'Sunday Morning Futures' on Democrats' economic agenda, vaccine mandates, border crisis

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House Minority Whip Steve Scalise on Dems divided over spending bills

House Minority Whip Steve Scalise says Democrats are 'tying the infrastructure package hostage' to the reconciliation bill, arguing that linking the two 'would devastate America's economy' and would 'be a kick in the gut to middle class families.'

This is a rush transcript from "Sunday Morning Futures," October 3, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Good Sunday morning, everyone. Welcome to "Sunday Morning Futures." I'm Maria Bartiromo.

Let it be clear. The socialists are in charge. Nancy Pelosi jetting off to Italy, I'm told, to meet with the pope after Friday's massive failure in Washington with no deal done and progressives able to blow up a bipartisan infrastructure plan, while pushing a $5 trillion tax, spend, and green plan that most of them have not even read.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JOHN BARRASSO (R-WY): This is their bill, 2, 500 pages. If you take a look at $3.5 trillion price tag, and you do the math, that's $1.4 billion for every page of this bill. And they want to pass it this week.

How many Democrats do you think have read this? You think Nancy Pelosi has read it? You think Chuck Schumer's read it? Do you think Joe Biden, who is desperately begging Democrats to pass it, you think he's read it? You think he knows what's in it?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Coming up, Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn on where the agenda goes now, with Pelosi this week slipping about who's really calling the shots on Bernie's budget.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): We have a number of things on the -- lift the debt ceiling, keep government open. We intend -- we have to do those imminently, more imminently even to address the full Obama agenda of building back better with -- and I love to say building back better with women. So that's where we are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Ah, but she's not getting the Obama agenda just yet.

Just ahead, GOP Whip Steve Scalise on the economic agenda, the vaccine mandates and the 400,000 new migrants making their way to the Southern border right now.

Then: The Chinese Communist Party bullying is on display, as the CCP flies an additional 60 military jets into Taiwan's air defense space this weekend, capitalizing on America asleep at the wheel.

Former Pentagon Chief of Staff Kash Patel connects the dots on the big lie of Russia collusion and why those who abused power are now in power. Will special counsel John Durham reel in any big fish in the coming weeks?

Plus: the culture wars.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUSSELL BRAND, ACTOR/COMEDIAN: I find myself in awe, gobsmacked, flabbergasted and startled by these revelations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Comedian Russell Brand and rapper Nicki Minaj reaction to the dirty tricks and the power grabs. Is the left finally waking up to the abuses and the failed policies of the Democrat machine?

Christian Walker and conservative publisher Louise Burke on cancel culture on the left and corruption in Washington.

All that right here, right now on "Sunday Morning Futures."

And first this morning: bowing to the socialists.

Bernie Sanders said no infrastructure without tax and spend, and so it goes. Nancy Pelosi failing in her bid to spend five-plus-trillion dollars on new social programs and put the American people on the hook to pay for it with higher taxes. The speaker now targeting the end of October to get a vote on her massive spending plans after pulling the bipartisan infrastructure vote Friday because progressives refused to vote for it without the massive tax-and-spend plan tied to it.

Joining me right now to walk us through it all and to address also the 400,000 migrants making their way to the Southern border right now, Louisiana Congressman and House Minority Whip Steve Scalise.

Congressman, thanks very much for being here. Good morning to you.

REP. STEVE SCALISE (R-LA): Good morning, Maria. Great to be back with you.

BARTIROMO: Walk us through where we are on the economic agenda of this administration.

SCALISE: You saw last week an epic collapse of President Biden's agenda, but they're not going to stop there.

And, as you pointed out, now Nancy Pelosi, I guess ironically, is saying that, on Halloween, that is going to be the next vote on this package that should be scary to every family in America, because it would raise taxes that every family would pay, not just the rich. It would kill millions of jobs. It would make us less competitive.

It'd be a gift to countries like China. But they're tying all of that and holding the infrastructure package hostage to this bill that's directly linked together. Even President Biden admitted when he came to the Capitol Friday that the two bills are linked. It's a multitrillion-dollar package.

Even if they get the so-called compromise, a $1.5 trillion dollar bill, would devastate America's economy and really be a kick in the gut to middle-class. So she's passed through every kind of deadline. She was supposed to vote on this thing a month ago. Then she promised her liberal members in the moderate districts that they were going to get a vote on Monday.

And then she promised them that they would get a vote on Thursday of this week. And she broke that promise as well. So, whatever number and date she says, it's less relevant to the devastation that these policies would have on lower-income and middle-class families, Maria.

BARTIROMO: So, tell me what's in the bill that's most striking. We have a graphic here with some elements in the bill. And I know that there's $80 billion or $79 billion earmarked for IRS tax enforcement. Biden wants to hire 80,000 auditors to track all of our accounts at banks and force the banks to report what we do in terms of any transaction $600 or more.

There's $12 billion for government electric cars. I don't know what $3 billion is for tree equity. Can you walk us through what strikes you most about that $3.5 trillion bill, which we're told is actually $5.5 trillion?

SCALISE: Right.

And, Maria, this is what happens when these big government socialists get ahold of a blank checkbook, because every time this bill changes, it changes in the direction against the taxpayer and for big government socialism, where they're spending money on things that are just crazy.

And, as you talked about, if anybody thinks that creating jobs is adding another 80-plus-thousand IRS agents to then go and track every transaction you make over $600 -- that's in this bill. What does that have to do with building back better or infrastructure or even equity?

If you look at that, it's about growing the size of government and their ability to track everything you do. There's a whole lot of incentives in here for things that, frankly, a lot of them are going to go to wealthy people.

But let's just start with the electric vehicle credits, I mean, thousands and thousands of dollars you could get to buy an electric car, except, Maria, they make it specific that it's only valid if you buy an electric car made in a union shop.

So, all of these states that are right-to-work states, a lot of car companies that build cars in America without union labor, they won't get a dime of that. So it's literally picking winners and losers and saying, we're going to punish you if you don't have a unionized work force.

That's the backdoor PRO Act in this bill.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

SCALISE: What does that have to do with trying to get our economy back on track? It would devastate our economy.

And, worse, Maria, I think this is the thing that every family should be looking at. There is a tax on natural gas. Now, look, we know they hate fossil fuels, although they fly around in private jets. They surely drive in cars fueled by gasoline, but they don't want you to.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

SCALISE: And so what they do is, they go after the fossil fuel industry in many ways, but one of them is to put a tax on natural gas.

Well, guess what? Probably half of the families in America fuel their homes.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

SCALISE: If it's a cold winter, if it's a hot summer, it's going to cost you 14 percent more in your electric bill.

That breaks President Biden's promise that you won't pay anything more if you make less than $400,000. That tax will actually hit the lowest income people the hardest. We tried to take it out. They didn't want to take it out because they want to spend all that money on big government socialism.

BARTIROMO: Look, I know that you have got a lot on the agenda, the debt ceiling, obviously. We run out of money October 18.

And yet my sources tell me that she -- Nancy Pelosi is traveling to Italy. And she has set up a meeting with the pope. But she has set October 31 as a deadline to get both plans voted on again.

Real quick, because I have got to move on to the border, what are the chances that nothing gets done?

SCALISE: Well, they don't have the votes. Otherwise, they would have voted on it Friday. They brought President Biden in. And it failed. It was an embarrassment for him.

But they're not going to stop. Look, and this idea that a trillion-and-a- half dollars is some compromise, my God, a trillion-and-a-half dollars or more spending, you know what spending in Washington has already done to inflation.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

SCALISE: Does anybody in America think that a trillion-and-a-half dollars of new spending is not going to impact them and that there's "no cost" -- quote, unquote -- which President Biden talks about?

That's -- that's not the case.

BARTIROMO: Let me move on, because there are vaccine mandates in place right now, Congressman, and you have got Navy SEALs, Navy SEALs, being told you're not deployable unless you get the shot. You have got state troopers resigning, saying, I'm resigning because I already had COVID and I know that I'm -- already have immunity, but I don't want to get the shot.

Nurses. I mean, I can't believe that they could tell us that we're in the middle of a pandemic and yet they're allowing nurses and health care professionals to walk off the job because they don't want to get the COVID vaccine.

These are clearly unconstitutional rules, but, more importantly, we have migrants coming in who are not being tested. I spoke with Brandon Judd, the president of the Border Patrol Union, on "Mornings With Maria" on FOX Business last week.

Listen to what he told me.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRANDON JUDD, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL BORDER PATROL COUNCIL: We are absolutely not testing migrants, nor are we giving vaccine to migrants. We are instead releasing them into the United States to spread all of the diseases, including COVID-19, to U.S. citizens.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: This is extraordinary, Congressman.

What can you tell us, because Mayorkas just told the local communities to get ready for 400,000 additional migrants to be apprehended this month, in October, 400,000.

SCALISE: Yes, Maria, think about this psychotic double standard.

If you come to America illegally, you don't have to worry about a COVID test. An American can't even come back home to America without a negative COVID test on an airplane. But, oh, by the way, if you're here in America, even with antibodies against COVID, we're going to get you fired from your job?

Hospitals, we have started to see some numbers that are very alarming in the middle of this pandemic and a resurgence of the Delta variant, hospitals that are seeing thousands of their employees leave. Some are firing their employees. You saw it with police officers.

BARTIROMO: Right.

SCALISE: And I guess liberals don't care about this, because they want to defund the police.

But you're seeing a lot of police departments where they're putting these mandates in place where the police officers are just quitting the job.

BARTIROMO: Well, that's just -- yes.

SCALISE: The military going after our men and women in uniform, this is crazy.

BARTIROMO: That is...

SCALISE: Look, again, we should be encouraging people to get the facts on the vaccination, not to threaten and shame them and kill their careers and livelihoods over that.

BARTIROMO: Right. Well, I see that you...

SCALISE: And, again, they don't even -- they discount the antibodies, Maria.

BARTIROMO: Yes, I see that you have already begun winning.

Let's take a look at last week's big congressional game. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Democrats are trying to get caught up -- wow, this is a long ball.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Greg Steube with the first pitch...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Greg Steube.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... and the first swing. It's going to be home run, Steube out of the ballpark, into left field bleachers!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Very nice, Congressman.

You have a lot to celebrate with a 13-12 win over the Democrats. It's got to feel good for you, Congressman. being on that field four years after that left-wing gunman opened fire during the game.

SCALISE: Yes, Maria, look, God performs miracles.

And I'm lucky to be able to get back out there every year. It's a treat to play in the big league ballpark. We raised over a million dollars for local charities.

But to see Steube crack that home run, I mean, he's a great athlete. He's done that in practice a few times, so we knew he could do it, but no one's done it in the big league ballpark since we have been playing this game.

It was a great maybe harbinger of things to come to see the Republicans beating the Democrats. And, hopefully, we get a lot more of that.

BARTIROMO: Well, it warms my heart to see you running around on that baseball field after you were severely injured four years ago by that maniac.

Congressman, it's good to see you this morning.

SCALISE: Thanks.

BARTIROMO: Thanks very much, sir.

SCALISE: God bless you.

BARTIROMO: And we will talk soon.

SCALISE: Thanks, Maria.

BARTIROMO: And to you, Congressman Steve Scalise.

Quick break, and then Kash Patel on what a 27-page indictment on Hillary Clinton's lawyer tells us about what other big fish are about to be reeled in, the John Durham report -- next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JAMES COMEY, FORMER FBI DIRECTOR: I have been authorized by the Department of Justice to confirm that the FBI, as part of our counterintelligence mission, is investigating the Russian government's efforts to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.

And that includes investigating the nature of any links between individuals associated with the Trump campaign and the Russian government and whether there was any coordination between the campaign and Russia's efforts.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: Ah, yes, what a deja vu.

That was former FBI Director Jim Comey back in March of 2017 on partly information the FBI ran with from the Hillary Clinton campaign, as they peddled made-up stories of Russia collusion about her opponent, Donald Trump. Many of those Clinton soldiers distributing the made-up stories are now working in the Biden administration.

My next guest took the depositions of several of the players who were pushing the false narrative.

Kash Patel is the former chief of staff of the Department of Defense under President Trump. He worked with Devin Nunes investigating the Russia hoax.

Kash, thanks very much for being with us. We so appreciate your time.

Assess where we are with the John Durham investigation. And what do you take away from that 27-page indictment of Michael Sussmann?

KASH PATEL, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: well, good morning, Maria. And thanks for having me.

Look, as a former federal prosecutor who prosecuted national security cases and a former federal public defender, I'm intimately familiar with federal indictments, especially ones that we talk about today.

The John Durham indictment against Michael Sussmann for lying to the FBI is normally an indictment that is about two to three pages' long, at max. A 27-page indictment is reserved for those mob-style conspiracy cases or for large-scale fraud cases that the Department of Justice brings.

And what I believe John Durham is doing and what I did in my practice as a prosecutor is lay out a speaking indictment, so that the American public can begin to understand what the corruption was and who exactly was involved.

I know you played James Comey's sound bite at the top of the show here talking about he's -- he's investigating the collusion links. What he should have been investigating was the collusion links between the Democratic Party, the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC to funnel this information into the FBI, fraudulently so. And now it's coming to light.

And thanks to your reporting over the years, America is finally starting to see the truth of what happened behind this indictment.

BARTIROMO: Well, thank you so much for that, Kash.

Yes, I remember an interview that I did with John Podesta many, many years ago. And that is exactly what I said. I said, John, it's weird to me, because it looks like all of the entanglements with Russia are actually happening in the Democrat Party.

PATEL: Yes.

BARTIROMO: He went a little nuts on me during that interview.

(LAUGHTER)

BARTIROMO: But I have got the -- I have got the indictment here in my hands.

And what strikes me about this indictment is, John Durham writes over and over again that every meeting that Michael Sussmann had, whether it would be with FBI agents or another government agency, which I assume is the CIA, he billed the time to the Clinton campaign. He was -- that's -- he was billing them.

PATEL: And that's it. And you hit it right on the head.

Look, that was -- when I was leading the investigation under Devin Nunes on House Intel, I told him, we got to follow the money. It's prosecution 101. And that's exactly what John Durham's doing here.

That's how we figured out the DNC paid for the dossier. That was the first big shoe to drop. And what John Durham's doing here -- and when I questioned Michael Sussmann and Jake Sullivan and so many others under oath three to four years ago during our investigation was, we locked them in, and we knew the truth because we followed the money, because we knew the DNC and the Hillary campaign were paying these lawyers to go out and get false information.

And we had to lock them in under oath, because at someday in the future, we were hoping there was going to be accountability. And that's exactly what John Durham does, because what the one thing that doesn't lie is bank records and money records. And that's what John Durham is basing his conspiracy investigation on, because he cited eight other individuals in that indictment, not by name.

But I believe that to be Marc Eliases of the world, the Fusion GPSes of the world, Glenn Simpson. All these individuals that helped perpetuate this fraud on the American people are in this indictment by title.

BARTIROMO: Well, they were also working hand in glove with the media, it appears.

Let's take a look at this tweet that Hillary Clinton put out. And it's a statement from Jake Sullivan. Let's note the fact that Jake Sullivan today, after writing this garbage for Hillary, is now the head of the national security. He is the NSA.

And she writes back in 2016 computer scientists have apparently uncovered a covert server linking the Trump Organization to a Russian based-bank. And there is Jake Sullivan's statement, saying that there's this new report exposing Trump's secret links to communications to Russia.

What's your take? Connect the dots on the fact that some of these people who were abusing power are now in power right now.

PATEL: It's a shocking tale of the height of hypocrisy and the corruption in Washington, D.C.

You have one presidential candidate and the national security adviser pretending in 2016 to have no idea what's going on, when their campaign is funneling the money to get this garbage dug up on President Trump and then putting it in not just the FBI and the DOJ to go up on a FISA warrant against President Trump, but, as you said, the media.

They're leaking stories at the time and pretending to be surprised. And then these individuals come back full circle four years later, and now Jake Sullivan is the national security adviser.

Look, Maria, you know this. All those depositions are now public. I declassified them when I was the deputy director of national intelligence with Ric Grenell and John Ratcliffe.

And everyone can go read what Jake Sullivan wrote, testified to under oath himself. And they should be held to accountable.

BARTIROMO: All right, hold that thought. I want to ask you if any big fish are going to be reeled in. And then I want to talk about the military and vaccine mandates.

We will be right back with Kash Patel.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BARTIROMO: Welcome back.

We are back with former prosecutor and former Pentagon Chief of Staff Kash Patel.

Kash, I want to know from you when you believe the FBI figured out that the lies were coming from the Clinton campaign. I know that, in January 25, '6 and '7, the FBI did meetings with the sub source on what exactly was in the dossier. And, at that time, they told them that it was garbage and they made it up. They had beers and embellished.

But when do you believe the FBI figured out that all of this was just one political campaign trying to take down another?

PATEL: I think they knew right away.

And the documents that we put out in the Nunes investigation, the Nunes memo and the HPSCI report on Russian active measures show that the FBI knew right away, because their FISA abuse process, now that declassification process is complete, and your viewers can read it, that the FBI knew the information was fraudulent.

They knew the credibility problems with Christopher Steele. And they knew the DNC, through Fusion GPS and Perkins Coie, were piping in tens of millions of dollars into the machine, so that they could get up a FISA warrant on President Trump.

So, I think they knew right away, which is why I think...

BARTIROMO: Wow.

PATEL: ... the individuals at the head of the FBI need to be held accountable.

BARTIROMO: Wow. So they knew that it was garbage, and yet they still pursued, pursued, pursued a FISA warrant to wiretap Trump Organization members like Carter Page.

Will John Durham reel in any big fish, in your view?

PATEL: Yes. And let -- I believe so.

Let me just put this in perspective. When I was running large-scale conspiracy and fraud investigations, they took me three, four or five years to prosecute. John Durham is only in his second year of the most political scandal in U.S. history.

So I believe, within the next six months, look out for indictments against the folks like Fusion GPS and Glenn Simpson for helping perpetuate this fraud. And look out for individuals like Lisa Page and Peter Strzok. I believe they're already helping John Durham, they're cooperating with him to get the bigger fish like the Andy McCabe, who is the biggest fraudster next to James Comey.

I think you're going to see these indictments start coming out on the individuals at the top. It's just going to take a few more months, but I remind your viewers it takes a little bit of time to work these matters.

BARTIROMO: Unbelievable. And, no surprise, the mainstream media gave them all jobs.

All right, quick move on to Afghanistan. What really is getting me is the politicization happening within the military. President Biden says he strongly opposes an honorable discharge for service members who refuse the COVID-19 vaccine. He doesn't want them to get discharged with honor because they won't take the vaccine.

Your thoughts on what's happening right now, in terms of the military and all of these vaccine mandates?

PATEL: Well, you hit it on the head. It is the ultimate politicization of the one apparatus that should never be politicized, starting with Milley, Austin, and Blinken, and Biden.

Look, it's offensive to me to see my Special Forces brothers that I served with have to step aside because they won't take the mandated vaccine. These are the guys that killed bin Laden. These are the guys that killed Baghdadi, that took out Soleimani, that go and rescue our American hostages overseas day in and day out.

And they don't want their names to be known, but they want to serve their country. And for President Biden to force a vaccine on them is outrageous, when he won't even force a vaccine on the tens of thousands of Afghan refugees that are now coming into the United States of America. The height of hypocrisy there is outrageous.

And it's showing with this politicization of the national security apparatus.

BARTIROMO: It's -- and, extraordinarily, last week, we saw General Mark Milley admit that he has been talking to all of these writers with their anti-Trump books, instead of having a serious and well-thought-out plan out of Afghanistan.

Your thoughts on what we learned on all of those hearings and testimonies that we heard last week from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, blaming the State Department for delaying the evacuation of civilians out of Afghanistan?

Look, you were there. You ran the DOD during the Trump administration. Your sense of all of this?

PATEL: Yes, it's outrageous.

I mean, Milley is the new Kraken of the swamp for a reason. I mean, he's the most apolitical figure by law who has become most political. Instead of spending time informing the president on how to safely evacuate out of Afghanistan, he's giving book interviews and lying to the American people.

And instead of Lloyd Austin going into Congress and telling them, we had a plan, not an evacuation emergency, he's telling the American people he doesn't even know. The secretary of defense does not know if there's 1,000 American citizens stranded in Afghanistan or not, and they have no plans to go and get them, because they don't have a plan in place to work with our allies and on the ground.

Instead, they're bringing home caskets of American soldiers because of their disastrous efforts. And then you know the U.S. government's failed the American public in the national security apparatus when they start blaming one another.

The secretary of defense is blaming the State Department for not removing Americans? The State Department is not the Department of Defense. The DOD has the planes, the helicopters, the soldiers, the necessary equipment to go in and safeguard our personnel, not the diplomats.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

PATEL: It's outrageous. And this is just going to get worse.

BARTIROMO: Really disturbing.

Real quick, we have got to jump. We're about to talk with Senator Marsha Blackburn about this. But you think we're going to go back to Afghanistan, that we're going to be forced to send troops in.

PATEL: Yes, look, Al Qaeda and the Taliban and ISIS-K are already on the rise. It's what happens when you don't have a conditions-based withdrawal, like we did under President Trump.

It's what happens when you don't keep Bagram Airfield, the brain center of our operation.

BARTIROMO: OK.

PATEL: And it's going to force us to go back in, in probably about a year time, tragically.

BARTIROMO: All right, we're going to talk about Bagram and the China Communist Party element when we come back.

Kash, good to see you. Thank you so much.

Marsha Blackburn on the other side of this break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MARSHA BLACKBURN (R-TN): What you have managed to do is to politicize the U.S. military, to downgrade our reputation with our allies.

Nobody has resigned. Nobody has submitted their resignation. And we have got thousands of people watching this hearing today that are looking at you all and saying, I can't believe they're sitting there and not answering the questions and are trying to punt.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BARTIROMO: That was Tennessee Senator Marsha Blackburn rebuking General Mark Milley on Tuesday.

She is calling for accountability after the Biden administration's reckless withdrawal from Afghanistan, resulting in 23 deaths that we know of, including the 13 U.S. service members killed in the Kabul Airport attack, and a botched drone strike that killed children.

Senator Blackburn joins me now. She sits on the Senate Armed Services and Judiciary committees.

Senator, thanks very much for being here.

(CROSSTALK)

BARTIROMO: I want to discuss Tuesday's hearing.

But, first, give us your reaction on what took place on the Biden agenda on Friday. How is this going to play out? And is this busting up the Biden agenda and the Bernie budget? Or do you think that we will see a vote and they will be able to pass all of this spending by the end of October, as Nancy Pelosi is hoping?

BLACKBURN: Maria, we know that the Build Back Better agenda has become the Biden build back broke agenda.

And the American people have figured out that what they're trying to do is institutionalized socialism. They're trying to do a takeover of the country in one vote. They want government control of your kids. They want to look at your bank account for every transaction over $600.

Anything thing that you do on Venmo and PayPal, they want a part of that transaction. They want government control of health care. They want to demoralize the military, close the churches, destroy your faith in the American system.

And then here they're going to come with the socialist program to run your life from cradle to grave, daylight to dark.

BARTIROMO: Unbelievable.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

BARTIROMO: Senator, I want to talk about Afghanistan, and I really want to get to China.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

BARTIROMO: You have been so good on all of this. Thank you for what you have been doing in those testimonies.

First, what struck you most after interviewing Mark Milley and Lloyd Austin last week?

BLACKBURN: What really struck me was the number of lies we have gotten out of the Biden White House.

Biden said he had no advice from military leaders that he shouldn't use August 31 as the date, that he should keep the troop levels at 2, 500. He said, nobody said you need to keep the Bagram Airfield.

And we know now that all of that was false. The generals never said this was an extraordinary success. That is all spin coming from the White House and Jen Psaki. So, that is probably what people looked at as, here you have these three generals. And, finally, after we pound them for a while, they say, hey, wait a minute, we said they needed to keep 2, 500 troops.

So Biden was wrong in his interview with Stephanopoulos. He was wrong in saying nobody said August 31 wouldn't work.

But, Maria, he wanted to take that victory lap on September 11 so badly that he was willing to sacrifice our relationship with our NATO allies, with our partners in the region, the Afghan government. Thirteen troops lost their life, and thousands -- we don't even know the number yet of Americans, of Afghan allies, SIV holders and their families, applicants and their families that are left stranded behind Taliban lines.

BARTIROMO: Well, Jen Psaki also said that Biden got advice from the generals and he got advice from others.

Who are those others? And who's really running the show in the White House right now, in your view?

BLACKBURN: I think the advice came from Ron Klain and Jake Sullivan and Susan Rice and Wendy Sherman and Antony Blinken, that they were saying, let's get out of there. Let's take this victory lap.

BARTIROMO: OK.

BLACKBURN: Joe Biden, you can say you're the guy that ended this.

I think that's where it's coming from.

BARTIROMO: Senator, let me move on to China.

What we know is that China has sent 20 more aircraft toward Taiwan one day after the largest ever incursion, the CCP sending more aircraft into Taiwan's air defense over the weekend, bullying Taiwan. And, also, there is a report from Axios that America's security agencies under President Biden are opposing the blacklisting of a spinoff firm of the Chinese Communist Party linked to the telecom firm Huawei.

We also have an article from Axios that says that our government agencies are buying drones, drone technology from China. Now, you have got to explain this one to me. Why would we be buying drones from China, when, in fact, there...

BLACKBURN: Yes.

BARTIROMO: ... is a surveillance program already under way? What -- can you tell us if the U.S. is buying drones from China?

BLACKBURN: From what we have heard -- and we have not been able to fully investigate this -- but what we have read is that they have removed Huawei from the blacklisting, and they are going back and doing business with Chinese tech companies.

Maria, we have said no government agency, whether it's our military, our intel, our law enforcement, our diplomatic agencies, can use Huawei, and they certainly can't use the DJI drones.

And here's the thing that is so troublesome. Joe Biden is kowtowing to the communist Chinese. He is letting them lead him around and put them back, to the point that they can sell this surveillance.

Well, what is going to happen with this? The communist Chinese are going to gather all that data. They're going to build profiles of these cities. They're going to build profiles of people whose information is riding on that Huawei network.

This is all part of their surveillance plan and building a virtual you online...

BARTIROMO: Yes.

BLACKBURN: ... so that they know everything that you're going to do.

BARTIROMO: Well...

BLACKBURN: So, this is incredibly dangerous. You can imagine that we're going to be on top of that this very week. You cannot do business with the communist Chinese.

BARTIROMO: Well, what else does the CCP have on Joe Biden and Hunter Biden?

We were told that Hunter Biden would travel around China and would tell the Secret Service, don't follow me when I'm in China. So, I mean, my question is, is it because there is a conflict of interests with the Biden family and the CCP? Is that why he is rolling over for Huawei?

We just sent the CFO who was under house arrest in Canada. Now she's enjoying her motherland of China. She's back.

BLACKBURN: That's right.

And this is all part of going soft on China. And whether it is Biden, Incorporated...

BARTIROMO: OK.

BLACKBURN: ... President Biden or John Kerry trying to do -- get them to work with him on climate change...

BARTIROMO: Right.

BLACKBURN: ... this is just ridiculous, how they're going about letting China lead the way.

BARTIROMO: Senator, you're right.

Senator, thank you so much.

I wanted to ask you about next week, because I know you have the whistle- blower of Facebook.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

BARTIROMO: You're going to be hearing from that person.

BLACKBURN: Yes.

BARTIROMO: And you will reveal the -- who that person is on Tuesday. We will be watching your testimony, your hearing of the Facebook whistle- blower on Tuesday.

Thank you so much, Senator, for all that you're doing.

BLACKBURN: Thank you.

BARTIROMO: We will cover that on Tuesday on "Mornings With Maria" on FOX Business.

Thank you, Senator Marsha Blackburn.

Coming up: Comedian Russell Brand has an awakening over the Russia big lie, while Rihanna takes heat for wearing a shirt that says "Think While It's Still Legal."

Political commentator Christian Walker and book publisher Louise Burke are here on whether the dirty tricks and power grabs are finally being exposed on the left, cancel culture in America -- after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRAND: There is now serious evidence that it was the Clinton campaign and Hillary Clinton acolytes that were directly involved in the generation of what has proven to be a conspiracy, untrue.

I find myself in awe, gobsmacked, flabbergasted and startled by these revelations that Russiagate was a Democratic conspiracy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Ah, the truth is finally coming out.

That was comedian Russell Brand, a self-proclaimed liberal, admitting to his 3.9 million YouTube subscribers this week that President Trump was right about Hillary Clinton and the big lie of Russia collusion.

So, is the left finally seeing the big lie?

Joining me right now to unpack it is political commentator Christian Walker and Louise Burke, a veteran book publisher who started All Seasons Press for conservative authors.

Great to see you both. Thank you so much for being here.

Christian, what's your take? We had Russell Brand and we had Nicki Minaj complaining about the vaccine mandates. You have got, every once in a while, Bill Maher say truth, Matt Taibbi.

What's your take on all of this?

CHRISTIAN WALKER, POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Maria, I think it's the left's aggressiveness that's begun to shake people awake to their lies.

We have the cancel culture. We have lies like the Russiagate lie, the big Russiagate lie. We have the terrorist attacks, also known as the BLM riots, that overtook our country for months on end, that the left encouraged.

People have had enough of this. But a lot of everyday Americans are scared to voice their dissent because of the violent tactics the left uses against people. But I think, if we see celebrities start to take up the front lines and use their public platforms to voice their dissent, we're going to see a domino effect and we will see everyday Americans start to do the same, which is super exciting.

BARTIROMO: Well, it's incredible, Louise, that, if you say anything, you get bullied and run down by the mob.

You experienced it yourself. You are a professional in the publishing industry, working at -- you worked at Simon & Schuster, and ultimately decided: I'm out of here.

And you started All Seasons Press.

Walk us through what happens. Jay Leno admitted that comedians now have to adapt jokes to fit cancel culture, Louise.

LOUISE BURKE, FOUNDER, ALL SEASONS PRESS: My fear is that the cancel culture has become a catchword, catchphrase that we all accept. And, in reality, we should be fighting back.

I started, we started All Seasons Press so that we would be able to counter these shutting down of opposing views. This is America. It is our right to speak. It is the right of people in the Trump administration to publish their works and their books.

And I really feel that, if you ask someone like Gordon Klein, a ACLU (sic) professor of 40 years, who was shut down because he chose not to go lenient on his black students' grades, and he found it patronizing and actually not a good thing for black students.

So, I think this is the problem. We're now fighting back. He is. He's suing the school. And I think that's great.

BARTIROMO: Yes, I want to ask you about some of the books that you're publishing.

And, Christian, you're there at UCLA. I want to get your take on college campuses and what you're hearing.

Let's slip in a short break and come back with Christian Walker and Louise Burke.

We will be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BARTIROMO: Welcome back.

I'm with Christian Walker and Louise Burke.

And, Louise, you are publishing Peter Navarro's book, as well as Mark Meadows' book. I saw Peter Navarro's cover, "In Trump Time." Looks great.

BURKE: Peter's book, "In Trump Time," is already -- breaking news, it's already garnered over 100,000 advanced orders, and it reached number three on Amazon's ranking. It came out of the gate strong.

BARTIROMO: Yes.

BURKE: Just like Peter, it's a hard-hitting book that will put you in the room with Donald Trump.

BARTIROMO: I love it. I love it, Louise.

All right, let me ask you, Christian, about UCLA. What are you hearing on college campuses? Tell me how cancel culture is evolving these days. Do you think it's resonating, the truth-tellers on college campuses, or not so much?

WALKER: Maria, college campuses have stopped teaching critical thinking. They're full-blown indoctrination centers.

They teach white students to hate their skin color, black students that they're oppressed, and everyone else to hate America. I'm a loud and proud conservative at my university, UCLA, and my classmates tweet about trying to beat me up on campus and assault me at my learning institution, all because I love America and I like strong borders, fully funded police forces, and I don't think I'm oppressed because I'm black.

It's really time we get our head in the game because we can't be sending our future children to these indoctrination centers to hate everything good about our country. It's not sustainable.

BARTIROMO: It's absolutely unbelievable, Christian.

Have you gotten any feedback since your father, Herschel Walker, the great Herschel Walker, announced he is running for the Senate? What's your take on the black community in terms of what they want to see from leadership in the U.S.?

WALKER: I think everyone's really excited that my dad, Herschel Walker, is taking the opportunity.

And I think what's cool about it is, he's already built this foundation of trust with fellow Georgians. They have watched his work ethic, his attention to detail throughout his entire career in and out of the state. So there's already a good rapport with them.

And I think we're going to see a lot of people, even demographics that don't typically vote Republican, come out in support of my father, Herschel.

BARTIROMO: Yes, what about the black community?

I know that there was a huge outpouring for really conservative values in the 2016 and 2020 elections.

WALKER: I think the left is very gross to the black community, demeaning, treats them like they're an other figure in the country, not like they're just average, everyday American citizens.

And I think conservative values are beginning to resonate with them, and they see that it's the conservative ideals that are in their best interests.

BARTIROMO: Louise, are they buying your books?

BURKE: Oh, yes.

And Peter Navarro's book, "In Trump Time," is not even on sale for a month yet, and already has all those copies ordered. So we're very excited.

BARTIROMO: Right.

BURKE: And we will publish more.

BARTIROMO: Louise Burke, Christian Walker, thanks very much. Great to see you both.

And thank you, everybody, for joining me. I will be back tomorrow morning on FOX Business. "Mornings With Maria" is 6:00 to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

Have a great rest of your Sunday. Watch us again today at 3:00 p.m. here on FOX News.

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