This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," February 18, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

MARK STEYN, GUEST HOST: Good evening and welcome to TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT. I'm Mark Steyn, in for Tucker.

Throughout the Western world this past year, governments of all kinds bungled the Chinese coronavirus. They did what no society has tried to do before: quarantine and lockdown millions upon millions of perfectly healthy people, destroying their livelihoods, and at least for the third of the population suffering from clinical depression, destroying their mental health into the bargain.

Meanwhile, at the same time, they walled up perfectly healthy grade schoolers. Our leaders utterly failed to protect the truly vulnerable, the population most at risk from ChiCon-19, the elderly.

Instead, they locked long-term care facilities full of octogenarians, nonagenarians, and thought, you know, that would be a good place to warehouse all those COVID positive patients.

The man who embodies this catastrophic public policy failure is the blood- soaked butcher of New York, Andrew Cuomo, and throughout the last year while his elderly citizens were dying alone, out of sight, without human touch, he was on your telescreen in the Cuomo Brothers vaudeville act, playing it for laughs.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: Do you think that you are an attractive person now? Because you're single and ready to mingle? Do you really think you are some desirable single person?

In scale, this was the actual swab that was being used to fit up that double barrel shotgun that you have mounted on the front of your pretty face.

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D-NY): To do Ellen's show was a pleasure for me. I'm a big fan of Ellen. Yes, she said nice things about you.

C. CUOMO: Yes, she did.

A. CUOMO: Which she did say about you, but she was just telling the truth.

C. CUOMO: Now, you know, I've seen you referred to a little bit recently as the Love Guv and I'm wondering if that's bleeding into your demeanor at all making you a little soft on the President.

A. CUOMO: I've always been a soft guy. I am the Love Guv. I'm a cool dude and loose mood, you know that? I just say let it go. Just go with the flow, baby. You know.

C. CUOMO: Listen to you, you've got an answer for anything. You're feeling pretty good about yourself these days, aren't you?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: Yes, he is feeling pretty good, because what government functionary wouldn't do that stick in the middle of a pandemic and an economic collapse? Well, why blame him?

He wants to Love Guv, the cool dude in a loose mood just going with the flow, the flow of sycophantic drivel coming from the court eunuchs of the American media.

Andrew Cuomo got an Emmy for Best Performance by a Governor on TV. If you were a 93-year-old in a care home being told you had to die alone without your loved ones, but not to worry, they've got a thing called Zoom. You'll soon get the hang of it. Don't worry about it.

Well, Cuomo didn't seem that great, but he looked good to his lame old brother on CNN and the other media suck ups. CNN has now decided Chris Cuomo will no longer get to cover his blood-soaked brother.

Meanwhile, Andrew Cuomo having run out of old people to off is moving on to lusher pastures. Here's how he reacted to a New York Democrat who had the temerity to object to going along with the Cuomo COVID cover up.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: He said he can destroy you. I mean, he literally said that and what else?

RON KIM (D), NEW YORK ASSEMBLYMAN: He said, I haven't seen his anger. I haven't seen his wrath and he will, you know, you just tell me -- he will go out and he has been biting his tongue, but he will go out tomorrow and destroy my political career, you know, everything. Like he would say how bad of a person I am to everyone in public.

My wife, you know -- you know, that night was very, very troubling because we couldn't sleep and she was telling me, well, what did you do to us? Stop what you're doing, please. She was -- she feared for my future, for my life.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: Really? This guy feared for his life. Oh, yes says the second most powerful Democrat in the state. That's our Andy all over.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY), NEW YORK CITY: It's a sad thing to say, Mika, but that's classic Andrew Cuomo. A lot of people in New York State have received those phone calls.

You know, the bullying is nothing new.

JOE SCARBOROUGH, MSNBC HOST: So, you believe Assemblyman Kim that he was threatened?

DE BLASIO: One hundred percent.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: The mayor has now filled the streets of Manhattan with interpretive dances doing an interpretive dance of Cuomo and forces menacing a Democrat Assemblyman.

[VIDEO CLIP PLAYS]

STEYN: Congresswoman Nicole Malliotakis represents New York's 11th congressional district. She called for an investigation into Andrew Cuomo's handling of the nursing home crisis on our show back in May 2020.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NICOLE MALLIOTAKIS (R-NY): I believe that we need to have an independent investigation and we cannot trust the State of New York to do an independent investigation.

We have to have a Federal investigation that will only -- that would be the only way we get an actual true, independent investigation to take a look at what exactly occurred here.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: Nicole Malliotakis was prescient. She joins us now to respond to these latest developments. Congresswoman, how come you got it nine months ago and Fauci and these dribbling celebrities continued heaping praise on this blood-soaked Governor for another nine months all the way to these recent revelations.

MALLIOTAKIS: Yes, I may have been alone at that time, but certainly since then, we have seen many people come out and say that Andrew Cuomo has to go. That this mishandling of nursing homes is criminal, that the misguided Executive Orders that he put in place and kept in place even after there were alternative sites like the Javits Center and the US Navy Comfort Ship is completely unacceptable.

Thousands, close to 15,000 people now are estimated to have died in those nursing homes. And then on top of it, he underreported the figures. The Attorney General exposed this. He stonewalled the State Legislature refusing to answer our questions, refusing to answer questions from the media as well this entire time.

And now, we have what is the second Department of Justice investigation or expanded investigation into his cover up that his own Chief of Staff admitted.

STEYN: And aside from all of that, he also passed this liability waiver on the policy. What do you think actually underlies it, though? Why didn't you just move them into the Javits Center? Why was it necessary to do a policy that would obviously escalate the death rate in these homes?

MALLIOTAKIS: Now, that's the question I've been asking for several months and have not been able to get an answer to. As a matter of fact, that is what the Department of Justice needs to investigate.

What was the communication that determine this decision? What information was he basing this on? Was there a lobbyist involved? Were people are pressuring him who can influence government?

You know, these are the questions that need to be answered, they need to be answered now. What I can tell you is that, I don't see a situation where this doesn't end with his resignation, with his -- or his prosecution, or at the very minimum, him being defeated at the ballot box next year.

And I can tell you that thousands of New Yorkers have contacted me, they've gone to my website, they've added their names to the growing calls of people that want him to go, and people can continue to do that at enoughcuomo.com, because we need to send this message that this is unacceptable.

But I have to tell you that we are really happy and my constituents are very happy, and particularly those who have lost loved ones that the Department of Justice is taking this inquiry seriously and we want it to proceed independent without interference from the Biden administration.

STEYN: You say the D.O.J. is taking it seriously. But we've all gotten pretty cynical after the last five or six years that Democrats somehow managed to skate.

Do you think -- you've called for him to resign immediately. If there were a real threat of serious criminal prosecution and possibly imprisonment, wouldn't that be the best thing for him to do?

MALLIOTAKIS: Absolutely, but this is a Governor that is stubborn. I think he is dictating with his ego. And I think that's very unfortunate, because there are people that do want him gone, and it's the right thing to do to resign. Nobody wants to see anybody forcibly removed.

But again, we're dealing with somebody who is in denial. He refuses to issue apologies to the public. He refuses to accept any responsibility or apologize to these families who've lost loved ones.

And so, we're not dealing with someone, I think, that is being rational about this, but the growing calls continue and the Democrats adding certainly help. Because originally when I was the first one on the show, months ago, I was being accused of political posturing by the Governor.

STEYN: Right.

MALLIOTAKIS: And now, we know that this is something that's much -- that's very serious and the growing calls by the democrats are helpful, but New Yorkers need to be aware and call those legislators who are still silent on this issue. There are too many out there that is still not commenting.

STEYN: Absolutely, absolutely. Call those legislators. Thank you, Congresswoman. We're going to stay on top of this.

I can't believe that guy actually sat there on TV and said, hey, who cares. That's his attitude. It's always someone else's fault.

What a disgraceful fellow.

Hundreds of thousands of Texans still have no power and our thoughts are with them tonight. Now, their Senator, Ted Cruz is finding himself in trouble for going seriously off the grid.

The one and only Trace Gallagher is following the senator's Mexicans sojourn -- Trace.

TRACE GALLAGHER, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Mark, in Texas, we should note that things are getting better and worse after several days without electricity. The power has been turned on to more than 2.7 million homes, but 359,000 Texans are still without power. And because of frozen pipes and water pressure problems, 14 million Texas residents have little or no water.

Meantime, Governor Greg Abbott is asking State lawmakers to investigate what happened to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas or ERCOT.

Just days before the storm, ERCOT said, quoting here, "We are ready for the frigid temps to come our way." Governor Abbott is also asking President Biden for an emergency declaration and Texas Senator Ted Cruz asked the President to fast track that declaration, right before he fast tracked his way to Cancun, where it's 80 degrees.

Cruz says he was just being a good dad by taking his daughter and her friends on vacation, but traditionally in times of crisis, national office holders act as conduits to the Federal government relaying the immediate needs of constituents, though Cruz claims he was always at the helm quoting again, "My team and I will continue using all our resources to keep Texans informed and safe." Apparently doing that from the Cancun office.

Republicans are a bit baffled by the trip. Democrats are furious calling for Cruz to resign. Remember, it was Cruz who hammered the Mayor of Austin for telling his residents to stay home for the holidays then hopping on a flight to Cabo.

Late today, Ted Cruz flew back to Texas and on arrival, he said quoting, "It was obviously a mistake; in hindsight, I wouldn't have done it. I was trying to be a dad." Now he says, he wants to help get the power and the water back on right after he finishes a margarita. I'm kidding. But want to get water and power back on.

STEYN: Thank you for that. I mean, that is Politics 101. You never want to be on the beach when your constituents are freezing in the dark. But on the other hand, that guy is working on his orange tan while Andrew Cuomo is dripping blood red and I wonder which the mainstream media will give most coverage to in the coming days.

Thank you for that, Trace. Always great to see you.

Yesterday, this show broadcast a genuine picture of Congresswoman Sandy Cortez's face. A writer for "The Daily Beast" who gets paid to watch our show accused us of superimposing googly eyes on Miss Cortez's face. We will respond to this disturbing sexist attack by "The Daily Beast" straight ahead.

Plus, get ready for "Tucker Carlson Originals" coming this April.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST, TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT: I cannot believe I'm shooting on the Hickok 45 range.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're stealing what we have here in Maine. They're totally full of [bleep].

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Let's go beat Donald Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: My concern in my safety and my daughter's.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We will pass that, they know that.

CARLSON: This corridor is more than an energy project. It is an attack of the weak against the strong.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're just so delighted you're a gun guy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STEYN: It's been a terrible destructive year for the economy. The restaurant industry is caput, and many hitherto contented minimum wage busboys and now forced to do degrading, humiliating, soul crushing jobs, in which they're paid to watch TV shows they don't even like in hopes that the host will say something racist or transphobic that will give all the other touchy twitchy pajama boys back at the office of hit of the vapors.

And sometimes the host is just so thoughtless and uncaring, he doesn't deliver. That was Tucker last night vis-a-vis Justin Baragona whose job is to watch Tucker for his masters at "The Daily Beast" in what have been the work of moments to throw a white supremacist bone to poor old Justin.

But lousy heartless Tucker couldn't be bothered. So eventually, Justin was forced to fall back on this, quote: "So it appears that Tucker's producers added googly eyes to AOC in this image," unquote.

That would be an odd charge for any man who hadn't been sniffing glue or suffered a concussion after falling trouser-less off the back of a dumpster in the early hours to make. And as Justin Baragona was eventually forced to concede it wasn't true.

That is a completely un-doctored image of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Now, I never comment on a woman's looks because the chicks don't dig it these days. So, you can say why, Miss Ocasio-Cortez, you're beautiful without your glasses, because guys like Justin Baragona will say you're not respecting her for her incredibly brainy plan to rid the world of bovine flatulence.

I happen to like bovine flatulence. It's my preferred aftershave scent. But if I weren't so cowed by political correctness, I'd say boy, that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one crazy braud with a bovine flatulence stuff, but she's kind of cute as crazy games high on the bovine flatulence go. You can't do that, because you'll get canceled as a sexist dinosaur.

If I was foolish enough to say anything like that on air, I'd be dead. Yet, it seems does it not that the only person actually disparaging a woman on the basis of her looks here is Justin Baragona, the impeccably progressive woke-stapo Gauleiter, who looks at a young Hispanic lady's beautiful face and instantly assume she has had googly eyes from the party store PhotoShopped onto them.

What a hater? Has that Twitter weird beard vaporized him yet?

Googly eyes from the German gook augen, as in ogling eyes, as in ma, she is making eyes at me. This is posterity making eyes at you "Daily Beast" boy. Do you want to waste your life making eyes at Tucker? It's driven you to the center racist sexist remarks about one of our most admired public figures to nosedive into the sewer of pathetic contemptible Hispanic ophthalmophobia.

Why not turn your life around and recognize that in the end, the got-cha game will get you, too. Why not bask that in a big, messy, diverse society, what we need is not hypersensitivity and walking around on eggshells, but insensitivity training. Letting it go. Letting it slide. Just oh, Robin oh, what am I on about even now, he is probably tweeting the talking about bovine flatulence is a well-known white supremacist dog whistle.

The eye may be googly, Justin Baragona, but it sees you for what you are.

Los Angeles new District Attorney George Gascon has announced that enforcing the law is racist. To fight systemic racism, George Gascon is dropping prosecutions and cutting inmate sentences.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GEORGE GASCON, DISTRICT ATTORNEY, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: My office will begin an unprecedented effort to reevaluate every sentence in thousands of cases.

Racism and the death penalty in our country are inextricably intertwined.

The reality is that the death penalty will not make us safer. It is racist. It is morally untenable. It is irreversible and expensive. And beginning today, it is off the table in LA County.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: To demonstrate his commitment to quote "anti-racism," Gascon made a big show of cutting ties with the California District Attorneys Association. According to Gascon, the group is just too white. It doesn't have enough people of color.

But according to the head of the California District Attorneys Association, Vern Pierson, Gascon hasn't been a member for a terribly long time.

Vern Pierson joins us now. Vern, is this a devastating blow for your organization to have Mr. Gascon abandoning it?

VERN PIERSON, DISTRICT ATTORNEY, EL DORADO COUNTY, CALIFORNIA: Well, no, it's not and the reason is, he is no more able to resign from our association than I'm able to resign from the starting lineup of the Giants. He is not a member of the association, nor has he been a member of the association since October of 2019 when he quit his job as District Attorney of San Francisco.

It's important to note the hypocrisy here. I mean, he is raising this issue in the context of a publicity stunt, really.

A few weeks ago, we filed an amicus brief in LA County in support of a lawsuit that alleged that he was violating the law. He, the chief prosecutor in LA County, was alleged to be violating the law.

Last week, the Judge sided with us and the deputy DAs in LA, in that lawsuit. And then here a week later, he supposedly resigns from our very diverse association in protest when he hasn't been a member for years.

STEYN: Now, just to be clear on that then, why isn't he a laughingstock in California? As you say, it's an obvious stunt. You know, it's like you resigning from the Giants. It's like me resigning from the U.N. Security Council. Why isn't -- why isn't everybody just making him a completely ridiculous figure in Californian public life?

PIERSON: Well, I think that's happening very quickly. It's important -- let's take a quick step back. He was appointed District Attorney in San Francisco in 2011. By 2019, when he resigned, property crimes were up by 50 percent, violent crimes were up significantly.

He was so unpopular when he resigned from San Francisco, it was impossible for him to be re-elected. In fact, when he moved to LA, and then ran for District Attorney, backed by a handful of billionaires including George Soros that funded his campaign, the Mayor, the African-American Mayor of San Francisco, London Breed supported his opponent.

So now what we're seeing is that it took eight -- seven to eight years for the people of San Francisco to really turn on Mr. Gascon, and in just a very short period of time in LA, that people are turning on him and there's a recall effort that's already forming to recall him.

STEYN: Yes, let's hope that works. I don't think that even in California, I don't think there are enough counties for a failure like this guy to keep moving to.

Thank you very much for that, Vern, and great to have the word from you. He is resigning. It's like a variation of the old Groucho Marx line, not caring to belong to a group that would have him as a member; in this case, he isn't a member, but he is resigning on principle for it anyway. Great stuff, Vern.

Bill Gates is not a scientist, but he has a ton of money and that's close enough. Now, Bill Gates wants to control your diet. So what will Microsoft permit you to eat exactly? That's straight ahead on TUCKER CARLSON TONIGHT.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STEYN: We were talking about bovine flatulence earlier because whenever you talk about bovine flatulence, it is a ratings bonanza. I said to Tucker a year or two back that whenever I fly, I take a flatulent bovine as my emotional support animal, 20 minutes out of LAX, you've got the first class cabin all to yourself.

But now, the old powerful Bill Gates is determined to put an end to such simple pleasures.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL GATES, CO-FOUNDER, BILL AND MELINDA GATES FOUNDATION: Well, there are some Tesla equivalents here. People like Beyond Meat and Impossible that are creating a category where instead of using a cow, they use proteins made in a factory and so there's no animal cruelty. There's none of this greenhouse gas release, none of the manure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: There's no manure because there's no cows. If you want to play the time honored rural game of Cow Pat Bingo, which given the thin rule of Netflix is all I do most weekends, the manure is now going to have to be synthetically made in a factory around the back of the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

So the new normal is tightening the screws and moving us to the next stage. From fake news to fake moos. Bill Gates, again, quote: "I do think all rich countries should move to 100 percent synthetic beef," he told "Technology Review."

"You can get used to the taste difference, and the claim is, they're going to make it taste even better over time. Eventually, that green premium is modest enough that you can sort of change the behavior of people or use regulation to totally shift the demand." Bill Gates, you can get used to the tastes difference.

That's the slogan of this cowed new world. You'll get used to the difference in everything from your cheeseburger to your freedom of movement, and freedom of association.

Greg Gutfeld is FOX News chief bovine manure correspondent, and he joins us now. Greg, what do you make of Bill Gates's plans for your cheeseburger?

GREG GUTFELD, FOX NEWS CHANNEL HOST, THE GREG GUTFELD SHOW: Well, first, I'm grateful that you thought of me when it came to cattle farts. I know you could have gone to Bret Baier or Bill Hemmer or John Roberts, but you said no, this is Gutfeld's turf and that keeps me employed.

STEYN: It was you or Victor Davis Hanson, Greg, that's what it came down to. Who wanted to take the bovine flatulence?

GUTFELD: Yes, well, you know, he is a classy dude too. You know, let's follow the smell of the science. Right? Gates's reduction of meat consumption argument is similar to the reduction of horses before cars, right, a half ton horse would produce nine tons of manure, which is a measurement called a Cuomo.

Then when a car is basically like a synthetic horse, right? It replaced the horse and that eliminated the horse pollution, right? In terms of methane, horses produced 45 pounds of methane gas per year. That's known as a Don Lemon.

But that's just a fraction of what cows can do. Right? So the whole point is, if you stop eating cattle, then you stop breeding cattle and then you eliminate the methane produced by the cattle. So basically, the fate of the Earth is all about flatulence and it depends on what flies out of a cow's butt, otherwise known as a Scarborough.

STEYN: I was not as familiar as you are with the international unit of flatulence measurement. Do you think we actually need flatulence offsets?

GUTFELD: Yes, I do. I actually practice flatulent offsets almost every morning. But I think you know what? You know, I can tell by your tone, Mark, that you're guilty of carnivore privilege because you can choose what you want to eat.

You just -- you devour any sentient being, I find it as a fellow Earthling offensive. And then when the robots take over, I'm pushing you to the front of the line.

STEYN: Okay, so you don't think the robots are going to be interested in synthetic humans? They'll want to tear the real deal apart.

GUTFELD: See, I led you into my trap, Mark, it's all about fuel. Right? Calories are a unit of energy. We are batteries. You are a battery. I'm a battery.

When AI reaches super intelligence, when their IQs reach a thousand and we're nothing more than their slaves, we become their batteries for fuel.

STEYN: Okay, I can't beat that. You've just laid out the fate of mankind for -- oh, actually, probably on AOC type time, it is probably coming on 2023.

Hey, Greg, when does this new nightly show of yours start? Weeknight show?

GUTFELD: I'm hope -- I'm hoping as soon as possible. But I would say it's probably going to happen in March and I can't wait and you're going to be on it constantly. You have no choice because I have pictures of you and I'm going to blackmail you.

STEYN: Okay, please. You promised you weren't going to mention those pictures.

GUTFELD: I've still got that video.

STEYN: Yes, yes. Can't keep doing that, Greg. It's not fair. Thank you very much, the one and only, Greg Gutfeld, our official flatulence correspondent.

When you think of cultural norms, you might think of things like handshakes or cuisine, but not Joe Biden. According to Joe Biden, genocide is merely a cultural norm, too. He said it on camera and we've got the video straight ahead on TUCKER.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STEYN: At the CNN Town Hall on Tuesday, Joe Biden was asked about the ongoing genocide in China, and according to Joe Biden, genocide is just a cultural norm over there. No big deal.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: No American President can be sustained as a President if he doesn't reflect the values of the United States. And so the idea, I'm not going to speak out against what he's doing in Hong Kong, what he is doing with the Uighurs in western mountains of China, and Taiwan trying to end the One China policy by making it forceful.

I said, and by the -- he said he -- he gets it. Culturally there are different norms in each country and their leaders are expected to follow.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: Cultural norms for each country. Gordon Chang is a Senior Fellow at the Gatestone Institute and author of "The Great U.S.-China Tech War." Gordon, the previous administration said that China was committing genocide.

The new administration says genocide against the Muslim Uighurs who get harvested for their body parts and all kinds of other horrible things, but the new administration's position is that this is just a slight variation in U.S.-Chinese cultural norms.

GORDON CHANG, SENIOR FELLOW, GATESTONE INSTITUTE: Oh, clearly this is horrific. By suggesting that those crimes against humanity flow from different cultural norms. What Joe Biden was saying was that China's culture is brutal, and also, he was saying it was racist, because those crimes against humanity are committed against racial minorities.

Now, I'm sure you know, Joe Biden, who talks about white supremacy, he actually got very dangerously close to expressing white supremacist sentiments. I'm sure he didn't want to do that. But that's, in fact, what he did and a lot of Chinese-Americans today are just outraged by what he said.

STEYN: Well, you're right is completely offensive to Chinese people that this is not the act. What they do to the Uighurs is not the act of a repressive communist regime, but just something that apparently Chinese people in general are partial to. Why is there no objection from Chinese- Americans over this?

CHANG: Well, many of them actually are really upset about this, and you can understand why because this, first of all, was a cultural generalization. Now that generalization was wrong, but it suggested all sorts of things.

And as you point out, look, this is -- what we're seeing, the genocide, crimes against humanity, organ harvesting that you talked about, that really is the result of China's communist system. It's not a result of Chinese for generations and generations being genocidal maniacs.

STEYN: No, and it's odd that he should be allowed to get away with that. The treatment of the Uighurs, you know, the powerful Muslim nations in the Middle East are completely silent on this, presumably because they like their Chinese money and they prioritize Beijing's interests over Muslim solidarity.

So when America actually checks out of objecting to what's going on there in China, who speaks up for the Uighurs? Who is there to actually argue that, you know, what China is doing, if it is genocide is a subject of international concern?

CHANG: Well, the people who speak up, Mark, are you and others and because we have a government right now that is not willing to do that.

You know, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made that determination that genocide and crimes against humanity, that was important. That really inspired people around the world and what we're hearing from the Biden administration so far is really uninspiring.

You know, it is one of the most disappointing things, perhaps the most disappointing thing that I have heard from an American President, and it just was -- I was -- I just couldn't believe it when I heard it.

STEYN: That's really quiet -- that's really quite an extraordinary statement, Gordon. Thank you very much for joining us tonight. We always appreciate it and do stay on top of this subject for us.

Thousands of National Guard troops remain in Washington, D.C. tonight. Our leaders are now justifying the military presence with all the grace of a junkie trying to convince you that he has quit even while he is holding a bag of Primo narcotics from Tijuana, sweat pouring down his face.

First they told us the troops were necessary to protect the Inauguration. Then they told us the troops were necessary because of that second impeachment trial.

Today, the Associated Press reports that the razor topped fencing surrounding the so-called People's House will remain until at least the fall.

Now they have another excuse. According to Congressman Adam Smith, the troops unnecessary because some people on the internet are saying weird stuff. According to Congressman Smith, quote, "Some of these QAnon people have figured out that apparently 75 years ago, the President used to be inaugurated on March the 4th. Now they are thinking maybe we should gather again and storm the Capitol on March the 4th."

Yes, sure. So as long as there are wackos on the internet, we should lock down the Capitol. In other words, the Capitol will remain on lockdown from now until the end of time, or at least the end of the internet.

The lessons are a familiar one: when we give our leaders power, they don't give it up. They want our seat of government to resemble Venezuela's and they will not stop until we make them stop.

Thank you for that.

We have Kristen Clarke coming up now. We're learning much more about her. That's the woman Joe Biden selected to lead the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. It turns out her creepy college comments about black supremacy were just the beginning of her creepy comments. That's coming up straight ahead.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

STEYN: Kristen Clarke is Joe Biden's nominee to lead the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. That's an odd selection because Kristen Clarke has repeatedly made it clear that she does not believe in the idea of racial equality or any kind of equality.

When she was a student at Harvard, for example, Kristen Clarke suggested that black people might be genetically superior to other races. We broadcast those comments on this show last month. But as recently as 2018, Kristen Clarke appeared on this program to defend the idea that skin color is incredibly important. In fact, she believes it's more important than merit.

BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Do you think that airlines should apply the same diversity rules you're calling for here that they shouldn't take the people who score the highest on the pilot tests, but that they should hire also on appearance? The way people look?

KRISTEN CLARKE, BIDEN NOMINEE FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE CIVIL RIGHTS DIVISION: Every workplace, whether you're talking about airlines --

CARLSON: So pilots to heart surgeons, too?

CLARKE: Federal agencies should hire the best, but should place a premium on diversity and Secretary Zinke's --

CARLSON: But which is more important? The way that you look or what you do? What you're capable of doing? So like when you're flying a plane, how important is it what you look like? Your appearance?

CLARKE: Incredibly important and it's also important --

CARLSON: Appearance is incredibly important.

CLARKE: And it is also important that we place a premium on diversity and the fact that we have people in this administration --

CARLSON: But diversity means appearance. It means what you look like.

CLARKE: No, no, no.

CARLSON: You're talking about the shallowest possible criterion.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

STEYN: But it gets worse than that. There's new reporting now that Kristen Clarke's views are even more disturbing than we thought.

According to a piece in "The Washington Free Beacon," Kristen Clarke has a history of opposing Civil Rights prosecutions of black defendants.

In other words, if you have white skin, Kristen Clarke doesn't think your Civil Rights deserve any legal protection.

Kevin Daley is a reporter for "The Washington Free Beacon. He broke the story. Kevin, this is actually quite a significant redefinition of human rights as opposed to being something universal. It's now something that applies to approved identity groups only.

KEVIN DALEY, REPORTER, "THE WASHINGTON FREE BEACON": Yes, Mark, "The Washington Free Beacon" found that as you say, Miss Clarke has a history of opposing Justice Department's Civil Rights lawsuits against black defendants.

One case, perhaps familiar to your viewers arose in 2008, when members of the New Black Panther Party were filmed outside a polling precinct in Philadelphia harassing and intimidating voters.

There was actually an investigation from a Federal oversight panel that explored whether Miss Clarke back channeled with friendly elements at the Justice Department to kill that case, the Bush Justice Department had brought a civil complaint against the individuals involved and the Black Panther Party itself, which the Obama Justice Department dropped in large part.

Another case, "The Beacon" found involved Mr. Ike Brown, who was the chairman of the Noxubee County Democratic Party in Mississippi, a Federal Court credited overwhelming evidence that Mr. Brown had run countywide primaries in a way that favored black voters over white voters.

STEYN: Yes, that's pretty amazing and pretty explicit. Do you think that will actually impede her progress through this new administration?

DALEY: Well, actually, I think it tells us a lot about the administration's commitment to an equity based approach to policy.

Heretofore, it's been understood as meaning that certain minority groups get, say, additional resources or special attention in the policy process. But here, it would mean that touchdown civil rights laws are applied depending on the race of the defendant.

STEYN: Yes, and that actually ought to be pretty disgraceful and disqualifying, but it appears it's not under the substitution of equity for equality.

DALEY: And it'll be interesting to explore how this plays in her confirmation hearing and getting that why exactly she believes this, of course, there's a view that you could look at this as a logistical question, that the Justice Department has limited resources, and it needs to allocate those resources consistent with the history of racial discrimination against minorities in this country.

But there's also a view, Mark, as you know, ascendant on the left that holds that minorities simply cannot be racist, that racism is a combination of power and privilege. And that because minorities are not privileged, they therefore cannot be racist.

You know, finding where Miss Clarke falls on that divide, I think is going to be a priority for Republican lawmakers.

STEYN: Yes, that's quite interesting, Kevin, it is one thing when it said a college campus, it is quite another thing when it's at the heart of the Federal Department of Justice.

That is about it for us tonight. Tucker is back tomorrow. Don't forget to tune in each night at eight Eastern to the show that is the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and groupthink. There's a lot of it about.

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