The Ben Shapiro Show - BREAKING: Trump Indicted

00:00:00.000 Well, they finally did it.

00:00:01.000 They did it.

00:00:02.000 They finally indicted Donald Trump.

00:00:04.000 It's the thing that they have been seeking for years on end, basically since 2015 when Donald Trump decided that he was going to run for the presidency, certainly since he actually won the presidency in 2016.

00:00:13.000 The left has been foaming at the mouth, seeking the day when Donald Trump would be frog marched into a police precinct somewhere and then thrown in jail.

00:00:21.000 And many prosecutors all over the nation have been aiming at this for a long time, but it was only Alvin Bragg, Brave and true.

00:00:28.000 You know, the guy who won't prosecute like any crime in New York, but he definitely will prosecute a supposed misdemeanor that happened back in 2015.

00:00:35.000 That guy, well, he is going for it.

00:00:37.000 The grand jury yesterday finally decided they would go forward with the indictment of Donald Trump.

00:00:43.000 Alvin Bragg tweeted out, quote, this evening, we contacted Mr. Trump's attorney to coordinate his surrender to the Manhattan DA's office for arraignment on a Supreme Court indictment, which remains under seal.

00:00:51.000 Guidance will be provided when the arraignment date is selected, according to the New York Times.

00:00:57.000 Trump's indictment comes on as many as 34 charges of falsifications of business record.

00:01:01.000 Now, here's the thing.

00:01:03.000 These charges, the falsification of business record charges, that's a misdemeanor.

00:01:05.000 In order to elevate that to a felony, so as to escape the statute of limitations, and so as to effectuate probably an arrest, In order for any of that to happen, they have to tie that to a campaign finance violation.

00:01:17.000 The campaign finance violation, as we've talked about before, is specifically the question as to whether Stormy Daniels was paid off by Donald Trump using his own personal funds rather than using campaign funds when it actually was a quote-unquote campaign expenditure.

00:01:30.000 So the question is going to come down to whether Trump paid off Stormy Daniels because he would have paid her off at any time because he's For sure signed hush money payments before or whether he was doing it as an election expense and then failing to properly bill that to his campaign instead paying it via Michael Cohen.

00:01:44.000 Now Michael Cohen did go to jail on the basis of pleading guilty to something like that.

00:01:48.000 But then Cyrus Vance, who is the DA in New York at the time, refused to elevate those charges against Trump.

00:01:53.000 The feds refused to elevate campaign finance charges against Trump.

00:01:55.000 Only Alvin Bragg, seven years later, is now doing this.

00:01:59.000 Which is kind of absurd.

00:02:01.000 The New York Times says Donald Trump was indicted in Manhattan on Thursday for his role in paying hush money to a porn star.

00:02:06.000 According to five people with knowledge of the matter, a historic development that will shake up the 2024 presidential race and forever mark him as the nation's first former president to face criminal charges.

00:02:13.000 Listen, the Democrats have now broken the glass.

00:02:17.000 And they broke glass in case of emergency.

00:02:19.000 And now that glass is broken, it's gonna be very hard to put it back together because here's the deal.

00:02:21.000 Democrats do this all the time.

00:02:23.000 They take a step that is absolutely unprecedented in American history.

00:02:26.000 Say, kill the filibuster for judicial nominees. 0.95

00:02:29.000 And not very long afterward, that entire process boomerangs around on them and Republicans are ramming through Supreme Court nominees with 51 votes.

00:02:37.000 Well, if you think this is the last time you're going to see a former president indicted, you got another thing coming.

00:02:43.000 Now the Democrats have made clear they are willing to go after a former president on the flimsiest of charges.

00:02:47.000 And again, we'll get to how flimsy these charges are in just one second.

00:02:51.000 You can just expect there will be politically motivated prosecutors on every side of the aisle going after everybody's favorite politicians.

00:02:57.000 So we have now entered an era in which the opposition is basically under threat of legal indictment at all times.

00:03:03.000 According to the New York Times, on Thursday evening, after news of the charges had been widely reported, the DA's office confirmed that Trump had been indicted and that prosecutors had contacted Trump's attorney to coordinate his surrender.

00:03:12.000 Three people with knowledge of the matter said Trump was expected to turn himself in and face arraignment early next week, at which point the specific charges would be unsealed.

00:03:18.000 Trump had for decades avoided criminal charges despite persistent scrutiny and repeated investigation, creating an aura of legal invincibility.

00:03:24.000 The indictment threatens to puncture.

00:03:26.000 That's one way to put it in New York Times.

00:03:27.000 The other way to put this is that this is a trumped up charge and that they are going after Trump mainly because Alvin Bragg wanted to make a headline and because Democrats had to have their day.

00:03:36.000 This whole situation just smacks of the Chekhov's gun idea. 0.94

00:03:40.000 There's this idea in theater.

00:03:42.000 The playwright, Antonin Chekhov, that if you put a gun above the mantle in the first act, it must be used by the end of the second act.

00:03:49.000 The looming threat of an indictment on Trump, that's been the gun above the mantle since 2015.

00:03:54.000 It was going to be used somewhere in here.

00:03:57.000 Trump himself put out a statement in response, in which he called Bragg a disgrace.

00:04:02.000 Trump's actual statement reads, This is political persecution and election interference at the highest level in history.

00:04:08.000 From the time I came down the golden escalator at Trump Tower, even before I was sworn in as your President of the United States, the radical left Democrats, the enemy of the hard-working men and women of this country, have been engaged in a witch hunt to destroy the Make America Great Again movement.

00:04:19.000 You remember it just like I do.

00:04:20.000 Russia, Russia, Russia.

00:04:21.000 The Mueller hoax.

00:04:22.000 Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine.

00:04:23.000 Impeachment hoax one.

00:04:24.000 Impeachment hoax two.

00:04:25.000 The illegal and unconstitutional Mar-a-Lago raid.

00:04:27.000 And now this.

00:04:28.000 The Democrats have lied, cheated, and stolen in their obsession with trying to get Trump.

00:04:31.000 But now they've done the unthinkable, indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant election interference.

00:04:37.000 Never before in our nation's history has this been done.

00:04:39.000 The Democrats have cheated countless times over the decades, including spying on my campaign, but weaponizing our justice system to punish a political opponent who just so happens to be a president of the United States and by far the leading Republican candidate for president has never happened before, ever, says Donald Trump in his statement.

00:04:52.000 Manhattan D.A.

00:04:53.000 Alvin Bragg, who was handpicked and funded by George Soros, is a disgrace.

00:04:56.000 Rather than stop the unprecedented crime wave taking over New York City, he's doing Joe Biden's dirty work, ignoring the murders and burglaries and assaults he should be focused on.

00:05:03.000 This is how Bragg spends his time.

00:05:05.000 Again, this is all Donald Trump's statement.

00:05:06.000 I believe the switch home will backfire massively on Joe Biden.

00:05:09.000 The American people realize exactly what the radical left Democrats are doing here.

00:05:12.000 Everyone can see it.

00:05:13.000 So our movement and our party united and strong will first defeat Alvin Bragg, then we'll defeat Joe Biden.

00:05:17.000 We're going to throw every last one of these crooked Democrats out of office so we can make America great again. 0.96

00:05:22.000 So listen, it's a shot in the arm to Trump's campaign, just on a political level.

00:05:25.000 We'll get to the politics of this after we get to the legality of all of this and what comes next in terms of procedure, because things are going to get very spicy very quickly now.

00:05:33.000 First, we have to talk about Daily Wire's most trusted privacy partner and a premier sponsor of this show, ExpressVPN.

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00:06:17.000 slash Ben use my exclusive link EXPR ESS VPN dot com slash Ben get an extra three months for free that's ExpressVPN dot com slash Ben again ExpressVPN dot com slash Ben get an extra three months for free. Okay so the next question is what happens next?

00:06:34.000 So apparently, Donald Trump is going to turn himself in.

00:06:37.000 This has some ramifications, not only for Donald Trump's campaign, but also for the other campaigns.

00:06:41.000 Ron DeSantis in particular, we'll get to that in a moment.

00:06:43.000 First, he will be fingerprinted, he'll be photographed, he might even be handcuffed.

00:06:47.000 Now, all of this for Trump's campaign, again, is a shot in the arm, because the feeling that he has been viciously attacked for no reason other than they hate him.

00:06:55.000 is obviously going to boost him in the Republican primaries.

00:06:58.000 Just politically speaking, that is absolutely what it's going to do.

00:07:01.000 Trump, for political reasons, is going to want pictures of himself being victimized by Alvin Bragg's ridiculous prosecution here.

00:07:07.000 And barring some sort of extraordinary change in the sealed charges from what we have seen before, it is a ridiculous legal case.

00:07:15.000 Trump will almost certainly be accompanied at every step of the process by armed agents of the U.S.

00:07:18.000 Secret Service.

00:07:19.000 They are required by law to protect him at all times.

00:07:21.000 It's a weird, unprecedented situation.

00:07:24.000 There'll probably be some accommodations made for him.

00:07:26.000 Most defendants who are arrested on felony charges are handcuffed, but it's unclear whether there will be some sort of exception made for Trump, particularly because, again, he's going to turn himself in and negotiate.

00:07:34.000 His lawyers have already said he's not going to resist any sort of extradition or anything like that.

00:07:39.000 The legality of the case itself is incredibly weak.

00:07:41.000 Even Trump's most vicious enemies, people like Eli Mistal over at The Nation, even he says that this case is particularly weak.

00:07:49.000 He suggests the odds the path to real justice, let alone prison time, runs through the Manhattan D.A.' 's office still seem very, very long.

00:07:56.000 He points out that Michael Cohen, who's their key witness, initially lied to federal investigators.

00:08:00.000 This makes him a not particularly good witness.

00:08:03.000 The fact that the Southern District of New York has already looked at these charges and decided not to do anything.

00:08:08.000 That the federal government looked at these charges and decided not to do anything.

00:08:11.000 The fact that this is going to be a state of mind crime, really.

00:08:14.000 How do you prove that Donald Trump paid off Stormy Daniels to keep quiet because of the election, as opposed to he paid her to keep quiet because he just wanted her to keep quiet?

00:08:21.000 State of mind crimes are very difficult to prove.

00:08:23.000 Intent crimes, particularly for Trump, are very, very difficult to prove.

00:08:27.000 Again, Eli Mistal says so at The Nation.

00:08:29.000 Very hard to think of somebody who hates Trump more than Eli Mistal.

00:08:31.000 Unless it's maybe David French.

00:08:32.000 David French over at The New York Times says exactly the same thing.

00:08:36.000 He says, most likely prosecutors will rely on an allegation of violating federal campaign finance law, specifically the claim that the hush money payments to Daniels were illegal campaign contributions.

00:08:44.000 But this isn't a simple case to make.

00:08:46.000 The prosecution might claim that state campaign finance laws apply to Trump and his payments violated New York law.

00:08:51.000 But remember, we're talking about a presidential election.

00:08:53.000 A federal statute expressly states relevant campaign finance laws supersede any state law.

00:08:57.000 That is a formidable barrier to prosecuting Trump under state campaign finance laws.

00:09:00.000 There's no obvious path around it.

00:09:03.000 The claim that Trump violated federal law isn't necessarily frivolous, but his defense is really simple, which again, is that the hush money payments had nothing to do with the election and everything to do instead with his desire to keep the story quiet.

00:09:15.000 So, is this prosecution actually going to succeed?

00:09:17.000 Here's the thing.

00:09:18.000 Because everyone knows that the prosecution is so weak, if it does, people are going to feel it's one of the great miscarriages of justice in modern American history.

00:09:25.000 If Donald Trump ends up being convicted on charges this flimsy just because it's happening in New York where everybody hates his guts, can you imagine the political consequences for the country if that goes forward right now?

00:09:36.000 Now, remember, this is only the first trial that Trump has on on the docket.

00:09:41.000 There may be others coming up.

00:09:42.000 There's still something for the three other open cases against Trump.

00:09:47.000 There's a special counsel, Jack Smith, on the federal level who's currently investigating whether he interfered with the peaceful transfer of power on January 6th.

00:09:54.000 He's also investigating Trump's handling of classified documents.

00:09:57.000 Both of those cases are still open.

00:09:58.000 Again, I think both of those probably amount to nothing.

00:10:00.000 But there's a Fulton County DNM, Fannie Willis, again, a Democrat, who's attempting to prosecute Trump on the basis that he tried to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.

00:10:09.000 So this may only be the first case against Donald Trump.

00:10:14.000 Obviously.

00:10:15.000 So, now we get to the political fallout.

00:10:17.000 So, again, in the primaries, there is no question this boosts Donald Trump.

00:10:20.000 Because every Republican in the world is going to swing behind Trump.

00:10:23.000 They're going to say what is true, which is that he's being unfairly targeted.

00:10:27.000 And Trump, the victim, does really well among Republicans.

00:10:30.000 Because there is the feeling, a correct feeling, that if Trump were not a Republican, he would not be getting this treatment.

00:10:35.000 That if Trump were not standing in the way of a bunch of other people that the left Desperately hate.

00:10:39.000 He would not be getting this sort of treatment.

00:10:41.000 So Trump is definitely going to get a boost from this.

00:10:43.000 And here's the thing.

00:10:44.000 I think Democrats know this.

00:10:46.000 You know, there's sort of an internal debate in conservative circles right now over whether Democrats are targeting Trump because they want to take him off the table for 2024 or whether they're targeting Trump because they actually want to elevate him in the primaries for 2024, knowing that if he wins the primaries, He will then lose the general election.

00:11:00.000 This is the going theory in Democratic circles, the same theory they used in 2015-2016.

00:11:04.000 They could be totally wrong, by the way.

00:11:05.000 They could elevate Trump and then Trump could win, which is their worst nightmare.

00:11:09.000 But it is certainly plausible from their perspective that if they indict Trump and Trump is then elevated in the primaries, let's say he wins the primaries, does that win any independent voters in a general election?

00:11:20.000 Who who voted against Donald Trump is now like, well, he was unfairly indicted.

00:11:23.000 I'm going to vote for him this time.

00:11:25.000 Very unlikely that you're going to swing a lot of voters in the sort of undecided category back toward Trump based on a flimsy indictment.

00:11:32.000 Democrats seem to know this.

00:11:33.000 I mean, they're coming out of the woodwork this week, Democrats, basically saying that they're hoping desperately for Donald Trump.

00:11:39.000 Here's Joy Behar doing exactly that yesterday. 0.97

00:11:43.000 Santus is what they call a dweeb.

00:11:44.000 And Trump is the one who needs to get the nomination because then the Democrats will win. 1.00

00:11:50.000 He's a two-time loser already. 0.96

00:11:52.000 Isn't that old, Griff? 0.98

00:11:52.000 Hello? 0.98

00:11:53.000 But he also lacks... Loser! 1.00

00:11:56.000 Again, Democrats want Trump. 1.00

00:11:58.000 George Conway, right, who's made his money for the past several years ripping on Donald Trump.

00:12:02.000 He's actively encouraging DeSantis not to run this cycle.

00:12:04.000 This is before the indictment came down.

00:12:06.000 Quote, it makes no sense for DeSantis to run the cycle.

00:12:08.000 To beat Trump, DeSantis would have to go hammer and tong in a one-on-one race against him.

00:12:11.000 DeSantis is incapable of that.

00:12:12.000 And no matter what, Trump would try to destroy the GOP.

00:12:14.000 If it ever became clear, he wouldn't get the nomination.

00:12:16.000 The smart play for DeSantis is to fleece donors by pretending to run and pocket the cash for 2028, when he'll still be only 49 years old.

00:12:22.000 So George Conway encouraging there to be no rivals to Trump.

00:12:25.000 Or how about the Lincoln Project, which is attacking DeSantis?

00:12:28.000 And the left would love nothing.

00:12:29.000 They make all their money off of Trump.

00:12:32.000 They get their base out because of Trump.

00:12:34.000 And right now, if you look at the polling data, what the polling data shows is that in a general election campaign, DeSantis is the candidate who scores most favorably with independents.

00:12:41.000 Latest Quinnipiac poll has DeSantis up 13 points in the favorability ratings.

00:12:44.000 43% favorable, 30% unfavorable.

00:12:45.000 Got Trump, net negative 27.

00:12:46.000 the favorability ratings. 43% favorable, 30% unfavorable.

00:12:50.000 Got Trump, net negative 27. 32% favorable, 59% unfavorable. So there's every reason to think that one reason Democrats may be very happy with this indictment is specifically because it elevates Donald Trump, which brings up the question of how exactly is Ron DeSantis responding to this?

00:13:06.000 because we saw that Ron DeSantis sort of botched his first iteration of this particular question a couple of weeks ago when Trump suggested that he was gonna be indicted.

00:13:14.000 And DeSantis said that while the indictment was unfair, he then talked about paying hush money to porn stars and it looked as though he was taking kind of shots at Trump while the left was attacking him.

00:13:22.000 Well, now DeSantis has a second bite of the apple and he learned something for the first go around.

00:13:26.000 We'll get to that in just one second.

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00:14:28.000 Okay, so Ron DeSantis is now responding to the indictment.

00:14:32.000 He's doing so with alacrity and aggressiveness.

00:14:35.000 Because again, last time this happened, he wasn't fast enough off the mark.

00:14:39.000 This time, within an hour of the news coming down, he tweeted out, the weaponization of the legal system to advance a political agenda turns the rule of law on its head.

00:14:47.000 It's un-American. 0.82

00:14:48.000 The Soros-backed Manhattan district attorney has consistently bent the law to downgrade felonies and to excuse criminal misconduct.

00:14:53.000 And now he's stretching the law to target a political opponent.

00:14:56.000 Florida will not assist in an extradition request given the questionable circumstances at issue with this Soros-backed Manhattan prosecutor and his political agenda.

00:15:04.000 So that doesn't mean that Ron DeSantis is gonna like send people out to Mar-a-Lago and block federal arresting officers from getting into Mar-a-Lago or that he even has the ability to do that.

00:15:16.000 He's sort of limited in what he can do here.

00:15:18.000 Basically, the standard method for extradition, now again, all of this is kind of a moot point because the prediction is that Trump is going to go to New York and just turn himself in.

00:15:25.000 He actually doesn't want to be seen being dragged out of Mar-a-Lago bodily.

00:15:28.000 That's not a particularly good look.

00:15:31.000 Instead, he's going to turn himself in New York, say I'm innocent, and proclaim that this is all a witch hunt, which it is.

00:15:35.000 Okay, but let's say that he were to take the radical path of attempting to avoid extradition.

00:15:41.000 Well, the process of extradition DeSantis has some say, but not total say.

00:15:46.000 Under Article 4, Section 2 of the Constitution, states are supposed to extradite people who are guilty of crime or who have been accused of crimes in other states to the states where they are being accused.

00:15:55.000 And that's just pure Article 4, Section 2.

00:15:57.000 But there are certain procedures that DeSantis could theoretically use to slow the process.

00:16:01.000 So, for example, the standard message, the standard method for interstate extradition in Florida is basically the governor of New York would write to DeSantis, Kathy Hochul would write to DeSantis with a form signed by Alvin Bragg Including a copy of the indictment.

00:16:16.000 And then DeSantis would have to make sure the indictment is valid before ordering Trump's extradition from Florida.

00:16:21.000 Now, making sure it's valid, that can be read in one of two ways.

00:16:24.000 One is he just looks and sees that it's facially valid, like all the blanks are filled in properly.

00:16:28.000 The other is that he actually...

00:16:30.000 Reinvestigates the case and determines that the indictment isn't just a show trial or whatever.

00:16:35.000 Now, he could theoretically do that, but in the end, that's going to be adjudicated by a judge, not by Ron DeSantis.

00:16:41.000 He doesn't actually have the power to fully stop an extradition.

00:16:44.000 He could theoretically delay the extradition.

00:16:46.000 Theoretically, he could ask his legal affairs officer or prosecutor to review the extradition demand and write a report on it.

00:16:51.000 If the extradition demand were legal, he would have to sign it within another 60 days.

00:16:57.000 But again, I don't think any of this is going to happen.

00:16:58.000 I think it's a smart political move for DeSantis to say that he's going to do this without actually having to do it.

00:17:03.000 Certainly, if he had not been fast off the mark again, Trump would have attacked him for that, and that would have been a smack against DeSantis that scored.

00:17:10.000 Because again, one of the things that Trump is trying to suggest is that DeSantis is insufficiently fighting the left, which is an absurd contention, but it is Trump's Major line of attack against DeSantis in the 2024 race.

00:17:25.000 So what is the effect of all this going to be?

00:17:26.000 Well, again, again, for Trump in the primaries, it's great for Trump in the primaries.

00:17:30.000 He is going to he's going to zoom in the polls because Republicans are going to rally around the Trump.

00:17:34.000 There will be a rally around.

00:17:35.000 Now, will that last long enough to get him all the way through the primaries?

00:17:38.000 I mean, it's only March of 2023, so it's doubtful that it's going to last long enough to actually get him all the way through the primaries.

00:17:43.000 But there's no question that at this point, he is certainly the very strong front runner in the presidential race.

00:17:49.000 And as I say before, that may have played into the entire math that Democrats are doing here. 1.00

00:17:53.000 See, I don't think that Democrats, when it comes to this stuff, are completely stupid. 1.00

00:17:57.000 I think they're corrupt. 1.00

00:17:58.000 I think what they're doing is wrong. 0.80

00:17:59.000 But I think that they're smart enough to realize what they are doing.

00:18:02.000 And as I say before, are they trying to take Trump off the table or are they very much trying to elevate Trump inside the Republican Party with exactly the same issue that will hurt him with independence in a general election?

00:18:12.000 It seems to me it's probably the latter.

00:18:13.000 Could be the former.

00:18:15.000 In any case, they may get more than they bargained for here, because as it turns out, Maybe Americans don't actually like when you trump up charges against a former president of the United States.

00:18:23.000 Now again, the precedent that's being set here is absolutely insane.

00:18:27.000 And I promise you, there will be retaliation from the other side.

00:18:31.000 Because we are no longer in an era where Democrats can break all the rules and then expect Marcus of Queensberry rules to apply for their opponents.

00:18:38.000 Joe Biden will be indicted by someone.

00:18:40.000 Somebody will come up with an indictment, a rationale for indictment, and they will indict him.

00:18:44.000 Either while he's president or after he's president.

00:18:47.000 There will now be a significant push by Republicans in positions of power to go after political opponents using the methods of law.

00:18:54.000 If Democrats are going to do this, some mutually assured destruction has to be created.

00:18:59.000 What Alvin Bragg is doing here is really, really dangerous stuff.

00:19:02.000 Indicting a former president of the United States on charges that are not clear-cut and open and shut is a wild, radical risk.

00:19:10.000 I mean, he's going to have to prove a lot more than he's proved so far.

00:19:13.000 If what we've heard so far is reflective of what the underlying case is going to be here, then he has just opened a Pandora's box that's going to be almost impossible to close.

00:19:20.000 He's exacerbating the massive divide in American life that separates American from American.

00:19:24.000 We all like to believe that there is a rule of law and that people aren't going to just be brought up on charges because they're members of the wrong party.

00:19:30.000 That faith is fading really, really quickly.

00:19:34.000 Honestly, if Joe Biden actually wanted to help achieve the unity that he preaches about so much, he would actually tell Alvin Bragg to cut this out.

00:19:42.000 But very doubtful that Joe Biden is going to get involved at all, obviously.

00:19:46.000 Okay, in just one second, speaking of the country coming apart.

00:19:50.000 We are now seeing insurrections.

00:19:52.000 New insurrections.

00:19:53.000 Different kind of... The good kind of insurrections, according to the media.

00:19:53.000 Not January 6th.

00:19:55.000 We'll get to that momentarily first.

00:19:57.000 All this may keep you up at night.

00:19:59.000 And politics is a rough business.

00:20:01.000 Things seem to be getting weirder and stranger and more dangerous.

00:20:04.000 Well, I still need to get my sleep.

00:20:05.000 And this is why I rely on bull and branch eats.

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00:21:00.000 Okay, so meanwhile, speaking of the country coming apart at the seams, in the aftermath of a trans man shooting up a bunch of Christian school children, the left has basically decided that the right is the problem.

00:21:13.000 So just to get this absolutely straight, the left-wing narrative is that when a right-wing, a purported right-wing insane person commits some act of violence, the entire right must answer for it. 0.63

00:21:24.000 And also, when a, a, Nutty left-wing transgender person shoots up a bunch of Christian schoolchildren the right must also answer for. 0.98

00:21:34.000 Amazing how the right must always answer for whatever is bad that happens in the world.

00:21:38.000 Almost as though the media is just basically a democratic outlet.

00:21:42.000 Well, this has come out in two forms.

00:21:44.000 Form number one is in the gun control arena, and form number two is in the trans arena. 0.94

00:21:48.000 So when it comes to gun control, the left has been promoting the idea that the right is intransigent on gun control, and that's why kids are being shot.

00:21:54.000 This materialized in the halls of Congress the other day when Jamaal Bowman, Democrat of New York, got in with Thomas Massey of Kentucky.

00:22:00.000 Bowman looks like a crazed nutjob here. 1.00

00:22:03.000 They're freaking cowards! 1.00

00:22:05.000 They're gutless! 1.00

00:22:06.000 They're not hearing!

00:22:08.000 I'm talking about gun violence!

00:22:12.000 I'm talking about gun violence!

00:22:15.000 Carry guns?

00:22:16.000 More guns lead to more death!

00:22:19.000 More guns lead to more death!

00:22:22.000 Look at the data!

00:22:23.000 You're not looking at any data!

00:22:26.000 You're carrying the water from the gun lobby!

00:22:29.000 The latter you yell, the better your point is, according to Jamal Bowman.

00:22:35.000 So this is the predicate.

00:22:38.000 the wall.

00:22:39.000 That's what I'm saying.

00:22:40.000 Because the latter you yell, the better your point is, according to Jamal Bowman.

00:22:51.000 So this is the predicate.

00:22:52.000 You have to understand that for the left, the actual arguments don't matter.

00:22:57.000 It's the loudness with which you make them that matters. 0.93

00:23:00.000 And you're allowed to be as praised and loud and insane as you want to be.

00:23:06.000 If a Republican protests in favor of Donald Trump on January 6th, runs out of control, and some people riot and trespass in the Capitol and get violent with folks, that's an insurrection that almost overthrew democracy.

00:23:15.000 If, however, leftists storm the Tennessee Capitol demanding gun control, that's just people who are a little bit overly enthusiastic.

00:23:21.000 In fact, you can't even say they're overly enthusiastic.

00:23:23.000 They're just concerned about gun violence.

00:23:25.000 That's what we learned yesterday when a bunch of leftists rushed into the Tennessee State Capitol building in Nashville.

00:23:31.000 It's Thursday morning.

00:23:32.000 About 400 people broke into the Capitol building.

00:23:36.000 We have footage of them outside the Capitol building amassing themselves.

00:23:39.000 And you can see them, large crowd.

00:23:44.000 And they are trying to bash through the doors.

00:23:46.000 As you'll see, they actually did get inside.

00:23:48.000 And in the next tape, you'll see them actually jostling with police officers on the inside of the building.

00:23:56.000 There we go.

00:23:57.000 You can see people getting physical with police officers.

00:24:00.000 The police officers are trying to create some sort of physical barricade here so that the various state legislators in Tennessee can be rushed to the bathroom for safekeeping.

00:24:09.000 This, of course, is not insurrectionary or dangerous in any way.

00:24:11.000 This is just people who are peaceful and fun-loving.

00:24:14.000 You know, doing the things that really matter.

00:24:16.000 And then they actually got into the state capitol hall itself.

00:24:18.000 They actually got into like the center of the Capitol building where they proceeded to grab the microphone and yell at people But this is all okay guys It's not a big deal at all.

00:24:32.000 See, this is the rule.

00:24:33.000 The rule is that when leftists trespass on state property illegally, then that is just because they are good, wonderful people.

00:24:41.000 If right-wingers do it, it's an insurrection that threatens the very core of our democracy.

00:24:45.000 That's the way that this works.

00:24:46.000 This goes, by the way, all the way back to 2011.

00:24:47.000 You remember that Wisconsin I saw teachers union activists who broke into, like criminals, they broke into the Wisconsin Capitol building, occupied the Wisconsin Capitol building, took up all of the places around the Capitol, were screaming, shouting, doing damage.

00:25:03.000 This is, by the way, at the same time the Democratic legislators in Wisconsin were fleeing the states who tried to deny a quorum.

00:25:03.000 Remember all this?

00:25:08.000 It's a pretty simple measure to break some union power in the state.

00:25:14.000 This was okay.

00:25:15.000 This is the way that it works.

00:25:16.000 When Democrats do it, it's fine.

00:25:18.000 And that's always the rule.

00:25:19.000 When Democrats do it, it's fine.

00:25:20.000 Meanwhile, you have the entire media that has rallied around the idea that Tennessee Republicans are to blame.

00:25:27.000 When a trans person shoots up a bunch of Christian school kids, Tennessee Republicans are to blame. 0.77

00:25:31.000 So you have the Wall Street Journal with a piece titled, Tennessee Republicans face pressure after Nashville school shooting.

00:25:37.000 Oh, it's the Republicans who are facing pressure, naturally.

00:25:39.000 It's not Democrats.

00:25:41.000 It's not people who promote a perverse ideology suggesting that boys can be girls.

00:25:45.000 None of that.

00:25:46.000 No, no, no.

00:25:47.000 It's the Republicans, of course.

00:25:48.000 Or perhaps it is the New York Times saying, after mass shootings, Republicans expand access to guns, right?

00:25:53.000 Because, of course, the problem is the guns.

00:25:55.000 It's not the problem of disturbed people, an increasing number of disturbed people, as we talked about yesterday on the show.

00:25:59.000 It's none of that.

00:26:01.000 The real problem is that there are too many guns, and Republicans are complicit in that.

00:26:03.000 Or perhaps Maggie Haberman. 0.98

00:26:05.000 Over at the New York Times, reporting DeSantis to visit gun store on book tour days after Nashville shooting.

00:26:10.000 Dems call it beyond the pale.

00:26:11.000 It's now beyond the pale for you to even be in the remote proximity of guns because somebody got shot.

00:26:17.000 That is the way that all of this works, according to the left.

00:26:19.000 So you're allowed to take over.

00:26:21.000 Government buildings.

00:26:22.000 You're allowed to do whatever you want.

00:26:23.000 You're on the left, after all.

00:26:25.000 And Republicans are the ones who are truly to blame.

00:26:27.000 Meanwhile, in the second kind of line of narrative here, is even more perverse than the gun control line of narrative.

00:26:35.000 The gun control narrative is ridiculous in the sense that this person legally obtained the guns.

00:26:40.000 I'm unaware what law would be passed that would have prevented this person from obtaining the guns.

00:26:45.000 But that takes us to our second narrative. 0.90

00:26:46.000 The second narrative is that the true victims The real reason this happened, the real reason a trans man shot up a bunch of Christian school kids is because right-wingers are intolerant bigots.

00:26:55.000 And so the real victim here is not the Christian school kids who got murdered.

00:26:59.000 Not the Christian school teachers who got murdered.

00:27:01.000 The administrators.

00:27:02.000 None of those people are the real victims.

00:27:03.000 The real victim is the shooter and people like the shooter.

00:27:07.000 That is the narrative the media are drawing today.

00:27:09.000 And it is just, it's vile.

00:27:12.000 I mean, I'm not sure that I've ever seen the media turn this much in favor of sympathetic stories about a shooter this quickly.

00:27:21.000 And you've seen it before.

00:27:22.000 I mean, you saw Rolling Stone featured the Boston Bomber at one point on their cover.

00:27:25.000 But it's pretty rare.

00:27:26.000 They don't do it all that often.

00:27:29.000 And so, now you have the media rushing out to declare solidarity with the trans community and the administration, by the way.

00:27:38.000 So, Corine Jean-Pierre, in what is the clip of the day, Corine Jean-Pierre, from the White House press secretary podium, she says, you know, we have to be careful.

00:27:47.000 We have to be real careful.

00:27:48.000 A bunch of school kids got shot in a Christian school.

00:27:52.000 You know who's under attack?

00:27:52.000 The trans community, says Corine Jean-Pierre.

00:27:56.000 And one of the things that we saw during the midterm elections is that people don't want their freedoms to be taken.

00:28:01.000 They want us to fight for their freedoms.

00:28:04.000 And so it is shameful, it is disturbing, and our hearts go out to the trans community as they are under attack right now.

00:28:14.000 You know, there's some other people who are literally under attack.

00:28:16.000 Actually, they're dead.

00:28:17.000 The people who were shot by a member of the trans community.

00:28:21.000 Those people are dead.

00:28:23.000 It would be amazing if this administration could muster even one smidgen of the sympathy that they have for the supposed trans people who are under vast assault for the people who actually are dead, including children.

00:28:35.000 That might be nice.

00:28:36.000 These are supposed to be the apex sympathy creatures, and yet they can't seem to muster any sympathy at all.

00:28:41.000 Remember Joe Biden out there suggesting that this shouldn't be investigated as a hate crime, because after all, Josh Hawley says it should be investigated as a hate crime.

00:28:48.000 Or Joe Biden opening up his presser about this particular shooting by joking about eating ice cream.

00:28:53.000 Weird how the sympathy just dries up immediately when the shooter happens to be somebody who has ideological kinship with a lot of left-wing causes.

00:29:00.000 That's an amazing clip, Corinne Jean-Pierre.

00:29:02.000 I mean, literally a trans person shot a bunch of kids at a Christian school for what appear to be ideologically motivated reasons, and the immediate response of the entire media is, well, obviously the real victims are trans people.

00:29:18.000 In fact, Joe Biden put out a statement on Thursday morning, just a couple of days after, again, a trans man shot up a bunch of school kids, saying, it's for the transgender day of visibility.

00:29:28.000 Quote, transgender Americans shape our nation's soul, proudly serving the military, curing deadly diseases, holding elected office, running thriving businesses.

00:29:35.000 Today, too many transgender Americans are still denied rights and freedoms.

00:29:38.000 A wave of discriminatory state laws is targeting trans youth, terrifying families, hurting kids who are not hurting anyone.

00:29:44.000 I can think of some kids who were murdered And we're hurting anyone.

00:29:48.000 But that doesn't fit your narrative, does it?

00:29:52.000 And again, this ties more broadly into that same exact symptom that we saw with regard to gun control activists taking over buildings.

00:29:58.000 If trans activists take over buildings, that's also okay. 1.00

00:30:01.000 So in Kentucky, there was a vote on banning transgender mutilation of children.

00:30:07.000 And the governor had vetoed it and then the Kentucky legislature passed it over the veto.

00:30:13.000 Well, trans activists took over the Kentucky Capitol and they trespassed.

00:30:17.000 A bunch of them were arrested.

00:30:18.000 But this was considered not only fine but good by the media.

00:30:20.000 Here's some of the footage of trans activists at the Kentucky Capitol.

00:30:24.000 Oh that that that is a dude wearing trans colors and giant horns. 1.00

00:30:35.000 And looking for all the world sort of like QAnon shaman, but as a hero.

00:30:40.000 A hero because, after all, trans.

00:30:42.000 The trans activists in Kentucky then performed a die-in.

00:30:46.000 A die-in is where you lie on the ground, you pretend that you're dead. 0.94

00:30:49.000 You want to talk about folks who are absolutely shameless. 0.90

00:30:51.000 This would be it. 0.98

00:30:53.000 After kids are killed by a trans person for what appear to be political reasons, you are going to do a die-in as though you're under the threat of death from a legislature that just says that you're not allowed to mutilate children? 0.89

00:31:05.000 Amazing stuff.

00:31:05.000 The media of course buy into this.

00:31:06.000 Benjamin Ryan, who again is the same NBC News pseudo-journalist, and this is the person who's had a raging desire, shall we say, to go after the Daily Wire because of our conservatism.

00:31:19.000 He tried to blame the Daily Wire again for this Nashville shooting, saying, quote, Nashville is home to the Daily Wire where Ben Shapiro and Matt Walsh have led an ideological war against trans people.

00:31:29.000 Ideological war against trans people? 0.60

00:31:31.000 No, ideological war against a perverse radical gender ideology that says boys can be girls and that kids must be taught this.

00:31:36.000 Their colleague Michael Mould has called for transgenderism to be eradicated.

00:31:39.000 This is the larger social context in which the Nashville shooting occurred.

00:31:42.000 Oh, well, you know.

00:31:43.000 I guess the threat is... So the threat always was with trans people. 1.00

00:31:47.000 The threat, we were told, is that if you don't give them what they want, they will commit suicide. 0.99

00:31:51.000 If you don't give them what they want, then they'll kill themselves. 0.95

00:31:53.000 You have to just pretend that they're members of the opposite sex. 0.99

00:31:56.000 Now, I guess, the threat has expanded.

00:31:58.000 Such that, if you don't give them what they want, they will commit homicide.

00:32:01.000 And so therefore, you have to actually just give them what they want.

00:32:04.000 The Washington Post is doing the same exact routine, by the way.

00:32:08.000 The Washington Post put out a headline stating, Ah, the pouncing.

00:32:13.000 The pouncing has happened.

00:32:14.000 by right to escalate anti-trans rhetoric.

00:32:15.000 Ah, the pouncing. 0.98

00:32:16.000 The pouncing has happened. 0.96

00:32:17.000 Quote, the attempts on the right to connect violence to transgender people come even though transgender people are rarely the perpetrators of mass shootings, which are overwhelmingly carried out by cisgender men.

00:32:25.000 According to criminal justice experts, there is a thing called per capita.

00:32:29.000 I'm gonna do a per capita examination.

00:32:31.000 There have been four mass shootings carried out by people who are gender non-binary or trans in the last couple of years alone, and there are very few gender non-binary or trans people.

00:32:39.000 Per capita might be something worth exploring.

00:32:42.000 What also might be worth exploring is whether you, in fact, are participating in the radicalizing of individuals by claiming that they are under genocidal threat when people simply say that boys are boys and girls are girls.

00:32:52.000 This sort of media narrative was also put forward by MSNBC, so Charlotte Clymer, who is a man who believes that he is a woman, was speaking on MSNBC.

00:33:00.000 What matters here is not just what Charlotte Clymer is saying.

00:33:02.000 What matters here is the chyron.

00:33:05.000 Transgender Americans under siege. 0.86

00:33:08.000 Not Christian school kids who are dead. 0.99

00:33:10.000 Transgender Americans under siege. 0.69

00:33:12.000 But Charlotte Clymer has some words about God and such. 0.99

00:33:17.000 Children are only unsafe at drag shows when a shooter shows up to kill them.

00:33:20.000 That's right.

00:33:21.000 That's where the threat is.

00:33:22.000 I would challenge anyone just to get to know trans people.

00:33:25.000 We are a vibrant, diverse community, as diverse as anyone else.

00:33:28.000 You know, I'm from the great state of Texas.

00:33:29.000 I served in the military.

00:33:30.000 I go to church.

00:33:31.000 Transgender shooting suspects sparked outrage on the right.

00:33:33.000 Is that Chiron? 0.68

00:33:34.000 God made me in her image.

00:33:36.000 God made me in transgender. 0.99

00:33:38.000 And to see these people so cynically weaponize this and exploit these children's debts and their teachers' debts, it breaks my heart.

00:33:45.000 I wonder what those families are thinking right now.

00:33:47.000 My guess is that what some of those families are probably thinking is it's really screwed up that people like Charlotte Klein are going on national TV and defending an agenda to push lies about gender to small children.

00:34:00.000 In order to, what, make some sort of excuse for what happened in Nashville?

00:34:06.000 This is a very dangerous game, but of course the media are fully perpetuating this game because they agree with the agenda.

00:34:12.000 Agenda uber-alice for the media.

00:34:14.000 Everything has to be fit into the narrative.

00:34:16.000 And that narrative is increasingly centered on the idea that children must be, they should be subjected to the idea of radical gender ideology and anyone who stands in the way of that is perpetuating both suicide and now apparently homicide.

00:34:30.000 We'll get to more on this in just one second.

00:34:31.000 First...

00:34:33.000 Let's talk about the fact that everyone who is responsible, who has dependents, needs life insurance.

00:34:37.000 It's just that simple.

00:34:38.000 A good life insurance plan gives you peace of mind if something, God forbid, happens to you.

00:34:41.000 Your family will have a safety net to cover mortgage payments, college costs, or other expenses.

00:34:44.000 And, you know, having life insurance through your work, it may not cut it because, frankly, if you leave your job, it doesn't follow you.

00:34:49.000 You might not be able to get enough through your job.

00:34:50.000 PolicyGenius makes it easy to compare life insurance quotes from top companies and find your lowest price.

00:34:55.000 With PolicyGenius, you can find life insurance policies that start at just 25 bucks per month for a million dollars in coverage.

00:35:00.000 Some options offer coverage in as little as a week and avoid unnecessary medical exams.

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00:35:07.000 That means they don't have an incentive to recommend one insurer over another, so you can trust their guidance.

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00:35:16.000 Head over to policygenius.com slash Shapiro or click the link in the description, get your free life insurance quotes, see how much you could save.

00:35:22.000 That's policygenius.com slash Shapiro.

00:35:25.000 Again, policygenius.com slash Shapiro.

00:35:26.000 Every person who is responsible should have a life insurance policy, be responsible.

00:35:30.000 Go to policygenius.com slash Shapiro.

00:35:33.000 Also, folks, not many things can get me excited to visit the sad wreckage of what has become present day New York City, but I got to chat with my old friend, Megyn Kelly, and that was certainly exciting and fun.

00:35:42.000 We just filmed the latest episode for season two of my show, The Search, available to stream right now.

00:35:46.000 It was fantastic to catch up with Megan.

00:35:48.000 We talked about fame, making friends, and of course, the culture wars.

00:35:51.000 Here's a sneak peek of our conversation.

00:35:53.000 When you first get married and your spouse is sick, you're like, oh my God, I'll take care of you.

00:35:57.000 This is so, I feel so bad for you.

00:35:58.000 Now, when you have kids and obligations, you're like, why do you get to be sick?

00:36:01.000 I need your wife here right now, because every woman out there knows that the man flu is way, way worse than the woman flu ever is. 0.99

00:36:07.000 In fact, there's no accident, I did not get the flu.

00:36:09.000 Because the guys get all the illnesses and the mothers are not allowed. 1.00

00:36:12.000 We have to build up our immunities before we get married and have children, otherwise the whole family collapses.

00:36:18.000 To watch this episode and all the episodes of The Search Is On is particularly fun, including our latest episode with comedian Russell Brand.

00:36:23.000 Become a Daily Wire Plus member today.

00:36:25.000 Get instant access to the entire Daily Wire Plus library of shows, movies, documentaries, upcoming kids content, and more.

00:36:31.000 Just head on over to dailywireplus.com and get started today.

00:36:34.000 Okay, meanwhile, the propagandistic crusade on behalf of the transgender agenda continues apace.

00:36:42.000 It is amazing, again, to see what sort of behavior is excused as okay, considering that it's coming from the sort of trans community, and which behavior is considered not okay. 0.96

00:36:51.000 So, for example, you're allowed to basically imply violence as much as you want, so long as you're a member of the victimized community.

00:36:57.000 Here is a trans activist gushing over a book in which JK Rowling dies and saying, well, I wish it'd only been more gruesome. 0.71

00:37:04.000 And people like J.K. 0.95

00:37:05.000 Rowling need to f***ing stop because my people are dying because of her. 1.00

00:37:09.000 She is killing us. 1.00

00:37:11.000 Oh, but there's one more good thing about this book.

00:37:14.000 J.K. 0.98

00:37:14.000 Rowling f***ing dies. 0.98

00:37:16.000 Yeah, Gretchen had the nerve to kill off the Queen of the Turfs, and it is glorious. 1.00

00:37:21.000 I only wish that scene could have been even more brutal. 0.90

00:37:24.000 That seems like an angry and unpleasant man right there.

00:37:27.000 Meanwhile, our nation's biggest corporations have decided to weigh in in favor of this wild left-wing propagandistic effort.

00:37:34.000 So Kate Spade New York has a brand new spokesperson.

00:37:36.000 Wait for it, wait for it.

00:37:38.000 It's Dylan Mulvaney!

00:37:39.000 Yeah, you excited?

00:37:40.000 Isn't this exciting?

00:37:41.000 A person who has been a woman for zero days but claims to have been a woman for one year is now getting mainstream fashion contracts to promote purses and dresses and such.

00:37:54.000 Here is a parody of a woman pretending to be a woman so that actual women will buy products that don't look all that great on a man who pretends to be a woman. 0.62

00:38:03.000 It all started with the first day of spring.

00:38:05.000 I am at Kate Spade New York to find the perfect spring outfit.

00:38:08.000 Let's go!

00:38:09.000 Kate Spade New York is a staple in my wardrobe, and I think I absolutely need to have this as my spring bag.

00:38:15.000 The mini bags are in.

00:38:16.000 They're in!

00:38:17.000 Let's go!

00:38:18.000 You know I love pink, and I think the bag will go great with this.

00:38:21.000 Let's try her on! 1.00

00:38:22.000 Let's not.

00:38:22.000 You can always use another pair of heels, right?

00:38:25.000 Here's the full fit check. 0.89

00:38:26.000 I love a puffy sleeve, and I added some jewelry because more is always more.

00:38:30.000 And honestly, I think I'm gonna wear this out of the store.

00:38:33.000 So, happy spring!

00:38:34.000 I love ya!

00:38:35.000 I love you, Kings Bay, New York!

00:38:36.000 You remember that line in As Good As It Gets where Jack Nicholson says that the way that he writes woman is he just writes a man without reason or accountability?

00:38:43.000 Remember that time?

00:38:45.000 And how it was a joke then?

00:38:47.000 That's literally how half of the American population now defines the word woman. 0.98

00:38:51.000 The word woman is now a man without reason or accountability. 0.97

00:38:55.000 That's like, man plus crazy equals woman. 0.98

00:38:59.000 Now, that's how far we have done.

00:39:02.000 But again, it's a political cause.

00:39:03.000 And in pursuit of that political cause, all is justified.

00:39:07.000 Invading state capital buildings, violence, threats of violence, all of it, all of it.

00:39:11.000 And again, the implicit threat is if you don't go along with this, then bad things are going to happen.

00:39:15.000 Bad things are going to happen, guys.

00:39:16.000 Well, speaking of bad things happening, Russia has now arrested a Wall Street Journal reporter on spying charges.

00:39:21.000 According to the Associated Press, Russia's security service arrested an American reporter for the Wall Street Journal on espionage charges.

00:39:27.000 That's the first time a U.S. 0.75

00:39:28.000 correspondent has been detained on spying accusations since the Cold War.

00:39:31.000 The Wall Street Journal, for its part, denied the allegations and demanded his release.

00:39:34.000 His name is Evan Gershkovich.

00:39:36.000 He was 31 and detained in Russia's fourth largest city.

00:39:40.000 Known by the acronym FSB, the service a domestic security agency and main successor to the KGB, they are alleging that this reporter, quote, was acting on instructions from the American side to collect information about the activities of one of the enterprises of the Russian military industrial complex that constitutes a state secret.

00:39:54.000 The Wall Street Journal vehemently denies those allegations.

00:39:57.000 They say they stand in solidarity with Evan and his family.

00:40:00.000 Totally unclear what the Biden administration plans to do about this.

00:40:03.000 They said they'd spoken with both the Journal and Gershkovich's family.

00:40:07.000 White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, she condemned the arrest in the strongest terms and urged Americans to heed government warnings not to travel to Russia.

00:40:14.000 So, great.

00:40:16.000 I mean, apparently that's going to be enough as we'll use a few strongly worded letters to get back our citizens.

00:40:22.000 Jean Pierre said, we've been very clear about Americans not going to Russia. It is not safe.

00:40:26.000 Well, I mean, how are journalists supposed to cover things precisely?

00:40:29.000 Anthony Blinken, the Secretary of State, he said, in the strongest possible terms, we condemn the Kremlin's continued attempts to intimidate, repress and punish journalists and civil society voices. Now, again, the Russians are saying that Gershkovich was looking at state secrets and that he's currently now being held in custody until May.

00:40:50.000 At this point, this would be the second high-profile American who's being held, presumably over the conflict, with the United States by proxy over in Ukraine.

00:40:59.000 The first was Brittany Griner, whom we traded for Viktor Bout, the arms trafficker in one of the worst WNBA deals in WNBA history. 1.00

00:41:07.000 Also the only WNBA deal anyone's ever paid attention to at all. 0.96

00:41:11.000 But nonetheless, is there an actual plan to get Gershovich back?

00:41:15.000 Absolutely unclear at this point.

00:41:17.000 Representative Jared Moskowitz, Democrat of Florida, he says, don't worry, Biden is going to be strong.

00:41:20.000 He'll show that he won't be toyed with.

00:41:22.000 And you said kidnapping an American.

00:41:25.000 I assume you believe that Russia should release him immediately.

00:41:28.000 Immediately.

00:41:30.000 I mean, you know, you know, the problem is, is that, you know, they're now going to use him as leverage.

00:41:34.000 And so it's not going to be that simple, unfortunately.

00:41:36.000 But obviously, you know, this is not the game that Putin should be playing.

00:41:40.000 I have, I think Joe Biden has shown that he's not someone who's going to be toyed with when it comes to these sort of things.

00:41:46.000 And so, yes, for his family's sake, he should be released immediately.

00:41:51.000 Um, I sort of beg to differ.

00:41:52.000 Actually, Joe Biden has shown that he is a person to be toyed with when it comes to taking American citizens hostage so that Russia can get, say, you know, the world's most notorious arms dealer traded for a female basketball player who was once famous for having once dunked a basketball.

00:42:07.000 Yes, I'm sure Russia is very, very intimidated at this point.

00:42:09.000 Well, meanwhile, You hear me talk about being prepared for whatever life throws at you a lot on this show, and there are a lot of weird things happening in the world.

00:42:17.000 Supply chain breakdowns, conflict in the Middle East, conflict in Ukraine.

00:42:21.000 All of that stuff has an impact on sort of the way we live our daily lives.

00:42:24.000 When those supply chains break down, you can't get the medicines that you need.

00:42:26.000 Many of you take some kind of medication every day, or if you don't, you probably know somebody who does.

00:42:30.000 Maybe you have a parent or grandparent who's on cholesterol medication or medication for diabetes, heart health, mental health, blood pressure.

00:42:34.000 What would happen if you or your loved ones missed a day of medication?

00:42:38.000 Or missed a week.

00:42:39.000 This is why you have to have a supply of these medications available at your house.

00:42:43.000 If you or someone you love takes any daily medication, you need to check out JaceMedical.com slash daily.

00:42:48.000 Check and see if the medication you need is one of the dozens of medications Jace can provide in your own one-year backup supply.

00:42:54.000 In addition to the regular supply you get from your pharmacy, it will have up to 365 days worth of emergency storage of your daily medication.

00:42:59.000 It's called Jace Daily.

00:43:01.000 It will be available to the public in just a matter of weeks.

00:43:04.000 Great thing to check out.

00:43:05.000 Go check it out right now.

00:43:05.000 Go to jacemedical.com slash daily today to get on the wait list.

00:43:09.000 That's jacemedical.com slash daily.

00:43:12.000 J-A-S-E-medical.com slash daily.

00:43:16.000 Meanwhile, as we as we look at the Biden administration suggests that it has all the strength and wherewithal to face down Vladimir Putin.

00:43:21.000 We're now learning exactly what America's enemies think of Democrats, especially former Democrats.

00:43:26.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, TikTok, which of course is a Chinese front group, They've now enlisted three heavyweights from American politics and business to advise it behind the scenes as the social media app tries to convince U.S.

00:43:36.000 authorities it isn't beholden to the Chinese government.

00:43:38.000 Now, you might think, well, I wonder which politicians or former politicians they're going to choose.

00:43:41.000 Will they be right wing or will they be left wing?

00:43:44.000 Hmm.

00:43:44.000 Let's think super hard.

00:43:46.000 Oh yeah, no, no, they're all left-wing.

00:43:47.000 David Plouffe and Jim Messina, veterans of Barack Obama's presidential campaign, and Zinia Muka, the former longtime communications chief of Walt Disney Company, are now advising TikTok in their fight against efforts to ban it in the United States, according to people familiar with the roles.

00:44:01.000 You mean Disney, which has done business with China, like in exactly the area where they are imprisoning Uighur Muslims? 1.00

00:44:09.000 And you mean David Bluth and Jim Messina?

00:44:12.000 Obama people?

00:44:13.000 Weird that they would call upon top-level Democrats in order to try to lobby.

00:44:19.000 Strange.

00:44:19.000 If they saw the Democrats as true opponents, why are they going solely to Democrats to try and get other Democrats to do what they want them to do?

00:44:26.000 That's so odd.

00:44:27.000 It's so strange.

00:44:29.000 Speaking of which, Democrats on the Hill are the ones who are really pushing something called the Restrict Act.

00:44:33.000 There are a couple of different versions of a bill that would ban TikTok in the United States.

00:44:37.000 The more ridiculous version is the so-called Restrict Act.

00:44:40.000 According to Reason.com, the Restrict Act carries the possibility that it would actually criminalize people using a VPN to access stuff that has been banned.

00:44:50.000 According to Senator Josh Hawley, he introduced one TikTok ban back in January.

00:44:54.000 His bill would direct the president to use the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to block and prohibit all transactions and to prevent commercial operation of TikTok's parent company in the United States.

00:45:03.000 But this new act, the Restrict Act, doesn't specifically mention TikTok or ByteDance.

00:45:07.000 Instead, it grants the U.S.

00:45:08.000 Secretary of Commerce broad power to, quote, identify, deter, disrupt, prevent, prohibit, investigate, or otherwise mitigate any risk So, that seems really, really broad.

00:45:15.000 Like, what exactly are they trying to apply this to?

00:45:17.000 It's certainly confusing.

00:45:18.000 any property that the secretary determines to pose, quote, an undue or unacceptable risk in different areas.

00:45:23.000 So that seems really, really broad.

00:45:26.000 Like what exactly are they trying to apply this to?

00:45:29.000 It's certainly confusing.

00:45:33.000 It also seems like it could theoretically be read to imply that a person using a VPN to access an app controlled by a foreign adversary might be subject to criminal penalty.

00:45:42.000 So leave it to Congress to screw this thing up.

00:45:45.000 A Rand Paul, a Senator from Kentucky, He says this act violates the First Amendment.

00:45:48.000 you There are two main reasons why we might not want to do this.

00:45:53.000 The one would be the First Amendment to the Constitution.

00:45:56.000 Speech is protected whether you like it or not.

00:45:59.000 The second reason would be is that the Constitution actually prohibits bills of attainder.

00:46:04.000 You're not allowed to have a specific bill against a person or a company.

00:46:08.000 So this fails on two egregious points, pretty obvious points, and I think we ought to think about that.

00:46:15.000 I think we should beware of those who peddle fear.

00:46:18.000 I think we should beware of those who use fear to coax Americans to relinquish our liberties, to regulate and limit our First Amendment rights.

00:46:27.000 Every accusation of data gathering that's been attributed to TikTok could also be attributed to domestic big tech companies.

00:46:36.000 Well, I mean, he's right about that, except for the fact that TikTok is, of course, a Chinese front group. 0.90

00:46:40.000 But with that said, you gotta draw these bills very, very, very narrowly.

00:46:43.000 It doesn't look like the Restrict Act is drawn nearly as narrowly as it ought to be.

00:46:47.000 OK, time for some things I like and then some things that I hate.

00:46:50.000 So things that I like.

00:46:52.000 This is kind of a hilarious story.

00:46:54.000 So there's a person named Avi Silverberg.

00:46:57.000 He's the head coach for Team Canada Powerlifting since 2012.

00:46:59.000 He's competed three times in the world bench press.

00:47:02.000 He won a bronze medal in 2010.

00:47:05.000 And apparently he shattered the women's bench press record by mocking the Canadian Powerlifting Union's rules that permit biological men to compete as females.

00:47:13.000 So he would be mocking it except for the fact that the current record is held by a transgender woman, meaning a man.

00:47:20.000 The last record was set by transgender powerlifter Ann Andres, who's recognized as a female on the Open Powerlifting Ranking site.

00:47:27.000 Andrew said, why is women's bench so bad? 1.00

00:47:29.000 I mean, not compared to me.

00:47:30.000 We all know I'm a tranny freak, so that doesn't count. 0.59

00:47:31.000 I mean, standard bench and powerlifting competition is for women.

00:47:34.000 I literally don't understand why it's so bad.

00:47:36.000 Well, I mean, maybe it's because men have completely different body construction.

00:47:42.000 Maybe it's because of that.

00:47:44.000 And lots more testosterone, different muscle composition.

00:47:47.000 Silverberg bench-pressed 501 pounds back in 2016 under raw rules that required an approved weight belt, approved singlet, approved wrist wraps, and chalk.

00:47:55.000 But apparently, he's allowed to use even more stuff here.

00:47:58.000 So he said, I am a woman, and then he came in and he broke the record left by the last transgender weightlifter.

00:48:06.000 Which is hysterically funny.

00:48:08.000 I mean, like, good.

00:48:10.000 No different from when our friend Zuby decided that he was going to become a woman for a day and break every single record at the local gym that had been set by a woman. 1.00

00:48:19.000 These are the wages of the stupidity that we have now embraced. 0.99

00:48:22.000 Other things that I like. 0.99

00:48:22.000 So, my friend Chaya Raycheck, libs of TikTok, She has been unjustly accused by fools like Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez of facilitating violence against, for example, Boston Children's Hospital for pointing out that Boston Children's Hospital literally told her on the phone that they were performing trans surgeries on minors. 0.99

00:48:39.000 And so she confronted, she tried to file an ethics complaint against AOC and tried to confront her on it.

00:48:45.000 She went to her office, AOC had kind of run away from there, and then she actually ended up meeting her and here's how that went.

00:48:50.000 I attempted to ask AOC why she lied about me in a committee hearing.

00:48:55.000 She cowered away.

00:48:56.000 She refused to talk to me.

00:48:58.000 So I'm back here today, one week later, and I'm going to deliver her an ethics complaint that I filed for lying about an American citizen in a committee hearing together with Mike from the Heritage Foundation Oversight.

00:49:14.000 He helped me file this ethics complaint, so we filed that.

00:49:17.000 And if you can give it to AOC, I would really appreciate it.

00:49:20.000 And tell her to stop lying about American citizens.

00:49:23.000 Right.

00:49:23.000 Okay.

00:49:24.000 Thank you!

00:49:25.000 I just dropped off an ethics complaint at AOC's office, and unfortunately she wasn't there.

00:49:31.000 So, we left, and then I was walking through the Capitol, and guess who I bumped into?

00:49:35.000 AOC herself! 0.99

00:49:36.000 I just delivered an ethics complaint to your office because you lied about me in a committee hearing.

00:49:41.000 Oh! 0.60

00:49:41.000 Yeah! 0.60

00:49:41.000 No, I actually didn't. 0.60

00:49:43.000 I never actually lied.

00:49:44.000 No, you're actually super transphobic, and I never share space with you.

00:49:48.000 Thank you! 0.97

00:49:49.000 You're super transphobic!

00:49:50.000 Big hand motions!

00:49:51.000 Let's do this thing!

00:49:53.000 Again, Al-Khai is a very pleasant person.

00:49:55.000 And Al-Khai is like, I delivered an ethics complaint to you. 1.00

00:49:57.000 And she's like, oh, well, you're transphobic.

00:49:58.000 Bye! 0.98

00:49:59.000 I will catch you laters! 1.00

00:50:01.000 Out for AOC.

00:50:02.000 Well, you know, you shouldn't lie about people.

00:50:04.000 It's just a bad, bad thing to do, AOC.

00:50:07.000 And so you deserve whatever is the effect of that ethics complaint.

00:50:09.000 Okay, time for a couple of things that I hate.

00:50:12.000 60 Minutes, apparently, is now featuring, this is 60 Minutes Australia, is now featuring parents who have decided to completely botch what it means to be a parent by not raising their children with regard to gender.

00:50:30.000 So they are now raising them as what they call babies.

00:50:33.000 We didn't assign a gender at birth. 1.00

00:50:36.000 You're a terrible person.

00:50:37.000 Letting this little person be who they want to be. 0.99

00:50:40.000 It is an experiment.

00:50:42.000 What they're doing is unprecedented. 1.00

00:50:44.000 And idiotic. 1.00

00:50:45.000 And cruel. 1.00

00:50:48.000 You can't tell what your gender is by looking at your body. 0.99

00:50:51.000 What are some of the biggest challenges?

00:50:53.000 Strangers in the street have had quite a strong response.

00:50:56.000 Why are you so obsessed?

00:50:57.000 Why do you need to know?

00:50:58.000 We're not trying to eliminate gender.

00:51:01.000 It's really helping kids find their own path to it.

00:51:04.000 Oh, so giving them no guidance whatsoever, giving them no rules and no restrictions and no actual, no actual civilizing influences.

00:51:12.000 It'll be great.

00:51:13.000 It'll work out fantastic.

00:51:14.000 Yeah, this is a great way to completely screw up your kids emotionally and mentally.

00:51:19.000 And there will be no long-term studies done on these kids for another 15-20 years, and I guarantee you 100% certainty, put it on the record right now, the kids who are raised this way will end up a lot more screwed up than the comparison group.

00:51:31.000 Because they always do.

00:51:33.000 Because that, in fact, is the goal.

00:51:34.000 It's about the parents feeling good about themselves so they can get on 60 Minutes.

00:51:36.000 You're gonna be on 60 Minutes if you're just raising your kid, who is a boy, as a boy. 0.99

00:51:40.000 You only get on 60 Minutes if you do something stupid, like say I'm gonna raise my kid genderless. 1.00

00:51:46.000 It's so vile. 1.00

00:51:48.000 But unfortunately, it's not restricted to Australia.

00:51:51.000 In the Netherlands, they've gone even further.

00:51:53.000 Apparently, this is an actual thing that is happening on the TVs in the Netherlands.

00:51:58.000 There's a show in which a bunch of adults ungarb in front of children to demonstrate what a trans body looks like.

00:52:08.000 Today our guests are transgenders. 1.00

00:52:09.000 These are a bunch of people getting naked. 0.95

00:52:11.000 And yes, that feeling can simply be a feeling, but you can also do something about it.

00:52:15.000 For example, I had surgery.

00:52:17.000 The girl says, at first you think, huh?

00:52:19.000 But later you realize it's actually pretty normal.

00:52:21.000 It's actually really normal, says another kid.

00:52:23.000 It's not just male and female, there's an entire spectrum of genders besides male and female.

00:52:27.000 It's not... How did you feel after you had surgery?

00:52:34.000 Do you know the word euphoric?

00:52:36.000 No, says the kid.

00:52:37.000 Euphoric means really happy.

00:52:38.000 Extremely happy.

00:52:40.000 I woke up, I knew that my breasts were gone.

00:52:41.000 That I looked like I had always wanted it to look.

00:52:44.000 It finally matched the way I feel inside and that made me feel ecstatic.

00:52:50.000 So it feels a bit like flying?

00:52:51.000 Yes.

00:52:53.000 You simply feel intense happiness.

00:52:55.000 I want that too, says the kid.

00:52:57.000 So, indoctrinating kids in life-ending insanity.

00:53:02.000 That's great.

00:53:05.000 Slow clap for our Western civilization.

00:53:07.000 We are the same civilization that brought you Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, the Sistine Chapel.

00:53:15.000 Augustine, great works of Western literature, the Enlightenment, and capitalism is now bringing you, let's teach small children that men can be women and get adults naked in front of them in order to make that happen. 0.71

00:53:30.000 Don't worry, they're not coming for the kids.

00:53:32.000 It's all just, what's the effect guys?

00:53:34.000 Why are you so mad?

00:53:35.000 Why are you so upset?

00:53:36.000 After all, this is all just open-mindedness.

00:53:38.000 This isn't damaging kids at all.

00:53:41.000 All right, guys, the rest of the show is continuing right now.

00:53:43.000 You're not going to want to miss it.

00:53:43.000 We'll be getting into the mailbag, but to have your question answered, you have to be a member.

00:53:47.000 So become a member.

00:53:48.000 Use code Shapiro.

00:53:48.000 Check out for two months free on all annual plans.

The Ben Shapiro Show - March 31, 2023

BREAKING: Trump Indicted

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