Here is audio and transcript of the opening segment of Rush Limbaugh's radio program today.
He reveals what he was previously unable to discuss, due to confidentiality reasons, about his involvement in the Dave Checketts group to buy the St. Louis Rams.
Audio.
Link: 
Transcript
RUSH LIMBAUGH: All right, folks, let me tell you what I now can tell you about the National Football League, the St. Louis Rams and my participation in a group seeking to buy the St. Louis Rams. There's a lot of things I've not been able to say because we were bound by a confidentiality agreement that all of the bidding groups have with Goldman Sachs, which is the broker handling the potential sale, but now that I'm no longer part of the group there's some things that I can tell you that are fascinating that you probably don't know. And not about me and not about the bid per se, but what really led to this result taking place.
Now, let me first trace my interest in this. It goes back to maybe the first part of this year. I forget exactly when it was, but when it was made public that the St. Louis Rams might be for sale, I said, "Oh, that's cool," and I said something about it on the radio. The St. Louis media started calling me, "Are you really going to put a bid for the Rams?" I said, "I can't talk about that. I've not talked to anybody at the Rams. I've always had a dream of being involved in the National Football League, being an owner," and so forth and so on. It went on for a period of weeks and months, and it would go dormant for a while then it would come back to life. And one Saturday I was out playing golf at Donald Trump's course here in West Palm Beach, and as I hit the practice range I saw a guy that I had met a couple of times previously, Dave Checketts. And Dave Checketts said, "You know, this Rams thing is real. I really would love to talk to you about it." I said, "Okay."
So we set a date and Dave Checketts and a mutual friend came to my home, I served them lunch and Checketts made his pitch, "This is what we think it's going to take. This is what we would like from you. We would like you very much to be part of this." They had a brief preliminary financial breakdown of what was involved, but at that point in time nobody knew anything because the bids hadn't taken place and the status of the Rams as a business wasn't known, so it was preliminary. And based on what he showed me, I said, "Okay, I'm in." So he came to me, probably with knowledge I had interest in this, but I met him on the practice range at a golf course. He came to my home some weeks later, it was either late May or early June for about an hour-and-a-half or two hours, and we sealed the deal and that was that. And I said to him at this meeting, "Are you aware of the firestorm this --" "Oh, yes, totally aware, Rush, and believe me, I wouldn't have approached you if I hadn't taken care of that. I would not have even come and asked you to be part of the group if I had not cleared your involvement with people at the highest levels of the National Football League."
And my mistake at that point was not asking him, "All right, do you really mean it, and who did you speak to?" He gave me a couple of names that are pretty high up and led me to believe that it was all handled and that he was fully prepared for what was going to happen. When the whole thing started to unravel last week, whenever this thing leaked -- and, by the way, I learned yesterday that George Soros might be in this group. Reuters had a story that George Soros is one of Dave Checketts's partners. I did not know that. I wasn't told that. Mr. Checketts is not the primary partner here. The NFL has a rule that the primary owner has to have 30% equity in the team, and our group lost our 30% equity guy, and we had to scramble and find a new one, and I was told who it was, but now I'm wondering if it was Soros and I wasn't told. Soros and Checketts did, I have learned, partner together previously to try to buy the Los Angeles Dodgers. Mr. Soros, of course, is well known politically for his left-wing slants, his politics fit in perfectly, apparently, with what the National Football League is becoming. But I wonder if they know that he is also involved in the movement to legalize marijuana and how that will play as the owners decide whether or not he's fit. This is all speculative because I don't know that he's in the group. Reuters reported it yesterday.
So when this all started to unravel with the leaking of my being part of the group, the predictable firestorm started, and I said, "Are you guys prepared here? Do you understand what's going on?" "Oh, yeah, we want you to be a partner, don't worry, Rush, I would not have gone this far if I hadn't wired this before I even spoke to you." Now, remember, I did not seek them out, they sought me out. They came here to my home. So eventually when DeMaurice Smith -- and he may pronounce it DeMaurice, I'm not sure -- DeMaurice Smith is the new executive director of the National Football League players association, he sent a letter to the Commissioner Roger Goodell strongly objecting to my being anywhere near the National Football League on the basis that I don't unify, I'm a divider and divisive and this sort of thing.
Then of course the two race hustlers, the Reverend Jackson and Reverend Sharpton got involved, and I got a call on Tuesday night from Dave Checketts, "I'm sorry, I have to ask you to withdraw." And I said, "I thought you had this wired, I thought --" "Well, Rush, obviously I'm sorry, I feel terrible about this but we can't go forward with you in the group." And I said, "Well, I'm not going to withdraw. If you want me out you go public and fire me," which he did. He sent me a letter yesterday afternoon right after the program and told me that the announcement would come this morning, and he wanted me to know that it was a very tough personal decision for him to make, he had a lot of respect for me, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but when I got to the airport -- Kathryn and I flew to Missouri last night for a family dinner in Cape Girardeau and I had to go to St. Louis first to pick up some of the family, then back down to Cape Girardeau.
And, by the way, we arrived back in Palm Beach at -- what was it, 2:30, something like that? -- and the flight crew says, "The airport's closed. We gotta go to Ft. Lauderdale. Do you want to rent a car and drive home or do you want them to drive your car down to the airport?"
"What? The airport's closed? For what?"
"I don't know. Repairs," whatever it was.
So we landed at Ft. Lauderdale and slept for two hours on the airplane. We got wheels up back home at 5:30 and rolled into the house at six. And I got about an hour's worth of sleep. My point is, when I got on the airplane yesterday afternoon at four o'clock I got my iPhone and it's already on ESPN that I've been dropped. I was thinking it wasn't going to happen 'til this morning because that's what Checketts said. But obviously that all leaked. So the thing that's happened here, now, the very slippery slope -- and this, by the way, is very crucial. I know all of the you people say, "Rush, don't be distracted!" I'm not being distracted because what is happening to the National Football League and what is about to happen to it, has already happened to Wall Street, has already happened to the automobile business.
DeMaurice Smith, the executive director of the Players Association is an Obamaite. He's donated to Obama. He is a Washington lobbyist at Patton Boggs, and I think he even served on Obama's transition team. He has no experience in professional sports. The National Football League's agreement, collective bargaining agreement with the players expires soon. Next year, the salary cap -- if they don't get a new deal done, next year the salary cap -- will go away. And after that, there is a fear that the owners -- who think they're giving up too much of the gross in salary, compensation to the players -- might lock them out, a work stoppage. This is something that the Players Association doesn't want, obviously.
And the real reason, the real reason -- and there are many, many reasons that are valid, but the real reason -- that was pressure was brought upon me by Sharpton and Jackson and DeMaurice Smith and the commissioner is that the Players Association is using my involvement in the Rams and this whole episode as a bit of leverage in their negotiations, the upcoming negotiations with the league and with the owners on a new collective bargaining agreement. That is what's really going on, and the Players Association... I don't know how many players know this, but Mr. Smith has let it be known that if he has to he'll bring the White House into this. He'll bring the Congressional Black Caucus into this.
So Obama's America is quite possibly going to include the National Football League, and pressure from Obama, the Congressional Black Caucus and other places might be brought to bear on the owners. I can't imagine that that's anything they want. You know, as all businesses are, they're regulated to a certain extent by the federal government but this would be a huge expansion of that. And that threat is being bandied about. And I don't expect anyone to admit it. The owners are not going to admit that. They don't want to. I'm sure that the reaction to this today will be, "Ah, Limbaugh doesn't know what he's talking about." It will be another one of these things, but that is one of the things that I do know is going on behind the scenes.
And of course to make me the poster boy here for, "Oh, my God look! These guys, would they ever consider Limbaugh?" It's designed to intimidate the owners, frighten the owners and say, "We're running this league now, gang, not you. Even though you may own the teams, we're running it, not you," and this was a little warning shot fired across the bow to the owners to say, "Get ready, here we come," for the next collective bargaining agreement. So we'll see how it all unfolds. The end result of this, folks... Let me run through it very, very quickly. I have lost nothing. I have lost very little. On the other hand, our country has lost a great deal -- a lot more than most people realize at the moment.
Oh, yeah, I would prefer to be noted as a part-owner of an NFL team. By the way, my stake was "minority." (chuckles) I was a minority owner, and Checketts has made it clear in his statement that I would have no operational control over the team and the operation of the club. I was also not told that specifically, but regardless. That doesn't matter. What I'm now going to be known as is The Mirror. I am the man who showed the country what America is becoming. I still love professional football. I'll still love the people that play it and admire them, and I'll probably end up remaining the biggest nonpaid promoter of the sport. But those people who enabled this event -- for their own racial reasons, for their own ratings, their own fundraising, their own face time, their own business reasons -- they're going to be just as unhappy as they were before this happened.
It's a collection of unhappy, angry, agitated people, and that's not going to change. But this kind of stuff: This misreporting; malreporting; lying; repeating lies while also saying "Limbaugh denies," repeating the made-up quotes, the blind hatred -- and, believe me, the hatred that exists in this is found in the sportswriter community. It's found in the news business. It's found in the race hustler business. As I said yesterday and I've said I don't know how many times in this program, "I love the National Football League." I don't dislike anything about it. I'm a fan. But the hatred that I am able now to mirror for the country to see is all over the place. And I tell you with absolute sincerity: I am more sad for our country than I am for myself. I'll be right back after this. Do not go away. These are dark days that we face, and I'm not talking about the National Football League or me. I'm talking about my news stack today.
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