The Ben Shapiro Show - BREAKING: Former FBI Director James Comey INDICTED!

00:00:00.000 Former FBI director James Comey is indicted.

00:00:02.000 Democrats continue to celebrate the return of Jimmy Kimmel, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel speaks at the UN General Assembly plus a lot, a lot more.

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00:01:20.000 Well, it was a long time incoming, and yesterday afternoon it was announced that a grand jury had indicted a longtime target of President Trump's former FBI director, James Comey.

00:01:29.000 Of course, James Comey has been on President Trump's so-called target list for a very long time, going all the way back to when President Trump fired him during his first term.

00:01:37.000 He, of course, fired him because James Comey almost certainly bootstrapped into the press the so-called steel dossier.

00:01:44.000 He promoted the Trump-Russia collusion hoax.

00:01:47.000 He was deeply involved in every aspect of that, up to and including the use of the steel dossier in documents that were presented directly to President Trump, which was then used as an excuse by the media to push the Steele dossier, a compendium of lies about President Trump into public view.

00:02:03.000 And there have been open questions about whether James Comey, over the intervening years, where he testified repeatedly in front of Congress, among others, had actually committed perjury.

00:02:12.000 Well, yesterday, the indictment came down, according to the New York Times, the indictment filed in Alexandria, Virginia came over the objection of career prosecutors in the Eastern Districts of Virginia who found insufficient evidence to support charges, but were then overruled by Lindsay Halligan, a Trump loyalist handpicked by the president to run the office a few days ago.

00:02:28.000 Halligan herself does not have any experience prosecuting criminal cases.

00:02:31.000 She's an insurance lawyer.

00:02:33.000 So this is definitely something new.

00:02:36.000 It represents the most significant legal step yet by the Trump administration to go after a former official, obviously.

00:02:41.000 There's been talk about going after John Bolton.

00:02:43.000 We'll get to that in just a little while.

00:02:44.000 He's obviously under federal investigation right now.

00:02:47.000 The indictment itself is as bare bones as it is possible for an indictment to be.

00:02:52.000 And so we have to analyze this on a few different scores.

00:02:55.000 One, what is the accuracy of the indictment?

00:02:59.000 Will in fact the conviction of James Comey happen?

00:03:02.000 That is sort of access number one.

00:03:04.000 Number two is the political.

00:03:05.000 Is what President Trump is doing here super duper duper bad, or is it just turned about as fair play?

00:03:11.000 And then access number three is sort of what comes next.

00:03:14.000 So let's go one by one here.

00:03:15.000 Let's start with the actual material in the indictment.

00:03:18.000 It is a very, very, very short indictment, as in like a page and a half maximum indictment.

00:03:23.000 Quote, false statements within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch of the U.S. government, that is count one.

00:03:29.000 On or about September 30th, 2020 in the Eastern District of Virginia, the defendant James B. Comey Jr. did willfully and knowingly make a materially false, fictitious and fraudulent statement in a matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch of the government of the United States by falsely stating to a U.S. Senator during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that he had not authorized someone else at the FBI to be an anonymous source in news reports regarding an FBI investigation concerning person one.

00:03:52.000 Person one would be the president of the United States.

00:03:55.000 That statement was false because as James Comey then and there new, he in fact had authorized person three to serve as an anonymous source in news reports regarding an FBI investigation concerning person one.

00:04:04.000 Person three is a person who is working at the FBI.

00:04:06.000 As we'll explain in just a moment.

00:04:08.000 Basically, the allegation here is that there was a lower down at the FBI who leaked to the press details involving the investigation into President Trump, and that is now being suggested that that person was authorized by Comey illegally to do that, and that Comey then fibbed about it.

00:04:22.000 Or if he had the authority to authorize the leak, he fibbed about it, and that fib is count one, which is the perjury charge.

00:04:29.000 Count two is obstruction of a congressional proceeding, saying that on that same date, based on that same testimony, Comey did corruptly endeavor to influence, obstruct, and impede the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry under which an investigation was being had before the Senate Judiciary Committee by making false and misleading statements before that committee.

00:04:46.000 That is the entirety of the indictment.

00:04:47.000 That's the whole thing.

00:04:48.000 It is an idea and compendium of accusations.

00:04:50.000 It is very specific.

00:04:52.000 It is about presumably one or two lines in his testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

00:04:56.000 The reason it's being brought so quickly here is because there is a five-year statute of limitations on perjury charges.

00:05:03.000 And as you may have noticed, that testimony was September 30th, 2020.

00:05:07.000 It is now September 26th of 2025.

00:05:09.000 So we are about to expire on that statute of limitations.

00:05:13.000 Andrew McCarthy, who breaks this sort of stuff down for National Review, had predicted that this sort of thing was going to happen.

00:05:19.000 And he sort of lays out exactly what the story here is.

00:05:23.000 He says on Halloween 2016, about a week before the 2016 election, the left-wing journalist Franklin Fowler published a report in Slate, strongly suggesting that candidate Trump had established a communications back channel with the Kremlin involving servers at Trump Tower in Manhattan and Alpha Bank, one of Russia's largest financial institutions.

00:05:39.000 Within hours on the same day, the New York Times published its report investigating Donald Trump, FBI sees no clear link to Russia.

00:05:45.000 The Times report related the FBI's conclusion there was nothing to the back channel claim, which, of course, was later confirmed by special counsel John Durham's Russia Gate probe.

00:05:55.000 More broadly speaking, according to Andy McCarthy, the Times report also detailed that the Bureau's counterintelligence investigation of Russia's malevolent activities in connection with the 2016 campaign were not linked to Trump or his campaign.

00:06:06.000 The consensus conclusion was that Russia was trying to harm the United States by sowing doubt about the integrity of our elections.

00:06:12.000 During the first Trump administration, Durham led a Justice Department probe of those leaks to the Times in connection with the October 31st, 2016 story.

00:06:20.000 It was investigated as what the FBI referred to as a UPD, an unauthorized public disclosure of classified information.

00:06:26.000 Catherine Herid, who is then reporting for Fox News, I believe, has posted the closing memorandum for the probe dated February 25th, 2020.

00:06:34.000 There were two major government sources for that story that came out in the New York Times.

00:06:38.000 Remember, it was a story that was meant to exonerate Trump of charges pushed by Franklin Fowler that there was a back channel between Trump and Alpha Bank or Russian sources, and that the FBI had no information suggesting that Trump was actually a Russian's cat paw.

00:06:49.000 So believe it or not, the league that is the subject of this particular investigation and indictment, that leak was actually a pro-Trump leak.

00:06:56.000 It was a leak that helped President Trump because it actually dispelled myths about Trump's involvement with Russia.

00:07:02.000 As the report, the Durham report asserts, one of the sources of the leak was James Baker, who at the time of the leak was the FBI's general counsel and a close advisor to Comey.

00:07:10.000 Baker explained to investigators he had been under the belief that he was ultimately instructed and authorized to provide information to the Times by FBI director James Comey.

00:07:18.000 Baker does not claim that Comey gave him a direct order.

00:07:21.000 Rather, he indicated that the FBI chief of staff, James at Rabicke, instructed him to disclose the information to the New York Times, and Baker understood that Rabicki was conveying that instruction and authorization from Comey.

00:07:32.000 Beyond that, most of the remaining pertinent information about the investigation was classified.

00:07:38.000 Apparently Durham closed the probe with a recommendation of no prosecution of Baker or anyone else for this for this league.

00:07:44.000 Number one, the FBI hierarchy actually did have the authority to declassify, so they could leak legally.

00:07:49.000 Two, Baker's belief he was acting with authority was reasonable.

00:07:52.000 C, it would have been impossible to prove criminal intent because if he thought he was acting with authority and this this was being declassified by the upper levels of the FBI, he didn't commit a crime.

00:08:00.000 And D, there was no harm done to national security.

00:08:03.000 Well, how does this bring up Comey himself?

00:08:05.000 On September 30th, 2020, appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Comey reaffirmed prior testimony from 2017, saying he had never authorized anyone at the FBI to leak information to the press pertaining to the investigations of either possible collusion between Trump and Russia or Hillary Clinton's use of an unauthorized email system.

00:08:24.000 So basically, the case here is that he says he did not authorize a lower down at the FBI to leak the information.

00:08:31.000 Even if he had authorized that leak, it would not have been illegal.

00:08:33.000 So the cover-up here would be criminal, but there would have been no underlying crime, is sort of the issue here.

00:08:38.000 All right, coming up more on James Comey, Jimmy Kimmel being celebrated as the great unifier now, mostly by Jimmy Kimmel.

00:08:45.000 So that's very exciting.

00:08:46.000 Plus, Benjamin Netanyahu at the UN.

00:08:48.000 And of course, Ukraine is just a ton coming up. 0.98

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00:10:56.000 Now McCarthy says that an indictment on this would be absurd, which is why Trump's own former nominee to U.S. Attorney for Eastern Dict Eastern District of Virginia declined to bring the case.

00:11:05.000 And the president fired him over that.

00:11:09.000 So apparently Lindsay Halligan has decided to do the thing that Trump wanted her to do. 0.76

00:11:14.000 And so what it appears from all sort of the public information is that this isn't a particularly well predicated indictment, that the indictment itself is quite weak, and that it's unlikely to survive in court.

00:11:24.000 Now, again, many of the things that Comey has been talked about for possibility of indictment are sort of in moral and ethics, much worse than this.

00:11:33.000 But that's not what he's being indicted for.

00:11:36.000 So Jim Trusty, former Trump attorney, he says that Comey had a special employee whose sole purpose it was to leak things to the New York Times.

00:11:43.000 Do you believe this decision to charge James Comey was reached independently of what the president has so clearly conveyed he wanted to happen here?

00:11:53.000 Well, probably.

00:11:54.000 I mean, you do have a grand jury that indicted, they carefully considered the case.

00:11:58.000 They actually shaved it down to an area that makes a lot of sense.

00:12:01.000 You know, nobody's actually talking about the specifics of his false statement, but this was a director of the FBI who had a special employee designed for one purpose to leak things to the New York Times.

00:12:13.000 Now, when he was pressed in Congress on whether or not he had leaked something, he'd authorized the leak of a memo he retained wrongfully at his house.

00:12:22.000 He said, No, that's not my recollection.

00:12:24.000 They challenged him about McCabe, another guy who had referrals to the inspector general for lying.

00:12:29.000 And Comey said, That's not my recollection.

00:12:31.000 So, in a weird way, through all this chaos, through all this kind of political interest of what's going on behind closed doors, who knew what?

00:12:38.000 At the end of the day, the indictment that's left is actually pretty simple.

00:12:42.000 He either lied about leaking to the New York Times in a tantrum because he is getting fired, or he didn't.

00:12:48.000 And I don't think it's going to lend itself to the easy dismissals that some of you other folks have been saying they're going to get.

00:12:56.000 I mean, it's an open question at this point how strong the indictment is.

00:12:59.000 Now, you've got people, again, like the former Trump lawyer Jim Trusty saying it's fairly strong, and people like Annie McCarthy saying it's fairly weak.

00:13:06.000 According to the New York Times, Pam Bondi was a little reticent about bringing this case. 0.98

00:13:10.000 And you'll recall that just last week, President Trump accidentally put out on Truth Social what was pretty clearly an email intended from Pam Bondi saying we need to indict.

00:13:19.000 Well, President Trump put out his own response, quote, Justice in America, one of the worst human beings.

00:13:24.000 This country has ever been exposed to is James Comey, the former corrupt head of the FBI, today who's indicted by a grand jury on Two felony counts for various illegal and unlawful acts.

00:13:32.000 He's been so bad for our country for so long and is now at the beginning of being held responsible for his crimes against our nation, make America great again.

00:13:40.000 Now, again, we'll get to the turnabout as fair play point in a moment, and what this means for the justice system and all the rest.

00:13:47.000 Pambandi put out a social media post saying no one is above the law.

00:13:50.000 FBI director Cash Patel put out a statement saying, quote, everyone, especially those in positions of power will be held to account no matter their purge.

00:13:59.000 James Comey then decided to do the thing that no one should ever do when hit with an indictment, which is go directly on camera and talk.

00:14:06.000 First rule of lawyering.

00:14:07.000 Tell your client to shut the hell up. 0.98

00:14:09.000 Anyway, here is James Comey doing not that.

00:14:12.000 My family and I have known for years that there are costs to standing up to Donald Trump.

00:14:18.000 But we couldn't imagine ourselves living any other way.

00:14:22.000 We will not live on our knees.

00:14:24.000 And you shouldn't either.

00:14:27.000 Somebody that I love dearly recently said that fear is the tool of a tyrant.

00:14:33.000 And she's right.

00:14:35.000 But I'm not afraid.

00:14:36.000 And I hope you're not either.

00:14:38.000 I hope instead you are engaged.

00:14:41.000 You are paying attention, and you will vote like your beloved country depends upon it, which it does.

00:14:50.000 My heart is broken for the Department of Justice, but I have great confidence in the federal judicial system, and I'm innocent.

00:14:58.000 So let's have a trial and keep the faith.

00:15:03.000 God, he's just the worst.

00:15:04.000 He's just the worst. 1.00

00:15:05.000 I mean, this self-aggrandizing ridiculous figure. 0.99

00:15:11.000 I mean, this person has brought our country to the brink in terms of the Justice Department and the FBI for basically a decade. 0.97

00:15:19.000 And it turns out he was one of the most ridiculous figures in the history of American public service. 0.94

00:15:24.000 Truly. 0.94

00:15:24.000 A ridiculous figure, not only blowing the Hillary Clinton investigation, but blowing the Donald Trump investigation, manipulating the release effectively of the Steel dossier, and then using his perch as the guy who got fired by Donald Trump in order to launch salvos at Donald Trump over and over and over again. 0.94

00:15:41.000 While walking through the forest and taking selfies of himself or walking on the beach and taking pictures of shells on the beach saying 86 Donald Trump and like he's just a ridiculous person. 0.86

00:15:52.000 So again, don't mistake my questions about the indictment for a belief that James Comey is somehow deserving of tremendous sympathy. 0.77

00:16:00.000 I do not think that James Comey is worthy of tremendous sympathy.

00:16:03.000 Awful director of the FBI, a joke of a public figure.

00:16:08.000 And his like, I'm standing up to authority.

00:16:10.000 I it's I am the hero standing in the breach. 1.00

00:16:13.000 He's just silly. 1.00

00:16:14.000 He's just a silly, silly person. 1.00

00:16:16.000 That doesn't speak to whether the criminal indictment that is being brought here is weak or strong. 0.99

00:16:20.000 And again, we'll see what the underlying evidence looks like.

00:16:22.000 On the face of it, typically, if you've got a page and a half indictment, unless it's like closed book, black letter law, easy indictment, kind of unusual.

00:16:30.000 The fact that again, the president had to replace the prosecutor who didn't want to prosecute with a prosecutor who would, who then a couple days later brought the prosecution, but has never actually prosecuted a criminal case, doesn't speak to the strength of the indictment itself.

00:16:43.000 Now, here's the question.

00:16:44.000 Everybody on the left, of course, is going insane. 0.93

00:16:46.000 Everybody on the left is going nuts.

00:16:47.000 So Joe Scarborough, for example, he says, we've never seen such an abuse of power.

00:16:51.000 Oh my dude.

00:16:54.000 Here's Joe Scarborough going crazy.

00:16:57.000 And again, this is a standalone uh case, John Hyleman.

00:17:01.000 Zanny said, uh, never have we had facts, certainly not in our uh uh political lifetime, certainly not since Watergate have we had such an abuse of power uh uh coming uh not only from the White House, but also the Justice Department in a charge.

00:17:20.000 And again, let's just sum this up uh the way the New York Times did this morning, Maggie Haberman, Alan Fior, and Jonah Bromwich, um an inexperienced prosecutor loyal to President Trump, in the job for less than a week, filed criminal charges against one of her boss's most reviled opponents.

00:17:41.000 She did not only do so at Mr. Trump's direct command, but also against the urging of both her own subordinates and her predecessor, who had just been fired for raising concerns that there was insufficient evidence to indict.

00:18:04.000 So um, it's one of the worst abuses.

00:18:06.000 Such such terrible abuse.

00:18:08.000 And Chuck Todd saying Trump is playing an eye for an eye games.

00:18:11.000 Here he is.

00:18:12.000 He is doing what he believes was done against him.

00:18:15.000 There's no evidence that it was.

00:18:19.000 But he doesn't care, and he just sees, hey, eye for an eye, right?

00:18:22.000 This is sort of old testament justice in his head.

00:18:24.000 Eye for an eye.

00:18:25.000 You indicted my guy, me, I'm gonna figure out how to get back at you.

00:18:31.000 Okay, so here is the problem for the left.

00:18:34.000 It is, in fact, tit for tat.

00:18:37.000 Let's be very clear about this.

00:18:38.000 Donald Trump was maliciously prosecuted repeatedly from the New York State level by Letitia James to the federal level by Jack Smith, repeatedly, over and over on the basis of manipulated charges, stretched charges, charges that were literally read in unique ways for the first time in order to go after him.

00:18:56.000 And so should you be surprised that Donald Trump is now doing this to the people he believes targeted him in the first place.

00:19:03.000 He had promised this was going to happen, so it's not exactly a shock.

00:19:06.000 It is a reality that these methods were used against him.

00:19:09.000 Now, the thing about Trump that I think frustrates so many people on the left is that he's not genteel about doing this sort of stuff.

00:19:16.000 Joe Biden would lie.

00:19:17.000 He would go out there and deny that there was anything political about the prosecutions of President Trump while his own DOJ was going after his chief political opponent, and indeed the person who both preceded him as president and then replaced him as president.

00:19:31.000 So, you know, that that is a reality that that Joe Biden fibbed about is that his DOJ was being manipulated to go after Donald Trump.

00:19:39.000 And so you'd go out there, no, no, Justice Rosa is just being forced Miller, and of course, we saw the same sort of stuff while Barack Obama was president when Loretta Lynch was on the tarmac meeting with the Clintons and all the rest.

00:19:53.000 The idea that there was no manipulation of the justice system as the justice system under Barack Obama launched a completely specious and ridiculous investigation, which was then laundered into public view to try and help Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election cycle.

00:20:06.000 So the thing that the press and the Democrats are very upset about is not what Trump is doing.

00:20:11.000 They're upset that Trump is doing it to the wrong people and that he's doing it out loud.

00:20:14.000 And this, of course, is Trump's habit.

00:20:16.000 President Trump is not somebody who hides the ball.

00:20:18.000 If he believes that the DOJ is in fact a tool to go after political opponents, he will just use it that way and he will do so out loud.

00:20:26.000 Now, do I think that that is significantly worse than what Democrats did?

00:20:30.000 I I actually don't.

00:20:31.000 I think the fact that he's doing it out loud at least makes the game pretty clear.

00:20:36.000 I'm not sure that it is better to do this sort of stuff quietly, to pretend that the DOJ is actually an objective arbiter and enforcer of the law rather than just saying the quiet part out loud, which is what President Trump is doing right here.

00:20:51.000 And President Trump, let's be let's be clear.

00:20:52.000 President Trump is not hiding the ball here.

00:20:55.000 Remember, he hates James Comey.

00:20:57.000 And not for bad reason.

00:20:59.000 And here in 2021 is James Comey calling for Trump to be thrown in prison.

00:21:04.000 Convict him, bar him from future service, have the prosecutors, the local prosecutors in New York pursue him for the fraudster that he was before he ever became president, lock him up for the garden variety frauds he did there, but don't give him that center stage, that dominant role in our national life just down the street where Joe Biden is trying to heal this nation. 0.95

00:21:29.000 Okay, I mean, he's just he was a ridiculous figure. 0.92

00:21:32.000 And and President Trump, again, was not hiding the ball. 0.91

00:21:34.000 Here he was yesterday before the indictment came down.

00:21:37.000 I can only say that Comey's a bad person. 1.00

00:21:41.000 He's a sick person. 1.00

00:21:42.000 I think he's a sick guy, actually. 1.00

00:21:44.000 He did terrible things at the FBI. 0.90

00:21:47.000 And uh, but I I don't know, I have no idea what's gonna happen.

00:21:51.000 Already coming up, Jimmy Kimmel is apparently the great unifier of America, according to you know, Jimmy Kimmel.

00:21:57.000 Plus, we get into the latest Ukraine news, the economic news, a lot going on.

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00:24:01.000 Okay, so uh again, President Trump, he does the quiet part out loud.

00:24:06.000 So what does this mean?

00:24:07.000 Well, I mean, I think that as always, the question about President Trump, the left always asks the wrong question.

00:24:12.000 They look at a body of a of an institution prone in the street, and they see President Trump standing over the body, and there's a knife in the back of the body.

00:24:20.000 And they're like, well, Donald Trump killed this institution.

00:24:22.000 Donald Trump killed the DOJ.

00:24:23.000 And those of us who've been watching politics for a while saying no, no, no, Donald Trump is just the coroner.

00:24:27.000 That knife was in that body.

00:24:28.000 It was slid in there subtly by Biden and Obama, and Trump came along and he just pointed out that this body's been dead for quite a while, and in fact, the body is cold.

00:24:36.000 And I think that is what's happening here.

00:24:38.000 Now, is any of this good?

00:24:40.000 I mean, the answer to me is no.

00:24:42.000 Now, I understand mutually assured destruction.

00:24:45.000 I understand President Trump's saying, listen, we're going to be openly political about the use of the DOJ if the other side was covertly political about the use of the DOJ.

00:24:52.000 And maybe in the future everybody will stop being political about the use of the DOJ.

00:24:56.000 However, I don't think that's the argument that's being made.

00:24:58.000 It seems to me that the argument that is being made is that it is actually a good, that actually it is a good thing to do this, to use the DOJ as a sort of an enforcement mechanism.

00:25:09.000 And again, I don't think that President Trump is unique in this view.

00:25:11.000 I think that Barack Obama thought this.

00:25:13.000 I think that's why he had Eric Holder playing his wingman going all the way back.

00:25:17.000 I think Joe Biden thought this as well.

00:25:19.000 But for America, it is not in fact a good thing.

00:25:21.000 For America, it is not in fact a very good thing for the DOJ to be widely perceived and indeed used as a political tool.

00:25:29.000 And even if the indictment is good, this is my problem that I've seen with, for example, the FCC chair Brendan Carr making public comment on Jimmy Kimmel.

00:25:38.000 Jimmy Kimmel should be off the air because he's a terrible host and because people don't watch his show.

00:25:41.000 He should not be off the air because of pressure from the FCC.

00:25:44.000 If there's an indictment to come of James Comey, it should come based on the analysis of the law, not because President Trump is out there pretty openly pushing for the indictment of James Comey.

00:25:54.000 It's a mistake.

00:25:57.000 All of this needs to be, if you want to recatalyze the institutions and make them useful, if you actually would like for a for an America in which we don't have this spiral, this ever-escalating spiral of the use of institutions to target political opponents.

00:26:11.000 At a certain point, somebody is going to have to restore honor to the institutions.

00:26:15.000 That is a thing that's going to happen.

00:26:16.000 And not only that, it actually sullies the capacity to get a conviction.

00:26:19.000 Let's say that this is a good indictment.

00:26:21.000 Let's say the indictment against Comey is stronger than I believe it is based on the available evidence.

00:26:26.000 Well, let's say that actually this is a convictable offense.

00:26:28.000 Fine.

00:26:29.000 You don't think the defense is going to have a very, very strong case for bias in the jury pool?

00:26:35.000 You don't think that they're going to have a case when the president of the United States is openly calling for conviction.

00:26:41.000 Now, this is a case that I've made with regard to criminal defendants before when Joe Biden was president of the United States.

00:26:46.000 I've said this about Derek Chauvin, when Derek Chauvin was convicted.

00:26:50.000 It certainly didn't help that the president of the United States and the governor of Minnesota and many others were pretty much openly calling for his conviction.

00:26:56.000 Well, when the president of the United States is openly calling for your conviction, it's going to be pretty hard to get a fair trial.

00:27:04.000 This is a bit of a problem.

00:27:04.000 So it actually throws an obstacle in the way of getting to the proper legal result.

00:27:09.000 We'll have to see how all of this plays out.

00:27:11.000 The same thing holds true, by the way, on the prosecution of John Bolton.

00:27:13.000 It may be that a potential prosecution of John Bolton is amply justified.

00:27:18.000 It may be.

00:27:19.000 We don't know yet.

00:27:20.000 I've been withholding judgment until I see the indictment or see the evidence.

00:27:23.000 As is my habit.

00:27:24.000 I like to wait until all the evidence is in to judge the veracity of the evidence and whether, in fact, the person deserves conviction or acquittal.

00:27:33.000 But let's say, for the sake of argument, the case against John Bolton is really strong.

00:27:36.000 The fact you have the president of the United States out there over and over and over again going after John Bolton is not a good thing.

00:27:42.000 And if the shoe were on the other foot, it also would not be a good thing.

00:27:46.000 So we can recognize all these things at the same time.

00:27:49.000 We can recognize one, that this indictment, I don't know whether it's good or bad at this point, how strong it is, their varying opinions, until I see the underlying evidence or even details of the underlying charges, it is very difficult to tell.

00:28:02.000 Two, it is very difficult not to perceive a sort of tit for tat turnabout as fair play aspect of what the DOJ is doing.

00:28:10.000 And that means all the things, right?

00:28:12.000 It means that this did not start with Donald Trump, but it is being done by Donald Trump now, right?

00:28:17.000 It means all those things.

00:28:18.000 And three, it means that if we're ever going to have a DOJ that we can trust again, at a certain point, we're going to have to have a DOJ that we can trust again.

00:28:24.000 And that's going to mean the actual use of the DOJ by the people running the DOJ to enforce the law rather than the political priors of the person who's in office, whether quietly as under Obama and Biden or overtly as under President Trump right now.

00:28:39.000 You know, when we talk about the DOJ, we talk about who caused the decline in trust over at the DOJ.

00:28:44.000 It is absolutely worthwhile to note when the American decline in trust actually began.

00:28:48.000 And so I asked our sponsors at Comet, a new web browser by Perplexity.

00:28:52.000 What do polls show about American trust in the DOJ?

00:28:55.000 When did it begin to decline?

00:28:57.000 According to Comet, American trust in the DOJ is at a historically low level, with recent polls showing only 39% of Americans view the DOJ favorably, while 46% have an unfavorable opinion as of August 2025.

00:29:09.000 The decline began gaining national attention around 2020, and public confidence fell sharply as the nation entered the 2020s, marked by political controversies, high-profile investigations, and shifting partisan views.

00:29:19.000 So it actually started to dump while Joe Biden's era was happening.

00:29:25.000 The steepest drop in trust began around 2020, and that was largely because of perceived politicization of the DOJ.

00:29:32.000 That's because of all of the news that was arising about Trump Russia gate.

00:29:37.000 All that stuff you remember came to a head in 2020.

00:29:40.000 Earlier declines were gradual throughout the 2010s.

00:29:43.000 But again, that controversy over the DOJ, the FBI, Trump Russia gate, that killed it.

00:29:49.000 So it had already started to decline even under Barack Obama.

00:29:53.000 So at this point, trust is really low.

00:29:56.000 But again, attributing that to Donald Trump personally, as opposed to the attempt by the DOJ to target President Trump and his allies, that would be a mistake in the timeline.

00:30:06.000 If you want John Bolton convicted of an actual crime, if he committed an actual crime, it's actually not a great idea to go around talking about as president how much you want John Bolton indicted and convicted of an actual crime.

00:30:16.000 So we'll see how all this plays out again.

00:30:18.000 Mistake none of this for sympathy for James Comey, other than perhaps some aspect of legal understanding that maybe the case is weak. 0.99

00:30:29.000 But as far as personal sympathy for James Comey, the guys are schmuck. 0.98

00:30:32.000 James Comey's been awful for years. 0.96

00:30:35.000 James Comey is going to go unindicted for many, many things that he did that probably are not criminally prosecutable, but definitely helped wreck the country.

00:30:43.000 And meanwhile, speaking of using law enforcement in positive ways, the president of the United States put out an executive order yesterday designating Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization.

00:30:53.000 Now it's unclear what the authority is or even what this is going to mean in terms of implementation.

00:30:57.000 What it probably really means is use of the DOJ to investigate the financial ties and actual bonds between members of Antifa, Antifa groups, according to the White House, because of the aforementioned pattern of political violence designed to suppress lawful political activity and obstruct the rule of law, I hereby designate Antifa as a domestic terrorist organization.

00:31:16.000 All relevant executive departments and agencies shall utilize all applicable authorities to investigate, disrupt, and dismantle any and all illegal operations, especially those involving terrorist actions conducted by Antifa or any person claiming to act on behalf of Antifa, or for which Antifa, any person claiming to act on behalf of Antifa provided material support, including necessary investigatory and prosecutorial actions against those who fund such operations.

00:31:39.000 So what does that mean in practice?

00:31:43.000 It really just means, I assume, redeployment of particular resources to investigate Antifa.

00:31:51.000 So Ken Cucinelli, who serves as Trump's deputy secretary of Homeland Security during the first Trump administration, he says there's not really a formal designation in law, but as the executive, he can do that.

00:32:00.000 He can direct a skewing of DOJ resources to attack the problem, and that's how I perceive what he's doing.

00:32:04.000 I wish we'd done it in 2020, when these people were rather clearly going from city to city.

00:32:08.000 I asked for it and I didn't get it.

00:32:11.000 This is a useful, this is a useful thing.

00:32:14.000 It is also a useful thing that the Department of Justice is now investigating George Soros' donations, his foundation.

00:32:20.000 Because it turns out that a lot of money has passed hands to violent groups.

00:32:24.000 And actually deploying law enforcement resources to go after monetary support for violence activity is not a partisan issue.

00:32:31.000 It is not, in fact, an aspect of this tit for tat revenge cycle.

00:32:34.000 It is a thing that needs to be done.

00:32:36.000 If there are foundations providing material support to terrorist groups who are committing shootings, who are committing vandalism, who are out there doing acts of intimidation and violence in violation of law, of course, those funding mechanisms should be investigated.

00:32:50.000 It is good that the DOJ is doing this.

00:32:51.000 According to the New York Times, a senior DOJ official has instructed more than a half dozen U.S. attorney's offices to draft plans to investigate a group funded by George Soros, the billionaire democratic donor whom President Trump has demanded be thrown in jail.

00:33:03.000 The officials' directive, a copy of which was viewed by the New York Times, goes as far as to list possible charges prosecutors could file, ranging from arson to material support of terrorism.

00:33:11.000 The memo suggests department leaders are following orders from the president that specific people or groups be subject to criminal investigation, a major break from decades of past practice meant to insulate the DOJ from political interference.

00:33:23.000 The step came in an accelerated push by the DOJ against Mr. Trump's perceived enemies in recent days and weeks.

00:33:28.000 And again, that is the New York Times' editorial take.

00:33:30.000 They stack it right into their news article there.

00:33:33.000 The idea being that Trump is targeting political opponents as opposed to, you know, violent groups who are receiving material support from groups like George Soros funded groups.

00:33:44.000 Open Society Foundations has been funding groups all around the world who engage in civil and possibly uncivil unrest.

00:33:53.000 On Monday, a lawyer in the Office of Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanch issued that directive to U.S. attorneys in California, New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Detroit, and Maryland.

00:34:02.000 And the lawyer, Akach Singh, suggested a wide range of charges for prosecutors to consider against open society foundations, including racketeering arson wire fraud and material support for terrorism.

00:34:13.000 Justifying this, he pointed to a report from Capital Research Center, we talked about this earlier this week, which monitors liberal money in politics, and he asked the prosecutors to determine if the allegations were enough to justify opening criminal cases.

00:34:25.000 That report states that the group, quote, has poured over $80 million into groups tied to terrorism or extremist violence.

00:34:31.000 It's cited as one example, Al Haq, a Palestinian human rights group, quote unquote, critical of Israel, but of course, AHAC has been a front for terrorist activity.

00:34:41.000 So this is a good use of law enforcement.

00:34:43.000 This I like.

00:34:44.000 This is good.

00:34:45.000 President Trump himself says listen, we are not going to tolerate the radical left's continued violence, particularly after the shooting at an ICE facility over the course of the last 72 hours.

00:34:58.000 It's going to get worse, and ultimately it's going to go back on them.

00:35:00.000 I mean, bad things happen when they play these games.

00:35:04.000 And uh I'll give you a little clue.

00:35:07.000 The right is a lot tougher than the left.

00:35:09.000 But the right's not doing this.

00:35:11.000 They're not doing it.

00:35:12.000 And they better not get them energized because it won't be good for the left.

00:35:16.000 And I don't want to see that happen either.

00:35:18.000 I'm the president of all the people.

00:35:20.000 But the radical left is causing this.

00:35:22.000 Radical left Democrats are causing this problem.

00:35:25.000 And it's uh it gets worse.

00:35:28.000 It gets worse.

00:35:29.000 And it'll be a point where other people won't take it anymore, and that will not be good for the radical left.

00:35:35.000 So we don't want that.

00:35:38.000 I mean, again, President Trump, it's funny.

00:35:40.000 The left immediately starts saying this is a threat.

00:35:42.000 It's not a threat.

00:35:43.000 He's saying if you guys keep pushing, there will be people on the other side who push back.

00:35:46.000 And we don't want any of that.

00:35:47.000 We don't want any violence.

00:35:49.000 But he is correct that the radical left has created permission structures for precisely this kind of violence.

00:35:54.000 The left, for its part, continues to deny that there is any problem with left-wing violence, which is truly amazing.

00:35:59.000 Julia Kayam Over on CNN, she says that as far as this latest ICE facility shooting in Texas, there's no evidence of political alignment, which is not true.

00:36:07.000 It's a very nuanced distinction.

00:36:09.000 Someone can perform something that is politically motivated, in this case, unjustifiably, you know, targeting an ICE facility, uh, but not be aligned with the political movement.

00:36:21.000 If the White House and and uh JD Vance, they they seem to suggest that there's evidence that he's part of a network of left groups that are promoting violence as compared to uh progressives, right wing uh conservatives, and left wing groups opposing some of ISIS actions.

00:36:40.000 And that's the link which we have to be super careful about in a democracy.

00:36:47.000 Okay, so I mean, really?

00:36:49.000 Like, really, this is not left-wing violence?

00:36:51.000 Strange, because all the evidence actually suggests that it was, in fact, left-wing violence.

00:36:56.000 Like, I noticed that.

00:36:58.000 So, again, they're just gonna pretend that that's not really a thing.

00:37:01.000 Meanwhile, Chris Murphy, who again, for some reason has pretensions of running for president.

00:37:04.000 I I don't understand why he would think that he has the capacity to do this.

00:37:07.000 He says that if you call ICE agents Nazis, that's somehow not incitement to violence, which is um it may not be technically legal incitement to violence, it's certainly a permission structure for violence.

00:37:17.000 What they are trying to do is exploit um these murders and these shootings in order to silence only um dissent and political opposition on the left.

00:37:27.000 Um, criticizing the way that ICE is rounding up people in this country in a deeply inhumane and immoral way is not an incitement to violence.

00:37:36.000 Um, there is a moment where you cross the line.

00:37:39.000 Um, but what they are trying to do is to destroy the ability for people who oppose their policies to legitimately um engage in political debate.

00:37:48.000 And we are not gonna let them do that.

00:37:51.000 Um, so yes, you're right that it is not legal incitement.

00:37:55.000 Also, why do you keep making excuses for it?

00:37:57.000 If it's bad for the country, why do you keep making excuses for it over and over and over again?

00:38:03.000 Alrighty, coming up, news on Ukraine, Russia, Pete Hageth calling a big secret meeting.

00:38:08.000 And of course, we pay tribute to our friend Vadi Bacum, who passed away yesterday.

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00:40:24.000 Well, meanwhile, Democrats continue to claim that America had a very unifying moment, actually.

00:40:29.000 You may think that America is quite polarized right now, that radical left-wing violence is on the uptick.

00:40:34.000 And that actually the biggest story of the last three weeks is the murder of Charlie Kirk.

00:40:37.000 Well, according to the left not so, the biggest story in America is the unity surrounding the return of Jimmy Kimmel to the airwaves, which I gotta say, the the man, grow yourselves more arms to pat yourselves on the back some more. 0.97

00:40:48.000 Really, really ridiculous.

00:40:50.000 Here is MSNBC celebrating the return of Jimmy Kimmel to the air, along with, you know, zero viewers.

00:40:56.000 He he got a big he got a big viewership the other night because of the controversy surrounding his return.

00:41:00.000 Soon he will recede to prior levels.

00:41:02.000 There will be recession.

00:41:03.000 There will be a regression to the mean in his viewership, shall we say?

00:41:07.000 Here's Jimmy Kimmel and uh the MSNBC crew.

00:41:11.000 Late night television has been with us for a long time.

00:41:16.000 And you could see last night, it can really galvanize the country.

00:41:20.000 It was a very old-fashioned moment.

00:41:22.000 We all sat down and wanted to at the same time and wanted to hear what he had to say.

00:41:29.000 And it's become uh there's been a national conversation about it for days.

00:41:35.000 You don't want to lose that.

00:41:38.000 Oh my gosh.

00:41:39.000 Oh my gosh.

00:41:40.000 That's the unifying moment.

00:41:41.000 That's the unifying moment.

00:41:42.000 Is opposition to what? 0.98

00:41:43.000 The FCC chief saying dumb stuff? 0.88

00:41:46.000 That's the that that's the that's the unifying moment. 0.86

00:41:48.000 What if there are a unifying moment around not only you condemning political violence, but those permission structures and violence that you guys keep promoting?

00:41:54.000 That would be a unifying moment.

00:41:56.000 I've been talking about this since the day Charlie died.

00:41:59.000 That the permission structures for violence have grown and they need to be stamped out, those permission structures for violence.

00:42:05.000 They create at their edge actual violence.

00:42:08.000 But apparently, we're just gonna what, talk about the FCC and how mean Brendan Carr is.

00:42:12.000 All right, sure.

00:42:13.000 And meanwhile, on the economic front, the possibility of a government shutdown continues to grow.

00:42:20.000 Democrats, for some odd reason, think that they ought to shut down the government.

00:42:23.000 I do not understand the logic of this.

00:42:25.000 Now, listen, I get the fact that government shutdowns typically don't seem to have much impact on midterm elections, but the politics here just don't match up for Democrats.

00:42:32.000 Republicans are trying to pass it, what's called a clean CR, a continuing resolution to fund the government for several more months.

00:42:38.000 Congressional Democrats are trying to shut down the government for no actual reason.

00:42:45.000 Apparently, one of their big things is that they want to restore hundreds of billions of dollars in healthcare spending.

00:42:50.000 A lot of that for illegal immigrants, as a condition for continuing to keep the government funded.

00:42:56.000 If no bipartisan agreement is reached, according to the Wall Street Journal, the government would shut down 1201 a.m. on Wednesday, October 1st.

00:43:03.000 There's a seven-week stopgap spending plan.

00:43:05.000 They say that it's the only one on the table.

00:43:07.000 It's just a basic continuing resolution.

00:43:10.000 Democrats say they are unmoved. 0.96

00:43:13.000 Well, this is kind of ridiculous, honestly.

00:43:16.000 So Republicans are saying, listen, don't threaten us with a good time. 0.84

00:43:20.000 Don't threaten us with a good time.

00:43:22.000 If you try to shut down the government, then we'll just fire everybody.

00:43:25.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, the White House budget office directed federal agencies to draw up plans to permanently reduce their workforces if there's a government shutdown next week, raising the specter of mass firings on top of the customary furloughs during a lapse in funding.

00:43:37.000 The new memo sent by the Office of Management and Budget Director Ross Vod sharply raises the stakes for funding talks and increases the pressure on Senate Democrats.

00:43:45.000 Because basically the idea here is if you shut down the government, fine.

00:43:48.000 It won't just be a temporary shutdown.

00:43:50.000 We'll use that as the leverage to simply fire everybody.

00:43:54.000 Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer says the OMB plan was an intent at intimidation and questioned whether any firings would hold up in court.

00:44:00.000 House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called vote a malignant political hack on X. So this fight is going to continue.

00:44:10.000 I do not understand why Democrats think that this is a winning battle for them.

00:44:14.000 By the way, there is a tacit admission there from Democrats that these government shutdowns, these kind of temporary government shutdowns, don't actually matter all that much.

00:44:20.000 What's the tacit admission?

00:44:22.000 Well, Russ Vogue is saying, like, listen, I'll fire people, and there will be a permanent shift in the workforce.

00:44:25.000 And Democrats are saying, you can't even do that.

00:44:28.000 Everybody will come back.

00:44:29.000 Well, if everybody will come back, then what is your what is the gigantic threat to the American public from a shutdown?

00:44:38.000 It's very likely the government will shut down next week.

00:44:40.000 Democrats at least want to show faith with their voters that they hate Trump enough that they're willing to shut down the government over it.

00:44:46.000 In the end, they'll cave, and we'll go back to status quo ante.

00:44:49.000 That is the likely outcome of all of this.

00:44:51.000 Meanwhile, very good news for the Trump administration in the form of a revised estimate on Q2 GDP.

00:44:58.000 According to Axios, U.S. GDP growth this spring was stronger than previously thought, according to new revisions released on Thursday morning.

00:45:05.000 In the April through June quarter, GDP rose at a 3.8% annualized rate, not the 3.3% most recently estimated.

00:45:12.000 That's the highest since fall of 2023.

00:45:15.000 Even better, that positive revision was not driven by volatile categories like inventories and trade flows.

00:45:20.000 So there is an artificial inflation in GDP numbers that tends to occur when you have a dramatic decrease in imports.

00:45:27.000 That doesn't appear to be the reason for the revision.

00:45:30.000 Instead, it should people keep spending.

00:45:33.000 Final sales to private domestic purchasers, which economists view as a good indicator of underlying trend growth in the economy, was revised up a full percentage point to a 2.9% annualized rate in Q2.

00:45:43.000 Now, that may be an impetus for the Federal Reserve not to cut rates anymore.

00:45:47.000 Because they may say, listen, consumer spending is already really, really, really strong.

00:45:51.000 It's not that people don't have access to capital or access to credit.

00:45:55.000 They clearly do.

00:45:55.000 They're spending at really high rates.

00:45:58.000 And so we may not want to toss more money at the supposed problem.

00:46:02.000 Jobless claims also came in at 218,000.

00:46:04.000 That is roughly 14,000 than the previous week.

00:46:07.000 A continued reversal of the upward surge seen in recent weeks.

00:46:12.000 The markets didn't really do much on the basis of this news.

00:46:17.000 The market seems to kind of just be holding steady at this point.

00:46:20.000 Meanwhile, the Trump administration continues to say that there will no be there will be no real tariff inflation.

00:46:26.000 That seems to be the case, by the way.

00:46:27.000 It seems as though whether it is weakening consumer spending or basically manufacturers and retail outlets eating the cost of the tariffs.

00:46:36.000 So far, there has not been any jump in inflation, whatever the rationale.

00:46:44.000 First of all, I think a lot of folks are more concerned about tariffs driving inflation than I am.

00:46:48.000 And while I've always allowed that that was a possibility, I have not yet seen evidence that there are uh tariff-driven increases in inflation.

00:46:56.000 And given the experience we had in 2018-2019, I think the burden of proof is on the data, and the burden of proof is on is on the folks expecting that rather than assuming that there's going to be these material increases ex ante.

00:47:08.000 Okay, so you know that's right.

00:47:10.000 We'll see how long that lasts.

00:47:11.000 Again, the big question when it comes to tariffs and the economic impact thereof is one, has conventional economics just been wrong?

00:47:18.000 Two, is it possible that the trade imbalances and the skewing of the markets were so great that this sort of hardcore correction is necessary and that there are other countervailing factors that's sort of wiping out the impact of tariffs?

00:47:29.000 Or three, wait for more time.

00:47:32.000 Three is, you know, maybe it'll hit, maybe it won't hit, we will find out.

00:47:36.000 Meanwhile, I will say again, the uncertainty in the markets continues because it's not as though the market is, you know, spiking.

00:47:42.000 It's not as though the market is exploding right now under President Trump.

00:47:46.000 It's kind of holding steady, steady growth would kind of be the way to look at the Trump administration at this point.

00:47:56.000 Again, if you look at the the kind of dip that happened right after Liberation Day and you go from there to here, obviously there's been a significant increase.

00:48:03.000 If you go from the president's inauguration to now, it's been a moderate increase at best.

00:48:07.000 You're looking at approximately 6100 on the SP 500 when when President Trump was inaugurated.

00:48:14.000 And today, it's like 6600.

00:48:17.000 So it's an increase.

00:48:18.000 But it's not like a gigantic spike that's happened under President Trump, which is what you would expect as we move on from Joe Biden's policies.

00:48:25.000 Meanwhile, questions have emerged with regards to the H1B visa changes that President Trump has implemented, a hundred thousand dollar charge for H1B visa applications, which essentially makes a lot of them unaffordable.

00:48:37.000 Some jobs are going to shift overseas.

00:48:39.000 The White House argues cutting back on H1B visas according to Axios is a way of protecting American jobs.

00:48:45.000 The problem, of course, is according to Axios' Neil Irwin, there aren't tons of workers who are sitting around on the sidelines to hire at this point.

00:48:53.000 So we're going to find out in short order whether that is true or not.

00:48:57.000 Also, there is a waiver provision with regard to the H1B visas that allows the Secretary of Homeland Security to just sort of make willy-nilly exceptions, which is not something I particularly like.

00:49:06.000 If you're going to have a rule, apply the rule evenly.

00:49:08.000 Don't make exceptions for your friends.

00:49:09.000 That is corporatism.

00:49:10.000 It is pick and choose capitalism, whatever you want to call it.

00:49:14.000 It is not pure capitalism, it is not free markets.

00:49:16.000 It is picking winners and losers.

00:49:19.000 Speaking of which, President Trump yesterday said that when it comes to the tariffs, he will be bailing out farmers who will be hurt.

00:49:24.000 Well, I mean, with whose money?

00:49:27.000 This is the problem with tariffs.

00:49:28.000 Tariffs benefit a very specific group at the expense of other groups.

00:49:32.000 Same thing as subsidies.

00:49:33.000 We're going to take some of that tariff money that we made, we're going to give it to our farmers.

00:49:40.000 who are for a little while going to be hurt until it kicks in.

00:49:44.000 The tariffs kick into their benefit.

00:49:46.000 So we're going to make sure that our farmers are in great shape because we're taking in a lot of money.

00:49:53.000 So, you know, again, picking winners and losers is the typical result of tariffs because you have to somehow compensate the people who lose the most, especially if they are a key voting demographic for you.

00:50:04.000 I prefer free markets.

00:50:05.000 Let's just leave it that way.

00:50:07.000 Okay.

00:50:07.000 Meanwhile, when it comes to Russia-Ukraine, it appears that the United States' strategy has shifted with regard to Russia and Ukraine.

00:50:15.000 The president has now issued an enormous amount of public approval for Ukraine to fight back against Russia full scale.

00:50:23.000 He said that NATO should simply shoot down Russian aircraft that are flying above NATO areas.

00:50:28.000 He posted on Tuesday on Truth Social that Ukraine could, quote, fight and win back all of its territory.

00:50:35.000 President Trump said, with time, patience, and the financial support of Europe, and in particular NATO, the original borders from where this war started is very much an option.

00:50:42.000 He called Russia a paper tiger in big economic trouble.

00:50:45.000 Vladimir Zelensky says that Russian officials should seek to end the war or they should find some bomb shelters.

00:50:54.000 Would you tell him to make sure he knows where the nearest bomb shelter is?

00:50:59.000 First of all, they have to know where the bomb shelter is up.

00:51:05.000 If they will not stop the war, they will need it in any case. 0.61

00:51:09.000 Okay, so, you know, again, it's about time that our strategy shifted because obviously nothing is changing and Putin does not feel the heat as of yet.

00:51:20.000 Meanwhile, there is a mysterious meeting that has been called by Pete Hexat, the Secretary of War.

00:51:25.000 He's apparently summoned hundreds of military generals and admirals to Virginia for an urgent meeting next week.

00:51:31.000 He has not told anybody what the meeting is about.

00:51:33.000 It applies to all senior officers with the rank of brigadier general or above or their Navy equivalent serving in command positions and their enlisted advisors.

00:51:40.000 Even people stationed in conflict zones are expected to attend.

00:51:45.000 It affects 800 generals and admirals spread across the United States and dozens of other countries and time zones as well.

00:51:52.000 So again, totally unclear what this is about.

00:51:56.000 It could have something to do with increased Russian aggression.

00:52:00.000 Russia has been sending nuclear bombers off the Alaskan coast.

00:52:04.000 They have been taking their aircraft and sending them into places ranging from Poland to Denmark.

00:52:09.000 So things are getting pretty spicy out there.

00:52:13.000 NORAD has been delivering a show of force along America's borders in Alaska, basically saying you cross that line, we'll shoot you down.

00:52:20.000 So, and things are pretty tense with the Russians right now.

00:52:23.000 And that's because Vladimir Putin is pushing where he feels there is weakness.

00:52:26.000 It's time, obviously, for the United States to push back, and that is a thing that's happening.

00:52:30.000 That will at some point require Europe to actually stand up at its hind legs and stop being a gigantic continent filled with pansies. 0.94

00:52:36.000 That would that would actually be a thing that has to happen here.

00:52:39.000 That may be a while on coming, by the way.

00:52:41.000 Ursula Vanderlein is still out there praising green energy. 0.84

00:52:44.000 Like, guys, if you say that you want to stop Russia, at a certain point you're gonna have to dump over your dumb ideas about windmills and start realizing that if you wish to be a strong enough economy, generating a strong enough military capacity to defend yourselves against the Russian bear, that you're gonna need to put aside your ridiculous predisposition toward useless forms of energy generation.

00:53:07.000 We will have stayed the course with the renewables because as we think it is good for the climate.

00:53:18.000 It is cheaper than the fossil fuels for us in Europe because we do not have to import them.

00:53:23.000 And it gives us independence and energy security.

00:53:26.000 Oh, good luck.

00:53:29.000 Good Lord.

00:53:29.000 I mean, again, how does Russia expect to defend itself?

00:53:32.000 It won't even defend itself economically from its own stupidity. 1.00

00:53:35.000 Well, folks, in the aftermath of the horrifying assassination of our friend Charlie Kirk, a number of people have been picking up Charlie's microphone going on campus. 1.00

00:53:42.000 We see Megan Kelly doing that. 1.00

00:53:43.000 I believe Glenn Beck is going to be doing that among others.

00:53:46.000 One of the people who's going to be doing a full TP USA sponsored college speaking tour is Brylin Hollihan.

00:53:51.000 He's a 19-year-old political commentator.

00:53:53.000 He's best selling author of One Generation Away.

00:53:55.000 Why now is the time to restore American freedom?

00:53:57.000 He's chair of the RNC's Youth Advisory Council, and he's host of his own show, the Bryland Hollyhan show.

00:54:01.000 Bryan, thanks so much for taking the time.

00:54:02.000 Really appreciate it.

00:54:04.000 Ben, thanks for having me.

00:54:05.000 Happy Friday.

00:54:05.000 I appreciate the opportunity.

00:54:07.000 So, first of all, why don't we talk about what exactly the college speaking tour is going to constitute?

00:54:13.000 How many colleges are you hitting?

00:54:14.000 Which ones are they?

00:54:15.000 And what are you going to be talking about?

00:54:17.000 You know, Ben, what man meant for evil, the Lord is now using for good.

00:54:20.000 What's become clear in the last week is that you can kill a man, but you can't kill a movement.

00:54:24.000 And all across this country, we're seeing an uprising of the next generation, waking up to the fact with seeds of revival being planted across this country.

00:54:32.000 You know, what this assassin, this coward in an attempt to shut our generation up, he actually woke us up.

00:54:38.000 And we're going to be traveling to these campuses to speak to young people that are more energized than ever before.

00:54:43.000 So I kicked off the tour last night at the University of Arkansas to a sold-out auditorium of over 500 students that packed out to come see us with one week notice.

00:54:51.000 We're going to nine other campuses, so 10 campuses total all across this country, because so many young people are eager to get off the sidelines right here right now.

00:54:59.000 Because they're waking up to the fact, Ben, that this is no longer bread versus blue.

00:55:03.000 This is a fight of good versus evil.

00:55:04.000 They want to be on the side of good.

00:55:05.000 They want to pay attention to politics.

00:55:07.000 This is no longer a fight of just their parents or grandparents' arena.

00:55:10.000 They want to get in the arena now.

00:55:11.000 And it's so cool to see.

00:55:13.000 So why don't we talk about the kind of stuff that you're going to be talking about on this tour?

00:55:17.000 Obviously, I'm sure free speech is going to come up.

00:55:18.000 What safety precautions, number one, are you taking?

00:55:20.000 And number two, what kind of topics are you tackling?

00:55:23.000 You know, two weeks ago, I didn't have to travel with a security detail.

00:55:26.000 That's like a brand new concept to me.

00:55:28.000 It's kind of a crazy world to live in that, like a college freshman can't walk to classes himself or like go on a campus, the one place you're supposed to have like a free exchange of ideas without like armed men in suits and guns.

00:55:37.000 Like that's an insane concept to me, Ben.

00:55:39.000 But sadly, that's the reality that we live in Spain 2025 in America.

00:55:43.000 I will say that what we're going to be doing is continuing Charlie's legacy of championing civil discourse.

00:55:48.000 That's what he lived and died doing, and we want to continue that baton uh on these campuses.

00:55:52.000 The one place that you're supposed to have free expression right now is the one place that's being censored.

00:55:56.000 So we want to continue that.

00:55:57.000 And what I want to be really clear is what we're seeing today is the result of higher education and liberal indoctrination starting during the hippies movement in the 60s and 70s, where these activists in teacher's clothing seeped into our education system and starting the indoctrination at higher ed, and then we've gotten all the way down to kindergarten teaching pronouns to our kindergartners.

00:56:14.000 We've got to stop that.

00:56:15.000 So we're going to the root cause of the problem.

00:56:16.000 We're going to these college campuses.

00:56:18.000 And what I'm trying to be really clear to our generation today is what we're seeing in America today as a result of our generation being raised to believe that politics and faith are taboo topics.

00:56:27.000 We were told that we couldn't talk about politics and faith at the dinner table.

00:56:30.000 We were told that we couldn't talk about politics and faith out in public.

00:56:33.000 Therefore, when our generation gets frustrated about politics and faith, we don't know how to communicate with each other.

00:56:37.000 We just know how to scream at each other.

00:56:38.000 We know how to assassinate each other.

00:56:39.000 We know how to, you know, paint our hair blue, get a nose to ring and a bullhorn and shut down a college campus in protest, but we don't know how to actually sit down at a table and have a free discourse of ideas, Ben.

00:56:48.000 So that's when going to this campus.

00:56:50.000 We had a really good conversation last night.

00:56:51.000 Some people agreed, some people disagreed, but guess what?

00:56:53.000 We all had it civilly.

00:56:54.000 That's what we have to champion on these college campuses.

00:56:57.000 Well, Bradley, it does feel like there is a gigantic movement that was already arising, obviously, before Charlie was killed.

00:57:03.000 It is now multiplied in size and effect.

00:57:06.000 So the a bit of controversy broke out over a social media video that you did introducing the tour.

00:57:12.000 Uh, you were sitting on a private plane.

00:57:14.000 Um, and so people were getting uptight with you for for being on a private plane while making this video.

00:57:18.000 What's your take on that?

00:57:20.000 Ben, I've been in politics for eight years.

00:57:22.000 I've never phoned fly it before.

00:57:23.000 I flew private last night because to make it to this tour, I had to leave English class in the afternoon and make it really in a tight turnaround to get to the speech in Arkansas.

00:57:32.000 Not my plan of the future.

00:57:33.000 I've been commercial for eight years.

00:57:35.000 I'll fly in this afternoon commercial to speak at a Faith and Freedom Conference in North Carolina.

00:57:39.000 I'll be flying commercial next week to my speeches.

00:57:42.000 That's the life I live.

00:57:44.000 I can't afford private.

00:57:45.000 A very nice person offered this flight in Arkansas yesterday to make it to the speech, because I had to fly from being a freshman at Auburn University to make it to my English classes to get my grade and graduate with a diploma fingers crossed, and then make it also to try to championslible discourse on the speeches.

00:57:58.000 So that's where we stand.

00:58:00.000 Well, Bryan, thanks for doing what you're doing.

00:58:02.000 We'll obviously be keeping tabs on your entire tour and Godspeed.

00:58:07.000 Thank you, Ben.

00:58:08.000 I greatly appreciate you.

00:58:09.000 Well, folks, something tragic happened yesterday.

00:58:12.000 Body Bachum, who's been a guest on our program before, he was an amazing, amazing person, pastor, theologian, best-selling author.

00:58:20.000 He passed away after suffering an emergency medical incident, according to his family, the Christian Post reported yesterday.

00:58:26.000 His ministry, founders and ministries, wrote, We are saddened to inform friends.

00:58:30.000 Our dear brother Body Bacham Jr. has left the land of the dying and entered the land of the living.

00:58:34.000 Earlier today, after suffering an emergency medical incident, he entered into his rest and the immediate presence of his savior, whom he loved, trusted, and served since he was converted as a college student.

00:58:43.000 Please pray for Bridget, their children and grandchildren.

00:58:46.000 He was born in 1969 in Los Angeles to a single mom, and then he became a very prominent pastor in Houston.

00:58:52.000 Then he became Dean of Theology at African Christian University in Lusaka, Zambia, and he was widely respected, particularly among evangelical Christians for preaching on biblical manhood.

00:59:01.000 We did an episode with Vadi Bacham just a few years back.

00:59:05.000 He's an amazing person.

00:59:06.000 He was an amazing person.

00:59:08.000 Apparently, he went he underwent treatment for heart failure back in February of 2021 and survived that.

00:59:14.000 But unfortunately, he um he passed away due to this emergency medical incident.

00:59:18.000 Just to give you a taste of who Body Vadi Bacham was, here he was from our Sunday special a few years back.

00:59:24.000 What's your chief argument to people who are purporting to object to the Bible or object more broadly to the existence of God and his providence in the universe on an intellectual basis?

00:59:36.000 Yeah, what I want to do is I want to show them that that's all based on presuppositions, right?

00:59:40.000 The last thing that I want to do is get down on their level and say, um, okay, fine, let's just leave that aside.

00:59:49.000 No, I want to say to them, all of that is based on presuppositions.

00:59:52.000 You're taking leaps of faith back there in order to get here and make that argument.

00:59:57.000 Your presuppositions have been tried before, and they've led to catastrophe.

01:00:03.000 Mine is based on presuppositions as well, but my presuppositions has led to Western civilization.

01:00:12.000 Body Bacham was an amazing person.

01:00:14.000 May his memory be a blessing.

01:00:15.000 In his final days, he did write a few posts about Charlie Kirk.

01:00:18.000 After Charlie was murdered, he wrote, You might kill the messenger, but you can never kill the message.

01:00:23.000 And then he said in a sermon, Paul, a servant of God and apostle of Jesus Christ, wrote for the sake of the faith of God's elect and their knowledge of the truth, which accords with godliness and hope of eternal life.

01:00:33.000 In another post, he wrote, May the good Lord accept you both in heaven.

01:00:36.000 Amen.

01:00:37.000 While sharing a pose of Charlie Kirk asking John MacArthur, who of course was a repeat guest on our show also to share the gospel with his audience.

01:00:44.000 It's been a brutal time for Christians in the United States who have lost a number of incredible spokespeople, and obviously our hearts go out to all of them, as well as Body's family, his children, his grandchildren, and all of his congregants.

01:00:58.000 Meanwhile, Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu came to the United Nations this morning, and he spoke before the anti-Semitic, most highestly, that is the UN General Assembly. 0.99

01:01:07.000 Again, it is a wretched hive of scum and villainy. 1.00

01:01:11.000 It is a place where terrorist leaders are welcomed with open arms. 1.00

01:01:14.000 It has been so basically since shortly after inception.

01:01:18.000 So no surprise when Netanyahu showed up at the UN General Assembly, a bunch of the so-called diplomats walked out because they'll sit there for the interminable ravings of Iranian leaders or terrorist friends.

01:01:31.000 But uh when the Prime Minister of Israel shows up, they walk out, of course.

01:01:39.000 A mixture of cheers and boosted many of these diplomats stationed themselves in the room just to get up and walk out.

01:01:50.000 Please order in the hall.

01:01:55.000 Not a particular surprise.

01:01:58.000 Apparently, there are reports that some of the junior ministers for other countries were actually given special seating by certain other countries so that they could maximize the look of the number of people walking out.

01:02:08.000 That would, of course, not be a gigantic shock.

01:02:10.000 And the fact that the UN General Assembly is filled with countries that are trash is not exactly a surprise to anybody who's been watching the UN for a very long time. 0.98

01:02:22.000 The UN is, again, filled with countries that hate America, hate the West, hate generally civilized countries. 0.97

01:02:31.000 Not a surprise at all.

01:02:32.000 Netanyahu had a bunch of loudspeakers stationed at the outskirts of the Gaza Strip and around Gaza City, aimed at the citizens of Gaza as well as the hostages who are still being held.

01:02:43.000 Remember them?

01:02:43.000 Yeah, there's still 20 living hostages being held in the Gaza Strip, many of them being held in tunnels, starved to death.

01:02:50.000 There's a hostage named Elie Shirabi, who recently released a book with Harper Collins, who's a bestseller in Israel.

01:02:55.000 It's now been released in English.

01:02:56.000 It's called hostage, it's well worth the read, so he can hear about what Hamas does to the people that it Kidnaps and then stuffs in tunnels for well over a year.

01:03:02.000 Again, if Hamas released the hostages and their leadership went into exile, this war would be over literally today.

01:03:08.000 So Netanyahu wanted the residents of Gaza to hear his speech, and he wanted hostages over ground to be able to hear his speech, as well as here was Netanyahu speaking to the hostages directly.

01:03:20.000 Our brave heroes.

01:03:22.000 This is Prime Minister Netanyahu speaking to you live from the United Nations.

01:03:28.000 We have not forgotten you, not even for a second.

01:03:31.000 The people of Israel are with you.

01:03:34.000 We will not falter and we will not rest until we bring all of you home.

01:03:39.000 Thank you.

01:03:50.000 Netanyahu was wearing a QR code on his lapel.

01:03:53.000 He does this a lot when he speaks at the UN as he uses visuals.

01:03:56.000 Uh that QR code links to information about the Gaza war and precisely what the hostages are going through as well.

01:04:02.000 Netanyahu also spoke directly to Hamas and to the people of Gaza, because let's be real about this.

01:04:07.000 Every single hostage of which we are aware was held at one point by Gazan, so-called civilians in the Gaza Strip.

01:04:13.000 Here's Netanyahu saying, let the hostages go.

01:04:17.000 Let the hostage again, I understand that the rest of the world seems to have forgotten about the hostages or doesn't care about the hostages or never cared about the hostages.

01:04:23.000 But there are, in fact, people who are being held in terror tunnels today who are alive.

01:04:27.000 Here we go.

01:04:29.000 Ladies and gentlemen, thanks to special efforts by Israeli intelligence, my words are now also being carried.

01:04:37.000 They're streamed live to the cell phones of Gaza's.

01:04:41.000 So to the remaining Hamas leaders and to the jailers of our hostages, I now say, lay down your arms.

01:04:51.000 Let my people go.

01:04:52.000 Free the hostages.

01:04:54.000 All of them.

01:04:55.000 The whole 48.

01:04:57.000 Free the hostages now.

01:04:59.000 Thank you.

01:05:07.000 If you do, you will live.

01:05:10.000 If you don't, Israel will hunt you down. 0.85

01:05:16.000 Again, that would be the responsibility of literally any Western leader, whether it be the President of the United States, the President of France, or the Prime Minister of Israel.

01:05:23.000 Netanyahu then made the absolutely clear and obvious point, which is that all of the various European nations calling for a Palestinian state wish to set up a terrorist state on Israel's borders.

01:05:33.000 Israel will not do that, nor would any nation in its right mind.

01:05:35.000 You don't see France setting up a Palestinian state in the 19th arrondissement for a reason, because it would be a terrorist state. 0.98

01:05:42.000 And you're not going to see Israel do the same thing.

01:05:45.000 No self-respecting country would.

01:05:49.000 So here's the uncomfortable truth: The persistent Palestinian rejection of a Jewish state in any boundary is what has driven this conflict for over a century.

01:06:00.000 It is still driving it.

01:06:03.000 It's not the absence of a Palestinian state.

01:06:06.000 It's the presence and existence of a Jewish state.

01:06:10.000 And I find it amazing.

01:06:12.000 Amazing that the foreign chancellor and the ministries and all those who pontificate about this, and the leaders.

01:06:21.000 How can they not see this basic truth when it is repeated again and again and again ad nauseum?

01:06:28.000 And the answer is they don't want to see that truth.

01:06:30.000 They would prefer surrender.

01:06:31.000 And this is a point that Netanyahu makes is that world leaders who are currently calling for a Palestinian state, they are surrendering to jihadis, which of course is true. 1.00

01:06:40.000 Every single negotiation between Israel and Hamas, conducted via Qatar or via Egypt or via the United States, has been scotched by European leaders, then handing concessions to Hamas, who then redoubles their efforts to keep hostages and continue the conflict.

01:06:55.000 If the reward for October 7th and keeping hostages and hiding behind civilians and firing rockets from hospitals and hiding your headquarters beneath those same hospitals and mosques, if the reward for that is a state, why exactly would they stop? 0.92

01:07:10.000 Israel will not allow you to shove a terrorist state down our throats.

01:07:15.000 We will not commit national suicide because you don't have the guts to face down a hostile media and anti-Semitic mobs demanding Israel's blood.

01:07:27.000 And I want you to grasp something else, which is also distorted in the medium.

01:07:34.000 I say this not only in my name or the name of my government, but on behalf of all the people of Israel.

01:07:45.000 Last year there was a vote in the Knesset, our parliament.

01:07:49.000 Whether or not to oppose the imposition of a Palestinian state.

01:07:53.000 You want to guess what the results were?

01:07:56.000 Out of 120 members of our parliament, 99 voted against, and only nine supported.

01:08:04.000 That's over 90%.

01:08:07.000 It's not a fringe group.

01:08:10.000 It's not uh the prime minister who himself is extreme or he's held hostage by extreme uh parties to his right.

01:08:20.000 It's over 90% of Israelis.

01:08:24.000 My opposition to a Palestinian state is not simply my policies or my government's policy, it's the policy of the state and people of the state of Israel. 0.93

01:08:37.000 Well, none of this is likely to change the minds of the people at the UN General Assembly.

01:08:42.000 However, it is all worth saying, and obviously the presidents of the United States, Donald Trump has made very clear that he agrees with all of this.

01:08:47.000 With that said, the President has also said that he is not going to stand for Netanyahu annexing portions of Judea and Samaria, the entirety of Judea and Samaria, the so-called West Bank.

01:08:56.000 There was talk inside Israel that might have been done as a response to European leaders trying to create a Palestinian state, whole cloth with no borders, no territory, and no government and no responsibility for its own citizenry.

01:09:08.000 The Prime Minister of Israel is supposed to meet with the President of the United States today.

01:09:13.000 Not only that, but the President of the United States apparently has now said that a deal will likely be reached in the near future.

01:09:20.000 Obviously, we hope and pray that the president is correct about all of that.

01:09:24.000 Alrighty, folks, coming up, we are going to jump into the mailbag.

01:09:27.000 Plus, is it possible that a Republican could actually become the next governor of New Jersey?

01:09:31.000 Remember, in order to watch, you have to be a member.

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The Ben Shapiro Show - September 26, 2025

BREAKING: Former FBI Director James Comey INDICTED!

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