This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," January 24, 2022. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: That's online. We highly recommend it. We are out of time this evening sadly.

The great Sean Hannity takes over next for 9:00 p.m. Hey, Sean.

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: Great. You leave me in the state of fear over the mystery of the monkeys. I appreciate that.

CARLSON: Weird.

HANNITY: Thank you very much. Actually, it's a fascinating story. Why did they kill them? It didn't make sense.

CARLSON: Yeah.

HANNITY: All right. Tucker, thank you.

And welcome to HANNITY.

Tonight, as the Biden White House implodes, poor Joe Biden, he's lashing out today. He called our own Peter Doocy, a, quote, stupid son of a bitch. Whoo, now, it's angry Joe.

Biden once promised to restore civility, telling his appointees he would fire them on the spot if they disrespected others. Of course, the rules they don't apply to Joe and his comments about Peter Doocy are especially ridiculous given that Biden's own weakened mental abilities.

In a moment, we're going to play the tape and Peter Doocy will respond. Also, we're just learning at this second that Biden apparently called Peter Doocy just a short time ago and we'll find out how that went.

All right. But first tonight, major cities all around the country, they are now reeling from another weekend of violence.

In New York City, a career criminal viciously targeting two NYPD officers, killing one, critically injuring another. Officer Jason Rivera was only 22- years-old. Officer Wilbert Mora, he was only 27 years old. He's fighting for his life tonight.

And according to reports, the deranged killer, quote, kept firing at the wounded cops even as they lay helplessly on the floor, a complete execution. Now, sadly, as we speak, cops all across the country, they're being targeted at an alarming rate, according to the FBI, while intentional police killings have now reached a 20-year high.

Three hundred and forty-six officers were shot in the line of duty in 2021 alone, another multi-year high. Meanwhile ambush style attacks against cops, that was up a whopping 115 percent over the previous year, and it's not just New York. On Sunday morning in Washington. D.C., an officer was rushed to the hospital after getting shot. On the same day in Houston, Texas, Corporal Charles Galloway was murdered during a, quote, routine traffic stop. There's no such thing. In city after city, violent crime is spiraling out of control. Carjackings -- look at this -- they're up by a whopping 510 percent.

Now, downtown shootings in Chicago, wow, you think it can't get higher they're already up a whopping 220 percent. California just recorded the most murders in 20 years. In 2021, at least 12 U.S. cities set a new record for murder. Why is it happening?

Well, if you listen to the Democrats and propagandist Jen Psaki, guns are just magically floating through the air by themselves. The guns are the problem. The guns hijack -- carjacking the cars? Anyway, they're terrorizing the communities they say all across the country.

The reality is this defund, dismantle, no bail is all responsible for this major wave of violence. In city after city, police budgets have been slashed, including a billion dollar cut into the New York Police Department. Now to make matters worse, you got far left prosecutors, they stopped prosecuting crimes in the name of equality and equity. You have some jurisdictions now even eliminating bail for many crimes and turning jails into revolving doors and our streets into a violent free-for-all.

Terrified by his radical base, Joe Biden is doing nothing to reduce crime by the way in many states now you can just steal as long as you don't steal up to a thousand dollars, 950 bucks, you're only going to get a ticket. During the 2020 summer of violence, Joe Biden all but ignored all of the carnage. We had dozens of Americans dead, thousands of cops injured, billions in property damage, arson, looting. Kamala Harris actually promoted the bail fund to get violent criminals out of jail. She praised the LAPD police cuts, you know, protecting the peaceful law-abiding Americans. Why don't we protect them?

This administration is providing cover for criminals, all while supporting groups like the group Black Lives Matter. You know, recently, they complained that murder police officers are treated like heroes in tear- jerker press conferences. The group Black Lives Matter apparently prefers - - oh that's right -- what do we want, dead cops, when we want them, now. Pigs in a blanket, fry them like bacon, or so they say.

But today, when pressed by our own Peter Doocy, a rare moment of truth. Peter had a battle with Jen Psaki who admitted that an underfunding of police departments has led to a surge in crime. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PETER DOOCY, FOX NEWS WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Would you agree that the most important job for any president is to keep Americans safe?

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I would agree.

DOOCY: So you said that the president's never satisfied if people don't feel safe. Does he know that after a year in office, people do not feel safe in this country?

PSAKI: Well, Peter, I think if we look at the facts here, we've seen a surge of crime over the last two years. Would you agree with that?

DOOCY: So what are you attributing the rising crime to then?

PSAKI: Well, I think we should be responsible in how reporting to the public what the -- what the -- what the roles are, what the reasons for the surge in crime. Gun violence is a huge reason for the surge in crime, underfunding of some police departments and their need for additional resources, something the president has advocated for consistently through the course of his career. That's something we know we need to take action on.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Hey, Jen, just like COVID deaths went up in 2021 under Joe Biden -- well, the same thing with violent crime. We just gave you the numbers for 2021. In case you weren't paying attention, it was Joe Biden that said, oh, yeah, I'd reallocate funds away from the police. It was Kamala Harris that said, oh, yeah, praise the LAPD for cutting their budget.

Anyway, Biden took a slightly different tone today, didn't want to answer any questions and he called our own Peter Doocy a stupid son of a bitch. Really? Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DOOCY: Will you take questions on inflation then? Do you think inflation is a political liability?

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: That's a great asset, more inflation. What a stupid son of a bitch.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Stupid son of a bitch. Mr. Unity strikes again.

In all seriousness, Joe Biden really shouldn't be casting stones from an extremely, extremely fragile glass house.

Here with reaction, FOX News White House correspondent Peter Doocy who has an update on the story.

First, what was your reaction -- words don't matter to me. I remember during the Trump years, everybody would feign the vapors, oh, the president said this. I think I know you pretty well. You have you're a pretty tough guy.

What was your reaction initially when you heard what happened?

DOOCY: My reaction, Sean, was delayed because as you can see in that clip, the Biden staff were ushering us out. They were telling us, okay, thank you. Time to go.

And you can see right there that people are just starting to move towards the door, myself included. It wasn't until we went to the basement and then outside and then back to the press room that somebody said, hey, did you hear what the president said about you? I said, no, what did he say? So he called you a stupid SOB.

And I was thinking, that, I did not hear that. And I went downstairs and I opened up my phone and he did. And so, I my response was delayed.

But, Sean, and we have some news tonight, after years of clips of the president and I kind of mixing it up on the campaign trail and during the transition and here at the White House, within about an hour of that exchange, he called my cell phone and he said, it's nothing personal pal, and we went back and forth, and we were talking about uh just kind of moving forward.

And I made sure to tell him that I'm always going to try to ask something different than what everybody else is asking and he said, you've got to, and that's a quote from the president. So I'll keep doing it.

HANNITY: All right. I want to be your negotiator here and I would like to negotiate a 20-minute sit-down with you and Biden, one-on-one. I think that would be -- you know, I'm a Christian, I believe in forgiveness. Okay, did he apologize?

DOOCY: He cleared the air and I appreciated it. We had a nice call.

HANNITY: He's -- that's not an answer did he apology. That doesn't sound like an apology.

DOOCY: He said it's nothing personal, pal.

HANNITY: Oh, pal, OK, pal.

DOOCY: And I told him that I appreciated him reaching out. Hey, hey, Sean, the world is on the brink of like World War III right now with all this stuff going on. I appreciate that the president took a couple minutes out this evening while he was still at the desk to give me a call and clearly - -

HANNITY: At least he called you pal.

DOOCY: But you know what, I don't need anybody to apologize to me. He can call me whatever he wants as long as it gets them talking. And today, you know, you played some of the bit with Jen Psaki, and I went in there with two pages of questions about crime. I actually still have them right here they've been rolled up in my pocket.

Two pages of crime questions that I didn't get in at the press conference last week that two-hour press conference. And so, I'm in there, and I'm looking, okay, if he takes questions, what's it going to be? But he said, I'm not going to take questions about anything off topic, so I'm thinking, okay, well, the topic is inflation, hey, over here. And then it took like five minutes, but I later heard what he said.

HANNITY: I want -- I think the president should apologize by giving you 20 minutes uninterrupted, one-on-one interview, and that and first -- Jen Psaki, she owes you 20 minutes, too. I'm trying to negotiate on your behalf.

DOOCY: Hey, they keep calling on us at the briefing and the president said, nothing personal, pal. And so I think that's enough, that's enough.

HANNITY: Come on, man. All right.

DOOCY: So we can move on -- we can now move forward, there will be years - - three to seven years of opportunities to ask him about different stuff.

HANNITY: We -- we're proud of the good work you're doing keep it up and you -- I think it's a badge of honor myself. So, if I'm your dad, I'm very proud of you tonight. Anyway, great job, Peter.

DOOCY: Thanks, Sean.

HANNITY: Last week, we played this RNC ad that went after Joe's disastrous press conference. We'll remind you.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: The idea that --

(MUSIC)

The --

(MUSIC)

But the nature not when the political coverage --

(MUSIC)

That look -- some of the political players and some of the --

(MUSIC)

Let me ask a rhetorical question --

(MUSIC)

No, anyway.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: I'm just going to stop it right there.

Anyway, cognitive decline, flashes of anger. Here's the question and it's a serious one. Is Joe Biden mentally fit to be the president of the United States?

He's the co-host of "THE FIVE", Geraldo Rivera, also the host of "Unfiltered", as if there's a filtered Dan. There's no such thing as a filtered Dan Bongino in the history of the world.

Geraldo, I'm going to give you first crack at this because I think it's -- Dan's going to go after you which I'm looking forward to. Is he mentally fit? This is now a serious question.

You -- you saw that tape and you saw what he said to Peter, the son of a bitch, Peter is one of the nicest kids you'll ever meet. He's a kid to me.

GERALDO RIVERA, CO-HOST OF "THE FIVE": Well, I've -- I've called one of our guests tonight a son of a bitch and he's a friend of mine. You know I think that --

HANNITY: Okay, check mate, I lost.

DAN BONGINO, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Yes, I remember that.

RIVERA: And it could be very it could be very frustrating when you're the president of the United States, the leader of the free world, and you have this young reporter keeps, you know, knocking you off your game. He has a stutter. You know, he's not the glibbest person. I don't know that and I don't think that that adds up to cognitive decline --

HANNITY: All right. Geraldo, hang on a second --

RIVERA: -- that I think people are being very cruel about that.

HANNITY: I have -- wait a minute -- I have played tapes of Joe in 2008 --

RIVERA: I mean, we are on the brink of war and what Peter said --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: -- 2016 and today, do you not see a dramatic decline?

RIVERA: Well, you know, I think that people get a little slower in terms of their presentation as they get older. That doesn't necessarily mean that their IQ has diminished or that they have some early onset of Alzheimer's. I believe that he showed in that two-hour press conference --

HANNITY: Do you think that's okay? You didn't answer my question then I got to go to Dan.

Is he mentally fit to be president?

RIVERA: I think that he is mentally fit unless you can prove to me with psychiatrists, psychologists and experts that --

HANNITY: OK, take a cognitive test like Donald Trump did. Donald Trump aced it.

Dan?

RIVERA: I wouldn't mind that, I -- but I -- you know, it's kind of insulting to ask a president United States to do that, particularly --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Donald Trump, John McCain or Ronald Reagan.

Dan?

BONGINO: Yeah, no, no. I could not disagree with Geraldo in any stronger possible terms that the guy is not cognitively competent to be president. You know where you can see it, Sean, here's where I see it most, and, Geraldo, I don't know why you're covered for this guy. I mean, it's transparent. You're not a dumb guy. You're a lawyer.

I mean, this guy was in the courtroom, you'd be like, you know, your honor, maybe the -- so we don't get a mistrial here, maybe we should get new counsel on the other side.

I mean, he's clearly not cognitively competent. But, Sean, notice on the retrieval thing, you know the brain processes and then there's a retrieval process. He may not have such a problem storing information and processing it, but you notice he has this retrieval process problem where he'll lose himself in the middle of his sentence and he has a general idea of what he's talking about but he can't pull the specifics out.

He's a perfect example, how his defense secretary. He can never seem to remember his name. I mean, this is arguably his most important cabinet official and he's always like this guy next to me, and then he had Mitch Landrieu. His czar was -- his infrastructure czar next to him the other day to the right and he's like and this dude whatever next to me, he can never remember any.

Listen, he processed it, he knows who the guy is, but he can't retrieve it. Is it Alzheimer's? I'm not -- I don't think. So is it some form of early onset frontal lobe dementia? I mean, it's possible, but it's clear as day to anyone looking at this. I mean, come on, Geraldo, that guy the guy's --

(CROSSTALK)

RIVERA: I call everybody, hey, man, hey, man, how you doing, man? That's what I do --

(CROSSTALK)

RIVERA: I mean, the older you get, the more people you've met.

BONGINO: One thing, wait, time out. Let me just throw this at you. Go look back to the Paul Ryan-Joe Biden debate from years ago and look at Joe Biden. Come on, man. Look at him today.

HANNITY: Checkmate.

BONGINO: That's not the same guy, man. It's not the same guy.

I watched that, believe me. I couldn't believe it. I thought Paul Ryan was going to eat his lunch. And even though he lied his way through the debate, I was like okay, for a liar, he's not too bad at this.

This isn't the same guy. Come on, it's not.

HANNITY: Geraldo, last word.

BONGINO: It's easier to trip someone up when they get older, and it is absolutely true. But it I think that to say that he does not have a grasp of world issues, he's making mistakes. But the mistakes are policy mistakes that whether you're 40, 50, 60, 70 or 80, you can make. I mean, trust -- you know, doubt his judgment and his political --

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: Geraldo, he goes into -- he slips into world lost for 15 seconds at a time. He can't stay focused on the issue.

BONGINO: Not knowing your defense secretary's name? I mean, really? This is the guy who is called you know in the process for an armed attack, you don't know his name? You're like, hey, that guy --

RIVERA: Listen to this Fred, excuse me.

HANNITY: Tomorrow night, I'm going to bring -- tomorrow night, I'm going to bring you if you both can come, both back and we're going to do Biden over the years, and then we'll ask you the same question tomorrow, okay? Are you in?

BONGINO: Put together the montage.

HANNITY: All right. I'll put a montage together.

Geraldo, get used to the words check and mate. They're coming tomorrow.

But anyway, another day, another new low for Joe Biden as polls are cratering. It's not just Republicans and independents who are unhappy with Joe. A lot of Democrats are. Biden's fans, the media mob, they're starting to turn on their dear leader that they've now protected for two full years. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHUCK TODD, NBC NEWS ANCHOR: Our new NBC News poll suggests Mr. Biden does need a reset because he's lost his identity a bit. He's no longer seen as competent and effective. He's no longer seen as a good commander-in-chief or perhaps most damaging, as easygoing and likable.

SEN. BERNIE SANDERS (I-VT): I'm not Joe Biden I like him, but I'm not Joe Biden. I think President Biden has done something quite unusual. He has taken a hard look at the problems facing the American people, he's brought forth legislation to try to address that, and I respect that. But obviously, we have our strong differences.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A new NBC News poll shows an overwhelming majority of Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who feels like we are in a better place now than we were a year ago? Show of hands.

No one believes we're in a better spot now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: If you're a Democrat and Chuck Todd questions your competency, guess what? It's bad.

Clearly, Joe Biden's presidency is imploding on every front given his obvious cognitive decline. I doubt the administration will ever recover.

Here now with more, FOX News contributors Leo 2.0 Terrell, Ari Fleischer.

Ari, you're a communications expert. In a different way, I'll ask you, when you put the polls together, the media now for the first time are critical. They've never been critical up to this point. That can't be good for him and having a 33 percent approval rating in some polls isn't good either.

ARI FLEISCHER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Sean, what you're hearing now is the sound of the water going down the drain. I mean, Republicans never supported Joe Biden. He was too polarizing, too liberal. Independents gave him a chance and then he spurned independents and now, he's even losing parts of his base.

His biggest problem, Sean, is that he cast his lot with Bernie Sanders instead of Joe Manchin. If he had come into office with a 50-50 Senate and with a narrowly controlled House and said, I'm going to govern as a moderate, I'm going to lead America as a moderate, the era of big government remains over, he'd been in a very different position as president.

But instead, he ran alongside Bernie Sanders, to the far progressive, spend-it-all, socialist left and you're seeing the results now for a president whose age is showing, whose policy problems are showing, and whose judgment is bad.

HANNITY: And the only solution and I'm saying this sincerely, Leo, is he'd have to adopt Trump's economic policies, Trump's energies policies, Trump's border policies, Trump's COVID policies. He needs to warp speed antivirals, monoclonals, even tests that he ran out of, which is mind-blowing to me, and he's got to get a tougher posture with Putin, not with 8,500 troops on standby, but go after their economy and that's oil. That's 50 percent of their economy, and he can't do that.

LEO TERRELL, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: No, he won't do it because, first of all, he's already thrown Manchin and Sinema off the bus. He won't associate with them. He's made his deal with the devil, with the Bernie Sanders, the AOC, the socialists.

And let me tell you right now, what Ari said is absolutely correct, plus, he's losing the heart and soul of the Democratic Party. Hispanics and blacks are questioning him. His numbers with Hispanics are down. Hispanics are more leaning towards Republican.

Blacks are down in numbers. It is the base of the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party has already used Joe Biden. He's useless to them now. So they're looking for someone else.

He got the White House for them and now they're going to cast him aside. Joe Biden right now, Sean, is in no man's land. Nobody wants Joe Biden right now.

HANNITY: Well, look, so, Ari, you're brought in -- Ari how do we turn the ship around? They're not going to listen to you, but if they ever did do something like that, what would you say?

FLEISCHER: You turn it around on substance, you turn it around on policy, and then you hope for an economic recovery. But the way you turn it around on substances is you start to govern, and when I said, get Joe Manchin's vote, I mean that. You govern in a way that you can get Joe Manchin to vote for you, your policies and if you do, you'll probably pick up 10 or 15 Republicans. You will lose 10 or 15 liberal Democrats and AOC in the House. That's the exchange that he needs to make. He cannot win off of the progressive base. He already showed he can't pass any progressive policies and then adhering to progressive principles is the kiss of death going to this election because he's misread the mood of the country, Sean.

HANNITY: Last word, Leo?

TERRELL: Thank you. If he wants to get the law and order back on his side, go after Democratic mayors, go after Lightfoot. Go after Adams. Go after Garcetti. Go after Democratic prosecutors like Gascon and Bragg.

Attack Democrats who are soft on crime. If he does that, he has a chance.

HANNITY: Yeah. Well said.

All right, both of you, thank you. Ari, good to see you. Leo, thank you.

Straight ahead, Vladimir Putin capitalizing on Biden's weaknesses and the world tonight is on edge. We'll have a full report.

Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers, he's blasting Biden. We'll tell you why. We'll get reaction. Clay Travis is with us.

A busy Monday news night. Glad you're with FOX.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Now, we're learning tonight that the Pentagon has heightened the readiness of nearly 8,500 U.S. troops amid growing tensions between Ukraine and Russia. And amid Joe Biden's non-stop weakness and outright foreign policy confusion, let's be brutally honest here -- 8,500 troops on a higher state of alert and readiness is embarrassing and it's humiliating.

The Russians have anywhere between 100,000 and 200,000 troops on the border. They have tanks. They have military equipment and Joe Biden is not going to war with Russia or Vladimir Putin, frankly nor should he. So let's stop to make pretend, oh, we have a state of readiness for 8,500 troops tough guy talk because Putin is laughing.

Now, President Joey wants to hurt Vladimir, he got the answer. He's a hostile actor, this is a hostile regime, must be taken seriously.

If you want to break Vladimir Putin and defeat him, the best way -- take back the pipeline waiver you gave him, number one, and then in this country, open up completely all natural gas and oil and coal production to our maximum capacity, and then you can help bankrupt Russia when we go back to being energy independent, and we can go back to being a net exporter of energy instead of making him and Russia rich again.

Now, press propaganda circle back Jen Psaki said today, Americans in Ukraine should leave now, and reiterated that no evacuation effort is planned should Russia invade. Okay, are we going to strand and abandon our fellow Americans again? Because tonight, it's day 163 when Joe abandoned our fellow Americans in Afghanistan.

ANNOUNCER: Americans held hostage, abandoned behind enemy lines, day 163.

HANNITY: If you or somebody you know is in Ukraine, somebody you love and care about, tell them to get the hell out of there. Those troops are not amassing on the border for no reason.

Now, not only did Biden today ignore questions about Putin after returning from another weekend from the White House. But remember back in 2019, when Joe tried to claim Putin didn't want him to be president because Putin was scared of Joe. Okay, take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: Because Putin knows if I am president United States, his days of tyranny and trying to intimidate the United States and those in Eastern Europe are over. I'm going to stand up to him. He's a bully, just like the president, and I know he doesn't want me to be president. But to tell you what, when I'm president, things are going to change.

One of the reasons I'm running is because of my age and my experience. With it comes wisdom. We need someone to take office this time around who on day one can stand on the world stage, command the respect of world leaders from Putin to our allies and know exactly what has to be done to get this country back on track.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Now perhaps Joe forgot in his cognitive state that it was under Obama and Biden that Putin took Crimea and now under this imploding presidency, Putin's at it again.

Here with reaction, former CIA station chief, FOX News contributor, Dan Hoffman.

I think there's nobody on the face of this earth that I think knows more about Putin, Russia than you. You spent over three decades of your life in intel. I can't even tell the stories that you won't tell me.

But with that said, in all seriousness, I don't think Putin's amassing these troops, these tanks, this military equipment for no reason. Do you?

DAN HOFFMAN, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: No, I don't, and look, I think the United States has a moral and ethical imperative to draw down our embassy and warn Americans to leave if there's impending war. But what the government of Ukraine sees is a certain inconsistency there because if war really is imminent and Ukraine really is under siege like we see that it is, then we need to be doing more.

You're right, Vladimir Putin has over 100,000 troops massed on the border of Ukraine. He's not leaving. We don't have the leverage to induce him to leave, and Ukraine wants more from us.

And the fact that we're not able to do enough is risking -- really driving a wedge between not just the United States but NATO and Ukraine.

HANNITY: All right. So, 8,500 troops being brought up to a higher state of readiness is meaningless. Is that -- is that correct?

HOFFMAN: Well, we're not going to deploy our troops to Ukraine. I mean, there was never any indication that the Biden administration wants to do that.

HANNITY: We shouldn't do that.

HOFFMAN: So this is a -- nor should we. What we need to do is increase the military assistance to Ukraine and look, we could take a page from the Baltic States who were sending stinger missiles and javelin anti-tank weapons. That's a good thing to do.

But we haven't done enough to fortify Ukraine and we knew that they were at great risk, you know, going back with the beginning of the Biden administration and we haven't done enough to support them.

HANNITY: Well, maybe, the only person for this job is zero experience Hunter because he's made millions from oligarchs in both Ukraine and Russia. He'd be maybe the perfect person to bring peace between the two countries. I don't know.

But there's nothing Biden's going to do that's going to stop Putin unless we go right to the heart of the Russian economy and that is 50 percent of its energy. And we have the capacity, we have the means, we have the ability, we have the natural resources to do it.

Dan Hoffman, thank you. Appreciate you being with us.

Now, the Biden agenda is falling uh on every front apart, at home and abroad. Biden's never ending struggles or even catching the attention of star quarterback Aaron Rodgers who exposed Biden's lies in a recent interview, saying, quote: When the president of the United States says this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated, it's because of him and his constituents which I don't know how there are any if you watch any of his attempts of public speaking, but anyway, I guess he got 81 million votes.

Here with uh reaction, Outkick founder, co-host of the Clay Travis/Buck Sexton show, Clay Travis.

All right. By the way, this is the greatest football weekend in the history of football. Let's be honest, some of the best games ever, and I like Aaron Rodgers, I like Tom Brady, I could I loved the battle last night Mahomes and Kansas City and Buffalo, that was an amazing game.

All right. Let's focus on Aaron Rodgers. Aaron Rodgers came under heavy fire for suggesting he was vaccinated, wasn't fully vaccinated. You know, he's a healthy athlete, why aren't more people willing to accept that the idea of freedom, medical privacy, doctor-patient confidentiality, and now that we know that whether you're vaccinated or boostered and had natural immunity you're still going to get it, why does he still say it's a it's a disease of the unvaccinated?

CLAY TRAVIS, OUTKICK FOUNDER: He's wrong. Joe Biden is.

And I actually think -- first of all, you're right, Sean. It was an incredible weekend of NFL. Every single game was decided on the final play and I got to say, I know there's a lot of people watching out there in Buffalo, crushing 13 seconds of defeat there at the end of the regulation. But Josh Allen's going to win you a Super Bowl.

Sean, run that. Save it. At some point, I'm telling you, Josh Allen is going to bring the Bills for the promised land.

HANNITY: I thought 13 seconds left, oh, I couldn't believe it. It was a great game.

TRAVIS: I know. Look, here -- here is where I think sports becomes so important. First of all, props to Aaron Rodgers for speaking out. And, Sean, one of the lessons that we can take from sports leagues, whether it's the NBA, whether it's the NHL or whether it's the NFL is they have this nearly 100 percent overall vaccination rate, right?

And when you look at the numbers, I believe it's a hundred percent in the NHL, 97 percent in the NBA, and 95 plus percent in the NFL. The guys are still testing overwhelmingly positive, even with either or nearly 100 percent vaccination rate.

It's actually a fascinating window into what the larger United States would look like and the answer is the pandemic doesn't go away even if everyone is vaccinated. So what Aaron Rodgers has, Sean, is he's got the ability because his contract is guaranteed, because he's one of the best quarterbacks to ever play the game to say exactly what he thinks, much like Kyrie Irving in the NBA and also like Novak Djokovic in tennis.

These are three of the greatest athletes in the world, all unvaccinated, all looking at the data, and making rational choices for themselves based on consultation with medical professionals. They've all had it to my knowledge COVID and all been fine just like me who's had it twice, Sean. I know I might look like the perfect specimen of health, but trust me, I ain't on those guys levels and I've been fine.

(CROSSTALK)

HANNITY: You could do a HANNITY workout. We'll take you in our dojo, you know, we might beat you up a little bit, but we won't --

(CROSSTALK)

TRAVIS: I bring my "Let's go Brandon" -- I'll bring the "Let's go, Brandon" shirt -- we'll be ready to go, we'll see you can pinch more.

HANNITY: I'll wear my let's go Brandon --

(CROSSTALK)

TRAVIS: Maybe we can get Joe Biden to do a push-up contest for this, too.

HANNITY: I'll win. But if you want to go for it, we'll do it for charity. We'll do it on camera.

All right. Clay Travis, good to see you.

TRAVIS: I'm in.

HANNITY: All right. When we come back, the left pushes more draconian COVID mandates. Bill Maher calling out the left-wing lunacy. "The View" co- hosts are angry at Bill Maher. We've got the tape and we've got real science from Dr. Oz. That's straight ahead. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: All right. Believe it or not, some sanity from far left Hollywood tonight as HBO host Bill Maher exposing the left's never-ending COVID obsession, one-size-fits-all medicine, non-stop pandemic power grabs. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL MAHER, TV HOST: It's just gone on too long. Nobody cares anymore. Last night, the Grubhub delivery guy was eating my French fries right in front of me. I don't want to live in your paranoid world anymore, your mass paranoid world.

You know, you go out -- it's silly now, you know? You have your mask, you have to have a card, you have to have a booster. They scan your head, like you're a cashier and I'm a bunch of bananas. I'm not bananas, you are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: Maher didn't stop, there even slamming Dr. doom and gloom, flip- flop Fauci in a new interview saying, quote, don't sit there in your white coat and tell me just do what we say.

Here with reaction, he's now running for Senate on the Republican side, Pennsylvania Senate candidate, Dr. Oz is back with us.

First, how's the campaign going?

DR. MEHMET OZ (R), CANDIDATE FOR U.S. SENATE IN PENNSYLVANIA: It's going fabulously well. We're getting these packed town halls all over Pennsylvania. You can see them on DrOz.com. In fact, that's what I want to jump off into this issue with Bill Maher because folks are anxious, and a lot of frontline workers who see the hypocrisy, they see the duplicity. And what we've really got right now is a caste system. We have staff who have to wear masks, and customers, they can do whatever they want.

And even -- everyone at home think about this, as you walk into the restaurant, you have to put a mask on. You sit down now, they tell you, you can take your mask off. Really? Where's the science there?

This is what undermines our confidence and what fibbing Fauci's been saying all along. The flip-flopping is not just a little bit of a problem in translation, it is undermining our ability to trust what we're hearing and you're being gaslit at home. People are telling you things like you'll have to wear masks forever, which is what they're actually thinking and it's complete utter nonsense.

HANNITY: You told me, I don't know, maybe about a month ago or so that Regeneron and Eli Lilly which had done a phenomenal job with delta, monoclonal antibodies. You told me that no, they're not working as well on omicron as GSK sotrovimab, I think I've said it right. And it turned out to be true.

Now, they're actually saying it. Now, these other companies that have done a phenomenal work. I'm sure they're going to adjust their monoclonal antibody formula and probably adapt to new variants.

If breakthrough cases, in other words, if you're vaccinated, you have a boost or a natural immunity, and it's -- you're still getting COVID, this is no longer a disease of the unvaccinated. Why is Fauci talking about, you know, fourth and fifth booster shots?

OZ: He's got to defend what he's been saying, and he's too arrogant to pull back from the precipice. And everyone now sees what's happening. You point out the good example which is the virus shifted, the monoclonal antibodies have to shift. We completely ignored the possibility of therapeutics, although you and I talked about this literally the first week that we knew about the pandemic and we got slammed for it. But it turns out in retrospect, it was probably the best path.

Now, no one knew it at the time but the arrogance of ignoring the possibility of what doctors have always known which is treat the patient in front of you, it's not a one-size-fits-all plan. Of course, try to prevent illness but have a strategy, a backup plan. Fauci is never taking care of patients. He's a virologist. He works in test tubes.

And so, there's no approach to patient care, the ministering of people who are ill that's required and that's where you need leadership and it's not been there.

I got to say, one thing I've noticed in Pennsylvania is when you get in front of folks and say, Washington got it wrong, COVID's a good example, but the authoritarian overreach, the power grab that you spoke of is continuing in other areas, people resonate to that.

I mean, part of the reason they're coming out in droves is because they want to get confident again and they know what's out there. They have someone who's got a bold voice to go to Washington and say, enough. We've got to stop thinking about how liberals evaluate the world. It's not all about victims. It's not caring about caring. It's caring about fixing.

HANNITY: So you you've had 4,000 heart operations. You've been 15 years on TV, you know, doing your show, which is highly successful in what is a very difficult genre daytime talk. And you're leaving all of that behind with the millions of dollars that go with it to run -- and get in a blood sport known as politics. Why?

I think that's really -- that's a huge sacrifice for a lot of people that do it. I admire people that do but I'm just curious.

OZ: It's one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. It's very cathartic to leave everything behind. In fact, I told my team we are burning the boats. We're not going back. Let the show go on to other people's hands, cancel the magazine, we're going to be here for the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and we'll be in the Senate next year protecting them.

HANNITY: All right. We're going to continue to follow this race closely. Dr. Oz, thank you.

Now, straight ahead we're going to sit down with the man who is challenging the "New York Times" in court and winning. You don't want to miss this, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Now, as we have exposed on this program night after night, the mob, the media is an arm of the Democratic Party, parroting the same talking points, pushing the same hysteria, living in what I call Twitter blue check mark media cult of theirs and echo chamber.

Ask yourself, where is real investigative journalism? I said in 2007, journalism is dead, mostly. Anyway -- but they went there for the Russia hoax Pulitzers that they got. When are they giving those back?

Where's the commitment to truth, facts and transparency?

Now, there has been wondering was constantly under fire. James O'Keefe has been taking on the corrupt media establishment, exposing them in their own words. Here is a small sample of Project Veritas' most explosive work. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PV JOURNALIST: What do you think is going to happen this week with the whole Russia thing?

VAN JONES, CNN: It's a big nothingburger.

PV JOURNALIST: Really?

AMY ROBACH, ABC NEWS ANCHOR: I've had this story for three years, I've had this interview with Virginia Roberts. We would not put it on the air. First of all, I was told who is Jeffrey Epstein, no one knows who that is, this is a stupid story. Then the palace found out that we had her whole allegations about Prince Andrew and threaten us a million different ways. It was unbelievable what we had, Clinton. We had everything.

JEFF ZUCKER, CNN: This is a president who knows he is losing, who knows he is in trouble. He is sick. Maybe it is on the after effects of steroids or not. I don't know. But he is acting erratically and desperately and we need to -- we need to not normalize that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HANNITY: James O'Keefe, founder and CEO of Project Veritas, has a new book out. It's called "American Muckbreaker: Rethinking Journalism for the 21st Century". It's on amazon.com, hannity.com bookstores everywhere.

No matter what you do, you come under fire. They have a whole series to catch a predator, undercover cameras, right? Mike Wallace made his career, "60 Minutes" did this all the time. Why is it different for you?

JAMES O'KEEFE, PROJECT VERITAS FOUNDER: Well, Sean, I think times have changed. Journalism is printing with others don't want printed. Everything else is public relations, that's attributed to George Orwell.

But I think the media has changed in the days of Mike Wallace and "60 Minutes", and in these days, you have -- what I've said in this book, "American Muckraker" all proceeds go to our nonprofit, Project Veritas, by the way.

I say that it's economics. It's fear. It's -- "The New York Times" for example actually in concert for big corporations and FBI who raided my apartment after a source transited me a document, Sean. You mentioned "New York Times" defaming me and me suing them for defamation.

It's up to us the people now. We, the people have to do the job that newsrooms used to do. It is a complicated problem. A lot of people are hopeless, but I kind of have written a book about how to do journalism, Sean, in the clown world.

HANNITY: Yeah. You know, it's because you had a high court ruling in New York in your favor on the issue of "The New York Times."

Sarah Palin's trial is supposed to start. That's when they basically accused her of being responsible for the Jared Loughner shooting were Gabby Giffords was shot. Sadly I understand she contracted COVID and it has been delayed a week. We wish her well and hope she recovers quickly.

But this is now, Times v. Sullivan, which is for public figures standard. You have to prove malice seems to be teetering on the brink here. Where do you see it?

O'KEEFE: Well, "The New York Times" case, the Supreme Court case, "The New York Times" versus Sullivan established the actual malice standard. They said that we were deceptive, "The New York Times" reported that our videos of September 2020 were deceptive. That is the guy who had ballots in their car. We sued that for defamation.

The judge in New York state, Charles Wood, arguing, denying their motion to dismiss our lawsuit, said it was "The New York Times" who engaged in this and ration and deception. Also a Christmas Eve ruling, Sean, where they had to sequester our memos, Sean, "The New York Times" published my private lawyer correspondence after the FBI raided my home and the judge ruling against "The New York Times" twice. "The New York Times" attacked the judge.

So there is no recourse in this country to hold the media accountable. In many ways, "The New York Times," and organizations like it, are more powerful than our own government because they work in concert with big tech which in turn works in concert with big pharmaceutical companies.

So, how do you break through that? Well, I wrote a book about how to break through that. In fact, we're winning. We're winning in a lawsuit and also having whistle-blower is not go to "The New York Times" but come to Project Veritas because to quote them, Sean, there is simply nowhere for them to go.

HANNITY: Yeah. Well, it's called "American Muckracker", Project Veritas. It's going to be interesting to watch your case and Sarah Palin's case. Great book. We always appreciate when you share your videos with us.

We'll have more HANNITY right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: Unfortunately, that is all the time we have left. As always, we thank you for being with us. You make the show possible. That we never forget, and we never say thank you enough.

We hope you set your DVR so you never miss an episode of HANNITY. And in the meantime, even a little early because we love the next show that's coming on, let not your heart be troubled.

Laura Ingraham, big show tonight.

END

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