Trump orders declassification of intelligence related to campaign spying

This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," May 23, 2019. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, HOST: Good evening, and welcome to “Tucker Carlson Tonight.” Maryland police have arrested two teenagers for the gruesome slaying of a 14-year-old girl. It was an awful crime, but the details are even worse. Both the teenagers were members of MS-13. Both were here illegally. Both could have been kicked out of America long ago, but weren't. A living picture of our failure to enforce our immigration laws. Trace Gallagher has the details on exactly what happened tonight -- Trace.

TRACE GALLAGHER, CORRESPONDENT: Tucker, the evidence shows this murder could have been prevented numerous times. Prosecutors say 16-year- old Josue Fuentes-Ponce and 17-year-old Joel Escobar, both suspected of being MS-13 members were so afraid that a 14-year-old girl would rat them out for a recent burglary. They made the girl take off her clothes and attacked her with a machete. Her mutilated body was found this month in a creek bed.

But last year, Prince George's County, Maryland had both Fuentes-Ponce and Escobar in custody for attempted murder in a separate case. Immigration and Customs Enforcement or I.C.E. issued an immigration detainer, but because of the county's sanctuary policy, it defied the request. I.C.E. says quote, "These individuals had demonstrated violent criminal behavior before and because they were released in spite of the lawful detainer, they were afforded an opportunity to take a life."

Authorities from Prince George's County are trying to pass the buck saying they transferred the suspects to a state youth detention center. Problem is, the 2014 Department of Corrections Policy mandates that county jails notify I.C.E. regarding any transport so that I.C.E. can track down the criminals.

Escobar came to the U.S. in 2016 as an unaccompanied minor. Fuentes-Ponce came with a surge of families in 2015. None of this is news to you, Tucker, because you were in El Salvador in 2017, and saw firsthand how dangerous and ruthless MS-13 can be.

Last week after being diagnosed with the flu, a 16-year-old migrant died in Border Patrol custody, the case got a lot of media attention and those who want stricter immigration controls wonder if the brutal killing of the 14- year-old will get as much attention. So far, the answer is, "No." Tucker.

CARLSON: Of course not. Trace Gallagher for us. Thanks a lot, Trace. Well, as you just heard Ariana Funes-Diaz's death could easily have been prevented. It wasn't an act of God or some freak accident. It wasn't even a random crime, the kind that inevitably occurs in a country as big as ours is.

No, her death was the product of a deliberate policy. Our leadership class has decided to downplay the threat of MS-13. Why? Because Trump attacked MS-13. Therefore, in the demented zero sum calculation of permanent Washington, MS-13 must be virtuous. The enemy of Donald Trump must be my friend. That's how they think.

It all started almost exactly a year ago when the President said this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT: So when the MS-13 comes in, when the other gang members come into our country, I referred to them as animals. And guess what? I always will.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Keep in mind, MS-13's motto is kill, rape, control. They routinely torture and murder high school students. They bring drugs across the border and into our neighborhoods. They're the deadliest criminal gang in America. And yet, once Trump attack them, the left decided that worrying about MS-13 was a greater threat to our values than the gang itself. Anyone who criticized MS-13 was denounced as racist, if not a tool of Putin. They said as much out loud, including on this show.

The traditional Democratic Party, the one that represented blue-collar America would have been baffled by this. Working class people of all colors are always the biggest victims of crime, if you want to protect them, don't side with criminals. That was something that Democrats including the young Joe Biden once understood intuitively, but no longer.

Today, criticizing MS-13 would mean asking questions about the party's orthodoxy on immigration. It would expose Nancy Pelosi's absurd lie that every single immigrant is impressive and must be allowed to stay in the country, no questions asked. Nobody in the left wants to talk about any of this. So instead, they just defended MS-13.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JULIAN CASTRO, D-PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He basically seems to assume that everybody is part of MS-13. Very strange to hear a President of the United States speak in such dehumanizing terms.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Is it appropriate for a President to ever call anyone an animal even if they are sadistic gang members?

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes, I think that's something to watch out for. The history of political leaders dehumanizing opponents, even criminals and using animal metaphors is a dangerous one. That is not something that we should accept from an American president.

JAMELLE BOUIE, CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT, "SLATE" MAGAZINE: I do think there's a serious problem with the President dehumanizing any group of people in the United States, even if they are hardened criminals.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Got that? Saying rude things about MS-13 is a, quote, "serious problem," unlike, say, abortion up to the moment of birth, which is liberation and not a problem at all. That's Nancy Pelosi position. Pelosi considers late-term abortion as wholesome as a Fourth of July picnic, but criticize a Central American gang member with a face tattoo and she will give you a long lecture about God.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI, D-CALIF.: We're all God's children. There is a spark of divinity in every person on Earth, and so when the President of the United States says about undocumented immigrants, "These aren't people, these are animals," you have to wonder, does he not believe in the spark of divinity, the dignity and worth of every person.

Every day that you think you've seen it all, along comes another manifestation of why their policies are so inhumane.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: That's today's lecture on Christianity from Nancy Pelosi. The media, of course, dutifully amplified Pelosi's message, she's their boss, that's their job. Vox.com produced an entire video designed to explain that actually, MS-13 members are just like your kids.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (voice over): When you think of the street gang, MS- 13, what do you see? Maybe something like this or this. But what if I told you the typical MS-13 gang member in the U.S. actually looks like one of these young men on Facebook?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The MS-13 members that I've been following are working after school jobs, they're living with their parents, they get around Long Island on bicycles.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's no indication that we're seeing a bigger surge of MS-13 than we've seen in the past.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: When the Revolution finally ends, when this era, this moment, whatever we're in right now, when it finally ends, that video you just saw from vox.com will be worth watching, a period piece. We're going to look at that and say, it's hard to believe that that's real, but it is real.

That kind of propaganda where powerful people are lying right to your face again and again and again, it happens a lot. And it'll be pretty funny, actually, if the stakes were lower, but they're not low, they're high.

The left defends MS-13 because they can't acknowledge a downside to the open borders they've given us. Once we start talking about all of this, who knows where it might end. So instead, they lecture us about dignity while high school kids get murdered. And for them, that's a small price to pay.

Andrew Arthur is a Maryland resident. He is also a former immigration judge and a resident fellow in Law and Policy at the Center for Immigration Studies and he joins us tonight. Andrew, thanks very much for coming on.

ANDREW ARTHUR, FORMER IMMIGRATION JUDGE: Thanks for having me.

CARLSON: As someone who has spent your life in Maryland and has spent a career involved in immigration policy, were you surprised to see the fruit of this policy?

ARTHUR: Absolutely not. The Attorney General of Maryland, Brian Frosh is a person who has filed 14 different lawsuits against President Trump. Not surprisingly, his immigration stance is in line with the lawsuits that he has filed. He has made it clear to local law enforcement that I.C.E. detainers are voluntary and that they risk a potential liability if they comply with them.

He does everything, but tell them not to. And in my hometown of Baltimore, which you see behind me, Marilyn Mosby, the State's Attorney has actually recommended to prosecutors that they consider unlawful status when charging people because they don't want to have people inadvertently deported simply because they're criminals.

CARLSON: So when people get murdered as a result, do the policymakers you just mentioned stop, think through what just happened and why and reassess their positions? Do they feel guilt or shame? Do they change?

ARTHUR: No, in fact, this is not a new phenomenon in Maryland and Northern Virginia, either. I mean, we've had an MS-13 problem in these states for the last number of years ever since we saw a huge influx of unaccompanied alien children, if you would, that's anybody under the age of 18 coming in to the United States.

At the end of the Bush administration, MS-13 as a force was almost spent in the United States, which was good for the United States, good for El Salvador because it deprived the gang of money that they used to carry out their heinous acts down there.

But as we've seen this flood of unaccompanied alien children, we started to see the gang become more prevalent. In fact, there was a horrible case -- I was one of the few people to write about it in Kensington, Maryland, twelve miles from the White House, in which an under-aged sex trafficked prostitute was beaten with a baseball bat more than 20 times simply because she did not provide -- she didn't do her job well enough for the gang.

But none of this actually makes any difference to the people who are in charge of the law in the state of Maryland. Governor Larry Hogan. I think would probably, you know, love to take action. But unfortunately, law in the State of Maryland is in the hands of Brian Frosh, a Democrat Attorney General.

CARLSON: What's odd in this specific case of MS-13 is virtually all of their victims are also Salvadoran immigrants or Guatemalan immigrants. So it's not like there's no racial component here at all.

The people suffering are the people that the left claims to stand for and protect. It doesn't make any sense.

ARTHUR: Now, and whenever you hear, Tucker, people talk about sanctuary policies, the argument is always made, that they're implemented in order to protect immigrant communities. But most of these crimes take place in immigrant communities. And when released from jail as these two individuals were -- Escobar and Fuentes-Ponce, they go back to those communities and they commit even more crimes, which is exactly what happened here.

They were arrested for attempted murder and gang-related activities. Escobar got 10 months in juvenile facility for conspiracy to commit murder, and then he was released. We don't even know what happened to Fuentes- Ponce, who, by the way, is actually in the United States illegally. He is under a final order of removal. The family that he came to the United States with never showed up for court.

So neither of these gentlemen should have been in the United States to commit any crime. They shouldn't have been in the United States to begin with, but they certainly shouldn't have been in the United States to commit any crime. Certainly, not one as heinous as this, and unfortunately, the machete is the weapon of choice of MS-13.

CARLSON: It's disgusting. I'd like to follow up on this story as we learn more, I hope you'll come back. Andrew, thanks very much for that. Good to see you tonight.

ARTHUR: Thank you having me.

CARLSON: Well, officially, Nancy Pelosi is merely the Speaker of the House and the most powerful elected Democrat, but she is more than that. She is becoming the High Priestess of the American left. What her teachings? We will tell you after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: This is a Fox News Alert. A lot going on tonight. "Wall Street Journal" reporting that disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has reached a tentative settlement with women who have accused him of sexual harassment and misconduct.

According to the newspaper, the settlement totals $44 million -- $30 million would go to Weinstein's alleged victims, $14 million would cover the legal fees for his associates who are sucked into the wave of lawsuits against him. The settlement will not effect is ongoing criminal case. He is charged with rape and other offenses in New York State. A trial is scheduled for September. Obviously, we will follow the story as it continues to unfold.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has many concerns. She wants to preserve the dignity of MS-13 gang members. She wants to preserve access to the left's holiest sacrament, abortion. But when she isn't doing those things, Mrs. Pelosi wants you to know that she spends a lot of time in quiet contemplation, praying for the soul of the President.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PELOSI: In any event, I pray for the President of the United States, and I pray for the United States of America.

I actually ardently pray for the President.

Again, I pray for the President of the United States. I wish that his family or his administration or his staff would have an intervention for the good of the country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Author and columnist, Mark Steyn is a praying man. And he joins us tonight to assess what we've just done learned from Nancy Pelosi.

Mark Steyn, I'm not quite sure what to make of that. But that was a press conference today, by the way, we should note for our viewers.

MARK STEYN, AUTHOR AND COLUMNIST: Yes.

CARLSON: What do you make of that?

STEYN: Well, I think actually, in a sense, she does believe in divine intervention. They were let down by Bob Mueller, who was the nearest thing to Jesus to walk on the face of this Earth for the Democrats until he actually issued his report. They've been let down by judges and now they're putting their faith in the big guy himself.

And when she says, she wants an intervention, basically she wants God to send Moses back down with a brand new tablet on which the 25th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution is inscribed, and that Moses will then persuade everybody else that it's time for Trump to be deposed from office.

And it's a strange world because the ostentatious religiosity of Mrs. Pelosi is at odds with the sheer insanity of what her party is proposing. The party has actually changed a lot, Tucker in the last couple of election cycles. You know, the way it used to be.

People like John Kerry would twist themselves like a pretzel to explain how personally-passionately, passionately-personally opposed to abortion they were, but that they would never let their deeply held personal Catholic faith interfere with their legislative agenda.

There's no pretense of that now. She leads a party that's in favor of fourth trimester abortion, pregnant men, MS-13 on every corner, a sanctuary nation with lawyers for any six billion people around the planet who want to come here and claim the right to live here.

And I think she is doing this in a sense to portray Trump is the crazy one, whereas it's their agenda that is crazy.

CARLSON: But why go through the motions? I mean, it's an aggressively secular party, an aggressively anti-Christian party, obviously, as you said, it wasn't always, far from it. There were a lot of sincere Christians.

Jimmy Carter is a sincere Christians, among others.

STEYN: Absolutely.

CARLSON: But it is now anti-Christian and there's no -- let's not lie about it -- why even bother to give us the God talk?

STEYN: Well, I think the God talk is interesting, because as I say, so much of this stuff, like the abolition of the sexes and infanticide is so off the charts, that I think they actually want to create a kind of new religion for secularists. They need to actually cloak this in faith.

CARLSON: Interesting. I think that's -- I think you're exactly right. Will you stay right there for a second, Mark? We just received a breaking news important for our audience now. Here is a Fox News Alert for you, the President has just a released a memo about declassification. He says he wants to release information about spying on his campaign back in 2016.

Fox's David Spunt is following all of this for us from our Washington Bureau. David, what do we know at this hour?

DAVID SPUNT, CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Tucker, we are just learning this in the last few minutes, I literally just rushed in the studio. This is the memo right here from the Trump administration. I want to read a statement from Press Secretary Sarah standards, just briefly go over. She just says, "Today, at the request and recommendation of the Attorney General, President Trump directed the Intelligence Community to quickly and fully cooperate with the Attorney General's investigation into surveillance activities during the 2016 election."

"The Attorney General has also been delegated full and complete authority to declassify information pertaining to this investigation, in accordance with long established standards for handling classified information. This action will ensure that all Americans learn the truth about the events that occurred and the actions that were taken during the last presidential election and restore confidence in our public institutions."

Again, this is a two-page memo. I'm looking at it right now, "Memorandum for the Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, other Cabinet officials" coming from President Donald Trump, a statement coming from Press Secretary Sarah Sanders declassifying that information on the Intelligence-related spying into that 2016 campaign. Breaking right now, Tucker, but we'll be sure to follow it.

CARLSON: An amazing story. I'm sure we'll be hearing very soon about how we don't have a right to see it. David Spunt, great to see you tonight. Thank you.

SPUNT: Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: I want to go back to Mark Steyn if he is still there. Mark?

STEYN: Yes. Yes, I'm here, Tucker.

CARLSON: This could be and we don't know what it is. We don't know what this information yet is. But this, this could be a genuinely significant development, I think.

STEYN: Yes. And this should actually have been done. He talked about doing this and then Her Majesty's governments in Britain and Australia told him not to, because there's a lot of stuff in this that's actually embarrassing in terms of relations between the U.K., Australia and the U.S.

But this is the ultimate game-changer. This stuff -- most of it shouldn't be classified. There's far too much stuff that is classified. And the only way actually to kill this investigation without end is to get it all out there and let the American people judge for themselves. Don't let the U.K. and Australia talk you out of this -- out of it this time, Mr. President.

CARLSON: Very quickly, how long will it be before the press starts telling us that we have no right to want to see this? And we're betraying our country and we're on Putin's team, if we want to see this declassified information.

STEYN: Oh, they'll have started about 15 seconds ago. And they'll tell you that, you know, our friends around the world don't want this stuff out. It should be out.

Basically, we had a bureaucracy gone rogue. There are -- there is exculpatory evidence about people, about American citizens who went to jail, because the deep state went rogue on this and the only way to get that out there is actually to release it all. This should have been done actually months ago. And it should have been done the day after the Mueller report was filed.

CARLSON: Exactly. Mark Steyn, as always, thank you.

STEYN: Thanks a lot, Tucker.

CARLSON: Amazing story. There are also new developments tonight in a bunch of different things, including the Jussie Smollett case, we will bring that to you after the break and more. Stay tuned.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Well, we could soon know much of the truth about the Jussie Smollett case. The case file for Smollett's fake hate crime was sealed last March, after prosecutors abruptly dropped all charges against the actor. Now Judge Steven Watkins has ordered that file to be unsealed. That file could expose exactly how state prosecutors wound up dropping the case, despite substantial may be overwhelming evidence that the hate crime was in fact, a hate hoax.

Robby Soave is associate editor of "Reason." He is one of the leading experts on hate hoaxes. He is the author of the book, "Panic Attack: Young Radicals in the Age of Trump," and he joins us tonight. Robby, thanks a lot for coming on.

So what do you think we're likely to learn, should this file become unsealed?

ROBBY SOAVE, AUTHOR: Well, I think we're likely to learn what Kim Foxx already said, which was that the case was very, very strong and if she had brought it to court, she would have won, right? She has already said that.

So the only explanation -- the only, you know, explanation for her actions that would be okay would be that the case actually had holes in it. And we could learn that in these unsealed records. But she said that's not what we're going to find. She said, we're going to find the case was very strong. And she decided not to bring it to justice, not to at least get him to plead guilty in exchange for whatever, you know, mercy we were going to show him which would have been perfectly fine.

But you had to get him to plead guilty and she opted not to do that. Why? Sympathy to him, maybe not wanting to push back on this narrative about hate crimes, that they're off the charts, something like that.

CARLSON: So that's really -- I mean, that's got to be in the end, the motive is that nobody wants to admit that this epidemic of hate crimes we're supposedly living through is fake.

SOAVE: Yes, I mean, the Democrats are holding hearings on this subject. I actually testified at one last week before a House Subcommittee on hate crimes. And I was, you know, the only -- even though the other witnesses there very much conceded that the statistics do not show that we have this massive increase in hate crimes, they were still there to call for the government to do more about this.

And then Congress is taking this issue very seriously, the idea that there is some Trump connected rise in hate crimes across the country. And of course, the Smollett case was briefly Exhibit A in that argument. So it's pretty important to know that truth about this specific incident because it was held up as an example of a broader narrative that must be true. So we deserve to know the truth if that's what it stood for.

CARLSON: I mean, if you judge a crime by a conviction -- and a conviction, that's when you know, a crime occurred is someone is convicted of it -- if that's how you measure hate crimes, we have virtually no hate crimes in America.

So you pointed out that the stats don't show what they claim they show that this epidemic is not measured. What was the response when you said that?

SOAVE: Right, actually, a lot of people conceived that. Even the people I'm sitting next to at this congressional hearing are saying, "Well, yes, you're kind of right. Actually, the statistics just kind of fluctuate from year to year and we don't really -- they don't really show us anything." But the government still needs to do something about this, right? Because there's never a committee hearing where the conclusion is the government doesn't actually need to do anything.

The conclusion is always, you know, people will die unless we have a whole new department or something to take care of this. Obviously, hate crimes are bad when they do occur. But it's just, you have to be very careful about scaring people into thinking that unless there's immediate action, there's going to be things like what happened to Jussie Smollett happening on every street across America, unless we act decisively now.

CARLSON: Unless you gain political power by scaring people, which is of course, the point. Robby, thanks so much for joining us today. I appreciate it.

SOAVE: My pleasure.

CARLSON: Well, Jussie Smollett's bogus hate crime is one of many signs that Chicago is failing as a city. It is corrupt, of course dangerous and broke -- really broke. Things are so bad that Chicago is the only major city in America, one of the very few that is losing population.

Brad Holbrook is the State Representative in the state of Illinois. He has a proposal tonight, remove Chicago from Illinois and make it a separate state. Representative Holbrook joins us tonight to explain his idea. Mr. Holbrook, thanks very much for coming on.

REP. BRAD HOLBROOK, R-ILL., ILLINOIS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: Thanks for having me, Tucker. Appreciate it.

CARLSON: Separate -- so Chicago would be one state and what they call downstate Illinois would be a separate state. Is that the idea?

HOLBROOK: Right. So basically, the resolution calls for Congress to separate or make Chicago the 51st state, but really the movement is to find what counties that are interested in forming a new Illinois. Hopefully, 101 of those counties would become the new Illinois.

CARLSON: I mean, part of the reason, the impetus for this has got to be financial. I mean, nobody wants to be saddled with the debt. They're really unresolvable, debt problems that Chicago has, I assume that's part of this, right?

HOLBROOK: Well, part of it. Yes, I mean, you know, Chicago is drowning in debt. They're drowning in unfunded pension liabilities. Illinois is same, you know, there's a $250 billion by some estimates of unfunded pension liabilities, and it continues to grow every day.

You know, that's part of it. The financial aspect is a big factor. But we see kind of an overreaching population out of the city that kind of has a different idea about how to live their life, and they continue to impose their will on us.

You know, when it comes to the life and unborn, the Second Amendment, minimum wage is a big issue. And they're just many other issues that they -- that they're having in the city that we're just not having in the rest of the state of Illinois.

CARLSON: So fewer drive-by shootings outside of Chicago, I would imagine. So how does Chicago feel about this?

HOLBROOK: Well, there's folks in Chicago, I get e-mail and phone calls every day that say, "Hey, we live in Chicago. We live in Cook County, we're with you." We do get some folks that call or e-mail say it's a bad idea, be careful what we wish for. But we're getting way more positive e- mail, comments - social media comments, way more positive than the negative.

CARLSON: I mean, Chicago as a state, what would that look like? Would that be the most dysfunctional state out of 51?

HOLBROOK: Some might say that.

CARLSON: Some might say that. You know what, I like your reticence, your subtlety. You're obviously not from Chicago. Representative, thank you very much. Good to see you tonight.

HOLBROOK: Thank you.

CARLSON: Time now for "Final Exam." Can you beat the experts on remembering all the weird things that happened in the news over the past seven days? Quite a matchup tonight. You're going to be impressed. Stay tuned.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Fox News Alert for you. Just moments ago, the President released a memo on declassification. He has given the Attorney General William Barr the power to declassify any documents he believes relate to Intelligence Agencies spying during the 2016 election. Presumably, that could include documents related to spying on the Trump campaign.

It could also potentially involve the FISA warrants against Carter Page or what justifications were given to launch the Russia investigation. This show first broke the story and we plan to bring you updates as we get them.

Time now for "Final Exam" where the hosts, guests and experts here at Fox compete to be crowned the king or queen of news. This week's defending champion is Kennedy, the host of "Kennedy" on Fox Business; her challenger this evening is Fox News, weather guru, Janice Dean, author of the new book "Mostly Sunny," which is a great book by the way.

KENNEDY MONTGOMERY, FOX BUSINESS HOST: Wow, look at that.

CARLSON: Two of our favorite people here on Fox. So I am not even going to guess who is going to win this week, but I assume you're both ready. Are you ready?

MONTGOMERY: We're ready.

JANICE DEAN, METEOROLOGIST: Ready. We're ready.

CARLSON: Okay, let me repeat the rules, which you're both familiar with, just in case. Hands on buzzers. I ask the questions. The first one to buzz in gets to answer the question. You must wait until I finish asking it before you answer. You can answer once I acknowledge you by saying your name. Every correct answer is worth one point. Each incorrect detracts a point from your total. Best of five wins.

DEAN: Okay.

CARLSON: Yes, I know, it's a lot. Okay, question one. This is multiple choice. Grumpy Cat was exactly what it sounds like, frowny-face feline, had her own Lifetime movie died at the age of seven. At one point, she was reputed to be worth $100 million. I am not clear how that works, but that's what they said. What was Grumpy Cat's real name? Was it A. Gizmo? B. Tardar Sauce? C. Cabbage Patch?

DEAN: I have no idea.

MONTGOMERY: I'm not risking it.

DEAN: Me neither.

CARLSON: Not risking it.

DEAN: Has this ever happened where no one answers?

MONTGOMERY: Not going to lose a point.

CARLSON: You know it's never happened before. But we're going to just -- we're going to --

DEAN: What do we do?

CARLSON: I am just listening for the judges' instructions?

DEAN: Do we dance?

CARLSON: We're going to give you --

MONTGOMERY: I think I'm going to dance now.

CARLSON: We're going to give you one hint, okay, and the first one to buzz in. Here's the hint. It's like a condiment.

DEAN: Oh.

CARLSON: Kennedy.

MONTGOMERY: Tardar sauce.

DEAN: Yes. Wow.

CARLSON: You're not going to go Gizmo? Okay. Tardar sauce.

DEAN: Ah, the hint.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Heaven got a little grumpier. Tardar sauce known globally as Grumpy Cat passed away this week peacefully in the arms of her mommy. At one time, it was estimated the famous feline was worth $100 million.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MONTGOMERY: More than me --

CARLSON: There you go. Pick a sauce. Apparently, according to our judges, we can't let a question go unanswered.

DEAN: Okay, well, this is a first, Tucker.

CARLSON: I am not quite sure why.

DEAN: I mean, this is exciting that this is a first.

CARLSON: These are the rules. I don't know. I don't make the rules. I carry them out. All right. Question two. According to a new poll from Quinnipiac, Joe Biden is the most liked Democrat in the presidential field. The most disliked candidate has an unfavorable rating of 45 percent. Who is that? Kennedy.

MONTGOMERY: Bill de Blasio.

CARLSON: Bill -- you're just saying that because you live in New York. Is it Bill de Blasio?

DEAN: I bet you it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mayor Bill de Blasio -- he is finally ahead in one category. He is the winner in the most disliked candidate running for President according to the Quinnipiac poll, 45 percent dislike. Bill de Blasio.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MONTGOMERY: Who is now in heaven with Tardar sauce, the ground hog.

DEAN: That's true. Grumpy the cat and Tardar sauce.

CARLSON: He is in heaven with Tardar sauce.

DEAN: The ground hog, remember Staten Island Chuck. He dropped it.

CARLSON: I get that joke. We played that video the other night, it's too good. All right, question three. Question three is our daily, it's a two point question and it's also multiple choice. Here we go. In an interviews this week, Democratic candidate Kamala Harris said her ideal running mate in 2020 would be which historical figure. Was it A. Mahatma Gandhi? B. Susan B. Anthony? Or C. Cassius Clay aka Muhammad Ali?

DEAN: I don't know.

CARLSON: Kennedy?

MONTGOMERY: I -- you know. I could be throwing all of this way. Because this would be my idea, I would say Cassius Clay. Mama called Clay, I call him Clay.

CARLSON: Is it Muhammad Ali?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ARI MELBER, MSNBC ANCHOR: If you could have anyone, living or dead, as your perfect running mate, who would it be?

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS, D-CALIF., PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Oh, Muhammad Ali.

MELBER: Oh, Muhammad Ali.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DEAN: I'm sorry, Tucker. She wiped the floor.

CARLSON: Sting like a bee, speaking off. All right. It's impressive, but it's not too late.

DEAN: It's not too late?

CARLSON: It's too late, Janice Dean.

DEAN: Can we do a dance off?

CARLSON: Beloved -- universally beloved Janice Dean. All right, question four. Your days of being stuck in an LA traffic jam with nothing to do are over. There is now a fast food chain that will send a motorcycle courier through the gridlock and bring a burger right to your car. Which chain is it? Janice Dean.

DEAN: Burger King.

CARLSON: Burger King. Not In-N-Out, but Burger -- is it Burger King?

MONTGOMERY: I wish it was In-N-Out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a real problem.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is a real thing. And yes, Burger King wants to solve this problem. Once you place your order, you'll get updates and then through a motorcycle courier, your burger, your -- whatever else you want to order from Burger King that will be delivered to you. But are you that hungry in traffic that you need to eat inside your car?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MONTGOMERY: On the 405, four o'clock on a Friday, yes?

DEAN: Oh my gosh. I'm still standing.

CARLSON: Okay, so this last question, I am just hearing this now from my judges, and as you know, this is the way the game works. They make up rules as we go along.

MONTGOMERY: Amazing.

DEAN: Can we have a cocktail?

CARLSON: They're like the Federal government that way and they're telling me that this final question is a three pointer. It's also multiple choice.

DEAN: Okay. The pressure is on.

CARLSON: Here we go. Some people in the northeast are very excited because a 10-foot great white shark is heading their way. It was seen last year in near Greenwich, Connecticut. It could be heading to Martha's Vineyard. The shark has been given a name. What is the name? Is it A. Lydia? Is it B. Charles? Is it C. Cabot?

DEAN: Oh no.

CARLSON: Kennedy?

MONTGOMERY: Tucker, we're going to need a bigger boat. It is C. Cabot.

CARLSON: I wonder if our audience gets that reference? I am just old enough to guess. It's so good.

DEAN: Of course, who doesn't get that? Dun-dun-dun-dun.

CARLSON: Is it -- is it. It's Very good. Is it Cabot?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This great white shark named Cabot has been detected in these waters here behind me in Long Island South. The Great White was named by Nova Scotians after the Explorer, Jon Cabot. The shark seems to have made his way West since then.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MONTGOMERY: Oh my gosh, I elbowed you. I'm so sorry.

DEAN: It's okay, it's all right. Injury on the "Final Exam."

CARLSON: Cabot. Usually, I could think white cheddar, but not great white shark. Kennedy, seven points. That's the highest point total in the history of "Final Exam."

DEAN: Oh my gosh, it's amazing.

CARLSON: Janice Dean. This does not diminish in any way, your goodness as a person or our profound and undying love for you. So thank you very much.

DEAN: You still love me, Tucker?

MONTGOMERY: By the way, this would have been a win-win. If Janice Dean had won this whole thing. I would have celebrated her greatness.

DEAN: It's the same -- we're going to --

CARLSON: Yes, everyone would have, but --

DEAN: We're celebrating.

CARLSON: But Cabot? Cabot that was good. So we have an Erik Wemple mug for you. It's on the way. Maybe you'll get a whole set of them.

MONTGOMERY: Excellent. Interoffice mail.

DEAN: Can I come back, Tucker?

CARLSON: Thank you, both. Interoffice mail. We'll send it.

DEAN: Can I come back?

CARLSON: Yes.

DEAN: I love you.

CARLSON: Of course, you can come back.

MONTGOMERY: Thank you, Tucker. Thank you, Janice.

DEAN: Let's do the kiss.

CARLSON: Thank you both. Well, that's it for tonight's "Final Exam." Pay attention to the news, especially the weird news all week, tune in Thursday to see if you can beat our experts. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: In April of last year, the United States launched a wave of missile strikes against Bashar Assad's government in Syria. It was the second time in two years. The justification for both attacks was an alleged aerial chemical weapons attack on anti-Assad rebels in Duma, Syria.

At the time that happened, this program was pretty much the only show on mainstream television to show any skepticism about the official narrative of the attack.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Before we go to war, are we sure all of this is real? Do we really know that Assad was behind the gas attack? It's not a defensive Assad, but it's an obvious question. How could we know that conclusively so soon after the attack happened? We didn't have any Americans on the ground. And why would Assad do that given the certainty it would hurt his own interests?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: We were attacked -- aggressively attacked for saying that. Now, a leaked document shows there was good reason to be skeptical. The OPCW is the world's top chemical weapons watchdog. In a leaked internal document, an investigator with that organization argued that the evidence from Duma does not indicate an aerial attack.

Instead, he argued, the chemical weapons were manually placed on the ground. That's so just the attack may not have been a government operation after all.

If he is right, United States went to the brink of war based on fraudulent information, and not for the first time. Tulsi Gabbard is a Democratic Member of Congress from Hawaii, the first female combat veteran ever to run for President and she joins us tonight.

REP. TULSI GABBARD, D-HI, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Aloha, Tucker.

CARLSON: Aloha, Congresswoman, as you say. Thanks a lot for joining us.

GABBARD: Thank you.

CARLSON: So you're someone else who has taken an enormous amount of heat, an enormous amount of criticism. I can't overstate it for asking skeptical questions about our policy toward Syria. How do you assess this leaked document? What does it make you think?

GABBARD: Yes, I mean, this is a significant and very important development we've got to take seriously. As you mentioned, you know, I initially expressed some skepticism around that whole situation, which is why I am getting more information, reaching out to the UN, reaching out to the OPCW and getting answers.

And when I get those answers, I look forward to coming back and sharing them with you and with your viewers.

CARLSON: So we're hearing again, even this week that we may need to bomb Syria yet again, because there may be yet another chemical weapons attacks. That would be three years in a row, always in the spring and always within the context of some of some other international question. I'm beginning to suspect that we're being played here. Has that occurred to you?

GABBARD: Once again, I mean, this is why doing our due diligence, and checking very carefully the evidence is so important. I want to bring up another issue that is extremely important to the American people right now. And that is something that that should concern all of us, which is the fact that we're at the brink of a war with Iran.

And I can tell you, as a soldier, I've served over 16 years in the Army National Guard. I've deployed twice to the Middle East. I know very well, both the Middle East, as well as the cost of war.

And as a Member of Congress on the Armed Services and Foreign Affairs Committees for over six years, I know where this path leads us. And I'm concerned, because the American people don't seem to be prepared for how devastating and costly such a war would be.

It would undermine our national security, because right now, we have troops that are deployed to Iraq, for example. And right now, they're working with both Iraqi soldiers, as well as the Shia militia on the ground. And their mission is to defeat ISIS, to try to make sure that ISIS doesn't reconstitute itself and re-emerge there in Iraq.

If we go to war with Iran, all of that changes, because then the United States, our troops, my brothers and sisters in uniform are fighting against the Shia militia, who knows what the Iraqi military is going to do. Maybe some go with us and fight alongside our troops, may be some fight against us and fight alongside the Shia militia.

And so what we're facing is essentially a war that has no front lines, total chaos engulfs the whole region, it is not contained within Iran or Iraq, but would extend to Syria and Lebanon and Israel across the region, setting us up in a situation where in Iraq, we lost over 4,000 of my brothers and sisters in uniform.

A war with Iran would take far more American lives. It would cost more civilian lives across the region. It would worsen the refugee crisis with millions of people fleeing into Europe, further destabilizing there.

To speak of the fact that this would cost trillions of taxpayer dollars. Taxpayer dollars coming out of our pockets to go and pay for this endless war that begs the question, especially as a soldier, what are we fighting for? What does victory look like? What is the mission?

CARLSON: And what's the benefits the United States?

GABBARD: That is the question.

CARLSON: So as far as I can tell us, this is being pushed primarily by one man, the National Security adviser, John Bolton. The President said repeatedly he is not interested in fighting war with Iran, Bolton clearly is.

So how does the United States, if this happens, how do we benefit from this? Is there an upside that you --

GABBARD: We don't. We don't and that's the bottom line. That's what's so concerning is even as people in the administration say, "Hey, look, we don't want to go to war against Iran." You look at people like John Bolton and Mike Pompeo and others within the administration who have talked about waging regime change war against Iran for a very long time. They have stated their intent and made their objective very clear.

Your question is the most essential one, how does a war with Iran serve the best interest of the American people in the United States? And the fact is, it does not. It better serves the interests of people like Bibi Netanyahu and Saudi Arabia, who are trying to push us into this war with Iran; again, a war that would undermine our national security in the ways that I talked about. It would strengthen terrorist groups like ISIS and Al Qaeda.

It would carry a heavy human cost and it would cost us, taxpayers, trillions of dollars. Forget about investing and rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. Forget about having the resources that we need for things like healthcare, education, affordable housing. We wouldn't have those resources because this would go towards yet another extremely devastating, costly war with Iran.

CARLSON: Yes. I think if you were to poll on that question, and it is polled, you would find that what you just said has overwhelming support with voters in both parties, not just your part of the Democratic Party, both Republicans as well.

And yes, I predict with certainty that you will be attacked for saying what you just did. And that tells you everything. Tulsi Gabbard, running for President from State of Hawaii. Great to see you tonight. Thank you very much.

GABBARD: Nice to see you, Tucker, Aloha.

CARLSON: Aloha. So we brought you twice during the hour the alert that the President has announced that the Department of Justice will be declassifying documents pertaining to among other things, spying on the Trump campaign in 2016.

I spoke during the commercial break with someone who is familiar with this process. And I will just say this, this is a bigger story even I think than we realized when we first broke it. So we're going to be on that hard tomorrow. Hope you'll tune in then. In the meantime, Dan Bongino sitting in for Sean Hannity tonight.

Content and Programming Copyright 2019 Fox News Network, LLC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Copyright 2019 ASC Services II Media, LLC. All materials herein are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, displayed, published or broadcast without the prior written permission of ASC Services II Media, LLC. You may not alter or remove any trademark, copyright or other notice from copies of the content.