Jackie, the state of Texas is once again taking matters into its own hands, passing a law which makes it a state crime to cross the southern border illegally. That means police in Texas have the ability to arrest people suspected of entering the country illegally. Civil rights groups are already suing over the three day old law. Let's bring in Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick. Lieutenant governor, good to have you with us. So the White House, other Democrats, immigration activists, they're all complaining long and loud about this new law. Listen to what Corrine Jean Pierre said at the last White House briefing.

This is an extreme law that will not and does not make the communities in Texas safer. It just doesn't. This is certainly extreme as we see it, and it is incredibly unfortunate. But this is what we see from particular Republicans trying to dehumanize a group of people who are coming here or some of them trying to migrate here, and they're putting them in harm's way. They're putting them in harm's way.

Lieutenant governor, what do you say in response to that?

I'm tired of her lies, John. I'm tired of this administration's lies. They are saying just the opposite of what's happening. They're the ones that have a policy that is seeing Americans killed by fentanyl. They're the ones who are seeing terrorists cross over our border. We know we've arrested about 300. They're the ones that are responsible for people drowning in the river. They're the ones responsible for women being raped across the border illegally. They're the ones responsible for all of this. And so we passed a law. And in Texas, the lieutenant governor is the president of the Senate. I oversee it. I was very involved in writing this bill with the senators and the governor's office, so I know it well, and we've had enough. So we're saying that we are being invaded, John. Our founders said an invasion by an army. Well, the army we're facing is not the mexican army. Although the mexican president is doing nothing to stem this tide. The army are the cartels. And so we're saying we have a right to grab people who cross the border illegally, arrest them, give them the choice of prison or going back home.

And so we arrest them. We get their fingerprints, we get their photographs. We do the background checks. A magistrate says, you got a choice, go to jail or go home. And if you go home and try to come back again and we catch you, the jail term is going to even be longer. We think we'll win at the Supreme Court because we're being invaded. And we have a right to protect the lives of Texas and american citizens.

Let me just add a little bit of context to that, because the federal government says we have the sole jurisdiction over the border. But Governor Abbot, and you are citing article one, section ten of the Constitution, which says, quote, no state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or contact with another state or with a foreign power or engage in war unless actually invaded or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay. The governor a couple of months ago declared this to be an invasion with a thousand or more gotaways every day. We have no idea about them running across the border and into this country. That would appear to be a clear national security risk. Then that's the basis you say, under which you're enacting this law?

Yeah. John, look, we believe in the constitution more than the president of the United States does. But our founders never envisioned a president who would allow us to be invaded by opening our borders to millions of people. When we say 8 million people have come here in their first three years of the Biden presidency, that's the ones we've apprehended. If you get one out of two, that's 16 million people. John, we are being overrun. Everyone knows it. From McAllen, Texas, to New York City, to Chicago, everybody knows it. This president is cold hearted. He doesn't care about what's happening to american citizens or those coming here. This is something our founders never anticipated. They never thought we'd be invaded by civilians and a drug cartel behind them that's as organized and as powerful, even maybe more so than the mexican army. So we've got to take this stand. We're willing to go to the Supreme Court and say, this is not what our founders envision, because this, and by the way, the reason. 300,000. We're going to break a record in December. He knows he's going to be out of office this time next year.

He knows the democrats are going to go down, and he's trying to stuff every person he can into this country eventually so that they get citizenship and a right to vote. They're already, John, 8 million people who have crossed the border. That would be enough to be the 13th largest state in the country today if they were all in one state.

Yeah. 300,000. What a staggering number. I want to ask you very quickly about this as well, because the state of Texas has had to take matters into its own hands. Again, Chicago put restrictions on busses that were bringing migrants from Texas to that city. So now you're flying them.

You bet. You bet. Because we need to move them on.

To these blue cities.

And these blue know these, quote, we're sanctuaries. Come and be here. Well, until they, we have, I passed a bill to ban sanctuary cities in Texas, but these other cities in these blue states said, no, come here. Well, now they're here. They don't want them. They're sending them elsewhere. We want to put pressure on blue states. But this president is so bad. Not only doesn't he care about a red state like Texas, who has a target on our back from his administration, he doesn't even care about the blue states. He doesn't care what's happening to New York City. He doesn't care about Chicago. He doesn't care about anybody. This is a policy that I said is designed to help take over this country long term. And these people who are coming here, most of them, if they got to a court in a short time, they would not be given asylum because they're mostly single adult males that are coming in. They would be sent back. Almost everyone who goes to court gets sent back. But these people, they get a trial date for 5810 years from now. This is, this is, we're going to put them on planes.

We're going to put them on trains. We're going to put them on busses. We're going to do whatever we can. We're going to get them out of Texas. I want to send them all to Martha's vineyard. I want to send them all to Delaware and Rehoboth. I want to send them all to where they start feeling the pain that our citizens feel on the border and across Texas every day.

Yeah, that notice that Bill Malujan saw that notice to appear, which I think was January 28, 2031, I mean, that was something. Well, we do know that it's a joke. We do know that the secretary of state and the DHS secretary are going to meet with Mexico's president in the days ahead. We'll see if anything comes of it. But they do seem to be getting the message.

Good luck, in a way.

Yeah. All right. Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick of the Great.

We don't trust my orcas.

Good to see you again.

Thank you. Thank you, John. Merry Christmas.

I'm Steve Ducey.

I'm Brian Kilme.

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