Speaker 1: And we are back with another edition of the Federalist
Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle, Senior Elections correspondent at the
Federalist and your experienced Shirpa on today's quest for Knowledge.
As always, you can email the show at radio at
the Federalist dot com, follow us on x at FDR LST,
make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcast, and
of course to the premium version of our website as well.
Our guest today is Congressman Andy Ogles, representing Tennessee's fighting
fifth Congressional district. Congressman last week called it asked a
secret service in FBI leadership to open a joint investigation
into disgraced former FB director James Comey's threatening shell game.
Secret service is now investigating the former leaker in chief
that President Trump is called a dirty cop. There's much
more to come on this front, as you can imagine.
Congressman Ogles, thank you so much for joining us in
the Federalist Radio Hour.
Speaker 2: Absolutely thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: You been well. We saw what most people with eyes
saw late last week on Thursday, the former FDI director
trying to be cute and putting on his Instagram page
this neat little shell formation he found when he took
some heat. He pulled that down, the old eighty six
forty seven. The message seemed clear to just about everybody.
He said, well, I didn't know that it was a
symbol that eighty six meant anything about killing or assassinating.
This is the same guy, by the way, the former
FBI director who spent the early part of his career
prosecuting the Gambino family, the notorious mafia family, my hunches.
You're not buying what he is selling.
Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, of course not. I mean, I mean
I would argue that, you know, it was one might
say it was a veiled threat to eliminate the president.
I would take it a step further, given his background,
his ties to or investigating the mob, you know, and
in eighty six is you know, take you know that
kind of that phrase comes from actually the mob saying
where you you know, take someone eight miles out of
town and you bury him six feet under. So that's
the eighty six. And so for him to say that
he doesn't know what that means is really laughable, if
not just offensive. And so you know, he was escorted,
he got a special ride by the Secret Service to
be questioned, we'll see what comes of it.
Speaker 1: Well, you were, I believe, the first to call for
an investigation. You got exactly that in short order from
the Department of Homeland Security and Secret Service within it.
What do you think will come out of this investigation?
I know there's a difference between hoping what comes out
of this investigation and what will ultimately come out of
this investigation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so as that was happening, I just happened to
come across it. Immediately reached out to my team and
we went ahead and tagged the FBI. So we got
a formal request out on letterhead and sent it to
Secret Service and the FBI, and really cited eighteen USC
eight seventy one and eight seventy five, which is threats
against the President and interstate threats, and so you know,
this is a pretty significant I mean, to threaten the
president of the United States is serious, and especially if
you're someone like Comy, given his background, giving his experience,
and again it's it's hard for him, in my mind
to claim he didn't know what it was, what the
eighty six meant. So you know, I don't want to
get ahead of my of my skiz or ahead of
the investigation. But this should send a chilling message to
anyone and everyone that you can't make these types of
threats against the president, the vice president, a senator, the
Supreme Court justices, a member of Congress, quite frankly, and
you know, words have consequences.
Speaker 1: And so do elections. But the left doesn't seem to
understand that, even though you know they're idle, they're bow
idol in. Barack Obama said the same thing and many
many years ago, the elections have consequences. This is, I
think the the interesting part about all of this. Interesting,
maybe a stretch, and it's not surprising that the usual
suspects on the left and their pals in the accomplice
media sprang to James Comey's defense. What do you make
of their argument that, well, you conservatives, the mega movement,
they just don't understand what eighty six means. You pointed
that out earlier in our conversation. It is indeed a
mafia term. They keep pushing the fact that eighty six
has connotations of getting rid of or removing someone, you know.
They point to a definition, an old timey definition about
eighty six ing someone a drunkard from a bar. When
you have an FBI director with a notorious record like
James Comy and his attempts to as I wrote in
The Federalist, a story published this week, to eighty six
the presidents from office in his first term, it's hard
to imagine him posting this and meaning something other than
the mafia like term we've talked about.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, and imagine for a moment if I
were walking down the beach and I were to post
a similar picture and would have said that about Biden,
or about Obama or about Kamala, the media would have
gone bananas. They would have been calling for my resignation.
You know, there'd be threats against myself and my family.
I mean, this is what the left does. But then
the left immediately circles the wagons and makes excuses for coming.
And keep in mind, this is the same guy that
you know led Operation Crossfire, you know that went after Trump.
They abuse fize and they lied about the Russian collusion.
This is the same FBI that denied that the Hunter
Biden laptop, you know, had anything of relevance on it.
And so I don't think he's a trustworthy individual under
his leadership, They weaponized the Justice Department against the American people.
And now you see him, you know, and he's a
smart guy, you know. I'm sure he thought it out
and realized that there was a secondary definition that he could,
you know, fall back to. But it was a reckless
act and again, in my opinion, he should be held accountable.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll get to that in a moment too. The
history of this guy, But discovery could be problematic for
James Comy as they go through what I hope is
a thorough investigation. Did he email some pals? Did he
have communications with his old professor Palell? You remember that
he leaked information to a Haha boy, this will really
stir up some trouble here. I don't know whatever his motivation,
Maybe it's selling his new book, but there seemed to
be definite intention there. Are you concerned because of what
we've seen from the Secret Service investigations thus far as
it relates to the actual assassination attempt of then candidate
Donald Trump in that field in Butler, Pennsylvania last July,
that has been a suspect investigation in the minds of
a lot of people thus far. You concern that they
may not treat this as seriously as they should.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean there's a lot of good people working
within our agencies. I think what we saw into the
Biden administration was lack of leadership and then an emphasis
on DEI where those individuals that should be in leadership
or you know, kind of taking charge roles actionable roles
were not and they were passed over by individuals that
were so par But that being said, you know, there's
this double standard both with the Justice Department and in
the media. You know, you so you go back to
twenty fifteen, you know, Comy oversaw an investigation to Hillary
Clinton's private email server, classified information on a private server,
and yet fast forward and you've got you know, the
media losing their minds over a signal gate, you know,
with our secretary of Defense. Then you have twenty seventeen.
You know, Comy had, you know, a conversation with Trump
that he leaked information to the press. So again, this
is an individual he's weaponized his role, his government, the
tools that he's had at hand, whether it's the press
or or the law, quite frankly, to kind of achieve
a political end. We saw it when he was in office,
and now you're seeing it out of office. So I
have faith in the leadership that the President has put
in place. Obviously, actions speak louder than words. So we'll
see what happens as we go forward. But look, when
when you're trying to write the ship, whether it's the
Secret Service, the FBI, the Justice Department, and all the
other agencies that had gone awry and woke under Biden,
they have their plate is full. But you know when
we look at say, you know Bondy and what she's doing,
you know, you saw a couple hundred children rescued this
past about ten days ago from a human trafficking child
trafficking sting. So they're working hard. But there this is
you know, this isn't a you know, clean up on
AL five. This is a clean up on a one routine.
And the Trump administration has been working at lightning speed
to correct the wrongs of the past administrations. But we'll see,
you know, you know, it's trust they verify. But we'll
see what happens in this investigation.
Speaker 1: Well, it seems like gasoline on the fire to a
lot of Americans, a lot of Americans who have who
watched Live last July from Butler Pennsylvania, when that assassins
would be assassin's bullet came within a fraction of an
inch of making the President of the United States an
assassinated president of the United States. If something should happen,
God forbid, Is James Comy culpable in your estimation in
terms of the eighty six ing expression, Well, you.
Speaker 2: Know, of course you'd have to, you know, from a
legal standpoint, you know, prove that he incided violence. But
I mean, I think one who is out there inciting
violence should be held accountable. You can't you can't yell
fire and a crowd at theater, and you can't go
on social media and call for the assassination of the
President of the United States. And you know, when you
go back to Butler, Pennsylvania, you know, my mind, that
was a God moment. You know, had Trump not turned
his head ever so slightly, that would have hit him
right in the temple. And so I think it's a
wake up call to Americans that we are truly a
nation under God and that God does watch and at
times intervene in the actions of man. But that being said,
coming back to our world is you know, I want
to know more about the shooter, you know, and his background,
his motivations. You know, did he have help, was he
you know, coached into it? You know, were there those
that were inciting him to violence? Or was he was
he this truly alone wolf? You know, there was certainly
huge lapses and security and breakdowns and communications almost to
the point of looking criminal and conspiratorial. So there's a
lot to unpack there. You know, they didn't have proper overwatch,
meaning a sniper. They didn't have drones and that sort
of thing. So the failings of the Secret Service in
that case are gross, uh again and perhaps even negligent.
But it goes back to under the Biden administration. They
weren't they weren't putting their best forward. You had the
agents that were body men for the president who were
you know, foot and a half two feet shorter than
he was. I mean, at some point there's a there's
a physics that comes into play if you're if you're
a body man guarding an individual. And so again could
just like with this comb investigation, trust but verify, We'll
see what happens as we go forward. You know, I
made the official request, Well can you continue to push
and push and try to hold him accountable. Same thing
goes with Butler Pennsylvania, figuring out what the heck happened there,
making sure that it never happens again.
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Speaker 1: We are a nation under God, but we are filled
with a lot of godless people who are trending more
and more toward violence. Perhaps you've seen the Survey, a
very detailed and academic study on the state of the
rising violence political violence in America. It was in partnership
with Rutgers University, came out last month showed that fifty
five percent of those identifying as members of the left
or liberal leaning believe that it is justified at some
level to assassinate President Donald Trump, to assassinate Elon Musk
and other Trump administration government officials. When James Comy does
this and says, I had no idea about the the
meaning behind eighty six, I thought this was just an
interesting formation of shells. What are we supposed to take
from that? Given how much hatred on the left, the derangement,
the Trump derangement syndrome is out there, knowing that threats
are everywhere. We've seen this in the first opening months
of Trump two point zero, and it portends to get
even worse. James Comy, the FBI, former FBI director, certainly
must understand the iron in which we now live.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I would say that when you look
across the blue cities across our country, that the left
eye is a systemic problem of you know, being they
cite the law when it you know, benefits to them.
That being said, and when you saw the defund the police,
these inflammatory remarks towards our men and women in blue.
When you see individuals on streets again typically in blue city,
sucker punching elderly or people totally unaware, you know, and
those random acts of little violence, small violence, you know,
and nothing's done about it. I mean, so that's setting
the stage and the narrative that that's okay. And now
now you magnify that towards Trump, who's a big personality.
Obviously he's the leader of the free world. I mean,
the idea that anyone that anyone would think that that
would be okay to assassinate your political opponent. Look, it
didn't work in Rome, it didn't work in the British Empire.
It really actually portends the end of an empire when
political violence is manifesting itself through the weaponization of the judiciary,
but also through assassinations. And so I think it's a
wake up call for us in this country to get
back to the rule of law. Justice is supposed to
be blind. It doesn't matter if you're right or left,
Republican or Democrat, black, blue, yellow, white, pink, it doesn't matter.
Justice should be blind. And if we allow the justice
department to be weaponized again, you and I can disagree,
but the same laws to protect you, protect me, the
same laws to protect me protect AOC, etc. And we've
got to get back to that.
Speaker 1: Indeed, our guest today is Congressman Andy Ogles, representing Tennessee's
fighting fifth Congressional District, joining us about James call me
the disgraced former FBI director and what too many Americans
is more than a veiled threat against the forty seventh
president of the United States of America. You raise a
good point, but you know, in the wake of Butler,
Pennsylvania last July, we heard from Joe Biden. At that time,
we heard from Democrats everywhere, We've got to turn down
the temperature, the political temperature in the room. What have
they done, in your estimation to turn down the political temperature,
certainly now that President Trump is into his second term.
Speaker 2: Well, they haven't done anything at all. In fact, you know,
I think some of those members of Congress on the
left have made very reckless statements towards Republicans, towards you know, conservatives.
And again, if I were to make and I'm not
going to call anybody out, but if I were to
make similar comments about them, I would have you know,
the Secret Service probably knocking on my door within you know,
thirty minutes. And so you know, again, actions speak louder
than words. They call for peace, they call for turning
down the temperature, but then they go right out and
they give a speech talk about resistance, and you know,
again calls of violence, albeit veiled. And so it's you know,
it's stark that that survey fifty five percent of those liberals,
you know, think it's okay to assassinate a president in
the United States. But this is a sad commentary as
to where we are in this country. Look, I was
never a fan of President Obama, wasn't a fan of
President Biden. But I never, in any circumstance would have
called for violence again against either of those men or
their family, because that's not who we are as a country,
and we're better than that.
Speaker 1: Is this long pass due that James Comy be held accountable.
I mean, this is a different issue altogether, this Instagram post.
But you mentioned it before. This was the same guy
who led the you know, the bogus investigation, the whole
bogus Russian collusion debacle, the guy who was responsible for
leaking so much information, including confidential information. This is the
sort of stuff that they tried to set up a
prosecution against Donald Trump about you know, it just seems
like he got a big pass even under the Trump administration.
Is it time for Congress to take a look a
closer look at James Comi and his career at the
end of his days at the FBI.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, like you said, you know, in twenty
fifteen you had the investigation of Hillary Clinton and the
private server that seemed to be a huge botched investigation.
Twenty sixteen, you had the Russian collusion operation Crossfire, which
again you had individuals of the intelligence community that were
falsified a letter against President Trump. He leaks information, private
conversations about the president. So is any of it criminal?
I don't know. Is it worthy of an investigation? Absolutely,
But again, at some point you have to determine what
is the greatest priority. You know, they have so much
on their plate, they being you know, the Trump administration
and those that he's put into office. Is Comy worth it?
Before that the Shell incident, the eighty six forty seven,
I would have said probably not because of that, Because
of that incident, because of the incitement of violence, albeit
veiled or I don't know, was it veiled or not.
But I think now he should be put under a
microscope and then quite frankly due to him what he's
done to so many others for political reasons, that he
did for political reasons, let me write.
Speaker 1: It correctly, right, and the examples are myriad. You know,
you're absolutely right when you think about how much of
a mess the Department of Justice has to clean up.
That's why I'm glad to see I'm sure you are
as well, a panel that is devoted to looking into
the weaponization of the Justice Department under Attorney General Pam Bondi,
and we're seeing the fruits of that early on. We
need to see more of that. Accountability has of course
been lacking, and that brings me to the Biden administration
and the former president of the United States. We've learned
some very troubling things in the last twenty four hours
that this former president now has a very very serious
form of prostate cancer that has moved into his bones.
There are some confirmations coming out that his prostate examination
was not included that information in his last round of checkups.
There is concern, and there was concern before we got here,
about a cover up about the capability of Joe Biden
to be the president of the United states. Now that
came long before that disastrous debate nearly a year ago.
What are your thoughts about what we are now learning
the Mia Kulpa tour by the Jake Tappers of the
world trying to get themselves off the hook for participating
in that cover up. What do you think about all
of this?
Speaker 2: Well, know, you know I sounded the alarm on Biden
and his cognitive ability after his State of the Union.
So if you think back lake and Riley, the young
college student who was killed by the illegal obviously there
was an outcry about that. And because of where I
sit in the House chamber, I am literally one of
the first I'm either the first or the second person
that the President greets when they come in. So President
Joe Biden walks into the chamber for a State of
the Union. On his left walking in as he's coming
down the aisle towards the podium is a Democrat. He
immediately turns to me and shakes my hand, And there's
a picture of me leaning over shaking President Biden's hand,
and I'm touching my lapel, And on that lapel was
a simple white button and it had her name Lake
and Riley, and I lean over, and I was a
nice and respectful to the president, mister president, thank you
for being here, or whatever I said. I said, I
want you to take a look at my button, and
it's for Lake and Riley. She was killed by an
illegal and I need you to do something about it.
And I paused, and he looks at me with this
blank stare. He doesn't say anything for a moment or two.
Then he kind of raises his hands and shutters and
he says, oh, I like your button. He was unable
to put together a compound sentence of Hey, I want
you to look at my button and oh, it's got
the name of a dead girl on it. He could
only process the first part of that statement very quickly.
His handlers realized that he and I were having a
very serious conversation, and they whisked him away from me.
And again, it was in that moment, you know, and
I'm not trying to be disrespectful, respectful, but I could
see in his eyes the lights were on, but nobody
was home because he was unable to have a cognit,
you know, a serious conversation with me in that moment
that was unscripted. And so it's no surprise that we
now see the as this tape comes out and he's
unable to complete thoughts, there's muttered words. His aides are
having to help him recall facts or correct the record
all through the interview. That's no surprise to me because
I had a one on one conversation with the man
and he couldn't have a conversation with me at all.
And so and again, it's not surprising that the White
House covered up his medical exam, that they left out parts.
I said, oh, well, he's got a meeting or whatever
their excuse was. Last time I checked. All presidents get
thoroughly poked and prodded because we need to know that
the commander in chief is actually the commander in chief
and whatever his disorder is that was affecting his cognitive
ability most of those cocktails, And to be clear, I'm
not a clinician, don't pretend to be one. Not only
are there a series of medicines that you have to
take and a diet that you have to did here too,
but it also requires a lot of rest. So that
begs the question. Were there periods of time when the
commander in chief was sedated? Was he the one who
signed the pardons, What actions were taken in that White
House under his watch that he he's totally unaware of.
There's an investigation that needs to be had in that
regard and whether or not those pardons, for example, are
even valid.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's exactly what I wanted to get to. You
were referring, of course, before to the Robert her interview.
Axios released those late last week. They basically told us
what we knew, but in more frightening capacity, we could
see with our own eyes just how far gone this
man was, and he was the man who was supposed
to be responsible for running the country. All this talk about,
you know, using the twenty fifth Amendment during the Trump era,
and nothing from the left or from the usual suspects
of the accomplice media on that is. Do you believe
there will be an investigation into the people who were
clearly running the White House when the lights were on
but nobody was there.
Speaker 2: Well, I would certainly hope so, And you know, you
hate to delve into the realm of conspiracy, but I
think they recognized that they had an issue, that they
had a man that was not going to make it
through a second term because of his health. They had
a vice president who was unelectable. Their best shot at
a reelection was Joe Biden, so they had to prop
him up and protect him. And of course, I think
again I'm guessing observation that his decline was much more
rapid than they anticipated, and ultimately he was dropped off
the ballot, and of course the rest is history. Kamala
was not a good candidate. Trump is a fantastic candidate.
He spoke to American people, he had a vision for,
you know, the golden age of America, and the electorate,
you know, rewarded him for it. But that being said,
there needs to be an investigation. I want to know
if he was actually president of the United States. I
want to know what actions are invalid. And then of
course there's some constitutional questions that come into play there
of you know, all right, how do we address those things?
If if we can at all, then how do we
make sure that this never happens again.
Speaker 1: It would seem to me that there is only one
guy that he pardoned that he would know anything about.
And I'm not entirely convinced at this point he still
knew about his own son, his own criminal son that
he pardoned not only for crimes previously committed, but crimes
moving investigations that you know that could prove very difficult
for Hunter Biden. But you talk about there was a
day with I don't remember the number it was, just
it was a record number of pardons in one day,
more pardons issued than any president had over the course
of a term in office. Here too, for this is
some pretty striking stuff going on. And then think about
all of the other issues, and they come up over
and over again, everything from the mass amounts of illegal
immigrants pouring into our borders, the invasion that we saw,
all of these sorts of things. Was this guy who
was supposed to be responsible for all of these things
because he was elected, right, was he actually doing this stuff?
Was he really signing this stuff? Was he leading this stuff?
And I think we've learned that the answer is no.
But just how deep does this go? Well?
Speaker 2: And then you know, you think about my interaction with
President Joe Biden on the House floor as he was
coming in for the State of the Union. Now, imagine
if you're a world leader, and so it's no wonder
that under Joe Biden you saw Iran and their proxies
attack Israel. It's no wonder that Russia was emboldened to
attack Ukraine. It's no wonder that hat fell apart because
the gangs there knew that the police weren't coming to
police being the United States of America. And then you
look at South and Central America, where otherwise pro US
countries have now shifted towards China, in part because they
saw US as weak. Part of it was because of
the Dei nonsense that pushing in religious countries in Central
and South America. So the foreign policy consequences of Biden,
his cognitive ability or inability, and the wokeness that they
were really trying to sell and push around the world.
This is something that President Trump is dealing with and
having to clean up. And but again it gets back
to accountability. Who know who knew what and when and then.
But we also saw it on full display, you know,
when you had and I forget I think they were
in Italy, but President Biden was there with with other
prime ministers and he literally just kind of wanders off
and the other the other prime ministers kind of kind
of pin him in and blocking so he can't wander off,
you know, And if you're in their shoes and you're
looking and say, this is the leader of the free world,
this is the guy that's supposed to have our back. Yeah,
I don't think they were convinced.
Speaker 1: And final question for you on that You look at
the the handlers Joe Biden over the years, from his
spokespeople Jen Bisaki and you know his latest most recent
handler on that front, you talk about the secretary's, the
department heads, the people who ultimately had control over the
twenty fifth Amendment and that decision. Will anybody be held
accountable for what clearly seems to me in absolute cover
up and perhaps the worst cover up we have seen
in this country when it comes to corruption in the
White House.
Speaker 2: We'll see, I would say, if I'm just being candid,
probably not. You know, if anybody made statements under oath,
that obviously is a whole lot easier to prove and
to target legally. But we'll see. I think I have
larger issues with or concerns about any executive orders and pardons,
legal binding documents that the President was signing, And the
question is was he actually signing them? Was he aware
of what was being signed in his name? I understand
that there's an auto pen. I understand that the President
may not sit down and sign two hundred pieces of
paper for pardons, but he's still giving the approval to
use his name on those documents. And I doubt that
Joe Biden was.
Speaker 1: We shall see, We shall see. Thanks to my guest today,
Representative Andy Ogle's Republican Tennessee. You've been listening to another
edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Matt Kittle, Senior
Elections correspondent at the Federalist. We'll be back soon with more.
Until then, stay lovers of freedom. I'm anxious for the
fray