BUCK: Democrats absconding, fleeing from Austin, the state capital of Texas. You had more than 50 of them on private planes leaving their state to jam up the legislative works because they’re not in the majority; so they’re just going to run away and decide that it’s their football and they’re gonna take it home with them. Nobody else is allowed to play with it. No one else is allowed to do any legislation for the people of the state of Texas unless Democrats have a majority. And what is this all about? I mean, we’ll break down what their complaints are.

Clay and I will talk to you in just a moment about why we’re having this problem, what it is that they say is going on here. But you gotta understand, this is all about the narrative, the Democrat narrative. There is a war on voting rights right now. Jim Crow 2.0, suppression of minority votes. They do this to justify the demonization of the right, to drive base turnout — and I would argue because if they lose in 2022 they say Republicans cheated through suppression. And if you think I’m exaggerating, here is Jen Psaki.

PSAKI: Well, thank you for the question. Because he’s very focused on this speech tomorrow, one that he himself wanted to deliver. And he’ll lay out the moral case for why denying the right to vote is a form of suppression and a form of silencing. And how he will use, he will redouble his commitment to using every tool at his disposal to continue to protect the fundamental right of Americans to vote against the onslaught of voter suppression laws based on a dangerous and discredited conspiracy theory that culminated on assault on our Capitol. He’ll call out the greatest irony of the big lie is that no election in our history has met such a high standard. With over 80 judges including those appointed by his predecessor throwing out all challenges.

He’ll also decry efforts to strip the right to vote as authoritarian and anti-American, as — and stand up against the notion that politicians should be allowed to choose their voters or to subvert our system by replacing independent election authorities with partisan ones. And he will highlight the work of the administration against this, the necessity of passing the For the People Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and how we need to work together with civil rights organizations to build as broad a turnout and voter education system to overcome the worst challenge to our democracy since the Civil War. So this is an opportunity for him to make the case.

BUCK: Okay, Clay. “The worst challenge to our democracy since the Civil War.” The Texas voting rights bill at the forefront of this now. Is there any level of crazy that’s too much for them?

CLAY: It is such — and this is just purely historical analysis, right? Don’t even take the political aspect of it. And we’ll get to the political on its most basic level here as we break it down. But the idea for anyone who has studied American history that the biggest threat to American democracy since the Civil War is voting rights bills that are being passed all over the country in multiple, different directions is so transparently false that it is absurdly ridiculous that she would even make that analogy.

Let’s just use several things that have happened since the Civil War as maybe a big jumping-off point. In fact, let’s just use World War II. I would suggest that it was a pretty big threat to democracy when the Nazis — and when we were attacked at Pearl Harbor by the Japanese — when we had to fight a war for the very essence of freedom, I would suggest that maybe just possibly World War II and the Nazis and the Axis powers were a bigger threat to American democracy than what is going on right now. I mean, at its most basic level, this is not true.

And, by the way, we had an election during the Civil War and during World War II. Buck, in 1944 we had an election. In 1864 we had an election. And this whole Jim Crow 2.0 argument, which Joe Biden is going to lay out today, is a lie. It is a flagrant, transparent, without-dispute lie that even the Washington Post, when they look at the Jim Crow 2.0 arguments in their lie detector, they gave it four Pinocchios. It’s not remotely an accurate determination. I’m curious what you think about the politics on this. Why now focus on this voting issue? I mean, ’cause I’m really trying to look at it from a, what are they trying to accomplish here? In July, as the infrastructure bill is out there, as the budget bill is right now in front of committee in the Senate, I really don’t understand. Is this just a big distraction is that people will forget about infrastructure examine the budget bill?

BUCK: Oh, no, it’s —

CLAY: Why do you think this is going on?

BUCK: It’s a three-pronged strategy. This creates a justification for the demonization of the right as racist and therefore not worthy of any — not only bipartisanism — but also you don’t have to respect the system. You actually save the system. This is how Democrats approach it. You save the system by undermining it, when you’re dealing with racist Republicans. That’s the operating theory they have. It drives base turnout for Democrats going into a midterm election year. And as I’ve said, look at what’s happened. In 2016, they said that they didn’t really lose; there was Russia collusion.

CLAY: Four years.

BUCK: In ’20 they won, and now they’re saying that if Trump were to run again, that would be a continuation of the insurrection; so there’s not allowed to be an opposition. I assure you in 2024 or 2022, more imminently, if they lose control of the House the primary argument they will make will not be, “Maybe defund the police was crazy and stupid and we graced it in the most cynical fashion as Democrats, if not in a true ideological fashion,” they’re not gonna say we had the border wide open under Biden because he undid what Trump did to secure the border, they’re not gonna say that inflation is rising, gas prices are setting records for the last decade. They’re not gonna look at any of that, Clay. They’re gonna say, we lost because of racist — and the subtext, of course, white nationalist, insurrectionist Republicans enforcing Jim Crow 2.0 voting laws. As crazy as that is —

CLAY: I understand all that and it’s crazy. I’m just saying, why is it becoming the focus right now in mid-July?

BUCK: What else —

CLAY: Right?

BUCK: — would the focus be? You’re asking a great question, and it’s one, I think, the Democrats would never want to have to answer. What’s the big success? What’s the big success they can point to?

CLAY: Yeah. No. I just think strategically it’s the middle of the summer. If your big swing is voting rights, you are going to — let’s say you get a week worth-of-attention over this. We know it’s not going to pass. We know that the filibuster is not going to suddenly be removed based on what Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin have already said.

Now, maybe you get the attention of a week of the Democrats from the Texas House on the steps of the Senate which, by the way, of the U.S. Capitol, is kind of a funny setup because effectively aren’t they demonstrating the power of a far more aggressive than the filibuster? Right? I mean if you are of the belief that majority rule should always govern, then fleeing your state to stand on the steps of the United States Capitol, it seems like in many ways you’re giving credence to the importance of the filibuster, right? So the logic there — I doubt they’ll even be asked any questions about that. But fleeing your state to avoid being present for a quorum is far more of an aggressive move than demanding 60 votes in the Senate in order for a bill to pass. And so I’m just looking at this, and it doesn’t make any sort of logical sense to me, Buck.

Like let’s pretend we’re playing chess, right? And the smartest politicians like to think of themselves as chess players. Let’s leave aside the fact that it’s totally a ridiculous argument they’re making. I don’t even see how it advances, right now — I can see next year for the midterm how you can make the argument. But in July of 2021 this just seems like a really strange, weird focus to suddenly have.

To avoid a vote, Texas Democrats jet off to DC on privately chartered planes — maskless, unlike all the little people who fly commercial. What a look. https://t.co/fLkcakHKbn

— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) July 12, 2021

BUCK: One thing I do know is you should never assume your opponents are geniuses.

CLAY: That’s accurate.

BUCK: In this case, the Texas Democrat contingent on the plane, which they chartered at a hundred thousand dollars of — two planes, actually — a hundred thousand dollars of taxpayer expense — with I think it was like a 30-pack or something of Busch Light in the background —

CLAY: Miller Lite.

BUCK: Miller Lite. Pardon me. Pardon me. And no masks on, of course, even though they’re under FAA regulation on that plane too. So that’s how seriously they take the virus. We’re talk more about the virus and all that in the seconds hour of the show. But, Clay, the overarching narrative is what they’re trying to play into, which is what Jen Psaki is giving voice to, which is that Republicans effectively Democrats now believe that if they lose an election it’s because racism. That’s it.

CLAY: Of course.

BUCK: If they lose, it’s racism. And anything beyond that they would view as an unacceptable bending of the knee to voter suppression effort.

CLAY: I would even argue, Buck, that the Democrat Party has basically become — it’s not even losing elections — it’s any disagreement with any policy that they put forward is racist. This is how the woke virus has spread to to such an extent that every single thing that they support that anybody else disagrees with the reason why they support it on the other side is racism. That’s where they devolved their entire policy, “Everything is racist.” That’s the Democratic policy now is summed up in three words, “Everything is racist.”