Live from Music Row Thursday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Congressman Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) to the newsmaker line to discuss term limits and Joe Biden’s cognitive decline.
Leahy: On the newsmaker line our good friend, Congressman Tim Burchett from Knox County and the 2nd Congressional District. Good morning, Congressman Burchett.
Burchett: Hey, good morning. Thanks for having me on.
Leahy: I see you’re causing trouble up there again. In an article in The Hill just earlier this week, a proposal by House Republicans to add term limits for committee chairs and ranking members to House rules if they win back control of the Chamber is getting enthusiastic support from some GOP lawmakers with a side of hesitation. You’re enthusiastically supporting this. Tell us about that.
Burchett: Absolutely. It seems like in Congress, if you stay around long enough, you’re made a chairman, and to me, that’s not a requirement.
And then they don’t, as I like to say, we need to start putting our best players in. If the NFL was Congress, Peyton Manning would still be waiting to get in. (Laughter)
Simon: Well said. Maybe you could make it around six weeks.
Burchett: Yeah, maybe. But when you got somebody up here 70, 80 years old, it’s just the cognitive skills aren’t there. And I mean, if they are, let them play.
But if they’re not … I’ve asked a committee chairman how much money was in a bill, and she looked at me and said, I don’t know. Next question.
Simon: You just mentioned cognitive skills. This is Roger Simon here. It’s something I’ve been wondering about, and you’re up there on the Hill all the time. How come the Democrats never mention a word about Biden’s very obviously challenged cognitive skills?
Burchett: That’s a good question. I can assure you they do when we’re in the gym working out or they’re in the hallways or they’re outside of the committee. They get it.
Simon: I wish you could record that.
Burchett: (Laughter) I wish you could.
Leahy: That would not be the way you do it up there.
Burchett: That’s the way – the Democrats would do it. That would be the way the Democrats would do it.
Leahy: That’s a very good point. Very good.
Burchett: If you remember the State of Union address when he would throw out some red meat to the liberals, something about all our kids are going to be Marxists and they’d all cheer or something.
And then the teleprompter would pop his next line up and he would start saying it as soon as it came up over the applause of his Democrats. And you never do that.
Simon: Well, he was probably scared he wouldn’t be able to read it.
Burchett: Well, that’s part of the problem, I’m sure, but it’s just awful. I’ve had a conversation with him and I hate the term, but in reality, it was just a word salad. It didn’t make any sense. And his handlers realized that he was not making any sense, and they moved him on.
Leahy: When did you have a conversation with him?
Burchett: I’d say, well, it was right after the congressional prayer breakfast. I caught him in the hallway going up the escalator.
Leahy: What was that like? Describe that interaction for us?
Burchett: I was coming out. I didn’t want to leave during his speech because a lot of them did that for President Trump. And I thought that was classless.
And I actually had a call with the head of TVA, but I figured, what the heck, I just skipped that. And then I didn’t want to be rude to the president since I am in the group that actually puts the prayer breakfast on.
So I waited until the president finished, and I scurried on out the door, and I heard this clunk clunk clunk coming up behind me. And I looked and it was this big entourage – of course, Secret Service.
And I was wearing my Carhartt jacket and the Secret Service agent grabbed me, told me, “what are you doing? You’re not supposed to be … get out of here.” And I said, what? And I turned and I showed him my congressional pin.
And then they had, a Secret Service who I knew hollered at the Secret Service agent said, in fact, no, he’s fine. He’s okay. And they turned to me and said, hey, I’m so sorry. And I said, no, you’re doing your job.
You’re supposed to be protecting the president. I get it. And so I just kept on walking. And I usually don’t do this, but I took the escalator.
And as I turned to get on the escalator, lo and behold, there was President Biden just right there. He had his little mask on and everything and his posse was all around him and I said to him, I said, “Mr. President, I don’t agree with a dadgum thing you do, but I try to pray for you every day,” which is true.
And he spoke to me and I could make out the words, but it didn’t go together. There was nothing there. And I’ve told people, I went from anger to pity towards the president because I realized at that point he’s not in control.
Someone else is. And his handler, who is very abrupt and rude but very protected by the president, grabbed him and said something like, you’re not supposed to be here, or something like that, and hustled him on the escalator. And he was five or six ahead of me before I could get on the escalator.
Simon: That’s a tragic story for the United States of America. We could laugh, and if you’re a Republican, say ha ha ha. But this is our country and we used to be the leaders of the free world.
Burchett: Yes, sir. And this is who is the leader of the free world? And it is a very scary proposition for our country and our world right now, because you’re seeing people that are behind the scenes pulling the strings on Ukraine.
And you’ve got this agenda for these electric vehicles and it’s just driving our oil industry out and wrecking our economy to do it. And it’s not saving the environment. It’s a much more toxic soup.
Leahy: If Joe Biden is not calling the shots, who is calling the shots for Joe Biden right now, today?
Burchett: I think it’s a combination. I think you got a chief of staff who listens closely to some of Obama’s people.
Leahy: Is this the Ron Klain guy?
Burchett: Yes, and he’s a hardcore liberal and you can see that agenda in everything that’s out there. And he has the president’s ear and it’s just pathetic. The media ought to call this out.
Obviously, they’re to blame for it. They’re the ones who elected him and they trashed Trump every chance they got. Just constantly and they just keep providing cover, whether it’s for Hunter Biden, which is a huge defense issue with China, and some of these others that he’s been dealing with and his access to the White House.
There are just a lot of things going on right now that are very dangerous. Especially you figure our border right now, they’ve just green-lighted over, I think this month was 200,000-some-odd people that came over.
And we’ve captured over, I think it’s 27 people now on the terrorist watch list. If that was under Trump, can you imagine that headline?
Twenty-seven that we know of on the terrorist watch list. These are people that come in here specifically to do us harm. And you gotta ask yourself, where are the others that they’re not catching?
Listen to the interview:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
