New York Gov. Cuomo faces Democrat revolt over nursing home cover-up

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New York Gov. Cuomo faces Democrat revolt over nursing home cover-up

Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y. joins FOX News contributors Mike Huckabee and Charlie Hurt to discuss on 'Hannity'

This is a rush transcript from "Hannity," February 19, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated


JASON CHAFFETZ, FOX NEWS HOST: Welcome to this special edition of "Hannity", Failures of the Left. I'm Jason Chaffetz, in tonight for Sean.

And we begin with our continuing coverage of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. Last year, his fatal and cavalier decision to send elderly New Yorkers infected with COVID back into nursing homes caused a massive outbreak. A brand-new study is linking at least a thousand deaths to this policy.

Now, according to a report, Andrew Cuomo is under a federal and state investigation for attempting to cover up the true nursing home death toll. One state assemblyman, a Democrat named Ron Kim, now claims Governor Cuomo threatened to "destroy him" if he blew the whistle on Cuomo's scheme. Dozens of others are now coming forward with similar claims.

Another Democratic New York assemblywoman tweeted, quote: My text messages, my DMs and my inbox are flooded with Cuomo stories: so many people have been bullied, mistreated, or intimidated by him.

Now, New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is calling for an investigation. Even Alec Baldwin is calling for Cuomo to resign and let's not lose sight of the worst part of this entire story. Thousands of loved ones are dead because of Cuomo's idiotic nursing home policy.

But Governor Andrew Cuomo is unapologetic. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D-NY): I'm not going to let you hurt New Yorkers by lying about what happened surrounding the death of a loved one. I see that as my job, and I'm going to do it aggressively. But in truth I was not aggressive enough in fighting back against these crazy political theories, and these crazy political opponents.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHAFFETZ: Keep in mind, in the middle of the pandemic, Cuomo wrote a book about his wonderful COVID-19 response and leadership. He also received an Emmy for his heroic work.

As it turns out he was acting all along but the liberal media does not care. Last night, CNN and MSNBC devoted their coverage to Senator Ted Cruz's brief overnight trip to Mexico, and "World News Tonight" on ABC devoted four times the amount of coverage to the Cruz trip.

Joining us now with reaction is former Arkansas governor and FOX News contributor and all-around good guy, Governor Mike Huckabee, FOX News contributor Charlie Hurt, and New York Congressman Lee Zeldin.

Gentlemen, thank you so much for joining us here tonight.

CHARLIE HURT, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Good to be with you.

CHAFFETZ: Governor, I want to start with you, Governor, because you've been there. You've been in that seat. You've dealt with tough situations, but I got to tell you, the ego is big in this one with Andrew Cuomo. What's your take on the situation?

MIKE HUCKABEE, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, you know you're in trouble when you're Andrew Cuomo, a Democratic governor of New York and you've got AOC and Alec Baldwin and members of your own party who smell the water -- smell the blood in the water and they're coming after him.

I think Cuomo is in big, big trouble because of what he's done and his cover-up which is always equal or worse than the crime. His bullying has finally caught up with him and people are no longer pretending that they are afraid of him, and they are speaking out.

I think his time is limited. He may finish his term but this is the last thing he'll ever do politically.

CHAFFETZ: Now, Congressman Zeldin, you used to be in the state assembly I believe before you were in the United States Congress. You know a lot of these people and these players.

And the quotes we did in the intro, these are from Democrats that are jumping on-board here. What's the atmosphere like there in New York?

REP. LEE ZELDIN (R-NY): People are upset because Governor Cuomo's tactics are to bully, to be very -- filled with revenge and spite and backstabbing. That's his political tactic. It's been since he first came into office.

I mean, let's break some stuff down. The nursing home directive, they just had a press conference earlier today, his administration's position is they had to do this deadly nursing home directive because they were running out of hospital bed space. They had just told all hospitals to increase bed capacity by 50 percent.

The federal government was sending the USNS Comfort. The Javits Center was turned into a hospital. They were building temporary hospitals in all sorts of other counties in the area. Governor Cuomo says he didn't have time to put out all of this information that the public was demanding and that the legislature was demanding because he was too busy saving lives.

Yet he had time to write a book as you just pointed out. He's receiving an Emmy for his communication with the public, and, oh, by the way the secretary to the governor, Melissa DeRosa, she just admitted that the reason why they weren't providing this information was because of their concern of being pursued by the Department of Justice.

So, we just have to take all of this with a grain of salt. And I think the other reason, to answer your question, is that these Democratic state legislators are tired not just with the bullying, but the lies and all the costs of all the lives (ph).

CHAFFETZ: Yes. Charlie, that's what's stunning about this. You have the assistant that basically, the right-hand person to the governor, coming forward and making the allegations, saying that she had firsthand knowledge of what the governor was doing in not providing the information.

HURT: Completely admits that they were -- that they had an extravagant scheme to cover up what they had done. But I still say, you know, from 30,000 feet up, the far worst crime is the cover-up by the media, the degree to which the media is treating him like some kind of hero, treated him like some kind of hero from the beginning, and refusing to pursue this story the way they should.

We're talking about thousands of people who died, you know, because of a directive he issued, forcing COVID patients, highly transmissible infectious COVID patients into nursing homes, into rooms with our most vulnerable people in the country, and I've always believed that voters, you know, in a pandemic, in a crisis like this, voters are going to give you a lot of leeway.

The problem is when a politician like Governor Cuomo decides to politicize this thing and Democrats have politicized this from day one, when that's your posture, not only did they politicize it to attack President Trump, but they also politicized it to expand their own powers into areas that they never should have authority in, in the first place.

If you're going to politicize something like this all of that goodwill, all of that sort of willingness to sort of give you a path about making a bad mistake goes out the window.

CHAFFETZ: Yeah.

HURT: And I think -- I agree with Governor Huckabee. I think his days are numbered.

CHAFFETZ: You know, Governor, it's not just the political PR spin that the governor seems to have put on this but the Centers for Disease Control wants this information because that's how they're assessing who is getting infected, how are they're getting infected, what's going -- I mean, the implications are far beyond the borders of just New York state.

HURT: That's right.

HUCKABEE: They certainly are. This is a national problem. It's something that every state has to worry about. But I think the big problem is, Cuomo is simply unwilling to be accountable for his decisions.

The one big difference, you mentioned Ted Cruz getting all the media attention but there's a big difference. Ted Cruz did something that wasn't real good, wasn't real smart but he apologized for it. He recognized it wasn't a great idea to go to Cancun in the middle of Texas' total freeze, but he said so.

That's something Andrew Cuomo cannot bring himself to do. His arrogance is so overwhelming that he refuses to say, I was wrong. People will forgive you for being wrong. They will not forgive you for being arrogant and unwilling to accept responsibility once you have that job.

CHAFFETZ: Yes. And I think it's even beyond wrong. I think it was just flat out deception and deceit to have a scheme, to purposefully withhold numbers from the federal government, from the state lawmakers, that wanted this information. That's devastating because that was not just a snap decision. That -- you have to talk to other people to put that in motion.

So, Congressman Zeldin, when does the dam actually break because I get the sense now, that you have Alec (ph) -- you know, Democratic assemblywomen, Alec Baldwin, for goodness sake, AOC and others, that dam seems to be breaking, isn't it?

ZELDIN: Yes. I think that the governor is going to be losing his emergency powers. That there's bipartisan support for that.

The Republicans in the New York state assembly are pushing for impeachment. I saw someone -- Ron Kim doing an interview earlier today. It seems like there might be some Democratic support for that, we'll see where that goes.

You mentioned the calls for him to resign and Governor Huckabee points out that Governor Cuomo is up in the ballot box November 2022. And a reminder as we get census data and we see New York losing congressional seats, why is that?

A lot of that has to do with policies to take away freedoms, to raise taxes, to erode public safety, cashless bail, an effort to defund the police in New York City. It is there are a lot of different components here as to why Governor Cuomo needs to go and whether it happens right now, whether he resigns, gets pushed out or in November 2022.

Gosh, if we want to save our state, I'm a proud New Yorker, if we want to save our state, Cuomo has got to go.

CHAFFETZ: Congressman Zeldin, Charlie Hurt, and Governor Huckabee, thank you for joining us tonight.

All right. Coming up next, former Texas Governor Rick Perry weighs in on Biden's snow day. You're going to want to hear about that and what Texas needs to do to get back on its feet.

Stay with us, as this special edition of "Hannity" continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHAFFETZ: Welcome back to this special edition of "Hannity".

Yesterday as Texas continued to suffer under a massive and deadly winter storm, the Commander-in-Chief Joe Biden took a snow day. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: Where is our commander-in-chief? You know that new guy? Oh, that's right, this morning, he decided to take a snow day.

The guy ultimately in charge of FEMA and all the country's emergency resources and federal agencies, yeah, he took a day off in the middle of this natural disaster. Where is the feigned, phony, selective liberal outrage on this? I guess, you know, to be fair, it's not even really totally clear that Joe even fully understands what's going on in Texas.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHAFFETZ: After the show last night, the Biden team felt the need to release a tweet assuring voters that the president called Texas Governor Greg Abbott. Biden now plans to visit the state sometime after the weather warms up.

No doubt Democrats will use the winter storm as a political tool to push their radical agenda. Already, the United States has reentered the Paris climate accord. No time to waste, apparently.

Biden's green energy oracle John Kerry now claims we have just nine years to save the planet.

Joining us now with more is former energy secretary and former Texas governor, Rick Perry.

I guess I'll call you governor because that's how I got to know you best. I appreciate you joining us.

This, to me, is going to be what I call a disaster liberalism. This is classic disaster liberalism. Disaster happens and they want to have a solution and their solution is usually more government, more regulation.

But that's not how we're actually going to solve these problems and these challenges, is it? Government, more government, more regulation?

RICK PERRY, FORMER ENERGY SECRETARY: Exactly right, Jason, and thanks for having me on.

You know, I'd love to have President Biden come to Texas. We can -- we can show him some things that he certainly needs to see. What's going on with this crisis is one of them, and kind of explain to him why we need the federal government to be a partner in innovating our way to better energy solution rather than regulating.

And that's what I worry about when people say, well, let's get into the national grid. I'm like, let's just tap the brakes on that. Let's talk about it. Certainly, let's hear what that would mean.

But I'm telling you, my experience with the federal government has been the first thing they do is regulate.

And we've got these great national labs, Jason, as you know, 17 national labs across the country that do some extraordinary work. Whether it's in the area of small modular reactors, whether it's in compact fusion reactors, we're seeing some fabulous things out there, on fuel cells and hydrogen. I mean, all of those are areas we can innovate.

But let's -- let's be clear. This was a once -- probably once-in-a-lifetime event that happened in Texas. A lot of reasons that it happened, you know. People are pointing fingers over at the wind industry. People are pointing fingers over here at ERCOT.

 They're saying here's -- I would just -- I would caution folks, look, let's find solutions. Every time there is a national -- or a natural disaster, rather, in the state, when I was governor, we learned something from it.

So what is it that we've learned from this? We obviously didn't have the weatherization going on that we should have had. We need to have more diversity in our portfolio.

I think walking away from fossil fuels, walking away from nuclear is an absolute recipe for disaster. So I'd love for the president to come to Texas, and, we -- as a matter of fact, I would love for him to come down to the border and talk to the people along the border of Texas, and find out how misguided this immigration policy is that he's trying to push through, that would be an absolute disaster.

And I'm telling you, a lot of those folks along the border down there historically have voted Democrat, and they never will again, if he carries through with this very, very bad immigration policy he's talking about.

CHAFFETZ: So, Governor, you know, to hear Joe Biden, the president, talk about this, he believes that the Paris Climate Accord is going to help save this situation. What's your reaction when you see that? I mean, that's job one right out-of-the-box, that's exactly what he's doing as if that's going to help solve the problem.

PERRY: The Trump administration made substantial increases in clean energy. They did some things on the emissions sides. American natural gas was going to Europe replacing older, inefficient power plants, not to mention the reliance upon Russian gas.

And to hear John Kerry and Joe Biden talk about it, those are disastrous policies. Well, emissions from electrical power generation in America is down to 1987 levels, Jason. I mean, isn't that good? Isn't that what our goal was, to reduce emissions?

And American natural gas that was developed through hydraulic fracturing, directional drilling, was right at the heart of that. And so fossil fuels - - and I'll tell you, last week in Texas, as people were losing their power, thank God we had fossil fuels in this state because if all we had had was the AOC Green New Deal plan with wind and solar, we would have had a massive disaster on our hands. As it was, fossil fuels are what really saved the day here.

So I think it's -- the wise move here is coming up with the innovation. Look at ways to create new diversity, use all of your natural resources wisely, cleanly, which we have done in this country. All the climate agreement is going to do is to let countries like China off the hook. They are going to continue to develop their energy resources, climate be damn, and America will pay the price.

I don't understand why John Kerry and President Biden can't see the truth to that.

CHAFFETZ: Well, they live in a different bubble and it's the Washington, D.C. bubble and it's not rooted in reality.

But, Governor, I thank you for your time and services. Governor and as secretary, for you and all of your fellow Texans out there, stay warm and get past this and let's get that innovation in place so we've never had to get through it again. Thank you.

(CROSSTALK)

PERRY: We'll learn from it, though. We'll learn from it.

CHAFFETZ: Thank you again. Rick Perry, thanks for joining us tonight.

Al right. Coming up, you won't believe who the Biden administration is considering giving amnesty to now. A full report ahead as this special edition of "Hannity" continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHAFFETZ: Now, the Biden White House continues to double down on its destructive immigration overhaul, prioritizing masks, amnesty and open borders over safety, security and enforcement.

For example, according to a new report from "Breitbart News", Biden's plan actually includes a waiver for previously deported illegal aliens to seek amnesty. And that's not all. As House Republicans today sounded the alarm over a possible health crisis at the southern border. Amid revelations that the Biden administration is apparently not requiring all migrants to get tested for COVID before entering the U.S. interior.

And get this -- ICE officers will now need pre-approval from managers to arrest some illegal immigrants if they do not fall into narrow criminal categories. And yet another signal from the Biden-Harris administration that border security is not a top priority. But the good news is, some state and local officials are pushing back against Biden and Harris's open borders agenda.

This week, 18 state attorneys general scolded Biden and Harris over their decision to cancel an ICE operation targeting sex offenders. And down in Texas, one local mayor is begging Biden to stop releasing illegal aliens into his city, a border city, amid the continued fallout from severe weather.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRUNO J. LOZANO, MAYOR OF DEL RIO, TEXAS: Mr. President, my name is -- mayor of the city of Del Rio, Texas, and I'm requesting to you please put a halt to any release of immigrants. We do not have the resources available to house and accommodate these migrants within our community. If you send them into our community, we will be forced to make a decision to leave them without resources under these dire circumstances.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHAFFETZ: Make no mistake: What the administration is doing is making our country less safe, less secure and less prepared for what's to come.

And don't be fooled. The message from the White House is being received loud and clear. Come to the border and come for citizenship. It's dangerous and destructive but unfortunately it's not all that surprising.

This is what Joe Biden and Kamala Harris campaigned on and this is what Democrats have wanted to pass in Congress for years. But they couldn't get it done.

Joining me now for reaction, former acting commissioner of the United States Border Patrol, Mark Morgan, along with talk radio host Dana Loesch.

Thank you both for joining us tonight.

Mark, I want to start with you because, you know, Biden was supposedly going to return to the norms and do things the way they were supposed to be done by the book but that's not what's happening.

MARK MORGAN, FORMER ACTING COMMISSIONER, UNITED STATES BORDER PATROL: You know, Jason, we talked about unity and this is another important element. Everything you rattled off has been done with the stroke of a pen, E.O.s, a White House directive, memos from DHS or other components within DHS.

Look, what we're seeing right now is the most radical single piece of immigration legislation this country has ever seen. If we want to talk about meaningful immigration reform, we have to talk about securing our borders and part of that, as you said in your opening, is addressing illegal immigration crisis. Open borders and mass amnesty is not the problem.

And let's be clear about this. Let's make no mistake, that right now, this is not going to be the last amnesty request. You're living a pipe dream if you believe that. Right now, because of the policies, we're allowing illegal aliens to enter the country, be released into the interior of the United States and then protect them from deportation. ICE can't do their job.

In a couple of years, we're going to have several million more illegal aliens. They're going to be the next individuals demanding for amnesty. That's what's going to happen.

CHAFFETZ: Dana, in addition to being magnet that really these policies put into place in saying, hey, come rush the board because we're going to treat you better than we treat Americans, I mean, I guess that's what's so infuriating is these people that are here illegally, they get treated better than they do the United States citizens and for them to cancel the rounding up and going after sex offenders who are here illegally, I can't think of anything worse than that.

DANA LOESCH, NATIONALLY SYNDICATED TALK RADIO HOST: Yeah, isn't that kind of the brush there? I think that's why so many individuals are made resentful of the promotion of one group before the other in the face of law, which is not how this country operates. As a republic, we're a nation of laws and it's a particularly bad rub for those who enter the country illegally and did everything they were supposed to do and then they see another group of individuals that are getting -- receiving this preferential treatment.

And you make a good point as well, when you talk about some of these convictions that are going to be excused from consideration when you have law enforcement looking at these cases, determining whether or not these individuals are going to be deported. I mean, drunk driving is now considered one of those exceptions, which, for any other American citizen, I mean, this is horrible, and particularly in Texas, which the last I looked led the nation in drunk driving deaths, but to have something like that and for that to be made an exception, where as, for any other American citizen, that's a crime, and you're called into account for it.

I mean, this -- the law -- part of one of the reasons why law has strength is because it's practiced with consistency, and when you are applying law inconsistently, and penalties as a result, you're going to get a lot of people questioning your motives and you're going to encourage more people to not follow the law.

CHAFFETZ: And along with that, Mark, what does this do to the average person who works on border patrol, who puts their life on the line, goes down there, puts on that badge and fights for the United States of America to have these kind of policies in place, we won't arrest this one, if they did this, don't worry about it, what does that do to the morale of the men and women who serve so valiantly?

MORGAN: It's devastating. I've talked to thousands. It's demoralizing. Everything that Dana said is just right.

Think about -- let's take ICE, for example. What the Biden administration has done is basically to strip 90 percent of their statutory authorities to enforce the law and remove people. Look, I've got a copy of the latest DHS memo that went out. It goes even further than that, Jason.

It actually says basically, unless you're a terrorist or a convicted rapist or murderer, you're scot-free. In fact, if you're in the country illegally before November 2020, you're off limits, and they say that those priorities, unless you're a terrorist or convicted rapist or murderer, you will cancel notice to appear. Be released from custody.

Those are their words, Jason, and even to not execute when they have a final order removal. So they have gone through the process. A judge has said they should be removed. They are telling ice, let them into the country. It's absolutely outrageous. American interests are taking a second seat to the interests of illegal aliens.

CHAFFETZ: Dana, I've only got 15 seconds. Last word to you.

LOESCH: Yeah, Jason, I appreciate you talking about this topic.

And as for the mayor who is warning the administration, saying, don't allow these people to be dumped into our towns, as we're dealing with this crisis, as someone who lives in a town that lost power and water, literally took my first shower yesterday, since Sunday because of all of this, I can second that. Resources have been spread thin so the administration needs to help the state respond here, and they are not doing it.

CHAFFETZ: Thank you both. We appreciate you joining us tonight on "Hannity".

All right. Coming up, Biden continues with his America last foreign policy. Ric Grenell and Congressman Michael Waltz weigh in next, as this special edition of "Hannity" continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHAFFETZ: Now, President Joe Biden's America last foreign policy is on full display tonight as the Biden-Harris administration is now exploring a return to the disastrous Iran nuclear deal, in a sharp departure from President Trump's campaign of maximum pressure against Iran.

Now, the development prompted a strong rebuke from former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Have a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE POMPEO, FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE: Wherever it was, wherever Iran responsible, we're going to hold the Iranians accountable. That's the kind of strength that built the deterrence model that we had with respect to Iran. I hope this current administration won't give up on that.

We can't go back. When President Biden talks about going back, the American people can't afford to go back to those policies.

Now, the Iranians knew they had the capacity to push President Obama around, to get a deal that gave them the pathway to a nuclear weapon and our administration didn't permit that to happen. We put real costs on them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHAFFETZ: But so far, it appears that Biden and Harris want the failures of the past to be the framework for the future, and would rather retreat to the status quo, instead of standing up for the interests of the American people. Because remember, it was President Trump who stood up for ending endless wars, obliterated the ISIS caliphate, stood up against the rogue Iranian regime, and fought back against the disastrous politicization of intelligence.

Joining me now for reaction, the first Green Beret to serve in Congress, Representative Michael Waltz, along with former acting director of national intelligence, Ric Grenell.

Gentlemen, thanks for joining us tonight.

You're both experts on this. I want to ask you both the same question.

As you see Joe Biden and Kamala Harris taking the reins and changing the direction of what the Trump administration did, what do you see happening and what will be the consequences?

Ric Grenell, let's go first to you.

RIC GRENELL, FORMER ACTING DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Look, I think what we're seeing is that the goal is consensus. The goal is to make sure that the Europeans and Russia and China and the U.N. Security Council and everybody come out all happy and in agreement.

And the problem with that is when the goal is consensus, it just means that the others get to water-down our policy, maybe even veto our policy. And so, instead of viewing talks as like a tactic, say, so that we come together and we push our policy -- look, there's no question that sometimes the American policy or the American position in the Trump administration, we stood alone, and we would step out. But we did that because we felt like that was the best thing for the American people and then we would convince others to follow, and many times they did follow.

Our goal wasn't to be accepted by the rest of the group. It was to protect the American people and that's the opposite goal that the Biden team has.

CHAFFETZ: Yeah, Congressman Waltz, it's the difference between leading from behind and actually leading world as President Trump did. But give me your perspective on what's -- what's happening here.

REP. MICHAEL WALTZ (R-FL): Well, Ric is exactly right, and he really took this on as ambassador to Germany as did Secretary Pompeo.

The bottom line is, the Iranians smell weakness. They can smell from it a mile away, and I don't think Neville Chamberlain could have been this naive to give our leverage away.

The maximum pressure campaign is working. The thing the Iranian regime cares about the most is not its own people. It cares about its wallet. Its oil exports are down to virtually zero. It's struggling. It can no longer pay its terrorist proxies.

Yet, in the middle of this dynamic, we're going to release sanctions. That's what the Biden regime is doing. It's going to allow its diplomats free travel now. And it's going to ease back because they want the deal so badly that they are going -- they are going to give away our leverage, and I want to remind everyone the Iranian regime tonight as we speak are holding Americans hostage, including one that was promised by the Iranians to be released during the Iran deal and they reneged on that promise and they just had their proxies attack an American facility, just this very week.

Yet, we're going to start pulling back on this maximum pressure campaign and start to give our leverage away. If we would just keep up that leverage we could actually get a better deal that has all of the elements of their nuclear program and get to -- and get to a permanent deal that doesn't have sunset provisions.

CHAFFETZ: Yeah. Ric Grenell, it was a year ago today that you became the acting director of national intelligence. Amazing things happened under your leadership. And we also -- we had progress in the Middle East with peace deals with Israel, and the United Arab Emirates and others because we took a position of strength. It's sort of that Ronald Reagan adage of "peace through strength," isn't it?

GRENELL: Yeah, for sure. Our allies saw what the U.S. policy was like in the Obama-Biden administration, and they didn't like it.

And so, in the Trump administration, they actually were scrambling. We should thank President Obama and Vice President Biden at the time for having such a weak policy that they convinced our allies to sign on to peace deals with Israel. If you think about that, they saw what happens when you allow Iran to bully the neighborhood. As Mike says, they smell weakness, and this is exactly what happened.

They threatened us, by the way, the Iranians said, we're not going to let any inspectors in unless you drop the sanctions, and let our diplomats do more walkabouts in New York City, and that's exactly what we did, is we caved. They smelled weakness. Mike is right.

CHAFFETZ: Congressman, I've only got about 30 seconds here. What's your biggest fear as we go forward? Because we're not be even one month into the Biden administration.

WALTZ: Yeah, the Iranian regime is emboldened by weakness and deterred by strength. If you look at just over ago, they were attacking international shipping, they launched cruise missiles into a Saudi oil facility. They attacked our embassy, killed an American and almost overran it in Iraq.

Yet Trump took out Soleimani and all of that stopped. Deterrence was restored and that's the posture we need to stay in.

And then, finally, if we let up the gas here, if we let our foot off the gas, they will march towards a bomb on a ballistic missile and that will proliferate across the entire Middle East, and that is my biggest fear.

CHAFFETZ: Well, I'm afraid you're right and we're only days into this administration and they've already let up on the gas pedal.

Gentlemen, thank you both for your service to this country and thanks for joining us tonight on "Hannity". Appreciate it.

All right. Coming up, progressives are already unhappy with Joe Biden. We'll explain why.

That and more as this special edition of "Hannity: Failures of the Left" continues.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHAFFETZ: Welcome back to this special edition of "Hannity".

President Joe Biden, he's been the president for just about a month and progressives are already pushing back against some of his early policies. For example, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is attacking Biden for rejecting her student loan forgiveness plan. Meanwhile, Biden has reportedly been telling governors that the minimum wage hike is unlikely. And don't expect this Democratic infighting to slow down as progressives are making it clear they intend to hold Biden to his campaign promises.

Joining us now with reaction, former Trump White House chief-of-staff, and Michael Best Law president, Reince Priebus, along with "Outnumbered" co- host, Emily Compagno.

Thank you both for being here.

I want to go to the chairman. He was the chairman of the Republican National Committee when Donald Trump was elected. Now, the atmosphere for Donald Trump is far different from the atmosphere with Joe Biden.

Is Joe Biden going to be able to do everything he promised he was going to do?

REINCE PRIEBUS, FORMER WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: Well, thank you, Jason.

Well, first, you're a hundred percent right. You have to look at what is the core of the Democratic Party? The core of the Democratic Party are the progressive issues that AOC is talking about -- debt cancellation, Green New Deal, socialized medicine. That's their core. That's their horsepower.

And they've got a problem because Joe Biden doesn't have the votes and he probably doesn't believe in it also. So, that's their problem.

The reason it worked for President Trump is that the Tea Party issues became mainstream Republican issues. That became Trump issues. The American worker, China, stop endless wars, taxes, deregulation so the horsepower of the Republican Party, the issues of America first, that became the agenda of the entire Republican Party.

Whether you were a Jim Jordan or a Paul Ryan or Mitch McConnell or whoever. And that's why we've got a huge difference, and they are going to have a real governing problem in the Democrat Party.

CHAFFETZ: Emily, what's going to happen here? I mean, I don't want them to personally -- I'm a conservative. I don't want them to pass this radical agenda but the infighting, we're not even 30 days into it and already, you can start to feel the tension here.

EMILY COMPAGNO, CO-HOST OF "OUTNUMBERED": That's exactly right. I think Representative Ro Khanna said it best, which is that this is the first key decision testing President Biden's real commitment to progressive issues. The reality is we're seeing President Biden sort of back away from it. Right now, we're seeing him say, well, if it's through legislation, I'll only do it by executive order. If the DOJ approves it, and he's also reduced the conversation from $50,000 down to $10,000.

Now, we know there is a political strategy to putting this into the budget bill. It has nothing to do with the budget, right? We know that because Sanders said specifically there's no way this will get passed unless it goes through reconciliation, so therefore, that's how we're going to do it.

But to the point, for example, AOC is making in her seven tweet thread about telling a story and not being persuasive and how everyone needs to get on-board, the fuller story is that if you wipe away part of debt, the cost is elsewhere in the chain. So, take University of California, for example, they pay almost $1.5 billion in pension. That's why tuition is so high, and you can't simply wipe away financial obligations of a state from federal legislation. You can reduce it to a slogan, no matter how hard the progressive left is trying.

So, I'll just close by saying it seems to me, President Biden has made it clear he's going to not let this happen and sort of apologize later rather than expend the political capital it takes to whip support for this now.

CHAFFETZ: Well, and that's exactly right. I mean, this process -- you know, if you wanted to glide past to get stuff done, you wouldn't create a Congress with a house and a Senate, Republicans, Democrats, multiple parties, the presidency, you're supposed to go slow.

But I think progressives are going to put pressure on Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris like there's never been before, and to Reince's point, I think in their heart of hearts, I don't know that he actually wants to do these things. I just think, he's been there for 50 years for goodness sake.

Anyway, I've got to shift gears here a second. We're nearing the end of this segment and I have a hard out, but, Reince Priebus, rumor mill is pretty strong out there that you might run for governor. The question is, are you seriously considering running for governor of Wisconsin?

PRIEBUS: Well, a rumor mill time in all of these special races, Jason. First of all, you never say never, but the reality is, there will be a lot of good candidates there. The fact is that the governor is taking the state into the ditch.

CHAFFETZ: Oh, come on, are you going to run?

(CROSSTALK)

PRIEBUS: Listen, we've got thousands of people's unemployment claims that haven't been responded to in Wisconsin. They've got no vaccination distribution plan, and the governor's latest move is to prioritize prisoners over healthy people in Wisconsin. You couldn't make this stuff up.

So, look, a lot of good people will run, and I never say never, but, you know, we'll see. I'll put that it way.

CHAFFETZ: It sounds like you're honing your campaign speech. I personally hope you do run --

PRIEBUS: No, no, no.

CHAFFETZ: -- because I think you'd be a great governor and your wife, she would be an even better first lady. So, think about it. Give it some serious consideration.

We'll be right back. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHAFFETZ: Welcome back to this special edition of "Hannity".

Unfortunately, that's all the time we have this evening. I would be honored if you would order a free copy of my new book. It's called "They Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste: The Truth about Disaster Liberalism." You can preorder.

Sean's back on Monday. Have a wonderful, great weekend.

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