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Of any purchase of $100 or more. That's promo code Brian. But first, let's bring in Carl Roh, former Deputy Chief of Staff, Serve Advisor to President George W. Bush, Fox News contributor. Carl, welcome back.
Thanks for having me. Hey, Carl. I mean, even for you and everything you've experienced in Washington, do you ever remember a situation where we're looking at a Democratic congresswoman, $5 million of COVID-aid, ethics committee investigates, guilty? And then we have a situation with the congressman from Texas, who I always enjoyed interviewing him, made a bad personal decision, tragedy. The woman he allegedly had an affair with kills herself, so he is resigning.
And then Eric Swalwell.
Somebody who made his living going after Trump now has five separate women and criminal investigations in Los Angeles and New York City. That's a lot. Yeah, yeah. In fact, my column tomorrow for the Wall Street Journal is about this very subject. It starts with Swalwell, who was not a serious legislator.
This guy was a puffin' artist masquerading as a legislator. And all he cared about was getting more clicks and more MSNBC, MS It Now interviews and repeats of his repostings of his various sundry social media items. He was a terrible human being. And he started this off and by first withdrawing from the governor's race in California, good for him. That was going nowhere.
Even though he was leading with 12, you know, leading the Democratic field with 12%, it wasn't going to go any further. And then he resigned. And then that gave Tony Gonzalez a chance to sort of get in the slipstream and resign as well. I got to tell you, that hurts me enormously. I knew him.
He was my friend. We hosted him. I'm sitting here in my home. We hosted fundraisers for him here. I asked friends to contribute to him.
He was a serious legislator. He was a great American story. You know, grew up in modest circumstances, joins the Navy, becomes a chief petty officer, gets made a congressional fellow, a Navy congressional fellow, assigned to the office of Senator Marco Rubio, father of six, goes home to West Texas, runs. Runs for Congress in a swing district and wins. And the district is bigger than 26 states.
It's bigger than the state of Pennsylvania, the district is. And he did a wonderful job, and he was a serious legislator, and he was on appropriations and homeland security and worked hard to secure the border. And not only that, but to fix a broken immigration system. But the demons inside him caused him to do bad things, and he's gone now. And good riddens.
But I just, you know, we're at a moment where trust in government and trust in our leaders is so low. We don't need more. We don't need more examples like the gal from Florida who's stealing money from taxpayers in order to fund her campaign for Congress. You know, that's just pathetic. And, you know, the Democrat leadership is now saying, well, we need to let the process move forward.
Okay, fine. But she needs to be gone. And we need leaders today who will inspire us, who will stand up in the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and make us proud of our country and proud of our leaders. Mm-hmm.
So I know it's the least important thing about this story, but just going back to the politics of it, because it's going to go to the November election. There's going to be a special election and a November election. That's a tough district for Republicans to win, isn't it? That's not a layup. Yeah, and particularly since we have a guy from New Jersey who moved down to the district who has videos of him displaying his latest gun acquisition, which is a German World War II submachine gun.
And I mean, he's not a serious guy, and the Democrats fortunately don't have their most serious candidate put up, but there's a good likelihood that the Republicans will either lose the district or win it by having to spend an enormous amount of money that could be spent well elsewhere. And it's a tough district. It runs from San Antonio to El Paso. And I'm serious: 26 states are smaller in area than the 58,000 square miles of the 23rd Congressional District. And we got a guy from New Jersey, not a guy who grew up in that part of the world and had friendships and alliances throughout the district.
We got a guy who's a transplant.
So, I want you to hear what I think is one of the scariest statements, which I think is going to become part. of what we're used to now, and it is the mayor of New York City. Proudly, after 100 days, saying what he is, Cut 38. That is the change that government can deliver. And it is the change that democratic socialism can deliver.
I know there are many who use socialist as a dirty word, something to be ashamed of. They can try all they want. But we will not be ashamed of using government to fight for the many, not simply the few. Proud to be a socialist. The crowd roars afterwards.
That used to be a dirty word that a Democrat told a Democrat, or a Republican went after a Democrat with, but now they're embracing it. Are we going to have to are we going to have to get used to this? Is this not jarring to you to hear that? And will at one point this not be jarring? Yeah, of course it's jarring, but I welcome it.
They're out in the open. They're admitting it. and let them live up to the consequences of their actions. You know, Apollo, one of the big financial institutions in New York, is leaving. going to Florida or Texas and taking with it thousands of jobs and enormous amounts of income that is now going to be not taxed by the city of New York and the state of New York, but they're going to two states with no state income tax.
And uh As a result, really bright, smart people who are capable of doing great things are leaving the metropolitan area of New York. And this nutty idea that he has of a $30 million grocery store that is going to be located in a neighborhood that is within seven-tenths of a mile of what is it, five or six other grocery stores. He's got a Costco that's within seven-tenths of a mile, a 15-minute walk. And this guy is going to take taxpayer money. And you know, and create this thing which doesn't have to pay taxes like all the other private businesses around it.
And we'll see how long this experiment lasts. And remember, he doesn't want just one such store for New York, he wants hundreds of these things throughout New York. Just do the math: $30 million to create a new grocery store. Crazy! Crazy, nutty, insane.
And the Democrats across the country are going to have to say, whether they're with him on not only these nutty ideas of his, but these statements of he and his wife excoriating the state of Israel and welcoming terrorists into the governor's, excuse me, into the mayor's mansion. I mean, how disgusting is that? This is the city that was struck by Islamic terrorists on 9-11, and this guy is parading around, and his wife is writing positive postings about a guy who welcomed October 7th, the slaughter of innocents in Israel. 100%. And I will say a couple of things are happening.
$30 million to open up a grocery store that will take three years. Can you imagine this? Three years to open up a grocery store. You definitely don't understand capitalism and understand a deadline. And they're making it clear: the prices of goods might not be that much cheaper.
And then people are telling me they might have to use a union.
So they might have to hire unions. Those wages are not going to be cheaper.
So, what is going to be the benefit to have it look drab like the motor vehicle or look like the post office? I mean, that's going to be the advantage.
Well, the advantage is that it puts more power in the hands of the government. It puts more power in the hands of the mayor. It puts more hands in the set, more power in the hands of the city council, not more power in the hands of the people. Look, HEB or Randall's or you name it can build a grocery store faster than three years, and it ain't going to cost $30 million. And they build their own building.
They're even taking over a building. Carl, I don't want to talk too much about New York, but I do want to say this. The governor of New York, looking for more revenue, has decided to raise taxes on people who have homes here as a second home worth more than $5 million. If you're going to leave it vacant, you should pay more. If there's anybody, if there is so much wrong with that statement, they're telling people who have a second home here, we will punish you.
So guess what those people are going to say? I will not have a second home here. What is wrong with these people?
Well, obviously, she's, you know, she's not a self-proclaimed Democratic socialist. She's just a misguided liberal. I mean, talk about pathetic. This is the empire state. We're talking about the fourth largest state in the union by population and probably the second or, you know, third by wealth.
And yet it has been badly mismanaged under her leadership and, frankly, the leadership of her predecessor. The last good governor the state had was George Pataki, in my opinion. And he was sitting there fighting at the gate, fighting. The people were coming over the walls trying to tax more and spend more and regulate more. And he was doing his best to keep that from happening.
But she is clueless. I'm so glad. I am glad that she is the governor of New York because the businesses that she is driving out of the state, many of them are going to relocate in Texas.
So Bruce Blakeman, as you know, has done a fantastic job in Nassau County, welcoming ICE, welcoming the cops. The law enforcement's the number one of the country. And he wants to be the next governor. You know, he's got plenty of experience. He understands New York.
What advice would you have for Bruce if he wants to win, which he does? Yeah, well, look, I think he's doing it. I mean, you know, do what he did in Nassau County, which is hold the line on the spending, look out for the taxpayer, economize in government, reform, think about doing new things in a more efficient, better way, or leaving them up to the people to do. And he ought to starkly compare an agenda of progress for the state of New York with Hochul's agenda, where she wants to raise taxes, he wants to cut taxes. When she wants to regulate more, he wants to regulate less.
And have a positive agenda that's going to make a difference in the lives of people of New York. Because look, people are voting with their feet. Poor New York is losing people. I mean, a lot of them heading to Florida, a lot of them heading to Texas, a lot of them heading outside the state to more reasonable tax environments and business environments. And that can't go on forever without the state of New York suffering mightily.
You spend twice as much money per capita as the state of Florida, the government of the state of Florida, spends per capita. And there's a message there.
So now we know what's going to be happening. Democrats are going to be running that the wealthy are not paying enough. Yesterday, Corey Booker and Chris Van Howen, both with presidential aspirations in my view, say they're advocating to raise taxes on high earners. Let me just share this with you, which you know. For people at home, for those people who think the rich aren't paying enough, the top 1% pay 40% of all income taxes.
The top 10% pay 72% of all income taxes. The top 25% pay 87% of all income taxes taxes. That's federal, let alone what they do in the state. What are they talking about? I mean, this is what they're going to run on.
Now, statistically, are they smart by this? doing this because seventy five percent are not part of the uh top twenty five percent obviously. Yeah, maybe they're politically smart and and but it's a s it's assuming people are dumb. And they're not dumb, and then ultimately figure things out and try to do the right thing. Are you sitting down?
I can see you that you're sitting down, but I want to make certain that you're and you're leaning back, lean back in your chair, because I don't want you to fall over when I say this. Do you know who wrote an editorial yesterday saying the income tax system in America is truly progressive? The Washington Post editorial board, and it said many of the same numbers that you were talking about. They've spelled out how they said, Look, everybody keeps talking about making it more progressive, but we have one of the most progressive tax structures in the world because a small group of people are paying the bulk of the tax burden. That is incidentally not a recipe for success.
Everybody ought to have a little skin in the game called America. And if we keep passing the burden onto the people at the top, the people who have been successful and have created industry and created business and invented things and helped bring prosperity for all Americans, we're going to start driving those people abroad. And we're going to have people saying, you know what? It's not worth it for me to work harder and work smarter. I got enough.
Let me move to France and live a lovely life. Let me move to someplace in the Caribbean. We are a great country because we encourage And enterprise and entrepreneurship and compassion and creativity, and doing what we were doing in New York. Is proven that if you do too much of that, if you do too much taxes and regulation and red tape, you'll drive people to more hospitable climes. And in that instance, they can go to another state.
But if you do it nationwide, we're going to be driving them to other countries. All right, so let me drill down. Scott Besson used to come on the show before he got this prestigious job. And he said, I said, What do you want to focus on most? You know what he said?
income inequality. He said, I'm worried about the distance between the the wealthy and the working class. He says I think it's getting too great.
So recognizing that, what would your answer be? I know you're not an economist, but you know this stuff. Yeah, look, my my answer would be to help people uh uh pull up uh move up the ladder. You know, for example, we ought to have more technical training. We're doing a renovation.
We've got some people who are skilled electricians working on the house. They make a good living. And you know what they tell me? There are not enough of us. You know, these companies that employ electricians and welders.
You know, we have a ranch. We sponsored our ranch foreman's grandson to go to welding school. The kid is 19, about ready to turn 20 years old. He is graduating from Texas State Technical College as a master welder, and he is being offered. He has no debt.
And he is being offered jobs about $100,000 a year to start. And he's 20 years old, high school graduate, who went to a technical school. We ought to be focused on what we can do as a country, as a state, and as a society to help people move up the ladder of prosperity by giving them skills to succeed. I thought I booked Carl Roe. I got Mike Rowe.
Who knew? Carl, thanks so much. I appreciate it. Thanks, Betty.
