... would be the best out- what would be the best result in your, in your eyes?

Yeah.

I would tell you selfishly, the best result would've been a few years ago when we filed the original action against California, New York, and other states that squarely put this issue before the court to allow them to deal with it once and for all.

Unfortunately, it chose not to do so at that time.

But look, the court can go two different routes, both of which will be helpful.

One is kind of around this idea of the structure of the Constitution and the equal sovereignty among the states to be able to make it clear that you, as a s- uh, in particular, as a blue state, that you're not gonna be able to regulate, uh, carbon gas emissions throughout the country, particularly those that, that have nothing to do with being originated in your state.

But secondarily, they can land on the fact that, uh, federal law clearly preempts this area.

Like, I should say, which justices seemed to be s- most sympathetic to, uh, Boulder County, and what were the arguments that they were making, or what were the kind of discussions that they were having with, with counsel?

... would be the best out- what would be the best result in your, in your eyes?

Yeah.

I would tell you selfishly, the best result would've been a few years ago when we filed the original action against California, New York, and other states that squarely put this issue before the court to allow them to deal with it once and for all.

Unfortunately, it chose not to do so at that time.

But look, the court can go two different routes, both of which will be helpful.

One is kind of around this idea of the structure of the Constitution and the equal sovereignty among the states to be able to make it clear that you, as a s- z- in particular, as a blue state, that you're not gonna be able to regulate, uh, carbon gas emissions throughout the country, particularly those that, that have nothing to do with being originated in your state.

But secondarily, they can land on the fact that, uh, federal law clearly preempts this area, both of which will give us relief.

Like I should say, which justices seemed to be s- most sympathetic to, uh, Boulder County, and what were the arguments that they were making, or what were the kind of discussions that they were having with, with counsel?

Uh, uh, TikTok, uh, g-give us, give us the synopsis on that, if you could.

Yeah, first of its kind in the country.

I think the concern has been, and you and I have talked about it before, you know, the impact of social media on young people.

And, you know, right now the research is obviously significantly scary.

Different impact on young girls and young boys, but it-- literally some of it is sort of the amount of time they're spending on social media, what they're ultimately exposed to, and the, the, the long-term consequences as a result of that.

And so, you know, people get caught up in the dollar amount and, like, a settlement that could, uh, ultimately equal three hundred million dollars is obviously critically important.

But I think it was Alabama securing the injunctive terms that limits the amount of total time that young people can get on.

There's a reason why I, I guess, uh, we, we have prohibitions in place and that you guys-- uh, I've, I know of some situations, I guess, where you've had to enforce that prohibition.

Uh, uh, one big settlement here, uh, uh, TikTok, uh, give us, give us the synopsis on that, if you could.

Yeah, first of its kind in the country.

I think the concern has been, and you and I have talked about it before, you know, the impact of social media on young people.

And, you know, right now the research is obviously significantly scary.

Different impact on young girls and young boys, but it-- literally some of it is sort of the amount of time they're spending on social media, what they're ultimately exposed to, and the, the, the long-term consequences as a result of that.

And so, you know, people get caught up in the dollar amount and like a settlement that could, uh, ultimately equal three hundred million dollars is obviously critically important.

But I think it was Alabama securing the injunctive terms that limits the amount of total time that young people can get on.

There's a reason why, I, I guess, uh, we, we have prohibitions in place and that you guys, uh, I, I know that some situations, I guess, where you've had to enforce that prohibition.

Right

... where it looks like a sting operation where it's gonna be law enforcement and documents and records that are gonna be used to prosecute.

But when you have what are, you know, larger human trafficking operations, I mean, one of the stranger aspects of these cases is that many times those women that are truly the victims on both sides, both the, the, the pimps that are holding them out and the individuals that are soliciting sex from them, uh, don't wanna view themselves as victims.

They actually feel an affinity for those who, who ultimately are engaging in coercive activity against them.

Uh, and they are very suspicious, uh, of law enforcement and others.

And so many times, and, you know, let's use the illicit massage parlor setting, uh, what we find is that when we're able to identify those operations, once we're able to pull those victims out of those circumstances, many times they'll leave within a very short period of time.

And so you're ultimately left as law enforcement and prosecutors without your key witnesses being able to help your case moving forward.

[chuckles]

[laughs]

... um, but, you know, you've got the radical environmentalists who have not been successful changing and obtaining the Green New Deal, right? The, the AOCs and the Bernie Sanders of the world who, who basically wanna eliminate fossil fuel generally.

And so they have turned their attention to the courts to try to achieve through judicial actions what they're not able to do, uh, through regulatory change.

And, and if, in fact, the city and county of Boulder are successful, and they've only sued right now two energy companies.

But they wanna argue that they are entitled to hundreds of millions of dollars to remedy what they claim are causal issues that have occurred as a result of their version of climate change.

And the, the desire for Alabama and other red states right now is to be able to say that not only are we really dealing with what is not a, a claim of, of compensation to the courts, but it's really an effort to radicalize, uh, trial courts to accomplish, uh, a left-wing agenda.

But it is also to really shut down those that are carbon gas emitters.

Mm

What are the implications if, in fact, a jurisdiction like Boulder, Colorado, can seek redress successfully in the courts for damages inflicted as of climate change in their communities because of decisions made by large fossil fuel companies?

I think they're allowed to proceed with the theory in which they've offered, because remember, they're not even suing emitters of carbon gas, right? These are just the producers of carbon gas.

Correct.

And so if you ultimately expand the theory, and one of the things that the court was very concerned about today was are there any guardrails around what Boulder's attempting to do? But everybody's in play, whether it be cattlemen in Alabama, whether it be those that are creating concrete to be able to build structures, fueling our economy and our state, to the people that are putting gas in their cars or trucks and being able to transport goods around the country.

If, in fact, the plaintiffs are able to proceed, there's no telling the impact it can have.

But I can tell you one thing will happen.

It's going to cost more money for folks putting in their cars, heating and cooling their homes, and for the cost of goods they buy for their own families.

do,

Walk us through how you got there.

Yeah.

Well, TikTok was on the eve of trial.

We had the opportunity in Alabama to be the first state in the nation, uh, to be able to set forth the facts that we believe demonstrated very clearly that not only were children addicted to the platform itself, but also that there are opportunities for harm that could occur as a result of being there.

We're grateful for the fact that we were able to resolve the settlement.

And people talk about the money.

The money was not the critical factor here.

Do you see any benefit for kids using social media?

What specifically are you concerned about that could happen to Alabama's law if Congress doesn't adopt this language? Good morning.

Good morning JT and look we all recognize that right now in college athletics is a mess.

We you know witness the the internal strife of the SEC here just recently and know that what is going on right now is not sustainable and finally Congress is Moving forward, commend Senator Cruz for his efforts around the Protect College Sports Act.

But right before they took the most recent break, there was an effort to be able to pass the bill in a way that we believe, and I think attorneys general and others across the country that have fought so hard to protect women's sports.

would have created a loophole for those that we defeated in states like Alabama and around the country to be able to argue again that now the law allows for transgender males to compete against females.

And so we clearly wanted to be able to highlight that for those that were a part of this discussion.

I'm pleased to see now that Senator Cruz has recognized what is our concern, and there's a very easy fix.

So what specific protections do you believe could be lost or, you know, weakened without this clarification?

What specifically are you concerned about that could happen to Alabama's law if Congress doesn't adopt this language? Good morning.

Good morning, JT.

And look, we all recognize that right now college athletics is a mess.

We, you know, witnessed the internal strife of the SEC here just recently and know that what is going on right now is not sustainable.

And finally, Congress is moving forward to commend Senator Cruz for his efforts around the Protect College Sports Act.

But right before they took the most recent break, there was An effort to be able to pass the bill in a way that we believe, and I think attorneys general and others across the country that have fought so hard to protect women's sports, would have created a loophole for those that we defeated in states like Alabama and around the country to be able to argue again that now the law allows for transgender males to compete against females.

And so we clearly wanted to be able to highlight that for those that were a part of this discussion.

So what specific protections do you believe could be lost or weakened without this clarification?

So when you talk about the $117 million that I guess is awarded to Alabama, how is that decided by the courts or who decides what states get what?

Yeah, that's actually the internal allocation was decided among the AGs.

In fact, JT, the 117 is the floor.

It could be upwards of $200 million by the time all is said and done.

And then the money itself is ultimately going to be allocated by the legislature.

And so Rex Reynolds, who I think led a charge really well on the opioid money that we've had coming through now, is going to have an opportunity through the work of the legislature to deal with how this money should be allocated to effectively deal with the issues that impact the kids.

But we're excited about the fact that not only did we bring those dollars in, but now we've seen structural changes that are going to come to the platform, whether it be limits on time for kids, where we now have more robust determination of age and make sure that young kids are not getting on when they're not supposed to, giving parents even greater controls over what's happening with their kids online, and then making sure that we're not allowing these platforms to become distractions for kids and learning environments.

So what's going on here? What are the nuts and bolts of this?

Steve, you guys got your own lawsuit, right? Besides what the DOJ is going after these folks for.

We do.

We live under the shadow of the SPLC's building here in Montgomery, Alabama, not a thing that we're proud of here in our state.

But the state of Florida and Alabama both are using their consumer protection statutes to send subpoenas to the SPLC to answer the very questions that you've identified, which is, who are you paying? How are they being paid? What was the purpose for doing it? And then how did you leverage the information that you obtained to be able to profit from that? Because what we've learned is the SPLC wasn't trying to dismantle extremism.

They were profiting from it, and we want answers.

They just prop him up to take the heat for this or what?

Yeah, I think you've seen great turnover in the leadership of that organization.

It's not surprising understanding what it is they're trying to do.

Steve, welcome.

Thank you.

And, look, we're pleased to have been a part early on in the federal investigation that resulted in that indictment here in the Middle District of Alabama.

But we have the opportunity now to leverage the authority given to an attorney general to deal with issues of fraud and abuse that go on in consumer sections.

And so using that authority is the basis for issuing our subpoenas.

And, by the way, likewise have my colleague from Florida.

Attorney General Thayer is likewise doing the same investigation.

Was this being looked at in your office and other offices around Alabama for years, months? Back up and fill us in.

the buck to the Supreme Court and tried to let the Supreme Court do stuff that probably Congress should do when it comes to redistricting.

Yeah.

I think we've waited far too long as conservatives to let the court solve our problems as opposed to, in fact, letting Congress do what they're supposed to do, is legislate, you know, to the extent that we've seen abuses of the Voting Rights Act.

And look, redistricting was not even in the equation of a Section 2 claim until the 1990s, more than 30 years after the Voting Rights Act was passed.

And when we see liberal judges expanding remedies and expanding the law, I think conservatives in Congress have a responsibility to be able to act, and right now we need to right-size how the Voting Rights Act is, is evaluated.

We need to set out the principles that can be used for redistricting, 'cause I mean, look, if, if you look what's taking place in Virginia, the ability they had to be able to draw the districts in their way, completely abandoned what has been historically how it is that we're supposed to draw.

Republicans at least are staying adhered to keeping communities of interest together, to not break up political subdivisions, but the left is so, um, strong in trying to push this agenda.

It just, it seems like the, the natural shift to Democrats in urban enclaves has put them at a natural disadvantage, and yet now they're screaming about it.

And it's Congress has kind of passed the buck to the Supreme Court and trying to let the Supreme Court do stuff that probably Congress should do when it comes to redistricting.

Yeah, I think we've waited far too long as conservatives to let the court solve our problems as opposed to, in fact, letting Congress do what they're supposed to do is legislate to the extent that we've seen abuses of the Voting Rights Act.

And look, redistricting was not even in the equation of a Section 2 claim until the 1990s, more than 30 years after the Voting Rights Act was passed.

And when we see liberal judges expanding remedies and expanding the law, I think conservatives in Congress have a responsibility to be able to act.

And right now, We need to right-size how the Voting Rights Act is evaluated.

We need to set out the principles that can be used for redistricting.

Because, I mean, look, if you look at what's taking place in Virginia, the ability they had to be able to draw the districts in their way, completely abandoned what has been historically how it is that we're supposed to draw.

It just seems like the natural shift to Democrats and urban enclaves has put them at a natural disadvantage, and yet now they're screaming about it.

Listen.

I shouldn't be here.

It was just a, an attempt, I won't use the word, an attempt, they say, on my life.

I should be indoors at a secure facility where I can quietly, beautifully, and safely play out my term, destroying everything that comes in our way.

Like bad countries that wanna get nuclear weapons, we'll take care of that.

[cheers] So they want me to be in a secure place.

I said, "What's more secure than The Villages here?" [cheers] The leftist stuff all over the world we have-

So theoretically, let me just ask you this as a philosophical question, why is redistricting for more Republicans for purely partisan reasons, why is that better than an effort to make sure historically disadvantaged minorities who haven't exactly had the greatest centuries in Alabama, making sure that they have more representation? Why is the partisan goal more important?