Congressman Doug Collins & The Fight For Americans In Congress 48:02

It's time to take the quiz. Five questions, five minutes a day, five days a week. Take the quiz every weekday at thequiz.fox and then listen to the quiz podcast to find out how you did. Play, share, and of course, listen to the quiz at thequiz.fox. Well, thanks for joining us. I'm Jason Chaffetz and this is the Jason in the House podcast. Thanks so much for joining us. You know, you give up your time, spend a little time sharing some things with us.

I hope you enjoy this. I think you will because we're going to have a good show. Got a few things to talk about. Quick mention of the news. Some stupid because there's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere.

And then we're going to get into it with Doug Collins. Doug Collins, former congressman from the good state of Georgia. I've seen him on Fox News. But I bet there's part of his story, his human story, his real story, his personal story that you didn't know about Doug. And it'll make you love him and like him all the more. It's just a great human being. And we're going to get him on the phone. We're going to dial him up and we're going to have a good conversation with Doug Collins. And I really do think you're going to enjoy it.

But let's kick some things off with the news. Now, I'm fascinated about things that I know aren't true, like Bigfoot. I always think that's pretty cool. You got someone, Bigfoot, I want to see it because I'm the Loch Ness Monster. I'm all over it. I love hearing about those stories. But this one, I don't know what to make of it because there is a person from the military, a self-proclaimed whistleblower,

who's going public with a claim that the United States government has a UFO retrieval program and that they're in possession of an aircraft. Now, from everything I've heard and seen, that's not true. But I'm fascinated to see how this whistleblower, in his experience, how he's vetted in what comes out about this background. Because

You can't, I mean, that's a very specific, I don't want to say credible, but a very specific allegation that our government is holding an aircraft. And I have a hard time believing it's true, but I'm fascinated to find out if it is true or not.

Second thing I wanted to hear about, I wanted to talk about in the news. It happened a little while ago, but the idea that live golf, for those of you that are golfers, I try to become a golfer. I want to become a golfer. Trey Gowdy, John Ratcliffe, these are people I like to golf with. I want to beat them so bad, but

quite frankly they're much better golfers than i am but uh so i do like watching golf uh i like playing golf i think it's a fascinating sport i wish i had started earlier in my life

But the idea that Live Golf, right, which was the Saudi-backed golf group, and there were a lot of big-name players, have merged with the PGA Tour is like, whoa. So we got to look back and then say, is golf better or worse? And I think golf is probably better. The purses are bigger. The stakes are higher. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. There was a lot of animosity between the players, and that's got to sort itself out.

But, you know, it's funny how competition makes things better. It's not always appreciated or liked. But I was a little surprised to read that, whoa, wait, all of a sudden these things are merging together. Wow, that's amazing. And then the other thing in the news, I just wanted to highlight this because when he broke this record, a guy named Jim Hines, he's an Olympic gold medalist.

He's the first man to run 100 meters in under 10 seconds. And he won the gold in the 1968 Summer Olympics. He passed away at the age of 76. And just hats off because that was an amazing thing. Think about when he broke that record. The shoes were not what they are. The socks were not what they are. The training, the stretching, the nutrition. None of that was...

as good as it is today. And for him to break that record and smash that barrier, good for him. It really is truly amazing. But let's transition now, because I want to talk about highlighting the stupid. Because you know what? There's always somebody doing something stupid somewhere. All right.

So as we're going to highlight the stupid, I got to point out this Tennessee woman. She tries to hire a hitman to kill the wife of a man she met online. Now, may I just advise everybody this ain't going to go well. And there's even websites that are set up like hire a hitman and all these stupid things. These are bait sites for law enforcement to go get some truly crazy people. And I got to tell you, it's...

This person in Tennessee, I don't want to give out her name, but arrested in this really bizarre plot. And I just got to highlight, you know what? Let's not be trying to kill wives and other people by hiring hitmen. That's like you've been watching too many movies and maybe you need to get some clinical help.

But that is absolutely crazy, if not downright absolutely stupid. And finally, I want to highlight this 82-year-old German man who received his quote-unquote last warning from the courts. Yeah, we'll see if that's the last warning. He's been arrested for...

for drug dealing for his 26th time. 26 times this guy has been arrested for dealing drugs. And I don't care if you're in your 80s, but you know what? That's probably not a good thing and pretty stupid for you to keep doing it. You're obviously not good at it. You keep getting arrested for it. Let's not be selling drugs because you know what? That ain't a way to make a living, even if you're 82. And that's the stupid.

All right. So I really want to move on now because, again, I served in the Congress with Doug Collins and I'm thrilled to call him up. So let's call Congressman Doug Collins from the great state of Georgia and let's get him on the line.

Doug Collins. Hey, Jason Chaffetz. Jason, what have you been up to, bud? One of my good friends from Congress. You know, I can't say that about a lot of them, but I can about you. Well, I appreciate it, my friend. It's good to hear from you. It's been a while. You're one of my better ones as well, and I can sympathize with that feeling a little bit. Well, I keep seeing you on Fox and keep hearing your voice. We chat and trade text messages here and there.

But I appreciate you joining me on this Jason in the House podcast. Very kind of you. No, I'm glad to. I mean, look, buddy, you've done a great job since you left a little before me. We served together a great deal. But then, I mean, with your books and you got a new book out, I mean, my goodness. I mean, I wrote one book. I'm not sure how you're pumping these things out. Let me know. I think it's Your Beautiful Bride. Is that really where we're at?

Well, I owe all good things to my wife, Julie. Yes. And look, it really is. You know, one of the fun things about going to Congress is that the people you get to meet and

and the families, and you and your family, beautiful family, just wonderful, and doing it for all the right reasons. I think there's some people that get into the gig, and maybe it's for the power, maybe it's because they don't have anything else to do, but a lot of people actually want to move the meter, they're patriotic, they care about the country, and they want to implement good policy, and you were definitely one of those people.

Well, I appreciate that. Yeah, I think that, you know, it's unfortunate, Jason. I think sometimes you saw it while you were there and I saw it while I was there. And I see it now in the last couple of years, especially with different eyes. I think I'm sure you maybe had this experience about 18 months or so, two years after you realize that not everything you say is going to be taken by a comms team. And, you know, said, oh, how could you say that as a member of Congress?

So you can just be honest. And really, I think we've divorced reality in politics. And I think until this country, both Republicans, Democrats, everybody else in between, gets back to the fact that politics is reality, you can't divorce the two to get some magic outcome in politics that you wouldn't get in reality. We've got some bumpy road ahead of us.

Yeah, you know, it's interesting because the body really is a cross section of America. And it's interesting there because you do want to have a difference of opinions and experiences and perspectives. But the lack of debating actual real bills and appropriations, that's just kind of unfortunately the process while I was there just was never like that.

Right. Oh, well, and again, after you left, it got progressively worse under the Democrats. Then for four years, it was, uh,

And now, you know, you're having to overcome that. I know the Republicans are doing as good a job as they could be expected to do right now with as you were there when I was as well. We had one leg of the three. Right. And you just got to be realistic of what you're getting. And again, still fighting over things like the debt ceiling, which is important, but realizing, as you well do.

know that the appropriations, until you actually spend less than you bring in, the debt is irrelevant. You just can't keep, you got to keep raising it because it's irrelevant. Yeah, I love how they keep talking about, well, we've reduced the deficit. I'm like, tell me when it balances, brother. Tell me when it balances. All right. All right. But Doug, before we kind of talk a little bit more philosophically about Congress and all that, I really,

Part of what I try to do is, you know, podcasts are nice because it's a format and a formula to talk about the people that are behind it.

And so I think people have seen you for years, you know, from the Judiciary Committee, Congress, being the chair, all that sort of stuff, being on Fox and whatnot. But I want to go back to how you and I kind of came to know each other. So let's go back to little Doug Collins was born in. And then let's walk me through that.

through the stone ages as a true gen xer yeah one of those who who run outside drink from the water house no i was it's actually pretty wild jason i was born here in gainesville georgia which is where i live it's where i've went all over the world literally but always have come back here to this little peninsula on lake lanier and my dad was a state trooper um my mom worked uh

a little bit with senior care centers when I was, she worked for an agency that helped with what we call Meals on Wheels days, senior day care center. So I got to know that and I came up and got married. I've been married 35 years coming June. - Wait, wait, slow down there, Doug. You blew through your childhood like way too fast. Brothers, sisters, what were you doing? - Yes, yes. It's sort of funny you should mention that 'cause my brother and I are five years apart. I'm the eldest and he's, we're five years apart.

I, of course, with everything that I've been doing, it's been out front. Even though I think a lot of us who are out in the media and out in public places, we like to be by ourselves a lot. Well, my brother teaches school, and we're completely opposite. If you were to see us, he has no desire to be in anywhere. Very quiet life. So I have one brother, but we live sort of by ourselves. It's interesting. I appreciate you asking the question.

my dad moved away from his family. He had to, because back then the Georgia state patrol didn't let state troopers work in the post or the areas where they grew up. So they moved him like 80 miles away, almost about 80, 85 miles away up here to Gainesville. And thus my, you know, my brother and I were born up here. So we, we knew our cousins and we had a lot of, but for the most part, we weren't raised near family. Right.

So it made our little family close. My mom has passed away now. My dad is still with me. But it raised us differently. We depended on each other. And I think that nucleus of the family was very important to a lot of my upbringing as I went forward. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be back with more of my conversation with Congressman Doug Collins right after this.

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So were you playing sports? Were you, you know, shooting crawdads? What were you doing? Were you fishing? What was going on? Well, you know, now I can look back on high school and I was the MVP of every team. I made all the points. Yeah, right. The older you get, the better you work. It's my story. I'm telling it. I played basketball, baseball. I was just like every kid. And the neat thing about it is, and one day I might have this opportunity, and I hope to have to see my grandkids, uh,

and I've got three kids. We'll talk about them later, but I'm in the same neighborhood where I grew up and to see them out playing in the front yard, like we used to do. It was, you knew the season. This is what amazes me today about kids. You could tell the season in my neighborhood by what ball we had in our front yard. And if it was football, it was football, basketball, baseball. And if it's snow down here in North Georgia, which we do get some snow, I mean,

the football had to come out because it was Green Bay. I mean, we thought we were on the frozen tundra. Yeah, you know, being from Utah, I can just tell you, I think that's cute that you all think you had snow. That's just cute. You probably had skiing and snowboarding too, right? Ha ha ha!

No, we just took an old flat dish pan and rolled down the hill. Well, okay. That I buy. That's realistic. All right. I can do it. I mean, look, a big snow for us is six inches. Most about it buys a good dusting we get for the most part. Alta, which was in my congressional district this year, had more than 900 inches of snow. Just to give you a little perspective. I was looking at that this year.

Yeah, I was looking at that this year because I had a chance to go out to Park City and ride up in there last year. And I was just thinking about it because they kept talking about 300 and 400 and 500 inches of snow. I was like, okay. I deviated a little bit. But let's get back to the rough snow of Georgia. It is rough stuff. But you're right. I mean, that's the fun, right? You go out until you're cold. You go out until you're hungry. You go out until it gets dark. Yeah.

And you were tethered to some electronic machine and you got to be friends and have the creativity. Oh, yeah. So when you're going into high school, are you playing sports at that point? I am. I am. I play basketball all the way through high school. Because you are tall. I play baseball.

Played baseball. Left football in junior high. I didn't play any more football after junior high. But played baseball, basketball growing up. And then it was out in the woods. I read somewhere the other day that they talked about, because you and I are very similar generations, that football

Gen X generation, you know, those born and raised in the 70s, 80s kind of time frame. You know, we've got at least one or two scars on us that have a story attached to them. And I am definitely one of those. I got a scar on the back of my knee where we were out hunting with our BB guns down on the farm. And I messed up and I was going under a fence and let the gun go. Oh!

hit back of my leg and the BB grazed down my leg. I,

I never told my mom and dad. I covered it up, didn't let them see it, because if I had done it, my daddy would have got all over me about how to handle that BB gun. I think I was like 10 at the time. But again, those are the kind of things that we did. So I grew up hunting, doing those kind of things, and listening to music and books, and that was my outlet. Because my dad worked a lot, because he'd be in state patrol. We didn't get regular holidays.

So he was always working when everybody else was on holiday. So the music, the radio and books became my outlet. Oh, that's good. So, but you then, so as you turned the corner in high school, because I know you served in the military, tell us about some of the big life decisions you made because you

You know, somewhere along the way, right, you get married, you go to college, you join the military. Explain all that to us. Well, it's like, from one thing, we do have a similarity, not as big, as beautiful as some of the mountains in Utah, I'll grant you that, but we got a lot of old mountain rindy roads up here in North Georgia, where the foothills Appalachian, the Appalachian Trail starts down here where I live.

And my story is like that. I went to college, met Lisa, my bride, while I was in college. She's a little bit older. She had just finished college at Georgia Southern. I was up at North Georgia. We met. At that time, I thought I was going to go straight to law school. Wait a second. Wait a second. Where did you meet?

We met at church actually. Oh, how sweet is that? Yep. We met at church. Okay. And as she loves to say, cause if she listens to this podcast, which she will, I'll have to tell the story. And she tells her, we, she came in July to our, one of our Sunday school classes and I met her, talked to her for a little bit. And then as she says, I didn't call her for two months, which is okay. Not what actually happened. Don't worry. She'll get her turn. We'll get to interview her. She'll get the final word. But yeah, go ahead. And she came back and, um,

We met each other again, but we talked again. And we went out with the Sunday school class, and then we went out on a date. And we had just started really getting to know each other. And she was scheduled to fly to Dallas to take a job with American Airlines for a flight attendant.

And this, we went out on Sunday night after, uh, church, you're supposed to get on the plane, uh, Monday morning. Um, I went on to school cause I was finishing up at North Georgia. I went up to school that morning. And, uh, back then, of course, no cell phones. I was stopped at a pay phone and call her. And she said, I'm not going. Wow. And, um,

You know, the rest is sort of history as far as that goes. She stayed in Gainesville. We got married about a year later, year and a half later. And that's great. Yeah. So it's pretty cool. Well, it's a little better than my story, because when I first met my wife a couple of times, I was.

She says she doesn't even remember. So you could have that going on. So your story is a little more complimentary to you than it is to, anyway, my story. All right. So you start dating. You get married. Now move forward. Now we're both out of college. She's starting, you know, sort of career. We thought I was going to law school. So we got married in June. I was thinking I was going to law school in August. And it happened to be around the time, if most people remember back, remember that show, Jason, L.A. Law? Yeah. Yeah.

Definitely. Definitely. I mean, law school applications went out the roof. I mean, you had doctors going. So I didn't get in where I wanted to go or anywhere close. So I said, well, that didn't work. So I was going to be in business. I went to work for a company and we sort of stumbled around. But there was something special there that I want to bring out here because I had always had the feeling as much as I loved political life, because I did campaigns and stuff back then. I was always involved in law and that's where I thought I was going to go.

But God had a call on my heart and, and it was something I had, I said, well, I'll be in church, God, I'll do whatever you want me to do. Um, but I'm just, you know, not going to be a preacher, so to speak, you know, it's Southern lingo down here. And, um,

And Lisa and I got married. We were working, we did business. We were, you know, we did all the normal, you know, young couple mistakes, buying a trailer, doing all kinds of stuff. And then one Sunday night, uh, we were back at home, my home church is an early nineties. And, um,

we had a singing for some reason, which was normally not really what we had. We had a great group come in and sing. And then that night my pastor got up and he said, I don't know why I'm saying this. He said, but somebody in here is just, you know, you're struggling with something that you know you shouldn't be struggling with. And

Jason, I knew at that moment he was speaking to me. And Joe was a good friend. My pastor was a good friend, but he didn't even realize I was there. And it was just me. And that night I said, this is what I need to be doing. And I answered the call to ministry. I started seminary. We went to a church across town to be a youth pastor while I was getting my master's. And then probably one of the

pivotal events of model our lives occurred up you know and I think even to this day but for the really at that moment um we found out we were pregnant with our first uh child and Jordan uh and again I was working with the company everything was going great I was Pat I was you know youth minister we said okay God I'm doing everything and then in February of 92 uh I was hurrying back from Atlanta I had been working with a group down there to buy some I was in sales

And it was Lisa's last appointment at the doctor, you know, that they were going to do an ultrasound, one more ultrasound. And they said, and I'd missed the other appointments. They said, if you want to come, come. So I rushed out of Atlanta, made it back. I mean, I just barely made it back. And they were doing the ultrasound. And I'm in there looking, and everything was great. And then all of a sudden, the lady stopped. And she said, OK, I'm going to go get the doctor and let him take a look at this, you know, just to take a look.

And I said, you know, I'm a guy. I mean, I'm sitting there saying ultrasound done before. And I looked over at Lisa and Lisa said something's wrong. And I said, what are you talking about? Something's wrong. And she just started crying a little bit. And the doctor came in and began a journey of the next couple of weeks in which we found out my daughter has spina bifida.

which is an open spine and you could see it. And I can remember that night because I hadn't ate lunch because I was trying to get back in time and everything. And I was, I guess I just got weak. They said, you need a Coke. And I said, I gave me a Coke and I just sat down and that was back before the internet. So we didn't really have any knowledge of what does this mean? And back then, you know, that was something that was very, it was very, I mean, nobody even thought she lived for the most part. So we went ahead,

Really interesting point because it really also confirmed for me that God gives life and that he has a purpose and a plan. We had a young lady, a lady taught with Lisa. Lisa was teaching school. I started her teaching career at this time. And she came to Lisa and said, well, and Lisa was telling her about, you know, what was going on. She said, well, you have choices. And Lisa says, well, yeah, we're trying to decide we're going to have the baby in Atlanta. She said, no, no, you have choices. You don't have to do this. And then Lisa looked at her and said, you're talking about my child. You know, this isn't a choice.

And so for me, if anybody ever asked about my, you know, why I'm pro-life, it's very simple. Her name is Jordan and she is 31 years old. She texts me every day. She works full time at the hospital in a job as a receptionist. She still lives with us. She's in a wheelchair. She's never walked. Her first six years of life, we had 30 major surgeries, three of which went over nine hours.

And so that sort of, and there's so much more I could talk about there. I'll just leave it sort of at that. It's just God showed himself in an amazing way. But it was that point that our life changed. I went into the Navy for a time after she was born. I started as a chaplain, my chaplain training, and stayed there for a few years. And

And with her surgeries and the church that I was pastoring at the time, because I got my own church called Chicopee Baptist Church, I had gotten out of the Navy. And that lasted for about six years, 2001 and 2002. I got back in the United States Air Force. In between time, we had two more boys. We had two boys. And that was a difficult decision, Jason, because-

The real weird thing about spina bifida is they say it's not hereditary, but yet if you have a child with spina bifida, your odds of getting one go from one in 2000 to one in a hundred. And so it was, I mean, gut wrenching to have another child. Then Copeland came, he's our oldest and he's getting married by the way, this September. And then our third child was just, God said, you need another one. It was like,

Here you go. And so they grew. And then I went back in the military, stayed at Chickapee until 05. And at that point in time, God was moving me again. And it was back to law school, amazingly. And I went back to law school at age 38, got my law degree. While I was in law school, I got elected to the Georgia House of Representatives.

And because you didn't have enough to do at that point, I guess, you know, one L was one L year was just, you know, and three small kids. I was going home and coach football. You have extra time to just be in the legislature. Yeah. Studying on the bus, driving to Atlanta. I mean, I rode a commuter bus from Gainesville to Atlanta and then caught it back just a full life. But it worked.

And I think it was, you know, it's and after that, I started a law practice, still a chaplain in the Air Force, deployed to Iraq. Here's an interesting one for you and your listeners. In May of 2008, I graduated law school. July of 2008, I took the bar exam. August of 2008, I deployed to Iraq. Right.

Of course. That's the Collins way. I get that. Hey, let's just throw it all in there one time. Found out I passed the bar on Halloween from Iraq in the middle of a war zone. Well, this is why we love your wife, especially. Yeah, she is amazing. Yeah, she is amazing. So you're in the military. You have the law practice. You've

dipped your toe into politics. At what point did you come home and say, honey, you know what? I think I'm going to run for Congress. Laughter

Yeah, that was it. We used to have what we called dinner night at Mama and Daddy's, which is not far from where I sit right now. And it's really interesting. The district was drawn. We had redistricting in 2011, 2012. I was a member of the legislature. And the district was basically drawn around my home up here in North Georgia and 20 counties up here. And

I didn't say this before. Right after Lisa and I first started dating, I actually went to Washington, D.C. for four months and was an intern with Congressman Ed Jenkins, who was one of the lead investigators in the Iran-Contra. He was actually the member who questioned Ali North. Wow.

So it was pretty cool. He's an old country lawyer. And it got my, that sort of, to go back a little bit, that got my taste for it. And it was really interesting. I always thought I might go back. You know, there's always something that I thought about doing. But it opened up. We ran, had a tough race, had a couple of really, you know, good opponents. But it was really hard. We wanted to run off. And then from there on out, it was a very Republican district. And that's how I got to Congress. And it was the kids...

Jordan was right out getting out of high school, and the boys were still in the middle of it. So it was a tough decision because at that time, as you well know, politics is family affairs now because of all the social media. So that was tough on the kids a little bit. They were how old at that point?

I want to say, let's see, let's go back to 12. I guess I should have asked your wife. Yeah, that would have been a better idea. They were middle school, high school. Yeah, but it is tough. You know, having been through that with my kids in that age category, it is tough because you get teachers that say stupid things or, you know, a neighbor or somebody who thinks they're trying to be cute or funny or some people that are just mad. I'm

Oh, yeah.

And she, it really scared her. It really scared her to the point that she didn't like, and I didn't have that happen a lot, but it happened enough that my daughter did not like going out to eat a meal with me. And it's just so sad, you know, I kept saying, no, we'll be okay. I can take care of it. You know, I'm big, I'm six two. I'm, you know, like I can take care of myself, but shouldn't have to deal with that either. And that these are the types of things that I think cause good people to say, no, I don't want to do that. I don't want to run, but yeah.

Yeah, but no, I agree. It was at a crowded field. Like I forget what happened in your first race there. The first race was, it was not overly crowded. We had about the, we had about three by the time qualifying took place, we ended up with about three people in the race. And, and,

It was split. I had a talk show host actually down here who had been on radio forever named Martha Zoller. And she had her kids and my kids were all in school together. We knew each other. And it was, I mean, we were just, it was a normal Republican primary. And, but we, we went to a runoff and,

And we won in the runoff back then. It was only a three-week live-and-die kind of runoff situation down here in Georgia in the middle of summer. I'll tell you, Jay, I don't know if you ever felt this way. By the time it got to the end of that runoff, I was just ready for it to be over. Win or lose, let's decide. Yeah. It's like the old comedian Jerry Clower story. Shoot up here amongst us. One of us has got to have some relief. Yeah.

That's a good way of saying it. Yeah. Yeah. But we did. And we got through it. So for us, it was – and that was when – it was interesting for people to put a perspective on when I ran for Congress and you were there. This was the fiscal cliff time. This was – I had won the seat, and then y'all were headed into the fiscal cliff. And it was the year at 13 in which –

The previous Congress adjourned 10 minutes before the Congress that I started, the 112th, I believe it was, actually started. Yeah. And, you know, because they still didn't have stuff done. And so coming into that time, I see so much. I learned so much from back then. And I know today's many in the conservative movement, Republican Party, however you want to put it, they look back on some of those days and some of the people, the speakers and stuff they don't like, and they're like,

But there was a lot going on then that if they just simply changed the names, removed the narrative, so to speak, you still see a lot of it today. It's the same stuff.

And we're not, this is 13 years into it and we've not got it straight yet. But I learned a lot from those folks back then. Some of that institutional knowledge when I first came in, it wasn't easy, but you know, going back and forth, I know you did that as well, living in my, you know, my office. And, you know, I,

I have a lot of admiration for folks who serve, especially those who want to try and get stuff done. Because for all of that out there in life, people don't understand what you really give up. And you talk about people taking you to restaurants, places like that. I've had so many, and I know you did as well. And then you have people actually have death threats, legit death threats. And it's like,

OK, look, you really need a life. You know, this is you know, this is what we don't want in our society. But but it's real. You're listening to Jason in the House. We'll be back with more of my conversation with Congressman Doug Collins right after this. No, people get a you know, I appreciate the passion. And but when it gets to somebody who's maybe a little off kilter and can't distinguish right and wrong.

We did. I've had three, four different incidents. I think it was where the FBI or Capitol Hill police had to pay a visit. One person actually went to jail, served time for the death threat that he made from us. Fortunately, I'm in Utah. He lived in Florida, but still, I mean, it was just unhinged and you run into that wrong person at the wrong time and it does scare you. It's one of the

One of the bad things that's out there, but nevertheless, so you get in, you're serving, but then you very quickly, I mean, look, I became chairman of the oversight committee after three terms. I think it was the, you know, not very many times that that ever happened in you. You ascended to become the chair of the judiciary committee.

Rank him about the same time. About the same time frame. Yeah, it was interesting, Jason, because I started with you. I always felt like later on when I actually... Yeah, ranking member. Sorry about that. Yeah, the ranking member because I had to go through impeachment and that was just the whole... Right, right. But, you know,

From a faith perspective, it's really interesting because you always look at, and I always go back to try and attach some things to faith. You know, in the scripture, God always prepares you. You know, David just didn't go up and start with Goliath. He started with the line and that, you know, he did things beforehand. And,

I came to Congress, I feel like, in a time in which was being uniquely prepared. Because if you remember at that time, we had Chairman Issa. You were on oversight. You were doing Benghazi. Trey Gowdy was, you know, we're all. And we had Lois Lerner. We had the Hillary Clinton and Benghazi stuff. And we had these huge hearings. I would go over to Foreign Affairs, which is another one of my committees, my first term. And the same stuff was going on over there with Hagel and Clinton and others.

And then, of course, in judiciary, we were having our normal fights. And so I began to be prepared for it. But moving up, but it was different. You did something I think was unique. And I think I tried to look at some of the folks up there and did the same thing. It's finding areas and digging into them.

because you people would be amazed at how many members and i don't say this without love but i just say it honestly they don't dig into much they they go day by day week by week on the calendar you know let's hit this let's take a youtube video here let's but without and and i've used it to say that members are bored because they don't have a passion their offices don't have a passion right and we got into it with judiciary with criminal justice we did with music uh

and intellectual property, and it gave us something to be up there for. So when you step back, like I've stepped back, and you could make some changes, lessons you learned in Congress, that kind of thing, what would be on that list? I think there's several institutional kind of things that you really, you would want to change, but I'm also not Pollyanna enough to think that they will. And that is,

The committees need to be committees. Yeah, they've they've lost. They've lost that. Rarely do you have a subcommittee. It's almost explain that, though. I know what you're saying. Yes, but somebody who's not there explain committees should be committees. I mean, I'm not going to argue against that. No, but what does that mean?

Well, most people always grew up, a lot of people grew up with schoolhouse rock. Here's how a bill becomes a law. The reality is, I think the Republicans in the House are trying to get back to this. They're still a long way from it. But committees is where the bill comes. And we have subcommittees off of the main committee. Subcommittees should be where you have everybody brings an amendment, everybody votes it up and down, you talk about it. I

I was always one that said, if you had a bill, like if I introduced a bill or you introduced a bill, that member ought to be there to actually talk about their bill. They couldn't just- And shockingly, that does not happen, ladies and gentlemen. No, it doesn't.

In fact, I would be venture to say this said I'm going to be high. OK, I'll just do it. Seventy five percent of the bills introduced by members of Congress. The member of Congress would know surface details about the bill, but very little effort. Yeah, they could not. You could ask them how many pages it was and they would struggle. They barely get it. And see, and I came from the state house in Georgia where.

We didn't have staff. If you had bills, which I was governor's floor leader, we actually had, we redid the whole hope scholarship program. You had to know it because you were the one giving the testimony. Right, right, right. And they don't have, that doesn't happen anymore. So folks out there just, that doesn't happen, but we don't, we've now used to start with a markup and subcommittee, and then it would go to a markup and full committee. And then if it passed out a full committee, go to the house, to the rules committee, to the house floor. Nowadays,

And we were seeing this when you were there. We saw it a lot when I was there, especially the Democrats. They're bringing bills that nobody's had a chance to really look at. They come to the committee with no real option to amend them. They go to the floor or to go straight to the floor. And so you miss members actually being able to craft the bills.

different perspectives that they have. And then that's just regular bills. Then you get into appropriations committee and it's even worse. All right. With that, we're going to save for another podcast because we could do a whole blowout on that. I mean,

Here's the point that I totally concur with you about that. I guess I want people to understand there is a quote unquote regular order where a bill comes up. People can offer amendments. You vote it up, you vote it down. But what happens is these continuing resolutions or an omnibus is such that everything's thrown into one big pot and you get one up or down vote, even though there's

Like a thousand plus pages on hundreds of different topics. Almost never do you get a, hey, this is a one topic issue and we're going to have one vote on it. It's like it never works out that way. All right. I want to I'm going to leave it there. Just the essence of the time. There's only like so much space on the Internet. So, yeah.

What I want to do is transition. And I think everybody's understanding. Doug's one of the people that actually dives into policy and understands policy and is passionate and patriotic about it. I appreciate you sharing the stories about your...

your family and those little things that happen in life that end up changing the trajectory of your life. And sometimes it's the hardest things in life that make the best things in life. And, you know, I, my guess is we go out and talk to everybody. Everybody's got this same story. It may not be spina bifida, may not be an accident. Like we had to with my son-in-law, it may not be, you know, maybe drugs, maybe a financial problem, maybe an addiction problem, maybe,

You can't get through life without having to go through some of these hardships, and hopefully it makes you a better person. And I know it's made you and your wife and your family a better person and just a lovely family. And it's just been a thrill to get to know you. But with all that said, Doug Collins, I have to ask you some rapid questions. And I don't know that you've been to enough seminary to actually get through these questions. Okay, I'm just warning you.

It kind of goes like that. Okay. So are you ready? Let's hear it. All right. First concert you ever attended. Um, it was the, uh, Romanics and Six Flags. Wow. All right. Haven't had that before. That's good. What was your high school? What was your high school mascot? Trojans. There were a lot of Trojans in Georgia back in the day. Yeah. And, and what colors were you? Green and white. The green and white Trojans. There you go. Um,

If you could invite, like you said to your wife, Jordan, everybody, and you said, hey, guess what, family? We got somebody special coming over. And you could pick anybody in history that are alive, anybody, to come over, break bread with the Collins family. Who would you invite? Outside of faith, it'd be, I think, Teddy Roosevelt. And why? I'm just fascinated by his life story. He does. Truly remarkable human being.

Yep. And changed the trajectory of the country. I mean, really did. And did, especially for the out West, you know, the more older I've gotten, the more I would love to hunt and be outside his balance of conservatism and, and outdoorsmanship would be one that it's just, it's, it's, it's a model. I'm doing it.

He did. He loved the outdoors. He loved America. And, you know, travel and communication was a little bit different back when he was there. But the guy was a true hunter, too. Yeah, no doubt about it. Fishing or hunting? Which one? Ooh.

That's a tough one because most people do one, they do the other. Yeah. Yeah, I do both. I really can't say I do both. So what's that other thing for Doug Collins? And what I mean by that is if you want to get out, clear your head, just be away from everything. Just forget about all the challenges of the world. What's that one thing that you do? For me, as an example, I like doing wildlife photography. You get out, I'm chasing wild.

some big, you know, a moose. And I have forgotten about the world. I forgot about my phone and I love it. Clears my brain. What, what do you, what's that for you? This may sound funny a little bit. And I love to golf. I love to pun. I love to do all those things. I love to go with my bride to the beach and everything. But the thing that gets me is put me in a room with a book.

Well, you know, I have a new book out. It's called The Puppeteers. Yeah. And see, we didn't even plan that. You know, I just know it's a book. You get bonus points for that, Doug. You fell into that one. I get it. I know it. But it's a book. And not necessarily always the for me, if I really just want to collapse, it's a it's a Tom Clancy book. It's something that is hot and candy. I read it. But yet my mind is.

in the book and it's not you know worrying about my phone as you said or do anything else so for me it would be it would be a book oh that's good pineapple on pizza yes or no

Yes. We were on such a roll. I mean, it was, I didn't up until recently. My wife started putting it on this ham and I said, well, it ain't bad. I didn't say anything about ham. I'm talking about wet pineapples. You're not in Hawaii. You're in Mount Georgia. Come on. Give me a break. All right. We'll let it slide because your military service will let that one slide. But that was definitely the wrong answer. We need to work with you on that one.

All right. Last question for you. Best advice you ever got. I always know why a fence was put up before you move it.

That's interesting. That's a good one. I like that one. I hadn't heard that before. Yeah, I had an old deacon tell me that one time. I was in a deacon's meeting, and here I was, 29, 30-year-old preacher, and I had an older church, and the deacons were 60, 70, 80 years old. And we were looking to change something. I can't even remember what it was now. We were changing a service time. We were doing something. And something was said, and then this gentleman who was supportive said,

And somebody had asked a question about, well, what have we done before? And I had made an offhanded comment about something. Well, it doesn't matter. And he made that comment and I have used it so many times, Jason, over the years, because what he was saying was it's okay to change.

But realize what you're changing was there was is just a possibly thought of as a great decision when it was made is you're making right now. And there could be a reason. And, you know, you know, I think that's we miss that sometimes. It doesn't mean change doesn't need to happen. In fact, a lot of times it does.

But if you've fenced off something, and the reason they did it was because a bull was in there one time, you don't want to be moving that fence. And you've got to know the heart rate. No, that's a good one. I really do appreciate that. You only got one wrong answer, and we'll work with you on that. Otherwise, you scored really well on the test today.

Doug Collins, former Congressman from Georgia and just all around good patriotic person and honored pleasure to know you and interact with you. And thanks for joining us on the Jason in the House podcast.

Jason, it's always good to be with you, my friend. Take care. Well, I cannot thank Doug Collins enough for sharing his story. You can tell he's got a passion and love for the country and, first and foremost, his family. And I appreciate him opening up and telling us a little bit about his family and some of the trials that they've been going through. I think it inspires a lot of people.

Whoa, is he an amazing guy taking on an innumerable numbers of tasks and doing things and accomplishing things. It's really is truly amazing. Hats off to him. And he's just a good friend. So I appreciate him joining us on the Jason and Alice podcast. Hope you can rate this podcast. You could use your help there. Let's rate this thing. I would appreciate it.

And I want to remind people that they can subscribe to it. You can listen 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. Thanks for listening to the Jason in the House podcast. We'll be back with somebody new and exciting next week. You can also go over to foxnewspodcast.com for others. Please rate it, review it, subscribe to it. And we'll see you next week. I'm Jason Chaffetz. This has been Jason in the House.

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