Sen. Blackburn on Biden, Roe, the NBA, Title 42 — and Keeping Kids Safe Online

BUCK: As promised, we’re joined right now by Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. Senator, thanks for coming back. Appreciate it.

SEN. BLACKBURN: It is good to be with you! Thank you so much.

BUCK: So, I’m sure you saw President Biden’s speech on the economy just a couple of hours ago. Seemed like a lot of blame deflection, some talking points about lowering prices. Not clear on how they would actually achieve that. What were…? As a legislator, member of U.S. Senate, what are your biggest takeaways, Senator?

SEN. BLACKBURN: Biden does not want to admit that this is his fault, it is his problem. All you have to do is look at what the costs were in 2020 and compare that to now. When you look at a carton of eggs, it’s up 43%. When you look at coffee, it’s up over 140 cents for a pound of coffee beans. When you look at milk, it is up.

When you look at bread, it is up, and it’s going up even more with the situation in Ukraine. Now, why did this not happen under President Donald Trump? It is because we were energy independent, there was a reduction in regulation, we were holding China to account for how they dealt with us on trade and other issues, and other countries knew they needed to be our friend and not our adversaries.

CLAY: Senator, appreciate you coming on. There’s been a lot of talk about the leaked opinion from Justice Alito. In the event that that opinion is accurate and Roe v. Wade is overturned and given the power back to the states, you are in the Senate. Do you think the Senate should have any role then, or do you believe it should just go back to the states and let every state make their own determination?

SEN. BLACKBURN: Clay, what we should do is have the states step forward. This is what conservatives have fought for for years, to see Roe overturned and then to see the issue of regulations and restrictions on abortion go back to the states. Now, are there some areas where the federal government does have some jurisdiction? Of course. When it comes to report language in budget documents, the Hyde Amendment language, the Mexico City policy.

Yes. Those components are there. Making certain that no taxpayer funds are expended for abortion. There’s also the opportunity to do a plussed-up tax credit for expectant moms. Those are areas where the federal government will have a say. But when it comes to the regulations and restrictions, the federal government and federal legislators need to give the states the opportunity to exercise the authority they’ve been asking for and that conservatives have been asking for the states to have for decades.

BUCK: Speaking to Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. Senator, your colleagues — and you, of course — passed a bill to expand security for Supreme Court justices and for their families. There are ongoing protests, very aggressive ones at the homes of these members of the Supreme Court, obviously targeting people based upon perceived political ideology of these justices. So do you think that that is sufficient and what do you think about the DOJ role in enforcing the federal statute that says that you’re not allowed — as a matter of law — to intimidate judges to try to bring about a different outcome?

SEN. BLACKBURN: The federal statute should be enforced, and DOJ should move forward with going out there, rounding up these people that are parading in the streets, blocking the neighborhoods where someone who is a federal — a Supreme Court justice lives. This is against the law. There is a federal statute that is there, 18 USC 1503. People can look it up.

This prohibits this type of using this activity in order to influence the outcome of a judicial decision. So the step we took is an important step. My hope is that the House will join us in this. It is something that Senator Cotton and I had supported last year. We were joined by others on the Republican side of the aisle to provide the type of security that a judge needs. You know, we had a federal judge last year — I think it was about 15 months ago — whose son was shot when he opened the front door of their home, thinking that he was opening the door to a deliveryman and it turned out to be someone who was trying to shoot the judge.

CLAY: Senator, I don’t know if you’ve seen this news. It just came down a little bit earlier today, but I know we’ve had conversations about this with you before as it pertains to the NBA and China. But for people out there who have forgotten, the NBA pulled their All-Star Game out of Charlotte, North Carolina, over a transgender bathroom bill. They now — the NBA, Senator — is going to the UAE, the United Arab Emirates, to play basketball games in the NBA.

The UAE punishes homosexuality with death in some cases. What do you think about these woke corporations that lecture America and will tell us what laws we can and cannot pass here, but then they’ll go overseas to countries where homosexuality is potentially punished by death, show up and play, and not uphold American values at all?

SEN. BLACKBURN: It’s astounding to me to see how these corporations continue to kowtow to the Chinese Communist Party, how they will set aside their beliefs and principles in order to chase the dollar. What they’re looking at is what they perceive to be a lucrative market. And in the interests of profit, they are saying, okay. We will go over here and we will play these games because we think it’s going to be a revenue stream for us.

And look at what has happened in China. They are in Xinjiang where they have their practice academies and they have their facilities and they have Nike merchandise — NBA-licensed merchandise — being made by slave labor. And they say absolutely nothing about any of that other than the Chinese people like basketball. And now you see them moving forward, as you said, a new market, a new opportunity for them to make more money.

So, again, they set aside their beliefs. And they have one set of standards in the U.S., they have another set of standards globally, instead of saying, “We are the NBA from the United States of America, and we’re going to stand against these human rights violations, we’re going to stand against slavery,” which is what they should do. They should be ambassadors for truth and for freedom and for consistency and for pursuing your dreams, and that is not what they choose to do because they’re chasing the profit.

BUCK: Senator Blackburn, in just a couple weeks’ time, Title 42 was set to end at the U.S.-Mexico border, the CDC authority that had been used to turn away pretty large percentage of illegal migrants over the course of the pandemic. A federal judge had temporarily blocked it ,but it seems it’s just a matter of time before it is removed — the Title 42 authority is gone — and then everyone expects a massive surge of illegal crossings at the border. Can you just tell us what are the expectations of people like you in the Senate and what’s gonna happen once that expires?

SEN. BLACKBURN: Once that expires, you’re going to see a rush to the border. Now, the estimate is that we will go from 6,000 illegal crossings a day to 18,000 illegal crossings a day. This is something that has the potential to completely overrun our Border Patrol. What we are aware of is that the cartels…

Having been given a six-week lead time that this was going to happen, the cartels are working globally. They are lining up people from across the globe. Indeed, last year we had people from 160 different countries that showed up at our border to seek asylum. So the cartels are working globally. They are in the process of moving vast numbers of people to the southern border.

Then they are going to begin to move them to the border crossings and push them into U.S. control. Our concern is for the safety of that border. Now, I want you to think about this. When I saw this 18,000 number, I thought, “My goodness. How does this relate to my state of Tennessee?” Well, in the state of Tennessee we have 345 cities and towns. Out of that number, 90% — 90% — are 18,000 or less in population.

I looked up the number when it comes to Illinois. Also there, it was about 90% were 18,000 or less. So you can say you’ve got a typical Tennessee — the population equivalent of a typical Tennessee — town or the equivalent of a typical Illinois town or any other state. I pulled it for just about every state, and that is going to be coming to our southern border for an asylum claim every single day. So the question is, “How long can our Border Patrol sustain this?”

CLAY: Senator, last question for you. I know you’re working on protecting kids online.

SEN. BLACKBURN: Yes.

CLAY: We have seen, certainly in the wake of covid, the overall mental health of children taking a precipitous decline that has been occurring. Really, for basically the rise of social media in general has not been healthy to our overall teenagers’ mental health. What are you trying to do to help protect them?

SEN. BLACKBURN: Yes. Of course I’ve got legislation. I have the Open App Market bill that’s ready to be marked up on the Senate floor, the Kids Online Safety Act that is ready to go through at Senate Commerce Committee. In addition to that, we have pulled together a parents’ guide for a way they can increase the protections for their children online.

You know, Clay, one of the things that we were hearing a good bit about from parents and grandparents was their concern of what children are being exposed to when they are online, whether it be pedophiles and drug dealers and some of the harms that are coming from bullying online. Summer is coming up. We are getting more questions from individuals from this issue.

So my team and I pulled together a guide, and people can get it from us on social media, on our website. This is to help parents and grandparents, caregivers of kids to know how to help those children take that phone, set those privacy guidelines, and be able to more effectively monitor what children are being exposed to when they get online.

BUCK: Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, everybody. Senator, appreciate you. Thanks so much.

SEN. BLACKBURN: You got it. Take care. Bye-bye.