We're back with another edition of The Federalist Radio Hour. I'm em a Ligitianski
culture editor here at the Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on Twitter at fdr LST.
Make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts and to the premium version
of our website as well. Highly recommend checking out that premium sections. It's
super interesting. Our writers are engaging in the comments with readers and I love
that. I love being able to do it. As you know, you
get to sort of interact with with readers on a daily basis. It's super
cool, so so make sure to check that out. Today's show is an
interview with Congressman Andy Ogles, now Cargressman Ogles was super kind to stick around
while we were having technical difficulties. Sometimes Zoom is an unforgiving application, and
that was the case in this time. But Carnishman Ougle stuck around and so
the episode is a little bit shorter, which is why I wanted to record
an introduction here, because we still felt that it was important to bring the
interview us. It's a really interesting one. It's a newsy one. Carnishman
Ouggles has actually introduced articles of impeachment against both President Biden and Vice President Harris.
He's also a member of the Freedom Caucus, and there are a lot
of interesting dynamics at play in the Freedom Caucus right now here in Washington,
DC. It's, you know, it seems like inside baseball, and I
think sometimes, you know, focusing on it too much can be inside baseball.
But actually Politico is just reported today that that Check Schumer is ready to
ramp up his legislative approach and wants to, you know, sort of start
working up by partisan stuff. And by partisan is always a code word in
DC for corrupt, I shouldn't say always corrupt or grift or words that come
to mind. Sometimes is great by partisan legislation, but a lot of times
if both parties are working together, it means the one thing they can agree
on is making lobbyists and industry and any special interest money. So bipartisan is
always just a red flag for me and Chuck Schumer said he's ready to ramp
up his approach to passing legislation through the Upper Chamber, which means it will
inevitably go over to the lower chamber and do some back and forth and end
up on President Biden's desk. And the one force really keeping the Speaker of
the House in check right now is the Freedom Caucus. And they're very powerful
and they need to wield their power. And Chris and I, obviously Bedford
the Big Bee shout out to listener Gregory who gave him that wonderful nickname,
have talked about this before. What good is your power if you don't wield
it? And the Freedom Caucus right now, you know, if you're a
political junkie, you're watching that and you are salivating because just from the sort
of art of politics, it's fascinating how they've wielded their power. How that
compares with the justice to Democrats under the Pelosi era, the Freedom Caucus under
the Banner era, Conservatives under the Banner era in general, and you can
go back even further than that into American history and it's all very interesting.
But it also actually is very immediately relevant because it's going to affect legislation that
passes or does not pass over the course of the next six plus months or
six months or so. And that's why I think, you know, it's
super interesting to get a glimpse anytime he can get a glimpse into the dynamics
of the Freedom Caucus. I think it's very interesting and worthwhile. So I
talked to the congressman about that. I talked about his articles of impeachment.
And he represents a Nashville district in Tennessee. There's so much interesting stuff happening
in Tennessee now, some of which we've we've covered here. So his perspective
is definitely worth a listen. So appreciate him hanging on the line while we
worked out problems with zoom, But we also wanted to make sure that we
at this interview to you guys. Um, we've got so much good stuff
coming up in the future. UM, a lot of a lot of good
conversations on the that I've I've already had because I pre tape a good chunk
of these. Um, that's a sort of secret um that it is the
case you've probably noticed this. Uh, some of these are pre taped because
people have books coming out, for instance, and we want to get that
interview out on the day the book comes out or the week the book comes
out, And so we have a lot of good ones ready to go and
I'm eager for you all to hear those. I just want to take a
moment to really appreciate everybody listening. Um, It's just means the world to
me. It means the world to our team. It's so so um gratifying.
UM. But also it just it really means the world to us,
UM that you you take the time to read our work, listen to our
work. And we obviously think it's important for the future. UM, not
just you know, for our own self interest, but for the future that
you know, you get this information and share this information, and that it
informs you know, conversations that you have at the dinner table, or conversations
you have at you have on the sidelines of soccer games, or you know,
if you're talking politics in that context, whatever it is. You know,
what you say at the school board meeting, um, how you vote,
all that good stuff. Um. And so we just we just appreciate
it. I can speak for my other team members. They work so hard
and dig up some really interesting stuff. So it's just greatly appreciated. And
I just wanted to give a little shout out to our listeners, UM,
because this is a great opportunity. There's there's no bad opportunity to do that,
but um it, it is so so, so greatly appreciated and really
meaningful. And again, if you ever have feedback, feel free to just
email Radio at the Federalist dot com. We read all of those, take
it to heart, and uh, you know it's it really means a lot
to us to get that feedback, and your reviews are so kind. Um
I check them on on iTunes when I can, and you guys are so
kind to myself and to Molly and David. It just means a lot to
us. So as always, thanks for listening, and please enjoy this conversation
with Congressman Indioguls. Thanks for having me. It's you know, it's a
crazy time at Washington. There's a lot going on. Yeah. Absolutely,
it wasn't tough tech difficulties, So I just want to say we're extra appreciative
of a congressman sticking around for that. But you also recently introduced articles of
impeachment not just against President Joe Biden, but also against Vice President Kamala Harris,
and Congressman wanted to get you to talk to us a little bit about
on what grounds you believe they're the president and the vice president should be impeached.
And a little bit about why you decided to introduce those articles a great
question. I think. To answer that question, you have to understand the
backdrop, right, and so in the context of you know, whether you
like Donald Trump or you don't like Donald Trump, that doesn't matter if you
have a former president who's not just being frostated to being persecuted by the Justice
Department. And that's that's a scary precedent to set, whether you're a Republican
or Democrat or independent. And so part of it is to send a message
that enough is enough. We're gonna hold people are accountable based off of facts
and on crimes that rise to the level that they're being huged. The other
part of that and for appeaching Harris along with Biden, is our southern border.
So to go back in history again looking at the backdrop. Under the
Obamba administration, a thousand crossing migrant crossing a day or thirty thousand a month
was a crisis moment, right, that's too many. We've got to intercede.
Under the Biden administration, with Harris being kind of the achieved borders are
we're hitting two hundred and fifty to three hundred thousand a month. And so
what's happened is is every small town in America is now a border town that
Finnel is sweeping through our streets of killing or compositing our kids. I mean
virtually everyone you can talk to is know somebody who's been touched by Finnel And
so understand ending that back drop, and then get into Biden himself and you
look at the money and the payments and the accounts and what's come to light
in the Oversight Committee, etc. It's time that we send a message to
the American people there's not a two tier justice system, one justice system,
and everybody's going to be created equally. We got to get back to that
because that is the root of our constitution and our founding fathers, and just
the protections and security that we all need is to go about our daily life.
Yeah, you've mentioned that the Biden has essentially weaponized his office in order
to shield himself from investigation. And obviously we're talking in the week the hunter
Biden news that he basically got a slap on the risk for some very obvious
charges and probably wasn't charged with some other various very obvious things. But can
you tell us a little bit about how that connects to the question of impeachment
itself and in your articles as well. Yeah, I mean, you know,
in life, we're always looking at the totality of the circumstances. You
know, what's going on as you're making the decision. You know, so
if it's if it's a business, maybe you call it a decision making framework.
If you're law enforcements the talipule or circumtances. And again to your point
about weaponization of the justice system. Look, you had actors and just average
run of the middle people go to jail for similar crimes, but because he's
connected to the president, he's being treated differently. And again that that speaks
to the fact that we now have a two tiered justice system in this country,
and that's not going to work. You know, political retributions by way
of prosecutions didn't work in Rome, it didn't work under the British Empire.
It's not going to work in the United States of America if we're going to
hold the republic, and so we've got to do a hard reset. And
from a political standpoint, this is why Republicans have to hold the House in
twenty four. We've got to win the Senate in twenty four and the White
House because we do need to quite frankly urge the bureaucracy of those who are
there to be actable versus implementing their mission statement, their core mission of justice
where everyone is equal in front of the law. We did an episode of
the show shortly after the disappointing debt negotiations, thinking about you, what good
is power if you don't wield it? For you just ends and wanted to
toss that over your way because you pushed for rules changes in the House.
I know that it's probably not first and foremost on your constituents minds when they
wake up every day. You know, as the House of Representatives functioning in
a constitutional sense, but you know that all those policy priorities are obviously downstream
of how the House is functioning. So, now that the debt negotiations are
in the rearview mirror, the speaker battle is in the rear room mirror.
How do you rate Speaker McCarthy's handling of the conference? Not an easy job
by any stretch of the imagination, And what can you tell us about how
the Freedom Caucus itself, which you're a member of, is functioning right now
as well, and so big question a lot to point. So what I'll
say is I'll rate you aren't these ability and the job he's done to United
the defense, it's quite remulkable because like you said, you do have multiple
factions, you have a variety of volts across the kind of the political affecting
of me being on the more conservative side. Now, specific to the debt
negotiations, I was incredibly disappointed. I think we could have gotten more.
In fact, I'll say, I know we could have gotten more. But
you know, I go back to you know when we talk about the roles
pactags and why that's significant and my regular order is so important is over the
last two decades, a lot of the power and function of the House representatives,
they've really been concentrated in the Speaker's office and within leadership. And what
we wanted to do is rent that back to rank and file members. I
mean, someone like me. I'm not a chairman, I'm not a cardinal
cardinaler, and those folks and appropriations that control money, like I have a
voice. I would represent my constituents. I can offer an amendment to cut
spending to do things that my constituents want back home, which is important.
And I go back to John Quincy Adam, you know, nerve of the
founding fathers. He was a he's a member of the House, he was
a senator, he was an ambassador president. And I have of faith and
retire back to the House of Representatives. Why because it was his most unloved
chamber. It was the raucous chamber, and it was where you argued and
debated and did the people's work. Because you know, we're elected every two
years. And so I'm up here. I'm doing a good job, and
I hope God before my confessionals and say, look, this is what I've
done, and you can take it. You can like it, and you
cannot like it. But I'm here before you to be judged. And so
John Quincy Adams, you know, I expect the House to be a little
bit raucous. We're supposed to argue in debate because at the end of the
day, iron sharp's iron, and we're striving for the best outcome. And
I don't care who you are. I mean, all the polling shows Republican
or Democrats. Everybody recognizes that Congress has broken and our spendings out of control,
and we've got to write this ship and got a correculast. The washtot
on Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski. Every day Chris helps unpack the connection
between politics and the economy and how it affects your wallet. Is Erica not
number one anymore? Sometimes it takes admitting we have a problem to'll be able
to fix it. Between parental rights over their children or the government paying big
tech for your private info, how can we right our wrongs to go back
to being the shiny city on the hill. Whether it's happening in DC or
down on Wall Street, it's affecting you financially. Be informed. Check out
the Watchdout on Wall Street podcast with Chris Markowski on Apple, Spotify, or
wherever you get your podcasts. Yeah, you've been even involved in the broader
conservative movement for a while. I believe you work for doctor Laugher, doctor
Art Laugher, the Flaffer Center, And can you tell us a little bit
from your perspective about how this sort of current moment in the conservative movement and
the Republican Party compares with the Tea Party moment Is this a continuation the sort
of populism that you see from the Freedom Caucus and others? Is this a
continuation of the Tea Party movement? Do you feel that, you know,
pushing for the debt ceiling, which is something that could have been ripped from
the pages of twenty twenty eleven, do you feel as though that is a
continuation of a prioriation of that sort of conservative uprising in the country. How
do the two moments compare. Yeah, you know, I think the Tea
Party movement was kind of a flashpoint where we kind of had it, had
specific action items, and I think what happened is is those of us that
consider ourselves kind of an activists or Tea Party esque, we joined and became
very active within the Republican Party in order to write that ship. Because we're
Republican parties have kind of drifted away from some of the core principles, that's
my opinion, and so here we are trying to pull it to the right.
And when I say to the right, I'm a more conservative. And
I would argue when you look at the twenty of us that fought for the
Rules package, when we look at the Freedom Caucus as a whole. You
know, we've moved the conference to a more a more conservative position. There's
a lot of work to be done there. And again, you know,
I think from a spending level. You know, I always like in the
Yorks autonomy to the Titanic, the big shift. It turns slowly, and
if we know there's a collision ahead, and if we don't make course corrections,
we are going to crash and the outcome is going to be catastrophic.
And so what are we going to do about that? Because we know it's
on the horizon, you know it's on our screen. We know it's there.
And I don't think we've done enough yet. But you know, I'm
going to keep fighting as our colleagues, and we'll see what we can do.
With the American people. Nashville is obviously a changing place right now,
like many big cities in the South and many places in the country in general,
and the Culture War has touched every community in the country. But I
wanted to ask, especially with the influx of business, the influx of people
from out of state New York, LA. I imagine you see that every
day in the Nashville area. How that is playing out in the clash of
sort of culture where you have a very conservative area that is changing pretty quickly.
Is this affecting your constituents. Is this affecting the way that some of
these big cultural questions like for instance, what books are in school libraries and
what books obviously should not be in school libraries are approached down in Nashville.
Yeah, that's a great question, because you have seen a huge influx of
folks moving to Tennessee and Florida and somebody your more red conservative state. But
what I'll say is, so my district is, and I'm just going round
numbers, is about a third urban, which would be the natural portion,
about a third suburban, which are the suburbs right there on the south and
the east of Nashville, and then further south would be another third rural area.
So I would argue, if if you're from California and you're moving out
to the country where I live, you're a clause of rednet if you just
figured it out, which is why you moved right now. For those people
that are probably seeking out in downtown Nashville, that's probably a mixed bag that
I'll say you both from the Left Coast or New Jersey New York or wherever,
and they moved to Tennessee like they're they're militantly conservative, especially on the
fiscal issues and on some of the social stuff that may be a little bit
different. But that being said, my experiences, all those folks understand and
realize that, look, when you look at some of the transgender issues,
let's keep our children, Let's let them grow up first, and then then
they can make up their own decisions. Then they can be exposed to some
of that material in making formed decisions. Right, And Tennessee from a broader
perspective on a policy standpoint, and the Tennessee General Assembly is quite conservative and
they're really the ones that step of telling as far as what books are going
to be into schools, etc. Yeah, just I know you have to
run. So last question. You've been involved on the economic side of the
policy movement on the right for a while and there's a lot of talk about
visit the conservative movement need to shift the way that approach approaches economics. Are
there, you know, different different questions that need to be asked when it
comes to fiscal responsibility versus government. Where you land on that, I mean,
Senator Vans on the Senate side has a rail bill that has put them
on odds with for instance Senator Cruise and definitely industry. Um, how do
you see this conversation evolving on the right. Do you think that the right
needs to rethink perhaps some of us approach us to that those big questions about
labor and uh, you know the government versus Marcus. Yeah, no,
you know again that's a big question. We could talk about that for hours.
But I think we kind of reach this inflection point in that, Um,
you know, we're no longer planning for what are they look like?
And what do you do when you kind of hit that crisis point that that
when you hit critical massive too much that we're there we get that point right,
And so I mean at this point, you know, I'm all about
cutting the budget and offer budget etcetera for holding the line on spending. But
the reality is when you look at on that Bertie huge trillion, there's not
enough money to balance that budget. There's the only way to to fix this
is to grow our way out. Some of it get gets back to this
idea we've got to get in government out of the way of commerce, and
we must be energy independence. We've got to be an energy independent country.
And this is the other thing. This little negative information is for those that
are like kind of anti fossil fuels and they talk about greenhouse emissions and all
this other stuff. You know, the United States produces the cleanest energy,
oil gas, and natural gas in the world, and if we were really
serious about cutting carbon emissions, we would make sure that our natural gas was
being used in Europe, not natural gas from other countries, because it would
cut emission by some crazy number. It's about like sixty. Because our energy,
our production, we hold ourselves to a different standard. It's just cleaner.
So again, we've got to be energy. We've got to leak the
nation economically on the resource stands time, and we can't be beholding the folds
like the ce some p that you literally want to see us fall and kneel
before then. I'm not going to let that happen. I'll continue to fight,
and I'll fight to my last bread. The Congressman Andy Ogles represents Tennessee's
fifth district. We really appreciate your time, Congressman, thanks so much,
absolutely, thank you. Of course, even listening to another edition of the
Federal Radio Hour, I'm Elijahnski, culture editor here at The Federalist, will
be back soon with more. Until then, be lovers of freedom and anxious
for the fray, all right,