Live from Music Row, Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Carol Swain in studio to discuss whether she would consider a run for the mayor of Nashville in the 2023 August election.
Leahy: Our good friend, all-star panelist Carol Swain, is in studio with us. Carol, yesterday, Mayor John Cooper announced that he’s not running for re-election. The election for a new four-year term will be held on August 3rd here in Metro Nashville Davidson County. There are several candidates who have been announced. They’re all pretty much far-left lunatics. (Swain chuckles) I mean, they’re nice people, but they’re far-left lunatics.
Swain: I know. Look at the National Democratic Party.
Leahy: Yeah, what’s the difference? And we’ve had Sharon Hurt, who’s an at-large council member on the newsmaker line. She’s not been in the studio yet. Freddie O’Connell, a council member is running. He’s clearly a far-left lunatic. And then Matt Wilshire, who’s pretending not to be a far-left lunatic, but he is a far-left lunatic.
Swain: He’s approaching Republicans, and I hope people are very cautious about lining up behind him.
Leahy: I can tell you he’s telling people he’s a Republican.
Swain: Just like Mayor Cooper told the Republican women that he was a conservative and got a lot of their support.
Leahy: Yes. You remember that well. Now, Carol, I recall that there was a special election; I think it was back in 2018. You ran for mayor, and then you ran for mayor again.
Swain: I would like the world to remember that I came in number two in that special election.
Leahy: You did.
Swain: Even though the conventional wisdom among Republicans in the world is that no Republican can win in Nashville, so you have to support the best Democrats you can find.
Leahy: You also ran for mayor in the 2019 general election.
Swain: Came in number three, and they changed the way they did the ballots. And so my name was at the bottom of the second page. It wasn’t on the front screen.
Leahy: It was just an accident.
Swain: Which part was an accident? (Laughs) Oh, yes, I remember those days fondly. I’ve attended two victory parties where I was the loser. (Laughter)
Leahy: Well, you handle it with grace and style, Carol.
Swain: Of course.
Leahy: Mayor Cooper not running for re-election. It’s a wide-open field. I think I heard Natisha Brooks announced it yesterday. She ran for the GOP nomination in the 5th district. She finished fourth or fifth in that. She didn’t have a lot of money, but she’s a good speaker.
But the big question that a lot of people are asking me is, and here you are. So I’m going to ask you, Carol Swain, are you going to run for mayor of Nashville Davidson County in the August 2023 general election?
Swain: Michael, I’m too old, too smart to give you a yes or no answer. (Leahy laughs) The thing about it is, everything you say you never do, sometimes you end up doing. So, I’m not going to say never, but it would take a miracle.
Leahy: We believe in miracles here on The Tennessee Star Report. Let’s outline the elements of what would be the elements that would enable such a miracle to take place. And there are several.
Swain: The most important thing is I believe God has a plan for my life, a call on my life. Everything would have to line up as far as what I felt, and how it was being laid out. And then I would need someone like Ward Baker to run the campaign.
Leahy: Our friend Ward Baker, he listens to the show.
Swain: And at least $2 million.
Leahy: At least $2 million.
Swain: And then before I would even consider that, I would have to do a deep dive into the city’s finances, the state of affairs, what’s happening with the crime, what’s happening with the police, because I have been focused on national issues, and I believe that I’m called to a much bigger arena than Nashville.
But at the same time, I do love the city. And it’s like other blue cities. It is going to hell in a handbasket. I don’t know what the solution is, but those far-left candidates can only take Nashville further down.
Leahy: There’s no question about that. As bad as Mayor John Cooper has been, the candidates that I outlined to you, Sharon Hurt, Freddie O’Connell, and Matt Wilshire would be no better and could probably be worse. That’s a really bad field.
Swain: Our cities are in a sad state right now. And I would encourage the Republican Party to stop being so fatalistic with this argument that no Republican can win and go out and recruit someone. Because I think it’s possible to win for the right person. Especially since the Democrats are in the race, I think that they’re going to sort of take each other down.
Leahy: They will split the left-wing lunatic vote. And if you look at Nashville, Davidson County, depending upon the election, it’s probably now 70 percent Democrat, 30 percent Republican, or maybe 65 percent Democrat, 35 percent Republican. Something in that range. Would you agree?
Swain: Probably. But the city has deep problems, and corruption is one of the major ones, and I’m not sure what it would take to turn things around. I look at that homeless encampment at the corner of Nolensville Road and Edmundson, and it is spread across the street. It was on one side behind the store.
It is growing. What do you do about homelessness? We know that whatever the Democrats are doing, it’s not working. And it’s just so many problems affecting the city. And I would never, ever run for office unless I thought I could make things better.
And I don’t know that because I don’t know the state of affairs in Nashville. I have not been following it closely. That’s my honest reaction. But I can tell you that my mother passed seven days ago.
Leahy: And we are sorry about her passing. How old was she?
Swain: She was 92 and a half.
Leahy: A long life.
Swain: And she lived with me for 13 years. And so all of my decisions have been made thinking of my mother, and she was declining. And so I had cut back on my travel. And the blessing there was that I had always prayed that I would be at home when she died, and she would die at home.
She wouldn’t be in the hospital, hooked up to a machine. And I was in the room when she took her last breath. And I could have gone to the store. I could have gone to the gym. I didn’t have to be there. God answered my prayers. And so right now, I don’t know anything.
I definitely don’t know my future. I do know that, as I’ve always told people, I feel that I have been called to hold politicians accountable, not to be one. I also believe that we don’t need any more politicians. We need statesmen and stateswomen who are out there for altruistic reasons and not for themselves.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
– – –
Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Carol Swain” by Carol Swain.
Live from Music Row, Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Carol Swain in studio to talk about the state of police departments and comment upon the Memphis Police Department’s response to questions about officers personal relations to Tyre Nichols.
Leahy: In studio, our very good friend for many years, all-star panelist Carol Swain on the phone right now is Eric, a former police officer here in Nashville who has a question for Carol. Eric, good morning.
Caller Eric: Hey. Good morning! Miss Carol, I’m so thankful for you. I just wanted to tell you, I think you do need to be in politics, but you answer your own call. I could go on for hours about the police department. There are many good men and women in that department, but the problem is they’re not allowing the good ones to be in leadership. Let me give you a prime example.
When they had the riots and different disturbances all over, and the people were laying in the street, well, I looked at a friend of mine who I went through the academy with, and she’s out there handing them bottles of water instead of arresting them.
Swain: I remember when they were really, the other chief gave them hot chocolate and cookies. (Laughs)
Eric: Yes, but they tied the hands of the police for years. Twenty-something years ago, when I was on, they gave us these profiling reports. I worked in the inner city, and it was 99.9 percent of the African American community. And then, at every traffic stop, I have to fill out a racial profiling report. Well, who do you think is going to be on it? So they instantly turned me into a racist police officer.
Leahy: Eric, how long did you serve as a police officer, and where did you serve?
Eric: Six years in Nashville, Tennessee.
Leahy: And it sounds like it was six unpleasant years for you.
Eric: The first couple of years were good, and then when Anderson took over, and it just became the trend when these people complain about the officers, it’s cheaper to fire the police officers because these guys are educated, and they’ll go on and find other jobs.
It’s cheaper to just fire them or put them on the Green Mile and make them quit than it is to tell the citizens, hey, we’re going to back our police officers here. Now, of course, you get a few bad apples, just like in Memphis. That’s always happened. But I didn’t see all of that when I was on.
Swain: It is my understanding that in Memphis, they had lowered standards to hire police officers. And so this DEI push often results in the hiring of people that really shouldn’t be in those positions.
Eric: Yes, that was nothing but a gang beating without any supervision. That should have never happened. And we used to have good supervision. We didn’t really need our sergeants that much. The guys kind of took care of that.
If a guy had a bad day and he felt like he was a little aggressive with somebody, you dealt with it on one on one. But then, when I left, there were more complaints of officer against officers than there was civilian against officer.
Leahy: Did you continue in law enforcement after your six years as a Nashville police officer?
Eric: No. Years later, I did a little stint signing warrants for a judge in the community I live. But, no, I completely got out. I vested it five years, got my retired little 14 percent coming, and I got out.
And I pray for those men and women every day, especially now, that are trying to do this job with their hands tied. We need some good, solid, conservative leadership in our police departments.
There’s a picture that went around on the internet of a little child sitting at a desk, and the parents and the school teacher are sitting there fussing each other, and the child is the one that did wrong, but nobody’s even fussing at the child. That’s what’s happening here in society. Everybodys wanting to fuss at the police.
Leahy: Thank you so much for your call, Eric, and really appreciate your listening to The Tennessee Star Report.
Swain: Thank you. I appreciate your support.
Leahy: Carol, I want to get your reaction to a story that we broke last night at The Tennessee Star. There are all sorts of rumors floating around Memphis, and we actually opposed a question with these rumors to the Memphis Police Department last night, and they gave us an answer.
So let me tell you the story. It’s one of our lead stories at The Tennessee Star. Tennesseestar.com. Here’s what we asked the Memphis Police Department public information officer, Karen Rudolph, and then we’ll tell you exactly what she told us. So we posed these two questions.
One, multiple sources in Memphis tell us that one of the five former Memphis police officers charged with second-degree murder in the beating death of Tyre Nichols targeted Mr. Nichols for a beating because Mr. Nichols was in a personal relationship with the officer’s, current or former significant other.
Can you confirm or deny this report? And then secondly, multiple sources in Memphis tell us that one or more of the five former Memphis police officers were affiliated with the Vice Lord’s gang. Can you confirm or deny this report?
This is the response we got from Memphis Police Department public information officer major Karen Rudolph. “There is no evidence that indicates that either of these claims is true.” So that was what they told us.
Now, to me, Carol, that sounds a little bit like a very carefully parsed denial, but you’ve seen a lot of these things before. What is your reaction to that comment from the Memphis Police Department?
Swain: I agree with Eric that it seemed like a gangland beating and that he may well have been targeted. And I find it very interesting that we only heard about this case in the last week or so, and it took place some time ago, and it was a black-on-black crime as far as I’m concerned.
Leahy: The five former police officers who’ve been charged with second-degree murder were all black. There was a sixth officer who’s been relieved of duty but not charged. He was the only white guy.
Swain: They had to bring a white guy in it. (Laughs)
Leahy: Preston Hemphill. He was there. The body cam that came from the very first stop was from Preston Hemhill. But I haven’t seen any body cam video from any of the other officers. PS. The Memphis Police Department is now withholding the full array of body cam until after the investigation. This does not sound like a good idea to me. Your thoughts?
Swain: They need to release the body cam. And if you look at the evidence about police brutality, black officers are more violent against black people. And I think that this DEI push where they are lowering standards for diversity, that’s not making the streets better for anyone.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
– – –
Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Live from Music Row, Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed top gov tracker Neil W. McCabe of One America News to the newsmaker line to talk about an unlikely path of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to win the 2024 presidency.
Leahy: On the newsmaker line right now, top gov tracker, national political correspondent for One America News Network. Neil W. McCabe, based in Florida. Neil, What is Governor Ron DeSantis up to this week?
McCabe: Hey. Good morning, Mike. Good morning, Carol. You know, Carol, since the last time I spoke, I understand your mother passed, and I’m very sorry that you and your family are going through that.
Swain: Thank you. She was 92 and a half, and she lived with me for the last 13 years of her life, and we had some great times together. I was with her when she drew her last breath. And so this is part of life. We will all have an appointment with death at some point.
McCabe: So at 92, I think you could say she had a good run.
Swain: She did. (Chuckles) Thank you.
Leahy: Neil, what kind of run are you having today, and what’s going on with Governor Ron DeSantis?
McCabe: Ron DeSantis won by 20 points, as he said at a press conference yesterday when he ran for re-election. And everybody focuses and gossips mercilessly about his possible run for president. Right now, he’s just worried about being the governor of Florida. What he announced yesterday at that press conference was that he was axing all of the diversity bureaucracy in higher education at Florida state colleges and universities. That’s kind of a big deal.
Leahy: And pearls were clutched all over liberal media.
McCabe: Some leftists were blinking away the tears, Michael.
McCabe: I want to make this one point. If you look at sort of the MO as I’ve studied this man, it’s an MO of DeSantis, where he’ll have a press conference for one topic, but in the Q and A, he’ll have a zinger ready. Two months ago, he was giving $5 million, so some guys could build a rail line and some industrial park. But in the Q and A, he blasted China, so that set up his Tucker Carlson hit. Anyway, I just want to point that out. I’m sorry to cut you off, Carol.
Swain: Oh, no, that’s fine. But I have forgotten what I was going to say. (Laughter)
Leahy: It was very important, and it will come to you in a moment. Has he gotten rid of the president of New College down there? I saw a report that maybe did that as well.
McCabe: Yes, there’s been a coup. There’s been a coup at New College. The thing I’m really interested in is nobody’s really talking about it, but Ben Sasse was always kind of a squishy, kind of Paul Ryan, kind of hip, young senator guy from Nebraska. And he actually voted to convict Donald Trump for basically as if Trump had anything to do with January 6 people crashing the Capitol in two years.
No one’s proved this, but Ben Sasse, like, two weeks after the event, voted to convict in that second impeachment. He was always one of these senators who was throwing sand in the gears for President Trump. And so Trump has punished a lot of these guys who voted against him.
Primary voters and other Republicans have punished these guys. What Ron DeSantis did is he hired him to be the president of the University of Florida at a million a year. So there you go.
Leahy: Yes. And I think, though, that the board of trustees had some influence on that hiring process. There were a lot of protests.
McCabe: Yes, I think the governor had some influence too.
Leahy: I think you’re probably right. Carol has a question for you.
Swain: I remembered what I wanted to say. I believe secretly, progressives around the country are cheering DeSantis on because they know that DEI is destructive and that the woke mob is coming after them. And so no one is safe. And the kind of leadership that he has been providing on that particular issue resonates with the American people.
McCabe: I think he absolutely has a finger on the pulse. And it’s interesting; he doesn’t really employ, like, pollsters and consultants. He has pollsters; he has consultants. But what he really relies on is the America he grew up in. And he talks about this in speeches all the time.
He’ll make this sort of side comment where he’ll basically say, you know when I was growing up, we never heard of this kind of thing. This is ridiculous. (Swain chuckles) And so basically, if what he’s talking about did not exist when he was in, like, high school, it’s out.
Leahy: The 2024 GOP primary fight has begun. The only announced candidate to date is former President Donald Trump. He’s already been attacking Ron DeSantis. If DeSantis were to run, President Trump said it would be a sign of disloyalty. I made him governor! I made him governor! Has he forgotten that? Guess what?
There are reports that former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, also the former ambassador to the United Nations, is going to announce her candidacy on Sunday, February 5th. How will former President Donald Trump react to that?
McCabe: He’ll be heartbroken but not surprised. And I think that it’s pretty clear in my study of presidential politics through the decades that if the money is there for you to run for president, you will run for president. And you never know. It’s like a scratch ticket, and you might catch on.
Swain: Nikki Haley would not catch on.
McCabe: But who knew that Rick Santorum had a shot at being President of the United States? (Laughter) These guys, you know, you’re in the game, you get momentum, and things happen. Nobody in 1974, nobody was saying, what this country needs is Jimmy Carter.
Leahy: That’s a very good point. That’s a very good point. And I refer to the GOP race as Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, and the Munchkins. We’re going to invite Nikki Haley to come in and talk about it. Will she take offense at being called one of the Munchkins? (Swain laughs)
Swain: You didn’t mention Pence. You didn’t mention Pence.
McCabe: We’ll see how Pence is doing. I think that what’s going to happen is that Trump is going to get primary opponents. And the problem for DeSantis is that if it looks like DeSantis is going to take a chunk out of Trump and make Trump vulnerable, it’s only going to invite more people in.
Tom Cotton is not going to stand there and watch Ron DeSantis become president for eight years. There’s a bunch of people who are not just not going to allow it to happen. And so the problem with DeSantis is it can only be a kamikaze mission because there’s still going to be millions and tens of millions of Trump loyalists who will never forgive him because everyone knows that if Ron DeSantis endorsed Trump and campaigned for Trump in 2024, DeSantis could help put Trump over the top.
Trump’s a one-term president, and it basically tees up DeSantis for 2028. And so this is the problem. He doesn’t want to wait. And so, because he doesn’t want to wait, he can’t win.
There’s no path for DeSantis because as soon as DeSantis starts making serious progress, all the other people rush in with their money and their friends, and their coalitions to take him out.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
– – –
Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Ron DeSantis” by Ron DeSantis.
Live from Music Row, Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed all-star panelist Carol Swain in studio to talk about her company, Real Unity Training Solution’s upcoming training for school board members and the general public.
Leahy: All-star panelist Carol Swain is in studio. Carol, I wanted to talk to you to learn about what you’re doing with school board member training. This is fascinating. You started a company called Carol Swain’s Real Unity Training Solutions.
This is for school board members learning to comply with Tennessee’s prohibited concepts in curriculum and instruction law. There is an upcoming training in March in Blount County at the Blount County Public Library in Maryville, Tennessee. And by the way, congratulations on putting this together. Unitytrainsolutions.com.
Swain: Yes. We are one of two companies that are licensed in the state to offer school board training. And before that, there was sort of a monopoly with the Tennessee School Board Association. And so we offer training that people can register for. They get seven hours of credit, and it’s required under state law that every school board member takes a course.
Before, they had to take it from people that were more progressive. Now they have an alternative. And we do go over the law as well as explain what is taking place in the classroom in various forms. It’s a one day training, and this would be the second time we’ve offered the class.
Leahy: And to sign up, go to unitytrainingsolutions.com. The registration deadline is March 16th. This particular training will take place on March 24th at the Blount County Public Library in Maryville, Tennessee, not too far from Knoxville.
Swain: Yes.
Leahy: You’ve done this before.
Swain: We have. But I also want to tell you that Unity Training Solutions is a company that I incorporated in 2020 in reaction to what was taking place after George Floyd’s death, when so many companies rushed in to pour millions of dollars into CRT, DEI, conflict theory, which can never bring about racial healing and reconciliation.
The company’s goal is to bring people together and to be in compliance with our civil rights laws and our Constitution, which promises everyone equal protection of the laws. So the company itself does more than school board training. We were licensed last year to do the school board training.
Leahy: It’s a significant accomplishment, I know, because I’ve talked to many people, Carol, who’ve thought about doing this, but it’s an arduous process to get approval from the state of Tennessee to be able to offer this training for school board members.
Swain: Yes, there were several rounds of approval for us to go through, and I would encourage people to go to my website. If you Google Unity Training Solutions, it will come up.
We changed the name to Real Unity Training Solutions because there were so many companies that were calling themselves Unity Training, even though they were engaging in divisive practices and they were pushing CRT, but they were calling it unity training.
Leahy: It’s a little bit like President Joe Biden and the Democrats having a world-record spending bill and calling it the Inflation Reduction Act.
Swain: Yes, they’re very clever with how to package things, but it’s something that I believe deeply in. I care about bringing people together, and I think that for our nation to be successful in our organizations, we have to be on mission, and we have to work as a team.
Leahy: A very good point. And the other thing I point out, which I didn’t know until you and I talked about this is that every new school board member anywhere in the state of Tennessee must go through training.
Swain: They do, and a lot of people don’t know that they have an alternative. And the people that took our training last year were very pleased with it, and we want to reach more people.
And they found out in various ways because it’s so new, there are a lot of people that would like to take the training that don’t know about it. We also allow people, teachers, and other people that are interested to take the training as well.
Leahy: Unitytrainingsolutions.com. That’s Carol Swain’s Unity Training Solutions to distinguish it from those others who might call it something like that when it’s not really that. Congratulations, by the way, for bringing that together.
Swain: Thank you.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
– – –
Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Carol Swain” by Carol Swain.
Live from Music Row, Wednesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Neil W. McCabe from One America News Network to the newsmaker line to discuss breaking news regarding the knowledge of fiber trunks which run underneath the Penn Biden Center that housed classified documents.
Leahy: On the newsmaker line right now, our great friend with One American News Network, formerly our lead political correspondent with The Star News Network, now top-gov tracker, based in Tallahassee, Florida, reports on all things Florida and Governor Ron DeSantis, Neil W. McCabe. Good morning, Neil.
McCabe: Good morning, Michael. Good morning, Carol. Good to be with you.
Swain: Good morning.
Leahy: One America News Network has offices at 101 Constitution Avenue in Washington, D.C. When you go on the elevator there, do you see the sign for the Penn Biden Center?
McCabe: (Laughs) I haven’t been there recently. I used to see it all the time. That’s a very secure building. You can’t even get into the lobby without some security guard saying, hey, where are you going? And then you say, I’m going to get some coffee. He’s like, oh, okay. (Laughter)
Leahy: We have a story. Our own Bradley Vasoli for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Star News Network. We’ve got a story about this 13,800 square-foot Penn Biden Center in that building where you could get in and out of often.
They had a whole bunch of interns from the University of Pennsylvania running around while they had these classified documents there. How they got there, no one knows from Biden’s time as vice president just running around there. It sounds very secure to me.
McCabe: Yes. I’ll break some news, I guess. There are two major fiber trunks under the District of Columbia, and one of them passes underneath that building.
Swain: Oh, my.
McCabe: This is owned by the Brotherhood of Carpenters. The carpenters union owns that building. That’s why there’s never any protests; there’s never any trouble. (Leahy laughs) I don’t know if you’ve ever run in with the carpenters, but the best thing you can say to a group of union carpenters is, have a nice day, sir. I’ll walk around. (Laughter)
Leahy: What’s the significance of the fiber trunk running directly under that building?
McCabe: It’s just something that major, major communications and data pass over that fiber trunk. And so I don’t know if you can tap it. I took science in high school, but I don’t really know if you can tap into it.
Somebody who was involved in the inaugural planning for George W. Bush’s two inaugurations mentioned it to me the other day. And I mentioned it to you. Just to throw that against the wall.
Leahy: Just in case there’s some communication coming out of the Penn.
McCabe: But they said that it was a security consideration when they were planning the inauguration because, obviously, the inauguration is held at the Capitol. 101 Constitution is maybe a quarter mile at best away from Capitol Hill.
Leahy: It’s right there.
McCabe: At One America, the rooftop shot of the dome, you’re literally right on top of the dome for those shots.
Leahy: Very interesting. The big news that’s come out is, oh, the first thing, Karen Jean-Pierre, perhaps absolutely the worst liar in America and the worst press secretary for a president in modern American history, she came out and said, well, they found this one document November 2nd.
And we’re just telling about it now. And that’s it. Oh, there’s a second set of documents, wait for it in a box in a garage next to Corvette, and then a couple of other documents surfaced. What do you make of all this stuff? Where does this go?
McCabe: When Trump left office, there was some question in Trump’s mind about whether he had won that election in 2020 or not. And a lot of that transition time was spent contesting and questioning and looking into things. And so there’s a phrase I use all the time, running and gunning.
There’s a lot of running and gunning as you run the country and you run the world, and you’re also contesting an election and an impeachment. There’s a lot going on. And so the idea that the GSA was supposed to pack up the President’s stuff, put it in a secure warehouse as they do for everybody, you know, these things never happen. However, Joseph R. Biden, Jr. knew, like in January of 2013 that he had four years to pack up his boxes.
Leahy: Good point.
McCabe: And when he said he wasn’t going to run for president after Hillary Clinton made a deal with Obama, he knew, hey, I got to start packing up my stuff. And then if you look at the charge that Garland gave Jack Smith, he says, I want you to look at everything, everything you could possibly do. I would argue it’s a violation.
Leahy: This was a special counsel investigating Trump.
McCabe: I would say that’s a violation of the Fourth Amendment ban on risks of assistance and open warrants, where you just sort of say that the royal officials were just allowed to look at everything until they found something. The Constitution says you can’t do that. With Robert Hur and these other investigations into Joe Biden it’s very specific and there’s no fishing expedition.
We’ll see how this plays out. But if Biden had that much time to plan his transition to private life and he also knew what he was going to be doing in private life, I think that the specific documents that he took with him are documents that, A, he did not want floating around. He didn’t want them in the public record or at the archives and/or two.
Second thing is, there was a document he needed as a reference for his own business dealings. And so who’s to say what happened? We’ll never find out. Jean-Pierre said we’re cooperating with counsel. But that’s like, the editor-in-chief of The Star News network telling one of his reporters or editors that he’s cooperating with his reporter. (Laughter)
Leahy: That’s very good. Carol Swain has a question for you.
Swain: Neil, do you believe anyone is digging into the anonymous Chinese donor that pretty much financed that center?
McCabe: No one’s digging into it, Carol, because they know exactly who it is.
Leahy: Oh, do you know who it is? There was, $40 million in anonymous donors, but there was one big one for $14 million.
Swain: What did he get in exchange for that?
McCabe: The Treasury Department has a record of every wire transfer that goes in and out, and everything that’s over a certain amount gets triggered. It’s one of those interesting records, whatever they call it. That’s if it’s over $10,000 something. If $40 million is coming in from China to the Penn Center, they know all about it.
Listen to today’s show highlights, including this interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Joe Biden” by Penn Biden Center.
