Congressman James Comer: The Media’s Relationship With The DNC 52:12

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Welcome to the Jason in the House podcast. I'm Jason Chaffin. Thanks so much for joining us. I appreciate your time. I think you're really going to enjoy this one because we're going to get to call in and talk to James Comer. You know him as the Oversight Committee Chairman. I used to be the Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, but I remember when I was Chairman, we had a freshman show up, and he was at the very bottom, very front of the

of the dais and turned out to be the next chairman. He was just absolutely superb. When I left, Trey Gowdy took over, but then James Comer went from there. So we're going to call him. Grew up in Kentucky.

But I don't know a whole lot about his background, where he grew up, what he believes, what was life like for him, what did he do professionally before he got to Congress. So we're going to have all those discussions with James Comer. Got some thoughts on the news. And then we're going to highlight the stupid because, as you know,

There's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere. And I look forward to sharing those with you. So let's talk first about the news. The stunning news that came out a number of days ago, the total complete reversal of the Biden administration now suggesting that they need a border wall. Oh, surprise, surprise. Walls work for all the times that Secretary Mayorkas, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris,

The president, the vice president, the Korean John Pierre, the White House spokesperson, all the times they got in our grill and got in our face and lied to us. I mean, they really lied to us. The border is secure. The border is not open. The border is closed. We're going to surge resources and do it with technology. That was all a facade. It was a total, complete fiction and lie.

And over the course of the Biden administration, we have literally had by the hundreds of thousands and now millions of people cross into our country illegally. These are just the ones that we know about. It's drug trafficking. It's human trafficking. It's illegal. It's unfair to everybody else who's trying to do it legally and lawfully. And you know what? They have thrown out all of these incentives, free education, free health care.

We're going to give you a phone. We're going to do all of these things for you. There are more than 80,000 unaccompanied minors, 80,000 minors who came across the border. Who did they go to? Where are they? Who is taking care of them? Nobody has any idea. I bet the stories over the course of time, the crime that will be committed is

The housing resources that it will take to house all of these people, it's just untenable. What's changed? Some of these people now are showing up in New York City and Chicago and Boston and other places where, guess what? Now they're feeling what Texas and Arizona, California, and New Mexico have felt being border states, particularly Texas. Borders work.

Walls work. By the way, a lot of the argument has always been, hey, if you're really, if you're compassionate and you want to, you know, these people are claiming asylum, the proper way, the only way to properly claim asylum is to go to a port of entry. If you don't cross at a port of entry, if you come across the river as you watch on Fox News and you see all the video day after day, the live cams,

If you don't go to a port of entry, the law says you are to be detained and then you are to be deported. That's the current law. Democrats say, oh, we need comprehensive immigration reform. No, we don't. We need to enforce the current law. Go through a port of entry. You can claim asylum and then you'll be dealt with from there. But the drug cartels don't want that. The human traffickers don't want that.

Port of entry means that your good data is going to be collected, that your stuff is going to be screened. That's not the way somebody from the terrorist watch list wants to get across. And by the way, they've scooped up more than 100 of those people along the way. And again, just the ones that we caught. I think it's absolutely, absolutely abysmal. And it is so fundamentally, totally wrong.

All right, now it's time to bring on the stupid because, you know, there's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere. And now we're going to talk about what happened, the stupid stuff that's happening with the Democrats. You know, after they voted to oust Kevin McCarthy, they seem to be shocked and surprised that Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer had their hideaways taken away. Now, let me explain what hideaway is.

If you're in the United States Senate, every senator has their main office. They have committee offices that they can use, but they also have what's called a hideaway. These are small offices that used to be just for a select few. Senators started complaining. Now they all have a hideaway. It's usually a windowless, small room where they can have a private meeting, quite frankly, take a nap. They can do whatever they want.

Crowds don't go there. Their name's not on the door. The media has a tough time figuring out where they are. They can do a whole host of things. It's a hideaway. That's the proper name, and rightfully so.

On the House of Representatives side, there's just a couple hideaways. You had Sam Johnson, who served valiantly, was a prisoner of war for some seven years, had some mobility issues. He passed away a few years ago, but one of the great Americans, period. He was a member of Congress, long-serving member of Congress. They gave him a hideaway close to the floor. It was very difficult for him to get from the floor back to his office and back.

That was proper. There's a hideaway for certain members of leadership. Again, they have official big offices, but they have some smaller offices where they can meet privately. They can not have to go back to their office. And typically it's been afforded. The immediate former Speaker of the House gets one of those offices.

So when Patrick McHenry became the speaker, temporary speaker, the speaker pro tem, just to functionally be able to take care of some administrative things, he is the congressman from North Carolina. He is the chairman of the Financial Services Committee. He's taken on this role. Well, one of the first things he did is he recognized at least staff or somebody, but

Patrick Henry's got the leadership role and he took the leadership there. And he said, OK, Nancy Pelosi, you have to vacate this office because guess what? She's no longer the immediate past speaker of the House. That's now Kevin McCarthy. And so there's a domino effect. So they kind of brought it on themselves. So initially, all the story was, hey,

Why are you kicking Nancy Pelosi out? A lot of people thought, hey, things are already getting better. But nevertheless, when that happened, the consequences, the immediate past Speaker of the House is Kevin McCarthy. So he gets to use that office. And she has to go back to using her current office, her member office. And that's the only office that she has now. That's bringing on the stupid.

All right, now it's time to phone a friend because, like I said, I'm really excited to have this conversation with James Comer, the congressman from Kentucky, chairman of the House Oversight Committee. Let's give him a dial and have a conversation with James Comer. Hello? James Comer, Jason Chaffetz. How are you? I'm doing great. Thank you so much. I know you are so busy because, you know what, I had your job at one point. Yeah, it's...

It's a lot of mouths to feed, a lot of expectations, but I'm very honored and blessed to get to have this job. And I can never feel your shoes, Jason. That's the Kentucky gentleman coming out of you. I do remember...

you know, when you were sitting way down at the bottom of the dais there, you had to turn all the way around. Yeah. All the way around. That's the worst seat in the place. It's like, you have to turn your, you know, crock your head over to the right just to see the witnesses. And then if you're going to talk to the chairman, you have to do pull like a, like a, you know, one 80 to see each other. Yeah. It wasn't desired real estate. I can tell you that. Well, that's what you get when you're a freshman. So yeah. But,

But you had a quick assent to the chairmanship and I did as well. And I love telling Trey Gowdy when I talked to Trey, I said, Trey, yeah, you're like my fourth favorite former chairman of the oversight committee. Everybody loves you and Trey, that's for sure. No, no, no, don't tell him that. Just don't, let's not even tell him that. That's great. All right, so with this Jason on the House podcast, we're not gonna get into the depths of that. We'll touch on a little bit, but I wanna go back to,

Little James Comer, tell us about where were you born? What was life like, the family? Where were you born? I was born in Carthage, Tennessee, which is the hometown of Al Gore. And I grew up in Kentucky. I lived every day of my life in Kentucky, except the first day I was born. My mom happened to be in Tennessee when she went into labor. But my mom and dad lived about eight miles apart.

but one lived in Kentucky and one lived in Tennessee. Both my grandfathers were involved in, in local politics. They were both local party chairs. And my granddad in Tennessee was the, uh, chair was the state representative and he actually represented Carthage. He was Al Gore's state representative. He always hated Al Gore and he hated his father more than he hated the son. But, uh, obviously my family's all Republicans. So I was born there, grew up in, in, uh, uh,

Monroe County, Kentucky, Tompkinsville, Kentucky, a small town. Everybody knows everybody, you know, 10,000 people in the county, 10,000 in the county, less than 3,000 in the town. My dad was a dentist. My grandfather was in the construction business. They owned some farmland, and I fell in love with the farmland. I wanted to do that for my business, so I went to school there.

got a degree in agriculture, became a really large farmer in South Central Kentucky. And, uh, but I always wanted to be in politics. So I ran for state representative when I was 27 and one and pretty much, uh, been in some type of public service ever since. All right. Let's, uh, so let's, let's go way back though. So when you're growing up brothers, sisters, um, were you, were you playing athletics? Were you like a drama guy? Were you a geek? What, what was going on there? I would,

I would love to tell you some great basketball stories, but I'm afraid my buddies from high school will hear this podcast. We'll call you out. Call me out. But I love basketball. That's the sport of choice in Kentucky. I played basketball in high school. I love to tell people, Jason, I was a

I was on the best high school basketball team to ever come out of Monroe County. I was the eighth leading scorer on that team. But the problem is they only had a seven-man rotation. There you go. You're in the top. You're in the top.

Right. Played basketball. I mean, how tall are you? You're not exactly, you know, towering over people. I'm 5'11". My boy's a really good baseball player. He's six feet tall, so he's a lot more athletic than I was. Well, that's good. You know, you pass it on to a generation. So your school that you went to, like...

How many people in the graduating class? Do you remember? Approximately. One public school in the whole county, graduating class of 140. Wow. Top of the class, class officer. I was active in addition to playing basketball. I was a member of the Future Farmers of America. I don't know if you're familiar with that organization. Oh, yeah.

I was actually state president of the Future Farmers of America. So I was pretty active in that organization and, you know, pretty active in high school and things like that. But it's a small town. I grew up in public schools. So I'm a big proponent of public education. So when you were doing the Future Farmers, I mean, your dad was a dentist. Right.

Were you farming too? I mean, did you have a plot of land there? What were you doing? I did. I did. He had a pretty good-sized farm, and I actually showed cattle growing up all through middle school and high school. I showed Charolais cattle. That's a white breed of cattle. I showed all over the United States and doing that. So that was my FFA project was beef cattle. And ironically, when I –

when I graduated from high school, I just really jumped into farming full-time really big and did what every business guy does. I started borrowing money and buying land and leveraging that. And I really accumulated a lot of land. I'm one of the bigger landowners in my home area and didn't really inherit that much. I just did it the old-fashioned way, took risks and

Got a lot of land. I still have a lot of liabilities, still have a lot of farm debt and stuff. But at the end of the day, I think I've had a pretty successful private sector career. So when you're doing the beef as opposed to dairy and you hear some of this discussion going on from these elites in Washington talking about climate change and methane from cows. And I mean, do they even understand what it's like to and how hard that business is?

No. One thing I've learned in a short period of time in Washington, you've got people making decisions, big decisions that affect a lot of industries that have absolutely no idea what they're talking about. And one of the elected office, the elected office that I was before I came to Washington.

Congress was I was statewide commissioner of agriculture at the same time Adam Putnam was in Florida, if you remember. Yeah. And so we were both, you know, in 13 states, we elect our commissioner of agriculture. It's like attorney general and governor and treasurer. It's a statewide constitutional officer. And I met I remember meeting when I first got elected with the EPA in Atlanta.

And they had all these people that were making big decisions affecting agriculture. And they all grew up in Atlanta. None of them had ever even been on a farm. They didn't know anything about... They were coming out with these rules on fertilizer. And you have to have fertilizer to make your hay grow and to make your corn grow, to be able to feed your livestock, much less feed America. And they were making these detrimental rules on fertilizer application. And they didn't even know...

What fertilizer was, they didn't know how it was applied. They didn't know how expensive it was and, you know, just didn't know how much fertilizer you put out per acre. And I mean, but they're making major decisions. Right. And these are bureaucrats that are in charge of important policy fertilizers.

for an industry that they have no idea what the industry is. No, I think that's one of the universal truths. I mean, this is one of the biggest challenges, certainly as you look at the technology sector, look at ag sector. And it's certainly true when you look at things like the Second Amendment. It's amazing to me how many Democrats want to implement gun control. And yet when they start talking about how guns work,

It's obvious they've never fired a gun. They've never owned a gun. They've never been around guns. And yet they want to change the way everybody else deals with guns. That's exactly right. I would go as far as to say one thing that I've learned in the oversight committee, you've got...

A lot of Democrats that were, you know, take Trump's tax returns. They were wanting to release them. They thought there was something there, but they don't know what depreciation is. They don't know what business write offs are. They don't know what 1030 must be must be shady. Yeah.

But they're making tax decisions. They create the tax laws, but they don't know anything about it because all they've ever been is an employee. They've been what you would call a W-2 employee, but yet they want to change the tax code. You've got Ocasio-Cortez and the squad wanting to change the tax code, but they don't understand the tax code. So you've got bureaucrats making decisions and politicians making decisions about industries that they don't know anything about, and agriculture is a prime example.

Yeah. All right. So let's go back here. So you're in high school. You're in the seventh man in the rotation on the basketball team. So your future in the NBA is a little suspect. But did your parents say, hey, look, James, we really want you to go to college? And what was that thought process? When did you decide, hey, yeah, I want to do this, not do this? What did you do? Well,

i always wanted to be in politics too i wanted to be in business i wanted to have a successful business and then get into politics why like where'd that come from well my both my grandfathers were involved in local politics and i just when i was a kid i was the kid that read the newspaper i was the kid that watched crossfire on cnn i remember that yeah got god awful and i did uh

you know i read books i didn't read you know a lot of books but every book i read was was on you know some type of politician president political biography things like that so uh just was really interested in volunteering campaigns i was always active in the college republicans in the local republican party so that's how you know that's what i that's what i wanted to do so obviously i was going to go to college

And I stayed close to home. I went to Western Kentucky University. I graduated in three years and it's a,

I didn't have any college credit when I started. We didn't have stuff like that in that little rural school. We didn't even have a computer or an air conditioner in my high school. And I graduated in 1990. I'm not that old. I guess I'm 51 now. You're getting older. Yeah. I know. I know. But no, I wanted to go to college, and I wanted to get done with college really quickly. And I did, and moved back home, and that's where I've been ever since.

So at some point you met a young lady, right? Yep. How'd that go down? So I've known her all my life. It's funny, talking about this small town, my father and my wife's father graduated from high school together in 1959.

So when I was a senior on the basketball team, my wife was a freshman cheerleader on the basketball, you know, that cheered for the basketball team. So we grew up in the same church, in the same town, in the same school. So after I graduated from college, and she graduated from college, we started dating and we got married. So we've been married 20 years now.

We have three kids, but we've known each other forever. I mean, I've known her her entire life, and I'm two and a half years older than she is. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be right back with more of my conversation with Congressman James Comer right after this.

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Well, good. I hope the grandpas, you know, got along all right. I guess they had to be okay with it moving forward being that close. Yeah, they always liked each other. Okay, so you go to college, you get your degree, and you start borrowing money to acquire this cattle and land, and then you're off to the races from there? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to say it was easy. It's a, they were farming cyclical, you know, there are good years and the bad years. The key to me accumulating what I have was, was through the real estate. And you know, when I bought my first farm and I was actually a senior in college, when I bought my first farm in 1993, I paid $350 an acre for that. And over time I've sold timber off that farm.

I got a tobacco buyout when there was a tobacco program. There was a tobacco buyout. They paid landowners based on the tobacco base you had. I've raised cattle on there. I've raised crops on there. Now I lease it. I lease the hunting. So it's been a very – that first farm was a very good investment. It's cash flowed really well, and I would say that that farm would bring –

at least $5,000 an acre now. So that's how much realist farm real estate is appreciated over the last 30 years. And you can leverage that, you know, I mean, you could leverage that, uh, refinance other loans and use the equity to buy more land. And that's kind of, you read those real estate books, how to get rich in real estate. I kind of,

I'm not rich, but I accumulated what I did kind of that way. Good for you. I had land and using the equity to buy more land. But when you want to pull the trigger, the first political office you ran for was? State representative in the Kentucky General Assembly. And how was that race? Easy for you? Open seat? You take on somebody? What was the deal there? I filed against a Republican in the primary.

He was old and in really bad health. Kind of looked like some of the senators that I've seen. Right. Yeah. And he dropped out on the filing deadline and ran his wife. And it was it was something they used the same signs. His name was Polston and her name was obviously Polston, the last name. So they had their old signs reelect Polston. And it was it was awful because he was an incumbent.

Of course, he wasn't running again, but his wife was running. And the NRA of all groups endorsed my opponent because he was the incumbent they thought. They had the wrong person. I don't know if they thought it was the incumbent running again, but it was his wife.

You know, you want that NRA endorsement. But I worked really hard in that campaign and I got 72 percent, I think. That's impressive. There was no Democrat. And so basically I won the primary in May and I took office the next January. I was 27 when I won and 28 now.

When I took office. And how long did you do that before you decided to run for a different office? Yeah, I was in the General Assembly 11 years. I was unopposed every time after that.

Never had opposition. I don't remember anyone ever... Smart folks there in your part of Kentucky. I wouldn't want to run against you. Yeah, well, the people back home have always been very supportive of me, and I appreciate that. There's no place like home. I say that all the time. But I was there 11 years, and then I ran for commissioner of agriculture because I had a strong agriculture background. That's a statewide office, and I ran in 2011 election cycle. And I was the only Republican...

That won that year in Kentucky, the Democrat won the governor's office, the attorney general's office, the auditor, the treasurer. And and then the Republican won the ag commissioner. And I was the top vote getter on the ticket. So never before had a down ballot Republican won a statewide office when the Republican governor didn't win. Our Republican governor candidate.

Got beat by 250,000 votes, but I won by 250,000 votes. So it was a remarkable crossover, and that kind of launched my –

you know, my, my career to a different level. Wow. I don't know what was going on there, but that swing of 500,000 votes in a statewide, and when you're both on the ballot, um, both with an R next to your name, that that's an incredible. Yeah. Unprecedented. Yeah. Never happened. So, so when you ran for Congress, open seat, we were running against somebody. What was it? Well, there was one little, little hiccup in between. So I was four years. Yeah. And,

Then I could have run for reelection. Fire Commissioner probably would have been unopposed. But it was an open seat for governor. So I actually ran for governor. And there were four Republicans, probably the four best, highest quality Republicans to ever run in a primary in Kentucky. And it was the Supreme Court, the chief judge of the Supreme Court, and then two self funders.

And then me and I came in second. I won 60 out of 120 counties. All four, the other three all won some counties. I won the majority of the counties. It was like the presidential map. You know, it was all red everywhere. But I lost that election by 83 votes. A gubernatorial race, 83 votes. I lost by 83 votes. It's the closest governor's race ever in America from the way I understand it.

And, you know, I was disappointed and it was hard, you know, I mean, I'm from a small town and in my home county, I got 97% of the vote in my county. They had the highest voter turnout in the state out of 120 counties in Kentucky. My little home county had the highest turnout and I got 97% vote. I think that says a lot. My old state house district, I got, you know, 85% of the vote.

And then in the first congressional district, which I now represent, I ran away with that. Well, but I lost. I lost by 83 votes. And then 90 days after that primary, Ed Whitfield, who was my predecessor, announced he wasn't running again.

And he actually dropped out. And I was encouraged by everyone because I ran away with that congressional district in the governor's race and, of course, in the ag race. So I filed for Congress in an open seat, won the primary election.

And with, with, you know, I won the primary by like 45 points or something, and then won the general by probably 50. I was actually on the ballot twice, uh, once to fill out the term. So I started in the lame duck session of 2016, the last eight weeks of that, and then the full term in 2017. So, uh,

That's how I ended up in Congress. That is an amazing journey. What was the lesson you learned when you lost? I mean, you weren't expecting to lose. You had to know it was going to be close. But every other office you'd won, so why not this one? And you get...

Such support from your hometown. And, you know, the problem is your hometown, your county only had 10,000 people. Well, I won 60 counties. If you broke it down by congressional districts, there's six congressional districts in the state. I won four of the six.

And then came in third in the other two. And the other two was Thomas Massey's district, which, you know, just a tea party. Yeah. I can imagine. I got killed up there. That's in that Cincinnati area, which is about four hour drive from my house. And then Louisville. I got killed in Louisville.

That's more of a moderate Republican. So the guy that came in third won the Louisville congressional district. And the guy that ended up winning by 83 votes won Massey's Northern Kentucky district. And I won the rest of the state. I won central Kentucky, Western Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky, and Southern Kentucky. But you know, if you start doing the math, I mean, I got killed in Northern Kentucky. I didn't have enough money to go on TV in that Cincinnati market. And at the, at the end of the day, you asked what I learned, uh,

It's hard to win a statewide race if you're grossly outspent. And I was outspent by biblical proportions in the governor's race.

Well, I can feel your pain there. So you get to Congress. How is it different than what you thought it was going to be like? It's a lot different. When I was in the General Assembly, I made a lot of close relationships. At the end of the session, which didn't last that long, everybody got along. Republicans and Democrats got along. We'd go out to eat. Frankfurt, where the state capital is in Kentucky, is not a big town.

So everybody would go, Republicans and Democrats would go out to eat. We'd have a big time. Nobody had fundraisers or anything like that. You didn't do that in the General Assembly. In fact, you couldn't raise money while the General Assembly was in session. So there was a lot of camaraderie and, you know, just developed a lot of friends that I'm still friends with today. Some of my best friends today are people I served in the Kentucky General Assembly with.

You get to Congress and it's different. Now, you may have had a different experience than I have. And I certainly am close to a lot of people up here. But, you know, I've never I think one time I went out to eat with a Democrat, Joe Cunningham, who Nancy Bates beat. Joe was was grew up in my district. His dad's a friend of mine. So we went out to eat when he first got elected. But, you know, this is the Democrats and Republicans don't.

get along well enough to go out to eat, with me anyway. And then, you know, it's just like every night, everybody goes in a different direction. You have fundraisers. You know, I'm doing a lot of TV now at night and things like that. So it's just a lot different. It's not as folksy and small-town vibe anymore.

As as the Kentucky General Assembly was, it's a whole and the media's got gosh. I mean, Jason, this press corps up here is so biased and unfair. And and it's just that's a battle dealing with that, too. I didn't have to deal with that that badly. Somebody was asking us and it was myself and Trey Gowdy. And, you know, and I remember Trey talking about this.

you know, the big, what's your biggest disappointment? What was the biggest? And I liked the way he phrased it, where he said, listen, the national media. And I think I'd probably put them at the top of the list to these iconic press organizations that, you know, where they have these laudable, you know, democracy dies in darkness and, you know, all the news that's fit to print. Yeah.

I beg to differ. Trey Gowdy used to like to say, you know, that the media in this town, they never met a Republican investigation they ever thought should start. And they never bumped into a Democratic run investigation they ever thought should end.

And I think that's true. It's just the lack of intellectual curiosity that somehow the media at some point, well before me, morphed into an activist organization as opposed to, hey, let's just have the facts and we'll lay them out here for you and you can decide. That's right. You know, in Kentucky, the Associated Press had a good reputation of being fair and balanced. And I came to Washington thinking, well,

The Associated Press will be a good news outlet. I want to develop a relationship with them and work with them. I mean, it's unbelievable, the stuff the Associated Press – I mean, it's like whatever the Democrat National Committee or the White House sends them, they will print. Almost verbatim. If I have bank records saying the Biden family cut a half-million-dollar wire from China –

And I actually have the bank records and release the bank records in a bank memo. And the White House tells the Associated Press that's not true. They wrote they would write Comer alleged he had bank. I mean, it's just like unbelievable what they what they what they write. I mean, so unfair, biased and false. Yeah. The one that's mystifying to me is they will say.

Republicans allege, you know, Biden corruption without any evidence. And then they continue on and like, wait a sec, other than, you know, voicemails, text messages, emails, suspicious activity reports, 20. I mean, the list just goes on and on and on. Right. And, and even,

you know, we're recording this podcast after you did this long, you know, six hour hearing, it won't be out for a number of days, but you know, they still walk away from that saying there's no evidence. Seriously, like where do you come up with this no evidence thing? I mean, any jury in America would have, would have indicted,

this family by now with the bank records, the text messages, the pictures, the sworn testimony, the emails, the bank statements, the bank records, the bank wires, the IRS whistleblower testimony. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. And then just a couple of days ago, we had that wire from Beijing, from the Chinese National to Hunter Biden for a quarter of a million dollars. And the address listed on the wire was Joe Biden's house.

And we released that and I walk out and I'm feeling pretty good. I get a little pep in my step. I think, all right, I've showed this media. And you know what the first question they asked me, they run around me, you know, how they do a little gaggle when you're trying to walk in to vote. They're waiting for you like piranhas, you know, and they swarm you. And they said, so this new evidence you released,

What does it have to do with Joe Biden? And I mean, his home address, his home address. Hunter didn't live there. You know, he did not live there at the time. So, you know, that's odd that it was sent to his home address. But the bottom line is, what did the this was when he was running for president? I mean, is this China collusion? I mean, can you imagine if a Republican candidate for president?

Got a quarter of a million dollar wire for no reason from a Chinese national, what the media would say about that. But as you said, there's no institutional curiosity with how did that quarter of a million dollars created that transaction? Nobody knows. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be right back with more of my conversation with Congressman James Comer right after this.

I think one of the hardest things that I dealt with and that is now in your lap is how to get those subpoenas enforced because it's going to get increasingly difficult. And the deep, dark frustration, like pulling my hair out type of frustration, is the ability to enforce those. And I think Congress really is going to have to self-examine and get a backbone if they're really going to do this

Because you can't just, you know, the way it's set up now, you have to go to the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, which is appointed by President Biden. Right. How do you have an easy solution to that? Because, boy, Trey Gowdy and I just ran into that and it just killed us. Well, we're headed there now with these personal bank records.

And we knew we would because the banks have been pretty cooperative with us on everything else we've subpoenaed. Of course, we were subpoenaing the bank accounts for those shell companies. And now we're subpoenaing the personal bank accounts. And all the wires went first through the shell companies. Then they were dispersed to the nine different Biden family members. So now we're going to try to get those subpoenaed.

those bank accounts. So we followed the eras. We got the era from China, Romania, Uzbekistan, to the shell companies, then to the various different Bidens. Now we want to see if there are eras after that. And that's where the banks have said, we've already been told by the Biden lawyers, do not cooperate with you all. We're going to go to court and all that. So that's one reason we did the impeachment inquiry. And that's what the purpose of the hearing was.

on the impeachment inquiry was, was to establish the basis for impeachment inquiry. And we did that. All three witnesses said that we definitely had established the threshold to go to impeachment inquiry. And they felt like we needed to continue to follow the money and determine what extent Biden was involved in this. Yeah. And again, you know, if it was not just Trump or any Republican that said, hey, don't abide by a duly issued subpoena, right?

I don't think I think it would be ignored. I think they would actually fulfill that request. But, you know, Democrats and Bidens, they Clintons, they all play by different rules. Right. That's exactly right. You know, in the cases that I was working on.

Not only did we issue subpoenas, but then some of these people decided, oh, we'll just go ahead and destroy these documents. And again, no consequence for just destroying the documents. You know, in the IRS case that we looked at, not only did they destroy the documents, the inspector general who came in, TIGDA, you know, the Treasury Inspector General,

went in and looked at it and said they didn't even look for the documents that were under subpoena. So, but again, zero consequence. And this is where I think Republicans have to look in the mirror and Congress has to look in the mirror and say there has to be a more substantive way to

to do this because not only that, you have a national media used to be, I think in the day you'd get shamed into it. They, you know, how could you do this? It'd be shameful to not do it. But now they think it's just part of the game and the, and the, the, the charade and, and it's, you know, it's the Democrats will just look out there and say, there's no evidence.

But when there is the evidence and you need to take the next logical step like you're going to, like you have, first of all, I think you've done a fabulous job. I mean, the amount of time that you've been able to put this together, it's amazing. But Congress has got to figure out how to enforce those subpoenas and give them weight. I agree 100%. And we're seeing that up close and personal as we speak.

Biggest surprises, Chairman? What's that been for you? I mean, the media, that's been the biggest surprise slash disappointment. I really thought that I could go in there and

have credibility i mean i i'm not uh you know i could go into reasons why i thought i would have credibility and all of that and i thought i'm going to work with these media people i'm going to be transparent we're going to answer their questions we're going to bring them in and it doesn't matter they're going to write whatever whatever they whatever their ideology leads them to write or whatever their their their talking points are from the white house or whomever their editors or whatever so that's been a big disappointment the uh

The speed at which we operate.

It's been a big disappointment because it just takes a long time in these congressional investigations. If I request information from the National Archives for the pseudonym emails that Joe Biden used, I expect to get those. Well, now, I mean, it's been over 30 days, and they're saying Obama had 30 days to review them because it was in the Obama administration. Now they're going to let Biden do it.

review him. He needs 30 days. I mean, it's just like everything is stonewalled. Everything's a battle. And I know people in America think that when the chairman of the House Oversight Committee asks for something, people give it to him. And that's not the way it works, but it should. But the obstruction and lack of cooperation from a lot of agencies like the National Archives, the Department of Justice, the FBI, the Secret Service,

the IRS. It's been pretty surprising. And, you know, I went in to this position. I was not a conspiracy theorist, uh, voted to certify the, the election in a district Trump won by 50, but I will tell you that the deep state is real and we have got to get rid of the people at the top in the department of justice and in the, uh,

in the FBI. And, you know, it's I used to say we should hold them accountable in the budget, but I've given up on that. I mean, we've got we just don't have the votes to do that for whatever reason in Congress. It's been a big disappointment, too.

Yeah. You know, I've talked, a lot of people talk about term limits. I'm like, you know, one of the first places you have to start with term limits is on the bureaucracy. Absolutely. If you don't do that, you don't get some turnover here. I remember talking to a cabinet secretary under the Trump administration and

And this cabinet secretary had served in Congress and he totally got it and he understood he stood and he said, you know, the problem is we won and it's great. But now I have to play with the Clinton team like they.

The Clinton-Obama team was still in place. They were still all the bureaucrats. And, you know, 98% of them, it's just not... There's no balance. There's no respect to actually do this and get this done. And I actually, I remember holding a hearing where at least part of the hearing we talked about, you know, the whole idea of email is how quickly you can search and find something. This is not...

The whole idea with technology is that you don't have to go to a bunch of files. Like, how long does it take to type in that email address? Exactly. And look at all the responses. Like, that's the beauty of it. And for them to say, oh, we need 30 for this. And it's just about, it's a game of running out the clock. Yeah, no, I agree. And that's what they're trying to do is stall and stall. And of course, the media came out and said, if the government shut down,

do you fear that the agencies will not work with you to conduct your investigation? I said, heck, they haven't worked with me when it was open. You know, I mean, they're going to use whatever excuse they can use to not

The frustrating thing is Joe Biden, you know, when he got elected, saying he was going to be a uniter, saying he was going to be the most transparent president in history. And he's the least transparent president in history. You know, they've got a war room attacking Jim Jordan and me as we speak. I mean, the tweets they were firing out during the hearing, it's comical.

And, you know, they've got billboards in my district attacking me. They've got social media and digital ads attacking me in the district, which is, I think, helping me, Jason, to be honest with you. But at the end of the day, if they want to make me look bad, turn over the emails and bank records. And if there's nothing there, then I'll look bad.

But they don't want to do that. If you want to make me look bad, just say what you did to get the $20 million from our enemies in China and Romania and Russia. But they can't answer that, Jason. And that's the way they win and make me look bad is if they prove that they didn't do anything wrong. But instead of doing that, they're attacking me and working with their friends in the media to create a narrative that there's no evidence. Right.

Well, again, I think having been the chairman for a few years there, I got to tell you, you got a good staff. You're the right people and doing an incredible job in a record amount of time. I mean, I know it feels like slow and I'm glad that you feel that way.

but if you think about it, you weren't even able to constitute the committee until, you know, middle of January, really. And so January, end of January and look at here we are. So,

Keep going that regard. I can't keep you all night. So I do need to ask you a few rapid questions and then we'll wrap this up. But you've been so generous with your time. So we just do a few questions and I don't care how many hearings you've been through so far in marathon hearings. I don't know that you're properly prepared for this, but we'll give it a go. OK. All right. I'm from Kentucky, Appalachia, Kentucky. So, you know, I talk slow, but I'll do my best.

It doesn't have to be that fast. I'm not Jim Jordan. Just remember that. Nobody lists off things as rapid fire as Jim Jordan. There's nobody that can do it as fast. And,

You've probably seen him on the exercise bike there in the house gym. He's a wrestler. He's just dripping sweat when he works out on that bike. Nobody wants to sit on that exercise bike after Jim's been on it because it's just sopping wet. He does clean it up, but you know. Okay. What was your high school mascot? Falcons. Well, that's legit. What was your first concert you ever attended?

Randy Travis. Man, that's about as solid Kentucky of an answer as it gets. Randy Travis. I'm a redneck. I'm a redneck. You probably couldn't run for ag commissioner if you had somebody else. Legit answer there. What was your first job? Working on the farm. What were you doing? Shovelling square bales of hay.

mainly putting square bells of hay up. That's a hard job, believe me. Oh, I bet. I bet. What about, what do you think about pineapple on pizza?

What do I think about what? Pineapple on pizza. Yes or no? Oh, pineapple on pizza. I don't like it, but my staff does. You got to work on your staff. I just praise them. But now I'm hearing that they're eating pineapple on pizza. That's making me a little highly suspect. My personal staff, my Kentucky staff. Best advice you ever got?

Work hard. Don't take anything for granted and believe in yourself. Good advice. Good advice. Chairman James Comer from the Oversight Committee from Kentucky. I really do appreciate it. I appreciate the work that you're putting in having been there. I know the sacrifice that it takes for you and your family and all the time away and everything else.

And but you know what? You keep doing it with a smile on your face and you're answering every question. And that's just the way it has to get done. And I have nothing but praise for what you're doing and how you're doing it. And I appreciate you joining us on the Jason in the House podcast. Thanks so much, Jason. Appreciate you. All right. That conversation with James Comer. Loved it. Enjoy it. Learn

Learned a lot about him. I didn't know he was such a landowner or dairyman. You know, for doing cattle, I should say. What a good guy. He's just a good guy doing all the right things. And his passion for public service, it shows. He's always got a smile on his face. And very, very appreciative that he would take the time to join us on the Jason in the House podcast. And I hope you found that fun. I would appreciate it if you could rate this podcast.

That would be helpful. And also, you can subscribe to this podcast. I want to remind people you can listen to ad-free with a Fox News podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. And Amazon Prime members can listen to this show ad-free on the Amazon Music app.

Appreciate you joining us. Hope you can join us next week. We got another good, fun, exciting guest who will join us and we'll talk about the news and stupid because there's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere. So join us again next week and thanks for joining us on the Jason in the House podcast.

Jason in the House, the Jason Chaffetz podcast. Dive deeper than the headlines and the party lines as I take on American life, politics and entertainment. Subscribe now on Fox News podcast dot com or wherever you download podcasts.