The Charlie Kirk Show - A 33-Year Veteran of the FBI Reacts to the Mar-A-Lago Raid

00:00:00.000 Hey everybody, a special treat for you today.

00:00:02.000 Citizens Free Press, an amazing website.

00:00:05.000 Believe it or not, it's one of the largest websites on the planet with almost no promotion, just word of mouth.

00:00:12.000 The man behind it just goes by Kane.

00:00:14.000 He's an anonymous person.

00:00:15.000 I don't even know his full name.

00:00:16.000 Talks about news, information, and his website.

00:00:19.000 It's an extraordinary story.

00:00:20.000 Then we're joined by a FBI agent who's been in the Bureau for 33 years talking about why the current FBI is a disgrace.

00:00:28.000 And then finally, we talk about some breaking news on this program about the warrant that is now being made public.

00:00:34.000 Email us your thoughts.

00:00:34.000 As always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:00:36.000 Subscribe to the Charlie Kirk Show podcast.

00:00:38.000 Open up your podcast app.

00:00:39.000 Type in Charlie Kirk Show and subscribe in the upper right-hand corner.

00:00:42.000 Buckle up, everybody.

00:00:43.000 Here we go.

00:00:44.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.

00:00:46.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campuses.

00:00:48.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.

00:00:51.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.

00:00:55.000 I want to thank Charlie.

00:00:56.000 He's an incredible guy.

00:00:57.000 His spirit, his love of this country.

00:00:58.000 He's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created.

00:01:04.000 Turning point USA. 0.65

00:01:05.000 We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.

00:01:14.000 That's why we are here.

00:01:17.000 Brought to you by the Loan Experts I Trust, Andrew and Todd at Sierra Pacific Mortgage at andrewandTodd.com.

00:01:26.000 I'm sure many of you have noticed in the last couple of years how Drudge Report has just become a left-wing rag.

00:01:32.000 It's unreadable.

00:01:33.000 I used to go to Drudge all the time.

00:01:35.000 I don't go anymore.

00:01:36.000 There's a new website, though, that is surging in traffic.

00:01:39.000 They do a wonderful job of aggregation and staying on top of the news.

00:01:45.000 It is citizenfreepress.com.

00:01:50.000 I have to tell you, their traffic is unbelievable lately.

00:01:55.000 And the man behind Citizen Free Press is someone just called Kane.

00:01:59.000 You could call him Citizen Kane.

00:02:02.000 He stays anonymous so that the left doesn't screw with him and that he's able to continue to operate the website freely.

00:02:09.000 To give you an idea, Citizen Free Press had 169 million page views in the month of July.

00:02:16.000 That is more than Politico, The Wall Street Journal, Huffington Post, NBC News, TMZ, CBS News, Daily Beast, ABC News, and more.

00:02:25.000 And the man behind Citizen Free Press, who's just called Kane, he lives in Bloomington, Indiana, and will remain anonymous for many reasons, of which I fully support, joins us right now.

00:02:36.000 Citizen Kane, who runs Citizen Free Press.

00:02:38.000 How are you?

00:02:39.000 Welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show.

00:02:40.000 Thanks, Charlie.

00:02:42.000 Glad to be here.

00:02:43.000 And yeah, I'll touch on that a little bit.

00:02:45.000 Look, from day one, I wanted to avoid any interaction with David Brock in Media Matter.

00:02:53.000 And it's only grown in the last five years since I've been running the site.

00:02:56.000 So it helps to stay anonymous.

00:02:57.000 And somehow I've been able to do it for five and a half years.

00:03:01.000 No one listening has ever recognized that photo.

00:03:05.000 Those are the colonnades of Thomas Jefferson's lawn in Charlottesville at the University of Virginia.

00:03:12.000 So that's actually a reunion photo.

00:03:15.000 So I'm a graduate of the University of Virginia and used to be a proud grad, but the new woke UVA, not so proud.

00:03:23.000 Well, be careful.

00:03:24.000 They'll find you.

00:03:25.000 They'll go through graduation records and artificial intelligence and facial analysis.

00:03:29.000 These people are sinister.

00:03:30.000 But enjoy the anonymity while you have it.

00:03:33.000 So Kane, you run an amazing website.

00:03:35.000 I visit it often, Citizen Free Press.

00:03:37.000 I saw the traffic come out and it blew me away, honestly, largely because of social media suppression and all of that.

00:03:43.000 So you are the new drudge.

00:03:44.000 You are the drumbeat.

00:03:45.000 I mean, your web traffic, I mean, you're punching right against BuzzFeed.

00:03:49.000 You're still at the top.

00:03:50.000 It's actually, it's totally incredible.

00:03:52.000 So let me ask you, Kane, what is really the conservative base right now focusing on in the last week?

00:03:57.000 Uptick of traffic.

00:03:59.000 What are you monitoring?

00:04:00.000 Because you monitor trends.

00:04:01.000 You monitor what clicks are getting.

00:04:03.000 What right now are people focusing on?

00:04:06.000 This is kind of an interesting, by the way, for our audience, a non-legacy media way of tracking public opinion.

00:04:13.000 Kane, what are people focusing on right now?

00:04:16.000 All right.

00:04:16.000 Well, yeah, that's a good question.

00:04:18.000 CFP Nation has been fired up about what happened in Mar-a-Lago, obviously.

00:04:23.000 And I'll get into some of the specifics of that, but I wanted to talk a little bit about that traffic chart that you put up.

00:04:29.000 It's insane.

00:04:30.000 You talk about it in the days of the woke left.

00:04:33.000 So from the beginning, part of the point of CFP was never to be able to be canceled, which meant I didn't develop social media at all.

00:04:42.000 There's no Facebook page.

00:04:43.000 We do have a rock and Twitter feed now that Spencer Neal is running.

00:04:47.000 He's one of the guys who works for me.

00:04:49.000 He used to work for Washington Examiner, was a political reporter, and he has that feed rocking.

00:04:55.000 But we never, we practically never linked to stories on Citizen Free Press.

00:04:59.000 So there was no sort of social media brand.

00:05:02.000 And part of why the traffic blows people away is there's a huge number of conservatives who have still never heard of the site.

00:05:08.000 They all know Breitbart, they all know Gateway, they all know Daily Wire.

00:05:11.000 They all know a huge number of these sites just because they have large social media presences.

00:05:16.000 Another thing about that chart, so Drudge has been doing that for, I'm going to say 12 or 13 months now.

00:05:24.000 He's been putting that giant blue chart up.

00:05:27.000 And Citizen Free Press would have fit in it about a year ago.

00:05:31.000 We first would have cracked his top 25 down near the bottom at 70 million.

00:05:35.000 And for about 10 months, he never put the site on the list.

00:05:38.000 We were above 100 million.

00:05:40.000 We passed Breitbart and he wouldn't do it.

00:05:42.000 And then just sort of out of the blue, for whatever reason, in May, he finally started including us.

00:05:49.000 Because that's sort of the interesting thing about that chart.

00:05:51.000 That isn't every top media company.

00:05:53.000 For example, for whatever reason, he leaves out Bloomberg, which came in at about $155 million last month.

00:06:00.000 So they were right about where, right about where Politico was.

00:06:04.000 So anyway, now let's get to what's going, you know, what do my viewers think the pulse?

00:06:08.000 Yeah.

00:06:09.000 CFP Nation, for people who don't know, 97% of my traffic comes to the homepage direct because I don't really push it on social media.

00:06:19.000 So these are regular readers.

00:06:20.000 It's about 600,000 of them.

00:06:22.000 And they are incense.

00:06:24.000 They are furious.

00:06:25.000 You know, all the anecdotes that you've heard about Trump fence sitters, people who are leaning more towards DeSantis, perhaps, or whatever.

00:06:34.000 These people are fired up, pissed off, and they're backing Trump much in a much stronger way than they were before.

00:06:42.000 And it's kind of surprised me.

00:06:44.000 Outside of that story, you know, it's sort of, we do 100 stories a day.

00:06:50.000 So the app and the site gets 20, about 20,000 comments a day.

00:06:54.000 That's amazing.

00:06:55.000 It's an unbelievable amount.

00:06:56.000 It's incredible.

00:06:57.000 Yeah.

00:06:57.000 Now, is that 100 unique stories or that you link to?

00:07:00.000 So meaning the one.

00:07:02.000 Yeah, it's a very good question.

00:07:04.000 We try to do it 50-50 each day.

00:07:05.000 So out of 100, 50 of them will be our own stories, and 50 will be direct outbound links to, you know, it's funny to be talking to you.

00:07:13.000 I've probably posted Charlie Kirk videos 15, 20 times in the past 12 months.

00:07:19.000 I linked to TP USA.

00:07:21.000 You're welcome.

00:07:22.000 It's a look, it's good content.

00:07:24.000 I only post good content, good video, and inspiring stories.

00:07:29.000 But so yeah, it's 100 stories a day.

00:07:31.000 So the 50 that are our own stories that have comments, they do an average of 300 to 400 a day, which brings you to the 20,000.

00:07:41.000 So yeah, I do sort of have a, just by reading, I have a pulse.

00:07:44.000 And CFP Nation is, you know, it's a super MAGA crowd.

00:07:48.000 It's America first all the way. 0.79

00:07:50.000 So it's a great group of people.

00:07:54.000 So, everybody, if you go to citizenfreepress.com, I love it because it reminds me what Drudge used to be.

00:07:59.000 And it's all the aggregated.

00:08:01.000 You could check it how you want it.

00:08:02.000 And you could look at the comments, they are amazing.

00:08:04.000 So, really quick, Kane, let me ask you, what happened to Drudge?

00:08:08.000 I mean, it's been a great thing for your business, obviously, for you to fill the void, but a lot of people are wondering what the heck happened to my Drudge report.

00:08:15.000 Yeah, no kidding.

00:08:16.000 And I actually have some inside scoop here that you're unaware of.

00:08:19.000 So, I'll say this really quick.

00:08:21.000 When I launched in May 1st of 2017, that was right when Drudge turned.

00:08:26.000 If you remember, that was when Comey got sacked.

00:08:30.000 Mueller was appointed as a special prosecutor.

00:08:32.000 And that's when Drudge sort of started to turn against him.

00:08:35.000 I've got details on some sort of, they started making fun of Drudge, apparently.

00:08:39.000 There was a nickname in the White House that they would use to refer to him, and he heard about it and it pissed him off.

00:08:45.000 And it was personal.

00:08:47.000 But I'll also add another thing because everyone wants to speculate.

00:08:50.000 Drudge sold Drudge is not running the site.

00:08:52.000 That is all completely wrong.

00:08:54.000 Drudge is still running the site every single day.

00:08:54.000 Wow.

00:08:57.000 He has a couple of editors who help him.

00:09:00.000 But one of the ways that I know that is, you know, Matt Drudge still uses his original email.

00:09:05.000 I'm not going to give it out on the air, but it's a pretty basic email.

00:09:09.000 And someone who is a journalist contacted Matt, asked him, Hey, can I quote you on this?

00:09:17.000 Matt said no.

00:09:18.000 I think he felt guilty about it.

00:09:20.000 And the very next day, like the fourth story in Drudge's stack at the top was from this journalist's website.

00:09:26.000 So it's an example of, you know, knowing that Drudge is at least still in charge of posting the top, you know, the links on the top half of his site every day.

00:09:36.000 As for what happened to him, that's, you know, because it can't just be the switch of him getting pissed off about a nickname that made fun of him because he's embraced a lot of these leftist things.

00:09:48.000 Drudge used to be incredibly pro-life, for example.

00:09:51.000 And now he promotes, yeah, and now he promotes pro-choice.

00:09:55.000 Let me also say this: Drudge also used to be, they used to post links from scattered websites all across the website internet.

00:10:03.000 It was fringe sites, it was blogs, and now it's just so corporate.

00:10:06.000 Like everything links to Politico or Washington Post.

00:10:10.000 I mean, and look, I'm highly suspicious of one thing: one time there was a Washington Post article written about us.

00:10:15.000 It was totally fraudulent.

00:10:16.000 Within seconds, it was on the front page of Drudge.

00:10:18.000 And I was like, man, there is no way that's not coordinated.

00:10:22.000 Again, totally speculation.

00:10:24.000 We're talking to Kane, who will remain anonymous for the time being.

00:10:26.000 I just love that he's anonymous because it drives the left crazy.

00:10:29.000 It gives them something to focus on that they'll never figure out.

00:10:33.000 CitizenFreePress.com is one of my new favorite websites.

00:10:35.000 I've been following them for a little while, but just the last couple of months, I've just been going there more and more.

00:10:40.000 You can get the aggregation of what's happening in the conservative movement, and it reminds me of what Drudge used to be.

00:10:47.000 Look, there are food shortages happening all across the world right now.

00:10:51.000 Are you prepared?

00:10:52.000 I have the most amazing preparedness plan thanks to my Patriot supply.

00:10:57.000 And you have to go to preparewithkirk.com.

00:10:59.000 Look, you are nine meals away from anarchy.

00:11:01.000 Do you see all these food plants blowing up?

00:11:03.000 Do you have preparedness food?

00:11:06.000 If not, you are not properly protecting your family.

00:11:09.000 I do.

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00:11:13.000 Go to preparewithkirk.com and you'll save $50 on a four-week emergency food kit from my Patriot supply.

00:11:19.000 I don't trust the government.

00:11:20.000 Do you?

00:11:21.000 You think they're going to feed you when things fall apart?

00:11:24.000 You might say, oh, Charlie will never fall apart.

00:11:27.000 Right.

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00:11:53.000 That is preparewithkirk.com, preparewithkirk.com.

00:11:57.000 Go to preparewithkirk.com.

00:12:02.000 So, Kane, can you just talk about the general dissemination of information?

00:12:06.000 I find it remarkable the web traffic you're getting, despite the censorship.

00:12:10.000 Do you think that the people are now finding ways to circumvent the gatekeepers to almost work around them?

00:12:17.000 What are your thoughts on this as we try to continue to get information out as the gatekeepers don't want us to get to the truth?

00:12:23.000 Without a doubt, and we posted a story in the last 24 hours about a new midterm policy from Twitter to keep quote-unquote misinformation off the site.

00:12:34.000 We've got 95% of the media aligned against us.

00:12:34.000 So, it's insane.

00:12:38.000 So, how do we succeed?

00:12:40.000 For us, it was to avoid social media completely, but I understand that most sites can't do that, right?

00:12:45.000 So, how do those sites navigate and get the word out and get the honest truth out, the message out without being censored?

00:12:52.000 And it's not simple.

00:12:54.000 You know, guys like you and this show are probably a huge part of what saves us.

00:13:00.000 You're able to spend hours a day publicizing this stuff, bringing attention to it.

00:13:06.000 You've got fantastic lawyers like Harmi who are willing to fight for the First Amendment that are part of, you know, sort of part of the team that you've built.

00:13:14.000 And that's incredibly important.

00:13:16.000 It's brought, you know, I hadn't really thought about it, but it's sort of like you're the inspector general of the media and other sources like you.

00:13:26.000 And so, you're the Horowitz. 0.87

00:13:28.000 You're the Horowitz of the Media Inspector Canal.

00:13:31.000 We're actually going to do our job and not just issue meaningless reports.

00:13:34.000 I'm curious, though, Kane, how did you build the traffic without the social media apparatus?

00:13:40.000 Word of mouth, it's one of the most remarkable viral growths I've ever seen.

00:13:44.000 Yeah, it really was just word of mouth.

00:13:46.000 It was CFP Nation. 0.96

00:13:47.000 I'll give you, I'll let you know, this is how ridiculous it was.

00:13:50.000 So, it was me in my office, in my home office in Bloomington, Indiana, the Marxist Republican home of IU. 0.67

00:13:58.000 Home of IU.

00:13:58.000 That's right.

00:13:59.000 45,000 students.

00:14:01.000 But literally, on May 1st of 2017, I just started posting headlines.

00:14:06.000 I didn't reach out to any media before I launched the site.

00:14:08.000 So, there were no articles.

00:14:09.000 Like when Bongino launched, he got articles.

00:14:12.000 You know, he had five million page views his first month because he got so much press.

00:14:16.000 I think I had 5,000 or maybe 10,000 page views my first month.

00:14:20.000 There were no more than 100 readers.

00:14:22.000 I tried to spread the word on Twitter a little bit, but literally it was nothing.

00:14:28.000 And I would still work 14, 16 hours a day at the beginning posting headlines.

00:14:33.000 And honest to God, you know, a month later, I had a thousand readers and I asked people to share it.

00:14:40.000 There's even messages on the site about sharing it because we don't run any advertisements, as you know.

00:14:45.000 So, how is that possible?

00:14:46.000 How do you not monetize it?

00:14:47.000 I mean, this is-I haven't, I don't, I haven't needed the money.

00:14:50.000 I hate ads as much as anyone.

00:14:52.000 If I see a takeover, I want to spit. 0.96

00:14:54.000 If I see a pop-up video in the right-hand corner, I want to kill someone.

00:15:00.000 These are things that have been infuriating me. 0.99

00:15:02.000 I'm a news junkie who's been using the web for 30 years and I can't stand this crap. 0.97

00:15:06.000 So, I've been able to pay for it. 0.63

00:15:08.000 It's not expensive on the server-wise.

00:15:10.000 And I did two fundraisers finally after five and a half years, each of the last two years.

00:15:14.000 And my readers donated a lot of money.

00:15:16.000 And that is how I'm able to pay my employees.

00:15:18.000 I have two employees.

00:15:19.000 That's how I'm able to pay them.

00:15:20.000 But I am going to start doing ads at some point, but there will never be a video.

00:15:25.000 There will never be a takeover.

00:15:26.000 It will be boring text ads at the very top.

00:15:29.000 But yeah, it's incredible.

00:15:31.000 It's one of the most amazing stories.

00:15:33.000 So, in closing, Kane, you remain anonymous, which I just want to say for some people out there.

00:15:37.000 Some people said, Charlie, I'm afraid to fight because people will discover me.

00:15:41.000 So, therefore, I won't fight.

00:15:43.000 No, no, no, you could still fight anonymously.

00:15:44.000 It's very important.

00:15:46.000 So, can you just talk really quick on that about a minute and how could people support you, Kane?

00:15:50.000 Yeah, I think, you know, I don't want to be anonymous.

00:15:53.000 Eventually, my name will be out there probably in a few years, and I'll be doing more TV.

00:15:58.000 But for this job, look, people have to understand, I'm sitting in an office 18 hours a day.

00:16:03.000 I have no time for distractions.

00:16:05.000 I cannot have the police at my door because David Brock and his denizen of freaks decided to send the SWAT team to my house.

00:16:13.000 I cannot have any interruptions.

00:16:15.000 Otherwise, no new headlines at the top of the site.

00:16:17.000 Yes.

00:16:18.000 So it's just been, I've been forced to be anonymous because of that.

00:16:22.000 How can people find it?

00:16:24.000 CitizenFreePress.com.

00:16:25.000 It's that simple.

00:16:26.000 Look, we post new headlines 18 hours a day from 10 a.m. in the morning, and I don't log off until 3.30 a.m. at night.

00:16:34.000 So 18 hours a day.

00:16:35.000 And all the new headlines are going to be at the top always.

00:16:38.000 That's what I always hated about Drudge.

00:16:40.000 Once you visited once in the day, then you had to scour the three columns, right, to find any new stories he adds.

00:16:46.000 So everything new is at the top.

00:16:48.000 It's simple.

00:16:49.000 It loads incredibly quickly because there are no ads.

00:16:52.000 And that's it.

00:16:53.000 And I want to thank you, Charlie.

00:16:54.000 You do a fantastic job.

00:16:56.000 I've had this at the live link at the top of the site.

00:16:59.000 I'm now going to start posting, watch live, Charlie Kirk show every single day on CFP in the stack, just like I do with Bannon's War Room.

00:17:08.000 Thank you.

00:17:09.000 You guys are going to be the only two.

00:17:10.000 So the whole three hours, I don't even know how long your show runs.

00:17:14.000 There you go.

00:17:15.000 So I'm going to have the live link of every day.

00:17:17.000 You're going to see it in the stack from now on.

00:17:18.000 Thank you.

00:17:19.000 You're welcome.

00:17:20.000 Have a fantastic day.

00:17:21.000 And thanks for reaching out to me and having me on.

00:17:23.000 It's awesome.

00:17:24.000 Kane, you're an American treasure.

00:17:26.000 It's remarkable what you've done.

00:17:27.000 We appreciate that greatly.

00:17:28.000 We have to hang together so we don't hang separately.

00:17:33.000 Look, we know rates are inching up and they're still historically low.

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00:17:39.000 And I was just talking about this on our program.

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00:17:42.000 And by the way, you could always refinance.

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00:18:11.000 I know Andrew and Todd.

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00:18:24.000 And by the way, again, some of you might say, oh, Charlie, I'm going to wait for the rates to go down and all this.

00:18:29.000 Okay.

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00:18:44.000 There is a new book coming out called The Fall of the FBI: How a Once Great Agency Became a Threat to Democracy.

00:18:53.000 The author is Thomas J. Baker, and he joins us right now to help us unpack what the heck happened to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

00:19:01.000 And he himself has over 33 years of investigative and management experience as an FBI special agent.

00:19:09.000 And he has an incredible Wall Street Journal op-ed, which says whistles start to blow at the FBI.

00:19:15.000 I have so much to ask him.

00:19:16.000 I'm so glad he's with us right now.

00:19:18.000 Thomas Baker, welcome to the program.

00:19:21.000 Charlie, good to be with you.

00:19:23.000 Thank you, and congratulations on the book.

00:19:24.000 So let's just start here.

00:19:26.000 I'll be very plain and blunt.

00:19:28.000 I've lost total and complete faith in the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

00:19:31.000 I believe it's become politicized and that bad actors are not removed.

00:19:35.000 In fact, some people believe, rightfully so, and I agree with them, the FBI is actually being used against citizens.

00:19:42.000 Is that a bridge too far as someone who's served in the Bureau for 33 years?

00:19:46.000 No, it's not a bridge too far.

00:19:48.000 And a lot of people share those sentiments.

00:19:51.000 My take is a little more precise or slightly different than what you just expressed.

00:19:57.000 I think what's happened, the root of what's happened, is a change in culture at the Bureau that began under Director Mueller, Bob Mueller.

00:20:06.000 And a lot of these bad actors is the term you just used, have been removed.

00:20:13.000 The bad actors, you can name them all, McCabe and Comey, et cetera, from before, and even more recently with the Jimness case and other, they keep getting fired.

00:20:24.000 They keep getting dismissed.

00:20:26.000 And unfortunately, current Director Ray and others around him keep pointing to that and say, well, we're getting rid of the bad apples.

00:20:34.000 We got rid of the bad apples.

00:20:36.000 And my contention is they're not looking at the underlying program problem, excuse me, the cultural change that took place beginning under Robert Mueller's leadership.

00:20:48.000 Yeah, and I will say, though, Annie McCabe is still getting his pension, right?

00:20:52.000 And that even though they might be fired, I think these people should be imprisoned for what they did.

00:20:57.000 So talk about what the Bureau used to be, because you argue in your book, it actually used to be something that had a commitment to the Constitution and how it, and then it fell from there.

00:21:08.000 Explain more how and why the Bureau slipped from a trustworthy agency to one now that has no faith, the American people has no faith in.

00:21:17.000 Okay, well, it is simply this: uniquely in the United States of America, and it's always been a good thing, our national security agency, domestic security, domestic intelligence agency, was a law enforcement agency.

00:21:31.000 The FBI, the FBI, always had been fundamentally a law enforcement agency.

00:21:37.000 And in a law enforcement agency, the individuals, the agents, you work every day towards the day when you're going to have to stand up in court or before a judge and raise your right hand and swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

00:21:55.000 That's the essence of a law enforcement agency.

00:21:58.000 An intelligence agency deals in deception, deceit, and they and they give estimates, they call them estimates.

00:22:07.000 We would call them best guesses.

00:22:08.000 It's a whole different mindset.

00:22:11.000 But the Bureau was always dominated by the law enforcement mindset.

00:22:14.000 That's so intense.

00:22:16.000 September 11th happened, and Robert Mueller, who had only been director a few days when the September 11th attack happened, was called.

00:22:26.000 The attack was on Tuesday on Saturday morning.

00:22:28.000 He was called to Camp David.

00:22:30.000 President George W. Bush wanted to see him.

00:22:33.000 He went to Camp David with the Bureau's report.

00:22:36.000 And Charlie, in three and a half days, and this is quite an accomplishment, the FBI investigation had identified all 19 hijackers, their associates, their money trail, their autos, their credit cards, their connections back to al-Qaeda, everything in three and a half days.

00:22:53.000 The Bureau did what it does best: investigate.

00:22:57.000 And Robert Mueller presented that report to George Bush with the rest of his security counsel around him in Camp David that Saturday morning.

00:23:08.000 And when he was done, and he expected praise and thanks.

00:23:11.000 And by the way, he's told us this, he's told me this on several occasions.

00:23:15.000 And George W. Bush just turned to him and said, I don't care about that.

00:23:20.000 I want to know how you're going to prevent the next one.

00:23:24.000 And later that morning, George Tennant, then the director of the CIA, gave his plan of action going forward.

00:23:32.000 George W. Bush, when he was done hearing that, turned to Mueller and said, That's what I'd like to hear.

00:23:39.000 Mueller was humiliated.

00:23:41.000 So, for reasons that seemed justified at the time, he set out, he said this, to change the FBI into an intelligence agency.

00:23:52.000 And a lot of bad things flowed from that.

00:23:56.000 So, changing it from a law enforcement agency to an intelligence agency.

00:24:01.000 Now, some people would say the FBI, though, in the 70s and 80s was still doing that kind of intelligence.

00:24:07.000 I don't want to go too deep into that, but can you talk about just a little bit how the 1980 or 1990 FBI was probably a lot better than what it is today?

00:24:18.000 Would you agree at that?

00:24:19.000 Yes, absolutely.

00:24:21.000 And we had great leadership in Judge Webster and then in Judge Louis Free, without a doubt.

00:24:28.000 They did handle counterintelligence matters.

00:24:32.000 It was part of their mission to catch spies, but they approached it as a law enforcement agency working within the law.

00:24:39.000 Muller changed this around.

00:24:41.000 So he had Mueller make the cultural change.

00:24:43.000 And then after Mueller, you had the poor leadership of James Comey, which just made matters worse.

00:24:52.000 So earlier this week, I mean, as you well know, on Monday, Mar-a-Lago was raided by the FBI, an extraordinary intervention on behalf of the Bureau.

00:25:04.000 What is your take on that?

00:25:05.000 As someone who is trying to explain this in your book, I just want to reiterate it for everyone.

00:25:10.000 They can get it at pre-order.

00:25:11.000 It's not coming up for a little while.

00:25:12.000 The fall of the FBI, how a once-great agency became a threat to democracy.

00:25:17.000 You call what happened Monday a dark day for the Bureau.

00:25:20.000 Expand on that for us.

00:25:22.000 Well, most likely we're going to find out.

00:25:25.000 We're going to find out shortly when the warrant and probably the underlying affidavit is made public.

00:25:31.000 We're probably going to find out that legally, technically, the warrant was justified.

00:25:38.000 It was a legal search.

00:25:40.000 But being legal doesn't make something necessarily right.

00:25:44.000 There's a lot of things that could have been done short of searching, raiding the home of a former president and potentially a presidential candidate.

00:25:53.000 So it's an abuse of authority.

00:25:55.000 And we saw that throughout the Russian collusion thing with the unmasking, with the General Flynn aspect, with the Stone aspect.

00:26:03.000 A lot of these things were technically legal, but they weren't right.

00:26:08.000 They were an abuse of authority.

00:26:11.000 Well, I totally agree.

00:26:13.000 So let me ask you: in the rank and file of the Bureau, are there rumblings of people that are very uncomfortable with the direction that it's heading?

00:26:21.000 I can't imagine that every single FBI special agent is comfortable with the rating of James O'Keefe's apartment or the rating of Rudy Giuliani's apartment or the raiding of Mar-a-Lago.

00:26:33.000 I mean, what are you hearing rank and file by some of the people that are not in the suits but in the boots of the FBI?

00:26:41.000 No, there's definitely, I mean, and I heard, and I'm in contact with several individuals who are very upset about this.

00:26:49.000 The other thing, Charlie, that the culture of the FBI, it was somewhat a collegial organization.

00:26:54.000 I mean, people who, once you were an agent, you could speak to someone who was an assistant director or an agent in charge, and you would have frank discussions.

00:27:02.000 And sometimes things happened in the past, and a supervisor or an SAC would say to the director, you know, maybe we shouldn't go down this road.

00:27:11.000 Maybe we shouldn't do it this way.

00:27:13.000 Unfortunately, either those voices didn't speak up this time or they were discounted.

00:27:21.000 But the underlying problem is the culture has to be turned around.

00:27:26.000 Getting rid of the bad apples is not enough.

00:27:29.000 So, yeah, so let's game plan this.

00:27:32.000 How do we fix this?

00:27:33.000 We have a national law enforcement agency that is more like an intelligence service than a law enforcement service.

00:27:39.000 I believe a vast majority of Americans have lost total and complete faith.

00:27:43.000 What is the roadmap towards a restoration, or is it just time to dismantle it?

00:27:47.000 No, I don't think it should be dismantled.

00:27:49.000 I think one of the strengths in the past of the FBI, a lot of people have proposed that, and I totally disagree with that.

00:27:56.000 A blessing, a blessing for our country was, unlike other Western democracies and certainly other countries around the world, is our domestic intelligence service was and is a law enforcement agency.

00:28:11.000 So the FBI had to work within certain parameters of the law to do things.

00:28:17.000 And that was a blessing.

00:28:18.000 What's happened now with the intelligence side being dominant and the leadership all coming up on that intelligence side of things, I fear what we may have now, and that's why I use the subtitle of my book.

00:28:30.000 We may now have a domestic intelligence service with police powers.

00:28:36.000 Yes.

00:28:36.000 Instead of a blessing, it's a curse.

00:28:38.000 And that has to be flipped and turned around.

00:28:41.000 And to change culture in any organization, and there's been books written just about this, you have to do a lot of things, big and small, and you have to do them consistently.

00:28:51.000 But the first thing you have to do is recognize the problem.

00:28:55.000 And as long as Ray and others hang their hat on, well, we're getting rid of the bad apples, they're not recognizing the fundamental underlying problem.

00:29:04.000 Well, if I may be share my opinion, they are the problem, okay?

00:29:08.000 I mean, Ray and all them are part of the culture that is continuing in this.

00:29:12.000 So I want to reiterate the book again for our audience.

00:29:15.000 It's super interesting.

00:29:16.000 Again, Thomas J. Baker has over 33 years of investigative and management experience as an FBI special agent.

00:29:23.000 The fall of the FBI, how a once-great agency became a threat to democracy.

00:29:28.000 And let me just say this: I want to live in a country where I trust our national law enforcement.

00:29:35.000 I want to live in that country.

00:29:37.000 It pains me greatly that I look at the FBI as a modern version of the Gestapo.

00:29:44.000 It really does.

00:29:44.000 I don't want that.

00:29:45.000 It doesn't make me happy.

00:29:46.000 It doesn't make me joyful.

00:29:47.000 Closing thoughts.

00:29:49.000 Well, I share your sentiment.

00:29:51.000 And for me and dozens and dozens of other former agents I know and a few in the Bureau that I'm still talking to, it breaks our heart.

00:30:00.000 We devoted our life to this.

00:30:02.000 We're proud of it.

00:30:03.000 It's our identity.

00:30:04.000 And we want it to turn around.

00:30:08.000 Well, again, thank you, Thomas, for joining us.

00:30:10.000 I just want to encourage people to check out the book.

00:30:12.000 We need more people that served in the Bureau and did a good job going after terrorists and gun smugglers and child sex traffickers and narco-criminals to speak out. 0.75

00:30:21.000 We have to do that.

00:30:22.000 It's so important.

00:30:24.000 And we just can't, we can't play around with this.

00:30:26.000 I'm afraid that if the FBI keeps on going in this direction, I think it's already there.

00:30:30.000 We're going to be in a really tough spot.

00:30:31.000 The fall of the FBI, how a once great agency became a threat to democracy.

00:30:33.000 Thomas Baker, thank you so much.

00:30:35.000 Thank you, Charlie.

00:30:36.000 The Wall Street Journal has obtained documents that have not yet been public about the raid on Mar-a-Lago.

00:30:43.000 And so we're going to get into this right now.

00:30:45.000 So the new narrative is that Donald Trump had nuclear codes, and that's why they raided him.

00:30:53.000 It's a brilliant PR tactic, by the way, to try to get people to think it's necessary to go invade and occupy a political dissident's home.

00:31:00.000 By the way, if Donald Trump had nuclear codes, why didn't the FBI visit him, I don't know, sooner and be like, hey, you got to bring him back?

00:31:09.000 Why couldn't they use a subpoena?

00:31:11.000 Really supposed to believe that Donald Trump had nuclear information, and that's the reason for raiding it.

00:31:16.000 That is nonsense.

00:31:16.000 It's a brilliant PR tactic.

00:31:18.000 It's a total smokescreen operation, garbage. 0.99

00:31:21.000 By the way, if he really did have that, you're trying to tell me Donald Trump wouldn't hand them back. 0.97

00:31:26.000 Like, oh, yeah, no, actually, I want to have the nuclear code still.

00:31:29.000 And by the way, there's no even evidence that he had nuclear codes.

00:31:31.000 They are just using the term nuclear.

00:31:33.000 So, for example, the Rachel Maddow program published last night.

00:31:38.000 I haven't had a chance to listen to this.

00:31:40.000 But yeah, this is, yeah, so this is how this is how sneaky they get.

00:31:43.000 And Maddow is being so sneaky when she does this. 1.00

00:31:45.000 Documents relating to nuclear weapons.

00:31:49.000 Oh, documents relating to nuclear weapons?

00:31:52.000 Oh, okay, wait.

00:31:53.000 So is it documents relating to nuclear weapons or is it nuclear codes?

00:31:58.000 Which is it?

00:31:59.000 So breaking news shows that 20 boxes of items, binders of photos, a handwritten note, an executive grant of clemency for Mr. Trump's ally, Roger Stone.

00:32:09.000 I know what you're all wondering, which is, did the FBI take Melania Trump's dresses?

00:32:17.000 Was that on the list?

00:32:19.000 FBI searched Trump's home to look for nuclear documents and other items.

00:32:22.000 Sources say this is right after, by the way, Merrick Garland comes out and says, I'm going to defend the integrity of the FBI.

00:32:29.000 And immediately they leak that it's all about nuclear codes.

00:32:33.000 Again, we are calling this entire thing Operation Cross-Dresser Hurricane in the tradition of the Federal Bureau.

00:32:39.000 They might as well follow J. Edgar Hoover's tradition of cross-dressing. 0.98

00:32:44.000 The list includes references to one set of documents marked as various classified TSSCI documents, an abbreviation for top-secret sensitive compartmented information.

00:32:54.000 It also says agents collected four sets of top-secret documents, three sets of secret documents, and three sets of confidential documents.

00:33:00.000 The list didn't provide any more detail.

00:33:02.000 Trump's lawyers argue the former president used the authority to declassify the material before he left office.

00:33:06.000 While a president has the power to declassify documents, there are federal regulations that lay out a process to do so.

00:33:12.000 So here's just a question.

00:33:14.000 We now raid people's homes, former presidents' homes.

00:33:17.000 We now raid sacred political institutions, as Mar-a-Lago, institution is not the right word, but let's just say places for paperwork crimes.

00:33:26.000 You notice how they worded it?

00:33:27.000 This is a process crime. 0.62

00:33:28.000 It's not even a crime.

00:33:29.000 Let me rephrase that.

00:33:30.000 It's wrong.

00:33:30.000 It's a process issue.

00:33:32.000 Like, oh, you took paperwork.

00:33:33.000 You wouldn't.

00:33:33.000 Now, it'd be one thing if Donald Trump was live streaming, like, hey, I got all these documents here.

00:33:40.000 And then the FBI comes on June 3rd very cooperatively, Department of Justice does, and they talk about these documents.

00:33:46.000 Every single president leaves the White House with boxes of stuff.

00:33:50.000 The Clintons left with, I don't know, $28,000 worth of furniture.

00:33:54.000 Some people say as much as $200,000 worth of furniture.

00:33:57.000 Barack Hussein Obama has boxes of documents.

00:34:00.000 Now, here's the other thing.

00:34:02.000 You do know that former president still gets a security clearance.

00:34:04.000 The former president and his team don't have the affidavit.

00:34:07.000 The affidavit is everything, by the way, which would provide more detail about the FBI's investigation, according to people familiar with the process.

00:34:14.000 His lawyers have asked for a more specific account of what was removed from Mar-a-Lago.

00:34:21.000 Mr. Trump said on social media, his representatives have been cooperating fully, and the government could have whatever they wanted if they wanted it, if we had it.

00:34:30.000 So why rate it?

00:34:32.000 Shock and awe to make you afraid and to bend the knee.

00:34:38.000 Now, remember, Trump went on Truth Social and said he would release the documents.

00:34:42.000 So why is it necessary to come in with 30 FBI agents for 270 man hours?

00:34:48.000 And after Garland said he's moving to release the affidavit, what is the affidavit?

00:34:52.000 The affidavit is the same thing as the quote, it is the equivalent of, but not the same technical thing as a FISA warrant application.

00:34:58.000 Judge, here is why we're going to raid.

00:35:00.000 Now, this is really important.

00:35:03.000 In order to get a raid authorization by a judge, the FBI just can't go decide to raid somebody.

00:35:08.000 They have to go to a judge, but it's judge shopping and they know what they're doing.

00:35:11.000 They have to explain to the judge why a subpoena would not suffice.

00:35:16.000 Why a document request for a subpoena would not suffice, of which there is imminent harm to the population, an imminent crime being committed, an act of crime being committed, or evidence being destroyed.

00:35:28.000 What evidence could you show that Magistrate Judge Reinhold and the DOJ would agree that you have to go guns drawn for 270 man hours to go into a president's home to do that?

00:35:43.000 According to Pam Bondi, the warrant was signed on Friday.

00:35:46.000 So why wait until Monday if nuclear codes are a threat to the nation?

00:35:53.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:35:54.000 Email me your thoughts as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:35:56.000 Thanks so much.

00:35:57.000 Talk to you soon.

00:36:01.000 For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk dot com.

The Charlie Kirk Show - August 13, 2022

A 33-Year Veteran of the FBI Reacts to the Mar-A-Lago Raid

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