there is a power outage? i have no idea. we have any more? no more. all right. again, smollett going to jail for about five months. that's all for us tonight. tucker carlson is up next. always remember, i'm watters and this is my world. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> tucker: good evening, and welcome to "tucker carlson tonight." last night, we told you the biden administration is funding a number of secret bio labs in ukraine, labs that are conducting experiments on highly dangerous pathogens. that is not a story that has we wanted to do. went back, we did not think it could be true. it's so over-the-top and bizarre. the administration repeatedly and very aggressively denied if they were doing anything like

this. then they attacked anyone who asked questions about it as russia. we foolishly assumed in this one instance, they might be telling the truth, and then out of nowhere, the bite and official in charge of ukraine confirmed the story. toria nuland, the undersecretary of state, casually mentioned in the senate hearing on tuesday that actually, yes, the biden administration does fund a series of bio labs in ukraine, and whatever is in these labs is so dangerous that she is deeply concerned, these materials will fall into the hands of the russian military. now that struck us as a shocking development. once again, not for the first time, what had seemed like a nutty conspiracy theory turned out to be true. toria nuland's testimony raised at least vertical media questions: what exactly are these labs doing with our money and in our name? and why didn't the biden administration secure the contents of these labs before the russians invaded? so far, we haven't received any answer at all to the second

question. we think we're the only ones with even asked it. whoever decided to leave deadly biological material sitting in ukraine as russian troops amassed on the border has not yet admitted. as to the first question, what exactly is going on in these labs? we have gotten several answers, all of them insulting. initially, the administration claimed the labs were designed to help ukrainians fight tuberculosis, as well as various livestock diseases. that is what officials told members of congress. it didn't seem plausible and in fact, it is not plausible. and then come after our show last night, the pentagon released what it nonerotically called a fact sheet designed to make these biolab stories seem small and ridiculous. virtually every news organization in america without exception repeated the administration's claim verbatim with no clarification of any kind. foreign policy magazine ran this version of it, which is identical to many other versions you so if you follow the news today, "fact-check: do d has

worked to -- but these are not, again, in all caps, weapons labs, as russians falsely claims. the official said. okay, so no big deal. this is not actually the story. the pentagon has been doing it since 2005, working with ukrainians to eliminate biological weapons left behind by the soviets. that makes sense. but wait, 2005 was 17 years ago. how long does it take to eliminate soviet bio weapons? 17 years seems like a long time. if you had 17 years and ample funding from congress, you could probably remove and catalog every grain of sand on waikiki beach. and yet, somehow come over that same period, 17 years, the pentagon has not finished moving test tubes from soviet era

freezers. how does that work exactly? how heavy are these bio weapons? do we lack the transportation capacity to get them out of ukraine and bury them in a desert in nevada? when was the pentagon planning to finish this important job? in 20 years? in 50 years? there's also a very obvious question, but not a single reporter asked any of those questions. meanwhile, over at cnn, perhaps where the first expedition did not make sense once you thought about it, offered a new alibi. according to cnn's website, the labs in ukraine existed "secure old soviet weapons," okay, secure, not eliminate. which raises the question, what does it mean to secure a bio weapon? and again, why has it taken 17 years to do it? and by the way, if these are really just old soviet weapons, why is toria nuland so worried they will wind up in the hands of old soviets? who presumably already have these very same weapons. probably don't need more.

it's absurd, when you think about it. so don't think about it. and that was the point of today's coverage of the biden administration secret ukrainian biolab spirit stop thinking about it. start accepting what they tell you at face value, otherwise you are an agent of russia. here is cnn. >> the foreboding music, biohazard warnings. this russian state media footage from 2015 came to show america running facilities in ukraine in georgia that caused deadly outbreaks and killed local livestock spirit of the story is false, but it has not stopped it to circulate, evolving from bios to biological weapons. a key part of russia's disinformation campaign justifying the invasion of ukraine. several years ago, in 2020, the united states issued a statement to "set the record straight," explaining the facilities are in

fact for vaccine development and to report outbreaks caused by dangerous pathogens before they pose security or stability threats. >> tucker: these claims were debunked several years ago. these facilities work on vaccines and reporting outbreaks. than they play russian propaganda. the point is, anyone who asks questions about this is repeating russian propaganda. got it? and the truth is, we are not interested in what russian propagandists they about these ukrainian biolab's. we are not interested in what the propagandists at cnn say about these biolab's. we are americans, so we would like and in fact we think we have a right to demand the biden administration answer simple, straightforward questions, important enough to make toria nuland very nervous. but why? we don't know. they won't answer. so instead we did some digging ourselves to see what we could find it here is what we came up with. the day after russia invaded ukraine, robert pope, the man who heads the cooperative threat

reduction program at dod, sat for an interview with the website bulletin of the atomic scientists. hope is in charge of limiting soviet era bio weapon so he knows a lot about the subject, may be more than anyone else, but it turns out that not all of these soviet weapons are being destroyed or even secured, and pope acknowledge that in the interview. which apparently cnn did not see. according to his interview, pope said the labs "may hold pathogen strains left over from the soviet bio weapons program, preserved in freezers for research purposes." pope said that "scientists, being scientists, it wouldn't surprise me at some of these strain collections in some of the laboratories still have pathogen strains that go all the way back to the origins of that program." in other words, because as five put it, scientists are scientists, they do not want to destroy all the bio weapons and instead are using them to conduct new bio weapons research. that is what he said. and not just on strains left

over from the soviet union. the second line. in fact, the u.s. embassy in in "angle" has acknowledged joint ukrainian and american research on other pathogens, such as hemorrhagic fever virus. apparently, there's a lot of this going on in ukraine funded by the united states. did you know that? why ukraine? we don't know, we can only guess. we do know that in 2010, the u.s. government helped fund the construction of brand-new level three biolab in odesa, ukraine. the purpose of that lab was not to eliminate or secure aging soviet weapons, no, that lab was designed for research on new and "especially dangerous pathogens." in ukraine, the poorest country in europe. again, not a hotbed of biomedical research. why ukraine? we don't know. someone should find out. we do know that the pentagon talking points use are reported as fact on television today and last night were an underline. did the reporters who repeated those talking points verbatim

know they were a live? maybe they did. on the other hand, how would they know? they did not bother to do any reporting whatsoever. they got a text from some biden administration flak and just read it on the air like it was true. you shouldn't be surprised because that is what they do. and it's possible they are afraid not to do that. they know if they stray from the script, the white house has written for them, they will be denounced from the briefing room as pools of putin. here is biden's publicist doing the very same thing today. >> the main issue that prompted my twitter thread yesterday was that russia has a history also of inventing outright lies like this, which is the suggestion that the united states has a chemical and biological weapons program, or ukraine does, that they are operating. russia is the one, is the country that has a chemical and biological weapons program, so the objective was to make clear the inaccuracy of the information, the misinformation

they were trying to put out, make clear that they not only have the capacity, they have a history of using chemical and biological weapons, and that in this moment, we should have our eyes open. >> tucker: yeah. but no one denies that. that's the thing. no one denies russia has a can bio program, that's bad. no one denies that russia lies, of course, and has for a long time. that russian propaganda is absolutely real, of course. that's not up for debate. that's all true. the question is, why is the united states funding these biolabs that are not doing anything close to what the pentagon claims they are doing? why is the white house press secretary, from the podium, contradicting what the director of the pentagon's bio weapons control program has already admitted is true? why is she doing that, and how should we feel about all of this? insulted, but also very concerned. there is absolutely a story here, a story that matters. clearly. that is why they are lying about

it. glenn greenwald is an independent journalist and his work is on sub stack and he is an expert on detecting deception and explain what it means, we are grateful to have him joining us now. glenn, thanks for coming on. i guess the first and most obvious question is, this is kind of a blockbuster story. i have no idea what it means or where it goes, but it is clearly a case where the u.s. government has been lying and amounting a disinformation campaign, if you will, to cover up what it is doing and no one in the press corps seems interested in finding out what is at the bottom of this. why is that? >> right, so first of all, like you, i have heard the russian and chinese accusations for weeks that the united states is partnering with ukraine to have biolabs right on the other side of the russian border and never talked about it because there was never any evidence for it. i don't take the words of the russians were chinese. >> tucker: exactly. >> that was when vic toria nuland went before the senate and marco rubio asked her, are there biological and chemical weapon programs in ukraine

expecting her? even set i only have a minute, heard her say no, of course not, so he could claim it was debunked but she didn't say no, in fact, she acknowledged exactly what you just went through, not only are there labs, but they are so dangerous with whatever's in them that they are deeply concerned with falling into russian hands. the other point is any russian journalist that comes on the air and can state these concerns are false or a byproduct of disinformation, like journalists have been doing under the guise of fact-checking, is not telling the truth. all they know is the pentagon denies it. the cia tells them it is not true, then they conflate that with proven fact, which is the number one problem in journalism that we are seeing very pervasively in this war. >> tucker: it is so shameful that anybody deployed as a reporter would do something liky actual reporting whatsoever or even bothering to learn about the subject, and then to scold anyone for asking legitimate questions. so here is the problem i have with it. government does things that are

secret. we don't always know what they are. may be some cases that is legitimate. but american citizens who ask honest questions as tools of russia, seems so far out-of-bounds i am worried this is being established as a precedent. >> well, as we know, this has been going on for five or six years, that anybody who questions the predominant mainstream narrative from the media and democratic party are tools of vladimir putin, kremlin agents, sympathizers for moscow. this has been their tactic forever and obviously it has escalated now, but the one point i want to make, tucker, when the government comes out and emphatically denies they have biological weapons and we know they are not telling the truth, remember the anthrax attacks right after 9/11? they were incredibly terrifying because of how weaponized they were. first the government said it was from al qaeda, then they said --

a scientist who cultivated these weaponized strains of anthrax and deploy them on u.s. soil. we know they did the same thing with the coronavirus, where they manipulated the coronavirus to become more lethal and contagious. they claim those are not biological weapons because inside their brain, they are intentioned not to use them, just to study them, but the things they are making are exactly the same as what you would make if you were to make biological weapons, and you have to be so careful to understand what they mean when they deny they have these. >> tucker: last question, maybe you don't need the answer, but why ukraine? of all the countries he would conduct this kind of research in this one, you would pick one with a solid medical interest russia, germany or israel or some place with first-class scientific research going on, do not pick ukraine, why ukraine? >> unless you viewed russia as your primary threat, unless you wanted to be provocative toward the russians, unless you wanted to be in ukraine developing all sorts of weapons as we clearly have been. we have been flooding that country with lethal arms for

five or six years, so clearly there is an intention for the united states to be heavily involved in ukraine. the russians say their motive is to be threatening at provocative. the united states denies that, but they have their technicals in ukraine and have for many years, all the time, which is ae narrative that has been lacking. >> tucker: it is fair to ask what they have been doing in ukraine, why are all of their kids working at ukrainian companies, what is going on here? glenn greenwald, i appreciate you coming out tonight. thank you. >> thanks, tucker. ♪ ♪ >> tucker: i want to bring in fox news alert, satellite pictures come apparently be russian convoy stalled outside the capital city is dispersing e morning ukraine time here for more on what is happening, we have moved to lucas tomlinson of fox news who is still in ukraine for us and we are glad he is. lucas, what do you see? >> tucker, for over a week, the pentagon has said that the long russian convoy, they said it was actually 40 miles long, if you could believe that, was stalled outside the capitol. today, u.s. satellite company

max r says it is dispersed, don't know exactly where all of those vehicles and tanks went, no longer the capital, this is what ukrainian forces did after it left and they went on the offensive. [explosion] >> about 50 miles northwest of the capital, appear to this russian column of tanks and vehicles drove into another ambush. this unit looks prestaged, like they fired as soon as there is a russian vehicles went into what is called the kill zone, you see these russian tanks all bunched up. officials i spoke to said these are very poor tactics and speaks volumes about the russian military strategy here in ukraine. russian trained forces all bunched up in their tanks walking straight into this ambush. a very similar scene in eastern ukraine. excuse me, east of the capital, as well come about 15 miles

east, another russian armored column. artillery units can fire from the capital and crushing these russian tanks. now tucker, five cities around ukraine are still surrounded by russian forces, including, increasingly, the road to the capital were russian forces are setting their troops but it is worth saying that over two weeks since the russian invasion, the russians have failed to take the capital and president zelenskyy is still firmly in charge. tucker? >> tucker: lucas tomlinson from ukraine for us tonight, thanks so much for that. so, you are hearing lawmakers in washington, you have for a week, the calls are increasing for a no-fly zone over ukraine. case in point, congresswoman leah salazar of florida, a member of the republican party just endorsed this idea. she was honest enough to acknowledge this could easily cause world war iii, a direct war between the united states and russia, but she said it is worth it anyway, watch. >> do you support a no-fly zone

in ukraine? >> i support everything that has to do with punishing vladimir putin and helping ukraine. >> wouldn't that mean direct conventional warfare with russia? >> i don't know what it would mean but you know freedom is not free. >> you don't know what a no-fly zone would mean? have to shoot down russian planes? >> of course. >> tucker: we are grateful for the reporting on that, too too fewer reporters have asked. congresswoman salazar has been one of the loudest voices in the congress pushing for open borders into this country. if we should get into a hot war with russia to protect the borders of ukraine. so far, the binding and administration has refused to implement a no-fly zone, making some cnn anchors very, very angry. today, one cnn personality grow they fight grilled a biden administration official on why we aren't yet shooting down russian planes. watch. >> hold them accountable but not stop them because they are continuing here. why won't the u.s. shoot down

the planes that are bombing hospitals? >> we are providing our ukrainian partners with what they need to engage in self defense, and you have seen the effectiveness of that strategy. the russian war effort really has been stalled. president putin has severely miscalculated. if he thought he would roll into ukraine, not find any resistance, clearly he was wrong. >> tucker: so, the reckless guy in hair spray who has no idea what he is talking about drilling the biden official that has never once told the truth on camera. no wonder nobody watches that channel. joe kent is a former member of the army special forces, he is running for congress as a republican in the state of washington and we're happy to have them join us tonight. thanks so much for coming on. i hope no one is going to call you a russian stooge. you have left a lot that is dear to you on the battlefield. i'm wondering how you assess, given your experience in the u.s. military, these calls for a no-fly zone. >> well, i think it is extremely

reckless, tucker, because a no-fly zone against a country like russia that has a developed surface to air capability and air force, that is an act of war. within minutes, we would be in a shooting contest with russia and that would trigger essentially world war iii, it's extreme the reckless. there were some calls earlier from so-called national security experts for a limited no-fly zone. there is no such thing as a limited no-fly zone, that's like halfway being at war. this is combined with the pattern of reckless talk we have seen from members of congress, members of the senate, lindsey graham calling for an assassination of vladimir putin. what all the representatives who are very passionate about us going to war need to do is they need to go back to their districts and they need to sell it to their constituents, and then demand a war powers vote, demand and actual constitutional vote on going to war and sell the american people, tell us what we are going to be asked to do, to send our sons and daughters off to the blood lands of eastern europe, or if we keep halfway provoking this conflict with billions of dollars of arms and aides going to be ukrainians and cheering the ukrainians on

as they are slaughtered, then we have to tell the american people, hey, this is likely going to result in the russians going right into the arms of the chinese communist party and then the chinese communist party is going to challenge our status as the prime reserve currency holder and open up a new front in the economic war that they are already waging on our country. we need clarity and honesty from our lawmakers, not reckless talk. >> tucker: i've got to agree with that. after watching the pure recklessness of our leadership, the biden administration and a lot of republicans, who is going to buy our debt going forward? if people start buying our debt, like, it all ends. but let me ask you this question. the pictures on tv and the suffering of ukraine are real, some of them are incredibly heart-wrenching. it is not the only suffering in the world but it is real suffering. the argument from limited people like maria salazar, people are suffering, we have to commit arms. you have been in a conflict first hand, does our committing arms necessarily relieve the suffering on the ground?

that is their assumption. is it true? >> no, not whatsoever, no. this whole idea, number one, that we have a responsibility to protect every single human tragedy occurring is absently ridiculous on its promise. that is the case, we need to reinstate the draft, again sell it to the american people, because there's a lot of horrible human tragedies taking place throughout the world, but us simply adding arms to this, especially in a conflict like this, when we are cheering on the ukrainians and telling them, hey, we will send you some arms, we are leading them on and making them believe that someday, the american and western calvary is coming to save them, so they are going to continue to blow off any kind of negotiation, they are not going to take that process seriously, they're going to continue to be slaughtered, and this will drag on for years, at least, until they are fought to some form of a stalemate. i'm calling for lawmakers to be pragmatic, recognize the world as it is, let's try to cut a deal that stops the bloodshed and brings russia back into our orbit as much as we possibly

can -- i know that is not 100% realistic, but we need to pull them away from the chinese communist party. we have to think what is best on the ground for people to alleviate the suffering, but also what is best for our country in terms of the broader strategic picture. we need to stop playing on these hit pieces from the media and on silly emotions and think like an actual, rational adults that are putting our country first. >> tucker: oh, rational adults. i remember when toria nuland told us we were going to improve the lives of the iraqi people and she has never apologized for that. joe kent, i appreciate the clarity of your thinking and your willingness to say it. thank you. >> thank you, tucker. >> tucker: fox news alert, the biden administration deployed its foremost foreign policy expert to eastern europe, a very tense situation there tonight, as we have told you, but rest easy. kamala harris is on the scene to calm tensions, to bring a wise, measured perspective to this powder keg. harris just held a joint s conference with the president of

poland. at that event, harris was asked about the refugee crisis in ukraine. watch how she responded. >> is the united states willing to make a specific allocation for ukrainian refugees? and for president judah, i wanted to know if you think and if you ask the united states specifically to accept more refugees? >> okay. [laughter] a friend in need is a friend indeed. [laughter] >> okay. >> tucker: yeah. it's pretty funny. more than a million people fleeing in the wake of an invasion and you, kamala harris, incited, certainly failed to diffuse, made much more likely, recklessness, and then you laugh about it. that's who she is. so, jussie smollett was just sentenced for faking a

hate crime. it was a hoax. wait until you hear what the sentence was. that is straight ahead. ♪ ♪

>> tucker: so it is time to wrap up the jussie smollett saga. smollett was in court today, being sentenced in chicago. he was convicted, as you well know, of staging a fake hate crime, blaming trump voters after he paid people to assault him. this afternoon, his family cited the war in ukraine as well as covid as reasons jussie smollett should receive a light sentence. did it work? fox matt finn is covering in chicago, hey, matt. >> hi, tucker. a short while ago, jussie smollett reelected in court, standing up and shouting after he was sentenced to 150 days in jail. here is jussie smollett moments ago in court. >> you will spend the first 150 days of your sentence in the cook county jail, and that will

start today, right here right now. >> i am not suicidal. >> okay. >> i am not suicidal. i am innocent. if i had -- black americans in this country for over 400 years in this country and the lgbt community and if anything happens, i did not do it to myself, and you must all know that. i am not suicidal. i am not suicidal! and i am innocent. i could have said that i was guilty a long time ago. >> judge james lynn roasted smollett just before he sentenced him to 150 days in jail. judge lynn told five that's be 25's name has become an adverb for lion, pulling jussie, that he can think of anything worse than that. also telling to be 25 his his hypocrisy is astounding.

his family is known for social justice work. a profound the arrogant side. four -- extreme premeditation. painter real hate crime victims. damage to the city of chicago and the judge says smollett lied and perjured himself on the stand for hours and hours. speech when he smollett's -- smollett's defense team immediately asked for the sentence to be overturned and the judge immediately denies saying the wheels of justice are turning. tucker? >> tucker: it is also great. matt finn for us from chicago. so jussie smollett is worried he is going to get epstein ad while in jail. did he offend the clinton somehow? not that we know of, we will watch the story carefully. in 2019 when this whole thing began, a lot of people had

doubts jussie smollett was in fact attacked by racist trump voters. shut up he said, anyone who doubts his story is a bigot. remember? >> if i had said it was a muslim or a mexican or someone black, i feel like the doubters would have supported me a lot much more, a lot more. and that says a lot about the place that we are in our country right now. the fact that we have these fearmongers, these people that are trying to separate us, and it's just not okay. >> tucker: the greatest clip ever. first year of jussie smollett attacking the fear mongrels, not the purebred deer people but the fear mongrels. then you have robin roberts, .jason whitlock watch the whole thing, and we are happy to have them tonight.

concerns for jussie's safety, do you think is going to get epsteined in jail? >> no, i don't think he is going to get epsteined. i don't know whether to laugh or cry at this, tucker. all of my ideas and thoughts. jussie smollett may be crazy like a fox, and i say that because he certainly has mental issues, what the judge said about his narcissism and the dark side to him, he certainly has it, but may be nutty display today was actually a play that he does these 150 days inside a psych ward or mental hospital that he think he will be safer, but then on a more serious side and a more, like, a thought that ran for my mind, so many people from jesse jackson to the naacp to so many people in the elite so-called civil rights movement, social justice

movement, attached their credibility to that guy. a narcissist with a dark side who did something really heinous here, who clearly is starved for attention. they attached so much of their credibility to him, i felt like what we just saw from jussie when his sentence was rendered was like that movement, the social justice warrior movement, the civil rights movement, were these the death throes or jesse jackson, al sharpton, the naacp, because i'm just not sure how you attach your credibility to that guy, and he makes a clown out of himself and you, i don't know how you survived that. >> tucker: what's interesting is they left to his defense, he is not oppressed, he is the opposite of a price on a highly paid actor and a famous guy. you know, it's just interest income they identify with him. the most powerful people in our society pose as victims, here is one and they are all over it,

backing up his story. what does it tell you? >> well, the judge pointed it out i thought brilliantly. he took 30-40 minutes unpacking his decision here, and basically -- like, jussie smollett comes from privilege. a great family that supported him tremendously, and that is why -- this is inexcusable. this isn't a crime of premeditation. i mean, this isn't a crime of opportunity, this is a crime of premeditation. you actually thought about this, and given your family background and history, that is really heinous that you thought about playing a game with a race crime when your family seems so invested in protecting people from race crimes. i just -- tucker, i never promote my show but people need to watch me tomorrow on "fearless with jason whitlock" because i can't wait to unpack all of it. this was the craziest thing i've ever seen in a courtroom, and on

tv. i'm just blown away by the acting display and the nutty display from jussie smollett, and i feel sorry for all of the idiots that leapt to his defense and were crying for mercy. this is a bad day for the grievance industrial complex. >> tucker: it is pure i wonder if it is friend kamala harris has weighed in. i will say -- >> statue just toppled. >> tucker: committed as an actor. jason whitlock, we appreciate you coming on. we will watch "fearless" tomorrow. thank you. >> thank you. >> tucker: so politicians in washington are telling us economic sanctions are all good. they hurt putin, they do not hurt us. but what if sanctions against putin had no real effect on putin but undermined the united states? russian propaganda?

or true? we've got that story next. ♪ ♪

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>> tucker: this is a fox news alert, air raid sirens have just gone off in the ukrainian capital. this comes as new images show russian forces redeploying. those were outside the city -- we think they are redeploying. fox news trey yingst on the ground in the capital of ukraine tells, joins us tonight. trey, what do you see? >> tucker, good evening. the last hour, we did hear air d sirens go in the ukrainian capital kyiv. one u.s. official says outside the city making some progress in their advance on the capital. we know according to that official, those forces are about 10 miles from where we are standing in downtown kyiv right now. we are also getting some new images today, tucker, of a rocket launcher from the ukrainian side so when they are trying to push back this russias of the country. take a look. [explosion]

some of that video they're showing how the ukrainians are responding to the shelling by russian forces. there have also been air strikes in a number of locations. here you can see the aftermath of a residential area that was hit with russian artillery in the southern town of mariupol, a town of about 400,000 people and also the site of that russian strike yesterday that killed three people at a maternity hospital. this video also showing some aftermath of damage in a region of ukraine. a number of emergency services, people injured when russian forces shelled this area. ukrainian still believe the plan of vladimir putin is to surround the city. as part of the reason we have seen so many defenses inside the city. every single block, soldiers are checking documents and want to make sure russian forces are not sending reconnaissance its troops to see how much resistance they will face.

tucker? >> tucker: trey yingst for us in ukraine, thank you so much. everyone loves sanctions, they seem like a relatively painless way to punish people who deserve to be punished, vladimir putin, for example, a lot of people were upset about the invasion of ukraine, understandably, so why not sanction putin? there are two questions you have to answer before you move forward with a policy like that: the sanctions punish the people they are intended to punish? the second is are there unintended consequences we should think about quest my good intentions are not enough, you have to think about the effects of your policies. that is how adults make decisions. are these adult decisions that are helping a helping us and hurting putin? a russian policy analyst joins us tonight. thanks so much for coming on. first, are these sanctions hurting the environment we didn't? >> no, the sinkings are helping vladimir putin. his approval rating has actually gone up in russia ten points, from 61% to 71% now, so even though the sanctions may be

hurting russia, they are consolidating putin's power within the country and making him a more robust enemy of the united states. >> tucker: but wait, that is kind of the last thing we want to do, isn't it? i just want to assume for the purpose of this conversation, good intentions of the part of people who back sanctions, they most people for sanctions think they work, but you are saying they are having the opposite effect? >> i know individuals on the ground in russia who are frankly anti-putin and pro-western before this happened, and they have been impacted by these sanctions so much that they are now really turning against the west. your viewers may not realize this, tucker, but international calls are being blocked into russia, when russians try to call home, they get a message telling them to go expletive themselves, these are brutal measures making the russian turn against us in a really significant way. they are angry. they are angry at us about the way they are being treated. >> tucker: russians who don't support the invasion of ukraine, who don't support putin, i think that is an interesting point.

are there counterproductive effects, effects of sanctions that might hurt the united states? i think that is probably some thing we should think about. are there any that come to mind? >> certainly. what we have effectively done is started to redirect the iron curtain. it was our policy during the cold war to integrate russia with the west, integrate them politically and economically and instead what we have done is isolate them, so essentially we have created a new north korea but this time was 6,000 nuclear weapons, so that does not advance our national interest and frankly it right into the global security. >> tucker: so if you're kicking russia out of the global financial system, that's an idea that has actually been affected, we have done that. but you've got to wonder if that might boomerang and make the united states less influential over time in the global financial system. is not a possibility? >> it's already happening. today, any state has to consider the risks that if it holds dollars as a reserve currency for its central bank, that those assets or other cia assets under

the control of the west could be frozen, so russia and china have an incentive to create essentially a parallel economy separate from ours so that they won't be under our control. which frankly undermines our influence very directly. to be one last question: econ 101, everyone who looks at the united states realizes the rest of the world will stop buying u.s. debt, the united states would grind to a halt and no longer be a rich country, it would be instantaneous. does any of our reaction to the russian invasion of ukraine make it more likely that other countries will buying u.s. debt? >> certainly. there is a real threat that they could stop buying our debt, so we are undermining really our most valuable asset that way. we are living on borrowed time economically, and we are getting into an economic war that we may not leave unscathed. >> tucker: i think every american, most are horrified by this invasion, is it needs ask

our lawmakers meet, it makes it unlikely the rest of the world will buy our debt, unloading our debt, and what will be the consequences of that, dumbo? clint ehrlich, thinking like an adult, we don't hear it often, and you do, clearly. thank you for that. >> my pleasure, tucker. >> tucker: so, a shocking new low, bill ballou july from los angeles tonight. >> good evening to you. this is a wild one. fox news has learned california state regulators went into a preschool in san diego and privately interviewed children as young as two years old about their masking practices without any parental consent, officials with the california department of -- visited a preschool in california after they got a complaint the school was not enforcing the states mass mandate. according to a letter from the agency obtained by fox news,

california officials went into that preschool's three locations on january 19th, separated the kids from their teachers, then interviewed them privately about their masking practices. the preschool's owner, howard wu, is describing this investigation as a simultaneous multi-school raid and unnecessarily resulted in inappropriate child interviews. in response, the california department of social services says their investigation showed the school did fail to ensure that staff and kids were masking up and they issued in the school a type a citation which happens to be the most severe of its kind, and tucker, as you can imagine, parents at the school are understandably outraged, telling fox news the california agency overstepped its authority and they are frustrated, and confused about why this happened, and some of them feel it just did not serve their child's well-being. we will send it back to you. >> tucker: [laughs] how do you spell police state, bill? bill melugin for us, thank you so much for all of your reporting. so, if you found that

unsettling, prepare yourself for this story: giant spiders. apparently, not making this up, giant spiders apparently about to invade a large portion of this country. we have scoured america for the men who might be able to stop this invasion. they join us next. ♪ ♪ (vo) what makes my heart beat? having everything i want in the place i love. jamaica. heartbeat of the world. let's go! (girls giggling) ♪ (fun music) ♪ heartbeat of the world. the comfortmat from weathertech offers support where you need it. mom's gonna love this! grandma's gonna love it! (girls giggling) comfortmat provides anti-fatigue cushioning while you're standing. and won't slip against your floors or under your feet. perfect throughout the home, or on the job. the weathertech comfortmat comes in three colors and finishes. (girls giggling) mmmm... it's so good!

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>> tucker: a study we will duty-bound to bring you tonightd invade the east coast of the united states. when this could happen weeks away. researchers at the university of georgia tell us these spiders could parachute down from the sky and that could be problem, so we have scoured the arachnid community of people who might be able to help. one of these exterminators is called believe the exterminator. he and his brother have dealt with this species in the past. before we get to them, we want to give you some sense of how they deal with invasive spider

problems. watch. >> the johnsons just opened up their cabin for the summer when they discovered it has been completely overrun by spiders while it was closed up. now they can't even enjoy their summer homes. >> we have spiderwebs all through here on the the front. >> the spiders can build up in a high abundance so we have to get in here with a vacuum cleaner and get all of this webbing out of here so the guys will not be hiding from us anymore. >> and johnson residents have a of different types of spiders in in their cabin. some deadly as a black widow and others like a house fighter. >> so much coming out so fast. it's amazing how they do that. >> it really is. >> tucker: billy brotherton is known as the arachnid community as billy the exterminator, ricky is the owner of a pest control company. thanks for coming on. how concerned should we be about

giant spiders dropping from the sky? >> you know, tucker, there has been a lot of problems with the weather, climate change, forest fires, all of this stuff pushing large groups of insects and animals all over the place. that is what is going on with this species of spider. i've seen some images already of this spider, it's like turning the sky black, like a giant black cloud coming at you. and i think it is displacement from the stuff we are doing. >> tucker: you are describing a plague of spiders. not to get theological but that is what you have just outlined for us. how are you going to deal with it? >> you know, there's a lot of different ways of doing it. i don't think chemical to be a smart move with that many spiders because we have a lot of nontarget pests and animals that will try to eat the poison, so it is just not good. i think the best way to deal with it is when they start to accumulate on the ground

somewhere, they have these industrial vacuum cleaners with a 12-inch hose, they run on gasoline, and they will suck a dead raccoon up, they certainly can handle a job like this, just suck them all out off the ground and they will be dead. >> tucker: . given the rising price of gasoline, i wonder if a broom might work. >> yeah! anything you've got, man. smash them with a boot, whatever, man, because i mean, it is coming. this isn't our only problem. we've got a lot of insect issues that are going to become a problem in the near future. from the climate change. >> tucker: it sounds like -- >> anything you can do. >> tucker: sorry, go ahead, ricky? >> yes, sir. anything that the homeowner can do as far as getting rid of mosquitoes or flies or any type of thing that the spider can eat on, then that would really help to shoo them away from your property and have them go elsewhere searching for food products.

>> tucker: that makes sense. >> open this? oh, my god, a spider in here. >> tucker: only 15 seconds left, show us the spider really quick, horrify us one last time. >> okay, so these things of a 3-inch diameter -- gosh, how do you get this thing out of your? >> tucker: i've got to get to sean hannity and three seconds, but that spider is horrifying. i hope you kill it. gentlemen, thank you. we will be back tomorrow. sean is now. >> sean: [laughs] give the spider all the time the spider wants, that is funny. trying to get it out, i want to see the spider. all right, tucker, thank you, great show. welcome to "hannity," and we begin tonight with a fox news alert, and just moments, the 45th president of the united states, donald j. trump, he will join us live for an exclusive interview. we will obviously talk about russia's invasion of ukraine, vladimir putin, joe biden, kamala harris, she was a disaster, by the way, and so much more, but first, breaking just moments ago, convicted hate crime hoax or