Why are Dems Pushing Insane Conspiracies?

Summary

Ruthless Podcast

Episode: Why are Dems Pushing Insane Conspiracies?

Date: September 4, 2025
Hosts: Josh Holmes, Comfortably Smug, Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook
Special Guest: Senator Eric Schmidt

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Episode Overview

This episode of the Ruthless Podcast dives into the seemingly chaotic state of the Democratic Party post-2024 election, particularly the prevalence of conspiratorial thinking among liberals and Democrats—most notably, online rumors about Donald Trump’s health and presence. The hosts use a mix of sharp critique, humor, and cultural references to analyze the left’s increasing obsession with conspiracies, the media’s role in platforming them, and contrasts with conservative messaging. The episode also discusses crime in American cities, prescribes conservative victories, and features an extended interview with Missouri Senator Eric Schmidt about court battles, COVID-era politics, and the Republican resurgence.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Left’s Conspiracies and Meltdown Post-2024

• Trump Health Rumors:
  The main jumping-off point is the viral left-wing rumor, propagated over Labor Day weekend, alleging that Trump had died or disappeared from public view ([05:00]-[12:00]).

  • Josh Holmes: "Over the Labor Day weekend... there was this omnipresent online discussion... bled deeply into the establishment of the Democratic Party... mainstream media is forced to cover it because that's their constituency." [05:50]
  • Michael Duncan: "Is there any truth to this story that Trump is— like, we're just asking questions. Yeah. Like, what is happening in this country?" [08:25]

• Addiction to Losing:
  The hosts argue that Democrats—and lefties on social media—are addicted to disappointment and doom.

  • Smug: "It's like a Freudian death drive... somewhere deep in their heart, they want to lose." [04:02]
  • Holmes: "It's like compulsory. It's not a choice. Like they just have to do this." [04:40]
  • Smug: "It's like a fucking fetish, dude." [04:47]

• Media’s Role:
  The media’s complicity in platforming left-wing online conspiracies receives heavy ridicule.

  • Holmes: "Mainstream outlets are like, people are asking questions, people are saying... then they go and they ask a question to the White House press office." [08:42]
  • Holmes: "Donald Trump... did not one, but two public press conferences last week... including the longest cabinet meeting in the history of this country." [05:05]

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2. Conspiracies Go Mainstream: Colbert, Politicians, and Media

• Stephen Colbert and Audience Cheers for Trump's Death:
  A segment highlighting Colbert’s late-night reaction to the Trump rumors launches a critique of how normalized such speculation has become ([11:00]-[14:00]).

  • Holmes: "If Stephen Colbert is in a situation where he needs to correct the audience, if that guy feels it's incumbent upon him to be like, no, I need to be the statesman here..." [12:13]
  • Duncan (mocking): "Secret Service should kick down his doors, raid his house. Parody, parody." [12:32]

• Elected Democrats Parroting Online Conspiracies:
  Governor Tim Walz (MN), described as part of a “failed state,” referenced the online rumors with a barely veiled tone:

  • Walz (clip): "You woke up thinking there might be news. Just saying, just saying there will be news sometime." [15:09]
  • Ashbrook: "He tried to stop his audience and... this guy is projecting into the future straight up that it seems like he's hoping will happen, putting it on his vision board." [17:21]
  • Duncan: "That should be a Secret Service visit though. Like that saying that like there will be. That's threatening at that point." [17:24]

• MSNBC's Jen Psaki and the Ironic Double Standard:
  The hosts lampoon Psaki for questioning Trump’s invisibility, considering she worked for the often-absent Biden.

  • Duncan: "For Jen Psaki, who worked for Joe Biden who was, I mean, like, saying he was on life support is charitable." [19:43]
  • Holmes: "She literally worked for someone who, when you saw him in public, that wasn't enough for proof of life." [21:06]

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3. Wider Patterns: Rudderless Democrats, Crime & Failure to Lead

• Rudderless Ship:

  • Democrats are described as having no real leadership; power vacuums filled by “TikTokers” and far-left activists.
  • Duncan: "They have no one trying to guide this ship. So who is actually calling the shots? It's all the nut jobs, the influencers in that party..." [09:09]

• Contrast on Crime:
  The Trump administration is praised for action on crime in cities compared to Democratic leaders’ rhetorical blame-shifting ([25:00]-[35:00]).

  • Holmes (on Trump): "If Americans are getting killed and he can do something about it, he feels a sense of obligation to do that." [25:49]
  • Chicago Mayor Clip (paraphrased): Crime is the fault of "red states" shipping guns in ([27:18]-[27:49]).
  • Duncan: "That's an insane take." [28:21]
  • Smug: "At some point, the people of Chicago have to do something about this." [33:12]

• Republican Debate: Save the Cities?:

  • Smug: "Why save these people from themselves?... Even if he does save them, he's not going to get any of the fucking credit." [31:59]
  • Duncan: "This... is a very interesting debate right now happening on the right is like, should we save the cities?" [32:30]

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4. Question of the Day: Favorite Left-Wing Conspiracies

[36:07]
The hosts ask listeners for their favorite liberal conspiracy theory, with examples:

• Inner-city crime is a "red state" issue
• Death rumors about Trump
• Outlandish immigration conspiracies

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5. Guest Interview: Senator Eric Schmidt

Introduction ([52:00]):
Holmes introduces Eric Schmidt, Senator from Missouri, as a multi-term guest and the author of a new book, Last Line of Defense: How to Beat the Left in Court.

Background & Motivation

• Schmidt details his origins: growing up “defending others”, and his son Stephen’s struggles with a severe disability, which inspired his political engagement.
  • Schmidt: "My origin story of getting into politics really started with Stephen. My Stephen was born with a rare genetic condition... he has seizures every day..." [59:59–61:54]

Leading the Legal Fight Against the Left

• As Missouri AG, Schmidt led several court actions:
  • COVID mandates & restrictions
  • Student loan forgiveness case
  • Uncovering federal government/private sector censorship
  • Unpacked the importance of the Missouri v. Biden lawsuit, which revealed the federal government’s pressure on tech companies to censor content:
    • Schmidt: "Thousands of pages of documents, emails, and texts from high ranking government officials—this changed everything..." [71:45]
    • Holmes: "You were literally the first... we didn't know until you started this case in the discovery process..." [72:37]
• Emphasizes that courage and willingness to publicly fight are necessary on the right.
  • Schmidt: "A lot of this is just having courage, right, to be willing to stand in the arena and fight back..." [57:08]

COVID Policy, Power Missuses, and Mask Mandate Litigation

• Schmidt discusses pandemic overreach by local and federal government; describes personal anecdotes of families and schools during mask mandates.
  • Schmidt: "Public health officials were telling who could live your life or not and forcing kids, 5-year-olds, to wear masks all day long..." [62:44]

Democrats' Senate Maneuvering & Rule Obstruction

• Discusses Senate obstruction, particularly concerning nominees and the likelihood of rule changes.
  • Schmidt: "There's never been a time in the history of our republic we've seen this kind of obstruction..." [79:24]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Democratic Narratives:
  • "The inmates are running the asylum."
    — Smug [00:23], [08:22]
• On compulsion and political psychology:
  • "It's like a Freudian death drive."
    — Smug [04:03]
  • "It's like a fucking fetish, dude."
    — Smug [04:47]
• On Trump’s Obliviousness to Conspiracies:
  • "He had no idea... which to me was the most satisfying codification..."
    — Holmes [10:08]
• On Media Enabling Conspiracies:
  • "Mainstream media as accurate as Arch Manning."
    — Ashbrook [10:45]
• On Chicago Crime Rationalizations:
  • "If they were making Smith and Wesson in Cook county, you might not have the cut."
    — Holmes [28:55]
• On Saving Blue Cities:
  • "Should we save the cities? Or do the cities deserve it?"
    — Duncan [32:32]
• On Deep Fried Oreos at the Missouri State Fair:
  • Schmidt: "I've discovered on a 95 degree day in Missouri, you don't want to have those at the beginning of the fair... I'm leaving. This is like, I'm gonna get it, but..." [53:11]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:00–02:30: Introductions and theme: media/Democratic conspiracies surge after 2024
• 03:15–06:00: Trump “owns the libs,” institutionalizing left-wing craziness
• 06:19–07:31: Weekend Trump death rumor explodes, media chases it
• 10:45–13:30: MSM picks up rumors; Colbert audience cheers possible Trump death; hosts discuss past decorum
• 15:08–17:24: Tim Walz and Dem politicians pander to online conspiracies
• 18:47–22:43: MSNBC’s Jen Psaki and the ironies of Biden/Trump health narratives
• 25:10–29:21: Trump and crime: D.C. vs. Chicago; blue city leaders’ blame game
• 31:59–32:54: Should conservatives ‘save the cities’ or let them hit bottom?
• 34:54–36:16: Fentanyl trafficker crackdown—Trump admin seen as effective, contrast with liberal handwringing
• 52:25–80:56: Interview with Sen. Eric Schmidt: motivation, lawfare, COVID, Senate rules, Missouri v. Biden case, and defending rights in the courts

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Conclusion

In this episode, the Ruthless crew gleefully dissects the left’s post-2024 malaise, pointing out the feedback loop between online lefty influencers, establishment Democrats, and mainstream media. The Trump “death” rumor becomes a symbol for broader patterns: conspiracy addiction, leadership vacuums, and clownish contrasts in policy and rhetoric between the parties. The extended interview with Senator Eric Schmidt provides a playbook for fighting leftist lawfare, exposing government overreach during COVID, and the central importance of courage in the conservative movement’s recent victories.

Listeners are prompted to comment their favorite left-wing conspiracy theory, and the show wraps on a light note before plugging new merchandise and reminding fans to “keep the faith, hold the line, and own the libs.”

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Listen/Watch Further

For full flavor—including relentless banter, vivid stories, and the interplay between hosts—catch the episode in video on YouTube or audio on your favorite podcast app.

Transcript

[John Ashbrook]

They had an actual headline. So once again, mainstream media as accurate as Arch Manning.

[Michael Duncan]

Oh, my God. All right, brutal, let's go.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Brutal.

[Michael Duncan]

So they have no one trying to guide this ship. So who is actually calling the shots? It's all the nut jobs, the influencers in that party who are just, listen, I'm on TikTok and I'm going to say I think Trump's dead.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

All of a sudden, the inmates are running the asylum. That's the thing. They know they're going to be disappointed by it. You know, they know they're going to be wrong. But they're so addicted to the depress that is their lives that every week they get hyped up on a new thing to disappoint.

[Josh Holmes]

Our nation is standing up for American workers, restoring the pride of making products here at home. That's what we do every day. We're America's beverage companies, making American products with American workers in America's hometowns, delivering brands that have been enjoyed for generations, creating good paying jobs, the kind that require only a strong work ethic because we believe in the promise of America and the people who make it great.

[John Ashbrook]

Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please.

[Michael Duncan]

Keep the faith, hold the line and own the lids.

[John Ashbrook]

It's time for our main event.

[Josh Holmes]

Good. Happy Thursday to you. Welcome back to the Ruthless Variety Program. I'm Josh Holmes along with comfortably smug Michael Duncan.

[Michael Duncan]

He's alive.

[Josh Holmes]

He's alive and well for you conspiracy theorists out there, along with John Ashbrook, left or right across your radio dial, as always, a full cast and crew here. Michael, you doing okay?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'm fantastic.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Shot out of a cannon. Full energy.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'm right as rain.

[Josh Holmes]

I'm glad to hear it.

[Michael Duncan]

There's been a lot of these conspiracy theories of conservatives being dead.

[Josh Holmes]

Yes.

[Michael Duncan]

And they're all untrue.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's true. It's true. I kind of felt like Donald Trump this weekend.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

You know.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, I mean, we're gonna get into that. It turns out the Democratic Party not well. Not well. I mean, we know that they've had some issues. Right. It's been a troubling time for Democrats across this country as they've sought to grapple with the aftermath of the 2024 election. And then all their hopes and dreams basically being, well, shelved in the first 24 hours of a Trump presidency. And then you get the big beauty and you get all these other things that are happening. It's been tough for them. And like, what typically happens with a political party in that period of time is you try to reconvene and understand where the pulse of your party and then how that interacts with a majority making electorate. And then you try to fuse together some kind of a call for the American people, like largely an economic message. Because your goal, if you're a Democrat, is to try to figure out how to win a midterm election. They don't want all Republican control for all four years of Donald Trump. God help them. Right? I mean, it would be a real problem.

[John Ashbrook]

No, that's exactly right. And here on the variety program, we always like to say own the libs. And President Trump currently holds the deed.

[Josh Holmes]

He 100% holds the deed. But where it's gone with Trump in a way that I don't think this has happened with any other president, Republican or Democrat, is he's actually like institutionalized. They're crazy.

[Michael Duncan]

So that's the thing, we've discussed for a while now how he's magically been able to find issue after issue to fight on. That's 80, 20, right. And that Dems are forced to take 20% side. But this is now like new levels of where Dems are unable to accept reality and are kind of trying to like wishcast, where they're like, donald Trump hasn't been seen for 24 hours. Is he alive?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

So I actually have a theory on this. You know, they say that addicted gamblers, people who gamble and gamble and gamble and can't stop, right?

[Josh Holmes]

They're chasing the dragon.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

They're chasing the dragon. But the reality is it's not about the big win. It's that somewhere deep in their heart, they want to lose. The feeling of losing is what ultimately drives them. It's like a Freudian death drive.

[Michael Duncan]

That's weird.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

And I feel like that applies to the Democratic Party all the way back from Russiagate and all these sort of hoaxes and conspiracies and things that they thought were gonna be the undoing of Donald Trump. Now they've gone to his actual life and they know they're going to be disappointed by it. You know, they know they're going to be wrong. But they're so addicted, the depression that is their lives, that every week they get hyped up on a new thing to disappoint them.

[Josh Holmes]

It's like compulsory in that. Yes. It's not a choice. Like they just have to do this.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's like a fucking fetish, dude.

[Michael Duncan]

That is so insane.

[Josh Holmes]

So, of course what we're starting with is what we made mention of in that over the labor Day, weekend in particular, there was this omnipresent online discussion happening that started them progressively left, bled deeply into the establishment of the Democratic Party. And lo and behold, the mainstream media is forced to cover it because that's their constituency. They've got to talk about what they're talking about at all times. Well, it turns out in this case, Donald Trump, despite the fact that he did not one, but two public press conferences last week, including the longest cabinet meeting in the history of this country.

[John Ashbrook]

I was there.

[Josh Holmes]

You were there.

[John Ashbrook]

I bore witness. You bore witness on the side of the building. Nonetheless, I was there all four and.

[Josh Holmes]

A half hours right there on White House crowds. So after the longest cabinet meeting in history, all of which was open press.

[John Ashbrook]

And might I add, after it was over, he started playing music.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. DJ Trump, TJ Trump. So there's four days there over the Labor Day weekend where he didn't have a publicly scheduled event. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. I mean, just as a recollection, in the first 48 hours of the Donald Trump presidency, he answered more press questions than Joe Biden did in all four years.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Kamala Harris didn't do an interview for, like the first month of her career. Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Which he did. They immediately.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

You know, that's the hilarious. And we talked about this a little bit earlier this. This morning, Holmes, because, you know, this weekend I didn't spend a lot of time online.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

You know, I. I had more drugs in my system than a billionaire in a K hole. And so I was trying. I was trying.

[Michael Duncan]

Amazing. I was. Holy cow.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I was trying to limit sort of.

[Josh Holmes]

A cold splash, which was a little bit of a cell phone.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah. It's whatever.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

But it's called ruthless. But, you know, I was trying to limit my intake. You know, I was trying to relax all weekend. I was maybe on Twitter, like, outside of, like watching sports, maybe on Twitter, like once or twice.

[Josh Holmes]

Sure.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

A day just to check in.

[Josh Holmes]

But it was omnipresent.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It was ubiquitous.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Every liberal in the world and every sort of liberal adjacent reporter was talking about Donald Trump. I don't know where he is.

[Josh Holmes]

They're like, maybe he's dead. And they're like taking pictures of his hands and stuff.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And they're like, we heard that he died, like somehow between a three and a half hour cabinet meeting.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Where he's answering every question from every media outlet in the English speaking world and some not in the English speaking world from that to Labor Day. Like he had somehow suffered this vanishing.

[Michael Duncan]

Act but, so this is the thing, is this shows so many things that we've already been discussing about how rudderless the Democrat ship is because they have no leadership. There is zero leadership in that party. You've got Chuck Schumer, who's terrified of the grassroots, that. That they're gonna come and kill him. So he's basically just like a spaghetti noodle. Whatever's happening, happening. He doesn't try to grab the reins or take control. Hakeem Jaffries, same story. He's got zero control in that party. He's scared to both endorse and not endorse Zoran Mamdani, where he's like, no comment, no questions. So they have no one trying to guide this ship. So who is actually calling the shots? It's all the. The nut jobs, the influencers in that party who are just, listen, I'm on TikTok and I'm going to say, I think Trump's dead.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

The inmates. Inmates are running the asylum. That's the thing.

[Michael Duncan]

There's no control over there. So. And then for that to now be upstream of the mainstream media, where you're seeing mainstream journals being like, is there any truth to this story that Trump is like, we're just asking questions. Yeah. Like, what is. What is happening in this country?

[Josh Holmes]

I just wonder what, like, our girl Caroline Levitt was dealing with in the press office. Because you have mainstream outlets that are like, people are asking questions, people are saying, that's my favorite clickbait is like, online, people express concern that President Trump may be deceased. And then they go and they ask a question to the White House press office that they're supposed to take seriously at some level. I'm sure her inbox was inundated.

[Michael Duncan]

But.

[Josh Holmes]

But there was a great little vignette, in my view, of how this press office and this White House work in that Donald Trump was enjoying his weekend. He was playing golf. It was a Labor Day weekend. Right. I mean, the guy took no time off in August. Zero. I mean, he was, like, hosting world leaders on the reg. He was doing these cabin things and all this stuff.

[Michael Duncan]

The only folks in D.C. who were working in August were Trump and us. That's it.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, I feel like that's right. But at the end of the day, the guy takes three, four days to just sort of, like, reinvigorate himself, and then we're getting all of this. And Doocy, I think, asks him about it at the. At the press briefing that he did on Tuesday, was it. And he's like, yeah, what you know, do you have any response to the online rumor mill that you were dead? And he's basically like, what? He has no idea. Which to me was the most satisfying.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yep.

[Josh Holmes]

Like codification. That Levitt and Taylor Buttovich and the crew that run the White House press office are just so locked solid than anything in that I'm sure they had a.

[Michael Duncan]

They know how to serve their principal.

[Josh Holmes]

Exactly. But they didn't give a shit. They didn't even tell them about it. They're not gonna respond to that stupid shit. And they're not gonna tell them, like, they don't care what's trending in the fever swamps of the left, even to the point where you had like the Axios of the world. Have to write it up.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Because of what was happening. I was like, wow, that's fantastic. Yeah, it was really good stuff. He had no. It is the first time he heard.

[John Ashbrook]

Of it about it in Politico had a headline on this. They had an actual headline. So once again, mainstream media as accurate as Arch Manning.

[Michael Duncan]

Oh, my God. All right, brutal.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Brutal.

[Josh Holmes]

We're starting hot. So anyway, if you're not aware of this online, everybody. The left started speculating that he was dead. And it started as like a nice little encapsulation of the mental health of the left and then it bled into like a darker component of it. And we're gonna get into all of that. But, like, here's clip one, for example. This is Colbert, right. This is the show that's canceled because it is off the left hand side of the map. It was supposed to be and always was a show that was main for the mainstream American, not particularly political, one way or another. Supposed to be funny to wait on wine after a long hard day's work.

[Michael Duncan]

And it's losing what, like 40 mil a year? It's an insane number.

[Josh Holmes]

It became so psychotic that the only people that listened to it or watched it were left wing lunatics. And they're like, no, no, no, that's not the case. We have a very mainstream audience. Check out clip one. The biggest story was frenzied social media.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Rumors speculating whether Donald Trump had died.

[Michael Duncan]

For the record, Donald Trump is very much alive.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Okay.

[Josh Holmes]

And no.

[John Ashbrook]

Great audience.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

We like our presidents alive.

[Josh Holmes]

If Stephen Colbert is in a situation where he needs to correct the audience, if that guy feels it's incumbent upon him to be like, no, I need to be the statesman here.

[Michael Duncan]

No, he did that with like a nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I don't, I don't know.

[Michael Duncan]

He did he? Hundred percent did. He's a criminal. You saw him right there. He's egging on that audience.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

How is he a criminal?

[Michael Duncan]

Secret Service should kick down his doors, raid his house.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Parody, parody, parody.

[Michael Duncan]

We're laughing. I believe the Secret Service should check his.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I think, I think at the very least that's probably the moment he realized, oh, this is. This is why I got canceled. No, because you know what I mean?

[Josh Holmes]

His entire side of the story is that it's not.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Like just a mouthpiece of the Democratic Party. That this is, you know, an audience that is very much mainstream in the way that David Letterman and everything else was. And then you see something like that and he's like, no, no, shut up. You're doing this out loud. We're not supposed to do this out loud.

[Michael Duncan]

I'm telling you right now. If there had been a host who did that when Barack Obama was president, he'd lose his show and the Secret Service would visit. Remember when they.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Remember when they tracked down.

[John Ashbrook]

Right.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Remember they tracked down that rodeo clown because he wore Obama mask. Oh, yeah, you.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, yeah. No, I mean, it used to. We used to live in a day and age when if you were speculating with like a glint of hope that perhaps something happened to the President of the United States, it was taken extraordinarily seriously.

[Michael Duncan]

And it should be taken 10 times more seriously for a president who's had multiple attempts on their life.

[Josh Holmes]

I totally agree, but it doesn't stop.

[Michael Duncan]

Stephen Colbert has no class. They should remove him from television immediately. The Secret Service should kick down his door, tear his house apart, search the whole place. Cuz the time for jokes is over. Many attempts have been made. Colbert's a sick man. He was egging his audience on. It's disgusting.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, we got you. We put a quarter in your.

[Michael Duncan]

And they should. They should have live footage of his house getting raided too. I want to see it.

[Josh Holmes]

All right, so. But part of the contention that we've had, if you listen to Ruthless for the last like eight months, is that this stuff that used to be confined to a very small sliver of an online progressive universe the likes of which people are like sweatpants that are like, you know, laying in mom and dad's basement. And they're like crazy individuals that you would not bring out during a family reunion. Right. You'd hide them at some point. That has seeped into the center of the Democratic Party, one of two parties that are vying for control of the United States of America. The ethos, the very ethos. Of that party is now on board with doom scrolling X finding a conspiracy and centralizing its message into their pitch. See last year's vice presidential nominee, tim waltz. Clip 2.

[Michael Duncan]

You up in the morning and you.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Doom scroll through things and although I will say this, the last few days you woke up thinking there might be news. Just saying, just saying there will be news sometime.

[Michael Duncan]

Just so you know.

[Josh Holmes]

What will be news?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

There will be news sometime.

[John Ashbrook]

What is that?

[Josh Holmes]

So like what started is just a bad, bad humor. First of all, it says a lot to who he thinks he's talking to and maybe it is who he's talking to. Somebody would go see Tim Walls at this point. Like you probably have to be a left wing lunatic at some level.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean that's Minnesota now. But I mean that's the thing. Minnesota is all left wing lunatic.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

He's giving a failed state.

[Josh Holmes]

He's given a speech to Mogadishu.

[Michael Duncan]

That's the thing. And for him to go up there and it's just like, I'm telling you, it's the same way Colbert did with like a nudge, nudge, wink, wink of like, you know that news we're talking about. So like he's trying to give himself plausible deniability of like, oh no, of course I'm not suggesting, I'm hoping to hear news that Donald Trump has passed away. He wants to give himself that deniability but also ham it up for his audience because he's like, right guys, we're all cheering for it. That's sick. Horrible.

[John Ashbrook]

It is.

[Josh Holmes]

But it took a turn and I heard you react to it when you watched the clip. It took, it went from bad humor and this guy, like he's a limited individual. This is not somebody who has like, he's not a five tooler. Like he's just right real, such, such.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

An insult to a dude.

[Michael Duncan]

Governor of Minnesota. They sent their best.

[Josh Holmes]

So. But he with like a thing where a hyper online progressive crowd knows what he's talking about and like that's a telling on yourself moment that he's.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah, the dooms. Like even referencing doom scrolling it encapsulates how captured even the former vice presidential candidate is by this online left psychopath community.

[Josh Holmes]

100% definitely. But it turns and this is what I heard you react to Smash when he's like there will be news.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah, that's what caught my attention because as hard of a time as we gave Colbert and he didn't go that far.

[Michael Duncan]

That is going too far.

[John Ashbrook]

He tried to stop his audience and I Mean, this guy is projecting into the future straight up that it seems.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Like he's hoping will happen, putting it on his vision board.

[Michael Duncan]

That should be a Secret Service visit though.

[Josh Holmes]

That's what I'm saying.

[Michael Duncan]

Like that saying that like there will be. That's threatening at that point, that becomes threatening. Like what are you saying here? What do you think there's going to be news about that?

[Josh Holmes]

Like, are you trying to be. Is this an attempt at humor? Because it's like nobody finds that funny.

[Michael Duncan]

Nope.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

The President, United States, America does borderline incitement.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, it does, dude. That does.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, you know, and I like, look, we are the last people to be like hand wringery. Yeah, you know, whatever. But like that's where their head's at.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

You'd think like back to Smug's point, you'd think like after two attempted assassination attempts, you know, that they might have a little more sensitivity to this entire thing. But now not at all.

[Josh Holmes]

Not. That's Tim Walls. Yeah, ladies and gentlemen, he'll be on the 50 yard line cheering for the Minnesota Vikings in full get up this Monday night.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I mean, my team might be bad, but yours is embarrassing.

[Josh Holmes]

Listen, I've had a rough off season, pal. I'm just hoping to put stack a couple of wins and get through this deal. But anyway, so you might ask yourself when you see that kind of behavior from a Colbert crowd or a Tim Walls who's doing his quote unquote doom scrolling, like where do you get it? Like, what's the information silo other than just being hyper online left. Well, let's check out MSNBC and Jen Psaki in clip three.

[Michael Duncan]

Now, just to be clear, we went and there's a very quick span there. We went from Trump saying he hadn't.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Heard about the rumors of his death.

[Michael Duncan]

To Trump saying he did hear about them from reports to then back to Trump saying he hadn't heard anything about any of it in the span of approximately 60 seconds in the Oval Office today. Really can't make this stuff up sometimes. And look, we may never know why Donald Trump suddenly spent a week hiding entirely from the American public, but you don't actually need baseless online conspiracies to explain why he might not want to show his face in public right now. Come on. That's the thing, is there is such little level of like self awareness among Dems. I mean, you have to be with essentially the kind of like brain damage system that they've put themselves in. But for Jen Psaki, who worked for Joe Biden who was, I mean, like, saying he was on life support is charitable.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

The guy couldn't answer questions. Like when her interviewed him, her was like, I'm real, I feel bad for you, bro. Just say stop and we can put you back in the gurney and wheel you out.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It also, I think, speaks to the sort of thing, thin gruel that the progressive media has to take to their audience right now as Donald Trump stacks W after W after W. You know, they're treating this thing like it's Watergate. They're like, when did Donald Trump find out he died and when did he know it? You know?

[Michael Duncan]

It's true.

[Josh Holmes]

It's true. And they also have this hilarious.

[John Ashbrook]

Like.

[Josh Holmes]

Mainstream media, they've adopted corporate media, right? All the nets and all the. And they all grew up like, with a very West Wing view. We talked about it 100% and if we could play the theme, we would, but we're afraid of the copyright. Anyway, the, the way that she presents that to me is the most comical thing of all. She's like, it's like, you know, the hard hitting commentary, you know, where it's like, why isn't he just twice in the Oval Office? He did. First of all, he wasn't in the Oval Office. He was the West Wing, stupid bitch. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know what I mean. I understand it sounds pretty harsh, but.

[Michael Duncan]

She used to work there.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

She's a communications professional. She used to be the mouthpiece of the Biden administration. Like, if any person should be able to know this stuff and not be ignorant about it, it's her.

[Josh Holmes]

And second of all, she literally worked for someone who, when you saw him in public, that wasn't enough for proof of life. Yeah, like, this is. This cat was out from the drop. Like every time Joe Biden showed up in public, you were like, is it Joe Biden? Like, is he. Is that like a.

[Michael Duncan]

To the point where like you're having every week more and more people who work for Joe Biden saying they either hadn't seen him alive in over a year or they're taking the fifth. When asked, like, have you, did you ever see anything about him that made you think he was close to death? They're like, I played the fifth, bro. I got to be real. I can't say this.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

You could do an entire Oscars awards of Democrats who work for Joe Biden feigning outrage over Donald Trump's health. It's amazing, like the ability for them to straight face that they are concerned about this.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, I think what makes it, and I'll just wrap my commentary up with this, I think what makes it so aggravating from my standpoint, why, like, Psaki in particular just really gets my goat is I know Jen Psaki like, I used to do TV with Jen Psaki. She's actually a pretty smart lady.

[Michael Duncan]

She's not.

[Josh Holmes]

No, no, no, I'm dead serious. She's a pretty smart lady. She's funny. She gets the joke. Like, she understands politics. She understands all that. And the willful ignorance in which she pursued her job in the Biden administration was troubling. Much worse, in my estimation, is in an opposed career where you have to pretend. I mean, where's the leadership? You have to pretend as though the absolute fever swamps of the left that are driving the message of today's Democratic Party have, like, some sort of insight.

[Michael Duncan]

Like, you need to do a full.

[Josh Holmes]

Segment on your show echoing back. Pure insanity. That's nuts.

[John Ashbrook]

How is it that Democrats are drawn into these contrasts over and over and over again? The contrast between Joe Biden, who was dead for four years, and Donald Trump, who goes 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Everybody knows that. And then Democrats who are like, no men should be able to play girls sports. And Republicans are like, no, I don't think that's such a good idea. And then on crime, Democrats are like, no, the criminals, the murderers, they're the ones who matter. And Republicans are like, well, wait a minute, what about the. What about the victims? Why don't we stop crime? How is it that time after time after time, Democrats are drawn into the absolute, unexplainable position of every conversation?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's the addicted gambler. They're addicted to losing.

[Josh Holmes]

I think you might be right about that. Well, anyway, when we come back, we've got so much more, including crime, which there is some beclowning here that. I mean, there's plenty of yucks to be had. Wait till you see what we have. We got a great guest in Senator Eric Schmidt, who's here. Great new senator from the state of Missouri. You've heard him here a couple of times. He's one of our absolute favorites. Just a terrific guy. And he's gonna be with us. We're gonna play a game, and we're gonna have a lot more yucks right after this.

[John Ashbrook]

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[Josh Holmes]

Okay, welcome back to the ruthless Friday program. Crime and punishment is something that the Trump administration has taken a great sense of obligation over. I found personally an awful lot of just enthusiasm behind clip four here.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Mind up on Chicago, though.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, we're going in. I didn't say when we're going in. When you lose. Look, I have an obligation. This isn't a political thing. I have an obligation. When we lose, when 20 people are killed over the last two and a half weeks, if the governor of Illinois would call up, call me up, I.

[Michael Duncan]

Would love to do it now.

[Josh Holmes]

We're going to do it anyway. We have the right to do it because I have an obligation to protect this country. I mean. All right, so that is a sense of responsibility that we haven't seen in an awful long time of somebody who thinks as president, not only they have an obligation to the free world. You saw that with the meetings in Ukraine, Russia, all that other stuff, but an obligation at the local level. If Americans are getting killed and he can do something about it, he feels a sense of obligation to do that. I think all of us are like, wow, yeah, that's great. You know who else felt that way? The mayor of D.C. came in under great protest of the D.C. government, D.C. residents and everybody else to an obvious crime problem that they were having over a series of years, really cleaned it up in a matter of 48 hours, reduced the homicides, took carjackings down several hundred percent. Like it just cleaned up the city. And you can see it. I mean, we're here, you can see it. It's a very different deal. And she in return is like, you know what? Great idea. That's great. I appreciate the help. I would like to assign a future authority so it's not just rammed upon me like the first time around to actually partner with the federal government to continue to what we're doing because it seems like it's working great. So how does like Chicago, for example, react to this? Let's see. The mayor of Chicago. This guy is really something special. Clip 5.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

We will never be able to end gun violence in Chicago as long as the president continues to allow tens of thousands of guns to be trafficked into our state and our city. The vast majority of guns do not come from Chicago. They are not made in Cook County. They are not bought in the state of Illinois. These guns come from red states will continue to have a violence problem as.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Long as red states continue to have a gun problem.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Shootings will continue as long as this presidential administration continues to put politics over people.

[Michael Duncan]

That's incredible.

[John Ashbrook]

Goodness.

[Michael Duncan]

It's like he's so close to getting it. He's so close to getting when he was like, well, Chicago's a gun free zone. So like, I don't know why the problem has to be the guns, but we're in a gun free zone.

[Josh Holmes]

He's so close, he just can't quite see. Snap that thing closed.

[Michael Duncan]

It's like almost like criminals don't care about laws.

[Josh Holmes]

He's like, oh, guns aren't manufactured in Cook County.

[Michael Duncan]

Insane.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

That's an insane take.

[Josh Holmes]

That's an insane take. Oh, they're not. I mean, imagine being a human being breathing air in the same world that we live in. You're like, well there, he's right about that. If they were manufactured in Cook county, well, his whole argument would have flown out the window. But if it's not manufactured in the homes of Cabrini Green in the projects, well then I have no explanation as to how it is could be used for violence. Perhaps it's a behavior.

[Michael Duncan]

He's like, you see, we have no manufacturing jobs left in Chicago because he.

[Josh Holmes]

Ran them out of here.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, right.

[Josh Holmes]

If they were making Smith and Wesson in Cook county, you might not have the cut.

[Michael Duncan]

What an idiot.

[Josh Holmes]

But it's just incredible of the amount of. Again you go back to the Jen Psaki thing, the willfully obtuse blocking of reality that the sky is not blue, that all these things are reality, but this is where this guy's at. So. All right, so let's go to the governor of his state. This one.

[Michael Duncan]

Oh, I love this.

[Josh Holmes]

This is my absolute favorite. This Jabba da Hutt cat.

[Michael Duncan]

I'm ready to go in.

[Josh Holmes]

Let's go to clip six. You're going to hear people, especially this.

[Michael Duncan]

Past weekend, 54 shot, seven dead. They're going to say the city's not safe.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Would you ask your friends to ride.

[Michael Duncan]

The L after midnight or after, you know, nine o' clock at night even to come down to the city From o'.

[Josh Holmes]

Hare.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Look, big cities have crime.

[Josh Holmes]

There's no doubt about it.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

But let's just pay attention to what President Trump is doing. Overlooking red states that have much higher crime rates. Much higher.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, so here's the thing. So straight up, what you just saw happen is he says, she's like, there were 57 shootings. The governor's like, well, listen, here's the thing. Big cities have crime. Let's look at what Trump is doing. He straight up, like, just conceded the fact that, like, yeah, we're gonna have crime. There's nothing that can be done about it.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's like playing hard pivot on our show. It's insane.

[Michael Duncan]

And like, normally that would be like the death knell for a politician's career if they straight up said, there's nothing I can do about it. You just got to accept the fact that there's crime. But here's why Pritzker, his career is not over. That's why you're seeing this like, tubby, talentless dude just waddling along because his last name is Pritzker. His family's got so much money, they bought out all the political machine in the state of Illinois. They put money in the hands of all the left wing think tanks and, and politicians and organizations and organized labor in the city in the state of Illinois. They bought a talentless son like Pritzker that seat. And that's why he has zero talent. He has no reason to look at people are getting murdered and shot nonstop under his watch. If he had any dignity whatsoever, he would resign because he's a clear failure. But this is the thing. He's a billionaire. Failson. His family's got so much money, they keep his fat ass in that seat that he doesn't deserve. Trump has shown Washington D.C. had like five times the murder rate of any other capital on earth. We're talking about, like, you could go to Angola and you have less of a chance of getting murdered than you did in D.C. and that changed like that. He's like, now let's look at what Trump did. Let's look at what Trump did. You walk around in D.C. now you are safe. You don't have these drugged out zombies out on the street that are going to assault you. And you don't have gang members driving around doing drive bys nonstop carjacking people. He should be ashamed of himself. He should be ashamed, but he can't feel shame.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

So maybe this is an unpopular take, but I don't care. Like, I disagree with President Trump. He shouldn't go into Chicago. Like, I watch those two clips. You look at the mayor, you look at the governor and it's like, why save these people from themselves? I don't wish violence on anybody. I don't rush anybody to get killed in Chicago. But like, Donald Trump proved the point in Washington D.C. yeah. Like, maybe the people of Illinois or the people of California should wake up to the fact that their politicians have run their states into the ground and do something about it. And Donald Trump can't save them. Even if he does save them, he's not going to get any of the fucking credit.

[Michael Duncan]

This I think is like a very interesting debate right now happening on the right is like, should, should we save the cities?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

Or do the cities deserve it? And I see both sides of it of like, yeah, you get what you deserve. Kind of like joker fide take of like, let these blue cities, hey, if you vote for it, you deserve to suffer. But at the same time, Trump should have total rule over the entire country coast to coast.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Dude, you look, you look at like, who is the.

[Michael Duncan]

Every city belongs to Trump.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

The previous Chicago mayor, Beetlejuice, whatever her name was, was fucking horrible. Terrible mayor.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

And had terrible approval ratings. And then they picked somebody even worse and more to the left than her to be the new mayor.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Beetlejuice was even like, whoa, really?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

At some point, the people of Chicago have to do something about this.

[Josh Holmes]

They do. I do want to give hats off to an Illinois company. I don't know who manufactured the shirt for the Fighting Illini, and I don't know what the thread count was, but that shirt is hanging on for dear life. Can we put that thing back up? Look at, let's look at the B roll of, of Pritzker walking in.

[Michael Duncan]

Let's see the waddle.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, look at the stretch on that particular garment.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's like a tall tee. It's extra long for.

[Michael Duncan]

Also, there's at this point, zero excuse for any billionaire to be that tubby. Like, money can now buy your way out of it. Dude, you're a billionaire. Like, he is such a soft like billionaire baby boy that he's still tubby. Like, what a lazy fuck.

[Josh Holmes]

I just think all the big ten's gonna have to look into this thread. The manufacturer of shirts for the Fighting Illini. Because that shirt, it's doing more work than most. More than you signed up for, for sure. Yeah, you order a triple XL and you expect it to only go so far. Pritzker's pushing it to the limit.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It's A moo moo. Build a border wall material.

[Josh Holmes]

You could.

[Michael Duncan]

Pritzker's got a moomoo, bro.

[Josh Holmes]

So good. All right, finally in the crime area. I love to see it. I just love to see it. So it turns out everybody's thrown up their hands over drug traffickers. Oh, what are you going to do, you know, if you can't like have a Coast Guard cutter on every single square inch of the ocean? Well, we're just going to get fent trafficked into every square inch of America and kill the center of this country. Well, it turns out the Trump administration is doing a little something about that. Clip seven, please.

[John Ashbrook]

He has this video of that boat just getting torched.

[Josh Holmes]

So what you're seeing is a trende Aragua. That's a name that might sound familiar to you. It's a gang that's been in.

[Michael Duncan]

It's a narco terror group that's designated by the State Department because they've committed many acts of terrorism and do everything they can. And they're a government supported terror group, might I add, which has been just trafficking drugs, human trafficking. They've been committing atrocities against humanity, against Americans, and that's what you get. And I think it was oilfield rando on X who made the tremendously good point of he was like all these like bleeding heart libs who are like, oh no, won't someone think of the traffickers. You can't just let the military smoke them like this. It's like, dude, Trump has been doing everything he can to deport just one one of these gang members. And you get judge after judge after judge. He wouldn't have to smoke them like this before they get in if it wasn't so hard to get him out.

[Josh Holmes]

Well, he went guns hot on the U.S. navy. And it turns out for drug traffickers, it doesn't end well.

[Michael Duncan]

Well, we saw in that boat shout out Secretary Hegseth. I mean, that's how it's done. And he posted the kill feed too. When the video went up on X, I was like, this is what I voted for.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh God, I know.

[Josh Holmes]

Straight to the gates of hell with everybody in that boat. So that leads to our question of the day is what's your favorite left wing conspiracy?

[Michael Duncan]

There's so many to choose from, right?

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, for one, we heard the mayor of Chicago say that crime in inner cities is a red state issue.

[Michael Duncan]

Incredible.

[Josh Holmes]

You heard the death of Trump. You heard that, you know, all of the various deportation, immigration conspiracies that they've come up with that like Maryland man, and all of those other things. I mean, there is no end to it, but I know there's probably some that missed our radar that we haven't talked about, but you probably are aware of them when you like and subscribe to the Ruthless Variety program and comment away on the question of the day. We read them all and we get back to you in the very next episode. So urge you to go ahead and leave your answers to that. And when we come back, we're going to be playing some games and we're going to be answering your question today from Tuesday's episode, which is a substantive episode.

[John Ashbrook]

Good question.

[Josh Holmes]

Every once in a while we have to show you not only do we laugh at stuff, but we kind of know what we're talking about.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

We're smart.

[Josh Holmes]

Smart.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I didn't help, though.

[Josh Holmes]

No, you were tending to your wounds, old man. Right after this.

[John Ashbrook]

Only 58% of Americans today say they're proud to be American, the lowest number ever recorded. That's not just sad, it is very dangerous. Because if we forget what makes America special, we risk losing it. That's why Americans for Prosperity is launching the One Small Step Campaign, a bold nationwide initiative to reconnect Americans with our founding principles that sparked unparalleled innovation and prosperity. It's not just a celebration, it's a call to action. Through the 250,000 Steps for Freedom challenge, AFP is partnering with the grassroots in all 50 states to take meaningful steps that defend freedom and advance opportunity. Call your representative, attend a local event, knock on a door, talk to your neighbors, and every single step counts. And every step moves us closer to a more perfect Union. Go to takeonesmallstep.com to learn more. Then join the [e-mail].

[Josh Holmes]

Okay, as we said, when you like and subscribe and you leave your answer to the question of the day or really anything, we read them all here on the Ruthless Friday program and get it back to you the next episode with a good summary. And to do that, we always start with a voice first.

[John Ashbrook]

Comment comes from Steve Rhee. And Steve writes, maybe GOP should run on abolishing the D.C. federal district court, which Congress has the power to do, and moving its cases to other venues. You can't have a federal district court that has jury pools 96% of one party, and that party has gone insane. They could try to do it now and at least pass it in the House. That's Steve Re with a very, very good point.

[Josh Holmes]

Very good point. Remember, this is the question of what should Congress prioritize? So comment number 2 dunks.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'm just now seeing this comment. You're telling me for the first time. Comment number 2 is from Brian. Brian writes, trump isn't dead. Duncan is dead.

[Josh Holmes]

I will say, old man, there was a fair amount of concern for your well being.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I hate to disappoint you, Brian. I'm alive. It is sort of a surreal moment when a lot of people on the Internet are contemplating whether you've, you know, died.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, you got close for a while there. It was very close.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It was not close. You're gonna scare my mom. Don't say that.

[Michael Duncan]

That's why I didn't talk about it, because I didn't want to scare your parents, I'm sure. Come on.

[John Ashbrook]

There were, there were, on that point, two other comments. If I may.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Here we go.

[John Ashbrook]

I'm worried about Duncan, guys. That's one of the comments from Lorraine. Another comment from Palmer's fam. Did Duncan contract malaria? Asking for a friend. Just kidding. Get well, Mikey D. No.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

See, that's nice.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, it's nice to hear. There are people who were concerned.

[John Ashbrook]

They were worried about you.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, because they know. Look, your track record of infecting all of us with ever infectious disease you've contracted is like a hundred percent.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah, that's all he does.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

For me to not come in, it had to be done.

[Michael Duncan]

That's the one reason he was like, I have to stay alive so I can infect everyone.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, we know the motives. Comment 3, please.

[Michael Duncan]

Smug comment 3 is from Gator Troy. Gator Troy writes, the pure solution to most issues is that you have a super majority in the Senate and House in 2027. Then elect the next Republican president in 2028. This should be the goal of the RNC and podcasters who helped Trump get elected beginning today. In addition, state and local elections should be a focus.

[Josh Holmes]

Ah, well said.

[Michael Duncan]

It's got to be done. It's got to be done. We have to get rid of all elected Democrats. We get supermajority, we get JD Next, we throw all Dems in jail. And.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

He'S really hot on the throwing people in jail today.

[Josh Holmes]

No, it's big.

[Michael Duncan]

D.C. has shown declines of choice. You throw the criminals in jail, good things happen.

[Josh Holmes]

You can see it festering now. I mean, you know that like late nights, he just sits there and he's like, oh, I bet we could throw everyone in jail.

[Michael Duncan]

We can put them all, lock them all up.

[Josh Holmes]

We can do it solitary.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

That's how he spent his Labor Day.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay, so it's Thursday, and on Thursdays, we play our signature game, King of the Hill. I understand I'm a participant today. Who's the champion? Duncan?

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'm the champion. I have Rick Wilson.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay. All right. That's a tough out always. I'm going to bring the old fat man, Steve Schmidt.

[John Ashbrook]

Amazing. Okay, return.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Let's go ringside.

[John Ashbrook]

Ladies and gentlemen, your attention, please. It's time for King of the Hill. In the red corner, fighting from his giant deck out west, the old fat man, Steve Schmidt. And now, in the blue corner, hiding, formerly from the Daily Beast and the Lincoln Project, and current champion of the world, Rick Wilson.

[Josh Holmes]

Just good to hear. It's been a couple of weeks, and.

[Michael Duncan]

I am your judge, I think. Let's just get right to it.

[Josh Holmes]

Let's do it. Champion starts.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Okay, can I get exhibit number two, please? I love how all the quote, six Semper Tyrannus bros are just utterly silent over the slow march to autocratic rule. In the meantime, enjoy this heartwarming scene. And the scene that he's put in there in that video is from the movie Civil War, and it's the execution of the president.

[Michael Duncan]

Are you.

[Josh Holmes]

Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Wow.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Good luck.

[John Ashbrook]

They're really pushing the envelope.

[Michael Duncan]

They are, because we don't do things like send the Secret Service and raid Stephen Colbert's house. Once you start making examples that there's gonna be consequences. You know, it's the fafo.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, in all honesty, like, we.

[Michael Duncan]

Need a lot of fo.

[Josh Holmes]

Like, what? I'm gonna have to throw? Nah, I'm not gonna throw, but I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna give you.

[Michael Duncan]

It's tough, man. He went right with it.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay, okay, so this is just in the last week here, and what exhibit? Exhibit 11, please? Apropos of absolutely nothing, Steve Schmidt writes, there are degradations of human rights on American soil, and they are disgusting. And it's a video of Jan.6, round one, Rick Wilson.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, like, what's the debate, dude? That was out of control.

[John Ashbrook]

That was clear.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, you know, Secret Service should just start listening to the show. We'll let you know who to knock.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, and by the way, if Smug could be warden of wherever it is that you're housing these people, I have a feeling there wouldn't be a lot of recidivism.

[Michael Duncan]

No consequences.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

He'd make Joe Arpaio look like a cuckoo.

[Josh Holmes]

So good. Okay, this one is one of my favorites exhibit 10, please. He is posting a graphic which is a picture of Trump and Putin. The old Saul, right. This guy sort of made his deal and it's about Trump, you know, the peace talks or whatever. And he. Can I say. Yeah, yeah, can I say what it is? That's because it's all his. It's not like he's retweeting.

[Michael Duncan]

Yep.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, so it's Trump promised peace. The reality is that he set the course for World War Three. And then he says Trump has unleashed misery and division. Okay, so look, it's a little bit of a thinking man's take, but if you take just a moment to understand that the Ukrainian war of which that he's referring to happened entirely on Biden's watch, would never have happened under Trump's. It hadn't operated opportunity and didn't. And Joe Biden did absolutely nothing other than try to appropriate 250 to $300 billion of American money to try to fight on one side of the war or another. Never conducted a peace talk whatsoever and never found it incumbent upon himself to be leader of the free world to actually convene a group to do so. Trump for the very first time convenes not only Putin for his head to head sit down on this thing, but then the entirety of the European Union and the Prime Minister of the. To have the first real discussion that we've had since the onset of this. And Steve Schmidt's take, the guy that we sent to Iraq to write good news in Baghdad talking points, is giving us the discussion point that this act is what is unleashing misery and division. Rest my case.

[Michael Duncan]

Incredible. Incredible. Good breakdown.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Incredible. Good salesmanship.

[Michael Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I got to commend my opposing counsel. Exhibit number three, please. I love tweets like this where it's like government account and it's just HHS and all they're tweeting is. Suzanne Menarez is no longer director of the CDC and Prevention. We thank her for her dedicated service to the American people. Rick Wilson, quote, tweets it, you're all going to burn in hell for eternity.

[Michael Duncan]

My God.

[Josh Holmes]

God. I would just appeal.

[Michael Duncan]

I would appeal to the court.

[Josh Holmes]

I understand that it is. Is more eye catching.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, that's the thing, dude, man, like, I'll give you credit, I'll say this, you know, I'm rendering a verdict. Holmes. Holmes. Really put in the showmanship.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Michael Duncan]

On this. But like Rick Wilson, just monster. He's a menace this week, bro. That's a two round knockout champion.

[Josh Holmes]

He's a Menace.

[Michael Duncan]

Reign of terror continues.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Let's go.

[John Ashbrook]

That is incredible.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, I'm sorry. That. That is not.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, the guy is trying to get the Secret Service to kick his house down. Like, you win the prize.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, I can't. There's nothing I can do about that. That's unbelievable. For eternity. Yeah. They have a disagreement over vaccine policy.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah, that's like the funniest thing of all time.

[Josh Holmes]

Anyway, all right, so a couple of things of variety, if you guys don't mind. Yeah, well, have you seen the video from the Chuck E. Cheese guy?

[John Ashbrook]

I heard about it. I haven't seen it.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh my God, this is so good. Clip 8, going to be him in the mouth.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Oh, boy.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh my God.

[Michael Duncan]

Chucky's a little bit busy, man. Chucky, come with me. Chucky.

[Josh Holmes]

Come on.

[Michael Duncan]

Come with Chucky. Chucky. Stop resisting.

[John Ashbrook]

Wait, he's getting arrested. They're arresting the. The guy in the suit.

[Josh Holmes]

Let it. Let it go.

[Michael Duncan]

The kids running scene here, sir. Great question. Bye, Chuck.

[John Ashbrook]

Holy cow.

[Michael Duncan]

Is that. Does this just come off the top? Also? It's. It's a class move by these cops that they only took the like mouse head off outside so the kids didn't have to see. You know what I mean?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'm sure putting Charles Entertainment Cheese in handcuffs was traumatizing enough.

[Josh Holmes]

So police have arrested and released the video of Chuck E. Cheese employee outside of one of the company's Florida locations while in full costume. The Tallahassee police say that employee Jermell Jarreau Jones. Jermell Jarreau Jones. Triple J. Triple J, 41, was arrested after being identified as a suspect in a credit card theft investigation. Investigation. Officers found the Jones inside the restaurant after another employee told them he was the one that was in costume.

[Michael Duncan]

And I guess it had been like a company card from the Chuck E. Cheese. So like.

[Josh Holmes]

So it's like the officer.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, like I want to see that court case. Because he's gonna be like, I'm Chuck E. Cheese, bro. My name is on the building, bro. I can use the credit card.

[Josh Holmes]

Dude. Yeah, exactly, right? I'm Ronald McDonald.

[John Ashbrook]

So just tickets and tokens. It's not real money.

[Josh Holmes]

The officers said that they intended to handcuff Jones outside of the restaurant, but he resisted, as we saw in that video. At which point the officers had to handcuff him inside. And you heard the commentary. This is why you gotta subscribe and like the YouTube channel, cuz he can't.

[Michael Duncan]

You have to see that video.

[Josh Holmes]

You gotta see it. The kid, the first Kid to hightail it. He's sitting there talking to Chuck and then the cops come up and they're like, hey, you, whatever. And he kind of like pulls away.

[Michael Duncan]

That's a smart kid, man.

[Josh Holmes]

And the cop slaps the silver bracelet on him. The kids like, I'm out of here.

[Michael Duncan]

Smart kid.

[Josh Holmes]

And then one kid is like, see you, Chucky.

[Michael Duncan]

I'll show you the kids away.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, look at, look at this kid.

[Michael Duncan]

Get away from the fact. There he goes.

[Josh Holmes]

He's on his way.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

See, this is the problem with organized crime in this country. They always get the low level dealers. I'm sure this Chuck E. Cheese character was a bad guy. But Chuck E. Cheese, overall, I feel like I've been a victim of fraud there. I have collected hundreds of tickets when I was a kid. And I feel like the best I could get was one of those like sticky hands or one of the bouncy balls.

[Michael Duncan]

Skill issue, bro. I used to clean up there. Skill issue. I used to crush it, bro.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

No, rack it.

[Michael Duncan]

Chucky's gotta do this. Cause I cleaned him out. That's a skill issue, bro.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Can we also point out that Chucky.

[Michael Duncan]

Ball maniac dude, Chuck E. Cheese.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Chuck E. Cheese must be fallen on hard times because I remember when I was a kid, Chuck E. Cheese was like a standalone place. And it was like you went in and it felt like you were transported into like this awesome place. This is like in a strip mall with floor to ceiling windows.

[Josh Holmes]

Strip mall.

[Michael Duncan]

That's Tallahassee, dude. There is nothing nice in Tallahassee. I mean, I gotta say, it's a tough town. Beat up it is. Anyone who's been there, you know, why.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Are we hating on Tallahassee?

[Michael Duncan]

It's just beat up, bro.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Hey, Florida State beat Alabama.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, yeah, they got like finally something to cheer for there. It's been a minute just goes jumps ugly on Tallahassee.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I like Tallahassee.

[John Ashbrook]

Oh, man, it's the state capital.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay, well, let's get to our interview. Who has nothing to do with Tallahassee whatsoever. Chuck E. Cheese, for that matter. But he is a formidable gentleman in his own right. Senator Eric Schmidt. Well, our next guest is one of our absolute favorites here on the Ruthless Variety program. I think he's been on three times. This is the third time that he's been on this show comes at a very good time. Congress is coming back. He's written a new book which we're gonna talk about. Senator Eric Schmidt. How are you, sir?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

I'm great. It's great to be Back with the fellas.

[Josh Holmes]

You spent, I would imagine, a few weeks back with your constituents in the great state of Missouri.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah, the show Me State. I got around and you look good.

[Josh Holmes]

You look.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Thanks.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Smiling.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Well, you know, we haven't been in Congress, like in session, you know, for a few weeks, so I look like a normal human being. I'm sure, like, if you talk to me in three weeks, I'll look haggard and depressed, but. No, it was great. It was great. You know, did the state fair got by Mizzou. Talked to Coach Drinkwitz. I got a little sc. SCC preview.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Oh, yeah, over there. You know, looks like good quarterback.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. Well, they were going to have this competition and then Sam Horn got hurt, so. But he looked good in the first game.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Did you eat anything interesting at the state fair?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

I always do the kind of my I'm out of here meal is the deep fried Oreos. But I. I've discovered on. On a 95 degree day in Missouri, you don't want to have those. At the beginning of the fair, it's like, I'm leaving. This is like, I'm gonna get it, but. But no, I'll get there. And there's usually a great concert. You get around and see all the. The AG folks, eat all the food and do all the things and stop by the Budweiser tent in the evening and have a little fun, so.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, exactly. That's great. Well, in the midst of all that, you managed to release a book that in my view is like perfect timing.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

I mean, we're dealing literally today with new court rulings on whether we can send National Guard to protect the people of California. We've got tariff rulings. Trump administration has run into the court problem. And who better to talk to the guy who's written the book, the Last Line of Defense, how to Beat the left in Court. Well, it comes from a position of some education.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

One of the things that I think, you know, when we first met.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Right.

[Josh Holmes]

You know, my previous job was trying to recruit people like you for the United States Senate. And I'd sit down with a lot of people who frankly had no business in the United States Senate. And when we met, I was like, wow, not only is he good and authentic and comfortable, but he's actually doing a lot of stuff. When you were as Attorney General, and I imagine that that. And your work in that capacity helped sort of foment your views on how you could beat the left in court.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah, it was. I've never written a book before, so it was kind of an interesting process, but it really was kind of a wild time. So before I was in the Senate, I was Missouri's Attorney general. And the first two years of my time President Trump was in office, we were doing partnerships with U.S. attorneys and fighting crime and doing all that. And then Biden came in and everything changed. Right. So it really, I think we're on the other side of the fever dream now. And so you guys get, you know, an opportunity a couple times a week. And when I do shows, you talk about all these great successes we're having, and it's just a lot of fun. It's. It's great to be a Republican right now because we're in the majority. We're doing a lot of things President Trump talked about on the campaign trail. He's got this new coalition and it's disruptive. And we're taking all these, on all these important fights and by and large, winning. But I think it's important to remember just how close we were to really losing all of it. I mean, this was a time of lockdowns and compulsory Covid shots and DEI struggle sessions and critical race theory in our schools and esg. And it happened in a censorship enterprise that boggles the mind.

[Josh Holmes]

Right.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Not somewhere else, but here. And so it just so happened I was in that role. We led the charge on a lot of important fights. We took this, we took the student loan debt forgiveness scam to the Supreme Court. We won. We took the Missouri, took the vaccine mandate cases, the Supreme Court, we won. We filed the Missouri vs Biden lawsuit that exposed before Elon Musk even bought Twitter, this vast censorship enterprise that existed that, you know, we took Foushee's deposition, we took Elvis Chan's deposition. It was just a wild time. And before anybody knew that any of.

[Josh Holmes]

Those people were involved in any of this grand. The scheme was right.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

And, and I think this book, Last Line of Defense, how to Beat the Left of Court, you can get it on Amazon right now, you know. Yeah, that's the New York Times bestseller. How about that? For conservative. That's kind of actually a thing.

[John Ashbrook]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

So I'm proud of that. But you can get it. And I think more than just war stories or kind of this field manual of what it was like to be on the front lines against this left wing lawfare machine. It's a playbook of, like, how we win this stuff moving forward, because it's not the last time we're going to see this kind of stuff. In fact, they're dealing with it right now, of course, with the administration. But the good news there is there are these random district court cases that pop up, and there's a, you know, some Biden appointee that should never been confirmed is the judge. But by and large, whether it's on programming and personnel or on immigration, President Trump's been successful as it makes its way through the courts into the Supreme Court. But I think one big takeaway, and certainly I gathered when you reflect on your time and you write a book like this is a lot of this is just having courage, right. To be willing to stand in the arena and fight back. And when everybody is, you know, all the slings and arrows are coming your way. And I think that's one of the great gifts President Trump has given the Republican Party is a confidence to fight back and be unafraid to do so because we're right. We have common sense on our side, the people are on our sides, and we shouldn't cede any territory, especially the courts.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, I think it's really well said. Look, one of the things that we like to do here in the ruthless Friday program is a little different than your average interview is to try to give people a little sense of who you are. Right. I mean, I want to get to the manual. I want to get to the success stories and what you were able to accomplish. But the motivations, I think, speak louder in terms of why you're doing what you're doing. And you gotta go to the acknowledgments here.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

It's something that, look, you got highlighted. You've highlighted.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, well, it's something that we've known about you for a long time. But I think our audience would benefit an awful lot as there was two sort of major inflection points in your life that brought you to do what you're doing with the kind of approach that you're doing it first. Your son, Stephen.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. Yeah, it's really interesting. Like, there were some things in this book that I really didn't think about as far as myself. Like, for example, I played a lot of sports. I'll get to the Stephen Kingsley Stephen thing is the most important. But, like, I look back, and even in college, I played. But like, in baseball, I played in the outfield. In basketball, I played in the paint. Grade school soccer, I played sweeper. And in football, I played free safety. Like, you were kind of this last line of defense. So maybe there's something like, I don't know, like, nature nurture of, like, being this defender of things that you believe in. You're also a large man and a six. Six. Yeah.

[John Ashbrook]

I can't imagine being a quarterback and seeing you at safety.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah, right. Wheels back then. But. But anyway. But also there was a counter. I remember in seventh grade, I talk about the book. I remember there was a kid with disabilities was getting picked on on the bus and something kind of stirred and I was in there. I was. There were clearly like three or four other dudes and just stood up and like, you know, this is not. This is not going to happen.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

You know, and. And wasn't afraid of the confrontation that growing up where I grew up sometimes could get physical, the neighborhood I grew up in. But it really kind of shamed him with my words. But I remember going home and telling my dad and he was like, he was absolutely. You don't let anybody ever.

[Josh Holmes]

Great work. Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

You know, pick on somebody who has, you know, challenges that are no fault of their own. Little did I know that Stephen, my son, would find his way into our lives. And I think, God, there's a reason for that. And so the whole. My origin story of getting into politics really started with Stephen. My Stephen was born with a rare genetic condition. Stephen just turned 21. He is on the autism spectrum. He has something called tuberous sclerosis, where he's. Tubers that form on different organs, including his brain, which has really affected his development. And also he has seizures every day, nearly every day, including when he was really young, a four hour seizure that all I could do is sort of hold his hand and pray. And I remember seeing the, like this clock. But it had the seconds too. Is it the minutes, the hours, the. The minutes and the seconds tick away before they could try a new med to make it stop. And they got to the last one before they're gonna have to do some coma. And it worked, but we almost lost them.

[Josh Holmes]

Oh, man.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

So we're in the icu. And when you go through all that, I was a first time parent. You kind of go through this discernment process of what do you want to do? And so for me, it was. I. I want to. I want to do more than what I was doing. And so I ran for office. And that to this day, Stephen's really kind of the touchstone for me, like what's really important. And so all the things that, you know, happen here in the swamp and all those things, it gives things to me a proper perspective. Right. Because the, the best part of any of my days are when I get to, you know, when Steven Gives me that, the big smile and the big hug and hanging out with him this weekend, it's just like the most important stuff in life. So it was a catalytic event for me.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, totally. But I wanted to cover that because I think, you know, look for people who know you or know just enough about you and what, what it is that you're doing. Not everybody knows the depth of that. Right. Because you're a good humored guy, always fun to talk to, you know a lot about topics, but nobody really knows sort of the inner motivation.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

Of, of how you've come to this. And that's a really important, unique inflection point. The second one is what you saw with the COVID Yeah. Situation.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. It. For whatever reason, when Covid. You know, I think the first few months, nobody really knew what was going down. But then what I saw as this thing went on was just people who had just a little bit of power, aggregated more of it, used it in ways that were just sort of unimaginable.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

And really an insight into the left of what they would really do if they had more and more power. Because you had, you know, these county executives and public health officials who were telling you could live your life or not and forcing kids 5 year olds to wear masks all day long when like, quite literally, they were twice as likely to die of a dog attack.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. Right.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Than Covid. Yet they were destroying their lives. And if you said anything, you were going to be, you know, ostracized and othered and all these sorts of things that they wanted to do to people. And so I just decided that this was antithetical to what I thought it was, what America was supposed to be, which is you could live your life and you could make your own decisions. And if you wanted to wear six masks on your face outside while jogging, God bless you, it's the United States of America. But you shouldn't be telling everybody else that's how they have to live their lives in perpetuity, like forever. Like it was never going to end. So we, you know, we had the vaccine mandate case. I didn't think a truck driver who was just trying to feed his family should be forced to take the shot or lose his job.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Right. So we won that at the Supreme Court. But then we also, at a local level in Missouri, we were suing. We sued like 50 plus school districts for the mass mandates. And that kitchen was pretty hot when we did it. Like it happened to be. We didn't plan it this way. The peak day of Omicron, like in early January.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

And we filed all these lawsuits with parents, I might add, who were co plaintiffs. But I remember being interviewed by like reporters in their, like local reporters in their cars with masks on, a zoom because they weren't allowed in the studio yet. And they're like, why are you trying to kill the kids? You know, and it's like, that's not what this thing is. But it really was. I tell people I don't think power necessarily corrupts, but I do think it reveals. So you can tell a lot about somebody when they get a little position in what they do with it. And Covid was just like the worst case scenario. So yeah, I think that was an inflection point. And, and the. To this day, back home at the grocery store, the, the most frequent comment I get is usually from a mom come up and saying, hey, thanks for fighting for our kids. Because they're, because a lot of people felt the same way, but they weren't really in a position or they, you know, people didn't want to lose their jobs or they want, you know, there were a lot of reasons why, but, but for me it was, it just was a time where I felt like I needed to do something.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, you were ostracized in the school line, if you said anything.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Well, honestly, Holmes, when we had opened up a portal, like we saw one of the things we talk about in the last line of defense, how to be the left in court and get on Amazon right now is, is we saw what, what they were doing in Michigan or with Tim Walls, Mr. Jazz Hands himself was doing in, in Minnesota.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

With opening up these sort of tip lines basically to throw people in jail. So we turned it on its head. We said, we're opening up a tip line, but not to oppress your rights, but if you see that kind of oppression, let us know the attorney General's office and we're going to do something about it. So we were getting like email after email, thousands of emails from parents who would say things like, look, you had your lawsuit. My kid doesn't wear a mask. The school wants to want some wear a mask. So to punish the kid, they would make the kid eat lunch by himself in the middle of a stage in the gym to isolate him to like. And then, you know, kids were being, and then we did it on crt. Kids were being forced to do, you know, engage in privilege walks. I mean, crazy. This is Missouri.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, right, right.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

But these left wing lunatics got their claws into the, into the, the Education cabal and this was what you had to talk about in training sessions. So anyway, that's all in here. And I just thought it was a story worth telling because we can't forget about that stuff.

[Josh Holmes]

Exactly.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

There's a lot of things to do now and the wind is at our back, but we can't forget about how abusive that system was.

[John Ashbrook]

You had so much success as the AG of Missouri and you've had so much success early on as a senator. And obviously, I think Holmes mentioned it a little bit ago, these district courts are doing overtime to try to stop President Trump from little things that he is trying, well, I guess shouldn't say little things, but big things like trying to stop crime in California, trying to deport violent illegal criminals who are here. And I just wonder, you know, you walk through so much success and there's so many, there's a pathway that you basically lay out that the current administration and the current leaders can follow to try to defeat some of these low level courts. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah, I mean, one of the things I, I, I don't reveal private conversations with, with the President, but I, I get to play golf with him. I play well enough to get invited back.

[Josh Holmes]

But one of the pace though, right?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

You, yeah, you're playing fast.

[Josh Holmes]

Okay, all right.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Playing fast. And the carts move a little quicker than your average golf cart. You go right to your ball and I hit. But one of the things I told them was that I think in a weird way, this non consecutive term, you think about it, it's a different cast of characters he's able to put in these key positions. And also you got guys like Stephen Miller, who I've had a chance to work with over the years, including my AG time, was just a brilliant guy. And when he's at Union Station calling out like, you know, the hippies that want you to live in crime infested, I mean it's just like, yeah, this is what we voted for. Like, this is what we voted for. But I think they, one of the differences is I think the executive orders or some of the executive actions are very well thought out. One of the things that we were able to tie up Biden and Court on is when he was trying to undo a lot of the executive orders like Take remain in Mexico or Title 42, they were pretty sloppy.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

And so we were successful in like holding the dam for a little bit on that front, but even on some other stuff. But I think they're much, they're very well thought out. And by and large, like I said, I think they're, they're, they're standing up. If you think about it, what the left was really trying to do, or what they're trying to do now is to reinstitute what Biden had, which was really unpopular with the American people. Nobody would have ever voted for this stuff. And it's the expansion of the administrative state. The president of United States, President Trump has the ability, as part of his core Article 2 powers are to kind of reshape the executive branch. Whereas they wanted to expand it unlawfully. What they're trying to do is reduce it lawfully. And I think that's one of the things they have going for them too, is like the president, of course, doesn't like that USAID wants to fund Guatemalan sex changes. And nobody ever, like, you can do something about that as president. You're the only person everybody voted for. And that's where the Article 2 powers, they go directly to the President on purpose. So I think that is a good thing. But you're gonna have Boasberg and guys like that, these district court judges who want their, you know, their, their 15 minutes of fame. I mean, and I think that shining a light on some of those abuses are good too. I mean, this guy, there's an emergency judge, so if you're filing like a temporary restraining order, there's an emergency judge on duty for that day. He wasn't the emergency judge on duty, he was on vacation. Somehow got the famous MS.13 wife beater case at 2 o' clock in the morning. Like we probably ought to be asking, was he tipped off? How did he get the case? So there is clearly a number of district court judges who literally try to make it their mission to be part of the resistance.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah. But, well, they see themselves as legislators.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

They do. And that's again, another difference. But I think Trump's gonna have another go here with judges, which will be good. But by and large, I think it takes courage. And there's also some strategic things. I mean, one of the things talk about in the book, like in the Missouri vs Biden lawsuit, for example, you gotta remember this was before Musk bought Twitter.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

But we were seeing things. And by the way, my Solicitor General is a guy by the name of John Sauer, who's now the Solicitor General of the United States.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

So Missouri is coming, like. That's right. And the first four district court judges Trump appointed all worked in my AG office. And they're coming, you know, they're part in, in St. Louis now. So there's helps on the way and Missouri's doing their part. But, but anyway we see, we would see Jen Psaki at the podium saying oh we're flagging this stuff for Facebook. And then they floated this with Mary Poppins. The, the disinformation governance board. You know like Poppins so good, the super califragilistic gal. But and I remember talking to my team like there is something here. Like this is just not. There's more to this than just. So we filed a lawsuit, we made a strategic decision. Normally when you do that you, you want the government to stop or the other party to stop what they're doing immediately through a temporary restraining order. We said you know what, let's get discovery. Because people were lampooning the case as a conspiracy theory and just attention grabbing headline thing. So the judge granted discovery. And that to me, if there was one moment, it changed it for me too. My eyes were open. We got thousands of pages of documents of emails and discovery and text messages of high ranking government officials.

[Josh Holmes]

You know this changed everything from us, from our perspective too in that you were literally the first and you came and, and talk to us about this where I think anybody right of center was hair trigger on blaming tech companies and censorship as if they were sitting in a bubble just deciding what information that people could have. And what we didn't know until you started this case in the discovery process was somebody who held their future in their hand. And at the same time you got the spokesperson for the president saying like, you know, if there was antitrust issues, I don't know, maybe we'll look into it. So it's basically like a nice house. It'd be a shame if something would happen to it. At the same time you're saying, by the way, as the government we would appreciate if you'd censor these things and like what choice do you have as a private company at some level?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Because yes, the coercion of it all, I mean Biden was saying maybe there should be criminal charges. They're killing people. By allowing the misinformation or disinformation or mal information out there. I mean they were coming in section 230 which is a protection given to tech platforms because they're viewed as platforms, not publishers is a multi billion dollar subsidy effectively. Right. I'm all for it if it's like truly a free speech platform. But you don't get to have it both ways. You don't get to claim your platform and then Be a publisher. And I think that's a big issue. But yes, they were threatening him in. In Rob Flaherty is this, you know, was the deputy communications director. And there's, you know, messages going back and forth saying, this is individually flagging people. Yeah. This is a big, like talking to a high level executive saying at the highest levels of the White House, this is of a concern. Take it down. And it's like berating these guys. And then you had, like, the cdc, we took a deposition from somebody at the cdc. They had words and phrases that, like, were prepackaged for them to make sure if this. Somebody says this, they're throttled or deplatformed. They were hiring out to Stanford and University of Washington to do the same. Like, everybody, you're supposed to know that the government can't do it, but they shouldn't be able to outsource it either. Which is exactly what was happening.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

And not for nothing, but they were also censoring scientists.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Actual scientists.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Well, one of the great ironies now, Jay Bhattacharya, who was one of the plaintiffs in the case, actually is now the director of nih was one of these guys that Fauci tried to destroy this guy because he had the. He. He was so bold as to say that natural immunity was still a thing. That was his crime. He was like, you know what? There may be. The natural immunity still works.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

And then you'd pull up a clip of Fauci literally saying the same thing 10 years ago, and it was like, it never happened.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Right. Well, I think, you know, if you get the book now, but you can. But the deposition of Fauci was just fascinating. It was just like. So Jeff Landry, who was my counterpart in Louisiana, who's now the governor of Louisiana, you know, he talks like this. Yeah. And. And shot a gator, by the way. Shot. He has a gator hunt every year. It is awesome. Yeah. Shot a gator and turn it into boots with the Missouri seal on it. My swearing. So Landry's a great guy, but he had. Which is great. He had out on the table when Foushee walked in. The book, the Real Anthony Fauci, written by RFK Jr. Like, it was like. I thought it was hilarious. I don't think Fauci thought it was very funny. But when you get a guy in a room like that who's used to just kind of ducking and dodging.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

For a full day, you learn a lot. And he would go from this like, I am the science to I Don't remember anything. You know, like, and especially as it related to like, the lab leak theory. I mean, he was very protective of this because, you know, basically the government of the United States said we don't want to do gain of function research because maybe like, creating like this super virus that could kill half the world just to find a vaccine that we might use for it someday isn't such a great idea. Some danger, like. But so then he's kind of like working through NGOs, and it happens that, you know, be born in the Wuhan Lab, you know, Institute of Virology. Right. Like, maybe one of the few funny things Stewart. Jon Stewart said in the last decade was like, I don't know, maybe it wasn't a penguin baiting with a bat.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

It was in the slab.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

So it's like so obvious. But he sends his deputy over to China. It's in the deposition. They fall in love with this lockdown strategy and immediately starts to undermine President Trump. And then, of course, the left sees that they have this alternative figure who becomes almost like this saint. I mean, they had found candles.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Oh, yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

It's really weird.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah. That whole era was. They had Robert Mueller candles too.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Just crazy.

[Michael Duncan]

Jesus.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

I mean, we all, We've all known that to the left, government is a substitute for God. Little did we know that Fauci was like some sort of patron saint or whoever was in the.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

But it goes back to your whole point you had earlier, which is sort of like the whole Rahm Emanuel point of like, never let a good crisis go to waste. And we saw in Covid how far they would take the control that they could have if they, if they had a magic wand, they would do it and they'd lock us down forever.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. And. And, you know, and you couldn't. I mean, it's just. You couldn't see a loved one dying in a hospital. Remember, they were, they were, they were putting those, Those, those rubber gloves with, like, hot water. You could touch it and pretend it was grandma dying. Like, and if you crazy, if you said anything like, you were a menace. So it was wild. It was wild. But, you know, look, it's not the last time. I mean, it could be a climate emergency. It could be Trump's the emergency. I mean, look what they were willing to do with the Russia hoax. If you play that out over a number of years, because they told us that Trump was a threat to democracy. They were willing to literally bulldoze democracy.

[Josh Holmes]

In a little wind at their political back, and their political fortunes Change what they're willing to do, which is why this book is so important. Two quick current event questions. You're coming back. Obviously a real mess in the Democrats have created both on the nominations front and on this government shutdown. We, I think, are of universal opinion that Chuck Schumer believes that in order to stay minority leader of the United States Senate, he needs to shut the government down because of his experience last March. Is that your takeaway?

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

I don't know. I think actually what shut down Schumer may not realize or what he's going to come to the conclusion of what happens if he does shut the government. What does President Trump and Russ vote do then?

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, the wall gets 10ft higher.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

I'd love to find out.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

You know what so, and I think you're right, though. His calculus is now he's getting an AOC primary at home. Maybe. I'm not sure. Chuck Schumer runs again.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

I don't know. Yeah. But the calculus is different. But it will very clearly. The fact that we're trying to move appropriations bills like in Republicans are pretty unified on that. He is very squarely going to be blamed for it.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

That's a different dynamic because, you know, I was very, I was here my first few years, I was told that, you know, Chuck Schumer, that a government shutdown was the worst thing that could possibly happen in the history of the world. So is he really going to be the guy now?

[Josh Holmes]

So an annual.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

So it'll be interesting. But I don't know. I'm, I think that it'll happen. I think that, that there'll be. There'll be 10 Democrats that, that decide that. That maybe they don't want to mortgage.

[Josh Holmes]

All of their futures.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. I mean, but you're going to have plenty of Senate Democrats kicking and screaming, looking for attention to be the chief resistor.

[Josh Holmes]

And on the NOMS front, clearly it's been a problem.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

A lot of talk about whether rules are going to change here to try to do the bare minimum the Democrats just refuse to do in terms of confirming this administration.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah. I'm part of a working group actually of senators that are, that are looking at what are the options for us now. Because I think we are. We should do something you can't allow. This has never happened. And I know a lot of people talk about how things are unprecedented all the time, literally. There's never been a time in the history of our republic we've seen this kind of obstruction for a long time. Basically, the Senate operates as you guys know, on three calendars it's the legislative calendar, the executive calendar, which is all the nomination stuff and the impeachment calendar. Those are the three worlds you operate in. And this was never a thing. Think about it. Clarence Thomas was, was confirmed United States Supreme Court with 52 votes. So there wasn't a 60 vote threshold because they didn't filibuster that on the executive calendar. Now they filibuster like the ambassador to Uruguay, which we've not had a roll call vote on in 50 years for that person. So like they're clearly just in this mode of. They, they're like in a death spiral. They don't have a message, they don't have a messenger. I don't think they've hit rock bottom yet. But if that's the game that they want to play, Republicans going to do some. There are some rule changes. Yeah, I think that. Why would you have a two hour rule after the. Why not? Why not ten minutes. But I think there's some things that we're going to do move forward on to, to get the Senate back to a place it's always been which is able to function on nominations.

[Josh Holmes]

Yeah, that's great. Well, listen, last line of defense, how to beat the left in court. You gotta go get it. You can get it in Amazon.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

You can't. Anywhere you buy your books or anywhere.

[Josh Holmes]

You can buy your books. New York Times best seller. Senator Eric Schmidt, thanks for joining us.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Great to be with you guys.

[Josh Holmes]

All right, great interview. Like I said at the top, he's one of our absolute favorite. He is a guy who has been recruited to do like every job in America. Because you sit with him for like more than five minutes, you realize he's super authentic, super smart, super effective and all those things written. New book, we don't tell you to buy every book, but this one is one that you should check out because it has actually a roadmap on how the left can be defeated in court, which I don't need to tell you, hugely important. Hugely important these days. Eric Schmidt. Good dude. Good dude. So with that, fellas, listen like and subscribe to the YouTube channel. Check out a little bit of merch. We're gonna have some. We've. We're testing. You're sewing.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

Yeah.

[Josh Holmes]

And we're testing some more gear. We've got a fall line coming out for you. It'll be out there soon.

[Michael Duncan]

I mean, look at the vest that Ashbrook has.

[Senator Eric Schmidt]

Yeah, look at that.

[Josh Holmes]

That's one of the test even I.

[Michael Duncan]

Haven'T gotten one of those yet?

[John Ashbrook]

I got it because I bought Duncan a brand new thimble. And as a thanks for the thimble, he gave me this vest.

[Michael 'Smug' Duncan]

That's exactly what happened.

[Josh Holmes]

You have crochet needles coming your way soon, old man. Appreciate that. With that, fellas, I think we did it.

[Michael Duncan]

Absolute banger of an episode. Gentlemen, thank you so much to Senator Schmidt, and thank you to the Minions. Remember, like Holmes said, if you have not yet hit that, subscribe on the YouTube. It's more fun in video. So until next time, Minions, keep the faith, hold the line, and own the libs. We'll see you Friday. Stay ruthless.