend, it looks like the threat of the tariffs was enough to get some signed documents from the Mexican government, they're going to do something about their border. This is another win for Trump.

I know you've highlighted the border on your show repeatedly. It is a crisis. It's always been a crisis. Now at least, Donald Trump can hang his hat on a victory there. So it looks to be a pretty nice job by the President, Tucker.

CARLSON: Pretty amazing. It'll be interesting to see the reaction to it next week.

BONGINO: Oh, yes. Well, you know what the reaction is going to be. It's going to be collusion and the Russians did it, you know, Putin was advising me. Come on, Tucker.

CARLSON: It's so stupid.

BONGINO: You know, I know you're only half kidding. We already know the reaction. Trump is horrible. He's the worst. He is the worst in the world.

CARLSON: How can you be against the United States prevailing over a rival, an adversary? Mexico? You should -- we should be happy if you're on our side.

BONGINO: I want to say something, but I want to keep my job, so I'll leave that one for another time. Maybe we'll have it over a beer sometime. I'll tell you what I really think about that. But I assume you're on our side sometimes and some people aren't unfortunately.

So story number two, Joe Biden who is evolving at such a rapid rate. I was joking. He should be in the new X-Men movie. He may be developing some mutant powers like Magneto or something.

This is the first Tucker, flip-flop-flip I've seen in a long time. It's not a 180, it's not a 360. It's a 540. Very well done by Joe Biden. What happened?

Joe Biden came out in 1976, two years after I was born. He has only been in politics for a few minutes, I'm 44, of course, I say that jokingly. And in 1976, he supported the Hyde Amendment, a ban on Federal funding for certain abortion procedures.

He then flip flopped on it the other day, and said he was -- he backed himself up, yes, I'm supporting it, then he flopped on it again, and then he flopped back again. And now, he is not for the Hyde Amendment anymore.

So it's a flip-flop-flip. This is what happens when you cave to the progressive left. And I've got to tell you, Tucker. He has got a long campaign in form. If he thinks every position he has taken, that's been mildly centrist, if he is going to flip on every one, he might as well just do it now. It's going to be over for him before it even starts.

CARLSON: That's for sure. I agree with that.

BONGINO: All right. Story number one. What a tremendous success this week for President Trump. The overseas trip. Now, you'd never know it by the media coverage. The trip to Europe, this speech was I thought one of the finest he did.

His celebration of what you and I, and I think the entire audience, regardless of your political affiliation would agree, the finest generation of men we may see in our lifetime in the United States, who stormed the beaches of Normandy.

His speech lauding their accomplishments was a real tear jerker. It was tremendous. Of course, you'd never know it by the media coverage.

And to be fair, there was some media outlets that at least gave him credit for the speech.

But the majority of the coverage about his very successful trip overseas -- Europe -- the Europe trip, Tucker was about the Trump balloon. The balloon which, by the way, by the impression of MSNBC and CNN, you would think this balloon was the size of like 62 football fields.

It's a little ridiculous balloon, like they make at a kid's party, that's as big as like the bouncy house, but on the TV, it's like the size of 72 football fields because that's what they want you to believe. So the media just can't give up attacking this guy.

CARLSON: Who cares about a stupid balloon? Dan Bongino, you are the best. Thank you for ending our week on a note like that.

BONGINO: Oh, thanks, buddy. Always good to talk to you.

CARLSON: Great to see you.

BONGINO: Take care.

CARLSON: You can catch Dan in the next hour, filling in for Sean.

Well, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio's presidential campaign is off to a legitimately rough start. Among Democratic voters, he is polling somewhere between Idi Amin and Pol Pot, maybe lower than both.

He is not going to be President of the United States, but he is still pretending as if it could happen. Now, New York residents are trying to get annoyed by the whole thing.

This past weekend, Bill de Blasio -- this coming weekend, rather, Bill de Blasio was skipping the city's annual Puerto Rican Day Parade so we can campaign in Iowa.

One city councilman, Ruben Diaz from the Bronx, says he thinks de Blasio's decision is quote "disrespectful and an abandonment of the city." And of course, he is absolutely right. De Blasio has abandoned the city.

But Councilman Diaz should look at the bright side, de Blasio abandoning New York is the single best thing he has ever done as mayor.

In fact, we hope de Blasio commits even more to his presidential campaign. Keep fighting mayor, stay in Iowa until January and stay on the campaign trail until the convention. Don't give up. New York needs you in Des Moines.

Well, that's it for us tonight. We are out of time like sands through an hourglass. Everything goes faster than you think it will, doesn't it? Yes, it does.

But we'll be back, Monday, 8:00 p.m. Eastern. The show that is the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and groupthink. Have the best weekend with the ones you love.

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