Thomas Massie: Hero or Villain?

Summary

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The Charlie Kirk Show – Episode Summary

Episode Title: Thomas Massie: Hero or Villain?
Date: May 18, 2026
Host: Charlie Kirk
Guests: Eric Metaxas, Alex Marlowe, Eli Steele

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Charlie Kirk and his team dive into contemporary political controversies, focusing on Congressman Thomas Massie’s divisive role in the GOP, recent legal developments in the Luigi Magione case, updates on the Iran conflict, the intersection of Christianity and American founding principles, and the persistent cultural and racial tensions in America. The episode features interviews with Eric Metaxas about the “rededicate250” event and America’s Christian roots, Alex Marlowe on GOP primaries and party unity, and Eli Steele with an incisive analysis of the roots of America’s racial dysfunction.

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Key Discussion Points

1. Luigi Magione Case Update

• [01:17–08:05]
  • Judge Caro ruled that evidence from a backpack found near Magione at the time of arrest was inadmissible due to improper, warrantless search. However, items later recovered at the station (including a gun) are admissible.
  • The team discusses the implications for the trial, the legal gray areas of "immediate control" in search-and-seizure, and frustration with perceived leniency toward Magione, who is framed as a symptom of a growing “assassination culture.”
  • Quote: “What is the distance away from the suspect that it all of a sudden becomes a warranted search? ...This feels absolutely like the judge is sympathetic to Luigi Maggione. A cold-blooded murderer, an assassin.”
  • The narrative is that such legal outcomes distract from broader societal issues (e.g., Big Pharma, systemic violence).

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2. Rising Tensions with Iran

• [09:17–15:59]
  • Charlie’s crew breaks down Trump’s recent social posts about Iran, Iran’s worsening economic condition, the ongoing blockade, Chinese involvement, and the strategic patience of the Iranian regime.
  • Discusses the military options (escalating conflict, declaring victory, maintaining the blockade) and how domestic political considerations (midterms, oil prices) are intertwined with foreign policy.
  • Quote: “If this is still going in the midterms...I think it will be very bad for the party.” [15:34]
  • Emphasis on the importance of ending the conflict soon for electoral reasons.

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3. Faith and American Identity: The “Rededicate250” Event

Guest: Eric Metaxas

• [17:43–34:44]
  • Discussion of the national event “rededicate250” (the 250th anniversary of U.S. independence) devoted to “rededicating America to God” and the role of Christianity in America’s founding.
  • J.D. Vance is quoted:

    "Our system of justice, our generosity to neighbors, our respect for conscience, and the moral discipline necessary for liberty itself...all law reflects a morality. Neither law nor morality appears in a vacuum, but ultimately come from religion." —J.D. Vance quoting Charlie Kirk [18:54]

  • Metaxas argues that without returning to America’s explicitly Christian roots, constitutional government is weakened.
  • Conversation covers freedom of religion, misperceptions in media about America’s origins, and historical illiteracy in journalism.
  • Key Moment:
    • The media misrepresent Metaxas’ joke at the event about Trump building a ballroom in the White House, taking it literally and sparking viral (and absurd) outrage:

    “I seem, according to them, seriously, said God has raised up Donald Trump to create the ballroom...even though everybody knows it's a joke.” —Eric Metaxas [33:09]

  • The discussion ends with Metaxas promoting his new book “Revolution” about faith and American founding.

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4. GOP Infighting: Bill Cassidy’s Primary and the Massie Conundrum

Guest: Alex Marlowe (Breitbart)

• [35:51–49:08]
  • Analysis of Senator Cassidy’s humiliating defeat in Louisiana’s Republican primary, sending a message to GOP dissidents who opposed Trump post-January 6.
  • The main theme: party loyalty versus independence. There’s a warning that deviating from Trump or MAGA priorities leads to political ruin.
  • Thomas Massie’s race in Kentucky is dissected at length:
    • Divided opinions: Some appreciate Massie’s principled, budget-hawk and antiwar stances; critics lambaste his “grandstanding,” lack of party discipline, and conspiracy-driven rhetoric (notably around Epstein and anti-pedophile claims against Trump’s administration).
    • Quote:

      “Voting against the party on every single issue, you're eventually going to make too many enemies. And that is the problem that Thomas has had...when you always vote against the party, you can't expect the party to actually back you.” —J.D. Vance (clip played by show) [43:06]

    • Suggestion that even with Massie’s strengths, unity is crucial given slim majorities.
    • Funding criticisms: Noted that most of Massie’s campaign funds come from out of state, paralleling criticisms about AIPAC and Israel-aligned PACs.
    • Discussion of the Democrats’ strategic use of racial narratives and the Iran crisis as wedge issues for the midterms.

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5. Race, Fear, and the Origins of White Guilt

Guest: Eli Steele

• [54:07–62:35]
  • Interview explores the roots of white guilt, collective fear of accusations of racism, and their effect on public discourse and policy.
  • Steele argues that America’s current “racial dysfunction” is driven by societal fear, not suicidal empathy, and traces it back to the Christian roots and civil rights era.
  • Discussion touches on the loss of individual innocence, how guilt was used as an organizing political principle, and the dangers of returning to pre-biblical, tribal morality (collective punishment for ancestral sins).
  • Quote:

    “It is blood guilt, and they've brought that back, and it's created this psychosis in a lot of people.” —Co-host [58:01]

  • Connection to the exploitation of racial guilt for political and legal power (e.g., SPLC, DOJ actions).
  • Steele: “If we do become tribal, then we will have to reinvent America somewhere else and there's nowhere else to go at this point.” [62:35]

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6. Listener Feedback and Final Reflections on Massie

• [63:31–70:07]
  • The hosts share a diversity of listener emails—roughly evenly split between pro- and anti-Massie camps.
    • Supporters: Value Massie’s consistency, libertarian stances, and fiscal discipline.
    • Critics: Argue he grandstands at the expense of party progress and is too obstructionist in crisis moments.
  • Sharp rebuke to “accelerationists” advocating protest votes for Democrats as a statement against perceived GOP sellouts:

    “You are voting for the great solvent of our civilization...perpetual thrall to the worst excesses of labor...That is the future of the country if you lean into this.” —Co-host [67:52]

  • Massie is defended as an “interesting individual,” but show consensus is that party unity matters most right now.

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Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• Charlie Kirk, on faith and American destiny:

  “We wait on the Lord, you know, with expectation of him doing something in our midst, of him acting and moving in our country, in our politics, in our families.” [22:18]

• Eric Metaxas, on the meaning of the event:

  “Yesterday...we officially, in many ways, rededicated the nation to God. This is a huge thing.” [19:53]

• J.D. Vance (clip), on Massie:

  “Voting against the party on every single issue, you're eventually going to make too many enemies...” [43:06]

• Alex Marlowe, on Democratic strategy:

  “The Democrats really do think this [racism accusations over redistricting] is going to be motivational in terms of voting...” [49:08]

• Eli Steele, on white guilt:

  “That there was a collective judgment from the outside on white America, and that went into the mind of many people. And they said, okay, how do I achieve innocence?” [55:17]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Magione case & legal analysis: [01:17–08:05]
• Iran conflict and political consequences: [09:17–15:59]
• Interview with Eric Metaxas – faith & America’s founding: [17:43–34:44]
• Alex Marlowe: GOP primary analysis (Cassidy, Massie): [35:51–49:08]
• Eli Steele on race, guilt, and fear: [54:07–62:35]
• Listener mail & final debate on Massie: [63:31–70:07]

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Tone & Style

• Unapologetically conservative, frequently combative style
• Religious references woven throughout
• Humor and sarcasm, particularly about media and political opponents
• Calls to collective action, party loyalty, and renewal of faith

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Memorable Moments

• Media Meltdown over Metaxas’ “ballroom joke”

  “They cannot get the joke. They are so enraged by President Trump that they have to attack. It’s almost unbelievable.” —Eric Metaxas [34:44]

• Debate over GOP “rhinos” vs. "libertarian saboteurs"
• Direct listener pushback and heated on-air reactions
• Sharp criticism of Democratic policies and warnings about “anti-civilizational forces”

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For Listeners

If you’re interested in the crossroads of Christianity, grassroots activism, partisan primary drama, America's current cultural war, and the psychology of race in politics, this episode is a rich, spirited summary of the conservative movement’s worldview heading into the 2026 midterms. Whether you agree or disagree with the conclusions, you’ll understand the stakes and narratives driving conservative activism today.

Transcript

[A]

My name is Charlie Kirk. I run the largest pro American student organization in the country, fighting for the future of our republic. My call is to fight evil and to proclaim truth. If the most important thing for you is just feeling good, you're gonna end up miserable. But if the most important thing is doing good, you will end up purposeful. College is a scam, everybody. You gotta stop sending your kids to college. You should get married as young as possible and have as many kids as possible. Go start a Turning Point USA College chapter. Go start a Turning Point USA High School chapter. Go find out how your church can get involved. Sign up and become an activist. I gave my life to the Lord in fifth grade. Most important decision I ever made in my life. And I encourage you to do the same. Here I am, Lord. Use me. Buckle up, everybody. Here we go. Noble Gold Investments is the official gold sponsor of the Charlie Kirk Show, a company that specializes in gold IRAs and physical delivery of precious metals. Learn how you could protect your wealth with Noble gold investments@noblegold investments.com, that is noblegoldinvestments.com.

[B]

all right. Welcome to the Charlie Kirk show. It is Monday, May 18, 2026. Hope you guys had a great weekend. I know I actually relaxed a little bit. It was truly, truly amazing. I don't know. I asked you how your weekend was and Blake, in customary fashion, said it was fine. That's about all I got out of Blake. All right, so breaking news that we want to get to here. Lots to cover this morning. We've got Eric Metaxas, who was at the rededicate250 at the half hour. Then we got Alex Marlowe from Breitbart. We're going to talk politics and primaries and all that stuff. We got Massie, we got Cassidy, lots going on there. And then Eli Steele, the son of the great Shelby Steele, talking about race, race relations, what's really behind all of our dysfunction. So a packed show. We've got some Iran news to get to, of course, repeatedly. But Luigi Mangione is back in the news this morning. Obviously, that's a topic that strikes near and dear to our heart here on the Charlie Kirk Show. Luigi Magione, in a big way, contributed to this rise of assassination culture. It's something that Charlie was very worried about. And just this morning, Judge Caro, who's overseeing the state case here, has ruled that the backpack that was next to Luigi mangione in the McDonald's where he was arrested. So he's sitting at a table. There's a Backpack either on a table adjacent to him or on the floor. And they have. It has been ruled that the. The contents of that backpack are inadmissible.

[C]

That includes.

[B]

They will be suppressed. Yes.

[C]

Cell phone, his passport, magazine. Is it a gun? Magazine, Bullet magazine, Bullet magazine, wallet and computer chip.

[B]

Computer chip. I'm not sure what the computer chip is here. Let's go ahead and play that scene from inside the courtroom. SOT 13, I find that the search of the backpack at the McDonald's was improper warrantless search.

[D]

That the backpack was not within the

[B]

immediate control or grabbable area of the defendant. And further, the people fail to demonstrate exigent circumstances there or those items found in the backpack during the search at

[D]

the McDonald's will be suppressed.

[B]

However, the people have established that the subsequent search of the backpack at the station was a valid inventory search, and therefore the items recovered at the station

[D]

will not be suppressed.

[B]

All right, so the items recovered at the station include the gun, which is key, obviously here. But just to go into this rule, because I had to look it up when this ruling came through. No, it is typically not illegal to search a suspect's backpack when they have been apprehended under the search incident to a lawful arrest exception to the fourth Amendment, meaning that for the officer safety, if the backpack is in or around the person that's been arrested, the suspect in this case, then the immediate association with the suspect that's been lawfully apprehended is then fair game. They should be able to search that. There is, however, some exceptions. So if the suspect is in the car in, like the police car in the back, he's handcuffed, and they haven't searched the backpack yet, they may need to get a warrant for that. So this looks to be basically a gray area. My question for this judge would be what was to say that there wasn't a bomb inside that backpack?

[C]

Yeah, it's very strange. You could hear it in the clip where he's saying essentially the backpack was basically, it sounds like too far away from Luigi when they detained him.

[B]

What's the distance?

[C]

If he were holding the backpack, they could have searched it. But I guess it was maybe on the other side of the table or the cops could get between him. It sounds very, very ticky tack either way.

[B]

Very ticky tack. So just so you know, the idea of a backpack or a possession being in the immediate association or vicinity of a suspect, this includes clothing, wallets, purses, and backpacks that the person is wearing, carrying, or had in their immediate possession. The Justification is officer safety, Are there any weapons and preserving evidence. So if the backpack is separated from the suspect as the suspect is being secured, handcuffed in a patrol car, under control with no realistic access. Some courts like the 4th Circuit have provided the reasoning that may require a warrant or other justification, treating it more like a container as opposed to part of the person. So that's obviously what the judge has ruled here. Apparently body cam footage was used in this hearing to come to this ruling. Very, very frustrating though, because obviously they had probable cause, they checked his ID, they arrested him at the McDonald's, the backpack was on the floor or on the table. So two questions then immediately come to mind. What is the distance away from the suspect that it all of a sudden becomes a warranted search? And by the way, again, what if there was a bomb in the backpack? This feels absolutely like the judge is sympathetic to Luigi Maggione. A cold blooded murderer, an assassin.

[C]

Well, so, okay, on the flip side, we should emphasize, you see two different headlines and it kind of shows, I think, different perspectives of media outlets because some Fox, certainly they're leading with all of this evidence is getting suppressed. It's a big win. But other publications are emphasizing they are allowed to use his gun and they are allowed to use his diary. And I suspect that means they're allowed to use his manifesto, which is 260 pages or words approximately saying basically he's motivated by how angry he is about the health care system. And that's pretty strong evidence overall. So I think we can be hopeful. There's still a lot here. What I will say is the uneasy feeling I've had, you've had, I think a lot of people have had is it seems like every couple months we get a new development and it's always away from what we want. So first they're going to seek the death penalty with him. Now they can't seek the death penalty for whatever reason. And now they're suppressing some evidence. Maybe next time other evidence is going to get suppressed. It's always one little development after another in favor of this guy who we should remind everyone, heinously murdered, it seems a stranger in cold blood, a father because he was angry about the industry the man worked in which the man did not create. The man did not really perpetuate. He was just a CEO of a health insurance company. And by the way, guys, I'll have you know, health insurance is not the reason us healthcare is expensive.

[E]

No.

[B]

Well, this is the thing. So big pharma's watching this whole show trial, go on. And they're overjoyed. Right. That was an observation that Walter Kern made and I agree with it. And basically it's a giant distraction from the fact that this man is a cold blooded killer who is sparking this rise in assassination culture. We'll let Charlie take it away here. Sat 16.

[A]

Look, you got two options. You can go Maga or Magionism. You can go Maga or you can go Mamdanism. You can go Maga or you can go Mohammadism. It's very funny how all the M's, Maga is the only option on the right. Neoconservatives are not coming back. The corporate oligarchs. We're not going to let him. So MAGA has cemented the worldview of the American right. But the left, we don't know. It could go Magione, which is the most extreme. You could go Mamdani, which is very, very extreme. Or you go Mohammedanism, which is just, you know, Muslim, Islamic takeover. You get reform or you get revolution. We at Magawana, reform stuff. Political undercurrent underneath Magione that cannot be ignored, that should not be dismissed. And that political reality is that is on the American left 100% right.

[B]

All right, so want to get into Iran Updates here. It's very important. Okay, so President Trump issued a couple new truce over the weekend. It felt like the rhetoric is ramping up once more because the back and forth seems to be with Iran via the Pakistanis. Impossible to reach a deal. Their whole strategy does seem to be waiting out the clock. So go ahead and throw up this truth. It says for Iran the clock is ticking and they better get moving fast or there won't be anything left of them. Time is of the essence. President DJT now this is in reaction to again negotiations that are ongoing that seem to be netting approximately zero. Now over the weekend we did hear reports that, that fuel shortages within Iran are starting to accumulate. This was from an Israeli source to Fox News saying they're seeing lines at the gas pump. They are running out of energy, which is ironic. They're having to start plugging some of their wells, which if you know anything about oil extraction, once you plug those wells, you might not be able to open them ever again. They've run out of storage. They're finding anything they can to store this. The economy's in free fall, inflation's off the charts and it doesn't seem to matter to these guys. They are simply playing the long game. They are basically pointing to the fact that America has a short patience, short amount of patience for this war, and that President Trump is incurring political costs. So they're gonna wait it out.

[C]

I mean, it's. In a lot of ways, it's that dynamic where they might be vastly weaker, but they also care vastly more. There was a line, Ho Chi Minh, who was the leader of North Vietnam, and supposedly he had a line that says, you can kill 100 of my guys for every one of kill, I kill of yours. But still, I am going to win and you're going to lose, because I am just that much more fanatical about it. And so, yeah, their economy is vastly worse than ours. They've taken vastly more losses than us. But their thought, I mean, they're not. They're not a democracy. They don't have to worry about a midterm election. They don't have to worry about a Congress getting in the way. They can just say, we'll make our country suffer as much as it takes to drag this out.

[B]

Yeah, and here's the thing. At some point, there's really only two options left on the table. Either you decide to hit them hard again militarily, and you start taking out additional targets and you accelerate the kinetic activity in the region. You break the peace, fire and. And you make them cry uncle that way, or at least attempt to. I'm not sure you can, as essentially where we're at militarily, but that would be one way. You know, China has said that they were going to stop supplying anything to Iran based on that last meeting with President Xi and President Trump. However, they'll say a lot of things publicly, whether they'll follow through on anything. We're still struggling to get China to follow through buying our soybeans, for goodness sakes. So that's a whole question. They said they were going to buy 500 Boeing planes. They've only bought 200, so on and so forth. This is the way that the Chinese work. So getting them to follow through with anything. We're also seeing reports that there is actual caravans going overland to get through the sea blockade through about a dozen different countries from China over to Iran. So we know that they're still supplying them with something. Right. The regime is desperate. They'll use other means. And those caravans have been ramping up. All right, so the question then is, can you simply declare victory, say, hey, we got what we could, we tried our best. We destroyed their military installations, we destroyed their nuclear capacity. Yeah, we'd love to have the we'd love to have the nuclear dust. We'd love to have all the uranium out of there. Even President Trump said they basically, it would be very difficult for them to get that out. It would take a very, very long time. It's a question of whether or not they could get the nuclear dust out or not. But he said, I would feel better getting it. Okay, well, you would feel better, but it's not necessarily a must have. Maybe. All right, so can you just declare victory and get out? Can we just say, hey, listen, it's up to the Iranian people now. We declare victory. Everything is copacetic as far as we're concerned. We did a good thing. We're out. If you push us again, we'll be back. But don't push us.

[C]

Well, the downside there is Iran has also shown they're willing to push it a little bit. And if they say, okay, well, we're going to go back to putting a toll on the straits, we're still going to close the strait.

[B]

Yeah. Or you just, I guess option three would be status quo. You just keep the blockade up. But I'm telling you, the economic impact of that, a toll on a huge container of oil is one thing. Yeah, it drives up the price a little bit, maybe like a dollar a barrel. But could you absorb it globally? Probably. Right. So it's not ideal, but even the Chinese don't want that. So my point is, could you. Domestically. And here's the concern. If the audience is wondering why I'm concerned domestically, this is having political ramifications. I am thinking about the midterms and we want to win the midterms. There is a very good chance, based on redistricting, based on, based on the Supreme Court decision, that we would be closer in the midterms than we thought, even with all the political headwinds, even given the economic or, sorry, the historic precedent of. You usually lose seats during a midterm race when you're the incumbent power. So the question is, can we, when you got essentially, what's left, like, depending on whose math you're using, 11 to 14, toss up seats? Can you win half of those? Can you do that and retain control of the House? These are really, really important questions. For the next two years of the Trump administration, can you avoid impeachments? Can you avoid the House getting bogged down in constant investigations, chasing the tail, mainstream news media, legacy media, going crazy with every new thing that they come out that Tamu Obama comes out with, can we avoid that fate? And I believe that a big chunk of that is what is the price of the pump? What is going on in Iran? Desperately. I am one of those people that I want to see this wrapped up sooner than later.

[C]

We said at the outset that this was not something that the base had voted for, but if it ended in a few weeks, even if they were annoyed, they would get over it. But now those several weeks have passed. We're two and a half months into it at this point. And if this is still going in the midterms or when the midterms arrive, we should just be frank. I, I think it will be very bad for the party.

[B]

All right. If you are like me, you are looking at summer, thinking about all the fun stuff that you want to do, ensuring that your family and you have many, many rich memories and ensuring that everything that you've built is protected. I don't know if you've got like a road trip coming up or a vacation, some beach place, whatever it is, you got to feel an urgency. You got to sense that urgency to protect your family. And how do you protect your family? You make sure that their financial future is protected as well. Policygenius made getting life insurance for my family much, much easier, simpler, straightforward. All of the guesswork was taken out. Prioritize, peace of mind. Lock in your life insurance today. Policy Genius. PolicyGenius is an online insurance marketplace that allows you to compare quotes from some of America's top insurers side by side for free. Their licensed team helps you get what you need fast so you can get on with your life easily. Find what you need. Coverage, amounts, prices, terms. No guesswork, just clarity. Policy Genius helps you find the most affordable policy that meets your needs and will answer any question that you have along the way. Policy Genius get this has 5,000 five star reviews on Google and Trustpilot from customers who found the best policy fit for their needs. With Policygenius, you can see if you can find 20 year life insurance policies starting at just $276 a year for $1 million in coverage. So head to Policygenius.com to compare quotes from top companies and see how much you could save. That's policygenius.com all right. I want to welcome Eric Metaxas to the show. Friend of the show. Eric, how you been my friend?

[E]

I have been great, praise God. As you know, I'm in the swamp today. I'm in Washington D.C. as I was here yesterday. I know you're going to talk about it. I'm laughing before we even begin.

[B]

I mean, we could get to. So all right, let's just get to it. I mean, but there's so much good to talk about that this. The way that they parsed your joke is hilarious. Okay, so wait.

[F]

First.

[B]

Let's just start. Go ahead.

[C]

The press is bad. They mangled the joke.

[B]

The press is bad.

[C]

They screwed it up.

[B]

Breaking news.

[E]

Let's talk about the serious part first.

[B]

All right, let's do that.

[E]

Get to the funny thing. We will never stop. It's so funny. And it will keep people listening because you will not believe what we're gonna share. But go ahead.

[B]

It's so ridiculous. Anyways, I'm gonna play. First of all, rededicate two. This was an opportunity to rededicate our nation. To prayer, to God, to worshiping the Lord. Basically re articulating what the founders believed. Right? And what the founding of our nation was. Christian. It was. And J.D. vance did a great job. He gave a shout out to Charlie when he did it. And so I'll start there Sat 1.

[G]

It was obvious to the founders that our faith was the ground upon which America stands. It was our very foundation. And as a people. And if this foundation were to crumble, so too would the very values that make us Americans. From our religious inheritance comes many of the virtues and institutions we most cherish as a people. Our system of justice, our generosity to neighbors, our respect for conscience, and the moral discipline necessary for liberty itself. As my dear friend, friend, the late, great Charlie Kirk put it, all law reflects a morality. Neither law nor morality appears in a vacuum, but ultimately come from religion. And the morality and religion that formed the American consciousness were decidedly Christian, founded upon the principles and the divinity of Jesus Christ.

[B]

Pretty well said there, Eric.

[E]

Yes. Listen. Yesterday was an historic moment in the history of this nation. This was a. An epochal moment. First of all, we have a president who declared on May 17, we are going to rededicate the nation to God. Nobody twisted his arm. He didn't have to do that, but he did it. And Yesterday, which was May 17, we officially, in many ways, rededicated the nation to God. This is a huge thing. And as you know, Andrew, because I showed you my new book. I mean, because I have written a book on the revolution which is coming out in a couple of weeks. I have done the research to see that there is no way that America comes into being apart from the revolutionaries, these great men looking directly to God. But we've been living in a time where secularists have pushed that away. Push that away. We need to go back to the founding we need to go back to how. How did we get to be a nation where we govern ourselves? It comes from looking directly to God. They didn't get this in the French Revolution, which is why it went sideways in 10 minutes and turns into a bloodbath. Our revolutionaries, from John Adams on down, they understood we're going back to the Sinai Covenant like the Israelites in the wilderness. We're going to govern ourselves because we look directly to God. And so yesterday was a great day on the National Mall. So many wonderful people were there. The president read from Second Chronicles, the famous passage. I mean, just an amazing moment in American history. And I believe as a result of what happened yesterday, we're going to feel it, because that's a real thing. Really did this. And House. The speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, says we hereby. You know, it's like the government doesn't need to do this, but here we have the speaker of the House saying this. Officially, as a member of the United States government, we hereby rededicate the nation to the God of the Bible. It was a huge moment, and I was privileged to be one of the speakers. And I just. I can't say how happy I am that we did this. I expect to see things are going to happen because we have officially turned to God in the way we did yesterday.

[B]

Well, and that's so Scriptural, too, Eric. We wait on the Lord, you know, with expectation of him doing something in our midst, of him acting and moving in our country, in our politics, in our families. Right. And I totally agree with you that when we rededicate ourselves to the Lord, when we repent, when we cry out to him that he will heal our land, that he will bring righteousness in ways that we haven't seen maybe for a while. And I pray that that is so true. And when it's coming from the headship of the country, namely the political leaders that have been elected by we the people, I do believe that there is a powerful exchange that happens in the spiritual realms. We are not in a war against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities. Things move when we pray and we rededicate ourselves to the Lord.

[E]

Well, the important thing I think to say is that this is historical, or I should say we're being faithful to American history. This is not like a bunch of Christians got some crazy idea by doing this. And I write about this in my new book, Revolution. I didn't know this really until I did the research. It's not deniable that the men who rebelled against England and said, we're. We're going to take up arms to defend our rights. Our rights are given from God. They had a keen sense that this is what the Bible says, and we're doing this because this is what God says to do. So it was not a secular revolution like the French Revolution. They themselves understood this. And, and I write about it because I think most Americans are a little bit. We've forgotten how radically, explicitly Christian the revolution was. And now I have to be clear. This doesn't mean we impose our faith. And neither did George Washington or John Adams want to impose their faith. They believe in freedom of religion. So if you want to be an atheist, if you want to be a Muslim or you don't want to believe in anything, or you want to be an agnostic, they said, the government's not going to force you. But where do we get this great idea of freedom of religion? We get it from the Bible. It comes out of the Reformation, is that religion cannot be forced. We are not radical Muslims that are going to convert people by the sword. We are not radical atheists that will throw you in prison. We believe in religious liberty because we believe freedom comes out of the Bible. All the founders quoted Deuteronomy more than any other book. So it is everywhere in our founding. And what we're doing is we're going back to the beginnings. We're saying, you know, what makes America great again? We want to make America great again. What made America great in the first place? That is what made America great in the first place. Everybody needs to know that we can't be great again unless we know what made us great in the beginning. And I think of the 250th, the super centennial year. This is the time for us to relearn what many of us, myself included, had forgotten or weren't so clear on.

[C]

I mean, as you guys have been saying, it really is of existential importance. For real. Charlie loved that line. John Adams, that our Constitution was for a moral and religious people and it was wholly inadequate to the government of any other. That cited a lot just to say, oh, you know, this was a society founded on Christian belief and principle and it requires that to work. But we often glide past that second part that it's required for it to work. And I think about a lot of the stresses our system is under right now, where you especially have the left contemplating much more aggressive reaches beyond what I think our Constitution is supposed to have. Where they're talking, let's just 100% pack the Supreme Court, let's create entire new states just to cling to power ourselves. Let's do mass amnesty for every illegal immigrant. And you can't help but think, okay, well, this is a political faction that has abandoned religion, loudly trumpets that it's abandoning religion. And as a result, they don't see merit to the endurance of this Constitution. They don't see as much of a problem with burning down things that have lasted for 250 years and been successful. It's all, blow it up now to get power right now. And I just think of what John Adams said.

[E]

No, it's a total. But we have to be clear. It is a betrayal of America. You can have a country, but it won't be the America that we've had for 250 years. If you. If you don't understand the basics, if you don't understand that our rights come from God. I was interviewed by National Public Radio a couple days ago about this, and they were like, did you know that Pete Hegseth is going to speak and that he says that our rights come from God? And I was like, I don't think Pete Hegseth came up with that concept. I think it's. It's in, you know, it's in our founding documents. Like, that's. The whole nation is based on that. So the fact that you have major journalists that are unaware of this is a staggering drift away from the basics. But that's kind of where we are right now. It's almost unbelievable. And that's why yesterday was so important.

[B]

And.

[E]

And, you know, but the left, they've forgotten everything. They've forgotten how to laugh, they've gotten how to voice like it's.

[B]

We'll get into that in many ways. We'll get into that in just a second. But one word here is that. You know that Charlie has that famous clip where he's talking about how all the 13 colonies had a statement of faith, and even Maryland, which was Catholic, how the God is mentioned four times in the Declaration. It ends in a prayer to the supreme ruler, right? The ruler of the nations, which is Jesus Christ. I mean, it was so saturating the founding generation that it affected the way that they spoke, their turns of phrases, the way that they constructed the document itself, the Declaration and the Constitution. But people kind of miss the end where he says, the reason we have a constitutional crisis today is because we have a Christian document and our people are less and less Christian, and those become incompatible. And that's the real. The real takeaway. We need Revival in this land. If we are going to see a reconstitution of the America that we've always known and loved, what's made it such a shining city on a hill and a beacon of freedom for the world over. So we need people to reconnect with Jesus, to meet Jesus. We need a rededication. All right, Eric, we got to get into it. You said that the left can't take a joke anymore. They've lost their sense of humor. Couldn't agree more. They are absolute shrills. They are hall monitors. They are the fun police. I don't know what's gotten into them, but they are complete. They're like puritanical secularists. It's the craziest thing. And they've struck again. They've done it to you this weekend.

[E]

This is one of the best ever.

[B]

And they're writing hit pieces on you. The Daily Beast, MAGA pastor. Are you even a pastor, Eric? I don't know.

[E]

I'm not even a pastor.

[B]

Okay, that's what I thought. I'm aware of maga. They're so bad at the, like, Christian thing. They don't even know who pastor is and who's not. MAGA pastor makes bonkers claim about Trump's ballroom. Ok, Eric, I'm going to play the way they cut, by the way, on the left, like lefty Twitter. Blue sky. You are famous today. Like, this thing is gone.

[E]

Like, they're making. They've made my book break into the top 100 on Amazon.

[B]

There it is.

[E]

And it's not coming out for two weeks.

[B]

Put that book up on. Put that book up on the screen. There it is. Everybody get your copy. Pre order it today. Revolution. I saw Eric. We had breakfast in D.C. a couple weeks back and I read like the first 10 pages. This thing's beautiful, Eric. It's so well written. I want to say that you've gotten even better since Bonhoeffer. Yeah, that was the, like, international mega, huge bestseller, millions of copies, whatever. You're really good at this. I mean, as a historian, Eric, you are becoming so elite.

[E]

You're very kind. This story is much more fun, happy, obviously, than the Bonhoeffer story. And it's unfortunately extremely important that every American know this story, which is why I wrote the book.

[B]

But I mean.

[E]

Yeah. So yesterday.

[B]

Well, let me. Let me play the clips, Eric. I'm play the clips. Yeah. You're also a show host yourself, so you can't help it. But I'm going to commandeer it. This is the way they edited what you said stop. 15.

[E]

It's hard to believe that it would take two centuries for the Lord to raise up a great man, to bring that ballroom finally to stand where it needs to stand. It's extraordinary. We only had to wait 200 years.

[B]

So this is the way they edited your. Okay. And now I got the full. Because these people are liars. And if you did not know that they are liars yet, Eric. Yes. This would be. Case in point, Exhibit A.

[E]

No joke. No joke.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

I mean, think about this, right? I'm invited to speak in the National Mall about something that, to me, is one of the most important things in the history of the world, which is God's hand in American history. And that's because I wrote the book on the revolution. They wanted me in my speech to focus on two times when God did something miraculous. So I submit my speech. They put in the teleprompter, and I talk about the escape from across the east river, this incredible miracle in our history in 1776, and then a few months later, the crossing of Delaware. Two miracles where we lean on God, we look to God, and God delivers us. And that's the whole story of America. And that was the point of my speech.

[B]

But, Eric, you make a lot of jokes when you speak publicly. If you've ever heard Eric speak, he's kind of weaving really serious stuff in the midst of, like, offhanded jokes. And this is what it was. Here's the full. Eric, here's the full stop.

[E]

For it was 30 years after we won our independence. The British challenged us again in the War of 1812, burning parts of that city named after George Washington. You may be familiar with that city. They burned parts of the city, including the White House, which at that time, if you can believe it, did not yet have a ballroom. Yes, it's hard to believe that it would take two centuries for the Lord to raise up a great man, to bring that ballroom finally to stand where it needs to stand. It's extraordinary. We only had to wait 200 years.

[B]

It's perfect. There was laughs. Everybody was in on the joke, except for the freaking shrill Democrats in the media.

[E]

So funny, Andrew. This is what's so hilarious, is that the crowd instantly got the joke and left. Any fool listening to my speech up to that point knows this is just a dumb joke meant to get a laugh, right? That, you know. And 200 years later, God raised up a man to create that ballroom, as if that's God's plan for America. Is the ballroom like, I'm Joking around, right? Okay. So all my friends said, oh, that was a great line about the ball. Everybody gets a joke. I then find out that David French, who has Trump derangement syndrome, officially, the doctors have confirmed it, and others are on X freaking out. That I seem, according to them, seriously, said God has raised up Donald Trump to create the ballroom. Like, they believe this and they don't understand that I'm joking, even though everybody knows it's a joke. Then I read the Daily Beast has written an article about it. There was another major article about it. I can't even think. I saw it this morning. Huffington Post wrote an article about it, and the Jerusalem Post mentioned this. Everyone is freaking out, not getting that it's a joke. And you just think, this is, on the one hand, the funniest thing ever because it's promoting my book. And the other thing is, like, it's kind of sad that here's a moment of joking about the ballroom. They cannot get the joke. They are so enraged by President Trump that they have to attack. It's almost unbelievable.

[B]

It's almost unbelievable. Guess what? God has a sense of humor. And we're just gonna assume that this means you're gonna have a new New York Times bestseller on your hands here with. With the new book on the revolution. I mean, why not, Eric? Because, you know, that would be the. That would be you getting the last laugh. Okay, I will beg.

[E]

I will beg your audience to please

[B]

pre order the book. Put it up, please. There it is.

[E]

Please. And in fact, I'll say this. We never did this before. If you pre order it through my website, ericmantaxis.com we will send you a PDF. You could start reading the book immediately. I've never done that before because the book doesn't come out officially till June 2nd. It's a big, beautiful book, like the Big Beautiful Ballroom, if I can say that. But you have to go to ericmotaxas.com

[B]

and get the book, everybody. God bless you, Eric. God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. Thank you, my friend. We have a very nice treat in store for you. And that is Alex Marlow, editor in chief of Ripe Bart. And I check it every day. Multiple times. Most of the time. Multiple times. And he's also hosted the Alex Marleau Show. Alex, welcome back.

[D]

Well, it's great to be back with you guys. Thanks for having me yet again.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you're one of our regulars, Alex. You can't get away from us. It's just gonna Be this is the way it is now. You know, a true story. By the way, I have polled the audience informally about which of our regulars they like, and your name always comes up. So you're stuck with us, Alex. Love it, love it, love it. All right, thank you so much. Well, let's talk politics. There's a lot going on. Namely Senator Cassidy was just successfully primaried in Louisiana as a Senate. That's a huge. I don't think most people realize what a big deal it is for a sitting senator to be primary.

[C]

Yeah. And just pretty bad. Really badly because it wasn't even a full primary where he lost head to head with somebody. It was the first level primary. And so he got third place among the Republicans. Doesn't even make it to the runoff. So he. He knows months out that his time in the Senate is done.

[B]

Yep. Julia Letlow pulled away with that one with 44.8% of the vote. And John Fleming will be her challenger with 28.3%. Bill Cassidy came in third, as Blake said, at 24.8. So a distant third and be up against Jamie Davis, it looks like for the Democrats. So what do you make of this particular one? And then we're gonna move on to Thomas Massie.

[D]

Yeah. First of all, both of those candidates seem good. I think Trump endorsed let low the other candidate. We've done stuff with him, a lot of Breitbart. So this is a huge improvement and really awesome stuff to see this. But it's so rare. And that's the shocking thing is that we haven't seen this happen since 2012 with Richard Lugar getting primaried. And it's Senators tend to just keep their spots in the primaries until they get unseated by the other party. And that is just not how the country should work. And so it's really good where the voters actually hold people in power and just shows you money. External influences really do manipulate so many of our elections. But Cassidy was a bad guy. He was right out there, front and center grandstand against President Trump after all the J6 stuff. And it was such a loser move. And I'm glad that he got his comeuppance politically. And it's a great signal the base is sending to the establishment. Establishment. If you're gonna throw down against President Trump over nonsense mainstream media hokum like the GN6 stuff, then we're gonna vote you out. And so it's fantastic. I love it.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, candidly, I mean, I haven't ever shared this, but I remember When Charlie was trying to get Secretary Kennedy through the confirmation hearings and Cassidy was once again a thorn in the side, didn't like seeing some of Kennedy's stance on vaccines or whatever. I think Senator Cassidy is a doctor. Right. So he was much more in the establishment camp and was very nervous about that. And Charlie kind of swallowed his pride and reached out to him and said, hey, get on board with this. If not, there's going to be huge problems for you. It turns out there was problems for him anyways. Obviously, it's not Charlie's fault or Turning Point's fault, but President Trump definitely took notice of that impeachment vote and wasn't gonna let it go. I don't think anybody should be surprised by that. Next up is another race that President Trump has weighed in very heavily and that is involving Thomas Massie in Kentucky. Now it's become sort of a proxy fight on many things. On Epstein, on the Iran war, on Israel, foreign money. What are you making of this? It seems to be a dead heat right now, Alex. If not, Massie might be a little bit behind, depending on the poll. You see.

[D]

Yeah, it's a dead heat. It's one of these things where if you pull the Breitbart newsroom, there's a lot of people who are comfortable with Massie and there's going to be some people who are not. I'm in the camp that would like to see him lose. I think that he's built up his brand as an online grandstander. I don't see him making a lot of productive votes. He seems to be the guy. And J.D. vance was very articulate about this. Whenever Trump needed him to make sure something passed, then Massie is dependably not there. And also out on everything app where he uses the platform to try to fundraise and get clout by suggesting that Trump's government is covering up for pedophiles, at which I don't believe that to be the case. I believe we should all get all full information on Epstein. But I don't think that Donald Trump's government is going out of their way to try to protect pedophiles. That's Massey's entire online brand. And he always is the vote that. That the Republicans need and can't get. And he loves it. He delights in that. That, to me, is just so counterproductive. And I think the state of Kentucky can do better.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, listen, my take on Massie is we like Massie. I like some of his principled stands. Charlie liked Some of Massey's principled stands, namely anti war. He loved that he was a good maha fighter. He liked that principled budget hawk like that. But you know, Blake and I were talking about before the show today and go ahead. Yeah, it was your thought.

[C]

It was just. Yeah. Charlie liked a lot of things about Massie. He said he was a favorite congressman of his for a long time. But Charlie is also a guy who supports President Trump. He supports getting as much as you can done with this administration. Cuz he recognizes we're in a national crisis. Time is short and I don't think he would have a lot of patience for Massie. For example, when the Iran action happened, even if Charlie himself would have been very skeptical of that Massie, basically he went on and he said literally PSA bombing a country on the other side of the globe won't make the Epstein files go away. Suggesting the war is this wag the dog effort to distract from the Epstein files. Or another thing he said is I vote with the GOP 91% of the time because 9% of the time the they're starting wars, bankrupting our country or covering up for pedophiles. He's totally leaned into this brand that the administration is this pedophile cabal, which is the stuff you can find on Blue Sky. It's the stuff you can find in the worst conspiracy swamps. And frankly, I'll go further. I'll say I think that a lot of the file releases have vindicated President Trump's warnings, which is there's a lot of salacious gossip, it's made a lot of people look bad, it's been embarrassing for a lot of people, but it has not exposed some massive pedophile cabal. That's why people haven't been charged. If someone can show me this specific person should be charged with crimes against

[B]

children, I'd love to see some people charged from it. But that's another topic. I agree with your main point though.

[D]

Yeah, sure.

[B]

That essentially. Listen, there was some calls on X over the weekend. Will you endorse Thomas Massie? Listen, if Thomas Massie wins, I'm gonna be good with it. That's life. I'm totally good with it. I think we can work with Thomas. He's got some great positions and he's got some. To your point. He has made his whole brand about pedophile protection with Ro Khanna, by the way, Ro Khanna has stood shoulder to shoulder trying to make much of this political football with the Epstein thing with women that have been accused of actually soliciting some of the minors that were abused. So I'm just saying I have an open mind here. But at the end of the day, I say I will do what JD Vance does.

[G]

SOT17 being independent, having your own opinions is one thing. Voting against the party on every single issue, you're eventually going to make too many enemies. And that is the problem that Thomas has had. It's not one issue, it's not three or four issues. It's that every time that we've needed Thomas for a vote, he has been completely unwilling to provide it. That is why the President, United States has trained his ire on Thomas Massie. It's because we can never count on him for some of the most difficult votes. And when you always vote against the party, you can't expect the party to actually back you.

[B]

So listen, that. That seems to be pretty logical. Listen, again, I don't hate Thomas Massie. I actually like so much of him, just like Charlie did. But at the end of the day, we got a slim, slim majority and we gotta get stuff done. So, Alex, you had another thought that you wanted to convey on the Massie race.

[D]

Yeah. So the positive thing about Massie is he is a real American individual. And I do like that. And I wanna encourage people to be individuals, but his job as a congressman is to vote. And when you're consistently voting, that make the job easier for the Democrats and for the bad guys politically, then that becomes a major problem for me. And think about the One Big Beautiful Bill act where he opposed that. And that was essentially what people voted for in the 2024 election. Trump wanted this. He talked about the whole dime. He wanted one big beautiful bill that's going to get his agenda going. And Massie stood in the way of that. That's just a sign that he's in it for himself. And, you know, I don't love the glow up that his wife died and did the big glow up and then got the younger wife immediately. That's also off putting to me. But all that matters to me is how does he vote. And he's a Republican who votes problematically, a lot. And that's what it comes down to. So I'm rooting against him. But again, an interesting individual.

[B]

Yeah. I mean, listen, when it comes to his personal life, I mean, listen, from all I can tell, he was a devoted husband for many years and his wife died unexpectedly. My heart goes out to him about all of that and I don't subscribe to any of the salacious stuff. That people are slinging. I get the optics of it, Alex. I just. To your point, what matters to me is, is he going to be a part of a team or is he not? And listen, I understand, like I said, I love his principled stance on war. I think Alex Clark has been out publicly defending his maja bona fides. Love that, love the budget hawk stuff. But at some point, J.D. vance made a point. This is politics. When you fight the party and what the agenda of so many of your colleagues are trying to get accomplished constantly, eventually you're going to have a lot of enemies. So, again, if he gets elected, I'll be happy. If he doesn't get elected, we're going to deal with that reality as well.

[C]

Bill Cassidy just lost his primary because he was a senator who voted to convict Trump after January six. That was the reason he lost this primary, above all.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

And so if you are, the number one thing that annoys Republicans for the most part is deciding to be a giant thorn in the side of the president from their party, especially when they would prefer to be in conflict, at war with the left. And I think there are plenty of lawmakers who have navigated the dynamic of disagreeing with President Trump on specific issues, sometimes strongly. There are multiple lawmakers who do that on multiple issues, including even on Iran itself. But Massie has carved out a special brand for himself in that regard. And that, unsurprisingly, has created a lot of conflict.

[B]

And listen, part of this is the Trump dynamic. There's no doubt, I'm sure Trump played a part in this relationship devolving down. I've, I've seen, you know, certain allegations from Marjorie Taylor Greene about how this, how this has happened. And, and listen, I want us all to be in peace and to, to be rowing in the same direction. I want unity. Hopefully, if Massie ends up pulling this off, we can do this. Just one more note, by the way, like, there's a lot of groups spending a lot of money in this race, which one I think is a distraction. I think it's taking resources away from other races to beat Democrats that are more important. So that's my first perspective. Turning point action is not involved in this race. We're not spending money, we're not doing it. And so we're going to let the chips fall where they may. But I will say there's a tweet here from Stephen Miller that I thought was interesting because Ro Khanna says Thomas Massie is a man of character. He's the type of congressman our founders envision. I hope his constituents will see the courage, independence, and sincere love of country he brings to the job. Okay. And he's quoting a New York Times opinion column. Stephen Miller comes back and says Khanna is among the most radically liberal anti maga extremists to be found in all of Congress. This is the equivalent of being endorsed by Rachel Maddow. I do think that that's interesting. There's a whole discussion here, Alex, about where the money's coming from. There are pacs, there is the aipac, there's Israel aligned pacts. It's not foreign money, by the way. That's a misconception online, commonly, these are Americans that do care about Israel. Whatever you think about that, however, there is another side of the coin here where apparently it's only between 3% and 5% of the funding on Massey's side, who's actually outraised his competitor, Gow Ren, but there's only 3 to 5% that's coming from Kentucky. He's getting a lot of support from outside as well. If you're going to make that critique on one side, you can make it for both. In this race, there's a lot of national tension. We understand how it's going. All right, I think we've made our point clearly here. All right, last point, Alex Marlowe. The Iran war drags on. Okay? This is becoming a whole thing. Democrats have basically staked their entire political fortunes on calling Republicans racist after the Supreme Court ruling gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. We're getting rid of these racially gerrymandered districts, especially in the South. Those two dynamics, Iran and racism from the left. How are you, how are you looking at all this? How is it going to play out?

[D]

Yeah, I want to look at this in a neutral way because even though people in our audience, they're going to be so just numb to just being called racist and fascist and all that stuff. But the Democrats really do think this is going to be motivational in terms of voting because they're trying to frame it up as the Republican racist. Redistricting is what they're fighting against and is giving them a narrative. It's probably their clearest narrative in a while. I was playing a bunch of clips on my podcast earlier today, just going through how the talking points clearly went out. It's the entire party. They're all framing it as though all the redistricting is based in racism and they think they can win on it. I haven't seen fresh data, but they really do think this is the case. So mark that down. This is happening and they do think this is a winning issue to frame it this way. I hope the American people burned out on it. They don't stand for anything principally, but I think that's a very important point. The next thing, Iran, as you mentioned, the Democrats know that the longer the Iran war goes out, the goes on, the harder it's going to be for Republicans to win in a midterm. So they want to see it go on, they want to see it prolonged so that they can continue to dunk on Trump for this stuff. They're not looking for him to wrap it up and declare victory. Iran also, ironically, would like for things to go on longer because they know that Trump's going to get a bunch of political pressure both from his party and from the Democrat party at home. The media obviously, trying to make it so that write a narrative that we've lost the war no matter what happens. And so these are the two big things that I think are headwinds for President Trump heading into the midterm season, kicking off in full flight.

[B]

I will tell you what I mean, maybe it's just me, maybe I'm biased, but every time they sling the racism slur at us, I just feel like it falls flat. I feel like. And we're going to have Eli Steele on next segment to talk about this. He had a great essay out over the weekend explaining what drives so much of our racial dysfunction in here. But we'll just give you a taste of what Alex is talking about. SA8 I have to just tell the truth. There are people in this hostile anti black administration that would rather black Americans

[E]

pick cotton than pick the president, then

[B]

pick their congressperson, then pick a senator. Well, that's just civically idiotic actually because a sitting senator is chosen by the whole state and they don't have the votes in the south to get their senators in most races. Anyways, the point is, Alex, you're totally right. I mean, I've got 14 clips of this that I could choose from as well. And that's what they're staking their whole thing. I will tell you this, I would prefer this over the anti ice narrative after Minneapolis where you had Rachel Good and Alex Preddy that were killed.

[D]

I think this is far less wrong. I think we gotta be able to beat this. We gotta be able to beat this one. It's not a strong one. And have you guys ever talked to anyone who wants black people picking cotton? It's so she's going too far back. She's reaching too far back.

[B]

Yeah. Alex Marlowe. Thank you, my friend. We'll talk to you soon. How much are life, liberty in the pursuit of happiness worth to you? This is the question America's founders had to answer. You see, for more than 150 years, America's 13 colonies governed themselves until Britain declared they had no right to self rule. So ordinary people had to make extraordinary choices and risk their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to fight for independence. And against all odds, they won. And in victory, they built one of the most stable and lasting republics in human history. Now experience the American Revolution like never before, thanks to our friends at Hillsdale College. Revolutionary America, a new documentary from Hillsdale Studios and narrated by Tom Selleck, brings the founding of our nation to life through the voices of those who lived it. Alongside insights from leading scholars and commentator. I'm telling you, Hillsdale has outdone themselves with this. It's amazing. You've got to check this out. You've got to, frankly, you got to buy tickets to see this film. So please, please, please, it's something you could take the whole family to. You could take your friends. I mean, listen, at a time when history is often distorted in schools and classes and media, this is your chance to see the stories that really happened and ask yourself, what would you risk for freedom? Face the decisions our founders grappled with in Revolutionary American, a Hillsdale Studios film only in theaters May 31st through June 2nd. So get your tickets now by going to Hillsdale. Edu Revolution. You do not want to miss this opportunity to see this on the big screen. Hillsdale. Edu Revolution to locate a theater near you and buy tickets for Revolutionary American one more time. That's Hillsdale. Edu Revolution. All right, without further ado, I want to bring in our next guest and that is, of course, Eli Steele. He's a filmmaker, an American. Proudly whiteguiltfilm.com and you can find him on substack. Manofsteel.substack.com welcome to the show, Eli Steele.

[F]

Thank you, Terry. Thank you for having me.

[B]

Yeah, absolutely. It's an honor to have you, Charlie. Had your father on the show a couple of times. It was always a great pleasure and you've really taken up his mission and you're doing a great job. I was really profoundly moved by a piece you wrote, you published on X. I'm assuming it's on your substacks as well. But you said you're basically taking issue, I think, kindly, gently, with Gad Saad's position, suicidal empathy, who's another guy that we love on this show. And I think Gad's contribution to this discussion is important. But he said whites. You said this in your piece. You said white stood accused by history. They had failed the founding idea of all men are created equal and were stigmatized as a group. Whether or not they had personally owned slaves or enforced Jim Crow. The question that haunted many of them was not, how do I feel for you? But how do I prove I'm not one of the racists? This condition of societal guilt, not the emotion of empathy, became an organizing principle of American public life. You underscore that you believe that so much of our racial dysfunction in this country is caused by fear, not empathy.

[F]

Explain, sir, thank you for having me. And this is my first time on the show, so you already may not know that I am deaf, so I have a deaf action. But to your question, yeah, I mean, you're pointing out to something, I think this very fundamental, which is we're talking about collective guilt here. America had practiced, you know, racism, whether it was slavery or segregation, for almost four centuries. And it's another thing that's very important to remember that America was a very Christian country, and the civil rights movement was a Christian movement. And which form of Christianity was white? Because Christianity had been kind of the furthest. She was blamed slavery, she was blamed segregation, and that was a huge problem. So white America, rich, always pride itself on having that innocence, of having that special thing. And the civil rights movement said, no, you are not innocent. You enslaved us. And that created a huge fallout or a collision in the 1960s where white America relies. Oh, we're not on the top morally, as we thought that we were. And that spread to all of white America, whether you were a slave owner or you actually precipitated segregation, or even you didn't. Your white skin was enough of a condemnation. And I think that story was mischief on this whole suicidal empathy question, because it sort of focuses on the individual. Empathy began as the individual emotion, and you're kind of trying to steal that out. I'm arguing the opposite. That there was a collective judgment from the outside on white America, and that went into the mind of many people. And they said, okay, how do I achieve innocence? How do I achieve moral authority? And my father obviously calls this false innocence, because only true innocence can be done through true means of repenting. In other words, if we had done it the right way, we would have focused on developing the people that we had of prayer Instead, we focused on white redemption instead, what we call the left, what we call the postdoctrial liberalism. So it became all about white redemption rather than actually doing the much more difficult work of coming together as a country and repairing the damage.

[C]

No, exactly, Eli. It really feels like a regression to, you might even say, pre biblical morality that Charlie loved to cite that in the Old Testament. One of its innovations is to say, you do not punish children for the sins of their fathers. That individuals choices matter, individual decisions matter. Whereas many other moral codes don't take that. They do consider it normal to do collective punishment. In China, a very common punishment was if someone committed treason, you killed their wife, their children, their parents, sometimes even their. Their friends and associates. And that was totally normal. And this is doing the same thing that it's reviving this. This pre biblical morality of you are responsible for the decisions of your ancestors, in fact, your entire race, you're responsible for those. It is blood guilt, and they've brought that back, and it's created this psychosis in a lot of people that I

[B]

do agree, though, it's fear. Fear of being stigmatized with the racist word, fear of being called a bigot. We have turned that into American society. Is the number one insult, the number one assault on somebody's character conceivable, Right. It doesn't matter if you're a pedophile. If you killed somebody, we'll let you out of bond, cashless bond, if you did those things. But if you're a racist, then that is the number one chief sin that you can commit as an American. And how they did that is really, really fascinating. Now, that doesn't. So what we've done, Eli, is we've completely cut out the knees from logical conversations, common sense conversations about crime, about education, about fatherlessness. And instead, it's just. It's a blanket pejorative they can sling at you to make sure you're not allowed in polite society, you're not allowed to run for office, you're not allowed to lead a company, you're not allowed to be a part of a church. If you are the R word, they will take you out of everything. And that has created a paralyzing fear in the American body. Politicians, and I think we're finally. The further we get away from the 1960s, we're finally seeing a true reawakening where we can have actual discussions about race, politics, culture, and these sorts of things. That's why I think your piece is so powerful, Eli.

[F]

Yeah, and I think this dad piece is Very helpful in many ways because what he is doing is, he is describing, I think what is the symptom. You could call it suicidal empathy. I mean, I agree with it, but I don't think it's invaluable because I think it helped a lot of people focus on what's going on in the country and maybe we could get deeper beyond that. Because I think when you were talking about like paying for the stings of the father, that is about the most anti American principle. Yes, A nation of individuals. We broke away from aristocratic Europe where the first son had all the power that now everybody had to change. Everybody individual. We created, you know, the whole boundary principles are all around the protection of the individual and what the. We could call them, you know, bad actors or something like that. Based on an opportunity. In the 1960s, they said white America is guilty. That's our power. That's why my father says the white guilt is literally the same day as black power. Not only that, across Europe we have colonialism and now you have colonial guilt. So now you see how whites all across America, this is why when George Floyd happened, you have the uk, you have Sweden, Finland, Germany, all bowing down to Black Lives Matter responded to this Western guilt, which we should kind of call white guilt in general. But all of that, I think the whole purpose of it is to undermine the individual and force us into a tribal society, back into, I guess we call it pre biblical times where we are tribal. This is very anti western. And this is why my father and I, we believe it is the most destructive force that going on in the Western world. Because if we do become tribal, then we will have to reinvent America somewhere else

[B]

and there's nowhere else to go at this point. And I think it's very telling when you look at that SPLC story too, Eli, how they knew that if you could weaponize white supremacy, if you could create a boogeyman that rested upon this foundation, this narrative that had been created in the post 1960s world, then you could monetize it, you could weaponize it, you could send it to the DOJ and you could criminalize it. You can do all of this with the cudgel of racism, of guilt, of fear that has paralyzed our culture. And if we are paralyzed by this fear, we will lose Western civilization. We will lose confidence in ourselves, the confidence we need to build this civilization that we know and love, the greatest that the world has ever known. Eli Steele, you can check him out@substack manofsteel.com and check out this new essay, I think it's super important, Eli, to the discussion. Thank you so much for your time, my friend.

[F]

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

[B]

God bless you. Really important conversation there. Okay. We got a ton of emails from you guys about Thomas Massey, a bunch

[C]

of emails about Massie and from various deluge. Various perspectives, I will say. And we should acknowledge that.

[B]

Would you say it's about 50? 50. I haven't reviewed it.

[C]

I actually probably would say, which. Which is notable for someone who is in conflict with the president. Yeah. One from Ali says Massie would rather grandstand about balancing the budget than stop Iran from building ballistic missiles. He voted against Trump's big, beautiful bill that delivered tax cuts for Americans. He's done nothing to help JD Vance go after the massive fraud and waste that is actually draining our budget. Priorities matter. But then Jamie says, I love Massie. We need more Rand Paul's and more Thomas Massey's. I want him to vote yes where he can, but he has always been against spending. This isn't new. I understand the loyalty issue though. Democrats also vote together. But I think we have so many rhinos that it has become impossible for Republicans. I wish we would focus on removing Rhinos though, before the Massey types. Someone says, tell me, tell Rhino Andrew that Massey does not have any points. So I think he's saying, you said he had a point on something.

[B]

Oh, I say no. No. Okay, listen, I'll stand by it. Massey's good on war, he's good on maha, he's good on spending.

[C]

All right. And then we have another one. This was actually from a few days ago, but I thought it meshed well with this. Massey was on my friends list. But I have been telling people for a couple years that libertarians are planning to sabotage MAGA to by helping Democrats because they hate tariffs and they are pro China. Big Tech wants them to. Wants to fund the libertarians to destroy our movement. At some point, it no longer matters whether people are good on some things. His opponent should be endorsed. So that's a good representation. I mean, we actually got one from someone who says that they're so pro Macy that if he loses, they're going to vote Democrat from now on. So that's a very strong opinion giant.

[B]

Psyop.

[C]

We disagree on that.

[B]

Zero reason to vote Democrat. Listen, listen. Democrats are an anti civilizational force.

[C]

Yes.

[B]

Let me prove this to you. There are. Let's just bring up the real numbers. Okay. So these are the same people that let Irina Zarutska's killer out after multiple Multiple violent crimes in this man's past. All right, we've got another story of the. I mean, it's like every day there's a new story. That's what Democrats do. Democrats are the one that flooded the the borders and want to replace American voters with more compliant third worlders. Democrats are the ones that want to blow the entire federal budget to give freebies to foreigners, to give green New Deal scams, all this stuff. They are agents of chaos, quite literally. They don't believe in merit, they believe in dei, they don't believe in equality, they believe in equity. Every single point that they choose is going in the wrong direction. Literally every single point. I've got nothing for them. They want to kill babies at 9 months old. What could you possibly want to defend them on? Now, if you're an accelerationist. Right, let me deal with you guys too. If you're an accelerationist who wants to burn it all down so that you can rebuild a party in your image, it doesn't work. All they will do is get stronger, entrench their power more deeply and cause more chaos, destruction and and carnage in their wake. Do you think that we are going to anytime soon get out from under the 10 to 15 million illegals that they let flood this country in just four years of Joe Biden? In four years, they darn near killed the country. Four years. So if that's your plan, I couldn't disagree with you more strongly.

[C]

Yeah, so it's like, for example, we read the Ro Khanna tweet endorsing Massie and yeah, Roe, he is a somewhat different Democrat in that he sometimes finds issues to collaborate with. But you can check this, you can just check this where Ro Khanna, he supports amnesty for illegal immigrants with a path to citizenship. Ro Khanna all in on the transculpt. Totally loves all of that stuff.

[B]

Ro Khanna all in on COVID vaccine. No bodily autonomy in that. You know, all in on the George Floyd riots as free reckoning.

[C]

He actually wants a. I checked that. He wants to investigate possible reparations.

[B]

You want to know how Americans.

[C]

No, but it's just this thing happens over and over. And if you're going to say I'm going to vote Democrat as a protest thing, you are voting for the great solvent of our civilization. You are voting to create California for the entire country. And if you want to see how things are going, you can look at California right now. California can't build anything. California is just in perpetual thrall to the worst excesses of labor they basically are just controlled by a cartel that defrauds their state government with the willing connivance of the state government itself. That is the future of the country. If you lean into this and we're frustrated if Massie is enabling that to come about, even if he is on our side for a bunch of different issues. But if you're going to look at this and say I'm mad over this, over a House race, I am now going to switch to the other party, you need to get your head checked.

[B]

Well, and here's. And listen, I understand the president can be difficult to deal with. Lauren Boebert is running into some of this and Warren Davidson, who's. They're all campaigning with Massie. Listen, if Massie wins, we're gonna be just fine. We're gonna deal with it and it's great. I don't dislike Massie in a broad sense. That's all I'm saying. But if you're gonna vote Democrat because you don't like the way this race goes, that's insanity. This is how insane it gets. Throw up these numbers. This is from the FBI. Did you know that because we've become so insane about our racial in this country, because of Democrats, because of left wing progressives, that their murder rate is now at 1 out of every 22 black men will murder someone in their lives. That's that red column in the middle. That is the fruits of the left. The vast majority of those murders are being enabled or inspired by a very small percentage of people that we can't ever get off the streets because they believe in no cash, bail and all this garbage. And these judges have been co opted by the radical left. There is not one single issue where I could get on board with Democrats. Not one. So I completely disagree with the accelerationist burn it all down protest vote. What's going to happen in Kentucky is going to be decided by Kentuckians in that district. Let it play out. That's my final word.

[E]

For more on many of these stories and news you can Trust, go to charliekirk.com.