How Radical Democrats Destroyed My Hometown and What It Means for America

Summary

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The Charlie Kirk Show

Episode: "How Radical Democrats Destroyed My Hometown and What It Means for America"

Date: June 18, 2021

Host: Charlie Kirk

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Charlie Kirk reflects on the steep decline of his hometown, Chicago, attributing the city’s problems to radical Democratic leadership and ideological policy shifts. Kirk analyzes how Chicago—once known for hard work, grit, and opportunity—has become a cautionary example of what he sees as the dangers of prioritizing ideological agendas over pragmatic governance. The episode explores key events and leadership changes in Chicago’s modern history, delves into the wider implications for America's urban centers, and ends with Kirk expressing rare admiration for a Democrat—Senator Kyrsten Sinema—for resisting party pressure on critical legislation.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Charlie’s Personal Connection to Chicago

• Kirk shares pride in his upbringing in suburban Chicago, describing the city’s traditional values: grit, accountability, and opportunity for all.
  • “I grew up in a world that believed that you must be accountable for your actions, that there is no place to tolerate widespread criminality or vagrancy.” (03:20)
• Chicago’s unique cultural mix (Greek, Irish, Polish, Czech) once enabled newcomers to thrive.

2. Chicago’s Golden Age and Gradual Decline

• Kirk reminisces about Chicago’s strengths: world-class infrastructure, universities, cuisine, business climate, and vibrant neighborhoods.
• Chicago was infamously corrupt under mayors like Daley, but, Kirk argues, street-level order and public services were maintained.
• “No one cared if Daley was doing backroom deals. Do you know why? He had a zero tolerance policy for crime. The city worked.” (08:40)
• Turning point identified: Barack Obama’s emergence from Chicago’s political machine, bringing national scrutiny and fostering a culture shift.

3. The Impact of Leadership Changes

• Barack Obama, with connections to figures like Bill Ayers (described by Kirk as a “domestic terrorist”), becomes president — a product of Chicago’s political ethos.
• Rahm Emanuel follows as mayor; Kirk dubs him a “transactional old school Democrat,” but points to his eventual weakness and the ideological leadership that followed.
• Chicago’s steepest decline is attributed to the rise of “ideologues” rather than merely corrupt figures.
  • “When Rahm Emanuel became weak, something worse than corruption took over. Ideologues. And now Chicago is unrecognizable.” (09:42)

4. Comparing Old-School vs. Ideological Democrats

• Kirk contrasts Emanuel and Bloomberg (NYC’s former mayor): “They are short, narcissistic, sociopathic, self-interested, corrupt people that actually don’t want to see the city decline ... I will take Napoleon over Lori Lightfoot any day.” (13:24)
• Critique of mayor Lori Lightfoot and past reforms for pursuing “transformational change” for ideological reasons over practical city management.

5. Contemporary Chicago: Crime, Dysfunction, and Policy Failures

• Kirk cites disturbing stats, including nearly 300 people shot and killed in the year to date, and over 1,700 shot overall.
  • “Year to date there have been 295 people shot and killed in Chicago ... 1,718 people total shot and 312 total homicides.” (07:46)
• Faults Lightfoot (and similar leaders) for focusing on “bumper sticker phrases like eradicate racism” instead of practical solutions.
• Highlights public safety failures: rising violent crime, multiple mass shootings, police officials told to “sit in cars rather than investigate crimes.” (22:19)

Notable Moment: Lori Lightfoot Email

• Kirk reads an email from Mayor Lightfoot (16:46):
  • “I need office time every day ... not just once a week or some days. Every day ... If this doesn’t change immediately, I will just start unilaterally canceling things every single day.”
• Interprets this as evidence of dysfunction and poor leadership style.

Notable Quote from Lightfoot’s Speech

• “The reality is, the insidious nature of systemic racism has other impacts that are every bit as deep and harmful, but often ones that we can’t see.” – Lori Lightfoot (19:44)

6. Racism as a Public Health Crisis

• Kirk is critical of Lightfoot’s declaration of racism as a “public health crisis” (19:44–20:43).
  • Parodies the expansion of emergency powers and warns of “authoritarian” measures justified by such declarations.
• Posits that focusing on abstractions like institutional racism and climate change distracts from practical governance.

7. The National Implications: Urban Policy as Blueprint

• Kirk warns listeners that what’s happened in Chicago is a harbinger for other cities.
  • “Let me say this again. What has happened in Chicago is the model for America.” (12:39)
• Suggests that unchecked Democratic rule enables radical policies, erodes checks and balances, and breeds dysfunction.

8. Call for Conservative Values

• Encourages the conservative movement to “stand for things that work that are so obviously good up against abstractions.” (25:04)
• Believes in common-sense leadership and warns against placing ideology over results.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Chicago’s Decline:
  • “Chicago stopped caring about things that work and they started caring about things that sound good.” (22:35)
• On the Police Situation:
  • “Fifteen armed robberies in nine hours overnight as the Chicago Police Department again orders detectives to sit in cars rather than investigate crimes.” (21:38)
• On Ideological Governance:
  • “They do not actually care about the circumstances around them. They think they are going to march these cities towards ... chaos, a place of disorder, that eventually only an authoritarian tyrant autocrat can then solve the problem.” (21:30)
• On All-Democratic Control:
  • “There are no Republicans in Chicago in leadership. The entire city council are all Democrats. All the congressmen are all Democrats. The mayor is a Democrat, all the aldermen are Democrats ... that system of checks and balances in Chicago has been completely and totally destroyed.” (24:46)

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[27:10] Closing: Admiration for Kyrsten Sinema

• Kirk closes with a positive note about Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), applauding her refusal to eliminate the Senate filibuster—a move he credits with protecting American institutions from “fundamental transformation."
  • “Kyrsten Sinema is not an ideologue. She’s always looking at what’s best for her own political interest. … Any sort of chaos, disruption and disorder you can throw at these maniacs, you’re a hero in my book. A Democrat from Arizona.” (29:40)
• Kirk jokes he would invite Sinema on the show just to praise her for standing up to progressive pressure—even while disagreeing with her on key issues.

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Important Timestamps

• 03:07 – Charlie’s account of Chicago’s values and upbringing
• 07:46 – Chicago shooting/homicide stats, introduction of mayoral history
• 09:42 – Discussion of corrupt vs. ideological leadership in Chicago
• 11:01 – National implications and the Chicago model for America
• 13:24 – Comparison of Emanuel/Bloomberg (“Napoleonic complex”) versus activist mayors like Lightfoot/De Blasio
• 16:46 – Reading of Lori Lightfoot’s viral email to staff
• 19:44 – Mayor Lightfoot’s public health crisis speech on racism
• 21:38 – Reports of increasing crime and ineffectual police directives
• 24:46 – Lack of political opposition and the resulting lack of accountability
• 27:10–29:40 – Praise for Kyrsten Sinema, importance of the filibuster

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Summary

Charlie Kirk’s critique of Chicago’s decline serves as a broader warning against what he characterizes as radical, ideological governance sweeping America’s cities. Through vivid personal recollection, detailed policy critique, and targeted commentary on current leadership, Kirk calls for a return to pragmatic, accountable city management rooted in traditional American values. The episode ends with a surprising note of admiration for Senator Kyrsten Sinema, illustrating the importance Kirk places on institutional checks and moderation—even when it comes from across the political aisle.

Transcript

[Charlie Kirk]

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[Charlie Kirk]

hey everybody, why America's second city, Chicago? Why has it fallen? Why is Chicago all of a sudden a city that is largely unrecognizable? The answer we explore throughout this episode. And we also talk about a Democrat that I admire.

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[Charlie Kirk]

The death of America's second city. And a Democrat that I admire here on the Charlie Kirk Show. Thank you for supporting us@charlie kirk.com support if you want to get involved with Turning Point USA, go to tpusa.com where we play offense with a sense of urgency to win America's culture [e-mail] email us your thoughts freedomarliekirk.com and if you want to support us, go to charliekirk.com support buckle up everybody. Here we go. Charlie, what you've done is incredible here. Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus. I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.

[Guest Speaker]

I want to thank Charlie. He's an incredible guy. His spirit, his love of this country. He's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point usa.

[Charlie Kirk]

We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country. That's why we are here.

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[Charlie Kirk]

I grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, and I'm very proud that I grew up in Chicago. In the first couple years of starting Turning Point usa, I was so proud of being raised in a city that was focused on grit, determination, resilience and character. As I traveled the country and I started to get to know different business owners and entrepreneurs and people, different family backgrounds, I realized and recognized the upbringing and the values in the community that I grew up in in the suburbs of Chicago and the Chicago, the greater land Chicago area were unique, that not every part of the country saw the world the way that Chicagoans did. I grew up in a world that believed that you must be accountable for your actions, that there is no place to tolerate widespread criminality or vagrancy. And I grew up in a place in Chicago and a whole culture of Chicago that didn't really care about where you were from or who your parents were, but instead they wanted to give you an opportunity to succeed. Regardless of all of that, Chicago is always called the second city. Growing up second to New York City, I never liked that. I think Chicago's a was a better city than New York. I don't even know we're gonna get into the present in a minute. There's a saying that goes like this. New York is all about money, DC is all about power, LA is all about fame, Miami is all about sex, and Chicago is all about work. And I agree wholeheartedly with that. It's 6 o' clock in the morning and you get on a highway in Chicago, there will be people up and they will be moving and they'll be doing something in Chicago. There is no excuse, whether on sports teams or in the local area, if you're doing a construction site for taking it easy, no excuse for complaining when you have to go to work. I believe that Chicago could have been the greatest city in America. Centrally located Phenomenal infrastructure, once great universities, a hard working people, a midwestern culture, terrific businesses, an incredible skyline, restaurants that were the envy of most major cities in the world. Some of the most incredible Michelin starred restaurants in the world. Not to mention the lakefront and all the beauty surrounding that. So what happened to Chicago? What happened to my home in just the last ten years? Ten years ago there was crime in Chicago. No doubt. Ten years ago, Chicago was frequently made fun of for criminality and for being more dangerous than Iraq. How does a miraculous and beautiful city fall? Did something happen to it? Was Chicago invaded? Because as I walk through what's happened to Chicago, it's almost as if there was Chicago was conquered. It's hard to believe a city would do what's happened to Chicago to itself. And that's the most puzzling thing, is that Chicago in the last 10 years has almost been the vanishing man decided to be miserable. Chicago is one of the reasons why America was the greatest country ever to exist in the history of the world. From its Greek culture, Irish culture, strong Polish culture, Czech and bohemian culture. No matter where you are from, you could come to Chicago and you could make something of your life. So now where is Chicago? Well, just this last couple of weeks, more and more people are talking about Chicago. Mainly because of Lori Lightfoot, probably the worst mayor in Chicago. Year to date there have been 295 people shot and killed in Chicago. 1423 people shot and wounded. 1,718 people total shot and 312 total homicides. So let me tell you something about the mayors of Chicago. When I grew up, we had Mayor Daley, the son of the other Mayor Daley. Now there was no doubt that Mayor Daley was corrupt. No one actually cared. Do you know why? He had a zero tolerance policy for crime. The L was always on time. If you don't know what the L is, it's the above ground subway transportation system in Chicago. Millennium park was built, the Cubs lost gracefully and you wouldn't get mugged on the way to Wrigley Field. If you went to a Sox game, you might get mugged. When I grew up, that was Comiskey Park. The point was that the city worked. No one cared if Daley was doing backroom deals. Of course he was. He was getting paid off by the developers. He was keeping the unions at bay. He didn't want to revolt amongst the police. So what? As Tucker Carlson said, I would rather vote for the corrupt local mayor than that keeps the city nice than the person that plans to make the city like the new tomorrow of a perfect utopia. Daley ran the city. Well, he did, and he was pro police. And Chicago's murder rate was kept at bay. And then all of a sudden, Chicago was thrown into the national spotlight because the worst of Chicago all of a sudden became President of the United States. Now, Barack Obama was not raised in Chicago, but Barack Obama found his values in Chicago. Barack Obama's mentor, Bill Ayers, still teaches at the University of Illinois, Chicago. And Bill Ayers, who, of course was a domestic terrorist, like an actual domestic terrorist, by the way, ran a group called Weather Underground with his wife, Bernadine Dorn. Nothing says romance like trying to blow up a police bureau. True story. Bill Ayers. And he got off on all charges suspiciously. And now he teaches your children at the University of Illinois, Chicago. Barack Obama did his first ever fundraiser to run for office at Bill Ayers home. Bill Ayers, by the way, writes textbooks for children still. And Barack Obama then got thrown onto the national stage, and people started wondering what. What is actually coming out of Chicago? And all of a sudden, this idea of the Chicago political machine became very popular. David Axelrod, Valerie Jarrett, this idea of thug brass, knuckle politics got instituted. The highest levels of our federal government. And then kind of as a payback. First, Barack Obama had Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff as one year. And then Rahm Emanuel became mayor of Chicago. And I point that moment of tiny dancer. Rahm Emanuel. I call him Tiny dancer because he is a ballerina. From that point forward, Chicago took a rapid decline of a city that was corrupt. And look, if you have a major city like Chicago, corruption is just kind of, like, baked into the equation, okay? It's just gonna happen. I wish that wasn't the case. I wish we had a bunch of virtuous philosopher kings running our city. But then all of a sudden, when Rahm Emanuel became weak, something worse than corruption took over. Ideologues. And now Chicago is unrecognizable. And we're gonna walk through that in great detail.

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[Charlie Kirk]

and now from North Carolina, six. Six. Michael. No, I'm kidding, everybody. Charlie Kirk here. Welcome back. I wasn't bad though, right, Mr. Gordon? Oh, that goes back to a time. You know, I said this to my team earlier. I miss sports. I do. Because currently I'm boycotting everything. I don't shop at Walmart. I don't shop at Target. I don't go to big box stores, don't watch Major League Baseball. I don't watch basketball. I heard basketball's on. And you might say, charlie, why is that? Look after the All Star game, after the basketball thing. If I'm going to tell you to purchase in alignment with your values and to not support people that decide to do things that are just purely political, then so be it. The 90s bulls, I really believe, played a major role in the type of culture that I was raised in. Relentlessly pushing towards excellence, holding yourself to an incredibly high standard. And all actually started with the 85 bears. Now I know all of you listening in Riverside, California, maybe on WABC on the dial, you're saying. Okay, Charlie, enough of the Chicago stuff. No, no, no, hold on. Not so fast, my friends. As Lee Corso would say. Is Lee Corso still doing college football, by the way, Is he still doing college football? If you don't know who Lee Corso is, I grew up with Lee Corso and that was a great show. And they're probably all taking knees and wearing masks or something now. Who knows? Not so fast, my friends. What's happened in Chicago is the model for America. Let me say this again. What has happened in Chicago is the model for America. Chicago, a once great city of fairness and decency, grit, character and resilience, has now been taken over by sociopathic ideologues. A city that used to look at things as they are and how they should be and then put public policy measures in place to try to fix those things has now become the land of professors dominating all. Look, Lori Lightfoot is now the Mayor of Chicago. So after Mayor Rahm Emanuel, he was a total disaster. He mishandled. What was that one police shooting. He mishandled. He didn't release the tape. It wasn't Ahmad Arbery. It was. It was actually a legitimate one where the police officer really screwed up and they. Rahm Emanuel did not handle this correctly. And there was a lot of backlash surrounding that. You might not remember, Rahm Emanuel almost didn't become mayor of Chicago because of a technicality. He didn't live in Chicago. They got that cleared up really quick. Couple phone calls. All of a sudden, Rahm Emanuel is back in the race. When Lori Lightfoot became mayor, all of a sudden she started to bring in not a desire for what's the best of the city of Chicago. She brought an ideology. And this is where New York and Chicago have something in common. Rahm Emanuel and Mike Bloomberg are very similar. They are short, narcissistic, sociopathic, self interested, corrupt people that actually don't want to see the city decline. I'll take that in a second. I will take Napoleon over Lori Lightfoot any day. I will take someone with a Napoleonic complex like Rahm Emanuel or Mike Bloomberg. Can you see who's taller? Mike Bloomberg or by the way, if you're a small person, I'm not making fun of you. I get all these emails. How dare you make fun of small people. Listen, if we're not able to have fun here, then we're just gonna be very serious all the time. How tall is Mike Bloomberg? Is like 4, 11. No, he's not that small. He is small. He's like a hobbit. And so you got Mike Bloomberg and you got Rahm Emanuel, who are very similar. They were transactional old school Democrats. And then both New York and Chicago decided to elect college professor activist types as mayor of their city. So then all of a sudden, Chicago and New York decided to go in a direction that was completely unprecedented. They were going to elect mayors not based on qualifications, not based on making realistic promises, but on transformational change. New York and Chicago made a decision to actually wage war on their citizens. And I've always said that mayors are actually the most powerful positions in America that Republicans usually and typically don't care about. Mayors have a ton of power and we are all focused on governors or senators or congresspeople. Mayors and district attorneys have an amazing amount of power. We're going to go through how Chicago and New York, but Chicago even more so have become a blueprint for the rest of the country. Say everything is racist. Do not govern. Be a complete and total demagogue and seek power for power's sake.

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[Charlie Kirk]

how has Chicago, a once great city, fallen from grace alongside New York City? And this is going to be happening to every major city across the country. Urban areas are vulnerable to this type of takeover. Well, first of all, the mayor of Chicago had an amazing opportunity. Lori Lightfoot could have reversed course. She could have been a magnanimous mayor that cared about lowering crime and bettering schools, attracting businesses and keeping businesses there. But Lori Lightfoot has been a very bitter and quite honestly craven mayor. She has been not interested in the well being of her citizens. And now, thanks to new emails, she's actually a sociopath. I mean, she's, she's actually someone that is. I'm sorry for this kind of hostage situation that is existing between her and her staff. So Lori Lightfoot became mayor a couple years ago, probably America's worst mayor. And this was a new open records request of a email that Lori Lightfoot sent her team. And I am going to read every single word of this. None of this is embellished. Since my prior requests for office time are routinely ignored, I am now resorting to this. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. I need office time every day. She goes on for another 15. Then she says, not just once a week or some days. Every day. Not just once a week or some days. Every day. Not just once a week or some days. Every day. Another 15 times. Breaks or transition times between meetings are not office time. Breaks or transitions team between meetings are not office time. Then she says, if this doesn't change immediately, I will just start unilaterally canceling things every day. If this doesn't change immediately, I will start just unilaterally canceling things every single day. Then she says, have I finally made myself clear? Finally. Have I made myself clear? Finally. Have I made myself clear? Finally. Have I made myself clear? Finally. You see, Lori Lightfoot just discovered copy paste. And so because of that, she thinks she's being really cute by doing this. She's a crazy person. And so what's happening actually in Chicago? Well, breaking today in Chicago, police warn of woman stabbing people randomly on the north side of Chicago. The north side used to be the nice side. Chicago police are warning about three recent cases in which a woman stabbed a person on the north side for no apparent reason. Police said the stabbings have taken place in Edgewater. Uptown. In Lakeview, police said the same suspect is believed to have threatened to shoot a person for no apparent reason. Also on the north side, no apparent reason. Of course, Chicago is just a place where you come for the food and you stay because you get murdered. And let's play this tape here of Lori Lightfoot. What's her biggest concern? Declaring racism as a public health crisis. Play tape.

[Lori Lightfoot]

When we think about racism, many of us think about its visible and audio audible forms. But the reality is the insidious nature of systemic racism has other impacts that are every bit as deep and harmful, but often ones that we can't see.

[Charlie Kirk]

According to wls, Mary Lori Lightfoot firmly declared racism to be a public health crisis in Chicago. That's right. Public health. You know why? Because they know the power that you get. Now with public health, you can lock people at home. You can make them wear cloths over their face. You could stick jabs in their arm. Mayor Lori Lightfoot made the announcement at the MLK Exhibit center in North Lawndale. She says, quote, we can no longer allow racism to rob the residents of the opportunity to live and lead fully and healthy and happy lives. We work closely with the Chicago Department of Public Health and the community organizers to address these inequities. Once and for all. So she says now that she's improving anti racism policies by building capacity for anti racism leadership, reckoning with the impacts of racism, advancing strategies to operationalize racial equity, empowering transformational community relationships. The city is partnering with six community organizations in each part of the city. And Dr. Melissa Simon says it's so frustrating to see patients come to me and now know the system has failed them in so many different ways. This is a doctor from the Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine who says that racism is, is indeed a public health crisis. So how exactly has racism Contributed to the 1,423 people shot and wounded in Chicago? So here's the lesson for all of you out there is that these leaders, they do not actually care about the circumstances around them. They think that they are going to march these cities towards a place of chaos, a place of disorder, that eventually only an authoritarian tyrant autocrat can then solve the problem. Fifteen armed robberies and nine hours overnight as the Chicago Police Department again orders detectives to sit in cars rather than investigate crimes. You hear that? Fifteen armed robberies and nine hours overnight. And because they're just supposed to sit in their cars, by the way, mostly in the north side. Just yesterday, Idaho man arrested when gun falls from clothes while filing police report in River North. How about this one? This in felon who's on probation and bond hit a gun on grand red platform. Prosecutors say you can go to subd cwb chicago.com you go through this. It is absolutely the, the crime is at record levels in Chicago right now and yet the police are being told not to enforce this. Fox 32 family walking along Magnificent Mile in Chicago robbed at gunpoint. You guys ever been at Magnus Magnificent Mile? And I say this as someone who is grow who grew up in Chicago, I do not feel safe in Chicago anymore. It's because of ideologues. Let me reinforce this point. It's because of abstractions. Chicago stopped caring about things that work and they started caring about things that sound good. Bumper sticker phrases like eradicate racism. Do you know why Lori Lightfoot became mayor of Chicago? One reason Donald Trump, only Donald Trump and the hatred that Donald Trump was able to generate from the left. Only he was able to get politicians like Lori Lightfoot a footing. Get that Lori Lightfoot a footing. You see, prior to Trump, Democrats did not have the sort of rage in their eyes to demand the most radical person imaginable. They couldn't. Seven of the eight victims in Chicago mass shootings were shot in the head. You guys didn't hear about the mass shooting recently in Chicago? Of course not. Someone broke into the home of the 6200 block of South Morgan street sometime before 5:40am and started shooting. According to a police spokesman, Steve Russanov, three women and a man died in the attack. This is a mass shooting. You didn't hear about it. Denise Mattis, a mother of four boys, Shamitra Williams, 19, a mother of a two year old girl, Ratanya Ariel Rogers, 28, who lived in Rogers park and Blake Lee, 35, who lived in the home and did odd jobs in the neighborhood. Relatives said Donald Trump did this but not intentionally. You see, the Democrats started to push forward people that were so radical, so willing to engage in fundamental transformation. You are now seeing the tragic decline of our once great cities. And by the way, that's the third mass shooting in Chicago in just the last week. Second mass shooting of the day. Five shot in West Gar Field Park. The death tolls keep toll just keep piling up. Week in progress. Just this week, 14 shot and killed, 74 shot and wounded, 88 total shot and 14 homicides. And none of this has to be the case, by the way, Chicago could be the safest, greatest city in the world if they had just practical wisdom and prudence and what would be called by most people common sense type governing and leadership. But this is coming to a city near you. Do you have very angry politicians that are running for office that call everything racist and they just want more power to try to implement critical race theory or things to abolish systemic racism. Lori Lightfoot snuck into office because of the hatred that was built around Donald Trump, a media that dared not ask her any questions, a defund police movement that has been picking up steam at a rapid, rapid pace. And so what are we supposed to do about this? Well, Chicago has no impeachment and no recall mechanism. And by the way, do you know that there are no Republicans in Chicago in leadership. The entire City council are all Democrats. All the congressmen are all Democrats. The mayor is a Democrat, all the aldermen are Democrats. And so what is someone supposed to do about this? Well, that system of checks and balances in Chicago has been completely and totally destroyed and it's now spreading all across the country. And this is what the conservative movement must stand for. We must stand for things that work that are so obviously good up against abstractions. Meanwhile, Lori Lightfoot is declaring racism a public health crisis when she's actually a racist herself, only giving interviews to black journalists against white journalists. So maybe she's the public health crisis. And this is now going to spread to more cities. They're going to say, give us more power, because racism and climate change are a public health crisis. The Chinese coronavirus and the lockdown surrounding were a social conditioning exercise. They were pushing the boundaries of how far they could go to control you and limit your freedoms and liberties. One of the main reasons why I am optimistic is because a lot of the radical pipe dreams, the fundamental transformational agenda of the Democrats, the stuff that will actually change things, not just inflation. We can fix inflation. It's gonna be hard, but we can flex fix inflation. Not just big spending. We can fix that. Not just high or low taxes. No, I'm talking about the stuff that is going to break the back of the system that we have, like HR1. What's one of the reasons why HR1 is probably not going to pass? Well, one of those reasons is this woman that I really want to have on our podcast. And by the way, I will not even ask her tough questions. I'm just going to praise her the whole time. Kyrsten Sinema. Now, Kirsten Sinema is someone that I have opposed on a lot of different things. She is wrong on life. She is wrong on the transgender thing. She is wrong on immigration. She's wrong on all sorts of stuff. I have a whole packet of stuff she's wrong about, but she has something in her. And I read this long piece I was working out yesterday, and Apple News, the propaganda campaign of Menlo park, they send you these articles. You guys know that, that phenomenon, the Apple News kind of drumbeat. And so they sent me this notification that I didn't sign up for from Mother Jones, of all places, which is, you know, to the left of Joseph Stalin's choice paper, Pravda. And so Mother Jones had this push notification that said, what the hell happened to Kirsten? Cinema. Ooh, I like that. Mother Jones is mad. I must love this person. And so I listened to it, and it was really. It's really well written. I have to say, the person that wrote this, Tim Murphy, did a really good job. And it was really kind of about the life story of Kyrsten Sinema. Now, you might say, charlie, I don't care about Kyrsten Sinema. She's just one senator. Well, Joe Manchin is now waffling on the filibuster. Just so you know, we've praised Manchin before. He's written about it. Now all of a sudden, leaked audio, according to the Intercept, show that Joe Manchin might actually waffle on the filibuster. So what does that mean? That means that just a 5050 vote for HR1, HR5, DC's a state. Puerto Rico's a state. Getting rid of the electoral college and adding seats to the Supreme Court just like that can happen. But Manchin has someone that actually might if mansion waffles. That doesn't mean they're going to get to 50. Kiersten Sinema. She has said she will not break the back of the filibuster. And this 45 minute story, it takes you 45 minutes to listen to the whole thing on audio because I did it when I was working out. It's really interesting about this. Incredibly ambitious. That's the best way to describe Kyrsten Cinema is ambition. She never wants to retreat, she never loses. She's always polling. She's always looking at what's best for her political interest. And she's not a dummy. Kyrsten Cinema is not an ideologue. So let me contrast Kirsten Cinema with Lori Lightfoot as we close out this hour. Lori Lightfoot cares what is best for the revolution. Kyrsten Cinema cares what's best for Kyrsten Cinema. I'll take that in a second because Kyrsten Cinema represents a red state. And so in this long piece of Mother Jones, it basically comes to this place at the end where it says I love the last. We all thought Kirsten Cinema was crazy when we first crossed paths in Phoenix, but no longer. This is not the person we all knew. Jan Brewer said. And on that point at least, Kirsten Cinema has finally brought everyone together. Kyrsten Sinema is now governing like a center right senator in Arizona. She is refusing to break the back of the filibuster. And I want to just say a peace offering to Kyrsten Sinema, who's a Democrat. You are welcome on this program anytime now if you dare break the back of the filibuster. We're gonna have a different type of relationship around here. But as so far you are making Mother Jones write a 45 minute podcast piece about you. What the hell happen to Kirsten Cinema? God bless you for that. Any sort of chaos, disruption and disorder you can throw at these maniacs, you're a hero in my book. A Democrat from Arizona. Thanks so much for listening everybody. Email us your questions freedomarliekirk.com and if you want to support us, go to charliekirk.com support God bless you guys. Speak to you soon.