RUSH: The Democrat Party is now in full meltdown. They are in full meltdown. Do not make the mistake of thinking they are running things, that they are in control of things. In fact, it’s so bad that the Drive-By Media is getting all over Nadler and some of the other Democrats for being ineffective and not being able to pull off what the media wants them to pull off in terms of going out there and getting Trump. It is breathtaking to behold this.
Folks, we had this fiasco in the Senate yesterday, and after Mazie Hirono, I shared with you an observation that I think one of the things that was behind her diatribe, I think they are scared to death of the investigation of the investigation. I think when Barr said he thought they were spying on Trump, that they heard a death knell. They heard the funeral bells beginning to ring.
And I think that what is underway here is an ongoing effort to try to discredit William Barr from this day forward on anything he might find, anything he might say, anything that he might report. Pelosi confirmed it for me today when we heard that she had a private meeting with the Democrat caucus and she openly accused Barr of having lied to Congress and that that is a crime.
And then it was further confirmed in my mind with a story at TheHill.com. “Democrats Hope Attacks Will Sideline William Barr.” Here we have a random act of journalism. I bet if these people could have this back, they would take it back. TheHill.com has admitted that the Democrats are stepping up their attacks on Barr in order to try to sideline him from making future decisions about investigating the investigation.
“Democrats Hope Attacks Will Sideline William Barr — Democrats are stepping up their criticisms of Attorney General William Barr, seeking to sideline him from future decisions about investigating President Trump.” Actually about investigating the investigation.
“Several Democratic presidential candidates and senior lawmakers are calling on Barr to resign or recuse himself from future Department of Justice decisions related to further investigations and prosecutions based on special counsel Robert Mueller’s report.”
In fact, I think, folks, I think every Democrat presidential candidate has now called on Barr to resign. But what they’re really concerned about is Barr’s integrity. Barr is Mr. Integrity, by the way, Barr is Mr. Honorable, and they are scared to death of it. They are scared to death about his investigations of the Obama administration meddling in the 2016 election.
And so they’re doing everything they can to discredit Barr. And it all started yesterday with Mazie Hirono, continues this morning with Pelosi, confirmed with all the Democrat candidates demanding that Barr should resign because he sacrificed any credibility. And now TheHill.com with an act of journalism actually making the point.
But after that fiasco in the Senate yesterday, you would think, if you watch some of them yesterday, oh, they are so happy after Mazie Hirono. They were so happy after their hare-brained performances yesterday in the Senate. You might be excused for thinking that they had actually gotten their wish and removed Trump from office, they were so happy. But nothing could be further from the truth.
You know, I was thinking about it. I mentioned this yesterday. These people I think are so out of sorts, they just can’t adapt. A, they have a tough time dealing with losing elections anyway. They’re always trying to find some goblin or some gremlin that went in there and monkeyed up the results and screwed them. They just simply cannot accept an election loss or there has to be some scandal, the Russians or the United States Supreme Court or the inability to properly count votes or what have you.
But it’s gotta be miserable to wake up, all of these Democrats, has to be miserable to wake up every morning for three years still trying to find a way to win the 2016 election. We’re into the third year, and they’re still trying to find a way to win it. And what they’re really mad about, they’re really not mad at Barr. They are livid at Mueller!
They had everything invested in Mr. Integrity, Mr. Honor, they knew he was gonna return the goods. You had Brennan out there claiming it was only a matter of time, announcing when the report was coming, that Trump was gonna be indicted, all of Trump’s people were gonna be indicted. If you read the New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, they were just certain. And then Mueller presents a report finding no collusion and an inability to find any obstruction, and they had the reason for getting up every day for three years just snatched right out from under them.
Now, don’t misunderstand. I don’t have any sympathy for these people. I think they need to be shellacked into such minority status that they don’t recover from it in our lifetimes. But I’m just saying it’s got to be driving them insane. I think it is driving them insane to have awakened every day since Election Day 2016 trying to find a way to win the 2016 election, trying to find a way to get Donald Trump out of there.
And, meanwhile, Trump is working on winning in 2020. The country is much better off than it was three years ago. It’s much better off than it was during the eight years of Obama. There are substantive reasons for these people losing their sanity. Then you look at their candidates. Joe Biden, the best candidate they’ve got, who’s about to be overtaken by his own scandal involving his family and the ChiComs in Ukraine.
I saw a photo. Biden was in Iowa, I think last night. I saw a photo of the Biden rally, and the photo was taken in such a way as to hide the fact that there was nobody under 80 in attendance — and there weren’t very many of them. And then you look at Joe slurring his words and having trouble sounding coherent. He’s not gonna make it through this entire campaign. I’m talking about physically. I’m talking about in a physical constitution way. I just don’t… I could be wrong about this. I’m not wishing for it; do not misunderstand.
I’m just giving you day-to-day, on-the-spot analysis. They’ve got 20 candidates, it seems like. Joe Biden is clearly the frontrunner, which means that most of the people in this party are unimpressed, unenthused, and unexcited about the very people the Democrat Party hopes are their future. We’re talking about Democrat polling subjects. We’re talking about people in the Democrat Party who are rejecting the Cory Bookers, the Kamala Harrises, the Pete Buttigiegs, the Eric Swalwells, the Kamala Harrises, the Cory Bookers, the Elizabeth Warrens, go on down the line.
And they continue to tell themselves fake news stories. They continue to believe their own fake news stories. They think they’ve got a deep bench. They think the country is begging for socialism. So every one of them is trying to be Santa Claus, and all this time they’re losing their minds. By the way, while all this is happening, Jerry Nadler today… I guess I should mention this. Barr decided to skip the House Judiciary Committee today for a very substantive reason. Actually, there are probably many reasons.
After this charade yesterday, Barr knows what’s up. They’re trying to lay a perjury trap for him. They’re trying to get him to commit perjury. They’re trying to get him to lie in one of these hearings so that they can get rid of him. They are scared to death of what this man is gonna do. They are frightened to death of his integrity. They are frightened to death of the fact that Trump does not repulse him. They can’t believe that Robert Mueller allowed Barr to outsmart him and outflank him on Mueller’s own report.
So Jerry Nadler, who is the hapless chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, announced that the staff was gonna be asking Barr’s questions — staff lawyers rather than members of Congress, rather than members of the committee. Now, you may not know this, but this is unprecedented. This has not happened in 230 years. What Nadler is admitting is that he doesn’t have the faith and confidence in his own members to actually compete with Barr. He doesn’t think there’s a single Democrat on his committee who can stay even with Barr on a Q&A.
In other words, he knows he doesn’t have a Democrat on the committee who can run a perjury trap on William Barr. Barr is too smart for them. Barr is too immersed in the facts. Barr knows more than they do because they only know half the story, and the half the story they know is a lie. The only story they know is that Trump colluded with Russia. The only story they know is what was in the dossier. Everything they think they know is a lie, folks. Everything they think they know is not factual.
Barr knows the facts, both sides of the story. So Nadler goes out and changes the rules. Nadler changed the rules after Barr volunteered to attend. Nadler decided the 18 Democrat lawyers on the committee were not wily enough, they were not crafty enough, they were not smart enough to ask Barr questions that might get him to commit perjury. So Nadler insisted that his staff attorneys would do it for the Democrats and that they would have an hour to interrogate Barr without interruption, which is practically the…
Well, it wouldn’t be personification, but it’s the illustration of a perjury trap. But not only would that have been an insult to Barr (who is a cabinet member, after all), Doug Collins, who is a Republican member of the committee, pointed out that according to the rules and 230 years of precedent, only committee members are supposed to ask questions in an oversight hearing. Now, if this was impeachment, if there were some crime that they were investigating, they could go get their lawyers on the staff.
But it’s an oversight hearing, or supposed to be. As such, the staff is not permitted to ask questions. It has to be the actual member. Now, who was it? Jim Jordan. Jim Jordan tweeted out, “They are already down the road on impeachment.” They’re impeaching Trump. They’re just not calling it that. But that’s what we are in the midst of. They are in the midst of trying to impeach Trump. What they’re in the midst of doing, folks, is trying to win the 2016 election. They are trapped in the past. They are humiliating and embarrassing themselves.
People like Mazie Hirono and Kamala Harris and Blumenthal think they are coming off as brilliant and they’re outsmarting everybody. They’re so self-satisfied. They’re only portraying themselves to be the hacks that they are. So, I think you have to figure that Nadler knew that Barr would refuse to appear under such circumstances. Nadler had to realize that Barr would tell these people to go pound sand. “I’m not coming up there. This is not a criminal proceeding. If your members can’t ask the questions, I’m not showing up.”
I think Nadler wanted that. I think he wanted to be able to claim that Barr was chickening out, that Barr was a coward, that Barr was refusing to testify. Except that Barr did testify before the same committee a couple weeks ago, and just testified before the Judiciary Committee yesterday, and nobody humiliated him on the Judiciary Committee. They insulted him, they slandered him, but nobody outsmarted him. Nobody entrapped him.
So now it’s all set up. Barr is in the process of being discredited. Barr is being shown to be uncooperative. Barr is being shown to be a Trump partisan. “Barr must resign!” And I’m telling you, the primary thrust for all of this is to discredit any finding that Barr comes up with down the road should there be an investigation of the investigation.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Well, my friends, I just learned that my theory was used last night on the All-Star Panel of Special Report with Bret Baier. Here he is talking to the American Enterprise Institute scholar Marc Thiessen, and basically asking Thiessen (without mentioning my name, of course) whether or not my theory that’s all about discrediting Barr down the road is what this is all about.
BAIER: There are some Republicans out there saying that, uh, the Democrats’ mission now is to undermine Barr —
THIESSEN: Yeah.
BAIER: — in case his investigation of Democrats turns up something that leads to indictments on that side of the issue.
THIESSEN: Oh, that’s exactly what they’re doing. That’s exactly what they’re doing. Now we pivot. We’ve been investigating Donald Trump for the collusion hoax for two years, and now we’re gonna find out how this got started. And it’s gonna start with the Obama administration, and it’s gonna… If they think Donald Trump looked pretty bad from the Mueller report ’cause he — because of his cooperation, because he allowed — began to spend 30 hours with — with the special counsel, we’re gonna have the same thing happen on the other shoe and the other foot now.
RUSH: What he means is, let’s see if we do. But look, it’s patently obvious now, and TheHill.com makes it clear with their story today: “Democrats Hope Attacks Will Sideline Barr.” So far not. The latest is that Barr and the FBI director, Wray, are looking into how all this began. Barr is not gonna be deterred, especially now. Now with all these people going after him this way, he is not gonna cower and back down. But Thiessen’s point is, “Okay, Trump cooperated. He set his White House counsel for 30 hours with the independent counsel. Will we get that kind of cooperation who ran this investigation?”
There is no way that they’re gonna cooperate anywhere near like the Trump people did.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: I want to start with a continuation here of the idea that Barr is not showing up today and testifying before the House Judiciary Committee. This is Jerry Nadler this morning on Capitol Hill. They convened the committee, and they showed the empty chair where Barr would have been seated. And some deranged Democrat named Steve Cohen had a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken, eating from it, to try to show that Barr is a chicken and a coward for not showing up. Here’s the first sound bite from Nadler.
NADLER: The president of the United States wants desperately to prevent Congress, a coequal branch of government, from providing any check whatsoever to even his most reckless decisions. He is trying to render Congress inert as a separate and coequal branch of government. The challenge we face is that if we don’t stand up to him together, today, we risk forever losing the power to stand up to any president in the future.
RUSH: Come on. You guys —
NADLER: The very system of government of the United States, the system of limited power, the system of not having a president as dictator is very much at stake.
RUSH: You guys can’t even stand up to the Russians! You guys get in bed with the Russians. Your candidate gets in bed with the Russians to try to steal a presidential election. You accuse Trump of being a dictator. You know, you want to know the truth about Nadler? I’m gonna tell you the truth about Jerry Nadler. And Mr. Snerdley, as a New Yorker, New Jerseyan, you can back me up on this.
I went back and looked. Nadler, after the House was won by the Democrats last fall, if you looked at Nadler back then, Nadler was not all loaded for bear with this stuff. Nadler was not in on this “We gotta get Trump” or “We gotta kick Trump out.” Nadler wanted to use the opportunity of running this committee here to move liberal legislation forward.
But something happened, and that thing is AOC. AOC has these people petrified. Nadler is scared to death that he’s gonna be primaried like Joe Crowley was, these old dinosaurs that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez sent packing in the primaries and nobody saw her coming. She was a bartender. And they’re all living in petrified fear.
Now, do not misunderstand. Nadler is a leftist. And he’s a solid-to-the-core leftist. But I think a lot of Democrats — not a whole lot, and it may be a moot point anyway — but I think a lot of these people are engaged in something their hearts really aren’t in. And that’s why they appear to be disjointed and unorganized and senseless.
Somebody demonstrate to me the political wizardry involved here of still trying to win the 2016 election here in the spring of 2019. What is the objective? I mean, the only thing this party is known for right now is trying to get rid of Donald Trump. And I’m telling you, for every effort they make, they are undercut by the fact that the guy who was being depended on by all of them to get rid of Trump produced a report saying that what they all thought happened didn’t.
There wasn’t any Russian collusion, and Mueller couldn’t even pull the trigger on obstruction. It’s almost an invitation to Barr not to show up, to say that your own members of Congress don’t have what it takes to entrap him in perjury, don’t have what it takes to outsmart him in questioning.
You know, I made the point yesterday — and I see now this point you’ll remember and it’s being repeated by a lot of people. There is an unredacted version of the Mueller report up on Capitol Hill. It’s in a room where members of Congress can go read it. They can’t take it out of there. But the attorney general has made it available.
And no Democrat has yet availed himself of the opportunity to go read it. Nadler hasn’t read it. Eric Swalwell hasn’t read it. Pelosi hasn’t walked in there and read it. Only two members of Congress have read the unredacted report, and they are both Republicans.
Well, what does that tell you? They’re saying that Barr is lying to the American people. Barr is covering up. Mueller found collusion, but Barr is lying about it. He’s recharacterizing, mischaracterizing Mueller’s report. Well, the report’s up there for anybody that wants to see it as a member of Congress, to go look at it. And if there’s collusion in it, you’ll be able to find it.
They’re not even going. They know. They’re just creating media narratives here. But even some in the media, as you will hear as the program unfolds today, are getting very frustrated with the apparent incompetence of the Democrats to pull this off. Moving up to sound bite number 5, Doug Collins, member of the House Judiciary Committee on the Republican side, his opening remarks.
COLLINS: What are the Democrats scared of? They don’t want Bill Barr here today. They’ve had the report, they read it, they don’t like what’s in it. The chairman won’t even go look at what the attorney general offered him. Pretty amazing to me he wants to go in executive session and ask questions about it, but he won’t go read it.
RUSH: Exactly right. He won’t go read it. How do you ask executive questions about it if you haven’t even read it? That’s one of many reasons why they don’t want their members of Congress asking Barr questions about it; they haven’t read it! But they are trying to establish a perjury trap for Barr. Believe me, this is all about discrediting him going forward.
Now, here’s Pelosi today, Capitol Hill press conference, after she had a closed-door meeting with Democrats.
PELOSI: It wasn’t about who wrote the letter and how he characterized the letter. That’s interesting, but what is deadly serious about it is the attorney general of the United States of America was not telling the truth to the Congress of the United States. That’s a crime. Articles of impeachment for President Nixon, Article 3 was that he ignored the subpoenas of Congress, that he did not honor the subpoenas of Congress. This is very, very serious.
RUSH: All they’ve got. All they got is Watergate. All they’ve got is all these things in the past that they have used to get rid of Republicans, and they’re bombing out using all of it. So all they’ve got a here, they trying to make Don McGahn out to be John Dean. And now they’re trying to say that William Barr is no different than John Mitchell, the attorney general during the Nixon administration refusing to answer subpoenas.
That’s all they’ve got! And Barr lied? Barr didn’t lie about anything yesterday. She didn’t cite one specific, didn’t lie about anything. They were trying to set him up in a perjury trap today, I am convinced, in the House Judiciary Committee.