Ep. 2430 - BRAINROT DEFEATED: Massie Loses In Kentucky

Summary

---

The Ben Shapiro Show Ep. 2430 - "BRAINROT DEFEATED: Massie Loses In Kentucky"

Date: May 20, 2026
Host: Ben Shapiro (The Daily Wire)

---

Episode Overview

Ben Shapiro analyzes the defeat of Rep. Thomas Massie in the Kentucky 4th Congressional District Republican primary, widely regarded as a bellwether for the future of the GOP. Shapiro frames the outcome as a referendum on the ongoing power of Donald Trump within Republican politics, the influence (or lack thereof) of online conspiracy trends, and the dangers of political "brainrot" stemming from extremist social media circles on both the left and right.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Kentucky’s 4th: Massie’s Loss and What It Means for the GOP

• Election Recap:
  Ed Galran (Trump-endorsed, ex-Navy SEAL) defeated seven-term incumbent Thomas Massie (55% to 45%). The race was the most expensive House primary in US history, with ~$33 million spent (Massie and Galran themselves spent $8.4M; SuperPACs spent an additional $26M).
• Shapiro’s Take:
  Massie’s loss stemmed from direct opposition to Trump, personal attacks, and embracing online conspiracies—particularly about Epstein and “Zionist control”—alienating pro-Trump, mainstream Republican voters in a deeply pro-Trump district.
• Quote [00:39]:
  “Massie lost that seat because he decided that he wanted to go to war with President Trump on policy and also personally. That’s the reality." – Ben Shapiro

2. Contrasting Campaign Strategies: TV vs. Online

• Massie’s Campaign Approach:
  On TV, Massie presented himself as Trump-aligned, listing shared priorities (border, Second Amendment, ‘Save America Act’), despite voting against key Trump initiatives.
  • Quote [03:07]:
    “I agree with President Trump’s head on more than I disagree with him...I’m Thomas Massie and I approve this message because President Trump and I have a whole lot more to get done together.” – Thomas Massie (campaign ad)
  • Shapiro’s response [03:29]:
    “That ad is psychotic.”
• Reality Check:
  Despite TV attempts to play up Trump loyalty, Massie’s actual record was at odds—opposing Trump initiatives, joining Democrats to block Trump’s Iran policy, and fueling conspiracy chatter about Trump and Epstein.
• Trump’s Reaction:
  Trump publicly rebuked Massie, called his endorsement fraudulent, and strongly backed Galran just before the election.
  • Quote [05:45]:
    "Withdraw your fake statement, Massie, right now.” – Donald J. Trump (via Twitter/X)

3. The Online Alternate Reality ("Podcastistan") vs. On-the-Ground Politics

• Online Narrative:
  Massie and his online allies (Young Turks, alt-right influencers, even self-identified Nazis) pushed claims that the real enemy was pro-Israel forces manipulating the GOP.
  • Examples:
    • Ana Kasparian (The Young Turks) called for Massie’s support due to his anti-funding for Israel stance. [09:07]
    • Massie hosted online personalities like Ryan Matta (who has worn “American Reich” attire and espoused anti-American, pro-Iranian sentiments) at campaign events. [10:15]
• Shapiro’s Analysis:
  “[Massie's] strategy devolved into chasing strange online clout at the expense of real-world relevance. In Kentucky’s 4th, voters didn’t care about online anti-Israel conspiracies or internet personalities— they cared about Trump.”

4. Why Did Massie Go Down This Road?

Shapiro proposes three theories for Massie’s self-defeating embrace of fringe, conspiratorial rhetoric:

1. "Bank Shot" Theory:
   Massie tried to thread the needle by blaming “puppet masters”—AIPAC, “the Jews”—for Trump’s opposition, attempting to stay Trump-adjacent without attacking him directly (mirroring some Tucker Carlson strategies). [12:40]
2. Podcast Career Pivot:
   Massie recognized electoral defeat was imminent; decided to embrace internet notoriety and the “strange new respect” of anti-establishment left and right—the “horseshoe theory” coalition—possibly for a future media career. [15:00–17:50]
   • Quote [16:09]:
     “It took a while to find Ed Galran in Tel Aviv.” – Thomas Massie (concession speech, playing into anti-Semitic tropes)
3. Actual Delusion ("Brainrot"):
   Massie believed the online feedback loop on X (Twitter) predicted reality and that anti-Israel, anti-establishment activism would win in a district that fundamentally didn’t care about such issues.

5. The Enduring Influence of Trump in GOP Primaries

• Pattern:
  Trump remains the decisive "kingmaker" in GOP primaries—where his endorsement goes, so too goes the nomination.
• Other Examples:
  • Ken Paxton (TX AG) receives Trump’s late but decisive endorsement, becomes prohibitive favorite for Senate nomination—despite being less broadly electable than incumbent John Cornyn. [27:16]
    • Quote [27:56]:
      “If you don’t serve the people who sent you...or the President...that’s not a good place to be politically.” – JD Vance (VP)
  • Andy Barr in KY and others similarly ride Trump endorsements to victory; those who cross Trump (even if previously mainstream Republicans) are summarily dispatched.

6. The Dangers of Online "Brainrot" for Both Sides

• General Principle:
  Engagement in toxic online echo chambers (the “woke right” and “woke left”) creates political movements and candidates untethered from mainstream realities, often fixated on fringe issues.
• Case Study:
  The shooters in the recent San Diego Islamic Center tragedy left a manifesto echoing extremist, anti-Semitic, and accelerationist rhetoric seen across online forums—combining conspiracies from both far-left and far-right. [39:00–44:45]
  • Quote [41:45]:
    “All of them can be traced back to...the Jews. All caps. It’s the Jews. It’s the Jews. Epstein island is the most disgusting, vile, evil thing of our modern day. And yet it is nothing new. It is just Judaism in its purest form…” – (reading manifesto)
• Shapiro’s Warning:
  "If you’re a parent and you’re letting your kids untrammeled just travel the wilds of social media...these are the kind of messages people are listening to...and at the outer edge, at the fringe, it has some pretty deadly consequences." [44:50]

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• [00:39] Ben Shapiro:
  “The future still belongs to the rational right, it belongs to President Trump inside the Republican Party, so long as President Trump is president.”
• [03:29] Ben Shapiro (on Massie’s ad):
  “That ad is psychotic.”
• [05:45] Donald J. Trump (as quoted):
  “Withdraw your fake statement, Massie, right now.”
• [12:40] Ben Shapiro (on Massie’s campaign theory):
  “He adopts the Tucker Carlson strategy: Trump doesn’t oppose me, it’s puppet Trump being controlled by the puppeteer Jews...so it really isn’t about Trump, it’s about how Trump has been captured.”
• [16:09 / 16:19] Thomas Massie:
  “It took me a while to find Ed Galran in Tel Aviv.”
  (Shapiro: “Ed Galran, by the way, not Jewish, former Navy SEAL. But again, the story, according to Massie, is that he is, what, a crypto Jew or paid for by the Jews or all the rest of it.”)
• [17:36] Thomas Massie:
  “I might be trans-partisan, because I can’t identify with either some days.”

---

Additional Key Segments & Timestamps

• TV vs. Online Campaigning in Kentucky’s 4th [02:58–09:47]
• Theories on Massie’s Behavior [12:40–18:00]
• Social Media's Distorting Effect & Violent Manifestos [39:00–44:45]
• Trump’s Endorsement Power in Other Primaries (Paxton, Cornyn, Barr, etc.) [26:51–29:17]
• Lunatic Fringe/Nazi-Left Horseshoe in Politics (Nick Fuentes, Hasan Piker, Kim Iverson) [17:51–24:00]
• Democratic Party Drift to Extreme Left: Candidates, Policies, and Anti-Semitism [29:50–38:32]
• Longer Tangent: San Diego Mosque Shooter Manifesto [39:00–44:45]
• Vivek Ramaswamy on Medicaid Fraud in Ohio [45:59–46:41]
• Q&A Segment: Habits for Productivity, Cigar Persuasion, Population Decline [54:15–58:40]

---

Recurring Themes & Tone

• Shapiro’s Tone: Combative, sarcastic, sometimes caustic—heavily critical of Massie’s embrace of conspiratorial online culture and the left’s radicalization, with characteristic rapid-fire delivery. He often mocks “woke right/woke left” alliances (“horseshoe theory”), and derides influencers, journalists, and politicians who, in his view, have “brainrot.”
• Main Takeaway:
  The “normie” Republican mainstream still cares most about Trump loyalty and basic party priorities—not online echo chambers. Political realities, not Twitter (X) bubbles, determine election outcomes.

---

Episode Summary Table

| Timestamp | Topic | Details & Highlights | |---------------|---------------------------------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 00:00–02:58 | Massie’s defeat in Kentucky | Ed Galran wins GOP primary; pro-Trump sentiment decisive. | | 02:58–05:05 | Massie’s TV vs. actual record | Massie claims Trump alignment but record shows repeated opposition & conspiratorial attacks. | | 06:55–07:26 | Galran’s campaign ads | Emphasizes Trump’s “complete and total endorsement." | | 12:40–18:00 | Theories on Massie’s self-destructive path | “Bank shot”/conspiracy, podcast grift, or actual brainrot as causes. | | 26:51–29:17 | Trump endorsement power—Paxton vs. Cornyn | Trump’s backing decisive; similar cases across the GOP. | | 39:00–44:45 | Social media radicalization and tragedy | San Diego shooter’s manifesto as a case study for “brainrot;” warnings for online extremism. |

---

For Listeners Who Missed the Episode

This episode breaks down how the fate of Thomas Massie—once a libertarian darling—reflects ongoing battles over the future of the Republican Party. Ben Shapiro argues that the election proves Trump still dictates reality for the base: those not in his favor, especially if associated with anti-Semitic or conspiratorial online subcultures, are swiftly dispatched, regardless of previous standing.

Shapiro connects the dots between online culture wars, the rise of extremist rhetoric, and the ruined political fortunes of candidates entranced by internet echo chambers. He warns that both left and right are infected, but “reality”—voters outside social media bubbles—still determines what happens in American politics.

The episode also touches briefly on other key races (Texas, Ohio), warns about social media’s impact on vulnerable minds, and offers sharp advice (in his Q&A) for staying productive in a chaotic digital world: “Turn off your phone. Actually do one thing at a time.” [54:15]

---

End of Summary

Transcript

[Ben Shapiro]

Well, the future of the GOP. The Republican Party was up for grabs in Kentucky's 4th Congressional District last night. It was the most expensive House primary race in history and a bellwether for what comes next inside the gop. Thomas Massie versus President Trump online versus reality woke right versus traditional Trump. Right. And Trump won. And reality won. Turns out the future still belongs to the rational right. It belongs to President Trump inside the Republican Party, so long as President Trump is president. We'll get into every spicy detail in just one moment. This is the Ben Shapiro Show. So it turns out that this race was not particularly close. Ed Gall, who was the former Navy SEAL opponent of Thomas Massie, Massie, of course, has been in Congress since 2012. He's a 14 year, seven term congressman. Massie was destroyed by Gel Rhine last night. By 7:45pm Eastern time, it was over. Gallerine ended up winning about 55% of the vote. Massie ended up at 45% of the vote. So let's begin at the beginning because there's a lot of stories, a lot of tales being told about what defeated Thomas Massie. That Thomas Massie was defeated by APAC money. The Thomas Massie was defeated over his strong opposition to Israel and all the rest of the. That is not what happened. Thomas Massie lost his seat again. He'd held that seat since 2012. He was very popular in his district and that district happens to have gone for President Trump by 35 to 40 points in the last several election cycles. Massie lost that seat because he decided that he wanted to go to war with President Trump on policy and also personally. That's the reality. That's the actual story, pretty much the whole story in the Kentucky 4th. Now, again, it was a very, very expensive race because about $33 million was spent in the race. Massey directly outspent gal Ryan 5.8 million, $2.6 million. And then super PACs got involved. Supporters of President Trump, people who are pro Israel spent some $16 million against Massie in the race. Massey's supportive super PACs spent some $10 million in the race. So lots of money pouring in. But I think that to understand the race, you actually have to understand what people in Kentucky's 4th district were watching. They were not all on X, they were not all online. They were not watching the same race that many of us are in the online world and podcast to Stand, as it's called, we're watching. So I want to show you the actual ads, the kinds of ads that were running in Kentucky's 4th district because it tells you what this race was about. So Massey's strategy in his TV ads was to hump President Trump's leg. That was his strategy. His strategy was, what if I oppose President Trump on all of his major policy proposals? What if I throw a bunch of conspiratorial nonsense, crap at President Trump about Jeffrey Epstein, but when it comes time for reelect, then I hump his leg like a dog in heat? Like, here was a pro Thomas Massie ad,

[Thomas Massie]

so there's no sense in trying to avoid it. Let's just talk about the elephant.

[Ben Shapiro]

Elephant. I agree with President Trump's head on

[Thomas Massie]

more than I disagree with him. The list is long. The Save America act, to require proof of citizenship to vote. Stopping immigrant welfare. Fighting the woke agenda. Defending the Second Amendment, protecting the life of the unborn, securing the border. I'm Thomas Massie and I approve this message because President Trump and I have a whole lot more to get done together

[Ben Shapiro]

now. Again, that ad is psychotic. They have a whole lot to get done together. Here's the thing. Massie opposed Trump on a lot of issues where, frankly, I don't think he was wrong. He is a fiscal conservative. In fact, if you go back and look at things I've said about Thomas Massie in the past, he's been staunchly small government in ways that I largely support. But that is not what happened. What actually happened is he decided that he was going to be a gadfly Republican congressperson who is totally useless to Trump, and then he was going to attack Trump directly. He refused to support all of Trump's major legislative initiatives. The one big, beautiful bill. He was one of only two House Republicans to vote against it. He decided that he was going to hold up in 2020 the COVID stimulus package. Again, I'm not saying that he was wrong on all of this, but this is why Trump was pissed off in 2025. He decided that he was going to join with Democrats to try to stop President Trump's airstrikes on Iran. And then, of course, his biggest move was that he was going to push Trump on the Epstein files. He was going to suggest there was some deep, dark conspiracy about Epstein. By the way, on the SAVE act, he voted no on a procedural rule that would have enabled the bill to come to the floor. It was really Epstein stuff that set Trump off, because there are a lot of Congress people who have voted against Trump occasionally, and he's okay with that. The thing about Massey is he decided that he was going to join With Democrats in pushing a bunch of online conspiratorial nonsense, including the idea that President Trump was actively covering up some sort of sex trafficking ring involving important people who are Trump's friends or Trump himself. And he joined with Ro Khanna, another conspiratorial Democrat, in order to do this. This was just again, last year,

[Thomas Massie]

six men. We went in there for two hours. There's millions of files, right? And in a couple of hours, we found six men whose names have been redacted who are implicated in the way that the files are presented.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now, again, you should remember that those six men that he was talking about there, they had to apologize after naming them on the floor of Congress because it turns out it was total crap. So Massie decided to go to war with President Trump. But then every ad that he ran in his district, all the ads, the ones that, you know, the normie people who are not online all the time were watching, it was Massie trying to grab Trump and hug him, to bear hug him. And meanwhile, Trump was deploying his entire administration to say, I want nothing to do with this schmuck. I don't like this guy at all. President Trump actually broke his own Twitter ban in order to go on Twitter. So he has Truth Social, his own social media project, Right? He decided he was going to go on Twitter and then he was going to himself step in and basically stomp on Massie the day before the election, quote, horrible. Congressman Thomas Massie put out an old endorsement from many years ago of him by me long before I knew he was the worst congressman in the history of our country. I endorse that Galran, a true American patriot, which Massey knows full well. So the statement he put out is fraudulent, just like he is fraudulent. Withdraw your fake statement, Massey, right now. President Donald J. Trump. So again, if you were a normie In Kentucky's 4th congressional district, what you were watching was a congressman who President Trump did not like because that congressman voted against all of his priorities and was joining with Democrats in order to do that and had personally gone after Trump and basically accused him of covering up a child sex trafficking ring. And that guy, that same congressman, was trying to hump Trump's leg. Ed Gallerin's ads were all about how, wait for it. Thomas Massie did not support Trump properly. So here was a pro Gal Ryan ad.

[Ed Gallerin]

This is a real hero. Ed Galrain. He's a farmer, he's a tremendous war hero, and he's a great patriot. I can tell you, he's strong as hell. He shook My hand. My hand is still recovering. I'm telling you, that is the greatest candidate. This guy is unbelievable. He is central casting. Just elect him.

[Thomas Massie]

Ed Gowron.

[Ed Gallerin]

My complete and total endorsement.

[Ryan Matta]

I'm Ed Gowron and I approve this message.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so it was very clear what this race was about, right? Thomas Massey decided to go up against Trump and Trump just destroyed him. That's all. Harry Entin points out over at CNN that in 2020, 2022 and 2024, when Massey held similar positions, but had decided not to go up against Trump on every major legislative priority and also steer directly into conspiracy land, he got 75% of the vote. This time, he ended up at 45% of the vote. Here is Harry Anthony explaining.

[Ryan Matta]

And if you look at Thomas Massey, you can see it very clearly. You look in 2020, 2022, 2024, he was getting 75%, upwards of 81% of the primary vote in 2020. And today he gets less than 50% of the vote. That's the story.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay, so that's what actually happened in reality land. But that's not the story that you're hearing online today. You're hearing a very different story if you live in the online universe. That is because Thomas Massie decided in a bright red pro Trump northern Kentucky district of 770,000 people, less than 5 of whom are Jewish. There are less than 0.1% of the population Jews in Kentucky. Four to run on a platform of Israel is evil and manipulates our elections. And Shank Uyghur and online Nazis are pro America heroes. That is what he decided to do. I'll explain in a second why he was doing that. There are several theories, but that is what he decided to do. So he was receiving support from the young turks Chenk Uyghur and Anna Kasparian. Here is Ana Kasparian, who's become psychotically anti Israel, going off and talking about how everybody needs to support Thomas Massie. Again, getting Anna Kasparian's endorsement in the Kentucky 4th is. It's a bold strategy. Cotton,

[Ana Kasparian]

understand that Thomas Massie, as a libertarian, is against funding a foreign country's wars. In fact, I would like for all of our members of Congress to be against funding a foreign country's wars. But unfortunately, we don't live in a country that has leaders like that. And Ed Gallerin, Massie's opponent, not only wants the United States to pay for Israel's wars, to help it build its empire in the Middle east, he would like Americans to be forced Literally forced into fighting Israel's wars. Now, older conservatives don't have to worry about a draft, right? Younger conservatives, though, they're definitely worried about a draft.

[Ben Shapiro]

So again, this was Massie's strategy. I mean, the day before the election, he had a pizza party with alt right podcasters, influencers, and some Nazis. And here's what that looked like.

[Ryan Matta]

Here's the craziest, here's the craziest part about this. We just rolled 30 deep to Thomas Massie's house. Not just 30 deep, but he let Ryan Matta show me one other politician in Washington D.C. that's going to let Ryan Matta get even talking distance. Oh, my gosh. Damn politician. And I'll show you the man that you should put in office.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay. Want to know why no politician would be within shouting distance of Ryan Matta? Because this is who Ryan Matta is.

[Ryan Matta]

So we got some breaking news coming in from rt. Unfortunately, the video of the Marines getting captured turned out to be a total dud. That's. That would have been awesome, wouldn't it? Trump tries to take Kirk Island. The Marines get captured, Nobody gets killed. Iran holds, has them host. Basically what the, what the soldier said in that video was so good. It was basically, Trump set us up. Complete failure. We were not prepared. I was like, wow, this is insane. How good this is going to end the war. It's going to be such a great video. Turned out to be a fake. Anyways, check out this Large number of U.S. marines killed in a suicide drone plus missile mass strike by Iran. Complete elimination of American soldiers from their land.

[Ben Shapiro]

So again, Ryan Mata, an actual supporter of American soldiers getting captured and or killed while wearing a sweatshirt that says American Reich. And if you think that somehow Massey didn't know who Ryan Matt was, he literally took a photo with him wearing that exact same sweatshirt and hugging him. Now that's a bold move and it's a weird move in Kentucky's fourth. So here is the question. What the hell was Thomas Massie doing? What was he thinking? All right, coming up, we'll get into what Thomas Massie was thinking. You know, in a deep red district in Northern Kentucky, making the whole race about Israel and American Jews and all the rest. First, one of the stranger financial habits people have is spending hours comparison shopping for a plane ticket that saves them 12 bucks, but then continue paying 80 or 90 bucks a month for wireless service without any question. At a certain point you have to ask why, especially now that companies like PureTalk exist. PureTalk, which is veteran led and backed by 100%. US based customer service now offers unlimited high speed data for just 34.99amonth. That's a pretty major shift because unlimited high speed data at PureTalk used to start around 55 bucks a month. But PureTalk has continued pushing to offer more value at lower prices. So if you looked at PureTalk before and you didn't switch, probably worth taking another look right now. And one thing people always ask is whether the service actually holds up compared to those massively overpriced major carriers. The answer is give it a try yourself. PureTalk will let you test the service for 30 days. No contract, no cancellation fees. So there's really very little downside to seeing whether it works out for you. Again, US based customer service is a, is an underrated thing. A lot of people are getting somebody based in India or somewhere else very hard to get your problem solved. That doesn't happen at Pure Talk. The switch to PureTalk can happen in as little as 10 minutes. If you ever need help, Pure Talk's US based customer service team is standing by. Go to PureTalk.com Shapiro claim unlimited high speed data for just 34.99. Again, that's PureTalk.com Shapiro to switch to my wireless company, America's wireless company, PureTalk. What the hell was Thomas Massie doing? What was he thinking? Why in the world, in a district that has fewer than 500 Jews, would you decide that it was really, really important to run on the Zionist organized government, the Jews control everything platform? Doing podcasts with Chenk Uyghur, hanging out with people who wear American Reich sweatshirts. Why would you do that? It's really stupid. Just on a political level, it's really dumb. So there are three potential reasons. Reason number one, he thought that the only way to fight back against Trump was by running on a sort of bank shot electoral strategy based on conspiracy. So again, this is a common thing for members of the woke, right? President Trump has attacked a lot of people and people like Massie, he's trying to cling to Trump, right? He wants to hump his leg, but at the same time he also wants to ensure that people in his district don't think that he is anti Trump. So Trump is hitting him. Theoretically, he should fight back directly against President Trump, but he doesn't wanna do that. He doesn't wanna fight back directly against Trump. So he adopts the Tucker Carlson strateg. Trump doesn't oppose me. It's puppet Trump being controlled by the puppeteer Jews who's coming after me. So Basically, the idea is that it wasn't Trump who was opposing Massey. Massey instead says, it's not Trump, it's Miriam Adelson, it's aipac, it's the Israelis, it's the Jews. And so the idea is that if you're in his district, he still loves Trump, even though apparently Trump is somehow a marionette of the Jews. But he loves Trump, and therefore it really isn't about Trump. It's about how Trump has been captured. You see this routine again? Tucker Carlson does this all the time and points to Nick Fuentes and Candace Owens for being perfectly open in their perspective on life and just going direct up against Trump. Massie wasn't going to do that. And so it could have been just a bank shot. Didn't work. Obviously. Theory number two, the minute that Trump came out and went after Massey, Massey knew he was in trouble. And so he figured, you know what? I'm gonna go. I want to be a podcaster. I want to be like Joe Kent or Tucker Carlson. I want these strange new respect. I want. I want the podcast woke, right? And I also want the strange new respect of the left. And so I'm gonna go all the way. I'm gonna throw out conspiracy theories. I'm gonna go full scale conspiratorial, anti Israel. And so that was Massey's plan, is that he knew he was toast anyway and he may as well make some money on the other side. And the best way to make money on the other side is to do that sort of thing. Obviously. Now there's some pretty good evidence for this if you look at Massie's parting shot here, as Massey lost, he decides that he's going to call President Trump the emperor of a Roman Empire, and then he's going to slide in some not particularly subtle anti Semitism. So here's Massey.

[Thomas Massie]

I got to watch Fox also for the first time in 18 months. And there was the President talking about, by the way, while gas is almost $5 and diesel's almost 6, they're talking about this big ballroom they're going to build. And it looks. It looks like the Roman Empire architecture from the Roman Empire. I see a few analogies there.

[Ben Shapiro]

Okay. And then he went to this. This is really ugly stuff here from Thomas Massey, but unsurprising at this point from the Pine Cone Congressman.

[Thomas Massie]

I would have come out sooner, but I had to call my opponent and concede. And it took a while to find Ed Galran in Tel Aviv.

[Ben Shapiro]

It took him a while to find him Ed Gallerin by The way not Jewish, former Navy seal. But again, the story, according to Massie, is that he is, what, a crypto Jew or paid for by the Jews or all the rest of it. And again, he is. He's obviously trying to transform himself into hero of podcastistan. So he says we may have lost, but actually secretly we won. We may have lost, but the future belongs to us. Here's Thomas Massie in Cabaret.

[Thomas Massie]

Why am I hopeful right now? Because if you looked at the cross tab in the polling, and I'm sure if we had exit polling, it would show the same thing. We have the younger demographic. You are patriots and you will inherit this country and you will make it better. And I am hopeful because of that. Thank you.

[Ben Shapiro]

And the future belongs. And again, he's now doing this whole bipartisanship thing. He says he's a trans partisan, ok, because he doesn't like either party. So now he's going to lead the horseshoe theory, right? The woke left and the horseshoe theory, right. They all come to woke right, woke left. They will come together under the auspices of a, of a Thomas Massie, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Joe Kent, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Brianna Joy Gray party.

[Thomas Massie]

I'm not even sure that I'm bipartisan. Bi means you like both. I might be trans partisan because I can't identify with either some days.

[Ben Shapiro]

And so along with this new podcast possibility for Thomas Massie, who again, very weird strategy to go in this direction. But one possible part of the theory is that he also gets strange new respect from the left. So again, the left is strangely respectful of Thomas Massie. The New York Times came out in support of Thomas Massie. Hasan Piker came out in support of Thomas Massie Hasan Piker, the insane Manchin Marxist, Cartier, communist America hater extraordinaire, put out a tweet quote, massey's defeat proves the Republican Party is a pro Epstein, pro Israel cult led by their cult leader, Epstein affiliate servant of Israel, Donald Trump nuts stuff. But again, this is how you get the strange new respect of Hasan Piker, Nick Fuentes. Of course, on the same exact side. Fuentes says Israel used their control over Trump and here he is doing the routine and their Jew money, their Jewish money, to destroy Massie because he went against their agenda. There is no denying that Trump's GOP is nothing more than a front for Israel and it has to be destroyed for America first to prevail. So remember Nick Fuentes holding hands with Hassan Piker, which is, I'm sure, something that Fuentes has often hoped to do. Kim Iverson again is a Tucker Carlson fellow traveler. Put out her own tweet threatening Jews, quote, the defeat of Thomas Massie is the worst thing to happen to Jews in America. Every single Jew will be subject to suspicion of dual loyalty. I'm just telling you how it is. How about every. How about every Christian who voted against him? Since pretty much every who voted in that election was Christian. How about that? They also dual loyalty. Like what's the story here, Kim? The 55,000 people who voted against Thomas Massie in a completely non Jewish district. What are they just tools of the Jews? How does this work? And Iverson says, you might not like this post, but someone needs to say it. A deep hatred for Israel and a deep suspicion of Jews is solidifying in our younger generations, not just in the US but worldwide. Well, certainly she hopes so. They thought Nick Fuentes was bad. They have no idea what they just created within our youth. I can now see a future where Jewish Americans are eradicated from government and expelled to Israel. And this is the hope. So you'll get the strange new respect from the left. You'll get the woke right behind you. And that's pretty lucrative. Thomas Massey will make himself an excellent living on the other side of all this. By the way. As far as the strange new respect of the left, I promise you Ms. Now will be kissing Thomas Massie's ass. New York Times, they will love him. Of course. Of course he'll be on Ezra Klein, the whole deal. I should point out here that for those who think that Thomas Massie will only get the strange new respect from the left because he is anti Trump, that is wrong. He's not going to get strange new respect because he was anti Trump. He's getting strange new respect because he's trafficking with all of the Nazi woke right types. That that is why it is because of his anti Israel stuff. That is why he will get the strange and respect. How do I know that? Because there's a senator named Bill Cassidy from Louisiana who just got skunked by President Trump in a primary in Louisiana. Bill Cassidy, you want to say somebody who's anti Trump, that dude voted for Trump's impeachment in 2021, which is something Thomas Massie never did. And he's getting zero strange new respect. Zero. Bill Cassidy will get zero bookings on Pod Save America. He'll receive zero strange new respect. Comments on msnow But Joe Kent, Marjorie Taylor Greene, now Thomas Massie, they'll get all the strange new respect. All right, coming up, we'll get to the third theory of what Thomas Massie was doing. Maybe he just had brain worms. And also we'll get to Ken Paxton being endorsed by President Trump over John Cornyn. First. When you're younger, you can survive on four hours of sleep, caffeine, and a frozen pizza, and somehow you're still mostly fine. But at a certain point, that stops working. Honestly, this time of year makes sleep even harder for a lot of people. Summer travel starts, bedtimes drift later, everybody's routine becomes slightly chaotic because of school breaks. Well, that's why the quality of your sleep setup starts mattering a lot more than people think. That's why you need Helix. Helix makes mattresses tailored to different sleep styles and preferences because not everybody sleeps the same way. Some people sleep hot, some need extra support, some toss and turn constantly, some wake up every time another person moves. Like many of those are me. But Helix solves those problems for me and for my wife because we have a mattress made just for us. Honestly, one of the underrated things about a really good mattress is you stop thinking about all of that. You're just sleeping. Helix also has more than 20 different mattress models. So people can actually find something tailored to how they sleep instead of just buying that generic mattress and hoping for the best. According to Helix, a study they ran found 82% of participants saw an increase in deep sleep after switching to that Helix mattress. The mattress ships directly to your door. There's a 120 night sleep trial. It comes with a limited lifetime warranty. Head on over to helix sleep.comBen for 27% off site wide. That's helixsleep.comBen for 27% off sitewide, make sure you enter our show name after checkout so they know we sent you helixsleep.com Ben okay, finally, theory number three. So theory number one was he thought he would do a bank shot. He wasn't going to attack Trump, so he was just going to say that Trump was the puppet of the the evil nefarious Jews. Theory number two was that Massie knew that he lost already and so he may as well just program directly into the algorithm and get some clicks and giggles. And theory number three is that Massie has brainworms and he thought that he would win because of X. Because if you actually follow these things on X, you thought the entire election was about Israel. But as I pointed out up top, if you are a resident of his congressional district, every ad you saw on TV had nothing to do with Israel. Attacking Israel was just Massey's defense mechanism for failing as a congressperson. As per our usual arrangement, attacks will be levied at particular people over things that have nothing to do with Israel. And trying to get a bunch of clicks and trying to rally the support of some of the worst people on the Internet, you just start talking about Israel. That is the new tactic. So Massie may have thought he was going to win because he was watching X. That's the only way you explain why he is hanging out with Chenk Uyghur the day before an election in a district that has zero cenk Uyghur supporters. But it turns out that reality still exists online is not real, as we have been saying. And it turns out that people in Kentucky did not care about the Israel issue. It's not that everybody in Kentucky's 4th district is wildly pro Israel or tools of the Jews or anything. It's that people in Kentucky's 4th district don't give a crap about that issue. That is how Thomas Massie ended up as a seven term congressperson in that in that particular race. It turns out Kentucky voters don't give a crap about the Epstein conspiracy theories or your nutty Tucker Carlson junk about how Israel is the worst country on the planet. And it turns out neither do most people. You can ask James Fishback, who's going to soon win about seven votes in Florida. Or Casey Putsch, whose voting base looks like one of those western ghost towns with the tumbleweeds. Or Marjorie Taylor Greene, who took it harder in her Georgia election than she did from her personal trainer. So let's just be real. Reality still exists. And by the way, in the Republican Party, that reality is that if Trump endorses your opponent, you got some problems. This is how JD Vance ended up as Vice President of the United States. He was losing his Ohio primary. In the Senate, Trump intervened, he won his primary and then he won the general cuz it was a red state and now he's Vice President. Speaking of which, the other big Republican political news from yesterday is that the President of the United States endorsed Ken Paxton, the Attorney General of Texas, over John Cornyn, the sitting Senator in Texas. Now the reality is that Paxton was likely to beat Cornyn anyway. Trump had sat out the race for a very long time. And again Paxton in the Kalshi odds. And again Kalshee is one of our sponsors. But according to Kalshee, before Trump's endorsement, Paxton was already 62% likely to win that Texas Senate nomination. And then the minute that Trump endorsed Paxton, his chances jumped to 93%. And not a gigantic shock there. Now, listen, Paxton is a less attractive general election candidate than Cornyn would have been. Cor has won several terms in Texas. He has some crossover appeal. Paxton has none. But it's a red state. He's very likely to win. That said, those same Cali odds show that 53% of people are betting on the GOP, 47% of people are backing James Talarico, the Democrat. Now, it may turn out that this is actually kind of a boon for Republicans in the sense that Democrats are likely to sink an enormous amount of money into Texas. They are now going to be suckered into the beto play, thinking they might win. Bottom line is Trump endorsed Ken Paxton, and that's basically all she wrote. That's the end of that. That Senate primary, which is slated to take place next week, Quote, the highly respected Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton, an America first patriot and someone who has always been extremely loyal to me in our amazing MAGA movement, is running for the US Senate to represent a place I love and won big three times with 6.4 million votes in 2024, the most votes in the history of the state by far. And then he talks about how he is a big supporter of Ken Paxton and he's going to help him in the Senate and all the rest. Now, Paxton again is sort of running Gal Ryan's campaign here. He says that Cornyn was dishonest with voters about his support for President Trump. Here was Paxton again using Trump as the litmus test.

[Ken Paxton]

He has not been a friend of the president. In 2016, he said he was an albatross around our neck. And then in 2024, he said that his time had passed, and he insinuated that he was guilty of crimes. This guy has been a friend of Donald Trump ever since I got into the race a year ago, but has not been a friend to him prior to that. And as soon as this race is over, he will not be a friend to Donald Trump. That is not. Not his history. That is not his record, and he's been dishonest with the voters of Texas.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now, again, I think that the reality is that Cornyn has had basically a checkered history with President Trump. True for a lot of members of the Senate, but bottom line is that, you know, once Trump endorsed. I think that Trump just waited this one out, right? He waited a very, very long time to endorse Paxton. It's not like he endorsed him right out the gate. He wanted to see that Paxton could perform in the primary before Getting behind him, something the president frequently does. As opposed to Gallerin, where Trump called the shot. I mean, when it came to Massie and Gallerine, Trump was the first guy up to say Massey needs to be primary. There was not going to be a serious primary challenge to Massey. And then Trump launched it. Not the same thing here. J.D. vance, Vice President, slammed John Cornyn yesterday.

[JD Vance]

I think the message that people should take from this is fundamentally, you have got to serve the people who sent you. And if you don't do that, you're gonna find yourself out of step with voters or out of step with the President of the United States. And that's not a good place to be politically.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now, I have a lot of friends in Texas, by the way, who are not fans of John Cornyn. They think that Cornyn was too mushy with regard to things like gun control. I think there's a fair case to be made that Cornyn caucus with Democrats too often fair. Cornyn put out his own tweet saying he trusts the Republican voters of Texas, and then he canceled his campaign event and headed back to D.C. to vote on ice. Now, again, it's true that Cornyn voted with Trump 99% of the time. So Ken Paxton is going after Talarico. That will be the face off in Texas. Here is Paxton going after James Talarico, who is the sort of Pete Buttigieg 2.0. Talarico is the slightly more gay Pete Buttigieg. Fair. Not fair. Not fair. I don't know. Anyway, here's Paxton. How many genders do you suggest you might offer? There are during the campaign?

[Ken Paxton]

It's pretty clear to me. 2 Scientifically true.

[Ben Shapiro]

Is God non binary?

[Ryan Matta]

No.

[Ben Shapiro]

Is the front. Is our border best described as the front porch of America? No.

[Ken Paxton]

Just the opposite. We should protect the borders.

[Ben Shapiro]

And again, the key here is that if President Trump endorses you in a GOP primary, you're very likely to win. This just happened with Bill Cassidy. It's happening with Ken Paxton. It's happening with Ed Gel Ryan and Andy Barr just secured the GOP Senate primary in Mitch McConnell's seat after Trump endorsed him. So Trump is still the kingmaker inside the Republican Party. Now, one thing that's really fascinating that's been happening here is you may have noticed that many of the people who are the most anti Semitic in the Republican Party, the people who traffic in anti Israel conspiracy theories that shade over into anti Semitism, pretty clearly those people are being clocked by President Trump. Not because this is like a top issue for Trump, but because those same conspiracy theorists, I do not think it's coincidence if you're a conspiracy theorist about Trump or Epstein or in general about the world. If you, if you traffic in grievance politics, you're likely to end up in that category, and then Trump is likely to clock you. So as Thomas Massie is being ushered out of the gop, same as Marjorie Taylor Greene, same as Joe Kent and all the rest of this, Democrats are embracing every anti Semitic, anti Israel nut job they can find. Literally all of them. So Chris Raab secured a Pennsylvania House primary in Philadelphia yesterday after campaigning with Hassan Piker. Again, Thomas Massie endorser Chris Rabb, who is he? Well, he's a Democratic Socialist of America candidate who said the Bondi beach massacre in Australia was a false flag by, quote, unquote, Zionists. We are finding out new details, by the way, about the other anti Semitic candidate, Graham Platner, over in, in Maine. And again, there are a bunch. There's also the, the anti Semitic candidate the Democrats are running in Michigan, Abdul Al Said, who's likely to be their Senate nominee. In Maine, they have the dude who had to get rid of his SS tattoo. Well, now there are more details on Graham Platner. Where did they dig up this guy? I mean, truly, where did they dig this schmuck up? It's incredible. So it now turns out that he has a long history of Reddit posts that are unpleasant. So he used to have a username on Reddit, P Hustle. And. And he talked on Reddit about masturbating in portable toilets, which he said, I still have to bleep every time I sit in a porta potty. That blue water smell conditioned me. And Also he, in 2021, described a crude drawing of a penis inside a portable toilet while deployed overseas. And, and then he said, don't worry, it's just me bleep posting. It's obviously not true. Yeah, man. He also said, by the way, on his Reddit between 2009 and 2021 that he got older and became a communist. And he said he was supporting Bernie because I feel sacrifices must be made to build a better society. So he's a delight. And he's not the only one. It turns out that a woman who is very likely to win her House Democratic primary in Texas, a woman named Maureen Galindo, she has now announced that she would like to set up internment camps for, quote, unquote, American Zionists, which means internment camps for Jews. That's. That's what she means her latest set of inflammatory remarks comes as the Democratic hopeful for Texas's newly redrawn 35th congressional district continues to draw national attention. She accused her runoff opponent, former Bexar county public information officer Johnny Garcia, of participating in a human trafficking conspiracy orchestrated by billionaire Zionists. Oh my gosh. Oh gosh. And then she pledged to put her opponent on trial for treason. Her posts are crazy. She's a crazy person and she just won her primary yesterday. So things are going really, really well for the Democrats. They're getting more and more radical. They are really turning it up all the way up to 11. That's final tap 11 needs to move to a spinal tap 12 for the craziness of the Democrats. And it's not just, you know, a few of the outlying Democrats. It has seeped into the brains of the Democrats that they must be radical. In one second, we'll get to more from these insane Democrats. Plus, the manifesto of the shooters of this Islamic center in San Diego chose that brainworms have some pretty real consequences, particularly for those with pre existing mental illness. First Memorial Day weekend is the unofficial kickoff to summer shopping season. Everybody is looking for deals right now. Patio furniture, grills, summer clothes, travel gear, workout equipment, stuff for the house. There's one thing that determines whether people actually finish buying something online. Checkout. Because nothing can kill momentum faster than a complicated checkout process. And then you see it. That magical purple Shop pay button. One click and done. That smooth checkout experience is powered by Shopify. Shopify powers millions of businesses around the world and handles something like 10% of all E commerce in the United States. But Shopify isn't just about checkout. If you're building your business, Shopify gives you basically everything in one place. Online store templates, inventory management, payments, shipping, returns, analytics, marketing tools, even those built in AI features that help write product descriptions and improve product images. One thing that matters for smaller businesses is that Shopify helps them operate like larger companies without needing a giant team behind the scenes. Plus, when shoppers actually get to checkout, shop pay helps reduce abandoned carts and improve conversions. And that matters a lot during high volume shopping weekends. See fewer carts go abandoned and more sales go with Shopify and their Shop Pay button. Sign up for your $1 per month trial today at shopify.com Shapiro go to shopify.com Shapiro that's shopify.com Shapiro Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Fry he says that the goal of Remember those ICE protests? The ones that held up ICE for months and led to the deaths of a Couple of American citizens after they decided to obstruct ICE in their pursuit of their jobs. Well, now he says the goal was to influence national policy. Mayor Jacob Fry, also famous for kneeling before the casket of George Floyd.

[Jacob Fry]

ICE is not just the federal police force that he's developed, it is his. And there's a historical analog here, which is the ss. The SS was unaccountable to the parliament. They answered only to Hitler. Ice. Also, once they get the funding and have these massive increases, to the extent that it's larger than the FBI, they largely don't need approvals from the congressional body. It is very much Donald Trump's force.

[Ben Shapiro]

It's like Hitler Stormtroopers. These are. This is your Democratic Party. Mamdani Zormadani. Our third world is mayor of New York. He says no one should fear detention for following the law. He's tweeting out again, he's all about ice. A federal judge in Manhattan stopped ICE from arresting immigrants, illegal immigrants in the immigration courthouses, which, that's kind of wild. They're illegal immigrants. He says this ruling is a victory for New York's immigrant communities and the basic principle, no one should fear detention for seeking justice or following the law. Well, what if you are not following the law, which is why you are here illegally? Representative Pramila Jayapal, head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. She says ICE and CBP are unconstitutional. She was saying this at a, at a forum sponsored by the Muslim Public Affairs Council.

[Luke Rosiak]

And ICE and CBP have turned into completely unconstitutional agencies that have terrorized entire communities, killed US citizens in our streets, and are jailing over 70,000 people every single night in immigrant incarceration facilities, regardless of immigration status. US Citizens, legal permanent residents, people with valid visas, every single night. 70,000 people. Those mass detention policies have been ruled illegal by over 420 judges across the country, including a majority of judges who were appointed by Donald Trump. So this is not a partisan issue.

[Ben Shapiro]

And lest you think that it's just the crazies in the Democratic Party, remember Abigail Spamberger? She's the governor of Virginia. She's the one who got forced into that terrible redistricting map that then got rejected. She campaigned as moderate and she was supposed to be a moderate Democrat. Well, now she's announcing an executive order on how Virginia state employees can basically obstruct federal agents or fail to coordinate with federal agents on immigration.

[Abigail Spanberger]

Tomorrow I'll be issuing an executive order. So surprise, sorry to my comms team on this one.

[Ben Shapiro]

Let it out, Governor. Let it out.

[Abigail Spanberger]

In ensuring that we are putting out from the state level some guidance across public spaces, including polling places of how Virginia state employees or people who are working in support of Virginia's state run elections can react to, in this particular case, you know, federal agents who might be appearing at a location and where the worry is that they're principally there to intimidate or scare people.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now again, the goal for Democrats in the end, if they take back power, is to run the table on a bunch of far left policy. Hakeem Jeffries, who may be speaker of the House after November, depending on how that election goes, which is a scary prospect. He says the goal is to break Republican spirit.

[Hakeem Jeffries]

I guess part of how we as House Democrats view this moment, either MAGA extremists are going to break the country or we're going to break them. And our goal is to break them. We will defeat them. We have to beat them electorally and then we have to break their spirit because of the extremism that's being unleashed on the American people. That's completely and totally unacceptable.

[Ben Shapiro]

The Republicans are extreme for, you know, wanting to police the border or for wanting to stop the Iranian nuclear program. That's super duper extreme. Meanwhile, the Democrats are promoting zero border, get rid of ice, raise tax on everybody. Zormadani is legitimate third worldism, folks. If you vote for Democrats, then that is what is coming next. Now what we are watching, and it is a dangerous thing we're watching this happen on both sides of the aisle is the brain rot that sets in when everybody goes to online. It happened to Thomas Massie, it's happened to many of his supporters. It's happened on the left, it's happening on the right. That brain rot has consequences. Now the kind of mainstream consequences of the brain rot, the mainstream consequences of the brain rot are bad candidates, candidates who are focused in on issues that Americans don't care about and very frequently they lose. But brain rot has, shall I say, more vulnerable targets. If people, young people, spend too much time online, the brain rotation has serious damaging impact. Is why you should keep your kids off social media, folks. Or if you're a young person, restrict your usage because it is easy to get caught up in a bunch of absolute nonsense and dangerous nonsense. We now have the manifesto of the mosque shooters from the other day. The Islamic center of San Diego. Three people were shot and then the two shooters shot themselves. And the manifesto is an ode to all of the brain rot politics that you see from the woke right and woke left combined from that grievance party, New Left. It is. It is. If you just read this without knowing who exactly was promoting it, it could be on many of the woke right shows. It would be on Brianna Joy Gray or Tucker Carlson, many of the points that are in these sorts of things. And again, that doesn't mean that they are to blame for the violence. They're to blame for raising the temperature and for issuing brain rotation. That obviously has impact on people who have mental vulnerabilities. That part is true, because when you raise the temperature, you bear responsibility for that. I have a rule. Unless you are calling for actual violence against people, you are not responsible for the violence. But you certainly are responsible for creating permission structures for violence. Hey, so we now have the manifesto. It's a 75 page manifesto and it's fascinating only in that it is a reflection. If you spend time on the sewage tank that is social media, particularly Reddit or X or 4chan or any of that, it's basically a reflection of all of that stuff. So the manifesto admits, yes, I had some mental issues which I'm sure will come out eventually, so I won't waste any time talking about it here. I'm certainly not left wing, nor am I right wing, especially not with MAGA or Trump. Politically, I call myself a third positionist, specifically aligning most with nationalist socialism and eco fascism through any third war third positionism, especially those that prioritize its people, nationalism, racial homogeneity, nature, traditionalist ideals, et cetera. And then he quotes William Luther Pierce, who's the author of a book called the Turner Diaries, which was a sort of white supremacist novel manifesto. Whether you swung to the right or whether you swung to the left, we'll simply swing you by the net. Quote the modern left is retarded and the modern right is foolish. The left advocates for progression at all costs, not realizing how damaging that truly is. And the right tries to conserve traditional values, yet they support technological, economic and cultural growth. And here is some more of what the manifesto says. And again, if this sounds like it echoes a lot of the messages you hear on very popular shows online, that's because it does. Quote, the left says we need to bring in as many immigrants as possible, not realizing or caring that all that does is make our society a third world bleep hole while replacing white people. The right believes immigration is okay as long as it's legal. This in practice, merely causes the decay and replacement to come slower instead of stopping it. I would much rather have a worse economy run only by white people than a better one run by N words again. This is the manifesto. When it comes to conservatives trying to conserve traditional values, they fail miserably. They don't conserve bleep. All they do is slow down the impending doom and call it democracy and freedom. I believe conservatism is the ideology of the coward. The left wing, as stupid as they are, aren't cowards. They like to parade around the streets during their special days and month. Half of them will be naked, the other half's in fetish gear. I believe they all deserve to be hung or forced into a labor camp for that. A left wing revolution will never come, but a white revolution is coming. Stop fooling yourself that the right wing politicians are any less traitorous than the leftist ones. You responsible conservative types will get the same rope as all the rest. Now, the shooters were apparently Luddites. Quote, the average man used to have a purpose. They didn't have to worry about what another family was doing because they had to focus on their own family. The industrial revolution has severed family ties and destroyed all purpose, leaving the modern man with nothing but emptiness. In order to change this, we must sabotage the industrial complex and bring humanity back to what it once was. And of course, who's to blame? Quote, everyone has their own idea of who is to blame for all wrong in the world. They will say it's the government, the elite, the rich, the politicians, the 1%, the left, the right, the capitalists, the communists, the Illuminati, the F word for gay people and tran trannies, the immigrants and many more. All of them can be traced back to be or because by one group, the Jews. All caps. It's the Jews. It's the Jews. It's the Jews. It's the Jews. Epstein island is the most disgusting, vile, evil thing of our modern day. And yet it is nothing new. It is just Judaism in its purest form, scaled up to an attraction of sorts to blackmail those who will not bend their will willingly. And he says, what radicalized me? Simple, you did. Learning the truth and being exposed to the actions of the enemy is what drove me to the point of radicalization. So thanks for that. It is because of all these years of ridicule, rejection, being ignored and being treated like a joke. He says, of course, after the Jew, the most evil creature in the world is the woman. This is because after Jews, women tend to cause all the problems in the world. I'm an accelerationist. I believe that accelerating toward the destruction of our current political system and towards an all out race war for the purpose of a societal collapse is the only real way forward. Now, again, why do I bother reading all of this? Because these messages are effervescent in social media. They are there, everywhere, everywhere. So if you're a parent and you're letting your kids untrammeled, just travel the wilds of social media, hang out in podcasts, stand where half these messages are promoted, much more than half these, then you just know this is the kind of crap that people are listening to. And at the outer edge, at the fringe, it has some pretty deadly consequences. More specifically, on a broad level, obviously, it perverts our politics. All right. Meanwhile, in better news, Vivek Ramaswamy, who again, was opposed by many of these same sorts. He is now the Republican gubernatorial nominee in Ohio. He is promising to fight Medicaid fraud in Ohio. He was joined by some of our reporters at Daily Wire who have uncovered so much of it.

[Vivek Ramaswamy]

And so to everyone in this state who rightly feels that the quality of your health care may be going down even as your costs are going up, that you're working hard to make ends meet to put food on the dinner table and provide health care for your family, and it feels too expensive a copay that's a little higher than a child should be, health insurance premiums that have risen without quality outcomes to go along with it. The easiest solution that we can deliver for you as leaders, the easiest solution that I will be able to deliver to you in the first six months of my leadership of this state will be to crush Medicaid fraud by the billions and to put that money back in your pocket where it belongs.

[Ben Shapiro]

He was. He was joined by our Daily Wire reporter, Luke Rosiak, who's uncovered all this Medicaid fraud in Ohio. Luke also, by the way, was testifying at the State House, and he was accused of racism for the fraud investigation. Luke did not take kindly to that.

[Luke Rosiak]

So for you to imply the racist

[Ben Shapiro]

information that you're on Medicaid or home health.

[Luke Rosiak]

On Medicaid and home health, we.

[Ben Shapiro]

We are. When you look at the numbers of people that are in Ohio, the white population versus people of color, you're implying that most of the fraud is happening in communities of color.

[Thomas Massie]

I'm not implying it.

[Ben Shapiro]

I'm stating it. Okay, so again, the notion that somehow it's racist to uncover fraud is, of course, ridiculous. Speaking of fraud, JD Vance, who's been tasked by the administration with tracking down fraud on the federal level, he is previewing a fraud investigation into Representative Ilhan Omar, who's come up in some discussions of the stuff that's going on in Minnesota.

[JD Vance]

I don't want to prejudge an investigation. I mean, you read the things about Ilhan Omar and about, you know, who she married and whether she didn't marry this person or that person. It certainly seems like something fishy is there. But everybody's entitled to equal justice under the laws. So we're gonna investigate it, we're gonna take a look at it. If we think that there's a crime, we're gonna prosecute that crime. And that's something the Department of Justice is looking at right now.

[Ben Shapiro]

So while Republicans are looking into fraud, Democrats have decided that they're going to target President Trump and the administration over fraud. Gavin Newsom, of course, would love to run this campaign. Now, I have been warning since literally January of 2025 that the amount of sort of familial wealth being taken in by members of the Trump family on things like crypto was going to be a problem for President Trump like that. It is. It just is. You know, when you have people who are very close to an administration who are going around picking up giant sacks of cash in places, that will be a problem for the administration eventually. It would be political malpractice for Democrats not to target it, frankly. Here was Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, trying to launch that weapon.

[Gavin Newsom]

Trump administration's a corruption story. It's the great grift. And it's taking shape on a daily basis in every way, shape, form. You didn't even mention the $230 million of the DOJ that he's also trying to extract, not just that $10 billion now, $1.8 billion settlement. We've talked a lot about the $400 million plan, which is not $400 million. It was over $900 million in the Pentagon budget. To retrofit the plan. We talk about the eight large scale projects he has in the Gulf and around the rest of the globe, the fact that he quite literally used the tariff regime in order to get those deals done, particularly the one in Vietnam. We're talking about the kind of corruption at scale we've never seen in our lifetime.

[Ben Shapiro]

Now, again, Democrats, they would be politically foolish to ignore at least the implications there. And now they are focusing in specifically on a move by the DoJ to set up what's called a weaponization of government fund. So the DOJ announced the other day that as part of a settlement agreement with President Trump, President Trump was suing the IRS for having leaked his files and targeting him. The Attorney General established the Anti Weaponization Fund to provide a systematic process to hear and redress claims of others who suffered weaponization and lawfare. So again, the plaintiffs, that would be President Trump, Don Jr. Eric Trump, the Trump Organization. They filed suit against treasury and the IRS in southern districts of Florida following the leak of their tax returns. They have agreed in exchange for the creation of the fund, to drop their pending lawsuit with prejudice and also withdraw a couple of administrative claims, including for damages resulting from the raid on Mar a Lago and the Russia collusion. Collusion hoax. So what is this fund? Well, apparently, according to the doj, the fund will have the power to issue formal apologies and monetary relief owed to claimants. Submission of a claim is voluntary. There are no partisan requirements to file a claim. Any money left when the fund ceases operations will. Will revert back to the federal government. The fund will receive 1.776 billion, right? 1776, and will come from the judgment fund, which is a perpetual appropriation, allowing DOJ to settle and pay cases on a quarterly basis. The fund sends a report to the ag and they point out there is a legal precedent for this. The Obama administration created a fund called the Keeps Eagle Fund, which was a $760 million fund to address various claims alleging racism against the federal government over a period of decades. Let me be clear. I don't like any of these slush funds. I think all of these slush funds end up being abused. Giant bags of money end up being targeted by people who ought not receive that money. With that said, the accusation that Trump is setting up the fund to pay off his family, that's really, really silly. So JD Vance was asked about that by the media. Was Trump setting up this fund just to pay himself off? And he's like, no, that's silly.

[JD Vance]

I think in some ways, the media has misrepresented what this is actually about. This is about compensating Americans for the lawfare that we saw under the last administration. And by the way, anybody can apply for it. Republicans can apply for it, Democrats can apply for it. As you know, the President of the United States has pardoned a number of Democrats who he felt were actually subject to this lawfare. I mean, if Hunter Biden wants to apply for this particular fund, he is welcome to. It's going to go through a normal process where we vet everything, where we try to identify whether people's claims are actually legitimate. But here's the question. You say, what? Why should taxpayers fund this? Whenever the United States Government incurs legal expenses, it pays out those legal expenses. When it's settling a lawsuit, it pays out money to settle that lawsuit. And the question is, is a dollar of this money going to the Trump administration? No. Is a dollar of this money going to Donald Trump personally? No. Is a dollar of this money going to Donald Trump?

[Ben Shapiro]

Now, Todd Blanche, who's the interim ag, he says Democrats have been lying about the nature of the slush fund. Here's what he had to say in congressional testimony.

[Todd Blanche]

There's also an individual who, after being pardoned by the president, went on to molest two children. And that person actually tried to buy the silence of these children by saying that he would pay them some. Some of the funds that he was hoping to get from your slush fund. Can you commit to making the rule so that that person is not eligible for a payout under this fund?

[Ben Shapiro]

Well, you're obviously lying in your question, because there's no way that this person committed to that. The slush fund, as you call it, which is not. Didn't exist, I'm sure, but I can commit, Mr. Attorney General,

[Todd Blanche]

don't ever do that again. I. I am reporting what he said. He said on the expectation that he hoped to get some of the funds from a payout. He's, he's been.

[Ben Shapiro]

You said the slush fund, Senator, and that didn't exist when he said that. Okay, so Blanche is right about that. Now, there is a legit critique here. Okay? That legit critique comes in the form of a waiver that was put at the end of the settlement. Quote, the United States releases, waves, acquits, and forever discharges each of the plaintiffs from, and is hereby forever banned and precluded from prosecuting or pursuing any and all claims, counterclaims, causes of actions, appeals or requests for relief, including injunctive money, monetary relief, damages, examinations or similar or related reviews, appeals that relief costs, attorney's fees, et cetera, et cetera, whether presently known or unknown, that as of the effective date of the settlement agreement, have been or could have been asserted by defendants against any of the plaintiffs or related or affiliated individuals or parties, including trust, parents, sister or related companies, affiliates and subsidiaries. Okay, so why is that a problem? So there's been some time that's passed since the initiation of this lawsuit. In that time, there's been an awful lot of activity that has been performed by members of the Trump family. And so what the settlement does, it basically says, from today, meaning like May 20th from today back, nothing could be investigated or prosecuted. Now, again, I see why the Trump administration would want that. I can see why members of the Trump family would want that. Because obviously, you know, they've been targeted unfairly before. I get that. At the same time, I get the critique. The critique, which is, well, you know, when you initiated this lawsuit two years ago, you had not done any of these things, and Trump's been back in office since then, and some stuff has happened that we want to investigate. That is not the most insane critique that I've ever heard. Again, I'm generally against slush funds. To be clear, I do not like them. I think there are other ways of pursuing redress for grievances in this fashion. However, many of the myths that you're hearing about it are overstated. Alrighty. Now let's jump into the Pure Talk question and answer segment, because you have questions and we have answers. Sam from Kentucky has a question. Ben, what is one daily habit that has had the biggest impact in your productivity? The biggest impact is you actually have to set apart time in your life where you turn off your phone. You just have to turn it off. You have to basically turn off the Internet. Just do that for one hour a day. And do not be distracted by doing tasks. Everybody thinks that they're good at multitasking. Not a single human is good at multitasking. It is not what our brains are built for. We are built to do one task. You need to be able to get into what is called psychologically flow. Flow is where you feel that you and the task are one people. You almost have a dopamine rush when it happens. You can't get there if you are focusing on 10 things at once. You really do have to focus in kind of piece by piece throughout your day on the thing that's in front of you. Otherwise you end up distractible and not nearly as effective. And it actually wastes time. Multitasking loses you time. It doesn't save you time. Anonymous.

[Todd Blanche]

Hey, Ben, this is Anonymous. I have a buddy who I've been trying to convince to smoke cigars for like 11 years. And since you're the persuasion debate champ, I was just wondering, what arguments would you make, take to him to convince him that he should do that, especially on a celebratory occasion like his birthday.

[Ben Shapiro]

Thanks. Oh, you know, that was totally anonymous. I have no idea who that was. I have no idea. I mean, I could. I could feel all of the goosebumps of hatred rise upon me the minute that I heard that voice. Michael Knowles. Anyway, how would you convince somebody to smoke a cigar So I, I assume that I am that friend. If I'm not, that makes me sad. But in any case, if, if, if I'm that person, I mean, you'd have to start with like a full scale explanation of how I'm not gonna get mouth cancer. Then you have to start with that again. My understanding is that you won't, but I want some more facts to back that up. Second of all, I need to understand the enjoyment of it because the one time that I smoked a cigar, I vomited into a trash can because I sw. I swallowed the smoke. It was very, very unpleasant. So I need to be assured that actually it is a pleasant experience and I need someone to actually show me how to properly smoke a cigar, which, which I do not know how to do. And then third, honestly, my throat dries out so much that it's, it's, it's just a problem for me. Even when there's cigar smoke in the room. Like when we were doing backstage, oh man, I hated it so much I was basically dried out the entire next day. So the answer is no, I'm not going to do that. Todd, do you have a question? Hey, Ben, it's Todd from New York.

[Thomas Massie]

So everyone talks about the economy, climate change.

[Ben Shapiro]

I'm just wondering, why aren't people more worried about population decline? Well, I think the reason is because we have all been indoctrinated in the idea that people are the problem. Environmentalists have spent an awful lot of time making the case that the actual problem on planet Earth is the people, which is not true. The solution is the people. We are very, very good at solving problems once they appear, and population decline is a massive problem. Now, again, when people think of overpopulation or underpopulation, they're thinking about the wrong places. They're saying, well, you know, it's very, very overpopulated in the. Yes, well, when they become richer, they will stop overpopulating because that is what has happened in every single population group in the, in the world on planet Earth, where we do have underpopulation, specifically because of our social welfare systems and also because of our, you know, inability to form families or unwillingness to do so. It's going to be a major problem. Todd, you are right. We do need to convince people to have more babies. That would be a good thing. Head on over to PureTalk.com Shapiro to switch to my wireless company, America's Wireless Company. I mean, the reception was perfectly clear. Pure talk. Go check them out right now. Alrighty, folks, the show continues for our members in Just one moment. Remember, in order to watch, you have to be a member. If you're not a member, become one. We're going to be talking about this insane BBC story. It's totally crazy. The BBC is now trying to justify Afghan fathers selling their children into child sex slavery. I'm not even kidding. This is what the BBC is doing. We'll get into that in a moment. First, become a member. Use code Shapiro checkout for two months free on all annual plans. Click that link in the description and join us.