
The inauguration of President Trump begins, TikTok users flock to RedNote, and Joe Biden pardons Fauci. Click here to join the member-exclusive portion of my show: https://bit.ly/4biDlri Ep.1655 - - - DailyWire+: Join the celebration! Use code 47 at https://dailywire.com/subscribe for 47% off your membership today! ""Identity Crisis"" tells the stories the mainstream media won’t. Stream the full film now, only on DailyWire+: https://bit.ly/3C61qVU Order your Mayflower Cigars here: https://bit.ly/3Qwwxx2 (Must be 21+ to purchase. Exclusions may apply) - - - Today's Sponsors: Balance of Nature - Go to https://balanceofnature.com and use promo code KNOWLES for 35% off your first order PLUS get a free bottle of Fiber and Spice. Oracle - Oracle is offering to cut your current cloud bill in HALF if you move to OCI. See if your company qualifies for this special offer at https://Oracle.com/PRESIDENT PureTalk - Exclusive discount for our listeners at: https://PureTalk.com/KNOWL...
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Michael Knowles
Good morning, everybody. Happy Inauguration Day. I am here at the US Capitol. Beautiful building right behind me and the future is so bright that I have to wear shades today. History will be made. We are live as we prepare for President Trump to take the oath of office. Watch it all live on Daily Wire. Plus, celebrate the 47th president with 47% off your membership. Go to DailyWire.com subscribe Snoop Dogg played a Trump inauguration ball. Oscar de la Renta is bragging about designing clothes for J.D. vance's wife. Bill Gates sucked up to Trump for three hours over dinner at Mar A Lago. CNN is paying out millions of dollars in defamation settlements. CBS might try to settle a $10 billion lawsuit brought by President Trump. And in case you forgot, Trump is about to be inaugurated today after most Americans voted for him. It has never been more over for the American left. I'm not saying the libs are totally destroyed. Nothing is ever totally final in politics. But the libs are pretty thoroughly destroyed. They are more thoroughly destroyed than they have been at any point in my lifetime. Nobody likes them. Just about everyone now likes, or at least pretends to like President Trump. Either way, I don't really care. This is the biggest cultural shift of our lifetimes. It is happening live right now. I'm Michael Knowles. This is the Michael Knowles Show. Welcome back to the show. The hits just keep on coming. As if the day couldn't get any better. We have some exclusive info. We're going to break some news on this show. We know what some of the early Trump executive orders will be. The executive orders that are coming up in just a matter of hours. Now. We'll be talking to the Daily Wire's very own Mary Margaret Olihan momentarily. But first I want to tell you about Oracle. Oracle right now. 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Offer ends March 31. See if your company qualifies. Oracle.com President Oracle.com President we're getting even more breaking news. Actually, it's not just the Trump executive orders, which are great. But in his final moments in office, Joe Biden has decided to issue preemptive pardons to Dr. Fauci. Offensive enough, the January 6th committee, which probably committed crimes, as far as I can tell, to pardon them. And General Mark Milley, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. A really bizarre moment in American history when some of the top people in the federal government need to receive pardons because of their years of corruption and just hours before the new president is inaugurated. But a perfect ending to Joe Biden, a disingenuous hypocrite for his entire political career, a man who in this last presidential election began by saying that we need to make sure that we remain a nation of laws. No one is above the law. He said, democracy is on the ballot. We're going to restore the soul of this nation. And he ends by by placing people above the law. People who committed crimes, including his son, who got the most sweeping pardon ever in American presidential history. Joe Biden, who wants to ignore the democracy on the ballot. Joe Biden, who is noticing that the democracy voted for his opponent in this election. A criminal, corrupt, disreputable way for a criminal, corrupt, disreputable politician to end his his career. And I think an admission that the libs lost. There is political appetite in the country right now for investigations into Dr. Fauci, Dr. Fauci, who allowed the country to shut down, who funded illegal research, it would appear, who lied to the American people, who was so high handed, who forced all of our relatives, not all of them, but a lot of them, to die alone, who just upended our country and never had to pay any consequence. At least with Fauci, you can say most of the time it was just a maladministration rather than a direct crime. When it comes to the January 6 committee, they may have committed actual crimes, they actually withheld evidence, they actually defamed people, but they get their preemptive pardons. And then Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, just to show you how deep the rot runs. So, all right, see you later. Joe Biden, the left is just destroyed. They just have Nothing. They're just trying. They're basically trying to save the scraps of their reputations and credibility and wealth and freedom and go away. They're not even really trying to duke this out in the public square anymore. And you see this all around. I mean, the fact that Oscar de la Renta. It seems like this is a trivial issue, but it's actually not a trivial issue. The fact that a major clothing designer, hip, fashionable, cool elite would come out, post pictures of J.D. vance. We were told J.D. vance is Hitler. He's Hitler Jr. J.D. vance. Democracy's on the ballot. This is an existential threat to our republic. But now JD Vance and his wife, Usha Vance wears a custom noir velvet gown with asymmetric floral accents and a sweetheart neckline for the Vice President's dinner. Us. Ooh la la. Need I remind you, Melania Trump, an actual supermodel, never got a fashion magazine cover when she was First Lady. Jill Biden, Michelle Obama, perfectly nice women, perhaps, but nevertheless, they were not supermodels in their careers. They get their fashion magazine covers. The actual gorgeous professional model never gets one. Because serious, elite, reputable companies could not be seen within 100 yards of the Trumps or anyone associated with his administration. Now they are clamoring, they are begging to be part of Trump world because the American right, really, Trump and the Trump movement won. Do you know who played one of the inaugural balls? I'm in dc. I've been going to a lot of these parties and pre inaugural balls. There will be actual inaugural balls tonight, but there's one party I didn't go to that was the crypto pre inaugural ball. And you know who went? Snoop Diggity Dog. Snoop Doggy Dog. The man who in 2017 had this to say about black musicians who would in any way associate with Trump. So ain't nobody gonna perform for Donald Trump, huh? Which one of you jigaboo, gonna be the first one to do it? I'm waiting. I'm gonna roast the out. One of you, Uncle Tom, for doing. Which one of you gonna do it first? Oz? The one that performs for himself. About my. Those of you who are not watching and who are only listening, that last part of the clip was Snoop Dogg playing for a Trump inaugural ball. Snoop Dogg gonna roast the shit out of himself, I guess. But he's doing it. Why is he doing it? I'm sure he got paid a ton of money to play that ball. And why is he permitted to make. I mean, he would have made a lot of money had he done it in 2017. He is permitted to make a lot of money playing that ball because Trump is the mainstream. Not voting for Trump, not supporting Trump, not wearing the MAGA hat is now a minority political position in the United States. Meanwhile, what is Biden doing as he's leaving office? He's issuing all of these emergency pardons to all of his cronies so that hopefully Trump doesn't go after them as he legitimately should. In most cases. Joe Biden is also just declaring new constitutional amendments. Democracy's on the ballot. No one's above the law. Meanwhile, I'm going to pardon my family for all of our corruption, and I'm just going to rewrite the Constitution. You couldn't make this up. If this were a Hollywood movie, a producer would say it's too on the nose. The man who's gone mad with power, really just the avatar of the American left, has gone mad with power. And Biden, in his case, has gone literally mad. He is an actual representation of the broader ideological madness that took over the left because Joe Biden has become senile. Now, this is a stage of political degradation that I didn't think we would get to, of mental and political degradation that we would get to, where the President just thinks he can rewrite the Constitution, in this case by adding a 28th amendment, the equal Rights Amendment. A hobby horse of feminists for decades, here's what he had to say.
Joe Biden
Throughout my career, I've been clear. No one, no one, no one should be discriminated against based on their sex. And in order for the amendment to be ratified, it requires 3/4 of the states to ratify it. That benchmark was passed when Virginia ratified the ERA a few years ago. Today, I affirm the Equal Rights Amendment to have cleared all the necessary hurdles to be added to the U.S. constitution.
Michael Knowles
Now.
Joe Biden
The Equal Rights Amendment is the law of the land. Now, it's the 28th Amendment to the Constitution. Now, I consulted dozens of constitutional scholars to make sure there was all within the power to do this. And the fact is, we did. And third.
Michael Knowles
I don't know who those constitutional scholars are that he consulted. He might have consulted Hunter, the smartest guy he knows. Maybe he consulted Hunter. Maybe, I don't know. Charlie Day from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Because what Biden said is simply not true. The Equal Rights Amendment, you can amend the Constitution in one of two ways. You can either work through the legislature, or you can work through the states. And so a number of states did ratify the era. How many did they get up to. They got up to 35 states over the course of its lifetime, but they fell three states short. They had to get to 38 states to ratify. They fell three states short. There was an initial deadline of 1979. They blew past it, but it was extended to 1982 and it missed it. So, okay, Biden says, well, a few years ago, Virginia ratified the ERA to announce the law of the Land. That just simply isn't true. You don't need to take my word for it. Like the national archivist whose job it is to publish ratified presidential amendments, has publicly spoken about this and said, sorry, you missed the deadline by about four decades. So no, you don't get the Equal Rights Amendment. And yet the Democrats are uniformly getting behind this. This is not just Joe Biden speaking off the cuff senior moment. This is a political strategy. We'll get into what that strategy is in a moment. First, though, I want to talk to you about balance of nature. Balance of nature, fruits and veggies is the most convenient way to get whole fruits and vegetables daily, especially if you've centered your New Year's resolutions around creating a healthier lifestyle. Nature is pretty good at giving us the nutrients that we need through fruits and vegetables. So balance of nature takes fruits and vegetables, fruits freeze, dries them, turns them into a powder, then puts them into a capsule. You take your fruit and veggie capsules every day, then your body knows what to do with them. Balance of nature is just one ingredient. Balanced lifestyle that has no intention to replace a healthy diet, exercise, sleep or any other healthy habits. It's intended to be used in concert with other healthy habits when one is on the road and maybe staying out a little bit late at some of these inauguration parties and maybe not getting all one's fruits and vegetables. It's very helpful. I can attest it's very helpful to have balance of nature. Go to balanceofnature.com, use promo code knowles for 35% off your first order as a preferred customer. Plus get a free bottle of fiber and spice. That is balanceofnature.com promo code knowles. What is Biden doing here? Why is he pretending that there's this 28th amendment? There is no 28th amendment to the Constitution. The authority in charge of publishing the ratified amendment has clarified very I'm sure there are plenty of liberals working for the Archivist of the United States, but it's just not. It's not a thing. It would be like me walking out here on this patio today and saying it is raining. It is officially raining. That wouldn't be the case. I cannot, through sheer tyranny of will, change the weather. And Joe Biden cannot, through sheer tyranny of will, change the Constitution. Kamala Harris comes out. Kamala Harris says that the Equal Rights Amendment is the 28th Amendment, the law of the land. In fact, here is her official statement on it. I think her official statement gives up the whole game. It says, equality is a fundamental promise of our democracy. That's why the ERA belongs in our Constitution. Published this January 17th. If the ERA amendment has been ratified, why does she need to make an argument as to why it belongs in the Constitution? Because Democrats know it's not actually in there. History teaches us that civil rights are fought for and won with every generation. That continues to be true today. Now Americans must continue to fight for a more equal and just nation where everyone has opportunity. Again, if the ERA has been ratified, why do we have to continue to fight? Because they know it hasn't really been ratified, but it's not even just out of the White House. Tammy Duckworth, one of the more humorous members of the US Senate. Unintentionally humorous. She tweets out, biden officially recognized the era, blah, blah, blah. Major victory for women, even though actually the ERA was killed by a woman, Phyllis Schlafly, a conservative woman who organized lots of other women who didn't want the ERA to totally destroy women's rights and privileges. It was kind of an early version of the transgender movement. You know, the ERA would have destroyed women only schools, women only bathrooms, for that matter. And so women defeated that amendment. Why are they doing this? The real reason, the quick reason as to why the Democrats are pushing this right now is they have nothing, they have no actual accomplishment or victory to point to either a legal victory or a political victory over the course of the last four years or an electoral victory. They really have nothing. So they're just making stuff up. They can't say, we're leaving the economy stronger than ever. They've tried that, but it doesn't work. We're leaving the border more secure. We're leaving the world at greater peace. They can't. Everything's gotten worse. So they make this thing up at the end, hey, we. We changed the Constitution. But you didn't. Actually, you didn't. You really didn't do much of anything. And so now you're going away. We're being told that President Trump has just arrived at the Capitol. Initially, this lawn behind me, the National Mall, was going to be filled with people because everyone was going to stand outside. Then we were told that they couldn't because it's too chilly. Now I'm sitting here, I have a coat on, I have a scarf on. I'm not wearing a hat or earmuffs. I'm not even wearing gloves. I don't know. It's not that cold. Actually. There were reports that it was going to be 10 degrees. There is precedent for moving the inauguration ceremony indoors. Ronald Reagan did it his second inaugural in 1985. But it's unusual. Some people are wondering, was this really about the weather or was this about security? Some Democrats are suggesting Trump couldn't draw a crowd. That's a really bold claim to make from the party that just lost the popular vote for the first time in 20 years. I think Trump could probably draw a crowd, but I don't know. I've gone back and forth on this cuz I saw the weather reports and yet right now people could be outside. So Trump will be doing the swearing in, actually taking the oath of office in the US Capitol. Then I believe he'll be moving to the indoor arena, which was a site of a rally, and I guess he'll be giving some remarks there. In any case, when I saw that the weather was going to be chilly, I did this is before they announced any changes to the inauguration. I thought, all right, President Trump needs to keep his remarks brief because we do not want another William Henry Harrison situation. William Henry Harrison, I think it was 1841, was sworn in as president, gave a very long remark in the freezing cold in the winter, and then he died a month later because he caught pneumonia. So we do not want that from President Trump. President Trump seems to have nine lives. We want him to be around a long time and that is why he is going into the Capitol, whether because of the weather or perhaps more likely security. Now, the other huge news that happened, speaking of communication, getting all of this news out is that TikTok was banned for like 45 seconds yesterday. TikTok went down. It was actually for about 12, 12 and a half hours. And TikTok is back up. Coincidentally. I was actually at a party sponsored by TikTok last night. I didn't even realize the party was sponsored by TikTok until I got there. I thought that was kind of awkward for you guys. You're sponsoring one of these parties in D.C. and your app might not even exist. But there's been a big fight over this because Republicans want to take TikTok down. Democrats want to keep TikTok up. Some Democrats now want to take TikTok down. President Trump wants to keep TikTok up. What is going on? First of all, the TikTok influencers were absolutely melting down yesterday. We have. Where is the. Yeah, this. The heartbroken TikTok users. It's gone. TikTok is gone. I'm going through withdrawals. This is a crime. I'm just quoting directly from some big TikTok users. Mentally, I'm totally disassociating right now. I'm crashing bad. This can't be effing real. I hope they recovered. I hope not too many of them committed seppuku or, you know, leapt from there. Well, they weren't outside. Usually they're sort of inside. But I hope some of them are doing all right. Many registered nurses and employees for the National Institutes of Health are very relieved because I don't know what they would do if they couldn't choreograph silly dances on TikTok. Then they. I guess then they'd have to treat people or. I don't know. I don't know. First responders, all sorts, I don't know. They keep popping up on TikTok, but TikTok is popping back up on the App Store. What is going on here? What's going on is you're seeing a major political fight between multiple factions. This is not just left versus right. This is not just US versus China. The TikTok battle is a complex, nuanced political fight where it's not exactly clear who our friends and enemies are. So when TikTok was going down, a ton of Americans signed up for an app called Red Note. It's an app for which the Chinese translates more directly to Little Red Book, which is the book of sayings of Chairman Mao. So not great. According to the Chinese state owned Global Times, RedNote has become a message board for the people of China and the US reflecting the simple wish of both countries and the international community for peace, prosperity and security from sharing memes and cat taxes, something called the cat tax on there, where Chinese people will demand a cat tax of American users, which means the American users have to post pictures of cats and then the Chinese will respond and tell them whatever about their country. The phrase red note and cat tax both seem a little bit on the nose for a Chinese app. I don't know. That's probably a little politically incorrect, but I don't know. We demand your cats. What do they say in China? They'll eat anything with four legs other than A table and anything with two legs other than a human. So the cat tax, I don't think they're actually eating them. That's mostly obviously Haitians in Springfield, Ohio, but but also red note, a little on the nose. Clearly TikTok in the US is a vehicle for Russian state Communist Chinese party propaganda. And yet President Trump is thinking about giving them a reprieve and putting TikTok back on. Why? Why, you ask? We'll get to that in a moment. First of all, I want to tell you about Pure Talk. Go to PureTalk.com right now. This country was founded on freedom. Freedom from a country that forced us to buy overpriced tea. When we dumped their tea into the ocean, they tried blockading us. How did that work out for them, huh? Well, now it's time to throw your overpriced big wireless contract overboard too. 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Why is Joe Biden not enforcing the ban during the one day in office that might have overlapped with the ban passed by the legislators and Trump's being inaugurated? It seems to me this extension is aimed at three big players. China certainly, and YouTube and Facebook. In principle, I have no problem with a TikTok ban because I'm not a free speech absolutist. I certainly don't think a hostile foreign government has the right to a direct communication line into the United States to spread propaganda to our own citizens. I don't think there's any right to that whatsoever and I have no particular affection for the Chinese Communist Party. However, the chief beneficiaries in the US from a TikTok ban are gonna be Facebook and YouTube. And Facebook and YouTube. They're trying to suck up to conservatives now, but they have spent years trying to actively censoring us, trying to defeat President Trump and succeeding in 2020, trying to take over the public square in a self governing republic. That means you essentially take over the political order, personally harming our business, our business in particular. So no, I don't want to give them any advantage in the, in the free marketplace of big tech. So what is this about? I think what we're seeing from President Trump is the art of the deal. It's a little bit of a negotiation. I think he wants to make Facebook and YouTube sweat a little bit, and I think they do need to sweat and I think they need to make major concessions and I think they need to stop all the unjust activity that we've seen for years. But also I think he wants some leverage with China. I think he wants to say, look, TikTok is really popular. And so look, we're happy to have TikTok in America, especially if some more right wing content can break through on there, but we're gonna need some concessions for that in China. China has its own version of TikTok, which promotes news, scholarly kinds of materials, orderly things. But what do they send to America? Just brain rot, trash, Just absolute slop. So maybe Trump gets some concessions out of China and how TikTok works. At the very least, though, we need to level the playing field because China will not allow our communications apps into their country. So what? Maybe he says, look, loosen up the restrictions on our communications apps. It's just like trade. He says, look, it's not that we want to close off trade, we like trade, but the trade has to be fair. We shouldn't be getting ripped off on trade. Okay, so sure, you can have access to the American market, China, when we're just talking about trade broadly, but you need to stop illegally subsidizing your industries. You need to stop devaluing your currency, as you especially some years ago were doing a lot. You need to stop dumping your products here. You need to play by the rules, okay? And TikTok's gotta play by some rules. And you know what? Maybe our big tech companies in America need to play by the rules too. It's not always an either or. You can build some consensus here, okay? That's what President Trump did. That's how he won the popular vote as a Republican for the first time in 20 years. Now, what other great news is going on? It's. I Almost. I don't want to jinx the day by saying it's all so great, but on this day, as we're getting Trump inaugurated, the libs totally falling back, the left wing corporations obsequious, just pleading for President Trump's approval. Now you've got CNN paying out a multi million dollar fine for defamation. A Florida jury found CNN liable of defamation, defaming specifically Navy veteran Zachary young, giving him 5 million bucks plus punitive damages for CNN to pay. Why? What was the story? The story was CNN's chief national security correspondent said that Zachary Young and others ran a black market charging exorbitant prices to get people out of Afghanistan. This report was aired not just by some random correspondent, but by Jake Tapper, by Jim Acosta, by big figures at the network. They aired the report. Now internal communications, we found out through this lawsuit showed that employees at CNN doubted the truth of the story. But the national security correspondent at CNN really had it out for this guy, Zachary Young. According to messages, he called Young a mother effer, said that he hoped to nail him and said that he had a punchable face. So according to Young's lawyer here, he says CNN's defamatory comments have rendered Young permanently unemployable in the career he's trained for his whole life, have resulted in Young's income plunging to nothing, and have caused Young to suffer millions of dollars in lost income. All true. And CNN just got hit. It is good to enforce laws against defamation. That is good. There are going to be some people, especially on the left with this case, who say no. Free speech means that we shouldn't have all of these lawsuits about defamation. No, no. There's no free speech right to defame people. There's no First Amendment right. The founding fathers, the framers of the Constitution didn't think that there was some right to, to defame people. They didn't think there was some right to threaten people. They didn't think there was some right to promote obscenity. They didn't think there was some right to fighting words. There were all sorts of exceptions to free speech. Because what the founding fathers and the framers and anyone who's seriously considered this issue has realized is there are some kinds of speech that actually undermine free speech. Enforcing laws against defamation actually is a defense of free speech because the point of free speech is to arrive at the truth. That's the end of free. It's the telos of free speech. That's the theory. At least some people would say it doesn't really work to do that. But that's the theory put forward by people like John Milton in Areopagitica, people like John Locke in the Letter concerning toleration, people like the American Founding Fathers and Framers. That's the idea. The point is to arrive at truth if you legally protect speech that the speaker knows to be untrue, that the speaker has even been recklessly negligent in asserting the truth of and that the speaker has engaged in because he's got it out for the other guy. You are undermining free speech because you're undermining the purpose of free speech. All of this while we are learning through this lawsuit that CNN is collapsing. CNN has had massive waves of layoffs. CNN has been threatened with some of these lawsuits, rightly so. We found out that in 2021, CNN brought in $2.2 billion in revenue. In 2022, just a year later, they only brought in $2 billion in revenue and they only brought in $1.8 billion in revenue in 2023. That means in the course of two years, CNN lost $400 million, which underscores the basic observation of this show today. The left has not ever been this over in our lifetimes. When was the last time the left was this over? I guess you could maybe say 1984 because Reagan won 49 states. But even then, because the Democratic Party was less polarized, the left. The left just didn't mean what it means today. I don't know that you would say that there was still a healthy Democrat party. Reagan still had to deal with Tip O'Neill, the Democrat leading the House. There was still, you know, even though Mondale was a bad candidate running against Reagan, there was still a healthy left and Democrat party in the 80s. That is not true today. The left's politicians need to be protected against investigation and prosecution. January 6, committee, Dr. Fauci, all the rest of them, the left's propagandists in the media are losing their eyeballs and losing their money and having to pay out defamation cases. The left's politicians are losing elections and the left's corporations are now sucking up to the Republican who just won the White House and who is going to be inaugurated today. This is the day Donald Trump will be sworn in as the 47th president. The Daily Wire is live from D.C. as you can see, to bring you every moment, we're on the ground delivering it all to you unfiltered, uncensored and in real time. To celebrate this historic event, we are giving you 47% off new Daily Wire plus memberships. Plus we're including a free $20 gift as a thank you for joining the fight. People are so excited about this deal, they're actually flying their helicopters over to the studio right now to get it. But you can get yours from your phone or your computer. With your membership, you will get ad free access to all of our shows, plus an exclusive lineup of hit movies, Fearless documentaries and original series. Now's the time to join. Use code 47@dailywire.com subscribe for 47% off your new Daily Wire plus membership. My favorite comment yesterday is from SandyK067 who says, I think of Michelle Obama not attending the inauguration as another win. Still not tired of winning. Yeah, it's true. I agree. Or no, the Obamas are going to have to slink away from public life after dominating the Democrat party for, what is it now, almost 20 years. Okay, bye. See ya. You will not be missed in public life. Now, speaking of this inauguration, I spoke about it a little bit earlier, but this is a big question. Was the inauguration moved indoors because of the weather? Maybe just a bad weather prediction? Because right now, look, it's chilly, you know, but look, I'm from the Northeast originally. I've got a fairly high tolerance for this. But I don't know, it's fine. D.C. gets colder before, was it because of the weather or was it because of security? They did almost kill the guy over the summer. Twice, actually. They almost killed the guy. One of them, they got really close. They actually got him in the ear and he bled down his face. And he stood up on that stage. An implausible last minute 20 degree jerk of the head is the only reason that Trump didn't have his head blown off on a stage in Pennsylvania. So if the Secret Service could allow that kind of security risk in the middle of nowhere Pennsylvania. We know Trump has threats against him from foreign adversaries, from internal adversaries. There was an attempt on his life again at a golf course of his in Florida just shortly after the first one. Okay, maybe, maybe it's just security. I am a little. I'm a little confused. Well, maybe not confused. I'm a little dismayed at how eager the libs are to get Trump out in public today. Don't forget, he's not president yet. He's going to be. He's about to be president, but he's not president yet. So there is, it's. Everyone's still on tenterhooks, okay? And that's not just paranoia. And that's not just catastrophizing. The guy was almost killed twice over the last six months. Okay, why is David Axelrod. David Axelrod, the strategist behind Obama's ascent to the presidency. Why is he tweeting this out? Quote, In 1961, John F. Kennedy was inaugurated on the Capitol steps in wind chills of 7 degrees. It was almost as cold for Obama in 09. In fairness, Trump is more than three decades older than JFK and Obama were. Or did he just fear small crowds? Are you kidding me? You really. Ha ha. You're chicken. Come on, Trump, walk outside. Override the advice, potentially, of your security team. Come on. What are you, chicken? What are you, old? Are you old and cold? Buck, buck, buck. You're chicken. Huh? First of all, I don't think he fears small crowds. He won the popular vote. He destroyed your candidates. David Axelrod, Joe Biden, who was the candidate, at least in the early part of the 2024 race. Joe Biden is also a little long in the tooth, you may have noticed. Did he fear small crowds? I don't think so. I suspect. I think the Kennedy comparison is actually probably appropriate. I suspect the security detail is just a little more concern that what happened to Kennedy might happen to President Trump, since it almost happened. Very disturbing how much the libs want him outside. But the libs themselves have. Have not really taken to the streets. I've been in D.C. now, I came to D.C. to see some people on Wednesday. I was here Wednesday Thursday, flew home Friday to go Chico with the kids, and then I flew back here Saturday. So I've been in town for a lot over the past week or so. This is not 2016, folks. This is not 2020 George Floyd era, and this is not 2016, first Trump inauguration. There is very little in the way of protests. Do you remember in 2016, 2017, during the inauguration, they had the Women's March and all of those people were wearing genital hats. I'm not even going to say the name. It's so disgusting. I want to forget about that whole moment on the American left. But they came out. There were a lot of people who were marching the Women's March. Well, this time they've renamed it it's the People's March. Maybe they were trying to bring in more people. Well, they didn't get that. Nobody showed up. A handful of losers have shown up screaming, f you fascists. Andy Ngo was reporting on this rebranded Women's March. It's kind of odd, isn't it, to call yourself the People's March, when most of the people voted for the other guy. It's weird. Now look, Communists do this all the time. The People's Republic of so and so, the People's Republic of North Korea or of China. So typical right out of the hundred, 150 year old commie playbook. But it's not persuasive. No one's really showing up. They can't even the fact that they had to rebrand it to the People's March. I think the reason they had to do that is because most women 45 and older voted for Trump. So you can't say it's the Women's March. Well, what about younger women? Well, actually, Trump pulled, I think, 44% of women. 44, 45% of women under the age of 45, and he pulled 40% of women under the age of 30. So even the group that was most likely to vote for the Democrats, the group, many of whom were probably wearing pink hats back in 16, 17, they voted largely for Trump. Okay, well, could you call it the Black People's March? That was what they tried to do in 2020 with George Floyd successfully. Actually, probably not, because 1 in 5 black guys voted for Trump. That might not seem like a lot. That's a tectonic shift from the Democrats to the Republicans. Okay, can you call it the Hispanic People's March? No, 46% of them voted for Trump. Can we call it the, I don't know, the young, The Young People's March? Actually, young men in particular voted largely for Trump. Could we. Let's call it the People's March. The individual groups of people didn't vote for our guy, but let's just say the people as a whole. Okay, well, there are 15 people out there, if that. Do you see anyone? Do you see any protests behind me? I certainly don't. Pretty weak stuff, because it's over for them. It is over for now. Who knows, you know, they could always rebound. But for now, it's so over and we need to kick them while they're down. We need Trump to put through his 200 executive orders today. We need the unified government that we have over in that big, beautiful capital to push through as much of this agenda as we can get. Not even just in the first four years. There's no guarantee of four years in the legislature. Not even just in the first two years. We need to push this through in the first hundred days because getting the Republican congressmen together is like herding cats. Okay, so Trump has a limited window and it looks like he is ready to move. And this is not even just a strictly American movement. There are a lot of foreign leaders here. Okay, Nigel Farage, very popular leader of Reform uk. He's here. Liz Truss, the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. I actually saw her last night. I was chatting with her last night at one of the parties. She is here. Coincidentally, I was also in the UK when the Liberals torpedoed her government. And so why does she come over here? Why does Nigel Farage come over here? Why does Prime Minister of Italy Giorgio Meloni, why did she come to the inauguration? Eric Samour, Marion Marechal, prominent figures of the French right, even Tom Vick, Kriken. I'm sure I'm mispronouncing that. Who is the chairman of the right wing party in Belgium, Blaembelang, the Flemish interest, even the co founder of afd, the Alternative for Deutschland, Tino Chupala said that he was coming to attend. Why? Well, the reason is whatever we want to tell ourselves about being a republic of yeoman farmers, whatever impulses we might have, even to just be a nation like every other nation, we're not that. We are the global empire, okay? And Trump is speaking to that directly. All this talk of greatness and making America great again, that is the language of grandeur, okay? That is the language of magnificence. Trump is not just some small little guy who wants to stick on his farm, all right? Trump is a big figure. He seems closer to a Caesar than he does to some, you know, minor sort of statesman or Republican legislator. We are the global empire. We are sitting here in the imperial capital and our vassal states in the American empire, which is called the west, are going to show up. Of course they are. Why wouldn't they? This has been true since at least World War II. We are the global empire. And so of course they're going to come. Which means that winning here, winning the US Presidency and the House and the Senate, has global implications. These movements do not just happen in isolated pockets of the world. It's no coincidence that the Brexit happened in the UK right before Trump won the first time. Right before you see Viktor Orban really consolidating support in Hungary, before you see Giorgio Meloni winning in Italy, before you see AfD in Spain, the Vox AfD in Germany, the VOX Party in Spain, right wing parties really gaining momentum. The Front national in France, all gaining momentum. It's what Ronald Reagan said in a Time for choosing one of his most famous speeches. He said, when great forces are on the move in the world we learn that we're spirits, not animals. Okay? And there are great forces on the move in the world right now. There's a piece that just came out of the UK press, it said, this is out of the Telegraph. The left is more unpopular than any time since the Cold War except in Starmers Britain. And right now Elon Musk is doing his level best to destroy Starmers Britain to destroy the left wing party. Labour in the uk, that's the one holdout for right now. But the rest, they're all collapsing. Justin Trudeau just collapsed up in Canada. You've seen right wing leaders in Latin America. Nayib Bukele, one of the great leaders in the world today. Javier Milei. All these figures are just cropping up when we're celebrating this big win in the us I've been walking all around Washington DC and people seem giddy, they seem light. Some woman walked up to me and she goes, this is just the greatest day, isn't it? My friend Dennis Prager said on election day. He said, this is the greatest day of my life. And why is that? Is it just because everyone really likes Trump? People do really like Trump. But no, it just feels that after years, decades really of this constant degradation that we couldn't turn around the mass migration, losing our national identity, losing our traditional way of life, having threats against our children and against our education system, against our national security, just constant. We couldn't do anything. It feels as though we've turned a corner. We don't know how that's going to go. Nobody can predict the future. But that's what people are feeling right now. That's the next hour. Two hours, three hours is what it's not just about. Ah, the past four years have been tough and all my groceries are more expensive. That's what the liberals, lowercase l. Liberals. That's what the materialists, that's what the technocrats think. Oh well, it's all just about inflation or something. No, it's about this building up of tension and dismay for years and decades. And maybe, just maybe, we've turned a little bit of a corner. The business leaders know it. You don't just have to focus on the politicians. Very wealthy, very intelligent business leaders know that something has shifted here. Bill Gates had a three hour dinner with President Trump and what did he say about it? He said, I had a chance about two weeks ago to go have a long and actually quite intriguing dinner with him. A long, actually quite intriguing dinner. That's what Gates told the Wall Street Journal. I felt like he was energized and looking forward to help drive innovation. I'm sorry, I'm not doing a good Bill Gates voice. I felt like he was energized and looking forward to help drive innovation. I was frankly impressed with how well Gates he showed a lot of interest in the issues I brought up. Wow. Bill Gates, he's one of the biggest funders of left wing causes in the world. Bill Gates, why? If you can't beat him, join him. That's it. They are join. I'm just going to take us through a little informal logic. If you can't beat them, you should join them. That's my major premise. My minor premise is they are joining Trump, Oscar de la Renta, Snoop Dogg, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg donating to the inaugural ball. All these countries flame ball. They are joining. Therefore we beat them. Trump beat them. We to get you voting. Beat them. Beat em real good. Beat em real good. Beat em real bad. And everyone knows it. At a time when we're having so much difficulty agreeing about basic aspects of truth, what is truth? People deny the truth. We don't know what a woman is anymore, that sort of thing. One thing that everyone seems to agree on and they are proving it with their behavior, is that we won and we're see the fruit of that victory today. We've got a lot more coming up. We will be talking with our Daily Wire reporters about what's going on, maybe breaking a little bit of news about Trump's early executive orders. We have Mr. Shapiro coming up doing his show live from this desk. After my show, we have some extended inauguration coverage. Then once Ben's done with his show, then we're all going to come back out and have live coverage of the whole thing. Make sure you tune in. President Trump, 47th president of the United States. Full coverage all day right here on Daily Wire, the Ben Shapiro Show, Matt Walsh, Andrew Clayton, Jeremy Bore all join us live. The live coverage of the ceremony starts at 11:20am Eastern right here. Daily Wire. Plus Trump taking the oath of office. Join us for the Post show coverage. Now let me get to the iPad a little bit. I want to chat with some of our friends. Except all I can do is see me. That's very odd. This feels sort of like Inception. Where's my chat? Here we go. Here's the chat. Michael, please get some earmuffs and gloves on. We want you to stay healthy. Guys, I've been in Washington, D.C. going to various parties with Republicans, celebrating this wonderful moment for like five of the last seven days. Staying up a little late, maybe having a couple of Coca Colas, maybe a few Mayflower cigars, which are a great way to celebrate. So I think earmuffs are the least of my issues. But it's not really all that chilly out. Actually. Michael could talk for two hours, but should he? I know. Well, I might start losing my voice on account of all the celebrations, but I could, I could talk for two more. I could talk for five more hours because of how fired up I am. Let's see, like your shades, Mike. It says Travis 0611. Well, I felt, you know, my outfit is a little Anglo right now. It's a little bit Little Brit in prep. So I had to get some of that Italian, Italian suave kind of, kind of charm going on with my shades. Bring the hosts of Daily Wire in by canoe on the Potomac. Oh, that's a good idea. I did find out, in fact, that my ancestor Simon Knowles crossed the Delaware with General Washington. I don't think he ever had the misfortune of crossing the Potomac. I appreciate the schedule read, says Jasmine C. Oh, you're very welcome. I know because some people. Look, this is going to be a crazy day because the plans are so up in chaos. People don't even know basic things like, wait, when is he being sworn in? When is he addressing the crowd? So we will be with you for all of it and if the times change, we'll let you know that. 2 Chuck Diesel, you could set your watch to Michael's hair. Thank you. I like to think that in a world of subjectivity and constant change, my hair is an immovable object. Michael taking off. I'm not taking off, baby. Bryson was taken. Says, I can't believe Rachel Maddow works for the Daily Wire. No, that's only when I put my eyeglasses on. That's when I really take on a little bit more of a lesbian style. But for now, I remain right wing employed by the Daily Wire. Still a man. Ahoy, Michael. I hope Matt is doing all right after that dropped two point conversion last night. He was looking a little rough, actually. As I've been saying, I've been going to all of these celebrations, saying hello to lots of people. Matt has been going to the fewest number of these that he can because he just wants to watch sports. Prem du lahem rises up, says, bass shrink. This is so celebratory, guys, can I smoke one of my cigars out here or no? Is Secret Service going to tackle me if I light any. They probably will. Good morning, Michael. A lot of people asking about my hair. Alright, that's enough. Ethan King says, Michael, tell them to clean the camera. We can't. All right. Politics is a dirty business. Washington D.C. is a dirty state. It's not a state. The libs want to make it a state. It's a dirty federal district. So that's what happens. You know, politics is a dirty business. We do have breaking news. I'm not gonna be the one to break the news, though. Our Daily Wire reporters will do that momentarily. In the meantime, though, there is one story that I did want to get to, which is President Trump has released his official portrait and it is very, very cool. You think? That's very nice. I'm getting some compliments on my style. Nobody can match President Trump's drip and affect in this picture. So we'll get to that momentarily. But we do now have Daily Wire reporter Mary Margaret Olihan on the ground to break some very exciting news. Mary Margaret, thank you for coming on the show.
Mary Margaret Olihan
Hello. Good morning, Michael. It is a balmy 20 degrees out here and we're so excited to be join.
Michael Knowles
Is it really 20 degrees? Because I feel okay right now and maybe it's just because I have so damaged my body at all of these celebrations that I just can't feel anything anymore. Maybe that's what it is. Mary Margaret, you have.
Mary Margaret Olihan
That's quite possible.
Michael Knowles
You have an exclusive story here. We know that momentarily, in a matter of a few hours, President Trump is going to sign a flurry of executive orders. We know a lot of his top priorities, but we don't really know the specifics. And you do, what's he going to do?
Mary Margaret Olihan
So, Michael, I can exclusively share here that we just reported President Trump will sign an executive order today on the weaponization of government. This executive order will direct his incoming attorney general to scour through records, scour through all of the different aspects of the past Biden administration and find out what they did to target Americans. So that might be Americans of faith. That might be conservatives who are just living their lives. It might be mothers who are attending school board meetings, trying to speak out against woke ideology in their children's classrooms. It might be people who investigated Hunter Biden. It might be the people who were pushing censoring the laptop stories during the 2020 presidential election. All of these things are up for discussion. All of these things are up for investigation. And we have learned exclusively that Trump will be signing this order today to order that investigation into this weaponization of government in order to bring that weaponization to an end. So huge news. This is going to cover a very wide swath of territory. And I spoke to one policy adviser to Trump who told me that this is an issue really close to a lot of Americans hearts, especially when it comes to targeting ordinary Americans. Mark Hauck, the Catholic father of seven kids who woke up to have FBI agents at his door arresting him. Other Americans, like these school board mothers I mentioned. So big news. We're really excited to break that at Dilly Wire and to break it on your show first.
Michael Knowles
Well, I really like that because if you gave the scoop to Shapiro, I would have been absolutely furious. However, it would have been hard to get me down because I'm so elated at that news. I knew that President Trump wanted to make the weaponization of government a real focus of his investigations and his anti corruption efforts. However, I didn't know if that was merely going to be restricted to, I don't know, members of Congress or, you know, maybe one or two agencies, but really just focused on partisan matters. But what you're describing is, no, some of the most prominent scenes over the Biden administration, you mentioned, Mr. Howe, the fact that a pro life father could have the feds show up, essentially kick his door in in front of all of his children and he's a pro lifer, so he has a lot of children and arrest him for peaceably demonstrating outside of an abortion mill, an infanticide factory. I mean, that is, that is shocking. The man should be given an award for his efforts, not arrested by the federal government.
Mary Margaret Olihan
Exactly. Mark Hauck. I had the pleasure of traveling to his home, speaking with all of his kids. His youngest daughter I believe was 2 years old. His young sons who were in middle school told me they watched guns pointed at mommy and daddy when these armed agents showed up in their house and took their father away. That's traumatic. Mark Hauck's wife has suffered multiple miscarriages, she believes as a result of the trauma that she endured from that arrest of her husband and the subsequent investigation and prosecution of her husband. So really horrible. But like you were saying, Michael, this is going to be a very in depth investigation of how far this went. And you know, like you were saying, we've heard a lot of talk about investigations of the three letter agencies and how they conducted themselves, but this is, this is going to be very wide reaching. We're going to find out a lot more I think that we haven't heard about before. They also mentioned, you know, wealthy figures who were targeted for speaking out about Biden or, you know, this irs, whistleblowers, all these different things that are going to come. We're going to hear more about them. We're going to hear more investigations. And I think, frankly, it's long overdue. And a lot of people have been hoping that we would hear this. So I'm glad that we got this exclusive because we've definitely covered a lot of these issues and I was told that Daily Wire got to report this because we've gotten to cover a lot of these issues in the past and we've done a great job.
Michael Knowles
Well, also, you know, as we're talking about these pro lifers, I'm glad there's a real focus on them because a lot of people are going to be asking, when do the pardons come? Okay, that's great. We're going to get all of the EOs right away. But there are a lot of pro lifers who are in prison right now, including elderly women, people who all they've ever done, their greatest crime is to go pray and try to stop women from murdering their children. Really, they're going to some of the darkest places on earth. These abortion factories. And it's hard to say. It's a. A factory makes something. All the abortion mills do is destroy things. These wonderful people show up there and they're rotting in federal prison right now because of Joe Biden and the Democrats. So I know a lot of people are going to be asking, all right, is President Trump going to give them pardons, the pro lifers? Is he going to pardon the January Sixers? And even in this EO of focusing on the weaponization of the government, I think even of my own churches, you know, the Catholic churches, especially the ones that Joe Biden's FBI called extremist radical traditional churches, you know, the ones that, like, I don't know, they pray in Latin a little bit, they have too much incense or something. They were spied on by the FBI. The FBI and the DOJ then lied about that. We found out this was actually pretty widespread around the country. So I don't know. And that's just what was reported. You know, it seems like that just scratches the surface of the weaponization of government.
Mary Margaret Olihan
Absolutely. I mean, if this is what we heard about this very one specific case involving some Latin mass churches and the investigation of traditional Latin mass Catholics, we know there is so much more that's just scratching the surface. And of course, when it comes to these mothers, too, that we're speaking out at school board meetings, and we find out that the Biden DOJ was having all of these parents investigated for their alleged extremist rhetoric when all they wanted was for their children to get a very good education without ideology intertwined. Just unbelievable. As for those pro lifers you mentioned that are in jail, we actually reported last week at the Daily Wire as well that they just petitioned Trump to pardon them and they believe that they all deserve these pardons that, like you were saying, they were literally acting in defense of the unborn. So pretty wild to see, you know, when we have the Biden DOJ helping to release all these BLM protesters or rioters from the 2020 riots and then all the January 6th defendants in prison, all these pro lifers in prison. And the Trump administration would tell you that this is political prosecution, that these people were among the disfavored and the Biden administration sought to put them away without question.
Michael Knowles
Now you bring up rioters. Mary Margaret, switching gears a little bit, You've been in D.C. for some days now. Have you noticed any protests? I know there was the People's March. It didn't seem all that prominent to me. Is anyone pushing back against Trump and the Republicans right now?
Mary Margaret Olihan
Well, it's really, really cold, Michael. So I think that's kept a lot of people at home.
Michael Knowles
The Democrats, the liberals are physically, we, they're not hardy, you know, they just, they're not. I think the reason I don't need earmuffs right now, it's not even just from all the parties. It's just that my blood is up, baby. I'm feeling really good. Maybe they're just so crestfallen that they can't even walk out the door.
Mary Margaret Olihan
Maybe it's very possible. I mean, we were at the Women's March, the People's March on Saturday. There's a lot of protesters there. But I have to say the temperature was just very, you know, of the crowd was just very mild. We talked to a lot of different people about what they, what their issues with Trump were, and they didn't really have anything articulate to say. You know, they'll tell us they hated him or he's going to steal women's rights or, you know, he's taking away all of our rights. But then we'd ask, which ones are those? Or what are you particularly worried about? They really couldn't tell us. So I would say that the protesters are alive and well, but they're just not very enthused right now. And I think that's partially because there's so much unity around this election, right? There's so many people that came together to vote for Trump, not just Republicans, but we got all the crunchy moms and the Maha movement that were never Republican before, but they joined in because of rfk. We got all these families that were motivated by trans issues. They didn't want this ideology in their kids schools and they thought we're going to go for a Trump. So you just, you have a lot of different factions coming together and he's going to be president. There's nothing they can do about it.
Michael Knowles
It's true.
Mary Margaret Olihan
You know, there's a little bit of a temperature change.
Michael Knowles
It is remarkable that two Democrat presidential candidates at least voted for Trump and are now in the admin. And I'm actually pretty convinced Joe Biden voted for Trump too. Mary Margaret, thank you so much for breaking that story and for coming on. We'll see you down at the many celebrations. All right, I want to get to a little bit more from the Chemdul Haim, of course, if you want your comments to be read. Look, I love all of you out there on YouTube. I love all of you out there on all the public platforms, but I especially love the who actually show up. Oh, look who is speaking of the creme de la creme. This man shows up right here. Now, Ben does not have a microphone on. I do. I can say whatever I want right now. Ben cannot respond. I can spew any kind of right wing radical traditionalist propaganda. Ben will have nothing to say until he gets his microphone. He'll have nothing to say. He'll just throw me off the balcony. Before I hand you over to Mr. Shapiro, a few more comments from our friends here on the iPad. Make Democrats irrelevant again. Love that. My name is Ben. I'm here says Zach Neb. I don't think that's your name, Zach. I think you're speaking for Mr. Shapiro. Very kind of you. Michael, what is your favorite historical element in D.C. obviously the native American History Museum. It's one of the most beautiful buildings here. Buongiorno, Michael. Mike, the chat is so fast. How are you going to read all the comments? Says Knapp art with great difficulty. People are very, very excited. There is no question about that. Game show. Michael, are you still outside? Because that's where the inauguration was supposed to be. Well, it actually is still there. The inauguration is actually happening directly behind me. It's just inside the Capitol. So unfortunately there are a lot of people who are going to come down. I have personal friends who are going to come down from New York and other places who said they're not going to come now because they didn't know if they could get tickets to the arena. So all the more important, I guess, to be able to tune in, especially on Daily Wire plus, because while we're all surviving out here, it's probably a little cozier. You get your leftist ears, Tumblr, you get whatever beverage you want in there. Tune in and you can watch not only me, but even one Mr. Ben Shapiro. Ben, welcome.
Ben Shapiro
Well, now I'm officially here. And you. Congrats. It's a big day. Very, very exciting. As you know, I love parties. So this is my kind of weekend. Last night, Michael and I were at some parties together. And I will say that Michael is much more in his element at these parties than I am. It was. It's pretty much what you would expect if you've ever watched either of our shows. Michael was hobnobbing with everybody. I was standing off near the exit, attempting to leave at the first available blockchain.
Michael Knowles
Awe your way. I have long said about you, Ben, having a good time is not your idea of having a good time.
Ben Shapiro
That's exactly correct. That's exactly correct. I mean, I have to say that we met some cool people. That was fun, but, you know, it was very loud.
Michael Knowles
It's loud, it's raucous, everyone. Even for me, I'm pretty upbeat. But I really have never seen conservatives this excited in my entire life.
Ben Shapiro
And it was a little terrifying. Honestly, I wasn't sure what to make of it. But yeah, I mean, everybody's here. Everybody, like really everybody's here to have a good time. Everybody's very excited about what the next four years are going to bring. I think that all the best hopes, let's pray that they are all materialized in reality.
Michael Knowles
Let's hope we're not at peak hope right now. Let's hope it only goes up from here.
Ben Shapiro
Yeah, that's exactly right. Well, Michael, it's good to see you. Or at least mediocre. And we'll see you again a little bit later because our coverage is pretty much all day long.
Michael Knowles
I'm gonna go warm up. Maybe with a Mayflower.
Ben Shapiro
Well, yeah. Enjoy your.
Detailed Summary of "The Michael Knowles Show" Episode 1655
Episode Title: Libs Panic As Trump Becomes The 47th President Of The United States
Release Date: January 20, 2025
Host: Michael Knowles
Podcast: The Michael Knowles Show, The Daily Wire
Michael Knowles opens the episode by celebrating the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 47th President of the United States. He emphasizes the monumental cultural and political shift, declaring, “This is the biggest cultural shift of our lifetimes. It is happening live right now” (00:00). Knowles portrays the election as a definitive victory for the right-wing movement, asserting that the American left has been thoroughly defeated.
Notable Quote:
“It has never been more over for the American left. ... the libs are pretty thoroughly destroyed.”
— Michael Knowles [00:00]
Knowles criticizes President Joe Biden for issuing preemptive pardons to controversial figures such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, members of the January 6th Committee, and General Mark Milley. He labels these actions as hypocritical, contrasting Biden's earlier promises to uphold the law with his administration’s apparent corruption and favoritism.
Notable Quote:
“Joe Biden ... placing people above the law. People who committed crimes... a criminal, corrupt, disreputable way for a criminal, corrupt, disreputable politician to end his career.”
— Michael Knowles [04:15]
The episode highlights CNN’s $5 million defamation settlement involving Navy veteran Zachary Young. Knowles applauds the enforcement of defamation laws, arguing that such accountability is essential for preserving free speech by ensuring the dissemination of truth.
Notable Quote:
“Enforcing laws against defamation actually is a defense of free speech because the point of free speech is to arrive at the truth.”
— Michael Knowles [35:20]
Knowles delves into the confusion surrounding the TikTok ban, noting its abrupt suspension and subsequent restoration. He interprets the ban and its potential reversal as strategic maneuvers involving major tech companies like Facebook and YouTube, as well as foreign relations with China.
Notable Quote:
“TikTok is a vehicle for Russian state Communist Chinese party propaganda. And yet President Trump is thinking about giving them a reprieve and putting TikTok back on.”
— Michael Knowles [25:45]
A significant portion of the episode focuses on President Biden’s announcement regarding the ERA as the purported 28th Amendment. Knowles vehemently disputes Biden’s claims, detailing the constitutional requirements and deadlines that the ERA has failed to meet, thereby labeling the announcement as a political fabrication by Democrats lacking substantive achievements.
Notable Quote:
“Joe Biden cannot, through sheer tyranny of will, change the Constitution.”
— Michael Knowles [11:43]
Knowles observes the minimal turnout at the inauguration protests, attributing it to the disarray and diminished influence of the left. He contrasts the vibrant protests of previous years with the current apathetic or poorly organized demonstrations, reinforcing his narrative of the left’s decline.
Notable Quote:
“Nobody’s really showing up. It’s so over for them.”
— Michael Knowles [59:29]
The episode underscores the presence of prominent international right-wing figures at Trump’s inauguration, including Nigel Farage, Liz Truss, and Giorgio Meloni. Knowles interprets their attendance as evidence of America’s pivotal role in the global right-wing resurgence.
Notable Quote:
“Trump is a big figure. He seems closer to a Caesar than he does to ... a minor sort of statesman.”
— Michael Knowles [61:00]
In an exclusive interview with Daily Wire reporter Mary Margaret Olihan, Knowles reveals that President Trump plans to sign executive orders targeting the "weaponization of government." This initiative aims to investigate and dismantle perceived abuses by the previous administration, particularly those affecting conservative Americans and pro-life advocates.
Notable Quote:
“Trump will be signing this order today to order that investigation into this weaponization of government in order to bring that weaponization to an end.”
— Mary Margaret Olihan [52:08]
Towards the end of the episode, Knowles engages with live comments and interacts with Ben Shapiro, highlighting the camaraderie among Daily Wire hosts. This segment reinforces the community’s unified stance and enthusiasm for the incoming Trump administration.
Notable Quote:
“I've been going to all of these celebrations, saying hello to lots of people. ... there is so much unity around this election.”
— Michael Knowles [63:35]
Knowles concludes by urging listeners to capitalize on the current political momentum. He emphasizes the importance of swift action through executive orders and legislative collaboration to solidify the gains achieved in the election, ensuring that the Trump administration can implement its agenda effectively.
Notable Quote:
“We need to push this through in the first hundred days because getting the Republican congressmen together is like herding cats.”
— Michael Knowles [60:35]
Historic Victory: Trump’s inauguration symbolizes a decisive shift in American politics, with the left facing unprecedented setbacks.
Accountability: The episode underscores the importance of holding media and government officials accountable through defamation lawsuits and executive investigations.
Strategic Moves: Discussions around the TikTok ban and ERA highlight strategic political maneuvers by Democrats to divert attention amidst their declining influence.
Global Impact: The presence of international right-wing leaders at the inauguration signals a broader global trend towards conservative governance.
Community Solidarity: Interaction with Daily Wire personalities and live audience comments illustrate a united and enthusiastic conservative base ready to support the new administration.
Michael Knowles on Left’s Defeat:
“It has never been more over for the American left. ... the libs are pretty thoroughly destroyed.” [00:00]
Critique of Biden’s Pardons:
“Joe Biden ... placing people above the law. People who committed crimes... a criminal, corrupt, disreputable way for a criminal, corrupt, disreputable politician to end his career.” [04:15]
Defamation and Free Speech:
“Enforcing laws against defamation actually is a defense of free speech because the point of free speech is to arrive at the truth.” [35:20]
TikTok as Propaganda Tool:
“TikTok is a vehicle for Russian state Communist Chinese party propaganda. And yet President Trump is thinking about giving them a reprieve and putting TikTok back on.” [25:45]
ERA Constitutional Limits:
“Joe Biden cannot, through sheer tyranny of will, change the Constitution.” [11:43]
Lack of Protests:
“Nobody’s really showing up. It’s so over for them.” [59:29]
Global Right-Wing Support:
“Trump is a big figure. He seems closer to a Caesar than he does to ... a minor sort of statesman.” [61:00]
Executive Orders on Government Weaponization:
“Trump will be signing this order today to order that investigation into this weaponization of government in order to bring that weaponization to an end.” [52:08]
Community and Unity:
“I've been going to all of these celebrations, saying hello to lots of people. ... there is so much unity around this election.” [63:35]
Urgency in Legislative Action:
“We need to push this through in the first hundred days because getting the Republican congressmen together is like herding cats.” [60:35]
Episode 1655 of "The Michael Knowles Show" provides a fervent endorsement of Donald Trump’s presidency, coupled with sharp criticisms of the Democratic Party and the media. Through a combination of exclusive reporting, strategic commentary, and interactive segments, Knowles portrays the inauguration as a turning point towards conservative resurgence and a repudiation of left-wing dominance. The episode emphasizes the necessity of swift legislative action and continued vigilance to maintain and expand the victories achieved in the recent election.