Podcast Summary

Podcast: To The Contrary with Charlie Sykes
Episode: Zee Cohen-Sanchez: Beating Charlie Kirk at his Own Game
Date: August 26, 2025

Episode Overview

This episode features host Charlie Sykes in conversation with Zee Cohen-Sanchez, founder of National Ground Game, a progressive political action committee working to counter right-wing campus organizing efforts led by figures like Charlie Kirk. The discussion delves into the shifting landscape of youth political engagement, how figures like Kirk and Nick Fuentes have found traction, the alarming gaps in Democratic organizing, and the internal strife plaguing progressive activism. The episode’s central message: understanding and overcoming the right’s grassroots and media advantage is crucial if progressives want to prevail, especially among young voters.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Youth Vote and Right-Wing Organizing

• Democratic Assumptions Challenged:
  Sykes highlights how Democrats long assumed young voters, especially college students, were a secure bloc—an assumption now upended.

  • “I think Democrats took youth voters for granted… this demographic fantasy… that you were going to have all of these… this emerging electorate that was going to inevitably give Democrats wins.” (02:05)

• Rise of the Right Among Gen Z:
  Zee details the complexity in the youth shift, noting both improved Republican organizing and some genuine ideological movement.

  • "I think that we've seen this shift in the youth vote… it's hard to tell… if the youth is actually moving to the right ideologically or if they are just simply out organizing us." (03:34)

• Male Loneliness and MAGA:
  Male loneliness is a key vulnerability exploited by right-wing organizers like Kirk and Nick Fuentes.

  • “There is a male loneliness epidemic… people like Charlie Kirk are… using this… to pull them in so that they feel like they're part of something.” (03:34)
  • Sykes probes: “Is it primarily men? Is it boys? Is it, the, the, this incel culture… it seems primarily male.” (05:13)
  • Zee confirms: “It is primarily male. Although it is dangerous for us to not look, I think at women as well in this space.” (05:24)

• Turning Point USA’s Massive Funding and Infrastructure:

  • Kirk’s group raised $100 million in 2024, with 500,000 individual donors, showing broad grassroots buy-in.
    • “Charlie raised about $100 million in 2024.” (06:01)
    • “He has 500,000 individual donors… that's a huge amount. If he lost those really big funders, they would still be taking over the game.” (06:10)

2. Why the Right’s Tactics Are Working

• Community Over Ideology:
  Campus events are less about politics, more about belonging and networking—an area where progressives lack alternatives.

  • “Most of them told us that they don't really think Charlie's cool… they actually don't really care that much about Trump. They more so think of this as like a vacation for their friends… there isn't an alternative on the left that they could look and say… it doesn't exist.” (09:19)

• Organizational Weaknesses on the Left:
  Progressive and Democratic groups are fragmented, decentralized, and lack the shared goals, scale, and resources of their conservative counterparts.

  • “They don't have that Turning Point infrastructure. So they're usually student led and run… there's not like a shared goal… nothing like that exists.” (10:09)

• Ground Game Disparities:
  The right is beating Democrats at basic organizing, especially voter registration. Turning Point and groups like Scott Presler’s Every Vote Action consistently outwork the left.

  • “Every time I would send in canvassers… Turning Point USA and… Presler's org… were there long before, before us and long after we were gone.” (11:31)
  • “They've registered 4.5 million voters since 2020, and we haven’t.” (12:51)

3. Media Ecosystem and Social Media Dynamics

• Conservative Media Machine:
  Right-wing influencers—Kirk, Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro—unify ground activism with a disciplined, algorithm-hacking media empire.

  • “They are marrying the ground game with the online media empire… they have all of their people on one accord all the way down to the very smallest influencers… we don't do that on the Democratic side.” (16:53)

• Progressive Media Disorganization:
  Democrats lack coordinated messaging online; content is scattered, which reduces its perceived authenticity and impact among young people.

4. The Radicalization Pipeline and Nick Fuentes

• Extremism Ascendant:
  Nick Fuentes, an openly antisemitic Holocaust-denier, is surging in online influence—which shocks even seasoned observers.

  • Sykes: “Nick Fuentes is a crypto Nazi without the crypto part… give me some sense that. That he is… rising now on the right.” (18:26)
  • Zee: “Yeah, and that's part of the issue. Nazis… like, what's scary is that… the algorithms now favor the far right and the far left. And so that's why we're seeing this…” (19:36)

• Algorithms and ‘Rage Bait’:
  The structure of social media rewards ever more outrageous and transgressive content, explaining the rise of extremists.

  • “The algorithm wants to feed this, like, rage bait… so they grow much faster, grow easier than normal people.” (21:00)

5. Progressive Movement Dysfunction

• 'Unfucked America' Example:
  Zee’s Unfucked America campus tour faced enormous progressive infighting, with accusations spiraling despite the tour’s unprecedented engagement and reach.

  • “Everything imploded because… people… basically said that we were not uplifting black voices… The whole point… was that we're speaking to that demographic… And that was not a good enough answer… they proceeded to take down the whole tour because of that.” (28:53)

• Purity Tests and Cancel Culture:
  Sykes and Zee discuss the self-defeating tendency among the left to shrink its tent through endless purity tests and internal policing.

  • “The infighting has always been bad… this new emergence of Palestine and Israel has really just… shaken up the whole party… If you say, 'I don't have a position'… then you are the enemy.” (32:55)
  • “We are finding reasons to shrink our tent. And in a time where we should be expanding our tent, this is where my personal frustration comes in… if you don't believe in 100% of what I believe, then you don't deserve to be here, well, then that's how we get Trump.” (32:55)

• Electoral Consequences:
  The unwillingness to organize around shared goals or accept broad coalitions leads to losses—sometimes catastrophic ones.

  • “Some of these folks… wouldn’t support Joe Biden… because of her [sic] position on Israel and Palestine, and they got Trump. And we've seen what's happened since then.” (33:53)
  • Zee: “If you don't believe in winning electorally is important, then we can't work on the same team… it's affecting our actual ground game.” (34:22)

6. Solutions & Looking Forward

• Cutting Through the Noise:
  Zee calls for progressives to “cut the cancer out of the party” and refocus on actually winning elections, warning that leadership is being distracted by the loudest but least electorally relevant voices.

  • “What my hope is, is that we cut the cancer out of the party and we just move on. Because to me it's like, okay, if you're not voting anyway… why are you then making these fundamental decisions that are going to lead us into… a dictatorship.” (37:20)

• Gavin Newsom as Model:
  Zee praises Newsom’s media savvy and trollish engagement as something Democrats should emulate, though notes party tendencies to lag behind cultural shifts.

  • “I love it… Gavin is actually getting it now… I hope that… they do [follow his example].” (39:12)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the core appeal of Turning Point USA:
  “They get to meet girls. Right, like, and so it's, it is very much an ideal setup and nobody else is doing this. There isn't an alternative on the left.” – Zee Cohen-Sanchez (09:20)

• On the scale of the right’s organizing:
  “I've been sounding the alarm on our voter registration program for a long time… in 30 states that we can determine what party affiliation is for voter registration, we were down in every single one.” – Zee (11:31)

• On the algorithm’s dark incentives:
  “The algorithm wants to feed this like, like rage bait is really the only thing you could call it. And so they, they grow much faster.” – Zee (21:00)

• On progressive infighting:
  “We are finding reasons to shrink our tent. And in a time where we should be expanding our tent, this is where my personal frustration comes in… that's how we get Trump.” – Zee (32:55)

• On what needs to change:
  “I hope… that we cut the cancer out of the party and we just move on. Because… why are you then making these fundamental decisions that are going to lead us into… a dictatorship.” – Zee (37:20)

Important Segment Timestamps

• Intro & Zee’s Welcome - [01:12]
• Gen Z’s Rightward Shift, Turning Point’s Funding - [03:34] – [06:44]
• Turning Point’s Social Pull vs. Progressive Orgs - [07:53] – [10:46]
• Organizing/Registration Failures on the Left - [11:31] – [13:41]
• Media/Influencer Ecosystem Split - [16:16] – [18:26]
• Nick Fuentes and Extremism Pipeline - [18:26] – [24:17]
• Progressive Infighting & ‘Unfucked America’ Tour Implosion - [27:11] – [31:56]
• Israel/Palestine Controversy and Party Fracture - [32:55] – [34:22]
• Future of Democratic Organizing & Newsom’s Model - [37:20] – [40:05]

Closing

Charlie Sykes ends by reiterating the importance of recognizing these challenges, warning against complacency, and restating his show’s purpose:
“It is important to remind ourselves that we are not the crazy ones.” (40:37)

For more about National Ground Game or the Unfuck America Tour:

• nationalgroundgame.com
• unfuckamericatour.com

Episode Tone:
Candid, urgent, at times exasperated but practical. Both host and guest blend inside-baseball analysis with a call for grounded action, resisting both doomerism and denial.