On Friday’s Mark Levin Show, there’s a strange group of pseudo-intellectual ‘conservatives’ who trash Ronald Reagan and his policies. Is this the Conservative movement? Mark breaks down exactly what a Conservative believes. The problem isn’t our principles, the problem is the people we put in office who reject our principles. The problem is the evisceration of our culture. We don’t need to reinvent liberty or commerce. We need the right people to be in the right place, who will take on the enemy of culture and government. Also, the FBI is completely out of control. A FISA Court filing revealed that the FBI improperly used warrantless search powers more than 278,000 times in 2021 on Americans. We need accountability for this. If criminal law doesn’t exist that puts these people in prison, then one must be written and adopted. Later, Speaker Kevin McCarthy calls in to discuss the debt ceiling. Washington D.C. has a spending problem, and it needs to be reined in. The House Republicans raised the debt ceiling and found a way to claw back spending and Biden ignored McCarthy for 97 days. Finally, Politico put out a disgusting hit job on Casey DeSantis. Just like the media goes after Trump, they will now go after DeSantis. They would never put out a piece like this on Michelle Obama or Jill Biden. The media hate smart, strong, professional Republican women who are also loving mothers and wives, and who support their husbands.
Politico
The Casey DeSantis Problem: ‘His Greatest Asset and His Greatest Liability’
Real Clear Politics
Fetterman, Sanders Call On Biden To Declare Debt Ceiling Unconstitutional: “This Is The Whole Reason The 14th Amendment Exists”
Photo by Cynthia Johnson
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Rough transcription of Hour 1
Segment 1
Hello, America. Mark Levin here. Our number 877-381-3811. 877-381-3811. The speaker is asked to come on the program and I want to know where we stand on this spending stuff. And we also invited Chip Roy and he will be on here Monday. But I want to know what Biden’s up to were up to and the whole thing. So rather than speculate, we’ll see where things are. Now, there’s more breaking news on the FBI. The Federal Bureau of the Stasi. And this is from Fox. I want you to listen to this because this is on top of everything else. The FBI improperly use warrantless search powers against U.S. citizens more than 278,000 times in the year ending November 2021, according to an unsealed Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court filing. We need to deal with this this secret court stuff now. U.S. citizens covered in that improper effort included people involved in the Capitol riot on January six. George Floyd protesters during the summer of 2020 and donors to a failed congressional candidate, the filing said. Section 702. That’s the issue. Now face allows the government to conduct targeted surveillance of non-U.S. persons located abroad to acquire foreign intelligence information when U.S. citizens are flagged as part of these investigations. The FBI takes over the process of querying them for possible security reasons. The court filing, which spanned 127 pages, was unsealed a few hours ago by the FISA court, but was filed in April 20, 22. April 2022. Over a year ago. The FBI has faced scrutiny for the misuse of Section 702, and FBI Director Christopher Wray has said the bureau has taken steps to reform the system that. That zombie needs to be removed. Fox News Digital first reported last month that the Office of the Director of National Intel said there was a significant decline in the total number of queries the FBI made into U.S. citizens between 2021 and 2022. Under this Section 702, due to the changes the Bureau made to its systems, processes and training relating to U.S. persons queried. In the year ending November 2022. About half a year ago, the FBI conducted a total of about 204,000 queries, a 94% drop from the previous year’s reporting period when it conducted 3.4 million. And you’ll remember, 1 million of those were erroneous. Remember. The filing released today detailed a number of the improper queries, including a batch query for about or more than 19,000 donors to a congressional campaign. Called the analyst who ran the query advised that the campaign was a target of foreign influence. But National Security Division determined that only eight identifiers used in the query had sufficient ties to foreign influence activities to comply with the Queering standard. I guess that’s a few less than 19,000. It’s unclear to which congressional campaign the filing is referring. Fox News has learned the candidate was not a member of Congress and didn’t win the seat. The filing also said another batch of queries was made in June 2020 using identifiers of 133 individuals arrested in connection with the civil unrest and protests between approximately May 30. And June 18. 2020. The civil unrest was due to the death of George Floyd in police custody in May 2020. And it goes on. It’s just. Between December 2021 and November 2022, the ICE couriers, conducted based on evidence of the crime, increased slightly. Section 702 is set to sunset on December 31, and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are proposing reforms in order to reauthorize this section. I am proposing accountability. I am proposing that if the criminal law. Does not exist. That puts these people in prison. Then one must be. One must be written and one must be adopted. These are civil liberties. This cannot continue. The FBI is completely out of control America. And Christopher Wray. He needs to be replaced. The fourth FBI director was a complete dud in his case because then an owl involved in interfering in the fourth election, the 2024 election. It’s unbelievable. As I said, Kevin McCarthy, the speaker, will be here at the bottom of the hour. I’ve been hearing different things, including that discussions between the two sides are on hold. I just want to know what’s going on. And I think you want to know what’s going on tonight, the wonder all weekend. And there is a new thing afoot. A new weird. Thing afoot. By some. Sort of young pseudo intellectuals. Not sure if they’re conservatives or what they are. That is to trash Reagan. And to trash Reagan’s policies and to trash Reagan’s successes. I knew this happened on the left. I really did. Although the more I’ve looked into this, it doesn’t happen as much on the left as I thought. They embrace Lyndon Johnson. They embrace Franklin Roosevelt. They go back. They embrace Marx. But there’s a relative handful of individuals. Who think that they have created. That they’ve created a brand new philosophy. They’re in creating anything. I’ve been looking at their brand new philosophy. And you know what I found, Mr. Producer? 90% of it’s and liberty and tyranny. The book that I wrote. Which means it’s not new. Not because I wrote it. Because others already saw it. And so I have to actually come behind this microphone to defend Ronald Reagan. That’s how pathetic the conservative movement has become. Maybe it’s because these people, many of them, weren’t alive during the Reagan presidency. Or maybe they don’t comprehend it properly. Ah, maybe like young Marxists, they just think the world begins with them. And we’re going to have these discussions and debates, I’ve decided. Not just next week. But why have them with other individuals? So I’m going to call out by name and we should have those debates as well. People from the Blaze. People from other organizations. We need to have this discussion. Reagan destroyed the Soviet Union. He destroyed the Soviet Union. Well, there’s policies. Now. As a foreign policy accomplishment. That seems pretty big because we had a Cold War with the Soviet Union. Really before the end of the Second World War. Some of these folks thinks we ought to think we ought to get rid of Naito. There were tornado. For 78 years. We’ve had relative peace in Europe, which is where two massive world wars begun. As a result, Leonardo. So these tiny little countries that can barely arm a police force. They they work with bigger countries. They can. In order to protect them, particularly in the face of what communist China is doing now. Communist China would kill for a nado. A communist Chinese type native. And so that needs to be discussed and debated. Now look what Reagan did with the judicial system. An entire farm team. Of intellectuals and scholars using lawyers and professors was built. During the Reagan Meese era. That’s how Justice Scalia became. Justice Scalia That’s how Justice Thomas became Justice Thomas. That’s how Rehnquist became Chief Justice Rehnquist. And I could go on and on throughout the federal judiciary making a massive difference. And they can learn from how Reagan won elections. There’s still study to this day. Reagan was the first to remember the forgotten working class man. They turned out in numbers never seen before for a Republican president, ever. They turned out in blue states. They turned out in blue collar neighborhoods. In 1980. Reagan one 800. Excuse me, 400. And 88 Electoral College votes. A massive landslide. Even got over 50% of the vote, despite the fact there was a third party candidate and he was running against an independent, an incumbent. He even got more in 1984. He almost got 60% of the vote. He got 425 Electoral College votes. Almost 98% of all Electoral College votes. He got 425 out of 538. Is that passé? Has somebody done better? Is somebody going to do better? No. Now they’re not. So I looked over this Nikon agenda. There are a few big gaps that I have issues with. But for the most part. I cracked open my old copy of Liberty and Tyranny, which explains why some of these guys now try to build their cred. Attacking me used to try and contact me. Hey, can we have coffee with you? Or got jobs from me? I got blurbs on their books from me. It’s nothing new. But there are some serious incongruities that I do want to discuss and debate, and we’ll wait till next week. Because I want to give them it him a fair shot. But I definitely want to look at. Let me say now that. In terms of economics. I have a friend of mine. It was the head of a group. I think it’s still a group. On reducing the size of government. Any emails? Me a lot. I like them a lot and have known me a long time and I like his emails for the most part. But he’s into this, too. And. Sends me an article today and I went through it very long essay at An American Greatness. But I worked my way through it. Took little notes and the in the margins. As best I can tell, the guy was trashing. Big government. Big business. Profits. Profiteers. Lobbyists. And it goes on and on and on. And I thought to myself. Well, this is very interesting to me. So who is it that exactly is going to have checks and balances on somebody else? You know, you can see how corrupt the Department of Justice is right now. Right. And then you have people who say the antitrust laws must be vigorously, hyper, vigorously enforced. Well, who’s going to enforce them? Oh, the corrupt Department of Justice. What’s a greater threat to you, America? An out of control central government with an FBI like we see. A government that’s able to make laws by regulation and fiat. A government that has literal power over your private property, over your free speech, over your money, or ExxonMobil. I’m just curious. And so we’ll dig into this a little bit as time goes on. I think it’s a worthy cause. It’s a worthy effort. But forget about Reagan. Don’t you see? We can’t learn anything from him. You must be of the old generation. The old generation that defeated the Soviet Union. That build up the US economy like it never been built, been built up in American history. And in another thousand things. I’ll be right back.
Segment 2
Now, Reagan wasn’t perfect, but most of the quislings who write about him. They are mostly imperfect. We had Jerry Falwell, we had the Moral Majority. We had the new right. We understood what was going on with the culture. And we understand today the great leaders today. And at 25 and 30 years old, they’re not 32 years old. Nobody has replaced Bill Buckley or Milton Friedman or Thomas Sowell or Walter Williams. Nobody. And part of the problem is today is a lack of a bench, a lack of a bench, because when people read, they read their own columns, they don’t read history, they don’t read economics, and they don’t learn from it. I’ll be right back with the speaker.
Segment 3
Well, it’s a pleasure to have Speaker Kevin McCarthy with us. Mr. Speaker, you’re trying to deal with the Biden administration in this budget. I think I just saw a report that said things are off the rails right now. What do you know? You know everything. Well, thank you for having me back on. I want to come on because you have the smartest listeners in the country and this is why they will know that. And February 1st, I went to sit down with the president. I said, you know what? Let’s put this country back on the right track. Let’s get our fiscal house in order and let’s do it. When you want to be able to increase the debt ceiling, he said, yeah, let’s let let’s let’s work, let’s negotiate. Then he ignored me for 97 straight days. So Republicans went and passed our own bill limit safe growth. We raised the debt limit, but we also did smart things. You know what we did to clawed back the billions of dollars of unspent COVID money. We blocked President Biden’s student loan giveaway. We made US energy independent, took that energy bill we passed, put it in. We reined in the president’s runaway bureaucratic spending. We repealed those 87,000 IRS agents and we passed that. Then the president had to negotiate with us, but he has bumbled his way through. So today, it got off the rails. You want to know why? Because I am not going to spend more money next year than we spent this year. We’ve got to get our house in order. For 21 straight years, we have spent more than we brought in on a 50 year average. We normally spend 21% of GDP. In 22, we spent over 24% of GDP, and we’re bringing in more money than we’ve ever brought in in the last 50 years. It’s a spending problem and somebody’s got to finally rein it in and say, we’ve got to stop this. Meanwhile, the press in the United States isn’t even in the country. He’s overseas. They keep they keep talking about how serious this is. And yet it’s apparently not serious enough for him to be here. You know, if it were me hour by hour, I’d want to know where my team is. Where are we? What can we work on that this guy is so aloof, is he not? I’ll tell you, for 97 days, he said, I’m not going to meet with you. And it has to You just have to raise the debt ceiling. What people have to understand, what is the debt ceiling? Okay. It is giving your child a credit card and they spent it on the hit the limit. But year after year after year, all you did was raise the limit. Until you owe so much on your credit card, you owe more than you make in a year, because what we owe and debt is larger than our entire economy by another 20%. So shouldn’t you, before you raise that limit again, actually look at where you’re spending money and eliminate waste. Look, the pandemic is over. We have more than $30 billion sitting out there that was appropriated two years ago. That was just for the pandemic and hasn’t been spent. Why don’t you bring that money back? Why don’t you put in work requirements like when Biden was senator, he voted for it and Clinton signed it. It we found it put it got people jobs. It took them out of poverty to jobs. And you’re only talking about able bodied people with no dependents. I mean, sensible things. It’s reasonable. This is something Obama repealed. I mean, I know there was this was applied during the Reagan era. It was applied during the Gingrich era. And all of a sudden, I mean, on the one hand, we listened yesterday to Wasserman Schultz to say we need illegal we need immigration, more immigrants, you know, millions of millions. There’s not enough because the food is rotting right here in Florida. And then the other side, porter, she’s over there saying we shouldn’t force America. And we’re talking about, as you say, able bodied males even to work. It’s just not just. Which is it? Here’s subsidizing Americans not to work, but the borders open because you claim nobody will work. And you know what we want to do? I want to take that money for those 87,000 IRS agents. I want to take that money back and get Border Patrol agents. You know, let’s be able to secure our border. It’s it’s just like the budget. The president knew Title 42 was going to be lifted. He knew you were going to hit a debt limit. He ignored both of them thinking they’d go away. But Republicans in the House passed a bill to protect our border and also raise our debt ceiling, but put a fiscal constraint. And think about this. What the president wants to do when he argues against work requirements, he is literally saying let’s borrow more money from China, that our grandchildren will have to pay back with interest to pay somebody not to work who is able bodied male with no dependents. Why do you want to do that? Let’s help them find a job, make give their life worth and a sense of pride. They want to do it because most of them are Democrats. In my humble opinion. That’s why me. Let me ask you this. I don’t want to put you on the spot. But, you know, the speaker fight was pretty brutal. We talked about it here at some length. Many of these things that you’re pushing, these promises that you’ve made, your your ratings have gone really quite high. Republicans in particular, very pleased with what you’re doing and they want you to stay the course. They want you to hold the line. And I get it. Are these positions that you mostly had or positions that people whispered into your ear and said, you can have my vote if you agree to do what I told you to do? No, these are positions I’ve had from the very beginning. You know, I know we went through that battle, but that was internally how we were going to govern. With just five of us. And if you want those votes, kind of never change to the very end. And the one thing I had always promised people, give me an opportunity to govern in your seat. Watch what I did when we were leader. We’ve been able to win both times. Why? Because we put the Constitution and the American public first. It’s a new thinking here. And we keep our word. We put a commitment to America. So you know what? The first bill we did would repeal 87,000 IRS agents. We did keep our word, make a parents bill of Rights. We did keep our word by putting a border patrol, a border security bill on the floor and passed. We did keep our word by making us energy independent. We do it time and again and again. And I think it’s not my ratings. What’s really happening is they’re watching the Republicans in Congress lead because they’re listening to the American public. They’re focusing on the issues that matter most. The whole reason we have inflation, the whole reason that we had three of the largest four bank failures in the last couple of months because the Democrats spent $6 trillion and brought us inflation, made us more dependent upon China. And you know what? Even before we read about what was happening in the FBI, we put together a weaponization committee that would look at you haven’t seen something like this since the seventies because we believed when we were listening to these whistleblowers about what the FBI was doing going into Catholic churches to follow people, going to school board, being parents, to look at them because they think they’re terrorists. All of that has got to end. And that’s what this administration has got to understand. Elections does have consequences. The American people made a difference of opinion inside this House, and we’re going to stand up for them. For all of those that hadn’t been listened to for all those years. It looks like our buddy Mike Lee over on the Senate side in particular, spearheaded an effort to round up some Republicans in support of what you folks passed in the House of Representatives, I think was 43 Republicans. Is that about right? That is right. He got 43 on a letter, but he got another two. They didn’t sign the letter that said they would go with them, that they would not vote for just raising the debt ceiling. And I will tell you, I cannot say enough positive about all the Senate Republicans. They have been standing with us. They have helped us get stronger. The president would never be negotiating with us. It took him 105 days. So he finally appointed two people that would sit down and negotiate directly with us. But we’re not going to get everything what we want, but we are going to change the course of history. The president first said he would negotiate. You just had to raise the debt ceiling and we would break. You know what? That all changed. And at the end of the day, we’re going to fight for every inch we can get. If this part we come up short, we’re going to go get it the next day, just like Ronald Reagan told us to do. You cited Ronald Reagan. He’s so passé, you know, apparently. So I hear the most successful president in modern history. Well, I want to thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yeah. Any American that believes that should travel anywhere in the world. And they will cite Ronald Reagan not as the greatest president or one of the greatest leaders in world history because he believed in freedom. You understand what they understood, what it meant for, and he would fight for it anywhere in the country. And he understood what the Constitution and personal freedoms meant as well. Yeah, he made really fundamental changes in the country. I say he’s the third greatest president in American history, you know, behind Washington, a Lincoln. And that’s saying a lot. Is there anything else you want to play to the audience? What? Go ahead. Those are those are the three portraits that I have in my office. Oh, really? Lincoln. Reagan. Behind my desk. Lincoln’s on the other side, and Washington’s over on the other. Down the hall. Well, then I have to send you one of my portraits. My God, you should be hanging out. I’m just kidding. Just kidding. I’m just kidding. I’ve got it. I’ve got a picture of you and I. You were winning an award, and I got to be there. Well, that. You know what? That was very, very kind of you to come to Florida. The zero in Florida. Well, you know what? It was a. Played surprise. That was very kind of you to introduce me. I really was. All right. Thank you, Kevin McCarthy, holiday weekend and good luck with this guy. Thank you, my friend. Take care. All right. Take care. I don’t know why certain elements keep doubting me during that speaker fight, and I didn’t mean to put them on the spot. I had conversations with him. I had conversations with Chip Roy. I have texts with Chip Roy. I have texts with him. I had conversations with Jim Jordan, texts with Jim Jordan and others. And I told you without mentioning their names, what I was hearing. I have them. And I, in my own little role, was also trying to get it done. That is. To get the speakership issue done so we could take on the Democrats and save the country. And McCarthy didn’t change. When I spoke to him, he said, this is what we’re going to do. And then I was hearing the spinsters go out there and some the talk radio to going on about, well, he’s being forced to do their thing. And I knew he told me he was going to do X, Y, Z. So I knew it wasn’t true. I’m just pointing that out. Not to kick up dust, but to make sure the record’s clear. I’ll be right back.
Segment 4
And we’ll have a big announcement in a few weeks, as we do now have a publication date and a release date. I know the title and I will name the individuals who I will personally ban from reading the book. Just a handful, Mr. BLITZER, don’t you think? Just a handful. They can read their own columns in their own books. I also had a good talk with Ron DeSantis today. Look, I’m friends with a lot of these guys. I’m not friends with the rhinos, and I never will be. And I never have been. Never. And I’m not going to be nothing. And one of the things we can learn from Reagan and not those who are ignoramuses, but others. It’s how to run and win elections. Ronald Reagan won two massive electoral landslides, popular vote, landslides, Electoral College, landslides. The likes of which we’ve never seen again or haven’t seen again. He grew the economy by 25%. He had to take double digit inflation, which went through the roof. During the Carter presidency and into his early presidency in wrestling to the ground, which was very painful for the American people. But after two years, that’s exactly what they did. The most massive tax cuts in American history across the board. What are tax cuts there? Liberty. They’re your private property. And he changed. Tremendous amount of the culture. He directed the Department of Justice. That only individuals who would uphold the Constitution were to be sent to him for nomination to the courts. Now, look, we all know judges change. You can’t predict. You hope you can. He can make a reasonable appointment. Sometimes they flip, that’s for sure. But sometimes you also do a great job. The Federalist Society was founded during the Reagan era. The whole debate over originalism started during the Reagan era. And then we have people who want to abandon it. Oh, that’s then. This is now. Everything changed. I guess we should burn the Bible, too, right, Mr. Producer? And people like me. I guess we should take our scrolls, the their tower and burn that, too. Everything’s changed after all. Nothing’s the same. And if that is your mindset, you completely reject the founding of America, the Declaration of Independence, and all the principles. That undergirded. It’s like it’s like the Marxist mindset, which is the world begins today. Everything that went before Really? Doesn’t matter. Here we are. The problem is in our principles, America. A problem is the people. Who we put in office who reject our principles. The problem is in our principles. The problem is the evisceration of our culture. It’s not the principles. It’s a growing segment of our population. That rejects those principles. We don’t need to reinvent liberty. To reinvent commerce, to reinvent diplomacy and national security. We don’t need to reinvent any of it. We need the right people to be in the right place. Who will take on the enemy of our culture. We’ll take on the enemy, this government, who has some sense of the time that we live in today. McConnell and his ilk do not. They simply don’t. Reagan understood this. Trump understands it viscerally. He’s not a movement conservative, but he’s a man who loves the country. Ron DeSantis understands this. He is a movement conservative. All right. I’ll be right back.