Massie's Mess, Trump Victorious & Dr. Oz's War on Fraud

Summary

The Michael Knowles Show — Episode Summary

Episode Title: Massie’s Mess, Trump Victorious & Dr. Oz’s War on Fraud
Date: May 21, 2026
Host: Michael Knowles (The Daily Wire)
Guests: (Various Daily Wire contributors), Dr. Oz

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Main Theme & Purpose

This episode centers on the recent political downfall of Congressman Thomas Massie, the continuing dominance of Donald Trump over the Republican Party, and an in-depth discussion with Dr. Oz about pervasive healthcare fraud—especially in Medicare and Medicaid. The panelists dissect why Massie lost his race, whether “pinecone-gate” or anti-Semitic rhetoric drove voters, and how Trump’s will is now synonymous with the GOP direction. The episode closes with Dr. Oz’s revelations about organized healthcare fraud and the failure of state and federal systems to combat it.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

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1. The “Pinecone-Gate” Scandal & Thomas Massie’s Downfall

• [02:17] The discussion opens on the bizarre revelations regarding Rep. Massie’s alleged personal scandals (notably, referring to his genitals as a “pinecone” in texts), unearthed by journalist Laura Loomer.
  • “She found a woman who claims to have had an affair with Thomas Massie two months after his wife died. And… he referred to his male member as his pinecone.”—Panelist B, [02:17]
• [03:46] The panel quips about the absurdity of the detail, questioning its real political impact in Kentucky.
  • “If it had been cactus gate, that would have been a completely different thing.”—Panelist D

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2. Why Did Thomas Massie Lose? Policy, Personality, and the Trump Factor

• [05:08 – 07:00] Panelists analyze Massie’s campaign, noting that his obsessive focus on Israel, donors, and anti-Semitism did him no favors in a district with few Jewish constituents.
  • “‘You don’t run a campaign in Northern Kentucky in which your chief issue is Israel and the Jews. That’s the dumbest thing you can do.’”—Panelist D, [05:58]
  • Massie’s attempt to lean on pro-Israel donors backfired since “Trump owns the party.”
• [07:29] The libertarian “principle over politics” approach is critiqued.
  • “Libertarians are inherently annoying though because they're constantly saying I'm standing on principle, I'm not gonna play politics. And I keep thinking, you’re a politician…”—Panelist C

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3. Anti-Semitism, Trump, and Party Unity

• [09:20 – 12:57] Massie’s evolution from a principled outlier to a conspiratorial figure is described, with anti-Semitism both a symptom and a tool for post-defeat relevance.
  • “He started thinking in very conspiratorial ways … the anti Semitism…is the symptom, not the cause.”—Panelist D, [12:01]
• [13:01] Notable quote from Massie’s concession speech poking at his opponent’s Jewish ties:
  • “‘I would have come out sooner, but I had to call my opponent and concede and it took a while to find Ed Gowrin in Tel Aviv.’”—Massie (clip played), [13:01]
• [14:12 – 15:45] Massie’s partnership with left-wing figures and conspiratorial investigations into Trump (e.g., the Epstein files) are discussed as key turning points that alienated both the GOP establishment and the Trump base.

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4. The "Horseshoe" Theory and Party Cleansing

• [17:36 – 21:10] The panel debates whether anti-Semitic conspiracy elements on the right are equivalent to those on the left (“horseshoe theory”). Panelist B argues the right actively purges these voices, while the left increasingly mainstreams them.
  • “The right has done…an admirable job of telling these guys like Massie, this party has no place for you. Trump…excised [them]. …the left is just allowing it to metastasize. ...The word Zionist is a full-on slur.”—Panelist B, [19:41]
• [21:28 – 24:19] Discussion pivots briefly to authoritarianism in Cuba before returning to theorize on Massie’s possible run in 2028 and the broader GOP landscape.

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5. Massie’s Motives: Political Brainworms or Exit Strategy?

• [24:30 – 30:10] Panelists offer theories for Massie’s shift: blaming Trump’s attacks, a deliberate anti-Jewish pivot, or succumbing to online conspiracy “brainworms.”
  • “My vote is for a combination of the two theories...the passion and the greed...he seems to lose his whole personality.”—Panelist C, [28:41]
• [30:10 – 32:45] The conversation reflects on how personal tragedy (Massie’s wife’s death) may have emotionally unmoored him, leading to erratic decisions, and reaffirms that Twitter and podcast discourse are disconnected from actual voter behavior.

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6. Party Unity and the 2026 Midterms

• [36:03 – 37:45] The segment stresses party unity as a “virtue” in the face of worsening left-wing demonization, political violence, and a polarized electorate.
  • “Unity really matters. ...We can duke it out in the primaries, but then we need to get in line, follow the leader, and win elections.”—Panelist E, [36:03]

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7. Left-Wing Radicalization & Political Violence

• [39:02 – 44:45] The episode explores the left’s shift towards DSA-backed, radical figures, referencing Graham Platner, Sam Altman assassination attempts, and historical precedents like the Palmer Raids.
  • “The next generation of the Democratic Party is psychotic…fully damned crazy…If you said 15 years ago, there’d be an assassination attempt on Sam Altman, I would have said you were nuts.”—Panelist D, [39:45 & 42:17]

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8. Dr. Oz’s War on Medicare/Medicaid Fraud

• [47:01 – 57:17] Dr. Oz joins to expose widespread healthcare fraud:
  • “If you just took the fraud out of Medicare and Medicaid … that would allow us to double the life expectancy of the Medicare trust fund.”—Dr. Oz, [47:18]
  • Examples provided:
    • South Florida: “Twice as many durable medical equipment suppliers as McDonald’s… We think the Cuban government’s involved…” [48:25]
    • Los Angeles: “One third of all hospices in the country are in LA… Half are fraudulent.” [48:54]
    • New York: “#1 job is ‘personal care service attendant’—a jobs program for political patronage, heavily unionized.” [50:54]
  • On why this persists: “If you’re not making jobs yourself ... you create personal care services. ...And here’s the part that’s really getting me: they’re unionizing those workers … for political patronage purposes.” [50:54]
• [52:10 – 54:20] Dr. Oz calls for structural reform:
  • “You need a federal government that wants to do their job. ...There were six people left working in Medicaid program integrity for the country at CMS… We need an all-of-government effort.” [52:10]
• [54:54 – 55:36] Systemic nature of the fraud explained:
  • “A whistleblower from Minnesota...said the big problem there was they did not want to be perceived as racist. ...Many states have normalized fraud.” [54:54]
• [57:17] Memorable closing line from Dr. Oz:
  • “We have got to create a world where taking advantage of our most vulnerable Americans is no longer acceptable.”

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On Massie’s campaign:
  • “The only part of this I actually heard … was that he had an affair two months after his wife died, which I didn’t think was so bad. I mean, what was she gonna do, come back?” —Panelist C, [04:48]
• On the effect of Twitter:
  • “Sometimes I worry that Twitter is becoming real life…but no. There’s a huge distinction; the guardrails hold.” —Panelist E, [31:41]
• On the left’s rising radicals:
  • “The next generation of the Democratic Party is psychotic. I mean, fully damn crazy.” —Panelist D, [39:45]
• On fraud as a political structure:
  • “If your governor’s not willing to do their job, you...should be upset because you’re compromising your people and your state programs by not taking charge of the fraud.” —Dr. Oz, [52:10]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Timestamp | Topic | |-------------|--------------------------------------------| | 02:17–03:46 | “Pinecone-gate” and Laura Loomer’s reporting| | 05:08–07:00 | Analysis of Massie’s losing campaign | | 09:20–12:57 | Anti-Semitism, conspiracies, Trump’s role | | 13:01–13:17 | Massie’s concession speech (Tel Aviv remark) | | 17:36–21:10 | Mainstreaming vs. excising radicals, left vs. right | | 24:30–30:10 | Massie: motives and transformation | | 36:03–37:45 | Party unity and virtue | | 39:02–44:45 | Left-wing radicalization and political violence | | 47:01–57:17 | Dr. Oz on health fraud: problems, causes, fixes |

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Takeaways

• Thomas Massie’s defeat is attributed more to his alienation from Trump (and the party base) than to salacious scandal or outside donor influence.
• Anti-Semitism and online conspiracism, while present on the right, are being actively rejected by GOP leadership, unlike on the left, where such elements are argued to be mainstreaming.
• There’s skepticism among the hosts about “horseshoe theory” equating radical tendencies of both sides—the right is policing its own boundaries, the left isn’t.
• Dr. Oz reveals endemic fraud in U.S. healthcare programs, rooted in lack of oversight, political patronage, and systemic normalization of corruption.
• The panel emphasizes the necessity for unity in the GOP against both internal extremism and external (Democratic) radicalization and demonization.

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Final Memorable Moments

“I think my vote is for a combination of the two theories: one is the brainworms that he went crazy. …as he started to go nuts, he started to see that little light at the end of the tunnel that ends up in podcast and making good money…”
—Panelist C, [28:41]

“If you just took the fraud out of Medicare and Medicaid… that would allow us to double the life expectancy of the Medicare trust fund.”
—Dr. Oz, [47:18]

“Unity really matters … we can duke it out in the primaries, but then we need … to win elections.”
—Panelist E, [36:03]

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This summary captures the entire episode’s major insights, tone, and structure—allowing non-listeners to grasp key debates, highlights, and the evolving dynamics in American politics.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

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[C]

Why aren't we on the air, by the way?

[D]

What was that?

[C]

Why aren't we on the air when. Why aren't we? Aren't we. Why aren't we.

[D]

We're still. We're waiting. We're waiting for Knowles. I mean, Knowles is, Is like. I don't know. He's smoking a cigar. I don't know. Waiting for. Why are you asking? Clavin, if you had not brought Knowles to a dinner party 15 years ago, none of this would have been a problem.

[C]

It is my fault. It's just such a good.

[D]

Everything.

[C]

Everything winds up being my fault. It's, you know, whatever happens, it all comes back to me.

[D]

Yeah, that's true. Fine. Let's just do that.

[C]

I think it's an improvement. I think. Yeah, No, I think it raises the level of the conversation.

[D]

Okay, fine. Okay, so what are we going to talk about? And just start talking about pine cones or what? Like, you know what?

[C]

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I hate to admit this. I don't know what the pine cone thing is about.

[D]

Okay, I'm gonna have Baya explain this to you so that I don't get in HR trouble by explain the pine cone thing to Clayvan. Because I, I, I, I prefer not to be sued.

[B]

Well, I don't know. Like, I don't want to get sued, but. All right. And also, the reason I bring this up is because are we, are we actually recording already?

[D]

And we're all recording all this, but we'll cut out anything that is unpleasant.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

Which is to say, three quarters of the show will be cut out.

[B]

No, no. So I will, I, I, I want to give Laura Loomer credit because I feel like she often has great reporting and she never gets credited for it. But she will go into the gutter and get the people and find the people. And, like, last night was really Laura Loomer's night. And what she did was she found a woman who claims to have had an affair with Thomas Massie two months after his wife died. And the things that she claimed he asked her to do, they're perverse. I will not repeat them. But in part of her, what she sort of. What Laura got out of her was that Massie allegedly also had an affair with Lauren Boebert, and in text messages, would refer to his genitals, specifically his male member, as his pinecone. And I truly want to know. I know. I know it's horrific, but I truly want to know. Like, I'm sure a lot of us feel that, like, the downfall of Thomas Massie was sort of of a piece. The downfall of the podcast area and the influencers with no influence, and these people who have turned rabidly anti Semitic on the right, who pretend to have influence. There's that. There's the fact that he really. But to me, I really do wanna know, like, did pinecone gate make a difference to the people of Kentucky?

[D]

I'm gonna go know that the pinecone gate really didn't make a difference. If it had been cactus gate, that would have been a completely different thing. I mean, I'm just honestly, like, what other parts of the natural world would be worse to label your member than a pine. Really? You're running into, like, see an enemy gate. Like, I don't. I don't know. Coral gate. Like, what are we talking here? And he was. And apparently he was texting with women using this name, right? I mean, like, I think that's where the text came from is in a text with a woman, he was referring, allegedly to his member as a pine cone.

[E]

I know I answered a little bit late here, but I do want to tell the audience we have the pine cone coming on, actually, later in the show. So be sure to stay tuned, because this is friendly fire. Friends, like these coolies, Enemies of friends, like these coolies, Enemies.

[D]

That's pornographic.

[E]

Is that.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Well, that's for behind the paywall. Obviously. You got to subscribe for that. You don't get to put the podcast onto YouTube, only pine cones.

[C]

Can I ask a. I want to ask a question about this, though, because the only part of this I actually heard, and maybe this is selective deafness on my part, but the only part of this I heard was the part that he had an affair with a woman two months after his wife died, which I didn't think was so bad. I mean, what was she gonna do, come back? I mean, she died, he moved down.

[B]

Whoa.

[E]

It is interesting, you know, like, on all of the dirt that they were digging up on Massie right before the election, it is interesting that look, I mean, a lot of it was like, raised a lot of eyebrows and probably didn't represent good Judg if it was true. But. Yeah, right. You're right, Drew. They didn't allege that he cheated on his wife. They didn't allege that kind of impropriety. So it was kind of typical political stuff. Some of it was kind of weird, like the pine cones or whatever. But all of it together, I was confident. I'd be curious to know what you all were thinking. Yesterday, I predicted Massie was gonna go down. I didn't know it was gonna be a nine point swing, but I predicted he was gonna go down. And the reason why, it wasn't just cause of the big, beautiful bill. It wasn't just cause of the pro Israel donors. It wasn't just cause or the other thing. It was because he was acting like a guy who was about to lose. He was correct. Right? Yeah. All right, thanks.

[D]

Yeah, no, this is totally right. Ok, so first of all, you don't run a campaign in Northern Kentucky in which your chief issue is Israel and the Jews. That's the dumbest thing you can do. Because if you think that the voters in Northern Kentucky are thinking about that, you're out of your mind. His district has 780,000 people and he has less than 500 Jews. And so if you actually want to know what happened in that election cycle, it's very easy. Watch the local TV ads. The local TV ads were Massey trying to hump Trump's leg. And then the rest of the campaign was Trump saying, get off my leg. That was the entire campaign. The entire campaign was saying. It was Ed Gallerin being like, dude, Trump doesn't like you and you're not going to make it happen. You're trying too hard. And Massey being like, no, no, no, we're best friends. We're. We're super best friends. And Trump tweeting, I don't even like him. I want him gone. He's the worst. And so there is the entire race.

[E]

We can't paper over the fact that. What's kind of funny with Massie is he had a super pro Israel billionaire donor who was backing him. But there's no doubt pro Israel donors And sort of commentators.

[D]

Yeah, for sure. But that's cause he was vulnerable.

[E]

That's because he was vulnerable. Because he was vulnerable. And the other thing is though, cuz a lot of the Massey supporters are basically trying to peg the whole thing on Jews for the reason he went down. But within the context of Brad Raffensperger going down, Bill Cassidy going down, the five state legislators in Indiana going down, within that context, I think you gotta say the reason he went down, even if the Israel donors played a role in the race, the reason he went down is the same reason all those other guys went down. And it's because they opposed Trump and Trump owns the party.

[D]

That's 100%.

[C]

Libertarians are inherently annoying though because they're constantly saying I'm standing on principle, I'm not gonna play politics. And I keep thinking you're a politician. It's like Aaron Judd saying I'm not gonna play baseball. It just doesn't make any sense. The guy would not compromise over anything. They're all the same. I mean Rand Paul who I kind is like this too though. They will not play the game. Part of which is getting the President's agenda done, you know. And so Michael Trump was like, you know, be gone. You know.

[D]

Yeah. And Michael, to your point, the reason you knew he was going to lose is because he started running a campaign where it was like what if I have over podcast Nazis to my house? And I'm not joking, it was literally people wearing sweatshirts that said American Reich on them.

[E]

Really?

[D]

He wasn't really trying to. That was real. That was real. And so like that is. That is not the move of a person who thinks he is long for the Congress. That is a person who is trying to steer into the dollars and cents of podcast scan and making a future for himself. And by the way, I will point out the strange new respect he is likely to receive for this campaign from MSNBC and from New York Times and from all of these clowns is demonstrative of the fact that if you want to be accepted in left wing world, what you really should do is steer into the anti Israel, anti Semitism stuff. It is not about resistance to Trump. You know who is more resistant to Trump than Thomas Massie? A guy named Bill Cassidy who voted for his actual impeachment in 2021. You think Bill Cassidy is going to be on Ms. Now anytime soon? As a resistance hero? There's no way in hell. But Massie will. And so will mtg and so will Joe Kent and so will the rest of these clowns. And that is because, again, the anti Semitism of the left is, is now baked into the cake. I mean, that is a very real thing. From Graham Platner up in Maine to this insane House Democrat down in Texas who is literally calling for me to go to an internment camp, like to be sent to an eye, have to be sent to an attorney.

[C]

I think technically you may too.

[D]

Yeah, you may, you may be there too, Drew. It depends on, on her classification. I don't know. I don't know if your conversion was effective. So. So, you know, it all depends. But you know, what that says is that Massie, at a certain point here, I think when Trump came out against him, realized that he was going down and he was like, well, I'm going to launch a new movement that is, that is sort of, you know, the horseshoe right and the woke left altogether and we will be best friends. And I think that that's, that's really what the campaign became. As far as the, the Jewish American money that came in, and it was not Israeli money. That's illegal. It was Jewish American money that came in to that race via AIPAC and via other super PACs. Well, yeah, the guy's wildly anti Israel and it turns out that a lot of donors would like to see him go because he opposed things that they like. That's what happens in every race. But you'll notice that it was not until Trump actually started the process of kicking his ass out of Congress that that happened because he won over 75% of the primary vote in 2020, 2022 and 2024. And it was only when he went up against Trump that things started to get really squirrely for him.

[E]

Yeah, no, this is the key, Ben. I think, cuz, like, I don't mean to paper over it or gaslight, like obviously there were a lot of pro Israel donors who didn't like Massie. And you know, Massie kind of earned their ire in many ways in a lot of his comments. But first of all, he's not the only congressman who voted against funding for Israel. And like the hypothetical I think of here is had Massie voted for the big beautiful bill, had Massey gone along with the White House and not like disreel, voted against funding Israel, even made comments that were anti Israel, if that were the case, I think he would still have his seat. In other words, it's not that the pro Israel donors would like him or anything like that, but it's that Trump was this sort of catacomb figure and it was when Trump said, hey, buddy, you're out. That was when all of the other political machinations really started to play out.

[C]

But to be fair, Massey doesn't send anybody money.

[B]

Yeah, but, but didn't Trump back his opponent? Massie has won before against a Trump backed opponent. I think I see this exactly the opposite as Michael Knowles. I think Americans, especially young people on the right. People on the right, People on the left are very comfortable criticizing Israel right now. But there is a line in the sand when it becomes obvious that it's not just Israel you have a problem with which, you know, Rand Paul doesn't, you know, want to fund Israel. I don't ever feel like he's being anti Semitic. There's a line where you cross that it's not just Jews and it's not just pro Israel people. The American people have very little tolerance for antisemitism. And when you start saying that the Republican Jewish Coalition, just Republican Jews, are somehow undermining American interests because they're trying to whip up support against you, that reads, I think, to average Americans as really anti Semitic. And I think it's really off putting. I think the fact that he, the Trump piece obviously is a really big deal, but he won before against a Trump backed candidate. I really think it was the tonal shift, the way that he talked about Israel and it stopped being the same as the way he talked about Ukraine. It stopped sounding like it was a principal opposition to funding and to war and started sounding like he was attacking American Jews. And I feel like average Americans, they're not so into Israel right now, but they are very protective of their Jewish neighbors. And I think that that just came off as so gross. Like his opening to his concession speech where he said, I had to go find my opponent's phone number and he's in Tel Aviv somewhere.

[E]

I think we have the clip. Do we have the clip?

[A]

I would have come out sooner, but I had to call my opponent and concede and it took a while to find Ed Gowrin in Tel Aviv.

[E]

I did get to call through.

[A]

I have called and can see we've been honorable the whole time and we're going to stay that way.

[D]

He's been honorable the whole time. The whole time.

[E]

Except, you know, I wish you were right.

[C]

I wish you were right, Bacha, but I don't think that's true. I don't. I mean, I think that people, in America, people tend to be tolerant, they tend to be fairly accepting as long as you leave them alone. But I don't think that that's what brought him down. I think, I mean, Trump stomped on the guy. It was a, it was a curb stomping and it was, it was kind of unfair. I mean, I don't think Massey has actually been that bad, if you just consider him as a series of votes. I don't think he's been that bad.

[E]

He's quite good in a lot of ways.

[C]

Yeah, no, yeah, a lot of ways he's fine. I mean, I just think he got up Trump's nose. Well, people are really sick, I think, of a Congress that cannot accomplish anything.

[D]

And I think that, I think there's something else.

[C]

Trump's way it's going to be.

[D]

Yeah, I think there's something else there with Massey too. One is, yes, he is the most obstructionist congressman on the right. I mean, there's no question he was a consistent no vote for every major agenda item that Trump was pushing, which pissed Trump off. But there was something else that we're ignoring here, which is that Massey decided to make it his chief goal in life to drag Trump through the mud with a bunch of bullshit about Jeffrey Epstein. Right. He and Ro Khanna decided that they were going to run an op going after Trump. Right. He was going to reach across the aisle and suggest that Trump was covering for a child sex trafficking ring. And there he was, he was on video, I mean, naming people in the files who were guilty of nothing, which they then later had to admit. And he decided he was going to ramp this up. So I think that actually the anti Semitism, as always, is the symptom, not the cause. I think that, that he started thinking in very conspiratorial ways about American politics and grievance based ways about American politics. He started attributing that to weird cliquish conspiracies like the quote, unquote Epstein class and all this stuff. And Trump read that and he's like, listen, it's one thing for you to vote against me sometimes. It's another thing for you to vote against me always. It's another thing for you to go on Ms. Now and talk about how I'm covering up child sex trafficking. The answer here is no. And it just turns out that the crossover between believing all of those former things and also believing that the Jews are deciding on your fate at their Friday night dinners, the crossover there tends to be almost 100%.

[E]

Yeah, well, indeed, if you are a

[D]

conspiratorial thinker who does, who does grievance based politics and also opposes Every element of Trump's agenda. The chances that you are going to be wandering around outside in the rain ranting about the uden is pretty high.

[E]

Yeah, no, there was this clip that was going around. It was one of the last real knocks on Massey 11th hour. And it was him being interviewed by a hostile journalist saying, hey, why do you oppose Trump and why have you voted against the GOP on these crucial votes, whatever. And he said, hey, hey, hey, I vote with the Republicans 91% of the time, but 9% of the time I don't vote for him, cuz they're covering up for pedophiles. And I thought, okay, hold on, wait, that doesn't even make a coherent political position. So you agree with the pedos and the pedo protectors 91% of the time. I don't want to agree with them on any percent of the time. And so what he represented to me, if you kind of zoom out from these individual issues or the individual donors or whatever is. He had two problems going for him. One, he voted 77, a little over 77% of the time with the GOP in Congress this term, which is way below the median GOP congressman who voted 95% of the time. This was also down from Massie last term who was voting 91% of the time GOP, which itself was down from the previous term when he voted 95% of the time GOP. So you can say, look, I hate the GOP, I'm glad he bucked the party, I like that he's independent, whatever, but that's not gonna win you support with the party. And then the other issue was, and this gets to your point, Ben, when you're palling around with Ro Khanna, one of these unctuous left wing figures who's just constantly taking shots at the right when you're calling your colleagues and the people who are supposed to be on your team pedophiles, essentially. I mean, what you're expressing is not just independence from the party. You're expressing a kind of contempt for the party and a contempt for the leader of the party. And it just, at that point, the vice president put it very well, he said, look, if you do, look, I've gotten along with Thomas in the past, we've agreed on a lot of things. But you know, if you're gonna go against the party in such a brutal way, you can't expect the party to back you.

[D]

So I wanna get, I'm kind of backstory possible theories. Sorry, sorry, go ahead.

[C]

No, I think that kind of backs what Ben was saying, that the Jewish issue is really part and parcel of this horseshoe where right meets left. I mean, I cannot see the difference between most of the people who are spouting this stuff. I can't see the political difference. They all seem to be on the same side. And the worst of the kind of hatred and the Jew hatred that comes out is in the New York Times, which has always kind of been in that position. So I do think that there is this way that this guy just drifted out of the main mainstream of the right, which actually doesn't adhere to a lot of that stuff.

[E]

Well, you know, what I like to do is drift out of consciousness so that I can go take a nice sleep on my Helix mattress.

[B]

But I think there's.

[E]

Hold on one second. Bhatia. I had a great. Hold on, hold on. Wait, hold on. I had a great transition. I'm gonna do it again. You know what I like to do is drift off to sleep on my Helix mattress. What you gotta do right now is go to helixsleep.com FriendlyFire which it will feel a lot less clunky than my transition did. We love our sponsors, Helix. They let you sleep really, really well. Helix has a sleep quiz that uses your preferred sleep position, firmness and other factors to match you with the right mattress for you. Which is a far more rational system than wandering around a showroom and laying on random beds. Helix is an award winning mattress brand reviewed by outlets like Forbes and Wired. Gentlemen, and maybe Bhatia, you too. I'm not sure I know you, Drew and Ben, you guys love your Helix mattresses.

[A]

We do, I do.

[C]

But I get to stay awake on it so I know it's comfortable because I never sleep. So I just lie there going, wow, What a comfortable MA.

[E]

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[B]

What I was gonna say is, yes, on the far right and the left, you see a similar kind of blame the Jews for everything. The Jews are all pedophiles, the Jewish state is undermining American interests, et cetera, et cetera. But I really kind of dispute this horseshoe theory because a horseshoe suggests that they're equal, but they really aren't in terms of the mainstream, which is, I think what Drew was just pointing to. The right has done, in my view, an issue, admirable job of telling these guys like Massie, this party has no place for you. Trump kicked Tucker and Megyn Kelly and Candace Owens out of the party. Basically. They have all been excised. On my show, you've had congressmen, senators, members of the cabinet saying, what happened to Tucker Carlson? I would be surprised if Tucker Carlson is at the next rnc. And while they're doing a really good job on the right of excising this, the left is just allowing it to metastasize. They're turning the very same people into celebrities. Celebrities and really elevating their profile, campaigning with them, mainstreaming their views. So if I may just do a short plug for my book, the Jews and the Left. They're not the same. These are not the same. You've got one side that is deeply committed to saying we stand against antisemitism. You're allowed to criticize Israel, of course, but we are not gonna allow Jew hate to infiltrate and become mainstream. And the other side, which is saying, actually, no, this is the price of entry. Now, like the word Zionist is a full on slur.

[C]

I agree with that. I think that's true. I think the Republicans have been much better about this than the.

[D]

They definitely have.

[E]

So speaking of brutalizing the left, are we about to just take out 150-year-old communist dictator in Cuba? Has anyone been? I actually, I'll be kind of adamant.

[C]

Could happen. Yeah.

[D]

I mean, they're threatening to prosecute Raul Castro, right? I mean, that's. I think that's. So presumably that's the, the precursor to maybe we go in and kidnap him and fly him in a tracksuit. And you just hope that, you know, whoever sponsors that tracksuit has really paid top dollar for it because Nike made bank off of that Maduro tracksuit. So if we're going to do this in full capitalist fashion, we don't just go and take Raul Castro, we get an endorsement deal and then we put him in a Reebok tracksuit and really make some money back for the American people.

[E]

Spread it out A little bit. Well, listen, before we get into it, even though Bhatia, I'm certain would look much better in a tracksuit and really anything else than Ben Dominic, we unfortunately have to say goodbye to Bhatia. We have to bring on Ben Domenech. I have no say over it. The producers make me do it. Bhatia, wonderful to see you as always. Everybody should go watch Bhatia's show and follow her all over the place.

[B]

Thank you. Thank you for having me. God bless and protect you all. Take care.

[E]

Good to see you.

[D]

So you know, we're talking about Tom Massey's future prospects. I mean one of the other things here is that if you go out in a blaze of glory shouting about how you've started a movement, maybe you run for president. Our sponsors over at Kalshi are estimating like 36% odds that Thomas Massie tries a 2028 presidential run. Not totally crazy. Honestly, I think that that's, that's actually, that might be low because somebody is going to have to try and be the avatar of the, of the psycho woke right movement. And it's not going to be, I think Joe Kent or Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Massey MTG ticket man that could, that could do serious double digit numbers of voters. Well, there's also, I think that'd be huge.

[E]

Look on the, just on the libertarian point, I mean put all the other controversy aside. If Massey is going to be Mr. Libert, there's always some guy doing that. You know, Ron Paul would run for president. Rand Paul has already signaled he does want to run and Massie would have some juice to do that. So there is that. Lane, the other thing that's kind of interesting, cuz Massie's now a Republican. I think he's still a Republican who's in opposition to Trump is if Trump is doing really, really well. You saw Rubio once again saying he would back JD Trump reasserting control over the party. If it's like JD Rubio, if that ticket they keep floating from the White House, if that's the ticket, if Trump's doing really, really well. There you go. You got it. But if the Trump administration does collapse for whatever reason, then the Republicans who are gonna have a better shot are the ones who are not tied to the administration. So all of a sudden then the Ron DeSantis candidacy starts to look pretty interesting. Assuming he doesn't join the admin or. I'm not saying Thomas Massie or Rand Paul are gonna be president, but all of a sudden they actually do Get a little boost to their prospects.

[C]

Yeah, but this is the place where AOC comes in. This is my nightmare, that if the Trump administration really tanks, which I don't think it's gonna do, actually, I think it's gonna come out smelling like a rose. But if it is the most dangerous person in the country. Woman's. The woman is. Is an. A pretty, an idiot and a fascist. I mean, it's. It's an almost perfect combination to win over the left.

[E]

Mr. Dominic, you're in. And we turn back.

[F]

Why are you bringing me on? You could have kept her.

[C]

I know, I know. She's so much nicer than you are, Ben. She's like,

[D]

can I. Can I make one more point about the Massey thing before we turn to Cuba? Because, frankly, I'm much more interested in the Massey thing than the Cuba. Thank you. To be honest with you, because nothing's happening in Cuba until it actually happens. So I want to get your guys's take on this. They're kind of. It's very weird that Thomas Massie decides that he's going to steer directly into crazy land. He was. He was like, hanging with Chenk Uyghur and Anna Kasparian the day before a Republican primary in a bright red district in Northern Kentucky, right? Which is Libertarians.

[E]

The highest order Libertarians are like, oh, yes, they just. I mean, listen, they swing left sometimes.

[D]

Oh, no, no. They're totally psycho. I mean, this is why their convention is the best watch in tv, right? I mean, like, every four years, their convention is some fat dude with an iron cross dancing around without a shirt, followed by some naked chick talking about how pornography is the most American thing. It's an amazing place, the Libertarian Convention. But in any case, here's. Here's the question. I had three possible theories as to why Massey did this. Theory number one is the most obvious, which is Trump decided that he was going to punch Massey as hard as he could in the face. Massie did not want to blame Trump, so he blamed the Jews, right? Which is a typical thing. You see Tucker Carlson do the same thing where he says, well, you know, it's not Trump that I'm upset with. It's his puppeteers. It's the. It's the marionette masters who are really doing it. And those marionettes, the people who are handling all the strings, that's the Jews. So a great way to avoid hitting Trump in a race where Trump is hitting you is to say it's really not Trump is people who are being manipulated. Manipulative of Trump. So that's theory number one. Theory number two is he knew he was toast, so he was going to steer directly into podcast to stand and try to make himself his next career. And again, we talked about that before. I think that's quite plausible. And then theory number three is that people like Massey spend an awful lot of time online and you just get brainworms. And when once you get those brainworms online, it is very difficult to excise them in real life. Because, let's be real again, this was a district in Northern Kentucky in which Thomas Massie made his number one issue a small Middle Eastern state halfway around the globe, which. About which is, again, only understandable if you have brainworms or if it's on purpose or if it's on purpose a different way. So I kind of want to know which theory of those three you buy.

[E]

I'll give a more charitable view, which is, how did it start? It could have started from a real principled opposition to wars in the Middle East. I actually think it might have started a little earlier than that, but let's say it started there. There's no doubt that a ton of pro Israel Jews really wanted to get Nassi out. And Trump, you know, again, we were talking about it earlier, but it's like, I think Trump was really the factor that made the difference. But nevertheless, it could well be the case that even if Massie didn't start out, like, smacking at the Jews or, you know, he obviously had his Tel Aviv comment last night, it might just be the case that when he saw that his big opposition was gonna be coming from pro Israel Jews, it just accelerated whatever trend was going on there. You know, in other words, like, he had a problem.

[D]

So it wasn't strategic, it was emotional. He saw a bunch of Jewish money coming in.

[F]

He just went back, can I make a vote here for brain worms? Can I make a vote here for brainworms? Because I know. I know who Thomas Massie used to be, and he basically was this, like, hippie libertarian who was also somebody who would build these chicken coops and make them controlled by Bluetooth and stuff like this. He was just sort of weird and eccentric, but he really was not leaning into any of the crazy stuff that he leaned in all the way up to this. And that's why it doesn't really. It makes no sense that he would, you know, steer the rocket ship directly into the sun, you know, based on prior behavior and the way that he was just kind of this, you know, this loner who was kind of off on the side, you know, and, and the fact that he would pair up with Ro Khanna to deal in all of this bullshit going after Trump. Look, there are four things on my mount, on my mount Rushmore of hate. It's, it's communist, it's anti Semites, it's Karen's and it's hippies. And by the end of the day he was hanging out with three or four of those and, and doing it all the time. So who does that? You know, someone who, who was a libertarian, who has any kind of, of rural libertarian principle or something like that, who has the kind of pro life record that Massey had, the kind of pro gun record that he had in the past, stuff like that. You just don't anticipate him going in that direction. And so I think the last couple of years of him, he just went crazy and he started hanging around with the worst of the crazy.

[C]

I think my vote is for a combination of the two theories that one is the brain worms that he went crazy. It was exacerbated by the fact that Jewish money was pouring into the campaign against him. But, but also people do tend to look for an exit strategy and it wouldn't surprise me whatsoever is as he started to go nuts, he started to see that little light at the end of the tunnel that ends up in podcast and making good money and with a big audience. So I think there might be a combination of the passion and the greed because he seems to lose his whole personality.

[D]

If it is the greed. I think that that does speak to kind of where the Republican Party is. In other words, words the anti Semitism and the conspiratorial muddiness and sort of the Tucker wing of the, of what's going on. That is an excellent exit strategy and it's a very poor entry strategy. And I think people are mistaking an exit strategy for an entry strategy. Meaning that we've seen a bunch of candidates who are endorsed by Tucker who are getting their asses just handed to them in election after election. Whether it's Casey Putsch against Vivek Ramaswamy up in Ohio. James Fishback is about to get crushed by Byron Donalds down here. You have, you have Massie who's now lost to see seat mtg has lost her seat. You know, you're seeing this happen like over and over and over and over. And so you're seeing people exit and presumably make more money and get the strange new respect on the other end. But if you're a politician who is looking to get into sort of a position of power in the Republican Party. Is your best way of doing that, like, as an elected official, to steer into crazy land, or does it turn out that actually normie land is the way that you get in and crazy land is the way that you get out with money?

[E]

Now, that's a good observation. There's also one sort of emotional aspect here, because my theory is still, like, a lot of this was exacerbated emotionally and kind of understandably. But the part that we haven't talked about is he started to fall afoul of Trump and get a little bit more eccentric than usual right around the time his wife died. I mean, to what degree is this just his wife of decades died and he got kind of emotionally unmoored and it upended his political career. Is that too much psychobabble for political analysis?

[F]

I don't know him well enough to know that. I just know that he became unrecognizable to a lot of us who interacted with him over the years. He again went from being this kind of country libertarian type who was always smiling and kind of happy and knew that he was basically irrelevant to being someone who was aggressively going after the most important person in politics in America, not just in his party, and doing so in ways that repeatedly involved him lying blatantly about all these sorts of things related to the Epstein files. Ben was saying earlier. So I, I, I think that there, there is something to that, Michael. But, but, you know, I haven't had him on the, the psychoanalysis couch personally.

[E]

Right. I just wonder.

[C]

It's interesting, though, that the, that that Tucker's lack of influence is the exact opposite of what Tucker himself predicted. And that almost everything that Tucker predicts turns out to be the opposite, which I think is, is proof that God is a gigantic, invisible Jewish man with a long white beard. I think he's just screwing with Tucker.

[F]

It is either that or it's just the demon.

[E]

I actually like looking at the way these things have shaken out here. There are two things that make me feel really good about it. One, even again, it's like, I'm not a huge Massey hater. I think for a lot of his career he was great. It just irritated me when he was really turning away and kind of, I don't know, opposing the party and the president. But nevertheless, the two great affirmations are. One, Twitter's not real life. Sometimes I worry about that. Sometimes I think maybe Twitter is becoming real life. Or it's obviously. But no There's a huge distinction between those things, and there's a big chasm between the hardcore politics on the ground and the political media. And so, you know, if the podcasts conducted the election, the results would all be different, but they didn't. You know, it was conducted by voters in districts around the country. And we have so many data points. We have the Indiana data point, which, again, that issue was redistricted. We have the Georgia data point. That issue was really the election of 2020. We have Bill Cassidy. We have that data point. We now have Massey. So it just. It seems to me that the guardrails hold and politics is actually a little different than the entertainment project.

[F]

If we had a political.

[C]

I have to break in here. I'm sorry. I have to break in here. I have to break in here with a smooth segue into a Policy Genius commercial. And as soon as I think of one, I'll tell you what it is. But I think the important thing is, like, I could go. Look, I could go at any minute, in the middle of this conversation, I could just fall off. My chair in is gone. And I want to make sure that the people that I care about, you know, there's only like, one or two of them that they are taken care of. And I think through all the stuff we remember, we often forget that that's an important thing. What happens to your family when you keel over and die, which could happen to anybody at any minute, if I have anything to say about it. The responsibility of protecting your loved ones is heavy, and trying to navigate life insurance on your own can be a Mess. Our sponsor, PolicyGenius, makes that process easier by acting as an online insurance marketplace, not an insurance company. So you can compare quotes from some of America's top insurers side by side for free. Their license team works for you, not for the insurance carriers. So they care about your needs, your budget, your family. They help you figure out coverage, amounts, prices, terms, all of it. So there's no guesswork, just clarity. What do you guys do? I mean, you guys don't care about your families, so you probably haven't used this stuff.

[D]

I mean, I have an enormous amount of life insurance on me for very obvious reasons, like hundreds of millions of dollars of life insurance. And so I definitely understand the necessity for life insurance. But even if you are just an old man living alone at the end of your life, like Drew, well, you know, even you need Policy Genius.

[C]

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[D]

get a 20 year policy for that kind of price, my goodness.

[C]

As long as I don't have to have a health checkup because I never pass those for some reason.

[F]

So I just wanted to add if you made a comment about political media, I, I think that if we had a functional political media that wasn't just interested in carrying water for the Democrats, the narrative after last night would be that Republicans are way more unified than Democrats are. Over the course of the past couple of months, we've seen Democrats prevail in multiple primaries. We've seen the situation play out in Maine, we've seen the election of Mamdani, we've seen all of these different situations where the DSA backed candidate, the AOC backed candidate. It has prevailed over people that the Democrats have actually, you know, preferred or the establishment has even anointed on their side. And nobody's talking about that story in the legacy media because it's an inconvenient story and it's actually true. The fact is that they're only united about the fact that by the fact that they all loathe Trump and it's just a contest of how much they loathe him between them. And that's, I think, the real story of what's going on on the left today, which is far more divided than the right after everything that's played out in these primaries.

[E]

And it's clear that unity really is a political virtue. You know, I think one of the real points of pride for Massey, and it's a point of pride among libertarians, is they love to point out how different they are, how they're willing to stand up to their party or how they, I don't know how special they are. They love that, you know, individualist political ideologies do that. But unity really matters. You know, it's one of the four marks of the church per the Nicene Creed. And it's important in your home, it's important, you know, in your country, and it's certainly important in political parties. And so it's not just, look, you don't want to blindly follow the leader of a party, and the Republicans do a bunch of dumb things that we should try to fight against. But I can't help but going back to this clip that has been going viral of a journalist with an activist outside New York courthouse talking about Luigi Mangione and the killing of Brian Thompson. And this girl said, you know, his kids are better off without him. It's this guy, he deserved to die. And, you know, those kids, they can enjoy the blood money. And what I keep coming back to, and we've seen this time and time again, obviously with Charlie's assassination and with the near assassination of Trump, is that the left, mainstream swaths of the left, have been telling us for over a year now, really for much longer, that they would want to kill us and will mock our kids when they have succeeded. They keep telling us that. And in the face of that, we need party unity. Not to be lemmings, not to be blind followers, not to be NPCs, but we can duke it out in the primaries, but then we need to get in line, follow the leader, and win elections. And to your point, be, I think that that really comes out pretty cleanly last night. There is a clear leader of the political party. There is a clear party apparatus funding, media organizing. And looking ahead to the midterms in 2028, the stakes are very, very high. And I'll take unity as a virtue.

[D]

I mean, I agree with that. But I think that what happened here and what's been happening is that there are lines drawn. Right? Unity has to be around a thing. Right now, the unity in the Republican Party is around the thing of the Trump administration. Right. And. And so you can say, well, you know, Massie was more of a principled conservative when it came to spending, which, by the way, I agree with. I was very praiseworthy of Massey's positions for most of his career when it came to the role of the federal government, for example. But. But the reality is that there were lines that were drawn. And then Trump is legitimately excising people from those lines. He's not just saying blanket unity, come hug me. He's saying, listen, here's where the line is. And if you're on the other side of that line, you're on the other side of that line. The point that you're making about the Democrats is, is a good one, everyone. It also is demonstrated they have embraced the worst parts of themselves. I mean, legitimately, the worst parts of themselves Hasan Piker talking about social murder with the New York Times about Brian Thompson. And then Hasan Piker, no shock endorsing people like Abdul Al said the Senate Democrat would be nominee in Michigan who's probably gonna end up with the nomination, who's like a full scale terrorism supporter. And by the way, Hassan Piker endorsing, wait for it, Thomas Massie again. So there is this, this, this horseshoe that has taken place. But I think Bhatia's earlier point is right, the part of the right wing horseshoe that is horseshoeing is being actively excised from the party by President Trump, which is a pretty amazing thing, actually.

[C]

You know, it's demonization of the guys furthest edge of, of a party that if they would only allow them to do their thing, they would win everything. The Democrats are going to test that theory. I mean, they've been testing it and these, these DSA guys are going to get out there and it's going to be interesting to see how much, you know, leverage they have because there is a move to the left, left in a younger cohort of voters usually, who usually don't vote. So we've been safe from them. But they do get excited over a guy like Mamdani. I think, I think he is the only politician that I think of as actually being evil Momdani. I think he's an actual bad guy, you know, an actual.

[F]

Only one.

[E]

Well, I mean there's a lot of

[C]

corruption, a lot of that stuff, but this guy

[D]

planner is legitimately evil. I mean, some of the stuff, the stuff that Platters Democrats holders. Oh, yeah, yeah, for sure. No, I know what you mean by Platner is again, another guy who's being fully endorsed and legitimized by the entire Democratic Party infrastructure. You have members of the Democratic media who are out there massaging. A guy who was saying on Reddit like a couple of years ago about how happy he was to watch a video of an American military member literally being killed. I mean, he is. Platner is disgusting. Disgusting. And the Democratic Party is hugging him with both arms right now. I mean, legitimately saying. I mean, there are people who are saying that he should run for Maine Senate and then he should run for president. The only saving grace of Mamdani is he wasn't born in America, so he can't run for the presidency, but Graham Platner can. And there are a bunch of people in the Democratic Party who are rising. And the next generation of the Democratic Party is psychotic. I mean, fully damned crazy. Like they are not remotely anywhere in the neighborhood of the sane. And so I get asked the question a lot, do we think that there's going to be a reversion to a sort of, of normal politics after this? I mean, the only way that that happens if the Democrats get absolutely shellacked. And I think that unfortunately, because of the polarized nature of the political system right now, the chances that they get totally shellacked, pretty low, actually.

[E]

Yeah, I agree.

[F]

The demonization,

[C]

they just have to do badly.

[F]

Yeah, the demonization thing that Michael was just talking about, I think we need to really consider and take it seriously. I think people have kind of, they've joked about it's starting to turn because of Luigi Magione, because of the number of attempts on, on Trump's life and of course because of, of Charlie's assassination. But I think, like, I don't know why it hasn't gotten more attention that there have been multiple attempts on Sam Altman's life that like the, that the AI phenomenon is now creating and the, and the demonization of billionaires that Bernie Sanders talks about, that is echoed by so many, just not just on the DSA left, but just on the left generally that that's going to climate in which these people, they're, they're not going to be able to, to live and work and have the kind of roles as captains of industry that they've had in the past without having the fear of the kind of backlash that these radical, demon, demonized, demonizing elements of the left really, I think believe in, truly in their hearts. And that's something that is so evil and so atrocious in terms of American history. We've seen things like this happen in the past and it led to, to bombings, it led to assassination attempts, it led to things that were absolutely terrible for fabric. And to see this happening in the 250th anniversary of America really is depressing to me.

[D]

Well, one of the things that actually is unique, and Ben, you're pointing it out here, is that in the history of the United States, when there are assassination attempts, typically it is people who are involved directly in the business of politics. Right? It's RFK getting shot or MLK getting shot or even, even Charlie in the line of mlk. Right. Just being a political activist and not to say they were saying the same thing or anything, anything but. But the reality is that it is now extended out to almost Russian Revolution style violence, like going after people who are just captains of industry, as you say, people who are running companies, people who are just engaged in the marketplace, like the actual marketplace. If you had said to me 15 years ago that there would be an assassination attempt on the President, I said, okay, that's kind of like, unfortunately a relative norm in American political life. Even if you had said to me there would be an assassination of a high level political activist like Charles, I said that that's, that's unique and horrifying, but not totally unexpected. If you would say to me that we would be at a point where, you know, people like a Jeff Bezos or a, or a Mark Zuckerberg or a Sam Altman, these are people who have to walk around with 24. 7 Security for the crime of creating products and services that people want to buy. And these are the bad guys. Now the UnitedHealthcare CEO is now considered the bad guy engaged in, quote, unquote, social murder. You're talking about true Russian revolution style revolutionary violence directed against an entire class. And that's scary stuff. I mean, that is a completely different thing. And also, these are all soft targets.

[E]

Ben. We should also point out this has happened before and we kind of forget about it in American history. But you think about the Palmer Raids, you think about the early part of the 20th century. You had anarchists and communists who were setting off bombs on Wall street, who were setting off bombs and shooting people in the Capitol. You had a Marxist professor from Harvard in 1915. Of course, it was hard, Harvard, shooting up or setting off a bomb in the Capitol. You did have these kinds of anarchist bombings almost exactly 100 years ago. You're seeing them begin to crop up again. The last time that that happened, the federal government came in and curtailed civil rights and put these people in prison, deported these people, got them out of our country. Whether or not we have the ability to actually exert that kind of political authority or the desire to do so, right now, I'm not so sure. But we have seen this play out before. And the only way that we were able to survive it right around the time of the Russian Revolution, when Russia did not survive it, is because we wielded federal authority in a very, very strong way. And if we don't do that now, I fear that the problem won't resolve itself on its own.

[D]

Well, we'll get to more on that in just one second. First, we need to talk about how you talk. And I mean, like actually talk, like on your phone. One of the weirder financial habits people have is you will spend hours comparison shopping for a plane ticket that saves you like 12 bucks.

[A]

Bucks.

[D]

And then you'll continue paying 80 or 90 bucks a month for wireless service without any question. At a certain point you have to ask yourself, why am I doing that? Especially now that companies like Pure Talk exist. Pure Talk is veteran led. It's backed by 100% US based customer service and now offers unlimited high speed data for just 34.99amonth. It's a pretty major shift because unlimited high speed data at Pure Talk used to start around 55 bucks a month. But Pure Talk has continued pushing to offer more value at lower prices. So if you looked at Pure Talk before and you didn't make the switch, well, that was double view. You should have done that. And now you should probably take another look. One thing people always ask is whether the service holds up compared to the massively overpriced major carriers. The answer is, I mean, it's yes. But you should try it yourself. PureTalk lets you test the service for 30 days with no contract and no cancellation fees. There's really pretty much no downside to seeing whether it works for you. Knowles, I know that you have been using PureTalk. How has your service been?

[E]

I absolutely love it. I've had my Pure Talk phone for about six years now. Now the customer service is great because they speak English and they speak it in a normal American way. But two, it is actually the best service in the country. A lot of people hear that and they think, oh, you use similar towers, similar coverage. No, no, no. It is the same towers. It's the same coverage as the best places in the country. And you can even take it overseas if you're going on vacation this summer. So it's just phenomenal. I could not possibly recommend it highly enough.

[D]

Well, take it from Knowles. It's the one issue I trust him on. The switch itself can happen in as little as 10 minutes. And again, if you need help, that US based customer service team is standing by. Head over to PureTalk.com Shapiro claim unlimited high speed data for just $34.99. Again, that's PureTalk.com Shapiro to switch to my wireless company, an Knowles wireless company and America's wireless company, PureTalk.

[E]

We're saying goodbye to you, Mr. Domenech, because you don't have a doctoral degree and we are replacing you with Dr. Oz. Good to see you, sir.

[C]

Just like all of us. Good to see you. Good to see you, man.

[E]

I'm an honorary doctor, so if anyone ever has a heart attack on an airplane, I'll say, hey, hey, hey. Who needs a Commencement speech. I'm here. I gotcha. I'm totally recovered. Do we have Dr. Oz with us?

[C]

There he is.

[E]

Dr. Oz, good to see you, sir.

[A]

Good afternoon, everybody. How are you doing?

[E]

Very, very well. I know we're all here just babbling and cackling and giggling, whereas you are not only helping to lead health in the country, but also rooting out all of that terrible fraud which we have not talked enough about.

[A]

Well, maybe I can put it in the context of affordability, because I think for a lot of Americans, it's what they're most concerned about. And if you just took the fraud out of Medicare and Medicaid, and we estimate there's probably $100 billion of fraud on the programs that the government pays for you to get better health, that would allow us to double the life expectancy of the Medicare trust fund. Just to put that in context, if you're working your tail off right now watching the show and you're worried Medicare was not going to be there for you when you reach the ripe old age of 65, it's the parachute that's going to catch you and deal with your health issues that's costing you an arm and a leg. So you can keep your arms and legs. Then you should be pretty much with us on this fraud issue because by doubling the life expectancy of the program, we'll make sure it's there for you and for your grandkids. And that's the kind of discussion we need to be having in earnest with each other. Because the fraud is so large, it's so weaponized, that we have to start asking ourselves, is this really a flaw for state leadership, for governors? Or maybe there's a feature here we had not noticed before, which is why they've allowed it to go unimpeded for so many years.

[C]

Can you explain what kind of fraud is taking place exactly?

[A]

I'll give you three examples. So South Florida, where you guys have some affinity, is a state that has generally done okay on fraud, waste and abuse. But in the area of durable medical equipped equipment, where, you know, the wheelchairs and canes, these companies have now grown so quickly that we have twice as many of these durable medical equipment suppliers as McDonald's in South Florida. It's impossible that that many people want to sell you wheelchairs, but that's the norm. We think the Cuban government's involved because many of the perpetrators actually flee back to Cuba. Even worse, one third of all hospices in the entire country are in Los Angeles, not California. And actually specifically the city of Los Angeles. Now, that would imply a very high death rate in la. And no matter what we might say about Los Angeles, that's just not the truth. And so if you have one third of all of the hospices taking care of people at the end of their life with dignity in one city, then we would have to assume most of those folks are fraudulent. In fact, half of the people in Los Angeles, the hospice centers, we do think are fraudulent. And we have stopped paying almost half of them already. And here's the craziness of all 800 of these hospices we've stopped paying. We've had maybe two dozen complain. So most of these guys say, all right, the gig's up. You know, they came looking for a man. We know one day we'd be out of business. We're gonna go defraud somebody else. But the fact that that could have occurred under the watch of Gavin Newsom, even though he was warned four years ago by the state auditor general that there was widespread fraud and really just did performative things to pretend he was dealing with the crisis, why should the federal government have to come in and clean up the mess? Well, unfortunately, it's federal dollars they're spending so literally. New Mexico, another blue state, and Mississippi, a red state, their tax bills are higher because those folks who don't have the income of people in California are paying extra federal taxes. So we can transfer it right to Los Angeles, where the unmitigated disaster of fraud, not just in hospice, but in other programs, exists. Let me give you a third example, and then we can come to the why question, which is always the most important one. New York City, New York State. These are big prosperous areas. The number one job growth, in fact, the number one job of all in New York State is a personal care service attendant. Now, what does that mean? That means we're paying someone to carry your groceries up the stairs to your kitchen. That person is often your child or the neighbor's kid, and your neighbor's kid's driving you to the doctor's office. So all these services that historically your family would do for you, we're not paying someone to do for you. It's become a jobs program.

[D]

Program.

[A]

Let's take it to the why question. Why would it be that you would allow that much growth? Why does California have twice the amount of money being spent on these same personal care services than the national average? It's because if you're not making jobs yourself and you want to pretend like you're creating jobs and you Want to be able to get federal tax dollars to pay for those jobs and then tax those that income so you have more state revenue? Well, you'd create personal care services. It's literally exactly what they have done in New York, York and in California. And here's the part that's really getting me. They're unionizing those workers, which means we're gonna help the union that's, you know, the big service work workers union in New York double in size, all that union dues and all the taxes on that, that all flows back potentially for political patronage purposes to support the single dominant party in New York state and California.

[D]

So, Dr. Oz, other than sort of the rooting out of the fraud that's happening, what systemic changes do you think need to be made to how the federal government deals with Medicaid at the state level? I know there have been a lot of critiques of the block grant program because it basically removes a lot of the incentive for states to actually police their own fraud. Because if you're just getting a chunk of change, it doesn't really matter to you whether or not you identify the fraud or not that the chunk is the same. What sort of systemic changes do you think need to happen?

[A]

Oh, this is very addressable. First of all, you need a federal government that wants to do their job. The prior administration gutted the Medicaid program integrity. There were, and I'm gonna be clear about this, there were six people left that we're aware of that were working in Medicaid program integrity for the country at cms, the agency that I run for the president. And that basically means we're not serious about this. We just want you to enroll as many people as possible into the Medicaid program. We don't want to hear about fraud. And that's what I was told by people who are here because they were told, listen, just, you know, go do something else. Just don't focus on the fraud issue because you're gonna to create a narrative, a micro narrative that doesn't agree with our administration policy. But you also have to have states that want to work with us. And we need an all government approach. So what the President did by appointing JD Vance to be the head of this White House anti fraud task force. And we've been doing announcements, as you've been witnessing, frequently highlighting these realities is if I've got a problem at CMS and I'm the insurance company and I see that there's some aberrancy in payments, we've doubled or tripled the payments in an area. It doesn't make any sense. I can go to doj, FBI, the Office of Inspector General and they're gonna actually work for me with me rather and take charge of this issue to actually investigate crime. Or I can go to Scott Best in the treasury and he's gonna actually use forensic accountants to find out where's the money getting laundered to. Like who are the big players involved? Cuz it turns out we have foreign groups that are involved in organized criminal activities and foreign governments we believe that may also be involved in these endeavors. These are not mom and pop setups. We need an all of government efforts. And finally governors have to feel the pressure. Governor Waltz stepped down in Minnesota because of pressure over the massive amount of fraud that he was unwilling to take charge of when he was governor. We had. The governor of Maine has now stepped down. Others may as well. If your governor's not willing to do their job, you the people should be upset because you're compromising your people and your state programs by not taking charge of the fraud. Medicaid has to be run by the states. Medicaid therefore should be matured and nurtured and, and for good reason protected by state leadership against this kind of fraud. And if the federal government has to step in cuz our tax dollars are being abused, it's not gonna be a happy day.

[E]

To what degree is all of this fraud organized? To me with my political cap on, that's what's most interesting. Not just that some scam artists are trying to bilk the system, but that there is a system of patronage that has politicians not just looking the other way, but really in some ways cooperating with. You mentioned Governor Walz. There are plenty of accusations there. So how organized is this and who can we bring to account not just for stealing some taxpayer dollars, but for setting up a system that's fundamentally unjust.

[A]

Well, I just interviewed a whistleblower yesterday from Minnesota. She worked in state agencies. She's a Democrat by the way. Was raised a Democrat. Was a Democrat. And as soon as she began raising concerns about the fact that there was a disproportionate amount of money being taken by the Somalians in Minnesota, she was quickly ostracized and blocked off. And she said the big problem there was they did not want to be perceived as racist. They want to be Minnesota Nice. And that doesn't mean that you literally blind yourself to the reality of criminal activities. But because she was willing to call that out, she was ostracized and I think that's part of the puzzle, that people aren't willing to just do the right thing. Part of it is they recognize that by doing the right thing, they might actually look worse in the eyes of their voters.

[D]

Voters.

[A]

Some people may not like the fact that you're going after criminal entities. And these are dangerous groups that intimidate witnesses. If you go to Flushing, Queens in New York, you're not gonna get any of the Chinese folks who live there to talk to you about the fraud that they're witnessing. But we know there's tremendous amounts of fraud, human trafficking, by the way, lots of other bad things. Cuz once you tolerate corruption, it spreads widely. But there has to be a change in expectations. Many states have normalized fraud. Now think about this. If it's okay for a doctor to lie about a patient needing hospice by claiming that they're gonna die, when in fact they don't have any problems whatsoever that are mortal or even near immortal, they're selling their soul. And what we have allowed to happen. It got worse during COVID when there was a general belief you could just throw money at the problem and hope it worked out. And then a lack of policing program integrity over the last administration's tenure. You're left with a system where fraud is normalized, where corruption is what's always out there. So you're looking for your little handout. Like many countries that have fraud, it's systemic. Everyone gets a little piece of the action. Everyone dips their beak into the equation. But I was told this by a friend of mine, and this is a profound statement that he made. They said, when Republicans win the White House, everybody wants to be the Secretary of Treasury. Everybody wants to be the ambassador to England. That's what Republicans seek when a Democrat wins the White House. They want to get control of Health and Human Services because that's where the big money is. Our budget's almost $2 trillion. And that money flows through many systems where all you need is a beneficiary's identification number to serve as a credit card. And you can take advantage of the system. So we have got to create a world where taking advantage of our most vulnerable Americans is no longer acceptable.

[E]

Yes, we need to do that. Two things I really desire. I would desire to totally clean up HHS with all of this fraud. I would also desire to be the ambassador to England. That sounds like a great job, Dr. Oz. We've taken up enough of your time. Thank you very much for coming on the show. Thank you for everything. You're doing and God speed on this very important task. Now we turn to a man who every day goes by will more likely need health care coverage. And that is, of course, Andrew Clavin.

[C]

This Memorial Day, and I remember the first Memorial Day, this Memorial day weekend. Get 45% off an annual Daily Wire plus membership. That's too nice for these people. God. Here's what you get. Exclusive member only content like Real History with Matt Walsh, which has new episodes every single month. And frankly, we've got a lot more coming. Shows you haven't seen, content you haven't heard about yet. All exclusive to members. This is the time to join. 45% off dailywire.com do it today or else.

[E]

Do it. Do it right now. That's what I'm going to leave you on. Just go do it. I don't want to put any distraction in your head before then. And I hope everyone has a good Memorial Day. Good to see you gentlemen. See you next time.

[D]

You're. Good to see you too, Michael.

[C]

Good talking to you.