RUSH: And here we go again, folks. Here we go again. Donald Trump sets ’em up, they haven’t figured it out yet. I’m kind of reluctant to explain it here ’cause I don’t want ’em to figure it out, but I gotta explain it so that you get it. Everybody calm down here.
So here’s Trump with Stephanopoulos, “Yeah, if the bad guys call, sure, I’d think about taking it.” Meanwhile, they took it! Not only did they take it, they solicited it! And they paid for it! They went out there, the Hillary Clinton campaign, the DNC, they paid Christopher Steele, they paid Fusion GPS, they paid $6 million for this, for opposition research.
It was dirt. It was lies. It was made up from foreign agents in different countries. From the U.K., from the Soviet — well, Russia, and then Ukraine and who knows wherever else that Steele went trying to concoct information.
And the Mueller report makes it plain as day that there were numerous attempts to infiltrate and to pass the information along, and the Trump campaign didn’t take it. So here’s Trump with Stephanopoulos — why? Would somebody explain to me why, a two-day, no-holds-barred, even put him in the limo driving Stephanopoulos around.
Look, when Good Morning America calls you, it isn’t ABC calling you, it’s the Hillary Clinton war room calling you. When George Stephanopoulos calls and wants to come by and do an interview, you may as well understand that it’s the Hillary Clinton operation calling you, that it’s the Clinton operation, not just Hillary, but Bill and everybody involved in that, Donna Brazile, who’s now working over at Fox.
And it is effectively the Democrat National Committee calling and wanting access and Trump granted it. I’m gonna go back. Grab audio sound bite 4. This is me, April ’15, four years ago on this program.
RUSH ARCHIVE: When Good Morning America calls you, understand it’s not Good Morning America, it’s the Hillary Clinton campaign calling you because George Stephanopoulos is at Good Morning America and where he really works is the Hillary campaign, or the Bill Clinton war room.
You would no more accept invitation to be interviewed by Hillary Clinton’s campaign consultant, so why would you accept an invitation to be interviewed by Hillary’s campaign consultant disguised as an anchor on Good Morning America?
I know, it’s a challenging exercise to come up with alternative means here of reaching the American people. But one of the ways, this is a great field of candidacies that the Republicans have who can reach the American people by going over the heads of the media, and they should not be afraid to do so.
RUSH: And Trump does go over their heads but, you know, Trump, despite what everybody says and despite what everybody thinks, Trump loves the media and he loves these things. He loves Stephanopoulos coming in. And I think Trump likes to plant little bombs with these people. I think he likes to tweak ’em, and I think that’s what this was.
I mean, it’s so damned obvious. Here’s Stephanopoulos all earnest (imitating Stephanopoulos), “Hey, hey, if a foreign government called you, if they had dirt on your opponent, would you take it?”
And Trump knows the drill here. (paraphrasing) “Sure. Sure, I’d take it.” And plus Trump says, “This business of calling the FBI, nobody would call the FBI! Nobody calls the FBI! You deal with it or you deal with it some other way! Nobody calls the FBI!”
Stephanopoulos says, “Well, Algore called the FBI when he got somebody’s briefing book.” Trump said, “Briefing book’s a different thing. That’s absolute theft. This is just somebody offering me information.”
In addition to that, don’t forget that Pencil Neck actually accepted a phone call from people he thought were legitimate members of the Ukraine government that were gonna pass on information to Trump kompromat about Trump hiring the prostitutes to pee on the bed in Moscow. So little Pencil Neck was eager to accept information from foreign actors on a political opponent.
The difference here, folks, is very simple, but it’s gonna go past the vast majority of Americans because of the way the media is covering this. Trump talks about it, but he didn’t do it. Mueller report, he didn’t do it. The Democrats do it! And they’re having conniption fits today over the fact that Trump said he might do it, yeah, he would do it. Meanwhile, they do it! They did it!
Ted Kennedy wrote the Soviet Union during the Reagan presidency begging them not to nuke us and instead wait until the Democrats could get rid of Reagan, everything would be back to normal. The idea that the Russians are only trying to impact and influence Republicans, the Democrats had an ongoing symbiotic relationship with them, Soviet Union then Russia for years.
So they try to say that Trump violated federal law, committed the obstruction of justice act over and over and over again simply ’cause he wanted the investigation to end even though he didn’t do anything. So we’re constantly told how Trump hates the real news media. He’ll only appear on Fox, and yet here he is taking Stephanopoulos around in the Beast, the official presidential limousine.
But it’s fascinating to watch this ’cause it – (interruption) Why do I call it a setup? Well, the reason I call it a setup is because the Democrats have actually done it! Trump is forcing these people to go on the record steadfast opposition to this while Barr and Durham are conducting an operation to find out what kind of illegal activity there was between the investigators and Russia and other foreign actors in order to sabotage the Trump campaign and then the Trump presidency.
So Trump is forcing all these people to go public here with their outrage over just thinking about doing it, saying it’s illegal, it’s unpresidential, it’s un-American, and the day is gonna come where everybody’s gonna know that the Democrats did it, that Hillary Clinton did it. And it’s gonna be very difficult for these clowns have been conniption fits today to walk it all back, once Barr and Durham make their findings clear.
That’s why I think part of this is a set — Trump is not stupid. Don’t care what anybody thinks, he’s not stupid. And Stephanopoulos did not sandbag him. Stephanopoulos did not set him up, did not catch him in a moment of when his guard was down, or he was not prepared.
Another thing about Trump, he is brazenly honest. Which also flies in the face of the conventional wisdom that Trump is this lying pig, can’t tell the truth to save his life. The fact is the guy is over-the-top honest, almost a stream of consciousness honesty that he has.
So the Drive-Bys are treating this now as a tacit admission that Trump would have colluded, he would have if he’d been given the chance, and that’s almost as bad as colluding. Except for the fact that the august Mueller report says that Trump was given numerous opportunities to collude with the Russians, and he did not!
Contrast that with Hillary Clinton, who in fact did get dirt from foreign governments on Trump, even paid for it. And it was made up. It was manufactured. All lies, paid to foreign governments, foreign agents, you name it, the mother of all getting dirt on your political opponents.
The Drive-By Media is sitting there, and not one of them is gonna take what he said and run down the street and ask Hillary Clinton about it. They might discuss it amongst themselves on the panel discussions in cable news. You know what they’ll say? (impression) “Well, Mr. McCarthy is conflating two different things. What Hillary was doing was not opposition research. What Hillary Clinton was doing was gathering intel, gathering intelligence on a perhaps criminal opponent.” That’s what they’re gonna say. “Hillary wasn’t doing oppo research. She was gathering intelligence.
“She was using intelligence agents to gather intelligence. Hillary Clinton was running a counterintel investigation.” They will never admit she was running oppo research. But to… I guess the lesson here is, it’s okay to do it if you’re the Clintons and the Democrats. It’s okay to do this. But it is not okay to talk about it. If you talk about it, if you say you might or you would accept dirt from foreign sources (even though you haven’t done it), “Ohhhh, that’s very bad. We gotta get rid of you! You pose a great threat.” (laughing)
Now, because of this comment… This is another reason why I think there’s a bit of tweaking going on. The Democrats are all wringing their hands now. (impression) “The 2020 election is gone! It’s over. I mean, Trump’s offer… Trump is sending the signal that he’s gonna accept dirt on our nominee from all of these foreign countries. He’s telling North Korea, he’s telling the ChiComs, he’s telling the Russians that if they’ve got dirt on the Democrat, that he’ll listen to it.”
That’s the next thing they’re doing. They’re very worried that Trump has sent signals with this interview answer to Stephanopoulos that he’s open to accepting (laughing) all dirt from Kim Jong-un, from Xi Jinping, and Vladimir Putin. (laughing) They’re out there and they are wringing their hands. But they are making it clear — they’re establishing today — that they don’t think the 2020 election’s gonna be fair. It isn’t gonna be legit, it’s not gonna be proper, what have you.
These people are doing more to damage the integrity of our electoral system than any of these foreign actors could have ever hoped to. Let me know take a brief time-out. We’ll come back and hear some of the bites for all this, and we’re gonna go back and revisit… We’re gonna go back and revisit little Pencil Neck getting scammed by a couple of comedians pretending to be Ukrainian sources with dirt on Trump and the prostitutes. Adam Schiff was willingly and eagerly pursuing dirt on Donald Trump from foreign sources.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So we’ve got Barack Obama interfering in campaigns in Israel by advising opponents to Netanyahu. You have the Democrats openly violating the law with the illegal immigration, promoting illegal immigration — and who knows how destabilizing all of that is? You got the Democrat Party in California registering to vote people who are not citizens. You have all of these things that constitute tampering with the electoral process, all of these things that are gray areas or outright violations of the law, and the Democrat Party’s right in there.
Not to mention Hillary Clinton, the Steele dossier, buying and paying foreign actors to provide false information to use against a presidential opponent. You’ve got all that actually happening and happened. You got Donald Trump in a limousine with George Stephanopoulos, saying, “Yeah, if Norway called me, I might take it. I might take it.” He didn’t take it. The Mueller report, Mueller dossier makes clear that Trump was offered countless opportunities to take dirt from the Russians and didn’t do it.
CNN has not done one other story (I’ve had spies watching) since 6 a.m. They’ve broken away twice to talk about Iran torpedoing a couple of tankers, but they have not dropped this story. They’ve had everybody on. (laughing) They’re playing sound bites from MSNBC and the guests over there. They’ve had Brennan in there. They’ve had Clapper on. They have had everybody who was a big star during the 2-1/2 years of the Mueller investigation brought in, and they’re being treated as though all of that has now been validated, and that Mueller may as well have found collusion because Trump just admitted today that he would have done it.
Except, he didn’t.
So let’s go to the audio sound bites where all of this started. We’re up to number 5. This is Stephanopoulos. Who knows, really, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a grand strategery here to try to set the Democrats and the media up, because this investigation is ongoing. In fact, the New York Times has a story… Are you ready for this? The New York Times has a story today that the DOJ, under the auspices of Barr and Durham, are now going to interview CIA agents over their role in this — and the CIA is livid!
“How dare you tell us that the FBI is gonna come in and challenge us!” The CIA’s admitting they’re spies. What the hell are you gonna do? They’re livid they have to undergo this. They are livid that they have to be accountable here. It’s not the FBI doing the investigating of the CIA, It’s the DOJ, and CIA people (the agents) are livid over this. Anyway, here’s the bite. Stephanopoulos said, “Should Don Jr. have gone to the FBI when he got that note about the Russians having dirt on Hillary?”
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Let’s put yourself in a position. You’re a congressman. Somebody comes up and says, “Hey, I have information on your opponent.” Do you call the FBI?
STEPHANOPOULOS: If it’s coming from Russia, you do.
THE PRESIDENT: I’ve seen a lot of things over my life. I don’t think, in my whole life, I’ve ever called the FBI — in my whole life. You don’t call the FBI. You throw somebody out of your office. You do whatever you’re gonna do —
STEPHANOPOULOS: Algore got a stolen briefing book. He called the FBI.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that’s different, a stolen briefing book. This is somebody that said, “We have information on your opponent.” ” Oh, let me know call the FBI.” Give me a break. Life doesn’t work that way.
STEPHANOPOULOS: The FBI director —
RUSH: You notice, “If the Russians did… If the Russians called…” They’re so… They’re gonna make this work or they’re gonna go out of existence trying. They’re either gonna make this work — they’re finally gonna get Trump thrown out of office because he colluded with Russia and stole the election — or they’re gonna be committing political suicide. One or the other. They’re not gonna give this up. They’re not gonna give this up, I don’t care how long it goes.
It could go 10 years; they’re not gonna give this up. They’re hell-bent. They are committed. They are going to “prove,” quote-unquote. Even though it didn’t happen. They’re gonna prove that the 2016 election was stolen. They’re gonna prove that Hillary won it. They’re gonna prove that Trump cheated. They’re gonna prove the Russians did it or they’re gonna die trying. They can’t give it up. They can’t move on. I don’t think they have any idea how they look.
There is another series of stories today about the plummeting ratings at MSNBC and CNN. And over at MSNBC the news director there is Andy Lack, who used to be a great, great, great news director at NBC News. The story is that he’s just really puzzled and he’s really livid. They’ve lost 32% of the audience or some such thing since the Mueller report came out. They’re looking at changing staff during the daytime shows, they’re doing any number of things to try to stop the bleeding there, and yet they continue to program the stuff that is responsible for their bleeding their audience dry.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s the next audio sound bite. Back to number 6 now. Stephanopoulos says, “Well, the FBI director said that’s what should happen, that if a foreign government calls you and has dirt on your political opponent, that you need to call the FBI.”
THE PRESIDENT: The FBI director is wrong.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Your campaign this time around, if foreigners, if Russia, if China, if someone else offers you information on opponents, should they accept it, or should they call the FBI?
RUSH: That’s the bite that triggered it all today. If somebody called from a country like Norway, “We have information on your opponent,” oh, I think I’d want to hear it. I’d listen to it, maybe even then call the FBI. I don’t know, George. What do you want me to say?
But you hear in Stephanopoulos’ question, “Your campaign this time around, if Russia, China, somebody else offers you information,” they’re setting it up, they’re setting it up now. I told you yesterday, I told you yesterday that all of these polls that show the Democrats winning in a landslide now in all of these 17 states, this is all to set up the fact that Trump, after he wins, will have cheated again. And of course he’s helped them with this, with this comment today.
Finally, Stephanopoulos says, “You want that kind of interference in our elections? You want foreign countries to be able to call candidates and offer potential dirt and then candidates listen to it? You want that kind of interference?”
THE PRESIDENT: It’s not an interference. They have information. I think I’d take it, if I thought there was something wrong I’d go maybe to the FBI, if I thought there was something wrong. But when somebody comes up with oppo research, right, they come up with oppo research, “Oh, let’s call the FBI.” The FBI doesn’t have enough agents to take care of it. But you go and talk honestly to congressmen, they all do it, they always have. And that’s the way it is. It’s called oppo research.
RUSH: (laughing) It’s called oppo research. Telling George Stephanopoulos what gathering dirt on an opponent is, as though he doesn’t know what it is, is just hilarious. “It’s called oppo research.”
He’s right about something. Everybody’s offering dirt all the time. And nobody calls the FBI about it. When all of a sudden did the FBI become the authority permitted to determine what’s usable and what’s not usable in a political campaign when there’s a First Amendment over there guaranteeing, among all things, free speech and particularly political speech?
When did this establish itself, and who did it, that when there’s ever anything questionable, anything suspicious, anything that might be a little off kilter, you’ve gotta call the FBI? When did that happen? Anybody ever remember this being a big deal: Candidates must call the FBI if they are made aware of something suspicious, if they are thinking that they’re being advised by foreign actors, they must call the FBI? When did this get started?
If I were George Will and the rest of these guys, I would be more worried about the precedent set with a fourth or fifth branch of government type person or office, the Office of Special Counsel sitting over here in perpetuity gathering evidence whenever they can and demanding that it be turned over because they’ve got the ability to put people in jail, gather evidence about an existing presidency, a sitting presidency, under constant surveillance and investigation.
I think that precedent has just been set. You don’t think there’s gonna be another one if Trump wins in 2020? Think the Democrats aren’t gonna raise hell again? That’s being set up and telegraphed even now.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: By the way, there’s another point that Trump made that I think can kind of get glossed over here. Stephanopoulos “So you would accept interference from a foreign…” “It’s not interference,” Trump said. “It isn’t interference.” We’re losing the language on this. Trump-Russia collusion. Look at what polling data showed. Way, way, way too many Americans thought that meant the Russians had tampered with voting machines, that Russians had changed votes.
Something like at the worst point, 42% of Americans believed that, even though it didn’t happen, it isn’t even possible. On the scale that people are believing this, it’s not even possible. But it didn’t happen. The Russians did not tamper with votes, they didn’t change one vote, and even Mueller, when he announced this indictment of the Russians, made a point of saying so. So Russian collusion equals Russians tampered with votes. Russians meddled in the election, Russians canceled… Whatever it is.
Now there’s some hack calling from you Norway saying, “Hey, I’ve got dirt on Joe Biden.” Now that’s interference? So anybody in America can call anybody with a lie or any kind of abject piece of BS news and that’s not interference, but if somebody from Norway calls, it’s interference? Trump says it’s not interference. It’s information. But note now the limitations that are starting to be set on candidates. Republican candidates. Interference, collusion… All of these things are being set up to exist now as they are attached to Republicans in perpetuity. This is what Republicans do. Republicans interfere. They helped foreigners interfere. Republicans collude.
Anyway, let me get started on the phones in Los Angeles. We start with Jim. Great to have you, sir. Hello.
CALLER: Hi there, Rush. Just two brief points in terms of Trump’s saying that he would listen to dirt. One, that if he had said he wouldn’t have listened to dirt, then Stephanopoulos would have said, “Well, then how come you, Don Jr., who was at that point testifying before the Senate, didn’t immediately report it when he was offered potentially dirt by the Russians.
So he knew that if he had said no, you should never do that, you have to report it to the FBI, he would have been undercutting what his son did. And the second point I would make is that Trump is in fact now the chief law enforcement executive of the United States.
And so if somebody was saying I have dirt, he should have thought, well, potentially if it’s just somebody sleeping with somebody, obviously I don’t care about that, I’m not gonna do anything, but if some foreign government tells me that somebody’s been doing something unlawful, I want to make sure that I find out about that.
If that’s what it is, then I will refer to the FBI, but I’m not gonna just immediately report it to the FBI. I’m the chief law enforcement executive. There’s no reason I can’t hear it and then I can determine once I hear it, whether in fact it should be reported if it does appear to involve illegal conduct.
RUSH: See that is an excellent point, and it follows on with my fear. We’ve set Mueller up or somebody up, as an ongoing investigation of a sitting president taking away from him his constitutional executive branch powers. That they somehow have evaporated and they’ve been transferred over to somebody like Bob Mueller who’s getting information daily on what’s going on the administration to determine whether or not they’re legal or not, when in fact Trump or the president owns all of those responsibilities.
Your observation about Donald Trump Jr.’s right on the money ’cause they’re calling him back into the committee today! The Senate Judiciary Committee are calling him. They’re trying to set up a perjury trap for him. I hadn’t thought of this, but you’re exactly right. If Trump comes out and condemns receiving information from foreign government, he’s just opened the door to going after his own son by the people trying to do that.
CALLER: Yep. Well, thank you very much. I just wanted to make those two points. Your points are —
RUSH: Well, they’re very, very, very brilliant, very shrewd, very well-thought-out points, especially this business that the president’s the number one law enforcement executive in the country as the head of the executive branch. He certainly has the right to determine whether something’s legal or not. But, see, the way the Democrats are setting it up, the president doesn’t have any power compared to people investigating him.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
This is this New York Times story by Maggie Haberman. (paraphrased) “Their internal polls in the White House show that Trump is losing and losing big, and Trump has ordered his staff not to talk about it! He’s ordered his staff to lie about it — and Trump is livid. He’s storming around the White House. He’s having panic attacks, he’s having anger tantrums, he can’t see straight,” and because of them, he’s supposedly telling people to lie. That’s the New York Times story.
So Stephanopoulos is asking him about it. “Even your own polls show you’re behind, don’t they?”
THE PRESIDENT: No, my polls show that I’m winning everywhere.
STEPHANOPOULOS: We’ve all seen these reports and you’re behind in 15 out of 17 states.
THE PRESIDENT: Nobody showed you those polls because those polls don’t exist. Those polls don’t exist. I’m losing in 15 out of 17 states? Those polls don’t exist. I just was given a meeting with my pollster who — I frankly don’t even believe in pollsters, if you want to know the truth. You just run a campaign and whatever it is, it is. But I just had a meeting with somebody that’s a pollster, and I’m winning everywhere.
STEPHANOPOULOS: But the president wanted to know more, so a few seconds later he has to go off the record to call his campaign manager.
THE PRESIDENT: Just call Brad, and I want to ask him.
RUSH: Wait a minute. What was this? He goes off the record and he’s still on the record? Is that how Stephanopoulos — he goes off the record and he ends up on the record! Screw the record when it’s Trump. So Stephanopoulos, “The president wanted to know more.” What do you mean, the president — didn’t sound to me like he wanted to know more. “The president wanted to know more so a few seconds later he asked to go off the record to call his campaign manager.” Trump, “Just call Brad. I want to ask him.” And they continue with this.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Those polls still on his mind the next morning. When we meet, he’d already tweeted about it.
THE PRESIDENT: On Good Morning America today they had that phony polling information. I explained to you last night that it was phony, but you didn’t do anything about it. You should have, but it was late in the evening and perhaps you didn’t get a chance —
STEPHANOPOULOS: I didn’t see the piece this morning. I listened to — I studied those polls. I’ve heard the explanations.
THE PRESIDENT: Ultimately it doesn’t matter.
STEPHANOPOULOS: But why does it bother you so much?
THE PRESIDENT: Uh, because it’s untrue. I like the truth. You know, I’m actually a very honest guy.
RUSH: What? Wait a minute, now. “Why does it bother you so much?” What? Why does a news story showing that your internal polling has you losing 15 to 17 — is he really asking, why does it bother you so much? What the hell is that? Am I understanding this right?
Why does this bother you so much? So Stephanopoulos is asking the guy who has lied about in the media routinely, he’s slandered, he’s libeled, he’s defamed, why does that bother you so much? What is it that Trump as a Republican is just supposed to know that these are the rules in Washington, that when you’re a Republican, you’re gonna take shots like this and you gotta take ’em, that’s the rules.
Why are you so upset about it? This is how this town works. Is that what he’s asking him? So the response was predictable. The Drive-Bys and the Democrats went nuts condemning opposition research from foreign governments. And this is where, if there is any kind of a trap being laid here, this is where it begins to manifest itself.
I mean, we got Chris Matthews, Anderson Cooper, Alisyn Camerota, David “Rodham” Gergen, Tracie Potts, Chris Cuomo, Fredo Cuomo, Chris Lu, James Clapper, we got anybody that’s anybody in the Washington establishment in this next montage here.
ANDERSON COOPER: He says it’s done all of the time, just normal opposition research, says President Trump. History says otherwise. It is not done all of the time or even some of the time. It’s not normal.
ALISYN CAMEROTA: He is willing to do it all over again. He has learned nothing.
DAVID GERGEN: … so out of bounds, it was just unimaginable.
TRACIE POTTS: … unamerican, treasonous and the very definition of collusion.
CHRIS CUOMO: This behavior is collusive behavior. “Hey, yeah, let’s work together. Give me what you have.”
CHRIS LU: It’s foreign interference. It’s subversion of our democracy.
JAMES CLAPPER: Stunning and disturbing that the president would advocate the use of accepting information provided by a foreign country.
BRIAN KILMEADE: You don’t want a foreign government or foreign entity giving you information.
BARBARA BOXER: You cannot take anything from a foreign government period. End of quote.
RUSH: Sitting here remembering Obama talking to the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev on that open mic in 2012, and Obama is telling Medvedev to send Putin a message, and the message is: Tell Vladimir to relax. I will have much more flexibility after the election. And he was talking about disarming American nuclear missiles.
So that apparently is fine. President Obama can sit there on an open mic unbeknownst to the American people and the press, send a message to the president of Russia that we’re gonna denuke and it will be much easier to do after the election, conveying information to a foreign government.
Why aren’t these people upset at all of these intelligence people from the U.K.? I mean, you look at all the people in the U.K. from MI5 and MI6 and the Oxford and Cambridge intelligence apparatus linkage, look at all the dirt those people were feeding Democrats, look at all the information during the Steele dossier era and during the investigation of Trump, British intelligence handling all –
“Well, they’re an ally, Mr. Limbaugh. The Brits are an ally, so if the British have negative information on Donald Trump, that’s perfectly fine if it’s intended for use by Hillary Clinton and the Democrats, but they are an ally. They are not technically a foreign actor, a foreign government.”
But yet they were interfering. They are indeed foreign. And the Democrats willingly with open arms accepted whatever those British intel people had to say about George Papadopoulos, about this lie that the Russians had dirt on Hillary Clinton, that they planted with Papadopoulos.
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