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- [00:01]
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Ben Shapiro
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- [01:01]
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- [01:26]
Ben Shapiro
Start your free trial@shopify.com okay, so I watched that Knicks spurs game last night, to my everlasting regret, mostly because I hate, hate, despise stupidity. And I have never seen a team coached as stupidly or play as stupidly as the San Antonio spurs did in the second half. It turns out when you have a 29 point lead and you're walloping the opposing team on its home court in historic fashion, there truly is only one thing to do. Put the pedal to the metal. Win. Drive the lane. No soft defense, no playing, not to lose. Oh, sorry. I thought I was talking about the Spurs Knicks game. It turns out I was talking about the Iran war. It turns out that in both basketball and war, you can only win if you win the second half. And it appears President Trump is prepping to do just that. I will explain all of it in just a moment. Plus, we'll get to the inflation stats that people who actually want America to lose and Zorin Mandani pledging taxpayer money to trans the kids. This is the Ben Shapiro show. So as you can tell I have agita over these first play last night. I cannot believe I stayed up to watch that they were dumber than Candace Owens at a middle school physics fair. Gravity exists, folks. Truly, truly stupid ball. Why? What are you doing? Don't settle for lobbing threes while the other team chips away at your lead. Not when you have WEMBY, a 75 monster in the paint. Do not pull the most aggressive players like Dylan Harper in favor of supposed experts who instead make the dumbest mistakes possible. I'm looking at you, Mitch Johnson into Aaron Fox. Just dribble out the clock, Manude. And for the love of all that is holy, do not let the other team go on an unanswered run without reassessing your strategy. Turns out it's dumb to think you can win the big games by implementing a losing strategy. It's true in basketball. It is also true in war. The media and their allies keep saying the only way to win the war in Iran is to lose. You know, let Iran have a path toward a bomb, give them a boatload of cash and beg them to leave the Strait of Hormuz alone. The alternative, they say, is endless war. That's really dumb. Both of those alternatives are super stupid. First of all, doesn't have to be an endless war. Second of all, giving Iran a clear pathway toward a nuke and ballistic missile building and funding of terror and billions of dollars in cash and the capacity to continue shutting down traffic in the Strait, that's called losing. Or we could do this thing called winning, which is what President Trump may now be considering anew. And it's actually the thing we have to do. So the real reason that people in the United States, of course, are very concerned over what's happening in Iran is inflation. In the US if we weren't getting price inflation due to the cutoff of energy, no one would care. It would just be a thing that's happening quite far away. Especially because the military has done an extraordinary job of minimizing the damage to the U.S. and our allies. The reason people are worried right now is because the inflation is coming in very hot. So according to CNBC, inflation clocked in in May at 4.2%. That's the annualized inflation rate according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and rose at A seasonally adjusted 0.5% for the month. Now, if you get rid of food and energy prices because of the Iran war, the so called core CPI accelerated at 0.2% for the month and 2.9% from a year ago, which Again, is not amazing, but it's not terrible either. The annual rate was in line with the forecast. The monthly gain was below the 0.3% estimate and less than the 0.4% April increase. So what we're really watching right now is, is a temporary price spike that is generated by the bottlenecking of energy supply in the Strait of Hormuz. Now the President was asked about this and here is how he responded. Are you concerned, Mr. President, about the latest inflation number which came out this morning. Could that be a headwind?
- [05:18]
Donald Trump
The numbers were great. You know what I really love? I love the inflation. You know why? Because as soon as this war is over, you know, I can say it now, something he didn't know. Do you know we've been taking out millions of barrels of oil? Nobody knows it. You know who doesn't know about it? Iran. Until right now.
- [05:39]
Ben Shapiro
Okay, so what he is talking about there, he then told the New York Post cuz they followed up. Because when you say I love inflation, people are going to take that out of context. That will be a bunch of campaign ads. That's not what he means. He said I love the inflation numbers because of what I'm talking about, the numbers are going to be phenomenal. Because what's showing is that despite the fact that we're in a war, the numbers are much lower than anticipated. And when we're out of that war, the numbers will be at lower numbers than they were before it even started, which of course is true. And again, the CPI annual rate 2020-2026, as you can see from this graph, you are seeing a jump. It is nothing like, nothing remotely like the spike that you saw under Joe Biden. That spike in inflation from January 2021 to essentially mid 22. You're talking about a spike in inflation numbers that went from the mid twos all the way up to 9% here, even with what's going on in Iran. You are talking again about the low fours, which is not great, but it is going to go down after this war is over already coming up, we'll get to how we actually get to the end of this war. What does that look like? And the people who really, really, really want America to lose, like openly want America to lose. Some people who you used to think liked America, but actually it turns out not so much. We'll get to that in a moment. First, small businesses help hold the American economy together. These are people taking real risks. Opening restaurants, running construction companies, starting logistics firms, building software companies out of garages. Here's the reality. More than 70% of small businesses need additional capital at least once a year. Meanwhile, big banks are approving fewer loans and creating more hoops to jump through than ever before. So even businesses that are profitable end up stuck waiting weeks or months buried under paperwork, just trying to access funding, which is totally, totally crazy. Bureaucracy makes it really rough to operate a normal business. There's too much red tape. But if you want bank rates without the bank delays, you need to check out Cardiff Co Shapiro for up to $500,000 in same day funding. Cardiff is the largest privately held small business lender in the United States. They funded more than $12 billion for businesses since 2004. Applications take less than five minutes, there's no impact on your personal credit, and businesses can get approved in minutes and funded the very same day. So instead of waiting around endlessly, businesses can actually use the money to grow banks. Try to lock out small businesses. Cardiff has the key. Big banks may not want to approve your business loans, but Cardiff does. If you've been in business for at least a year and you're pulling in 20 grand a month in revenue, apply now for up to $500,000 in same day business funding at Cardiff Co Shapiro. Again, that's Cardiff Co Apparel. Real growth Fast funding. Cardiff by borrow. Better. How do we get to the end of this war? Well, it turns out that Iran has in fact been tapping along the United States as per their usual arrangement. And frankly, I'm a little surprised that whoever was advising President Trump got this so wrong. And they certainly should not have. I don't know whether it was the Witkoff team or whether it was the Vice President's office that was leading the negotiations via Pakistan, which is a Chinese cutout. But the idea that Iran was ever going to, via negotiations, give up its nuclear program, its ballistic missile capacity, or its funding of Iranian terror groups abroad, that was, that was not a great premise. And you know how you can tell it's not a great premise? Because if the offer to Iran is, hey, you get to reenter the world economy. If you do all those things, you know what's been on the table the entire time for decades. If Iran had given up its extraterritorial ambitions, if it had not threatened its neighbors with ballistic missiles, if it had not tried to develop nuclear weapons, if they had been clear and open about all of that, they'd be in exactly the same position as Qatar or UAE or Bahrain or Saudi, none of which are democracies, all of which have Islamic law written into their constitutions, and all of which are well integrated into the world economy. So Iran could at any time have reintegrated itself into the world economy. So in other words, the sort of carrot that was being offered by the negotiators is not a carrot at all. Iran has had that carrot the entire time. And so it turns out that Iran instead, because of the United States, a cease fire, which I think was misbegotten. I think the cease fire was a bad idea. I think the embargo is a great idea. Cutting off Iran's capacity to. To use the straits to ship its own oil while they cut off everybody else's capacity. We couldn't allow that to happen. But I think the ceasefire itself was a bad idea. The reason it was a bad idea is because it gave Iran hope. And when you give the Iranian regime, hopefully they push. When you give them an inch, they take several hundred miles. They try to relink up all of their terror apparatus by linking activity in Lebanon to activity in Iran. The idea is that if Israel strikes Hezbollah in Lebanon, again, that is not the government of Lebanon. The government of Lebanon is not like Hezbollah. It's an Iranian terror group located in Lebanon. Iran was saying if Israel hits Hezbollah, then Iran will fire missiles at Israel. They were trying to link up all of these causes and create a sort of regional hegemony for itself based on that, based on grabbing, the. Grabbing the Strait of Hormuz and all of the rest. Well, there is really only one way to stop all of that, and that is to again exert extraordinary pressure on Iran and to show that you are willing to take what Iran is willing to dish out in return. That is the only way to win a war. As always, you have to make the cost for the other side, the cost they are willing to accept, too high for them to accept. And you have to accept the cost coming the other way. That's how you win a war. Well, the United States. In response to the Iranians shooting down an American helicopter yesterday, US Military forces struck air defenses and radar sites near the Strait of Hormuz. No infrastructure strikes were hit. Sites were hit. According to an official telling the Wall Street Journal, Iranian state media reported explosions in areas along the Strait of Hormuz, including Bandar Abbas, Qeshm island and, and Syriac. All of those are again, locations that sort of overlook the strait and are used to fire drones by the Iranians. The Pentagon cast the attacks as an act of coercive diplomacy designed to force Iranian negotiations. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, if we need to negotiate with bombs. We'll negotiate with bombs. We're very good at it. Nobody better in the world. Okay? But let's be real about it. Every act of military wherewithal is an attempt to get people to give you what you want them to give you. The question is, will that actually generate some sort of concessions from Iran? I'm highly doubtful, because again, I think that Iran is not led by people who are chiefly worried about their economy. I think they are worried only about the preservation of their regime only. And what they're worried about is that if their economy continues to tank, eventually there will be a movement inside the country to overthrow them. Meanwhile, the President announced via Truth Social that the United States had in fact been opening up the Strait of Hormuz, at least in part. He said, quote, last month I directed our great US Military to execute a secret mission to support oil tankers and other commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz. Today I'm pleased to announce this effort has resulted in more than 100 million barrels of oil making its way through the strait and into the open market. More than 200 commercial ships have safely traveled through the Strait. This wildly successful effort is because the United States of America controls the Strait of Hormuz, not Iran. Their military is defeated. Their economy is lost, is over for Iran. Thank you for your attention to this matter. And the President said yesterday, we have been taking out millions of barrels of oil under cover of darkness. So the idea that Iran has complete overwatch of the strait is not true.
- [12:55]
Donald Trump
We're taking out millions, which I'm just announcing today for the first time. But we've been taking out millions of barrels of oil. Millions of barrels every night took out oil. But now I'm going to tell you because they just figured it out.
- [13:16]
Ben Shapiro
Well, again, the fact is that we have not begun to really flex our strength in the Strait of Hormuz. Fearful of casualties or fearful of danger. Understandable. But the hopes for negotiation were always, were always, I think, far fetched. The phrase that's often been used about the Iranian government is that the Iranian government has never won a war or lost a negotiation. And if you'd like for them to lose a negotiation, they need to fundamentally lose the war. You don't win by simply playing not to lose. That is not how you win here. And the President this morning made that clear. So the President put out a statement on Truth Social. The United States will be hitting Iran, whose navy, air force, radar, anti aircraft and all other forms of defense, together with most of its offensive capability are gone very hard tonight. At some point in the not too distant future, we will be taking Kharga island and other oil infrastructure points and assume total control of their oil and gas markets, much like we have with Venezuela, which is working out brilliantly for both Venezuela and the United States. Thank you for your attention to this matter, President Trump. Now, some of us have been saying for literally months at this point that this is precisely what should happen. This is a clip from my show, March 19th. The current date is June 11th. So rather than doing a misbegotten ceasefire, this is what we should have been doing all along, would have shortened this journey a little bit. Here's what a smart man said on March 19. In my opinion, the faster you move, the better. And so my temptation would be to take Kharga Island. My temptation would be to, if that requires putting special operators on the ground to do it, I would do it. My temptation would be to basically obliterate the entire coastline where Iran is firing drones and missiles at ships, and then to provide whatever help is necessary in order to provoke a popular uprising in Tehran. So again, that seems to now be the strategy, which. It's about time. All right, coming up, the left has gone completely crazy. Maybe the right could, you know, win if they also didn't go crazy. We'll get to craziness all over the place. First, we all rely on our cars every single day. Commuting, running errands, getting the kids where they need to go, even taking a quick trip out of town when your car isn't working, your daily tasks can't be done. And you know the feeling. You hear a strange noise, a warning light pops on. Immediately you're thinking, how expensive is this going to be? You. Because nobody plans for a repair bill that could cost thousands of bucks. The reality is most people spend more time trying to save a few bucks on subscriptions than they do protecting themselves from a major unexpected repair. A guy on our team went through this exact situation. His extended warranty had expired, so he started comparing coverage options. After looking at several providers, he found Car Shield was about 20% less expensive than the alternatives he signed up. He's already used the coverage. He said the process was simple and hassle free. CarShield offers flexible month to month vehicle protection plans. They also include 24. 7 roadside assistance, towing and rental car options when you need repairs. Car Shield works with ACE certified mechanics nationwide. They've been serving drivers for more than 20 years, protect more than 2 million vehicles and maintain a 96% customer satisfaction. Rating the road is calling. Make sure your car is ready to answer. Right now, Car Shield is offering our listeners 20% off with the code shapiro@carshield.com Shapiro Protect your vehicle from the unexpected before the first big repair bill hits. Join the millions protected by Carshield. Go to carshield.com Shapiro and use code SHAPIRO right now for 20% off. That's carshield.com Shapiro code SHAPIRO for 20% off. And it seems to me that this ceasefire, again, all it really did was give the Iranians some time to rearm, maybe to get ready to shoot more of their citizens. Well, the president went on Fox News this morning. He said, listen, the Iranian regime is on its last legs.
- [17:01]
Pete Hegseth
They're finished. But the papers, the media refuses to write it. They're finished. We can walk in there tomorrow. We could take soldiers. I don't want to have boots on the ground, but if I wanted to, we could put a small group of soldiers and take over the whole place. They're finished.
- [17:22]
Ben Shapiro
Okay? So declaring they're finished is not the same thing as finishing them. That is the thing. Having a 29 point lead is not enough. You need to finish the game. You need to close it out. That's the only way to do it. The Treasury Department is ready to close it out. So Scott Besant, the Treasury Secretary, put up what I think is a pretty meaningful tweet this morning. He said the Iranian regime will lose the zero sum game it is playing. Any damage it inflicts on our allies in the Gulf will be paid for with funds extracted from Iranian accounts. Any tolls paid to the Persian Gulf strait authority will be offset by by funds extracted from their accounts. Every attack Iran launches will only deepen the economic and financial consequences it faces. So I think that buried here in this tweet is one of the things that is a solve and that is a lot of worry about the Iranians responding to American action against Eharg or South Pars oil field. That the Iranians will fire a bunch of missiles at gas and oil facilities in places like Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran, uae, Saudi. That has been the big concern. And Besant is saying if they do that, we will just pay them with Iranian money because we've frozen their assets. Seems like a pretty good solution to me. Meanwhile, the Iranians have been relegated to complaining about how mean the Americans are. So the Iranian foreign minister is accusing the United States of a deliberate strike on civilian water infrastructure. Water is the pulse of life, says Ismail Bakai. And the US Is deliberately targeting the lifeblood of the Iranian people. This is pretty rich coming from a regime that mowed down 42,000 of its own people in one weekend. Essentially, as part of its aggression against Iran, the US Military has deliberately struck vital civilian water infrastructure in Syriac Harmozgan, destroying two reservoirs with combined capacity of 2,500 cubic meters. These facilities support supply drinking water to more than 20,000 residents across 10 villages. This is not collateral damage. No, these are dual use facilities, meaning that you are allowed by the properties of war to target infrastructure that is used to benefit the military of the opposing military. It's how you can blow up a bridge. For example, Pete Hegsett, the Secretary of Defense, he said that bombs would be dropping on key facilities. This was yesterday.
- [19:29]
Admiral Cooper
Admiral Cooper, the commander of centcom, was going to be here with me. We just got done with detailed briefings, but of course he is busy because CENTCOM Central Command will be busy tonight because President Trump said we will be hitting Iran hard and we will be because Iran has a chance to make a good deal, a great deal, to codify what they said they've been willing to do and they haven't been willing to do it. So as President Trump said, they've been tap, tap, tapping. You can see when someone's trying to tap, tap, tap on a deal, instead they're gonna have tap, tap, tap bombs dropping on key facilities in Iran from the United States of America.
- [20:10]
Ben Shapiro
So again, this is the proper response to what Iran has been doing this whole time. Now there are people who are trying to stop Trump from winning this war. They don't like America and they are very much in favor of America's enemies winning just outright. Chank Uyghur is of course pretending that this is all about his concern about the economy. It would not matter, by the way, if inflation were at 0%. Schenck would be opposing what the United States is doing because he would like for Iran to maintain its power in the region as well as the Turkish government. He put out a tweet yesterday. Economic catastrophe is next. So all the talk of Trump and Netanyahu fighting was BS as usual. We were never negotiating. We were trying to find a way around the blockade. And now that the Iranians know, we're going back into the war just as Israel ordered. Again, the. The op that is being run by people like Chank being run by people like Tucker Carlson, as we'll see, is that the United States does not run the United States. Israel runs the United States. All of this is designed to generate hatred for the US government. That is what it is designed to do. Hatred for President Trump. It also happens to be a lie. I'm not sure how many times the president can say over and over and over that he bosses Netanyahu around. He literally said that, not the other way around. But this is the shtick. If you've been listening to the show for a while, you've probably heard me talk about Balance of Nature. If you're sitting there thinking, ok, Ben, you mention this company a lot. What's the real story? So here's the real story. First of all, we genuinely like Balance of Nature here at the Daily Wire. It's a regular part of my routine. It's become popular around the office as well. People are using it because you feel healthier when you use it. It's pretty simple. Most of us know we should be getting more fruit, veggies, fiber, whole food ingredients into our daily lives. The problem is that real life gets in the way. You wake up with the best of intentions and then you have meetings and deadlines and kids. That's why I appreciate products that make it easier to stay consistent. Balance of Nature's whole health system is made from real fruits, veggies, spices, fiber. I'll tell you something else. They're freeze dried snacks. They're excellent. They're convenient. Kids love them. They don't make a mess. In fact, later this month, I'll be sitting down with Dr. Howard. He's the founder of Balance of Nature. I'm looking forward to asking him about why he started the company and the philosophy behind the products. If you've heard me talk about Balance of Nature before but you haven't checked them out yet, go take a look. Trust me. Visit balanceofnature.com today. Subscribe to the Whole Health System to Get an additional 10% off your subscription with promo code SHAPIRO. That's balanceofnature.com that promo code SHAPIRO again. The mainstream left does this too. Hakeem Jeffries, the wannabe speaker and the House Minority Leader. Back in March, he was doing the sort of why can't we spend more money on programs here at home instead of dropping bombs, which is the dumbest form of politics? It turns out we spend trillions a year on the American people. By the American people, I mean a bunch of people supported by various government programs. Here is Hakeem Jeffries doing this routine back in March.
- [22:47]
Hakeem Jeffries
The administration has not even made the case to the American people as to why we are spending billions of dollars and dropping bombs every day in Iran while at the same period of time doing nothing about the affordability crisis, which Donald Trump continues to insist is a hoax. It's not a hoax. I travel the country people are struggling through throughout America to achieve the American dream. Many people have understandably concluded it is out of reach and we have to restore it. And instead you've got the administration without any plan, any objective, any exit strategy has gotten us into this reckless war of choice in the Middle East. So the notion that they would come up here and ask for additional money is beyond the pale at this moment.
- [23:35]
Ben Shapiro
Yes. Again, this has been the Democrat line, the left wing line. I have to say that actually somehow Hakeem Jeffries and Chenk Uyghur in some weird way have become less America hating than Tucker Carlson. I don't know what else to say about this. TUCKER carlson Literally last night, he's not just saying that it was a mistake to go into the war with Iran because of economic consequences or because of mistaken geopolitics. He is literally rooting for Iran. He's literally rooting for the Iranian regime. TUCKER Carlson this dude is so far gone, it's insane.
- [24:11]
Tucker Carlson
And the rest of the world is watching this in horror and no one's doing anything about it. The United States is abetting it. The United States is helping it happen, despite what they tell you. Those are American weapons and weapon systems being used to murder Christians in Lebanon. Who is doing something about it?
- [24:24]
Ben Shapiro
Iran.
- [24:26]
Tucker Carlson
Hate to say that. Wish that weren't true. Wish it didn't fall to Iran to do something about this. But it has and they are. And they're doing more about this than any other country, including ours, including any of the Gulf states. Sorry. Because they are tying the reopening of the strait, which the world wants to an end to Israeli bombing and murder in Lebanon. So in the eyes of the region, whatever people hate about Iran and there's a lot that the Arabs hate about Iran, they are uniquely standing up for the Palestinians.
- [25:05]
Ben Shapiro
I love that Tucker is just discovering that the Palestinians and the Iranians are in cahoots together. Yeah, that would be the entire problem, dude. But it is because he's on the side of Iran. I mean, again, I don't have to say it. He's now just saying the thing. It's pretty incredible. Marjorie Taylor Greene did the same thing on CNN last night. She's calling Trump a traitor and also obviously invoking Epstein because this is her shtick.
- [25:26]
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Their traitors, the ones that refuse to release Epstein files, want to cover up for pedophiles and rapists and all sorts of disgusting things in these files. Those are the traitors to the American people and they should be ashamed of themselves.
- [25:42]
Disclaimer Voice
I mean, this report basically says it was the President who didn't want anything released. Are you saying that that applies to the President himself?
- [25:52]
Marjorie Taylor Greene
I'm saying exactly that. He told me on the phone that his friends would get hurt and that's why he's against releasing the Epstein files. And I think we've seen a lot of that dribble out. So, yeah, it all matches
- [26:08]
Ben Shapiro
again, the two online. Right. My goodness. And they're just siding with the very online left. The President is going to have to overcome not only the Iranian military and government, he's going to have to overcome people who legitimately dislike America here at home. Joining me on the line is Senator Rick Scott of my home state of Florida. Senator Scott, thanks so much for taking the time. Really appreciate it. And let's talk for a, for a moment about sort of the international situation. Obviously, what we're watching right now is a lot of people in the United States who are very concerned, rightly so, about the inflation statistics that came in pretty hot. A huge part of that is because of the spike in energy prices, which the President acknowledges. The President also says that that means that when the Iran war is over, those prices will go back down, which means that we need to actually win that war. Where do you think, where do you think things are with that war? What do you think the prospects are for the economy as we move forward?
- [27:04]
Senator Rick Scott
Well, number one, I always thought we were going to have inflation because we're spending way more money than we take in as government. When you do that, you cause inflation. So we're spending 2 trillion. We're spending the government spending $2 trillion more than we take in. So we were going to have inflation. Inflation was not going away. Now, did the Iran war impact energy prices? Hopefully for a short period of time, absolutely. I grew up, and even worse, inflation. I grew up in public housing. I watched my family struggle to put food on the table. That's going on all across our country because wages are not stamped with inflation. So what we need to do is balance the budget and then we need to win in Iran. Now, I give the President all the credit and he's going to do everything he can to make sure they don't have nuclear weapons without putting more American troops at risk. But I think in the end, he's going to have to annihilate the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
- [27:56]
Ben Shapiro
And I think that that is really the big Thing. I mean, you and I are in agreement here that, you know, all this talk of a deal, you're talking about a millenarian regime that truly believes that they should go down with the ship rather than negotiating out some sort of agreement. They could have given up their nuclear weapons, by the way, in their program at literally any time. They could have given up that program at any time over the course of the past few decades and be reintegrated into the world economy. They could have stopped supporting terrorism or threatening their neighbors with ballistic missiles and everything would have been hunky dory. It turns out there are lots of dictatorships throughout that entire region that are fully integrated into the world economy. So long as they don't threaten their neighbors and try to develop nuclear weapons, Iran refuses to do any of that. And so this kind of notion that it's the United States that's isolating Iran as opposed to Iran isolating itself is crazy. But it also means that the United States is going to have to continue to really pummel them. And I think the President is on the verge. As of this morning, he suggested that the United States would sometime in the near future be either taking or blowing up Harg Island, South Parr's oil field in and some of the energy facilities. I've been advocating this since legitimately week two of the war because it seemed to me the only way to put the Iranian regime on sort of final footing is to take away their energy resources because that would also presumably flip China. There are a bunch of countries that right now are trying to play both sides. They would like to see the strait open, but they also are allied with Iran. Well, if Iran has no more economic largesse to offer China, then China is going to be significantly more interested in the Strait of Hormuz opening with without Iran being rebuilt. I think it seems like the President is moving in that direction, which I wish he had done it earlier, but I'm glad that we're doing it now.
- [29:27]
Senator Rick Scott
Yeah, I agree with you. Look, you always give the President the benefit of the doubt and he's a deal doer that he gets something done. But let's be realistic. These people are crazy and like you said, they'll go down with the ship rather than they'll go die. They probably believe something's going to happen good to them, heaven if they do. But I think we're going to have to pummel them. And, and so you have to destroy all their, you have to destroy their ability of the regime to have a dime. That's what you have to do, they can't have a penny. No different what we're doing in Cuba
- [29:59]
Ben Shapiro
or in Venezuela for that matter. So, Senator Scott, let's talk for a second about the state of the Senate races. So obviously the Democrats have decided that nominating a man with a Nazi tattoo who also allegedly said that he wanted to rape home invaders, but not in a gay way. He is the person that the Democrats have chosen to run against Susan Collins. And then you have James Carville out there saying that, listen, you have to sometimes side with Stalin to defeat the Nazis in this situation. I guess they're siding with the Nazis to defeat Susan Collins, the most moderate member of the Republican caucus. In the Senate, the Democrats are embracing a series of candidates who are too online. What do you make of it?
- [30:37]
Senator Rick Scott
Well, Democrats are telling you who they are. They're anti Semitic. They're basically anti capitalism. They are. I mean, they campaign with people that hate this country. They campaign with people like Hassan Piker, who wants me killed and every capitalist killed that goes to Cuba and teams up with the regime in Cuba. But you look at Maine, you look at Michigan, you look at so many of these Democrats, look at guys like Bernie Sanders and aoc, I mean, they're just crazy. They want open borders. They don't want to, they, they don't want to expel criminal aliens. I mean, it's like, do they care about Americans? I sort of wonder what happened. Do they hate their family? Because I don't want something to happen to my kids and my grandkids. I'm sure you don't want something to happen to your kids. And so the Democrats are crazy. So maybe Platinum is the extreme. But they're all like this. That's who the Democrat Party is now. If we don't win, we, we should be furious with ourselves.
- [31:42]
Ben Shapiro
Well, so, so that I think is the big question is right now, if you look at the state of the Senate, it looks as though Democrats who are running a less insane candidate, Roy Cooper in North Carolina, they're running a sort of historically less. I mean, he's, he's a very far left Democrat, but he's not of the sort of Hassan Piker school of thought. Sherrod Brown in Ohio, in those races, Democrats seem to be running pretty well. However, it seems that, you know, Republicans may be determined to lose seats. And this has been happening for several election cycles where Republicans pick out of the box candidates in a variety of races and put themselves in serious danger of losing the Senate. Are you worried about the aspect of the right that is becoming too online, too focused on issues that really only have traffic on X. But but most Americans are not worried about. We've seen this already by the way, the Republican Party doing a pretty good job of ousting candidates who have been doing this. Thomas Massie being a good example of over in Kentucky or Marjorie Taylor Greene in Georgia. But there is a wing of the Republican Party that seems like it wants to embrace all of the online rumors and the online speculation and sort of the too online craziness. What do you make of it?
- [32:46]
Senator Rick Scott
Well, I think in the end you win because you address the issues that dear voters care about. In 2018, I'm the only Republican senator that won in a swing state. And the reason I did is I talked about the things that are important to people. They want jobs and where the kids get a great education. They want it. They want to be secure in their homes. They want to have opportunities. They don't want the cost of living to go up. If we talk about what we do versus the Democrats, we say there's a clear choice. When I run, I say there's a clear choice. If you want higher taxes, I'm not your guy. If you want open borders, don't vote for me. If you think every kid ought to go to a government school, I'm not your guy. If you don't like sheriffs, don't vote for me. I'm the person that's going to help you get a job, help your kids have an opportunity for great education, keep you safe. That's what the election should be about and we should win hands down. I mean, they're supporting illegal aliens that rape and murder our wives and our kids and our grandkids. So this should be easy for us. But we have to go talk about it. We have to go. We have to have great kids to do it and we have to try to get stuff done. Like we got to try to pass things that people want, Save America act, stuff like that, make our elections secure. People want it. Bust our butt to pass it.
- [34:06]
Ben Shapiro
Well, that's Senator Rick Scott of Florida. Senator Scott, thanks so much for taking the time. Really appreciate it.
- [34:11]
Senator Rick Scott
Have a great day. Bye bye. Glad you're in Florida.
- [34:14]
Ben Shapiro
Speaking of people who dislike America here at home, a report from the Detroit News. Pretty shocking report. It turns out that there was a University of Michigan group that was orchestrating a terror campaign allegedly threatening university leaders in order to promote a severance of ties with Israel. Federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment on Wednesday against eight people who were linked to the University of Michigan. They were apparently orchestrating plans to threaten university leaders, police, and business with a wave of crime designed to force them to dissociate with Israel. The criminal activity included spray painting threats, breaking windows, throwing glass jars filled with noxious chemicals into family homes. They marked their victims with threatening symbols used by Hamas, including red inverted triangles and red handprints. They used the Internet and social media to broadcast their message to ensure the threats and commitment to continuing criminal activity were heard by their victims and others who support Israel. That is an indictment that is happening right now. And we actually have images of an exchange between students who are agreeing to terrorize targets at the university. These are people. And why are these people in the United States in the first place? Some of them are homegrown, Some of them are imports. One student said, quote, we are finding a victim's address. If we don't have it, so I can drive my car into it. That person's entire family is now on my hit list. The response? Let's. Let's get that person's kids, bruh. And another victim's, too. First person. Walla. By God, right? By Allah, Paige, I want to do something. The only way to clear my conscience. Voila. By God, I'm gonna be the dirtiest bleeping doctor ever. I'm gonna be bleep one's doctor. The victim's doctor. Poison her slowly. Response by the student. We need people following that victim. Get into that house and then burn it down. And the use of the universities as a. As a launching point for the far left hatred of America. It goes back decades, but this is its ultimate form. Its ultimate form. Unfortunately, that far leftism has now infused large swaths of the Democratic Party. President Trump had to step in and quash a meeting between Zoran Mamdani, the terrorist supporting mayor of New York, and the Colombian president, Gustavo Petro, who just a few days ago was tweeting heil Hitler, which is just awesome. He and Graham Platner need to. Need to hook up. Mamdani was poised to meet with him because this is the way that it works, is that you meet with the far left, anti democracy socialist, but if Bibi Netanahu shows up in New York, then you arrest him. If you're a Zor mom, Dani, or try to. So apparently the State Department called up and they said that the engagement was unacceptable. The State Department refused a visa, basically. Meanwhile, Zoran Mamdani, radical mayor of New York, he spent Yesterday announcing a $15 million investment into gender affirming care as
- [37:09]
Zoran Mamdani
a first step, my administration has made a 15 million dollar investment in gender affirming care over the next two years. And we will continue to use every tool at our disposal to ensure that trans and gender non conforming New Yorkers can live with dignity, safety and freedom they deserve. And we will do this while standing steadfast alongside our immigrant neighbors. Because if there is one thing New York City will do, it is stand opposed to cruelty and repression and stand in solidarity on alongside the vulnerable.
- [37:49]
Ben Shapiro
Yeah, nothing says standing alongside the vulnerable like, like siding with the people who stand outside a synagogue and try to attack Jews inside. He. He is a joy. By the way, he's wearing a Knicks pin here. You wonder why I was rooting against the Knicks. It's because of that. I will admit maybe I'm reconsidering that based on James Dolan pointing out correctly that Darmani is not in fact a Knicks fan. Here's the owner of the Knicks, the
- [38:10]
Pete Hegseth
mayor's office, and I'm sorry, the commissioner too. Right. Do not have the experience to do this. Right.
- [38:17]
Ben Shapiro
That's Mayor Momdani and Jessica Tish, who's the police.
- [38:20]
Pete Hegseth
I mean, they have never managed anything like this before. And it, and it's like peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It's coming out the sides. And you know, that's, I think that's part of. We're seeing a lot of fear from the, from the mayor's office, a lot of anxiety. They're sitting there trying to say, well, well, we're big Knicks fans. But this isn't. They're not Nick.
- [38:40]
Ben Shapiro
He called the Garden a stadium. How big a Nick fan is he?
- [38:44]
Pete Hegseth
He's not a Nick fan.
- [38:45]
Mika Brzezinski
Right.
- [38:47]
Ben Shapiro
Okay. Now again, this makes me more of a Knicks fan. Anyway. Anyway, the radicals on the left thoroughgoing the radicalism problem inside the Democratic Party. Thoroughgoing. Jasmine Crockett, we played on the show yesterday. She was nearly the Texas Senate Democratic candidate. She's just a congresswoman from Texas. Well, when she is not insulting the Metcalf family. That would be the family that lost their son Austin in a murder by Carmelo Anthony, not the New York Knicks scoring first small forward who, you know, couldn't play D. The other Carmelo Anthony, the murderer. It turns out that Jasmine Crockett is still defending Carmelo Anthony.
- [39:29]
Jasmine Crockett
From everything that I understand, which I wasn't at the trial because obviously I got a day job. But it's my understanding that Carmen Carmelo ended up stabbing, puncturing. I don't know what this tool was that they talk about knife or some refer to it as a tool. He ended up hitting Austin one time, and it was about where he hit him one time, two inches. This wasn't someone who said, hey, let me stab you five, six, seven times. And so when you're looking at the punishment range, there's a reason in Texas that it goes from 5 to 99 or life. Because you were looking at how intentional? Like, how bad was this?
- [40:10]
Ben Shapiro
How intentional? How bad was this? I mean, he did stab the guy to death with a knife. That's kind of bad. But this is your new Democratic Party. They continue to stand behind Graham Platner in his Senate race over in Maine, Graham Platner was asked by Miko Brzezinski whether he has any moral high ground to call out even Jeffrey Epstein issues and not be conflicted. Pretty incredible stuff. This is where Democrats have put themselves. It was Mika Brzezinski with Rolf the dog.
- [40:41]
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Can you call for the release of the Epstein files? And can you call out those who have abused women and not be conflicted in any way?
- [40:52]
Mika Brzezinski
Yes, of course. I mean, I engaged consensual romantic activities with adults at an earlier part in my life. That seems like a fairly normal thing. Most people do. Going to an island with billionaires to possibly assault children is a vastly, vastly different thing.
- [41:14]
Pete Hegseth
Yeah.
- [41:16]
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Okay.
- [41:18]
Ben Shapiro
It is a totally different thing than registering for a site that's mostly known for grooming children and also saying that you wanted to rape home invaders. Not in a gay way. Not in a gay way. No. Even Sunny Hostin interview is like, I'm not sure that we have the moral high ground at this point.
- [41:33]
Steve Hilton
I don't think Republicans at this point can ask us to take the moral high ground.
- [41:37]
Candace Owens
There you go.
- [41:37]
Steve Hilton
That is over at this point.
- [41:39]
Harry Ensign
That's right.
- [41:40]
Steve Hilton
That is over. It's a choice. Sorry. Democrats have always fallen in love and Republicans have always fallen in line. It's time for Democrats to stop that nonsense, put emotions on the side. Let's be strategic. Let's get some power. Let's take over the Senate, let's take over the House, and let's right the ship. Let's get our country back. I am sorry. I am someone that believes in character. I am someone that believes that morals matter. But because of the state of this country, I would. If I lived in Maine, I would hold my nose and I would vote for Platner. I would.
- [42:17]
Ben Shapiro
She's so moral. The most moral. The most moral. Well, we'll see how it works out for Democrats. Susan Collins has now Put out an ad pointing to some of Graham Platner's Again, remember, the Democrats are running a Nazi in order to stop Susan Collins, the most milquetoast Republican in the Senate.
- [42:36]
Susan Collins
Susan Collins spent time as a kid picking potatoes in Maine. Graham Platner spent time as a kid at a $70,000 a year prep school in Connecticut. Susan Collins has brought more than $1.5 billion back to Maine for hospitals, schools, roads, and communities across the state. Graham Platner runs a Hobby Oyster farm whose only customer is his mother's restaurant. Graham, say hi to your mother for me, okay? Susan Collins doesn't have a Nazi tattoo and she doesn't have an account on a notorious predator's parrot disapp. Graham Platner did for years and this was his profile picture. Oh, gosh, please, please get that off the screen. Anyway, Susan Collins, a senator we can be proud of.
- [43:24]
Ben Shapiro
Well, you know, Democrats are going to do the same. Now, here is the thing, here's the thing. Democrats, obviously, they've moved very, very far to the left. Democrats are embracing their radical side. But Democrats can still win. The only way the Democrats really can win is if the Republicans get two online. If the Republicans get too online, if they run bad candidates, and they have many times in the past, there should be at a minimum four additional Republican senators in the Senate right now. Two from Georgia, two from Arizona, and they went to online. As Harry Ensign points out, Democrats do not need to win Maine. Theoretically, if they can get some of the two online Republicans to win to lose
- [44:03]
Harry Ensign
four seats, that is what they need to know. And I think that there is this idea out there that if Graham Platner doesn't win in Maine, then it screws the Democrats. That is not true at all. Yes, it may make it more difficult, but they have a real path even without winning a Maine. What are we talking about? Well, why don't we just take a look at some polling in some key states. Right, Some state polling in GOP held seats. These are states that Donald Trump won by double digits. But look at this. The Democrats and the average of polls are actually slightly ahead. Sherrod Brown in Ohio, he's up by three points. He's of course, the former senator lost his seat back in 2024. How about in Texas, which has not elected a Democrat to the United States Senate since 1988? What do we see here? We see James Talarico again, a small lead, well within the margin of error. But the average poll, he's up three points. So in two states, we have polling out in the last few weeks, last few months, when you average it all together, where you actually have Democrats ahead again within the margin of error, but up by three points in two states that Donald Trump won by double digits just two years ago.
- [45:02]
Ben Shapiro
Okay, so how can Republicans blow it? Well, again, if they disconnect from the things Americans want, they can in fact blow it. And the way to do that is you go to online, you pretend that X is reality. So a couple of examples over the course of the last 24 hours, both of them from South Carolina. So South Carolina, Lindsey Graham had been targeted by the Tucker Carlson wing of the Republican Party because Lindsey Graham is a hawkish interventionist on foreign policy. And this is unacceptable. Unacceptable. And so the Tucker Carlson wing of the party had tried to launch a primary campaign against Lindsey Graham, and Graham just whomped his opposition, whomped him, I mean, 57% of the primary vote to mark Lynch's 28.9% of the primary vote. So so much for that effort. You know, yet another Tucker Carlson attempted coup or attempted maintenance in the case of Thomas Massey, that has, that has gone down to flaming defeat. Meanwhile, in the two online world, Nancy Mays, representative from South Carolina, who is very online, spends a lot of time online, does Representative Mays, and decided that she was going to steer directly into the very online of the Epstein files last year. Well, it turns out that without Donald Trump's endorsement, in her South Carolina gubernatorial nomination race, she completely flamed out. She won 12% of the vote overall, and she got destroyed in this race by a wide variety of candidates. She finished fifth. And she knows why she finished fifth. She put out a tweet, and her tweet said, quote, I know I put the likelihood of an endorsement on the line when I demanded transparency on the Epstein files. I demanded it because you deserve the truth, all of it. And as a survivor of a corrupt and broken court system, I will always pursue justice for those who deserve it. If sacrificing my values is the price of an endorsement, I will never pay it. Okay, let's be clear about what happened with the Epstein files and the release of the files. The reason the DOJ was hesitant to release the files is because the files had a bunch of references to people who had nothing to do with Jeffrey Epstein and also were basically just unverified gossip from the FBI tip line. They contain an enormous amount of crap. And as you saw, when all that stuff got released into the public view, there are a bunch of people who got named publicly who were not guilty of anything. And there were also a bunch of allegations that were absurd, that saw the light of day. And this is a warning for Republicans. If you follow the two online, you will end up in a bad place. This is particularly a warning for the 2028 race. The current frontrunner for the 2028 nomination for the Republican Party is obviously the Vice President of the United States, J.D. vance, and he happens to be extraordinarily online. I've urged him many times before to log off and touch grass. The reason I say this now is because there is an article in the New York Times talking about the White House freakout over the Epstein files and JD Vance's name is all over this article, all over it. According to the article, July 17, 2025 Vice President Vance took a seat at the head of a table in the John F. Kennedy conference room of the Situation Room Complex. This is a huge problem, he told the other people in the room. That'd be Susie Wiles, Caroline Lovett, Stephen Chung, Todd Blanche of the AG's office, Pam Bondi, Cash Patel. The Vice president appeared panicked to others in the room about the way the subject of Epstein was already dividing the MAGA coalition. Now, again, some of that has to do with the people that the Vice President is personally close with, including Tucker Carlson. Some senior officials had the impression that Vance had bought into the darkest theories about Epstein and a cabal of predators hidden within the country's ruling class. That, of course, would not be surprising since he was preaching that when he was not the Vice president, Wiles would tell others the vice President had proved himself to be a major conspiracy theorist. Another top official said later that Vance had been pounding on the Epstein issue since the release of the memo. He was privately pressing for the administration to release all Epstein files, everything in the DOJ possession, even encouraging a congressional investigation. Vance, hell in line is the Vice President he had floated to colleagues in an extraordinary PR gambit that the White House enlists, wait for it. Tucker Carlson to interview Epstein's longtime girlfriend and co conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell in prison, said the Vice President, trying to broker an interview for his friends Tucker Carlson and Ghislaine Maxwell, the Jeffrey Epstein's co conspirator in prison. It might help the President if Maxwell was willing to state that Trump had not been part of any wrongdoing with Epstein. Vance told the group he believed all the files should be released as soon as possible. Donald Trump Jr. JD Vance, Charlie Kirk, all of them who spent enormous amounts of time on social media were Very worried. According to the New York Times, Vance made clear to colleagues he feared losing some of these so called low propensity voters, the young men who are not traditional Republicans but who had voted for the Trump vance ticket in 2024. This was an audience tuned into the manosphere podcasters like Joe Rogan. And it was worrisome that the podcast hosts themselves were now rebelling. Vance's recommendation, by the way, is that he book himself on Rogan to talk about it. Because Rogan, again, Joe is. Joe loves conspiracy theories. He does. And Joe was not willing to have on Todd Blanche, the assistant AG who would actually know about the documents. So Vance was trying to book himself on that. The reason I say this is a problem. If the Republican Party programs into if J.D. vance programs into the the two online area, he will lose the 2028 election. It is that simple. If he decides that the priorities of the American people are whatever X thinks the priorities are, he is going to lose because that is not where the American people are, is not where the American people were. And by the way, if you think that the Republican Party after President Trump is going to be nearly as that, you can just pick up the Trump coalition and carry it forward. The reason that Donald Trump got a lot of young men to vote for him is twofold. One, Trump has a unique capacity to break through in a way no other politician does. None. And two, he was running against a party that decided to trans the children. You can't just pick up the last guy's coalition and try to run to daylight. That's not the way this works. If the Vice President decides to program into the two online world, what he is going to end up doing instead of maximizing the best parts of himself. And again, this is stuff I've said directly to the Vice President's team. The Vice President, instead of trying to maximize the most sympathetic, most interesting parts of himself, if he decides to program to the online world, he is going to minimize every part of Trump's coalition. If you look at President Trump's coalition, President Trump won an outsized number of blue collar white voters. He wanted outsized numbers of blacks, Hispanics, Asians, black whites and married women. JD Vance will win fewer voters in every single one of those categories. He will not even pick up votes to compensate in the college educated parts of the category. If he continues to program into this, there's a world where he forms his own new coalition based on his particular skill set. But if he continues to follow the primrose path, if you end up let's put this way. If you end up as a high ranking member of the United States government recommending that your solution to a PR crisis, you get Tucker Carlson, who believes that Iran is good in the Middle east, who goes to Russia to sniff the bread, who humors every insane conspiracy theory, who thinks he was scratched by demons. If you're, you're the Vice President, if you're suggesting that he must interview Ghislaine Maxwell as a defensive play, you might be too online. You might be too online. And again, the two online right will destroy the right. It will if it is, if it is continually fed. And Candace Owens, a great example of this. It remains absolutely incredible. Who refuses to see the reality about the Candace Owens wing, which again is not Republican. I mean, she has openly stated that Republicans should not vote for Republicans in 2026. Now she's going so far as to suggest that viewers go to Russia to see the grocery stores for ourselves, because we don't have grocery stores here in the United States. You have to travel to Russia.
- [52:54]
Candace Owens
I encourage literally every person in the world to visit Russia, apply for a visa. You actually are allowed to do that, Dana. Go see the Kremlin Museum. You will be spiritually moved by Russia. Everything, and I mean everything that we have been told about Russia is a lie. Okay? So when Tucker Carlson was going around looking at the grocery stores, that was not propaganda. That is real. Like I said, an entire Catholic family moved there from Iowa. And I asked them blankly, is, is this just in Moscow, they live an hour and a half outside? No, they said one of the most amazing things is how cheap the food is, how healthy the food is, that every place is like Whole Foods. They particularly pointed out the grocery stores. But I don't want you to take it from me. I don't want you to take it from Tucker Carlson. I want you to go for yourself. I want you to use your own eyes and I want you to believe your own eyes.
- [53:47]
Ben Shapiro
They are so healthy in Russia, by the way. Everything is so healthy. The food, everything is so healthy that the life expectancy for men is 67 years in Russia. 67. The life expectancy for men in the United states is about 80. So things are, things are great in Russia. By the way, you can see Russia today is promoting this, literally our enemies promoting Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson. This is what they do. Now. This is what happens if you go to online. You get the brain worms and then you can't get them out of your brain. Here she was explaining that our society is not Russia, not Russia, which has a replacement, a fertility rate of 1.3. Russia's not on the decline. They have no economy. They're a gas station with nuclear weapons. Half the country doesn't have indoor toilets. And she says that Russia is not in decline. The United States is in decline, she says from her palatial estate in America.
- [54:39]
Candace Owens
My takeaway from visiting Russia is that it is our society that is on the decline, not theirs. Russia, like I said, has not been communist in over 30 years. What about us? Pornography, welfarism, non stop war debt, people
- [54:57]
Ben Shapiro
telling us non stop war.
- [54:58]
Marjorie Taylor Greene
They're literally right.
- [54:59]
Candace Owens
This is great. This is. This is you being free. You wouldn't want to live in Russia. That's the boogeyman syndrome, right? They're comparing it to something that you've never seen so that you don't, I don't know, riot in the streets.
- [55:14]
Ben Shapiro
So you don't riot because you would need a society like Russia's otherwise you're going to riot in the streets when you find out how great it is in Russia. You know what Candace should do? She should go to Russia and say precisely the same kinds of things about Putin that she has said about Trump here in the United States and see how long she lasts as like a human. It would not go particularly well. Do not get the brainworms, folks. Do not allow the. It's so funny. There are people who are constantly talking about the dangers of podcastistan and what happens, all the podcasters attacking each other. Here's my view. Voting in America should not be reliant on podcasters who disagree with one another. Podcasters are just people who are talking on your phone or on your computer. We live in actually very serious times. It is a sign of how frivolously Americans treat politics that they have the capacity to treat the kind of trash that is being spewed by people like by Megyn Kelly or Candace Owens or Tucker Carlson as a form of political seriousness. It is, you know, we are a very wealthy and a very frivolous country that we can do such things. Well, speaking of wealth and frivolity over in Los Angeles, I do have to say I'm sort of astonished at Jimmy Kimmel here. It takes a lot to astonish me about Jimmy Kimmel. I have long been a critic of Jimmy Kimmel's because he gave up many, many years ago the attempt to be funny in favor of what Guy Benson called woke popery. He is the woke pope of LA entertainment. Well, Jimmy Kimmel is very angry at Spencer Pratt. For some reason we cannot discern, Spencer Pratt is likely not to be in the final two in the LA Mayor's race. It is worth pointing out at this point again, ballot harvesting in LA is a real major problem. It is a real major problem in California. Also, Spencer Pratt will end up earning about the same percentage of the vote in LA county that President Trump got in LA County. So it's not like a wild over or underperformance by Spencer Pratt. But let's be clear. Spencer Pratt is pointing out real problems in la. Jimmy Kimmel is very excited that Spencer Pratt lost, based on what he himself has said that he agrees with Spencer Platt's diagnosis of the situation, but he's cheering that Spencer Pratt lost in favor of what? Nithya Rahman, a psychotic socialist? Or Karen Bass, a person who is suddenly the moderate in the race after spending her youth training as a revolutionary in Cuba? Here is Jimmy Kimmel, a very rich man who has never had to live with the consequences of any of his own policy preferences.
- [57:41]
Jimmy Kimmel
Spencer, if you're watching, we are so, so sorry to see you go.
- [57:46]
Ben Shapiro
What we do know, we're gonna miss
- [57:49]
Jimmy Kimmel
the hell out of you. You're a man of your word and you've gotta go. You said you were gonna go and I know things might be tight right now, especially out of state. Donation money is running out. Moving is expensive. So to help you out, we rented you a U Haul.
- [58:06]
Ben Shapiro
This is it has plenty of room.
- [58:09]
Jimmy Kimmel
It's got filled two beds, tables, chairs, all your crystals, whatever you want. Our staff all day decorating for you, so. And everybody that will notice you and wave goodbye as you leave. And I hope that you and Heidi are happy wherever it is you go. Maybe you could be mayor there or maybe just run for mayor and finish in third place there. It could be fun for your new reality shows.
- [58:33]
Ben Shapiro
What a jackass. Truly, what a jackass. Has he made anything in America better? Jimmy Kimmel? Well, Pratt responded with a tweet. He said, jimmy, I guess you missed the part of the story. I don't need a U haul. I have nothing left to pack. Because of course his house burned it down. But again, the, the. I don't even understand the logic here. Why is Jimmy Kimmel upset with Spencer Pratt for running? I guess he's just perfectly satisfied with the governance in la. Okay, so he gets to own it. Every bad thing that happens in LA. Jimmy Kimmel is apparently 4 Steve Hilton, who is running for governor in California. And again, Steve is wonderful. His chances of becoming governor of California are very Low because it's a heavily, heavily blue state. But he says he'd be open to appointing Spencer Pratt to a spot within his administration were he to win.
- [59:16]
Steve Hilton
Would there be a place for Spencer
- [59:18]
Ben Shapiro
Pratt in a Hilton governor's administration?
- [59:22]
Steve Hilton (continued)
Well, I would, I would be honored to have him in any kind of role, particularly focused on the areas he spent so much time looking into and developing positive plans for, notably homelessness. I don't know where he's at. I haven't spoken to him since the election results. But of course he made a huge impact and he gave, he gave hope in Los Angeles. And I actually think it's a travesty that we have this top two system, which meant that in L. A there's not the same chance to vote for change as we're now going to have statewide.
- [59:54]
Ben Shapiro
Okay, so again, one of the things that's amazing about California is they just keep voting for this stuff. They just keep voting for it. And so my view about California is essentially my view about New York, which is you break it, you bought it. Democrats wanted this and now they're going to get it good and hard. Chris Rufo has an astonishing piece over at City Journal talking about Gavin Newsom and his land management practices. Remember, the governor would love to run for President of the United States. And Chris writes, last year, in the aftermath of LA's devastating wildfires, California Governor Gavin Newsom promised to speed up critical wildfire prevention projects. Newsom issued an emergency proclamation to cut bureaucratic red tape and fast track critical projects including brush clearance, forest thinning, prescribed burning and other forms of fuels reduction. Well, it turns out as of last month, the Newsom administration had fast tracked fuels reduction work on roughly 8,780 7,000 acres of land. But internal records show that state approved organizations had completed projects totaling 781 acres, less than 1% of the land. Those are disastrous numbers. So instead of cutting through the red tape, they just left all the red tape. And so instead of trying to clear 87,000 acres of land, they did 781 acres. So when the next wildfire happens, you will know who to blame. Great job. Californians are doing an amazing job with your voting. Truly, truly great stuff. And meanwhile, in other Democratic malfeasance, Act Blue, which is essentially a fundraising apparatus for the Democratic Party, they've been in trouble because it turns out that there were a bunch of issues on fraud that Act Blue suggested money was going to certain places. It wasn't actually going to to those places. A law firm had written memos expressing legal concerns at the time, including the specter of criminal investigation, should Act Blue conceal facts about its efforts to prevent foreign contributions. ActBlue fired the law firm. Their internal counsel resigned. According to the New York Times, ActBlue processed nearly $19 billion in contributions since its founding in 2004 building a donor database with millions of credit card numbers that is unmatched in American politics. And the problem is that they look like they were pretty non transparent about where the money was coming from. So they're being questioned by Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio. And ActBlue took the Fifth Amendment 22 times.
- [62:28]
Jim Jordan
Your board chairman said ActBlue accepted up to 38 million contributions in 2024 that had the signs of foreign origin. How much fraud is too much fraud?
- [62:38]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question pursuant to my fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution.
- [62:49]
Jim Jordan
How many Foreign Contributions Did ActBlue accept?
- [62:53]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectfully declined to answer the question pursuant to my Fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution.
- [63:04]
Jim Jordan
How much money did ActBlue accept from Russia?
- [63:07]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question pursuant to my fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution.
- [63:18]
Jim Jordan
Why did your entire legal team quit your in house legal team?
- [63:24]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectful decline to answer the question pursuant to my fifth Amendment rights under the Constitution.
- [63:34]
Jim Jordan
Did your legal team quit because of reduced fraud standards?
- [63:38]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question pursuant to my fifth amendment rights under the Constitution.
- [63:48]
Jim Jordan
And we won't keep you here all day but let me just do one more. Did you weaken your fraud standards to help Democrats?
- [63:55]
Kiana (Shopify Testimonial)
On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer the question.
- [64:01]
Ben Shapiro
Now again, the right against self incrimination does not necessarily mean that you are admitting the thing. However, it's a little suspicious. It's a little suspicious. She took the fifth 22 times. Democrats had no questions. By the way, they thought everything is perfectly hunky dory with Act Blue. Well, with regard to systems that are working better than that, the U.S. immigration system just turned away a Somali refugee. According to the New York Times, Omar Abdul Kadir Artan, a Somali refugee is among a select group of about 50 World cup referees. He was detained. They put him in a holding cell and then they deported him. He was deported back to Turkey. So why was he deported? So he was deported according to the left, because you know, he's a Somali and America's racist and all of that. What's the actual reason? According to CBS News, an administration official told CBS News on Wednesday that Artan was denied entry based on derogatory information that included association with suspected terrorist group members. So, yeah, agree. I do not think that just because you are a good soccer referee you should be allowed in the country if you associate with the terror groups. It seems to me now that seems to me pretty baseline. And he then got a hero's welcome upon his return to Somalia. It's good he can stay there. They like him there. It's fine. So he is a, again the, the referee, the Somali referee trying to get into the U.S. we said no, he gets home and, and they celebrate him. Well, good, he can stay there. All right. In media news, big media news, Bari Weiss. There were rumors that were being put out there by left wing opponents of Barry Weiss, that Larry and David Ellison were very upset with Barry because of how things are going in CBS News. That evidence is scanty, shall we say. It turns out that Barry is now poised to oversee CNN's editorial operation because of course Paramount has acquired the parent company of cnn. According to Axios, Paramount has held preliminary conversations with several candidates for a business side counterpart to CBS News editor in chief Barry Weiss. The search implies that if Paramount Skydance's deal with Warner Brothers Discovery goes through, Weiss would oversee all news editorial across both CBS News and cnn. Her potential counterpart would manage business operations across both companies. There are a bunch of names under consideration but again you have to love the caterwauling among the left wing legacy media chattering class. They are deeply upset. Barry Weiss. No, we have to have the great left wing agit prop promoters of the past, Jim Acosta. And ladies, find you a man who loves you like Jim Acosta loves Jim Acosta, former CNN White House reporter who loved taking pictures of himself in infinite mirrors. Well now he says that, you know, it's truth versus lies, not just left versus right.
- [67:09]
Jim Acosta
I don't think the, the problem today is left versus right. It's, it's truth versus lies and we cannot give in to these lies. And, and my sense of it right now is that we are heading down a path that we're not going to be able to come back from. And that's why we need to have media options that are not controlled by the wealthiest and most powerful interests of this country. They need to be controlled by the people. They need to be led by the people.
- [67:41]
Ben Shapiro
I mean I feel like he's wealthy and had no credentials and is somehow being treated as though we ought to respect his opinion. He by the way, says that we ought to pay for the news are taxpayer dollars, because PBS ought to be the standard of news. According to Jim Acosta,
- [68:01]
Jim Acosta
Donald Trump, in that truth social post that I put up there, he celebrates defunding PBS and NPR in Washington. Senator Schiff's familiar with the station weta, which is the local PBS station. They only can afford to do a newscast, the PBS NewsHour five days a week. They had to cancel the weekend edition of the PBS NewsHour. How are people being served in a lot of far flung places around this country who might identify with Donald Trump and his politics when those kinds of options are being taken away? And so this is a full frontal assault on every type of media option that we have in this country. They are gobbling up the newspapers and the TV station.
- [68:43]
Ben Shapiro
So Jim Acosta is. His solution is for the government to do the news. He doesn't want powerful people doing the news. He wants the government to fund the news. Impressive stuff as always from Jim Acosta and the members of the legacy media. Okay, time for some things I like. And then a thing that I will have to evaluate in real time. I don't know if I hate it yet. We'll find out. So, things that I like. There is an incredibly amusing thread on X from a German soccer fan at Freddy LA7 who is going around in the. In the American south and experiencing it. And it is hysterically funny because it turns out that people who actually come and experience America love it here because America is awesome. So here is a tweet. This is from a game in Georgia, a soccer match in Georgia, and the stadium is just totally backed. And he wrote, this is the most. The European mind can't comprehend this moment of my life. One of my friends said, punch me five times tomorrow and I'll still think this isn't real. Yeah, it turns out, America, amazing, amazing, beautiful place. And then he went to a soda machine at the Wendy's and was overwhelmed by it because there are so many choices of soda. Because America is a place of extraordinary prosperity. And then Wendy's escalation, and it's just pictures of Wendy's food. He went to Waffle House. He posted pictures. Just had our first Waffle house experience at 1am Great food, great prices, friendly staff. 10 out of 10, we will be coming back. Everyone loves it here. America kicks ass. America is wonderful. That's why when you hear all these people who are so down on America all the time, just shut up. Seriously, just shut up. America's amazing. This is a great place. Just passing through a town called Gainesville. And this place looks beautiful. The houses are insane. Wow. The European mind cannot comprehend. It cannot. America was built different, folks. It was built on principles of private property and equal justice before law and freedom from government. And it kicks ass. It's incredible. It is just great. This is why when. When you hear people just ripping on America, it's typically people who have not spent a lot of time outside America, traditionally. And again, this is why we need those pride in being American graphs to go up. This should not be a political matter. If you're a Democrat, you should be proud of being American. If you're a Republican, you should be proud of being American. You. Now, traditionally, Americans who are very proud of being American happen to be Republican. Since 2001, every single Gallup poll shows that over 80, well over 80% of Republicans say that they are extremely or very proud to be American. That was true when Barack Obama was president. It was true when Joe Biden was president. We did not become markedly less proud to be American when a Democrat was president. For Democrats, however, that changes really rapidly. So 87% of Democrats in 2001 said that they were very proud to be an American. And then that number maintained above 70% all the way until about 2014, 2015. And then when President Trump won, it nosedived. And now only 36% of Democrats say they are very or extremely proud to be American. Guys, I know you don't like Trump. I get it. I know you don't like a lot of things he's doing and you don't like things about him. Why would you not be proud to be from this unbelievable country that kicks so much ass? Why? If a Democrat wins in the next election cycle, I'm not going to become not proud to be American. What the. What the. Everlasting, we have done something deeply wrong to entire generations of people. If you're not proud to be American, if your pride in America is completely dependent on who is in political office, you are doing it wrong. You are just doing it wrong. And by the way, because of the World cup, gonna be a lot of international soccer fans here in the United States. Should show people how proud you are to be American. Because we are the dominant power on planet Earth. And we should be. The world is better for it. The world is a better place because of it. Okay, time for a thing that I don't know if I like RAI hate yet. Hey, there is a new trailer out for the sequel to the Social Network. The Social Network is the Aaron Sorkin piece about the original cutthroat nature of the founding of Facebook. It's not totally accurate, but it's a well written movie. Well, now there's a follow up movie called Social Reckoning about the evils of Facebook and the wonderverse of the whistleblowers against Facebook. Sorkin has gotten a little heavy handed. He was always pretty heavy handed. My biggest problem with Aaron Sorkin's writing and again, he's super talented. But my biggest problem with Aaron Sorkin's writing is that every single character is just Aaron Sorkin wearing a mask. Okay, but here is the trailer for Social Reckoning that was making all the rounds yesterday. It's got a big cast.
- [73:35]
Disclaimer Voice
Listen, before I go on, I want to make something clear, okay? I have a hunch you're not a fan of Facebook, but I am. I am here to help Facebook, not hurt it.
- [73:45]
Ben Shapiro
Okay, you send me a message. What would you like to talk about?
- [73:53]
Candace Owens
The chairman gavels a session to order. You'll read your opening statement which we'll skip past for now. That's a separate session and we'll move to witness questioning.
- [74:06]
Ben Shapiro
Spell your name and state your current
- [74:08]
Jimmy Kimmel
occupation for the record.
- [74:09]
Zoran Mamdani
M A R K Z U C
- [74:11]
Ben Shapiro
K E R B E R G. And your occupation?
- [74:16]
Zoran Mamdani
I'm a professional defendant.
- [74:18]
Disclaimer Voice
I ran classifiers on political groups where 30 of content hits multiple risk factors.
- [74:23]
Ben Shapiro
Hang on, I don't understand what you're saying.
- [74:24]
Disclaimer Voice
Aren't you a tech reporter?
- [74:26]
Polymarket Promoter
Ish.
- [74:27]
Zoran Mamdani
Ish.
- [74:28]
Ben Shapiro
These guys are counting on the next round of congressional testimony to make you likable.
- [74:32]
Senator Rick Scott
Mark, I'm happy to lend a hand, but I think you're doomed.
- [74:39]
Ben Shapiro
This company and that guy are playing an unprecedented role in our lives.
- [74:45]
Steve Hilton
The fire hose of bad information you
- [74:47]
Ben Shapiro
are injecting into the air. Coming jet power.
- [74:49]
Zoran Mamdani
I'm a free speech absolutist.
- [74:51]
Ben Shapiro
They would. They would not be making. I'm just telling you, they would not be making this film seeing someone do it. Pause for one second. They would absolutely, 100% not be making this film if it were not for the fact that Donald Trump won the last election cycle. It would not be happening. It would absolutely not be happening because Facebook has ridden the roller coaster of politics for the last 15 years. First, when Barack Obama was president, everybody was happy with Facebook. Look how the Obama team is utilizing new Facebook methods in order to win. They're geniuses. And good, good luck to Facebook. They've done an amazing job. And then Donald Trump won in 2016 and the entire left wing decided to blame Facebook for Donald Trump winning. And in retaliation, they went after anyone who was doing well on Facebook, including this particular company, the Daily Wire, which was dominant on Facebook. And in response, Facebook basically shut down the political algorithm entirely. They basically destroyed their, their political news algorithm in order to please the left. And then after 2020, when President Trump lost, things went a little bit into remission. And then Mark Zuckerberg made the most fatal mistake. He said he might consider voting for President Trump. And then he showed up at the inauguration and this was the sin. I promise you this movie would never have been made if it had not been for that last sin. That is what is going on here. And I don't agree with everything that Mark Zuckerberg does, but an entire movie targeting Zuckerberg as the root of all evil here is pretty astonishing. And of course, it's Bill Burr and Jeremy Ellen White and Jeremy Strong and Mikey Madison. A total, a total Oscar bait play. Very heavy handed stuff coming from Aaron Sorkin. You can sense it.
- [76:29]
Candace Owens
Anxiety, depression of teenage girls got worse as a result of time spent on the platform.
- [76:34]
Disclaimer Voice
Senior leadership knows and is doing nothing.
- [76:37]
Zoran Mamdani
I know there are easier enemies to make.
- [76:38]
Steve Hilton (continued)
The mafia would be an easier enemy me to make.
- [76:42]
Disclaimer Voice
So.
- [76:42]
Ben Shapiro
He needs your man. The internal documents.
- [76:45]
Disclaimer Voice
This is a material violation of my NDA.
- [76:47]
Ben Shapiro
We're twice as big as the biggest country on earth. We're not frightened of Congress.
- [76:50]
Polymarket Promoter
We're post government around here.
- [76:52]
Ben Shapiro
Please, please let me quote that.
- [76:55]
Disclaimer Voice
We have 102 hours to get everything.
- [76:57]
Ben Shapiro
She's gonna get sued into small pieces.
- [77:00]
Disclaimer Voice
I don't want to be made an example of by a guy with unlimited resources.
- [77:03]
Ben Shapiro
Harm, I promise you, is imminent.
- [77:06]
Zoran Mamdani
Enough people around here understand that when I say no, that's the end of the debate. I'm not two years out of a dorm room anymore. Charlie, look around.
- [77:22]
Ben Shapiro
I don't know what reckoning Aaron Sorkin is bringing. The reckoning. She's disrupting. She's disrupting. Oh, my goodness. Okay, now again, I think there are a lot of critiques that can be made of social media. If I could hit a red button today and make it all disappear retroactively, I would do it. I think social media has been horrible for the, for the brains of human beings. I think that it has not fulfilled the promise that it was supposedly created to perform. And I say this as a, as an economic beneficiary of social media's existence. With that said, Hollywood would not be doing this if they're not going to do this about Dario. Okay? They're not. They're not going to do this about any left wing, like openly left wing social media, bro. They would never make this movie about Jack Dorsey. It is pretty, it's pretty amazing. So, you know, Hollywood doing its level best once again to go after anyone. The Elon movie's coming next because Elon committed the grave and evil and horrifying sin, of course, of endorsing President Trump and then working with him. That, that is the next thing to happen. For sure. For sure. All righty, folks. The show continues for members right now. We'll jump into your questions. If you're not a member, become one. Use code Shapiro checkout for two months free on all annual plans. Click that link in the description and join us.