On this Salcedo Storm Podcast:
Texas Comptroller, Glenn Hegar.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Conservative Movement doesn’t go out there looking for fights, we really don’t. We just frankly want to be left alone. We expect government to adhere to the Constitution adhere to the restrictions government has, they’re supposed to play by the rules that are that we’re all governed by. And as long as they do that, as long as our liberties and our freedoms are maintained, then really the conservative movement is, is really just happy. The conservative movement exists. So government doesn’t get too big for its britches, that government knows its role knows its place, and its role in its place is to serve our people not serve itself.
It’s on the federal level, the state level, the local level, conservatives only get up in arms, when we see government abusing our people. When our freedom of speech is abridged, for example, when we have the rule of law at the southern border completely ignored. For example, when we have government that says, hey, you know what this particular politician is screwing with our agenda, our ability to do whatever it is we want to do, which is not comporting with the Constitution not comporting with the will of the American people or in this case, the people of Texas.
That is why so many conservatives are going wait a minute what you’re doing to Donald Trump is wrong. What you did to Ken Paxton was wrong. You didn’t obey the rules. You You made up a set of rules because you wanted to use government to take out your political opponents. And that’s what the Democrats along with the Never Trump errs are doing on the on the national level. It’s what Dade Phelan and his pro Democrat Republican Cabal. And the Texas House did to Ken Paxton, with this phony impeachment based on evidence that the key witnesses that were supposed to bring this avalanche of evidence, it was all hearsay.
It was triple hearsay, and they actually admitted under oath once they were put under oath, because the house didn’t do that. The house didn’t put them under oath because they wanted to preserve their ability to lie. So they could get their impeachment. And they were hoping that can pass it would just go away. You know it. They don’t want me. The Cabal doesn’t want me so I’m going to leave No. Well, turns out the people of Texas wanted him. And so he stuck it out.
And now Now we’re all looking at what the House has done. And anybody with their name attached to this fake and phony impeachment, this anti American impeachment and I say anti American, because many of us are going wait a minute, if if they can impeach somebody who got 4.2 million votes, by basically putting a whole bunch of people who are willing to lie about that person and and get it all down on paper, not under oath. But the minute the the lawyer start criss cross examining these people under oath and all the stories change.
If they can try to railroad Ken Paxton, what hope have we, if they can try to railroad President Trump What hope have we and people of conscience which is excludes Democrats in which excludes pro democratic Republicans, people of conscience go, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. That’s not the way government is supposed to operate. So we just got off a podcast with, with Ken Paxton. And there’s a there’s a whole side note to all of this, I would like to think isn’t related. I would just like to think it’s a difference of opinion.
But it’s Ken Paxton, when he was when he was forced to step down, because he was impeached, with no evidence. He had to give up his salary. And many people go, Wait a minute, he’s accused, he’s not convicted of anything he’s accused. So under what law? Does that happen? You accuse a man, then you take away his resources to be able to defend himself. Then after he was fully acquitted, Ken Paxton, didn’t get any of his back pay. So he was found not guilty of the bogus charges against him. And then still, he has not been given his back pay.
And that falls under the purview of Glenn Hager, who is the comptroller for the state of Texas. And he he and his office seem to be at loggerheads with Ken Paxton and his office over the interpretation of exactly what the laws of Texas say about somebody being accused of a crime and then okay, well, you can’t get paid, but once you’re acquitted of the crime, what about you still can’t get paid? This raises a lot of questions with me in my interview with Ken Paxton, and I wanted to get some answers and Glen Hager was was kind enough to say yeah, I’ll come on and talk with you about it. And you’ll hear it next on the Salcedo storm podcast.
I gotta tell you folks, there’s a lot going on on the federal level, a lot going on here in Texas. And I want to follow up on an interview we had on Monday with the Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton. And as many of you may or may not recall, I had asked or I told it to Attorney General that I’d be reaching out to the Comptroller of Texas to ask him some questions about about the Attorney General’s particular circumstance. And that’s what I’ve done. And Glen Hager has been gracious enough to come on the program and have a discussion with us. Glenn Hager has been the Texas Comptroller after winning election in 2014. As Comptroller, Mr. Hager has completely repealed eight over burdensome taxes, saving taxpayers billions. Most recently, he’s been on the front lines of the fight against ESG in Texas refusing to invest in companies like BlackRock, which he listed as boycotting the oil and gas industry. Mr. Hagar Welcome back.
Good to be with you again.
So sir, let me first off I this was wasn’t what I was planning on talking to you about because frankly, I couldn’t conceive that not even Dade Phelan, the Speaker of the Texas House, could do something like this. You serve in the legislature too. And just to remind everybody, Representative Tinder Holt who was is told by Speaker date feeling that he’s violated the rules of the house. And because of that any parliamentary inquiry that he wants to make has to be checked with date feeling and date feelings Obama parliamentarian before he can make those parliamentary inquiries. If you were told after watching Democrat after democratic Democrat violates so called rules of the house with with impunity, and then you were told you had to check with all of your parliamentary inquiries with the the Dyess with with it with an Obama parliamentarian, before you could represent your constituents. What would your reaction have been?
You know, I saw that headline last night. I haven’t seen anything I was gonna go back and look at it. Like today when I’m in the office. I’ve been traveling in West Texas or Stan, I got back to Austin late last night, I saw the headline, but I haven’t seen anything on it. But the point being is like to the root of the question, there. There’s rules, there’s processes, people should have the ability to speak just the same as you and I have average citizens going before a legislative committee, you want to be heard not sit there until midnight and say that, Oh, you can only say a couple of words. I mean, the point being is, as citizens, we expect to be able to have a voice in government. So I saw that last night. But I’m gonna go back and try to figure out what just happened yesterday, later on today when I get caught up at the office.
Yeah, from my from my point of view, Dade Phelan said if you have to come up and check with the Dyess check with me or my Obama parliamentarian, and if you say anything that doesn’t meet my agenda, which everybody concedes Dade Phelan’s agenda as the Democrats agenda, then you’re not going to be allowed to make your parliamentary inquiry, of course, Mr. Phelan disenfranchised with that move hundreds of 1000s of Texas voters, and it’s it’s unacceptable. Look, the reason I brought you on is I wanted I wanted to get your perspective, because the Attorney General has his perspective. And I wanted to get yours as well on the record. Ken Paxton, the Attorney General of Texas, and I want to go through this in two steps. Step number one, Ken Paxton is accused of a crime by the house. And he has to step down from his position. Legally, he was still the AG is my understanding what law says that he had had to have his salary stopped under under accusations only?
Yeah, no. I mean, that’s a great question. And as soon as the House took their action, my team and I were having a question because we didn’t know the answer to this question. And so they had actually already started looking at what the law says, What is the law and in short, is this is a state constitution, state statute. And let me be clear on number one, my oath is to uphold the Constitution and uphold the law. You and I both believe listeners believe conservatives believe we don’t want judges, being legislators, judges should be a judge legislators that people that are policymakers should make the law not activist judges. And so I picked that prism in that view, in doing my job. So the point is, what is the law? And we’re going to follow the law. And so the short answer is, the state of Texas has a provision in state statute, and this was corrected for judges years ago in the state constitution. But in state statute, there’s a difference between your state employee and state elected officials, such as myself, such as the Attorney General, Lieutenant Governor, the Ag Commissioner, railroad commissioners, all of us are in a different category. And so we don’t get leave. We don’t have sick pay. We’re in totally different category. And the Attorney General’s Office has argued that, that Ken Paxton, is an officer. He’s not an employee. I mean, they’ve done that themselves. And so when we looked at the law, the law was very clear to us that the legislature several years ago, when they enabled state employee to be put on suspension with pay, they specifically left off state office holders. Okay. Lieutenant Governor Mike made the same point. Paul Betancourt him and I have talked he’s he’s trying to fix this issue in state statute. There’s several legislators that agree with me that that’s what the law says.
You took me right where I wanted to go because he has a conservative. I don’t think we ought to be punishing people for being accused. If somebody said, Oh, Glenn Hager, we accuse you of a crime. And then all of a sudden, oh, yeah. We get to take away your your pay on an accusation. I don’t think that’s fair. Can you and I agree that’s something that legislature must fix immediately.
But you and I both agree. The fact is, we have a basic premise in this nation walls and one of those walls is you were innocent until proven guilty. Thank you. And I think that’s one reason that the legislature over a couple of different times change state statutes state law to allow state employees to be suspended With pay for those situations just as a police officer or someone else who’s under investigation to be suspended, but they received their pay during that time period. And so therefore they did the same thing for judges that had to be in the state call.
Mr. Hager, if somebody accused accused you of some some wrongdoing, right, and then said, Oh, I get accused all the time. I’m in politics. No, no, no, I get it. But if somebody if somebody this conservative if you were accused of a crime and said, Okay, we’re going to take away Glenn Eggers pay on based on an accusation, I’d say that’s wrong. And that’s got to change in praise God, we get A a pro rule of law majority back in the in the Texas state house one day to actually act on behalf of our people instead of a Democrat Democratic Party.
And that’s one reason, Chris, that, you know, soon as soon as my team sent me their legal opinion on this, it looks very clear. I sent a letter to the attorney general’s office said, look, hey, I want you all to be on notice. This is how we see the law. And and even in the last exchange that we had, I guess it was three weeks ago. The point being is there is an option of going to the Texas Supreme Court, you don’t have to start at District Court, you can go to the Texas Supreme Court who are all Republicans and ask the basic question is Glen Hager interpretation, correct or not? And as I said, if if I’m wrong I’ll write the check.
All right, all right. All right. So let’s, let’s go to step let’s go to step two. So now, let’s fast forward, Ken Paxton is found is found not to have committed these crimes. And we’ve we come to find out that the accusations that were levelled against him, were leveled by people that were never put under oath, and they change their testimony on the stand. And because of that, because they were under oath, and they changed what they told the House managers the change of stories. He was acquitted on all charges. So now he’s gone through a process he’s been acquitted of wrongdoing. Then naturally fairness says, well, he is owed his back pay because he didn’t do anything wrong. And why? Why isn’t he entitled now that he has gone through the process to get the pay that was denied to him? As it turns out wrongly and unjustly?
Yeah, I mean, that’s a great question. And a simple answer is because state ball doesn’t allow it. I mean, state law enabled this for state employees, but again, myself, all state elected officials, we’re not deemed quote unquote, state employees. And oh, man, that’s a that’s a technicality plan. I mean, come on land. But let’s have common sense. And I’m about common sense. But the problem is, when that’s what the law says, I took an oath of office to adhere to the law. I’m not legislator, I don’t go make changes to the law famous. I don’t believe we should have activist judges. I don’t think Glenn Hager the controller should be activists either and say, Oh, I don’t want to. I don’t want to agree to that. What I’m going to agree to a different one. No different than you and I are sick and tired of seeing all the District Attorney in very liberal cities across the nation again, you know, we’re just not going to prosecute. Right, exactly. We want to be soft on crime. Well, that’s not their job, Chris.
But on the flip side, but Mr. Hager on the flip side? Yes. On the flip side of this, you can see the danger of of government being weaponized with this. It seems to me a loophole that is so big, you can drive a Mack truck through it, that you can weaponize government to take out your political opposition with merely accusations. So what efforts has your office taken to lobby the legislature to change this? Because it’s It’s patently unfair to statewide officeholders regardless of party. It’s patently unfair. What steps have been taken to correct this.
I mean, medium immediately right off. Center, Betancourt my office, and then I we traded phone calls, he said, Hey, I want to know where the law is, how do we fix this? We’ve already given that to him. We’re happy to do whatever we need to the governor puts it on the call on the special session or if they wait until next next legislative session, whatever the governor puts on the call, we’ve already given that information and we’re like here, here’s a piece of law that needs to be changed.
Alright, let’s let’s move on. By the way, folks are talking to Glenn Hager. He is the comptroller of the state of Texas. First meeting of the Comptroller’s newly formed organized retail theft Task Force. I want to know how that went because there are so many elements in the Democrat party that are trying to turn Texas and they’re having a great deal of success in Austin of turning Texas into cities like San Francisco and Chicago and New York. What was your task force able to put together to stop the the the promotion of lawlessness inside of the cities?
Yeah, the very first one was just kind of an organizational meeting and get to know the members that are appointed to this task force which actually have law enforcement experience that has either been in law enforcement and or in retail outlets that we are seeing constantly in the media and in the news and on social media. He’s grabbing statues people come in and they take enormous amounts of advice and the real thing The issue is not just the monetary loss to companies, which then drives up the cost for me and do. But in fact, on top of that, just the violence, and the basic safety of you and me as customers and ordinary employees. And so in other words, the the first meeting was, it was really eye opening, there’s some really great members that I have on the task force. So really, my team got a bigger grasp of what is the bigger issues, and really the complexity because part of it, you got gangs in local communities, you got foreign nationals, I don’t know if you’ve noticed the border is pretty fluid. And people come across the border, not just not just from south, but from all over the world. And people are coming to this country. And these organized gangs are moving from one jurisdiction to the next jurisdiction, because what they’re trying to do is stay ahead of law enforcement. And so the point is, it’s pretty complex. But I feel like we’re going to come up with some solutions. We’re just starting to dig deep into this so we can get prepared for the next time the legislature comes back into legislative session, give them solutions, because I’d tell you what, while we look at this, and we can see, this is pretty appalling and pathetic, what’s going on in the east and west coast. We damn sure don’t hope that being in tax.
Well, no kidding. And again, the economic impact that you kind of touched on, businesses are shutting down and shuttering in these left wing cities, right. All of their jobs, their tax base, it’s all leaving, because because the Democrats have green lighted crime, and that because that’s what the party of crime.
When you take a basic and say, Okay, I’ll tell you what, Chris, we’re not going to prosecute you if you steal $499 with the Bible. Well, okay, now 10 20 People go into a store and steal $490 worth of them, nobody’s going to get prosecuted, they go sell the items, they go to the next store, they do the same thing again. I mean, it’s just a loophole. It’s unbelievable, that we would enable that type of behavior in this country.
Absolutely. And again, you go to a Blue City, and that’s even Dallas, let them go cruise Oh, up, there is the architect there. Glenn, last thing I have for you, you put out a statement. And in the wake of the attacks against our our ally, Israel. And you have reaffirmed that companies that are that are boycotting Israel, part of this BDS movement, they will not be tolerated in the state of Texas. And I want you to put this in into the context to of your efforts against companies that entertain this, this communist practice of environmental social governance, what is the state of Texas doing to push back on a the Jew haters, and also those who are trying to implement communistic practices in the business world in Texas.
So first and foremost, we all have to keep everybody in our thoughts and prayers. I mean, what what we have seen going on is just beyond the pale of imaginary. I mean, you can’t imagine putting kids in cages and the what they have done to poor little kids. I mean, it’s just it is just beyond that, what the state of Texas, my office one, we make sure companies that are boycotting, we’re not friendly to the State of Israel, we put them on a list, and we don’t do business with it real clear. And so we’ve been doing that for several years in the office. And then secondly, just just yesterday, we had agreed as a state to purchase Israeli bond, we have quite a few that we have purchased over the years. That’s an effort where the state of Texas buys bonds from the Israeli government. We support them, we upped another $20 million yesterday. The fact is, that’s all they would allow me to buy. But the point being is we want to, we want to support the Israeli people, the Israeli government and making sure they have the financial resources to deal with this crisis that are literally in their front door, their front yard and what’s going on in the Middle East, because it’s absolutely unacceptable.
Yeah, and the woke, communist companies, the Disney’s of the world, the woke colas, those who believe in this environmental, social governance BS.
I mean, a lot of these things are just beyond imagination these days, and that’s the far left the woke ism that we have to deal with in society is we have to push back the same thing is my office, as you mentioned in the beginning, you know, we drew a line in the sand companies that want to boycott our fossil fuel industry. And the fact is, it’s all around us, Chris. I know. It’s not about it’s not about whether we’re going to have renewable electric capacity. The fact is if you get in an electric electric vehicle which if you want to buy one that’s your right, your freedom as a citizen of the state of Texas and US citizen but when you sit on the stage, guess what? You’re sitting on a petroleum product when you touch the door to close it What are you touching petroleum products, I mean for goodness sakes the batteries are sitting in what in case they leave a petroleum product. B and is it is frustrating to me the lack of connectivity that people see it’s not really one or the other that industry is a real important part of our everyday economy when you wake up what are most people touch two things they touch first thing tomorrow, toothbrush and toothpaste. You know what both of them are made up But you’re catching on petroleum products. So the point is, it’s part of our daily lives. And we’re trying to draw a line in the sand and say, Look, we’re not going to accept this woke ism, this leftism, we’re going to do what’s right, have common sense, and continue to make sure that Texas is a place to grow economically.
Glenn Hager, the Texas Comptroller keep us in touch with your efforts to right that that pretty, pretty big wrong and the statute because again, I think you’re just you’re just asking for statewide officials to have targets painted on their back to have frivolous accusations leveled against them in an effort to get them drummed out of office and drive them into the poor house. Let us know about your efforts to combat that, sir. Thank you very much for being here.
Good to be with you. Thanks.
That’s gonna do it for this Salcedo storm podcast. Do me and yourself a favor, folks visit a couple of websites, Texas scorecard.com. That’s where you keep track of everything happening in Texas, including the effort to get rid of the pro Democrat Republicans who have been undermining conservatism undermining the state of Texas on behalf of the Democrat party for years now. Also check out Chris salcedo.com That’s where you go to find me the Chris Salcedo show on AM 700k SCV the voice of Texas at simulcast on end to the simulcast on getter and rumble. also find us on Newsmax one every afternoon four o’clock Eastern until five Monday through Friday, until we visit again my friends remember this a society’s worth isn’t measured by how much power is stolen by government. It is measured by how much power is reserved for you and me. We the People stay safe out there, my friends.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
