journey, and we owe them the time to sit down and listen to them and hear the incredible stories. >> it's awesome. i'm so glad you're doing this, fox nation provides a home to do this. it's so great you're bringing this back for everybody. such an important message. >> it's an honor for me. download it over the weekend and watch it when you can. thanks for being here today. now here's "america reports." >> when it came time to make decisions during covid we had to make decisions about do you follow the crowd, do you abdicate your office to dr. fauci or do what's right? >> he doesn't have personality. politics is a hard business. >> there's no shortcuts to the white house. it's about getting people's trust. >> the road through socialism runs through the democratic party. the democrats will weaponize against all of us. >> the race for the white house

quickly heating up this week as republican candidates begin firing shots at one another over who is the right person to lead the party against president biden in the 2024 election. but is the gop primary already shaping up to be a two-person race before former president trump and florida governor ron desantis? >> or is there a dark horse candidate voters should pay closer attention to? we're going to discuss that coming up. >> speaker mccarthy and i have had several productive conversations. our staffs continue to meet, and they're making progress. >> it's crunch time. it's not easy. we're going to make sure we're not just trying to get an agreement. we're trying to get something that's worthy of the american people. i thought we made progress yesterday. i thought we'd make progress again today. i want to be able to solve this problem. >> we begin with the debt ceiling negotiators trying to finalize a deal with six days to go before the u.s. government faces a potential default.

hello. i'm john roberts. people are headed away for the holiday weekend. we've got a long way to go before we get there. >> we do. a long three days coming up until we're back here just before the deadline. this is "america reports." washington is running out the clock on the debt ceiling. ner president biden nor lawmakers seem worried enough to actually stick around here this weekend. they're all planning to head out of town for the holiday weekend without having reached an agreement. an agreement that would likely take several days to move through congress. >> the rank-and-file members from both sides of the aisle are warning they will not support a bill that concedes too much to the other side. >> senior congressional correspondent chad pergram joins us from capitol hill. chad, can both sides get buy-in? >> gillian, if they forge a deal, it could be one both sides dislike, but they're willing to vote yes to avoid a debt ceiling

crisis. they face a time crunch entering another round of talks. >> here we are, night after night after night, and the pressure is more. the consequences are greater. we recognize that. >> but mchenry says leaks and tweets undercut the talks. he says details on outstanding issues are getting, quote, thornier. the question is how many gop house members can mccarthy lose? some are a no on lifting the debt ceiling, but will stand behind the speaker. >> kevin mccarthy is a great negotiator. if he was in knoxville, told me it was going to snow, i'd get a sled. >> the reality is he's going to lose votes there. you're telling me he's a great leader. >> obviously he's going to lose votes. >> does that mean he's still a great leader, in your mind, or worthy of this job if they lose? that doesn't diminish his political support?

>> he's still a great leader. >> democrats may have to make up the difference if gop members vote no. democrats say that's fine, but they will extract concessions. >> if there's going to be democratic votes for an eventual package folks want to make sure our values are represented in that package. i don't want to convey there's any sort of doubt in president biden's leadership, but it's important, members want to be sure in what we will be asked to vote for. >> here's a blue sky scenario. they get a deal this weekend, the house votes next week, the senate next weekend, a dark sky scenario no deal at all or a deal leaders can't sell. gillian? >> we'll be watching that closer. chad, thank you. >> so many possibilities, so little time. congressional investigators questioning an irs whistleblower behind-closed-doors today. he's raising red flags about potential mishandling and political interference with the,

quote, high-level case that sources say is related to hunter biden. david, what might be happening behind the closed doors today? >> he's been with the irs for 14 years, behind the closed doors, as you say, for several hours. he's meeting with staff members on the house ways and means committee, because we're talking about an irs investigation. no members are there, i'm told, by a source, because this is the friday before memorial day, but their staffs are there. he wanted to meet with members of the senate from the senate side, but there's nobody from the senate side there today, however in this meeting with staff members he's talking to both republicans and democrats. they have even time, important to note. now we could know that he will only call it a high-profile investigation, but multiple sources say it's clearly the hunter biden tax probe underway since 2018. he started on the team, john, in 2020. he says when he spoke up about

what he calls slow walking by the justice department, he was taken off the job, and he calls it clear retaliation. other than that, he can't say much, because he's bound by disclosure rules. he's still an agent with the irs. he did say the department of justice is to blame why this investigation was handled in the way it is. he says a heated meeting with federal prosecutors last october was the cat catalyst for him toe out and come forward. >> it was my red line meeting. it got to that point where that switch was turned on, and i just couldn't silence my conscience anymore. >> jim jordan, the house judiciary chairman wrote to attorney general merrick garland, the department's alleged efforts to remove an irs whistleblower from an ongoing investigation could be a retaliatory action prohibited under united states law. d.o.j. declining to comment on the letter from the congressman jordan and the allegations, though the majority of them are still unknown.

there's still, john, an unnamed whistleblower out there who worked under mr. shapley, but he's the only person that's come out. it's possible there could be more. john? >> we'll keep watching it. it's a multilayered onion. we'll watch it be peeled back. david, thank you. >> well, take a look at this, a source telling fox news special council john durham is now set to testify publicly before the house judiciary committee next month. his 300-page report on the origins of the trump-russian investigation revealed the fbi failed to uphold strict fidelity to the law and did not adequately examine or question materials and the motivations of those providing them. durham's public system is scheduled for june 21st. that's just a day after he'll give closed-door testimony to the house intelligence committee. >> it was a big week for the republican primary race with

both south carolina senator tim scott and ron desantis of florida making their bids official. the florida governor showing off his fundraising prowess, raising $8.2 million in his first 24 hours as a candidate, a stretch where he repeatedly sparred with former president trump on a wide range of issues. let's bring in karl rove. the let's put up the latest fox news polling on the republican race. trump way out in front with 53%, followed by desantis at 20%. everybody else is down in the single digits. karl, it sure looks like a two-person race at this point. what do you think? >> well, i think it's premature. it does look like a two-person race. it may be a two-person race. it could be a two-person race. we've got a lot of time to go between now and when people start voting in iowa and new hampshire, nevada and south carolina. key to this is going to be how the candidates campaign in the early states, whether they are able to spark large public

enthusiasm. then we'll have the debates starting in august, how they fare in the debates will have an impact. so we've just got to be careful about the early polls. president trump is the frontrunner. he may me the presumptive nominee, way out in front. remember rudy giuliani was leading in 2008. so was hillary clinton in 2008. 2012, newt gingrich was leading 30 days before people went to the iowa caucuses to vote. there's lots of twists and turns we'll see in this. but today, right now, it looks like a two-person race, but it's got the capacity to be much different than that by the end of the fall. >> karl, you brought up past race, also sparking enthusiasm and debates. i got in the way back machine earlier this morning, and went back to august of 2011. here's how the republican race looked at that snapshot in time. rick perry was in the lead with 29%, according to a gallup poll. mitt romney was second with 17%. ron paul, 13%. michele bachmann at 10%.

the herman cain back at 4%. rick perry is the closest comparison to ron desantis. hugely popular. four-term governor. longest-serving governor in texas history, second longest-serving governor in u.s. history. everybody thought it was going to be president rick perry. then along came the debate, and good-bye went rick perry. desantis looks good right now, but could he be this year's rick perry? >> that was the moment where rick perry couldn't remember the federal agencies he wanted to get rid of. at this point there's the enthusiasm of ordinary republicans. you mentioned this in passing. president trump declared on november 15th of last year, he's had 136 days between his announcement and the march 31st fundraising report. during those 136 days, he raised $17.8 million. ron desantis on the first day he got into the race raised

$8.2 million. something tells me by the time we get to the end of this quarter, which is the end of june, that we're going to see rosily eclipsing, and maybe by several times, what donald trump got in 136 days. so that has -- tends to have an impact. we may see some closing of the polls simply because the people who are for ron desantis appear to be more motivated right now than the people who are for donald trump. that, particularly in the early states, could have an impact. >> desantis certainly is going to hit the ground running. his travel next week, des moines, iowa. sioux city. cedar rapids. trump has one event in iowa on june the 1st. desantis has a lot of ground to make up, because trump has been all over iowa for the past few months. >> yeah, that's right. and look, that's what this is all about. you have to show up in iowa and new hampshire. in fact, you have to show up several times.

in iowa, they want to see you visit as many of the 99 counties as possible. they're slow to make a decision. the good news for candidates is once otherwisans tend to make a decision they tend to stick with that decision. in new hampshire, smaller state, but the voters there, it's been my experience, they tend to vibrate back and forth. they can be for you on this visit, but show up at the firehouse and hear another candidate after you leave town and decide to be for them and you have to win them back. different states, different kinds of attitudes. as a result, a challenge for any campaign. >> yeah. the folks in new hampshire are always open to a good argument. >> exactly. >> karl, hope you have a good memorial day. >> you too, john. >> thank you, karl. appreciate it. >> you bet. all the best. >> as all of this goes on, let's not forget, joe biden only 33% of voters think he's a strong leader. so if the republicans can come up with somebody who is perceived by the majority.

electorate as a very, very strong leader, there's the polling, they could give biden a run for their money next year. >> it's also interesting listening to you talk to karl to think about the fact in politics, in a presidential campaign, you're only ever as strong and good as your most recent event. by the time we get to the summer, the first rounds of the primary debates, no one's going to be thinking about this botched ron desantis/elon musk launch anymore. i think that's going to be a talking about among critics, and not more than that. >> a lot can change. always interesting to listen to me because of what karl says, not what i say. >> john, it's always interesting to listen to you, john. >> ha-ha-ha. plus, china accused of spyig

on u.s. network systems, a move that caused a multination alert. and the state department warning it could lead to cyber attacks against critical infrastructure. what does the u.s. need to do to protect itself? lieutenant general keith kellogg on deck for that coming up. >> it's very, very dangerous what the chinese government is doing. unfortunately the biden administration, they're not holding them accountable. ross t, people are working hard to build a better future. so we're hard at work, helping them achieve financial freedom. we're providing greater access to investing, with low-cost options to help maximize savings. from the plains to the coasts, we help americans invest for their future. and help communities thrive.

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>> the state department is warning about china's capability to hack into critical infrastructure, like oil and gas pipelines, rail systems, the electric grid, right here in the u.s. this comes on the heels of an announcement by microsoft and several intelligence agencies that chinese hackers gained access to network systems on

u.s. bases in guam. general keith kellogg served as national security advisor to former vice president pence. he's now a fox news contributor. general, what essentially happened here, the chinese hackers, they call themselves volt typhoon, installed malware in guam, meant to cut off communications between the u.s. and parts of asia in the event of an taiwanese invasion. talk how that undermines everything that the biden administration has put in place to protect taiwan. >> just shows we don't have good systems, administrators tracking that. i mean, what you do to defend against that, you have to have a good system administrator, a system in place to do so. unfortunately today, there's a big convergence between information technology and operational technology. i'll put it in layman's terms. a train running down a railroad

track. the technology controls the switches. more and more, you see the convergence this there. systems that are penetrated by malware, anything else, it makes it simpler to do it. what the chinese are doing, more importantly, zero day. zero day, you find out what's vulnerable. you don't take action, until the last minute, zero day, to take the actions that you want to take. here's how you defend that. two ways to do it. one you make sure that the chinese, or anybody else, any adversary, realizes that we have good cyber technology, and we'll come after you in a heartbeat if we see that coming. second thing you have to do, after you talk about the defensive system out there, you have to harden your system, because you're going to get attacked. we know that. there's vulnerabilities. you can't be 100% perfect on it. you have to understand you have to have some redundancy and ability to operate through that, because it won't shut you down forever, but for a critical

period of time, three, six, 12 hours. >> and could be fatal to your efforts. >> yes. >> the fbi director, chris wray, was on capitol hill, and said when it comes to cyber warfare, chinese outguns us 50-1 on that front. when we first started doing stories on this, everybody was, like, what's this cyber warfare thing, how to shut down the electrical grid. they are warning about this 20 years ago. why are we still so far behind the curve? >> it's probably worse than that. a few years ago, ships on the sea were running into each other. those systems were open systems. you could capture those systems. i'm still to this day those systems were not captured, and the adversaries seeing if they could capture the system. if you capture the steerage, then you've got a major problem.

>> let's turn your attention, general, to the war in ukraine. what do you make of the timing? looks like a long-awaited counter-offensive is getting underway, the beginnings of it? >> this is going to be bloody. the ukrainians have the advantage, because they'll be on the offense, they can pick and choose where they want to go on a 600-mile front. they have a better general. you'll see a critical bloody fight. they'll have to win this fight, because they'll get one shot at it. the frustration i have, they haven't gotten the equipment, but the question is where are they going to go? if i was predicting where they'll go, they'll head for the south, crimea, try to penetrate. if they get through the frontlines, the russian lines, then the russians have a major problem, because they're defending that major front out there. this is a fight. the numbers lost, they've lost, the russians and ukraine, lost

over 300 soldiers killed in action -- >> 300,000. >> 300,000. >> what are the stakes here? you could paint a scenario, if ukraine is successful, cutting off the crimean peninsula, gets back territory captured by russia, putin looks at this and says, i can lose, and goes for peace. if the ara ukra ukrainians lose- >> you have to wonder. if the russians are able to beat them back, then you're into an endless war. where are we going to go to in negotiations? i don't think anybody that can get these two sides together. how is this going to end? they cannot sustain these

losses. 300,000 killed, it's enormous. people just don't appreciate that. >> terrible. obviously, general, it's the memorial day weekend. any thoughts you want to offer looking at monday? >> yeah. well, i used to go down to -- still go down to the -- wall, vietnam memorial wall, section 34-e, young lieutenant kellogg was in the fight for his life. we won the fight, but lost 1/3 of my reconnaissance platoon. i go down there and talk to them. did we get it right, am i keeping the faith with you that we lost? americans need to understand that the young men and women we have on the ramp parts of freedom, defending against barbarians at the gate, this memorial day, give respect to them. i tell them, look, when i went over to the amphitheater, heard the national anthem, the last

two lines of the national anthem is a question, not a statement. it says, "o say does that does t "star-spangled banner" still wave? >> general, always good to spend time with you. as always, thank you for your service. >> thank you. appreciate it. >> again, nearly 3.5 travelers set to fly this memorial day weekend, surpassing prepandemic levels. do americans need to brace themselves before taking off? >> plus, one chicago community now is on edge as the city plans to imminently relocate hundreds of migrants currently in police stations to a college gym. a chicago alderman says it's a desperate situation. he also says he's okay with it.

he'll explain coming up next. >> the police department is going to make frequent visits here, which means if they're making frequent visits here, they're not out there.

>> millions of americans are heading out for the long holiday weekend, kicking off the start of the busy summer travel season, a big test for the airlines following major meltdowns over the winter holidays. rifirst to alexis mcadams at newark international airport. any major delays there? >> hey, john. good afternoon. no major delays at newark international airport. there were some this morning, which we'll get to in just a second. check it out, over my shoulder, you can see things are moving

along pretty well. delays across the country, 400 delays, and only a handful of cancellations so far, but that could all change. we did check with some passengers, though, who said they were prepared for the worst. take a listen. >> i think if we get through this weekend, supposed to be a busy one, i think the rest should work out. >> i mean, i'm guessing it's going to be busy, especially post-covid, a lot more people are wanting to travel. i'm one of them. >> i'm hoping it doesn't happen this time, but that's why i'm coming home on saturday instead of sunday. >> this memorial day weekend, nearly 3.5 million will ply fly to their destinations. one of the top spots? orlando, new york city, and las vegas. the tsa has been trying to get ahead of the surge, adding more staff, adding facial recognition scanners at the airports. we'll see if that helps. there's been a list of recent disruptions. southwest canceled more than 15,000 flights over the winter holiday during technical

failures. the department of transportation has initiated new rules, requiring airlines to compensate passengers and provide free rebooking if they cause a delay or cancellation. the also this week, the biden administration launched a portal for passengers to submit those claims. aaa tells us always have a backup plan in place. >> aaa recommends that you prepare for the worst, you hope for the best, prepare for the worst. have a plan b and c in place. >> now, one more hurdle for travelers, if there's not already enough going on, having to get to the airport early, waiting in lines, the faa says they don't have enough air traffic controllers across the country, that shortage specifically at the airports in the new york area, could impact the country. >> do they have a plan b or c for that shortage? i think not. >> that's a good question. yeah, we'll have to see. always have a plan b, right? >> and plan c apparently.

alexis mcadams, thank you. gillian? >> so, is the weather going to hold up this weekend? chief meteorologist rick reichmuth is live in the weather center with a look at the forecast. >> i've never had a plan c for anything in my life, much less a trip over memorial day weekend. very warm air across the center part of the country. that's going to be one of the themes all memorial day weekend. the other one is across an area, so many people have memorial day plans across the beaches. take a look at this. a flood threat for friday, today. bigger flood threat on saturday through myrtle beach. we thought this disturbance was tropical in nature, but it's not the case, but a big disturbance offshore is bringing in cool temperatures. for tomorrow, potential record

cold highs. high temperature in columbia, south carolina, tomorrow, 59 degrees. charlotte 58 degrees. you don't want to see that for your memorial day weekend, but it's what we have. we'll see a lot of rain totals piling up across the southern appalachians, down across coastal areas. some spots 5-8 inches. this is a look at the storm. it's stuck here, so it's going to continue bring rain. high pressure to the northeast. it's stuck, staying there across the mid-atlantic and southeast. northeast, we've had a nice memorial day weekend in the last three years. this is going to be one of them. really great temperatures. really great conditions. one other spot we'll be watching significant rain is across the high plains. west texas, parts of the panhandle of oklahoma, parts of western kansas. that, gillian, is the area that has the most drought going on in the country, so we really need moisture. unfortunately we're getting it over the memorial day weekend. gillian? >> we definitely don't need more rain here in washington. if you could put that out with

the weather gods, we would appreciate it, rick. >> do my best. >> thank you. john? >> you can be compassionate but not foolish. >> we're inviting in like a magnet, everybody come here, collect all your freebies, we're going to give it to you. every sucker in here is going to pay for it. >> tensions flair in chicago about a plan that would relocate 400 migrants currently living in police stations across the city. beginning june 1st, the migrants would be moved to a college on the city's northwest side, wright college, where they would stay through the beginning of august. our next guest supports the plan, saying that desperate times call for desperate measures. he's a chicago alderman representing the 38th ward. nick, good to be with you. moving migrants into schools was met with fierce opposition on chicago's south shore. we also saw the protests in brooklyn. now there are folks in the wright college area who seem like they're not happy with it either. we saw those folks talking in

that community meeting. listen to exchange between the deputy police chief and folks in the crowd. >> there's plenty of resources to staff, providing safety -- so wright college is part of our community. so to understand that -- >> i mean, audible boos there. what do you see to people who say, look, there's enough problems with safety in our schools that we don't need to be doing this? why should our community shoulder the burden of all of these migrants? what do you say? >> thanks, john, for having me on. good to talk to you and gillian. i don't support the plan. i support getting the asylum seekers out of the police station. something had to be done. this wasn't my idea. it was kind of -- i found out about it by an anonymous phone call, and i had no choice other

than to work with them on it. we have to get them out of the police stations. i blame the feds, the federal government, for allowing this to happen, not allowing resources or allowing these people to work. >> right. let me go to one of our later soundbites. this is brandon johnson, the new mayor. you blame the federal government. he blames the former mayor, lowlorilightfoot. listen to what he said. >> what is your game plan? this is a game of whack-a-mole, only carrying the city through the end of june. >> as i said before, this is a dynamic that i inherited. you know, i understand the urgency in this moment. it's unfortunate, you know, it took such a long reaction from the previous administration. >> what do you say to his charge this is lori lightfoot's fault? >> well, i don't know how he can say that, because this happened really quick. i don't blame either the former

mayor or the current mayor. it's just something that's been happening, only going to get worse if they let people continue to come in without a plan. we're getting no help from the state. we're getting no help from the feds. we need money. city council approved $51 million for asylum seekers. i expect it to pass without opposition from maybe seven or eight aldermen voting against it, me being one of them. >> right, right. so the city, it's costing the city a lot of money. that $51 million would only last until the end of june. yet chicago proudly wears on its sleeve the fact that it's a sanctuary city, says we're not going to work with i.c.e., because that would destroy the fabric of our community as a welcoming place for people who are poor, destitute, and where else to go. i mean, did chicago bring this upon itself by virtue of its status as a sanctuary and i? >> i certainly think we did.

they said we want to be a sanctuary city, not realizing that people will be sending people over. governor abbott is sending them over, saying vile things about texas and the governor, why is he doing this. basically the governor of texas is doing them a favor, because brownsville doesn't have the resources to help these people out. >> if chicago is suffering the way it is, putting 800 people in police stations to house them, you can imagine what the border towns are going through. >> if we can't handle 8,000, john, i don't know how they'll handle hundreds of thousands. >> i want to play one more piece of sound, if i could, alderman. this comes from jennifer preston, a mom at that meeting. she says, look, i've got compassion for migrants. the united states is a country built on immigration, but there's two sets of rules here. listen to what she said. >> i have five emails in my in

box saying my child can't return to school without a vaccine. i expect they're coming here legally, bound to the same guidelines and principles and laws that all of our own child of tax paying citizens are. >> that's another thing to throw into the pot of arguments here, costing the city a lot of money, putting a burden on communities, and migrants are treated differently than people who live in the city. >> absolutely. that's the truth. i mean, people were basically on temporary suspension from work during the pandemic if they wouldn't get the vaccine. now they're saying there's a different set of rules, we'll put you in the schools with no vaccination. i'm not sure what the vetting process was as far as health reasons and criminal backgrounds. i truly believe that 95% to 99% of these people are here to make a better life for their family, but there's that 1% to 5% we don't enough about them, what their intentions could be.

john, it's a fear of the unknown. >> there's no question that people have that fear, particularly given how quickly a lot of these people have been released in the community, were they fully vetted. nick, good to talk to you. i hope that you and your family 78 good memorial day. >> thank you, john. thanks for having me on the show. >> you bet. gillian? >> the former new york city professor caught on camera wielding a machete appeared before a judge last night. what charges will she face? >> plus, big crowds expected on long island for the bethpage airshow. how pilots are getting ready for high-flying stunts in the skies. ♪ ♪ liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. with the money we saved, we tried electric unicycles. i think i've got it!

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>> hunter collect fired a professor after video of an incident with a machete surfaced. she was released late last night. rodriguez has lost another job over her behavior, laura? >> yeah. we just got a statement from the school of visual arts here in new york city, where rodriguez was a faculty member, saying that sva has made the decision not to renew her contract. last night rodriguez was released from custody without having to post bail after being arraigned on menacing and harassment charges. she was also terminated from her job as hunter college this week

after the machete dust-up. fox digital catching up with rodriguez after leaving the bronx criminal correspondent. she headed to the legal popeye's for a bite. rodriguez turned herself in yesterday to face charges against her. all this comes after the widely circulated video by the "new york post," showing her holding a machete to a reporter's throat who knocked on her door for comment and reportedly threatened to, quote, chop him up. rodriguez said he appeared to be trespassing after not using the intercomat her building. she was seen on the dashcam video chasing reporters with the machete on the street after they left her apartment. "the post" looked for comment wafter a profanity-laced tirade.

listen. >> we understand that pushback and maybe even violence is always a possibility. so that's always something we have to think about. but when it happens, really, in real time, it's always a little scary, a little shocking. >> so now the next step, the max prison sentence for the menacing charges. the harassment charge, 15 days. we'll see what happens. rodriguez due back in court jun. >> laura, thank you so much. garrett graves one of the lead negotiators for house republicans on the debt ceiling just spoke with reporters. he appeared fired up over the status of the talks. we've got sound. let me set the context for you here. work requirements for entitlement recipients still is one of the big sticking points. the republicans want to increase the work requirement for medicare, food stamps, things

like that. democrats are saying, nope, we're not going to go for that. let's listen to congressman graves. >> are you willing to drop that, work requirements and -- >> hell no, hell no. not a chance. >> "hell no, not a chance," they're going to drop the work requirements. republicans go back to the 1990s, 1996, when bill clinton signed the welfare-to-work bill, and bill clinton said this is a step ahead in fixing welfare, that part of the entire social safety net system, that it rewards work, it brings respect to people. now democrats are saying, no, no, work requirements, we're not going to do that. >> it's interesting, because everybody is touting how they're inching closer to a deal, but that's far from the only sticking point. there's still pentagon funding on the table. there's still irs funding out on the table. these are significant issues to be all or nothing on, zero-sum.

>> mccarthy giving them four days to read it. they've got to get something done quick. >> yet everybody is leaving town right about now, except for us. we're here. >> i think it's a little naive about how willing some of these agencies were to try to intimidate reporters. this is quite brazen, what they're doing. i mean, they had to know that this was going to come out. >> that's journalist matt taibbi telling us about the irs launching an investigation into his tax filings last year. this began about three weeks after he first published the twitter files. that was the expose in which he alleged coordinated efforts across the federal government to censor content on social media. we bring in the president of americans for tax reform. he has a lot to say about this. grover, essentially matt alleges this was retaliation for his reporting. the biden administration says

this was what is for the irs the beginnings of a pretty routine criminal investigation. people might not know it, but the irs does a lot of it. >> umm, well, that makes no sense unfortunately, because the facts are coming out. they opened this file on the reporter, matt taibbi, after his ninth article came out about what was going on with the fbi, telling twitter how to censor things. okay? >> right. >> that day -- this was the 24th of december. this was a saturday. the irs is working on saturdays normally? this was the night before christmas. this was christmas eve they opened this file. what were they looking for? they were asking for whether he had a concealed carry permit. that's private information, so people don't break into your house and steal things. voter information, you know, how he's registered to vote. all this background, because they claim that four years ago they had a question about his tax return.

they claim they'd sent him letters on it. they could not show a single one when the republican leadership in the judiciary committee said please send us the proof of your letters. no letters. and then they showed up, when he was testifying before congress, and they sent an irs agent to his home, just to leave a note, to let him know that we know where you live. this is scary, scary, not usual stuff. >> grover, the irs says the routine process, this is a criminal investigation, which they are authorized to carry out. this is how they handle these things. they can send agents to people's homes, wherever they are, to talk to them. >> okay. two things. the irs knows, and admitted, they owed him money. he didn't owe them money in 2018. they'd never brought anything up to him. they'd send him no letters. they claimed it not truthfully that they had, and when asked to

see the letters -- this is now a congressional investigation into how the irs treated a journalist. this is a man of the left. you know, he was praised by left of center senators for a lot of his writings in the past, and yet he found it a problem when the fbi was telling people how to censor things at twitter before elon musk. now they're sending agents to his house to drop off paperwork, and they open up on christmas eve an investigation, wanting to know whether he has a conceal carry permit. really? oh, also his hunting and fishing licenses. what does this have to do with any kind of investigation about taxes, which, by the way, there wasn't one, there was nothing wrong with his taxes and -- >> well, grover, just to clarify, the s irs said -- thiss from them -- they were concerned about identity theft and identity fraud in his 2018 tax

filings, and they were looking into things that you just mentioned, the whole laundry list of his permits, you know, his gun registration. while i have you, i want to ask you about the debt ceiling, on everybody's mind right now. on the table is $80 billion on the table for irs. republicans are try to claw some of that back. they say the last thing this administration, this agency needs, is more money to pursue what they're calling a partisan agenda. what do you say? >> well, it's quite correct. there's been a series of problems, where they've violated people's privacy, where they've leaked contributions they've made to charities to embarrass people, where they leaked thousands of tax returns, the bloomberg's tax returns were handed to a left wing group so they could do stuff with it. none of this has been fixed. none of this has been explained. they want $80 billion. there's no reform in this

package. >> are you concerned that having more money -- i want to make sure i understand. so basically the argument here is if you give them more money you are empowering this agency to continue along this path, right? >> you're rewarding them. you might have said, here's the seven problems we see, fix them, and we can get you more money to do good stuff. there's no reform in this package. it's more money to do the same. if you've been misbehaving, your boss doubles your pay, you wouldn't think that he thought there was anything wrong with the way you behaved. you'd say, they expect me to do more of this. >> grover, always great to chat with you. thanks for taking time with us. we really appreciate it. happy memorial day. >> you got it. it's scary out there. wow. >> coming up new at 2:00, the war at free speech, now coming for high school debate clubs. why some students and debate coaches are warning the judges at top tournaments are bringing their own politics into deciding what can and cannot be talked

about. we'll speak with a debate coach on this troubling trend. plus, how americans can help our veterans this memorial day weekend. "america reports" rolls on.

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>> at this hour, we are expected to see house speaker kevin mccarthy on the hill. you're looking at a live picture right there right now where talks on the debt ceiling are stretching into the long weekend. most lawmakers are back home, but on standby in case a deal is reached. we'll keep watching for that shot for mccarthy to emerge any second. welcome back as "america reports" rolls into hour number two. i'm john roberts. a lot of news happening this afternoon. >> a lot of help, not a lot of chance a deal will get done this