Newt Gingrich on Fox Business Channel's Mornings with Maria | January 13, 2021

NEWT:

Well, I assume Pelosi has the votes to impeach. We will have to see if the Senate is willing to take it up before the 20th and whether they have the votes to impeach and are willing to go through a genuine trial. Remember, in the Senate the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court is supposed to preside and it is supposed to be a real trial. I don't see how they can possibly get that done before the 20th, and the Founding Fathers were deeply opposed to pursuing private citizens once they left office. They'd seen that happened in Great Britain, knew it lead to tyranny and were opposed to going after somebody after they left office.

NEWT:

Well, I think two things: first of all, they've always hated Trump and this is a chance, he's wounded, it's a pretty good reason to go after him, it may scar him up further and that's politics. What I object to is the idea that the U.S. Congress, whether Democrat or Republican, is going to dictate to the American people who they're allowed to vote for.vThis idea that they're somehow going to make it illegal for Trump to run, that says they think he's so popular that he could win. By what right does Nancy Pelosi or any member of Congress dictate to the American people who is allowed to run? I think that's an enormous danger if that's what they are trying to accomplish. I think it'll blow up on them because even the American Civil Liberties Union has come out and said that it's very troubling to watch these big internet giants try to strangle the president. Zuckerberg didn't get any votes. None of these people got any votes. Donald Trump got 74 million votes. By what right just because they're rich do they have the ability to shut up somebody who got 74 million votes?

NEWT:

I think that's right. There's no question the Chinese won this round. They are thrilled to have a Biden administration. They are thrilled to have people backing down, and I think Xi Jinping must be feeling good. Dictatorship is winning and democracy is losing. If you're the Democrats you have to pretend that Swalwell is okay. You have to behave as if there's nothing there, just as with Hunter Biden, oh, there's nothing there, just as with Dianne Feinstein's chief in San Francisco. I noticed Barbara Boxer just had to resign from representing a Chinese company because the transition team wouldn't accept her 500-dollar check as long as she was a registered agent for China. On the Democratic party, this is a big problem. I think Liz Cheney, just as I praised Vice President Pence for doing what his conscious told him to do, I think Liz Cheney has every right as a member to take take a position. However, I do think she has to walk a careful line because she can't speak as the conference chair on this issue because the conference is not going to agree with her. She has to somehow be very careful to say, look, I'm only speaking as the Representative from Wyoming, I'm not speaking as the chair of the conference.

NEWT:

Sure. I think two things: one is I suspect they'll find themselves in real legal and political trouble but two, there are 74 million people who voted for Donald Trump. The correct answer is to create a competitive conservative internet site, have those people pull out. If Twitter were to lose 30 million people, their advertising would collapse. They would understand the cost of a monolithic system. None of the people have the moral authority, this is what bothers me, they don't have the moral authority to censor a senator, governor or president that were picked by the people of their country, state or district. I don't mind people getting rich but when rich people start confusing wealth with power I think that's very, very dangerous.