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The Karol Markowicz Show: Will Chamberlain on the Conservative Legal Movement, Social Media Power & What’s Next
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Carol Markowitz
Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz show on iheartradio. My guest today is Will Chamberlain. Will is senior counsel at the Article three project and one of my absolute favorite people to follow on X. Hi, Will. So nice to have you on.
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Will Chamberlain
Great to be with you, Carol.
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Carol Markowitz
I find that your feed is really smart and very funny, clever, obviously. So I would love to know more about you. How did you get into this thing of ours?
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Will Chamberlain
Yeah, this thing of ours. That's a good way of describing it. Let's see. In 2017, I had moved to D.C. to go work for the Competitive Enterprise Institute as a lawyer. I, I, you know, graduated from Georgetown Law in 2015, practicing big law, had a cup of coffee, decided, didn't like it, moved back to D.C. and then when I was in here, I, I, one of my, the guy, one of the, I basically met Mike Cernovich through a mutual friend who was also my boss at cei, and through Mike, who I'd been following for years. At that point, I was like, hey, I want to, you know, I'm pro Trump. I like to be hooked up, hooked in with the D.C. pro Trump people. You know, hey, I'm also, you know, a Georgetown law grad. Like, I, you know, I'm a serious person. So he did. And so then I started organizing. One of the things I started doing was organizing cocktail hours for manga figures in the administration at the Trump Hotel, which was a very good way to get to meet everybody and sort of the many things that, you know, people not necessarily Know that, you know, big social media platforms are often built offline with relationships that you build with other people who have social media platforms.
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Carol Markowitz
Yeah.
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Will Chamberlain
So, you know, that was how I kind of got my foot in the door and, and then, you know, started posting and had, you know, bigger names at the time, like people like Cernovich, who's obviously one of the first big people to amplify me, Jack Posobic. And over time, I do that long enough and, you know, I do say enough interesting things that eventually a lot of people are following me. So, yeah, it's, it's sort of interesting. I know a lot of people build their platforms by doing something else first and then using the fame they get from that thing to build a social media platform. I kind of did it in reverse. I built the social media platform platform and then use that to do more and more interesting things.
- [03:29]
Carol Markowitz
It's funny, I also, my, my, like when I got my start in, I, I had a blog and I would throw happy hours and meeting people in real life had, you know, just had me make a lot of different connections and a lot of people started reading me and it kind of took off from there. I think the real life thing really shouldn't be overlooked.
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Will Chamberlain
Yeah, it's, it's, it's hugely important. And you know, you, you can't, you can't start out being in the middle of nowhere not knowing anybody.
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Carol Markowitz
Right.
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Will Chamberlain
You're. Well, you can, it's just.
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Carol Markowitz
You're doing everything on hard mode.
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Will Chamberlain
Yeah, you're doing everything on hard mode.
- [04:00]
Carol Markowitz
Exactly. Yeah.
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Will Chamberlain
So that was, that was sort of how. If you want a little. How. How did I get my break into this space? That's how I got it.
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Carol Markowitz
Amazing.
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Will Chamberlain
That said, like, you can get your break. Plenty of people have had their break and, and don't say interesting things for long enough to remain interesting. Like they do something and get attention for it. But if they don't have. I mean, fundamentally, X as a platform is built on having interesting things to say about the events of the day.
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Carol Markowitz
Yeah, yeah, right. You could say one thing and get a lot of followers, but then, you know, I don't think a lot of people hang on to that.
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Will Chamberlain
Right, right. And if, or if you only have one message and then that message no longer is relevant, well, then what are you, what are you, what else are you going to talk about?
- [04:37]
Carol Markowitz
Right.
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Will Chamberlain
You know, and, and so, you know, and then also you have to think about how you build your following. If you built your following saying exactly one thing to, you know, cheerlead for something, then you can't change your mind because that's why people are following you, because you're the guy who says the thing and you no longer say the thing.
- [04:53]
Carol Markowitz
Yeah. So I went to the Article 3 project website in preparation for this because I wanted to know more about it, more about you. And I loved the tagline on the front page. It says, A3P brings brass knuckles to fight leftist lawfare. What does that mean? What do you guys do?
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Will Chamberlain
We're bullies. So that's, that's the core of our, you know, we bully, you know, legislators into confirming the people we think should be confirmed. We try and advocate on behalf of, you know, like, you know, to get judges confirmed that will be good on the law. We try and advocate for judges to do the right thing in cases. And we try and win the debates internally on the right, especially about what the conservative legal movement should be doing and what conservatives lawyers should be doing. And so we find ourselves in conflict with people like Ed Whelan, for example, who might be like a, you know, kind of squishier Republican, you know, telling conservative judges, conservative lawyers that they should be more hesitant, weak, weak, need, that sort of thing. So in our view, I won't be too uncharitable. But that's, that's, that's a big part of what we do. And so it involves, you know, the pressure that both, you know, my, myself, Mike Davis, Josh Hammer, all of us can put through our advocacy on X, through op eds, through media hits, and then because all of us have a lot of followers, how we engage those followers and get them to speak to legislators to and to the public and to the executive branch. So that's through campaigns where, you know, we've set a portal, they can just contact and email people. So all this is just a. It's a very, very effective and aggressive advocacy organization. We're not very big. It's probably like 10 people total involved, and many of them are consultants. But in like the core, you know, what we're able to have, we have a lot of force that we can bring to bear on any particular issue. And when we do, I think we end up leading the way and kind of setting the line for the conservative movement on legal issues now, I think that's where we are. It used to be that other groups did that, but now it feels like those groups, those groups are kind of don't want to, if we set the line, they don't want to get on the wrong side of us because then they, we're both. We're really good bullies. So it's really not pleasant to be on the wrong side of us.
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Carol Markowitz
It's interesting because I often think the conservative side doesn't really have bullies. I think that so much of what we do is just there's a lot of squishy people and people who don't fight back and, and don't put up the arguments and don't want to offend anybody. And I think it's very hard to be the bully in that environment. Do you guys find that?
- [07:31]
Will Chamberlain
I mean, I don't. I don't think it's hard. I think it, you know, if anything, the vacuum of having people who are really aggressive and setting the line on these things made it was. Is what meant that there was just such a huge audience for what we're doing and so. So many people who got behind us and support what we're doing. Because I think the fundamental, you know, the fundamental failure of the conservative legal movement is honestly, for years, they weren't deeply loyal to conservative voters.
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Carol Markowitz
They.
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Will Chamberlain
They were kind of doing their own thing and, you know, had their own sort of clique and their own norms, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so we come in and we say, no, actually, you know what? You know, the people who are the reason you get to be judges and lawyers in the administration, the people who voted for Republican presidents, they have. They have asks and, you know, you don't, you know, the idea that you would just be completely oblivious to that and not on board with the broader conservative project, not just the conservative legal movements project, the broader conservative project is it's just not going to fly anymore.
- [08:32]
Carol Markowitz
Yeah.
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Will Chamberlain
And so, you know, and I think that's one of the reasons, like, you know, Mike is so popular on. On. He goes on ban and he goes wherever. I mean, all three of us have built enormous platforms. Really. And what is my platform like? Again, I didn't come at this from the perspective of, gosh, I have the stature from running a television show or something or, you know, being a major player. I've never served in the administration. I served briefly for Ron DeSantis in. On his. On the legal side for a couple months before I got bored of it. So, you know, that all. But the reason is because I know this, right. I have a very powerful and persuasive voice when it comes to conservative legal issues. Conservatives think I'm usually the people in our side think I'm right about things, at least when it comes to the law. And so that's the force. Like, it's persuasive force. I'm not physically beating on people.
- [09:18]
Carol Markowitz
No, obviously you're not, like, putting them in a headlock, but metaphorically speaking.
- [09:23]
Will Chamberlain
Right.
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Carol Markowitz
What are some big wins you guys have had?
- [09:26]
Will Chamberlain
We got Pete Hegseth confirmed. I think that was a big one. That's the biggest one off the top of my head. We're not the only people who worked on that, but we were a big part of making sure that he got confirmed. There were a lot of people whining about that, and once. Once we got involved, they stopped doing that. Who. Who are the other people that I'm trying to think of off the top of my head? We got Emil Bove confirmed. That's another big win. There were a lot of Republicans who were kind of wishy washy about that. And then we came out in full force behind the nomination and made the aggressive arg. Ed Whelan was like a really big conservative figure trying to get his people to not vote for Emil Bove. And again, we have a tiny majority in the Senate. So if he managed to peel off one or two people with his decades of, you know, relationships and work and prestige in the conservative legal movement, that he could have, you know, he should have, you think that he would be able to peel off one or two of the most moderate senators. Didn't happen. And I think a big part of that was, you know, by the time we were done advocating on that issue, Ed Whelan had blocked every single one of us. He had blocked me, he blocked Josh Hammer, and he had blocked Mike. And, you know, his job is to beat us. Right. Actually, when you think about it, like, if he. If his job is literally to win the debate with us online because he is advocating for a different view of how the conservative legal should work. He works at a nonprofit. He's taking donations to that effect. If he's blocking the three of us and just trying to ignore that we exist, it's like, well, then you've. We've won, you've lost. Like, we're, you know, because we're speaking to hundreds of thousands of people, you're speaking to a few thousand. So, you know, if you're not winning the debate with us, if you're just not even participating, then we just win by default.
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Carol Markowitz
What would you be doing if it weren't this? What would a plan B be?
- [11:03]
Will Chamberlain
Oh, gosh, I don't know. I mean, it's hard to say. In some abstract sense, Plan B would be going back to practice law in a normal way, which I don't have any intention of doing or trying to go work in in some state government somewhere. I guess I could have gone back to Ron DeSantis and worked somewhere in the Florida state government. Yeah, maybe I could have gone to work for the administration, but you know, all those things would be options. But I much prefer what doing what I do now, which is allows me to have this kind of bucolic suburban life with living, working from home with my family and then also being extremely involved in the issues of the day.
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Carol Markowitz
Through X. Yeah, I just met your wife. She is lovely.
- [11:41]
Will Chamberlain
Really? She's great.
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Carol Markowitz
Yeah, really great pair.
- [11:45]
Will Chamberlain
Got two beautiful kids and hopefully more on the way in the future.
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iHeart Podcast Announcer
Love it.
- [11:50]
Will Chamberlain
You know, we both work in North Carolina, we both live and work from our home in North Carolina. But we're know she's at the Manhattan Institute and goes up to New York every so often I'm here and I go out to D.C. when I need to for Article 3, so. And for other things as well. I help with the National Conservatism Conferences and help organize those and put together panels. So all that is all that is gravy.
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Carol Markowitz
Segs very well. To my. One of my three questions that I ask all my guests. What are you most proud of in your life?
- [12:17]
Will Chamberlain
So, you know, that's an interesting. I read that it was an interesting question because. And the answer is beyond, obviously my family and having what I've built with my wife, I am proudest of what I've built in terms of my ex account. Right. And it's not just, you know, it's a. That's the product of 10 years of work. Right. 10 years of advocacy. And so, you know, is there a book at the end of it? No, I haven't written.
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Carol Markowitz
Oh, is there a book at the end of it?
- [12:43]
Will Chamberlain
Maybe there will be. I have to like actually find a way to sit down and do that. I have terrible add. So that's one of the reasons I find X so appealing is that I can fire off thoughts quickly. But it's a product. My ex account is a product of 10 years of work and at this point it's its own kind of phenomenon. I mean, not a huge phenomenon in the world, but it's a very powerful thing that allows me to have influence on the issues of the day, get asked to testify before Congress, meet all sorts of interesting people, be followed by all sorts of interesting people, go on interesting shows like this one. And so I'm really, really proud of the platform I've built. I'm proud that I've managed through years of being advocating on very aggressively on a variety of topics, as aggressive as anybody, I think, in the sort of legal movement. Still, having built up this platform, having not, and also having done so in a way that doesn't, I'm not pigeonholed into anything as far as I can tell. Like, I can say, I say what I think and I can have a bunch of people who are following me because they respect that I say what I think and that I, or at a minimum, I do not say what I do not think. Right. Like sometimes I hold, I do hold my tongue at times. Especially given that we currently control the administration. It would be kind of rude of me to berate them on Twitter when I could pick up the phone. But you, you can count on me to not say things I, I don't think and yeah, and be, and be, be interesting and contrarian at times because, you know, that's, that's what I built.
- [14:08]
Carol Markowitz
We're going to take a quick break and be right back on the Carol Markowitz Show.
- [14:14]
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- [14:44]
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- [16:16]
Carol Markowitz
Do you have any legal, like, pet issues? Are there things that you really care about that are more important to you than, you know?
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Will Chamberlain
The funny thing is I won on the biggest issue I cared about, and I didn't win through the law. I won because Elon Musk bought Twitter, right? You know, and so basically, for years, my big piece of advocacy, you know, before for anything else, was everybody should have a right to use Twitter, right? They're basically like, the idea of permanent bans of individuals for bizarre things that were perfectly lawful was wrong. That free speech isn't meaningful in the modern era if you're not allowed to speak freely on the Internet. So that we needed to have legal change now, basically, I kept talking and I remember very early on, we're talking like 2017, 2018. I'd go on with people and people would be like, what? Free speech, civil right? What do you mean? That's intervention in private business. I won that debate. You'll notice nobody talks that way anymore. Like that. That. I just had that debate over and over again with people and discuss people who are skeptical on our side, and they were persuaded, like, I was just right. And also, thankfully, Twitter just kept behaving in such an obnoxious and ridiculous fashion that made my arguments seem endlessly more persuasive. So at that point, at a certain point, then, you know, eventually, you know, here's a funny story, right? Seth Dillon at one point had a discussion with me about this, right, where he was trying to probe my views. We had like a lengthy, I think, text conversation, phone call. And then Seth Dill went on with Elon Musk, right? Elon Musk went on his podcast and I think they talked about this stuff. And then Elon Musk went out and bought Twitter. So you can, you know, basically, I.
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Carol Markowitz
Think you're the starter there, Right?
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Will Chamberlain
I get the. I feel like I maybe.
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Carol Markowitz
Yeah, yeah.
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Will Chamberlain
But thank you, Seth. Thank you, obviously, Elon, for buying it. I didn't have 40 billion laying around.
- [17:59]
Carol Markowitz
No.
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Will Chamberlain
But talk about a DSX Machina. That basically ended the salience of that issue. I mean, who talks about free speech on the Internet? We don't have to worry about it because we have the biggest platform, the most Important one is controlled by us. So like whatever YouTube does, whatever Facebook does, like whatever, who cares?
- [18:13]
Carol Markowitz
You can put it on X. Yeah.
- [18:15]
Will Chamberlain
Yeah, I can put it on X. And X, X is where all the serious people are who I want to, you know, who, you know, have real deal influence are. So if I can put it there. Yeah. Not Blue Sky. No Blue Sky. I mean, Blue sky is making the mistake that all the competitors were making when we were getting banned in like 2020. I mean, because the fundamental problem is, and this is something, this was the beginning of my argument, like X is a natural monopoly. There's always going to be. You're not, you're going to have so much trouble replacing the public square with like a separate smaller public square that only has people who agree with you. That's so much less interesting than the real public square where everybody is debating. So I think Blue sky, what you're seeing is what happens to all these other platforms. Right. People are like, explore it, like have a little fun for a while. Feel really good because they're talking to people they agree with.
- [19:04]
Carol Markowitz
Everybody agrees with you. Yeah. And then it's really bored and want.
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Will Chamberlain
To go back to X. Yeah.
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Carol Markowitz
And they always come back. They do.
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Will Chamberlain
They always come back.
- [19:11]
Carol Markowitz
Yeah.
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Will Chamberlain
Because that's where that's, that's where the, the discussion with weight happens. Right. That, you know, you can get cheerleading on some small little platform that isn't X. But X is where the discussions with weight that have impact happen.
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Carol Markowitz
Yeah. At the time when people were getting banned on X for saying things like, you know, masks don't work or I mean, all kinds of insanity, I was thinking like, I'm not going to go to one of these smaller platforms. I just don't care. Like I'm, if I get banned from X, I get banned from X, I'm not going to go have the conversation with people who already agree with me and that's it. It has to be put out to the larger audience, otherwise it just doesn't matter.
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Will Chamberlain
That's right. I agree.
- [19:47]
Carol Markowitz
Give us a five year out prediction. Could be about anything at all.
- [19:52]
Will Chamberlain
Five year out prediction. I mean anything at all. Like we're gonna have self driving cars are gonna dominate. We're right at the cusp of self driving cars becoming the thing. And you know, I already, I'm already seeing like people able to drive all around the country in their Teslas. I, I think we're, we've, you know, it took maybe 10 to 15 years longer than people thought. But it's here now and Five years from now, it's, we're gonna start having debates about exactly who gets to drive and who doesn't. Because driving is gonna be seen as one of these things that humans do and it's very dangerous. It's so many people, so many people die on the road. So maybe that's more like a 10 to 15 year prediction. But like, we're not far from self driving. Being just self driving is already better than elderly drivers. For instance, like, you know, my parents are getting up there and, and I recommend like they're, you know, they're of means. And I was like, your next car should probably be a Tesla because.
- [20:38]
Carol Markowitz
Right.
- [20:38]
Will Chamberlain
You, you can't, you know, you're getting the stage where, you know, you don't want to drive at night. Tesla will drive at night.
- [20:43]
Carol Markowitz
Yeah. And I only use the Tesla at night. It's actually my husband's car. But if I'm driving somewhere at night, yeah, I'm a great driver at night, whatever. But I like the self driving. I don't have to really think about it at night.
- [20:57]
Will Chamberlain
Yeah. And like five to 10 years it'll just be obvious that the self driving is better. But yeah, no self driving is coming. That would be my big five year prediction.
- [21:05]
Carol Markowitz
It's funny because do you think Americans are going to go for it? Americans are so like, I drive my own car, you know, very independent and like nobody could take away our freedom of self driving. And I don't know, I kind of think Americans might rebel a little bit against it.
- [21:21]
Will Chamberlain
Yeah, I mean, they might. But I think, you know, I think ultimately the, the safety argument will be so persuasive and I think that, you know, you'll still have some. I think that it'll be one of those things that you'll just, it'll be more restricted and maybe every car will have to have some sort of self driving takeover to prevent accidents. That would be an interesting thing. Yeah, but it'll be, I mean, it's just, you're gonna, everybody's gonna be confronted with the force of the fact that.
- [21:47]
Carol Markowitz
Like we could be saving lives.
- [21:49]
Will Chamberlain
Tens of thousands of people who die every year in car accidents. And 30 years from now they're gonna look at us like we're barbarians. Like, what? You had this deck and you weren't using it and you could have saved tens of thousands of people a year. Like, come on.
- [21:59]
Carol Markowitz
Well, I have loved this conversation. I've loved getting to know you a little bit better. Leave us here with your best tip for my listeners on how they can improve their lives.
- [22:09]
Will Chamberlain
How you can improve your lives, I think it is how to read, how to win friends and influence people. So much of what people struggle with is understanding that you, you know, you should try and be easy to be friends with and easy to support. I think a lot of people in our space especially get kind of narcissistic and don't think through, you know, are they being, you know, they get and they also get obsessed about particular things. It's like always, you know, it's really useful to remember that it's important to be a good friend.
- [22:40]
Carol Markowitz
I love that he is Will Chamberlain. Check him out on x. Follow the Article 3 project. Thank you so much, Will.
- [22:46]
Will Chamberlain
All right, thanks for having me.
- [22:49]
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- [23:19]
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