The Charlie Kirk Show - Can I Change Rand Paul's Mind on the BBB?

00:00:00.000 Hey everybody, Charlie Kirk here, live from the Bitcoin.com studio.

00:00:04.000 Senator Rand Paul joins us.

00:00:05.000 Can we change his mind and get Rand Paul to vote yes on the big, beautiful bill?

00:00:09.000 I try my best, and you'll see what happens.

00:00:12.000 I think we get him very close.

00:00:14.000 You guys be the judge.

00:00:16.000 We then have Kalen Dalamita and Anthony Cabasa, two great patriots, right up on the front lines of doing the most important work in the country.

00:00:25.000 When it comes to reporting and journalism, you're going to love it.

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00:00:52.000 Buckle up, everybody.

00:00:53.000 Here we go.

00:00:54.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.

00:00:56.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.

00:00:58.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.

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00:01:52.000 Joining us now is an old friend and a great patriot.

00:01:56.000 We might not agree on everything, but boy, he is incredibly principled, and for that, I deeply admire him.

00:02:01.000 It is Senator Rand Paul from the great state of Kentucky.

00:02:04.000 Senator, great to see you today.

00:02:05.000 Thank you for the time.

00:02:06.000 Hey, Charlie.

00:02:07.000 Thanks for having me.

00:02:07.000 So, Senator, the news of the day is that in some ways you found yourself on the other side of this big, beautiful bill from the White House.

00:02:16.000 You know, I've heard a lot of the feedback from yourself and from Senator Ron Johnson, and I totally agree that we need to get closer to a balanced budget and just this addiction to spending must end.

00:02:29.000 Simultaneously, there's some really good points that were made by the White House.

00:02:32.000 We had a long conversation with Stephen Miller.

00:02:34.000 I wanted to give you a fair amount of time to make your case.

00:02:37.000 Where do you currently stand on the big, beautiful bill and what would potentially get you to a yes?

00:02:42.000 You know, I support quite a bit of what's in the bill.

00:02:45.000 The tax cuts is the primary aspect of the bill.

00:02:47.000 I voted for them in 2017.

00:02:49.000 I support making them permanent.

00:02:52.000 I accept the argument that if you lower tax rates, sometimes you get more revenue.

00:02:55.000 This is what Art Laffer argued in the 1980s and still argues.

00:02:59.000 So I'm fine with the tax cut, as is.

00:03:02.000 I'm fine with adding to the tax cuts as President Trump wishes.

00:03:05.000 So I'm fine with that aspect of the bill.

00:03:07.000 And that's a big bulk of the bill that will lead to growth.

00:03:10.000 It's what led to low unemployment rates in the first administration and really was a great boon to our country.

00:03:16.000 The second part of it, there are some spending cuts.

00:03:20.000 I think many of these spending cuts are good.

00:03:23.000 I think a lot of them are in the outlying years and may or may not happen.

00:03:27.000 Some of them are fake, such as forgiving the student loan forgiveness program or ending the student loan forgiveness program, which the courts have already ended.

00:03:36.000 So it's sort of saying, oh, we're going to save money by something Biden was going to do, but the courts have said he couldn't do.

00:03:42.000 It's not a real savings.

00:03:43.000 We know that the bill will add probably, even if you say the taxes don't add to the debt, which I accept.

00:03:50.000 The bill in the first years has $400 billion worth of new spending on border and also on military.

00:03:56.000 So we know in the first couple years there will be an addition to the deficit.

00:04:00.000 It may be made up in the later years, but that is yet to be determined.

00:04:04.000 But none of that really is my objection to the bill.

00:04:07.000 Those are minor things, and I actually could vote for it as is.

00:04:10.000 Even as imperfect as it is, I could vote for it.

00:04:13.000 But I can't vote to raise the debt ceiling $5 trillion.

00:04:16.000 And the reason is this.

00:04:18.000 The debt this year is going to be over $2 trillion, $2.2 trillion.

00:04:22.000 And people say, oh, that's Biden's fault.

00:04:25.000 Well, it was Biden's fault until March of this year when the Republicans, not me, but most of the Republicans voted to continue the Biden spending levels in a continuing resolution in March of 2025.

00:04:36.000 That's what we live under now are the GOP spending levels minus me and a few others.

00:04:42.000 So that year ends at the end of September.

00:04:44.000 The debt will be $2.2 trillion this year.

00:04:46.000 That's all on the Republicans.

00:04:48.000 If Republicans also vote to extend the debt ceiling by $5 trillion, then really we lose the power of the argument in our moral standing and saying this is a bunch of Democrat problems.

00:04:58.000 Democrats are deficit and spend, big spenders.

00:05:01.000 It's not Republicans if the deficit now is completely owned by Republicans.

00:05:06.000 So I've offered the opposite.

00:05:07.000 I have said that rather than give Congress, which is reckless with spending and has no good history other than adding $30,000, Don't give them a debt ceiling that lasts two years.

00:05:20.000 Don't give them $5 trillion worth because they will spend it and they will borrow it.

00:05:24.000 Give them three months worth.

00:05:26.000 So I've offered this as an amendment and I would accept it and vote for it if it were part of the bill.

00:05:30.000 Three months is an extraordinary amount though.

00:05:33.000 $500 billion.

00:05:35.000 And you say, well, it's inconvenient to keep voting on it.

00:05:38.000 Well, yeah, it's also inconvenient to borrow $36 trillion and have a trillion dollars in interest.

00:05:44.000 So I'd make them address the issue.

00:05:47.000 So in three months, let's say we gave them three months worth of borrowing potential, $500 billion.

00:05:52.000 It'd expire about the end of September.

00:05:54.000 What comes at the end of September?

00:05:56.000 Another big, beautiful bill to fund the government.

00:05:58.000 It's going to be an omnibus or a continuing resolution.

00:06:01.000 It'll be all the bills crammed together.

00:06:03.000 It's a terrible way to run government.

00:06:05.000 But then we would ask them at that point, All right, you promised us you were going to do better.

00:06:09.000 And once again, this isn't an accusation against the president.

00:06:13.000 This is an accusation against GOP leadership on both sides.

00:06:17.000 I'm saying I don't believe them or trust them.

00:06:20.000 So in three months, we'd get another bite at the apple and we'd say, all right, what have you done?

00:06:24.000 And they would say, oh, we're going to do it next time.

00:06:26.000 And that's what they say.

00:06:27.000 Right now, from Speaker Johnson, we hear he's going to be conservative after the 2026 elections.

00:06:34.000 The Senate has made it not just $4 trillion in borrowing.

00:06:37.000 They wouldn't do $5 trillion in borrowing.

00:06:38.000 They've explicitly told us it's to get through the 2026 elections without talking about the debt.

00:06:44.000 All of these things conservatives would oppose, but now because they support the president so much, they're willing to look the other way.

00:06:52.000 I like the president.

00:06:53.000 I like him personally.

00:06:54.000 I was his biggest defender against two impeachments.

00:06:58.000 We'll do it again.

00:06:59.000 I've supported his nominees.

00:07:01.000 But I'm just not going to go against all principle to support $5 trillion in borrowing because I don't know who we would be or where we would be of a movement if nobody opposes this.

00:07:11.000 So part of the problem, and I agree with a lot of what you said, Senator, is that the counterargument is that we don't have the votes in the House or the Senate.

00:07:21.000 To do this.

00:07:22.000 The moderates will not play ball with any dramatic spending adjustments, and we have to play with a very slim majority.

00:07:29.000 I imagine your counterargument is that, hey, maybe it's time for those of us that are fiscal conservatives start wielding the same power that these moderates wield.

00:07:37.000 What would your reply be to the fact that it might not be possible in this reconciliation bill to get some of the demands that you are articulating?

00:07:47.000 Right.

00:07:47.000 And I'm not looking for hundreds or dozens of demands.

00:07:50.000 I'm looking for one.

00:07:51.000 Separate out the debt ceiling and put it in a different bill and I can vote for this.

00:07:56.000 It's still unknown whether there are enough of us.

00:07:58.000 I think the counting and the tally depends on who has the courage to say no.

00:08:03.000 If there are four conservatives in the House.

00:08:05.000 Or four conservatives in the Senate who would say no to the debt ceiling, it would be taken off in a heartbeat.

00:08:10.000 They would just negotiate.

00:08:12.000 They're not negotiating because it's mostly me at this point.

00:08:15.000 Now, Ron Johnson has expressed some of the same concerns on the spending and maybe a little bit on the debt ceiling as well, but there aren't four at this point, so they will not negotiate.

00:08:24.000 In fact, they've chosen really to go full bore campaign mode against me, so they aren't really caring at all about whether or not I ever cooperate with the White House.

00:08:35.000 Because they've chosen to smear and lie about me throughout all the social media outlets by paying these influencers to attack me.

00:08:43.000 But I don't think, you know, if they know me at all, they apparently have misjudged me to think that somehow spreading lies about me and pilloring me will somehow cause me to be chastened and, you know, lick the boot.

00:08:56.000 So I'm not going to do that.

00:08:58.000 And I think what you'll find is that over time, people are going to discover that the debt keeps going.

00:09:04.000 The debt is going to go on and on, and it's going to get worse, and there's going to be a crisis in this country, and there needs to be a remnant of conservatives who actually still are fiscally conservative and can argue from that position.

00:09:15.000 So the argument against the debt, and correct me if I'm wrong, Senator, is that if we peel out the debt ceiling, then potentially it would need 60 votes as a standalone vote, and it would give a lot more.

00:09:28.000 Power to Chuck Schumer to then we'd have other concessions and other liberal boondoggle wishes or aims.

00:09:34.000 Is that true?

00:09:35.000 There's no history of Democrats ever voting against a debt ceiling.

00:09:38.000 They always vote for the debt ceiling.

00:09:40.000 They love and enjoy debt.

00:09:41.000 The modern monetary theory they talk so much about is just spend, spend, spend.

00:09:45.000 They know it has to go up.

00:09:47.000 Many of them, Elizabeth Warren agrees with President Trump.

00:09:50.000 She'd like to have no debt ceiling, but she will always vote to raise it. 0.95

00:09:53.000 And so if you put a bill on the floor and you said, this is it.

00:09:56.000 It's either this or default.

00:09:58.000 Are you going to vote to raise the debt ceiling?

00:09:59.000 They all will.

00:10:00.000 And they'll vote for any amount, too.

00:10:01.000 They'll vote for $10 trillion.

00:10:02.000 If they want to do $10 trillion and we can go through the whole term, the whole next term of President Trump and never have to borrow again, Democrats will all vote for that.

00:10:10.000 And people say, oh, no, they don't like Donald Trump.

00:10:13.000 They won't do it.

00:10:13.000 Well, they voted to raise the debt ceiling in his first term.

00:10:16.000 And historically, the debt ceiling has gone up.

00:10:19.000 I don't know, maybe a hundred times in the last, maybe not a hundred times, let's say 50 times in the last 30 years.

00:10:25.000 Each time it's gone up, it's been all the Democrats vote for it every time, and it's been the big government Republicans.

00:10:32.000 But to me, raising the debt ceiling is a day of shame, and they walk down to the front of the floor of the Senate or to the well of the House, and they have to admit that they are the big spenders.

00:10:41.000 So the big spenders on the Republican side always vote to raise the debt ceiling, and the Democrats.

00:10:46.000 But now you're going to change the dynamic.

00:10:48.000 Where it's going to be all Republicans voting to raise the debt ceiling.

00:10:51.000 And what you'll wind up with is no Republicans left who can argue with a straight face that it's the Democrats' fault because they will own the debt.

00:10:59.000 From now on, the Republicans will own the debt and have no argument against Democrats being the big spenders because they will own the debt.

00:11:05.000 I think it's more worrisome than people can imagine unless they've really thought this through.

00:11:11.000 So a couple minutes remaining here, Senator, and I agree.

00:11:14.000 I believe the national debt is a crisis to our country.

00:11:17.000 Would you agree that the invasion under Joe Biden, the immigration we've seen, is also a national crisis facing America?

00:11:24.000 Yep.

00:11:24.000 And so where would you rank that and balance that between this big, beautiful bill and the fiscal concerns?

00:11:32.000 I think you can do both.

00:11:34.000 So I'm against the 8 million people or so that Biden let come to the country.

00:11:39.000 I'm against open borders.

00:11:41.000 I think we should do more than we have been doing.

00:11:43.000 But I can't just quit being a fiscal conservative because you said, well, the border needs more security.

00:11:48.000 It does.

00:11:49.000 So I'll give you a very specific example.

00:11:52.000 THEY SAID TO US, WE WANT TO FENCE THE REMAINING THOUSAND MILES OF THE SOUTHERN BORDER.

00:11:57.000 PRESIDENT TRUMP AND OTHERS HAVE FENCED ABOUT PROBABLY SOME A lot of it's mountains, so you might be able to fence 1,000 more.

00:12:09.000 The Border Patrol website says it costs $6.5 million per mile.

00:12:14.000 You multiply that by 1,000 and you get $6.5 billion.

00:12:18.000 Well, the bill is asking for $46.5 billion.

00:12:21.000 So what are they going to do?

00:12:23.000 Build a wall between us and Canada, too? 0.77

00:12:25.000 I mean, you ought to at least have to justify your numbers.

00:12:28.000 There's been no justification.

00:12:30.000 Everybody says, you're not the president.

00:12:33.000 Be quiet.

00:12:33.000 We didn't elect you.

00:12:34.000 All this crazy stuff on the internet.

00:12:36.000 And it's like, well, somebody shouldn't push back and do the math and say, well, it doesn't add up.

00:12:41.000 You want $46 billion, and we're getting $6.5 billion on this thing.

00:12:45.000 And so, yeah, we should do the math on this.

00:12:48.000 They want to hire 8,000 new agents.

00:12:51.000 I'm saying hire 4,000 new agents.

00:12:53.000 I'm saying let's get started and not have a permanent army of people sitting around.

00:12:58.000 The border's been largely controlled by the president by sheer willpower, and I give him all the credit.

00:13:02.000 He came in and by sheer willpower and various threats and bullying of other countries.

00:13:08.000 He's controlled the border.

00:13:09.000 It shows that it could have been done under Biden and he never did it.

00:13:12.000 But now that it's controlled, shouldn't we at least think about the cost and not say, oh, we're conservative, except when it comes to the border when we're for unlimited spending?

00:13:20.000 Same with the military.

00:13:21.000 The military has been evading its caps for a long time.

00:13:25.000 It went up 3% last year.

00:13:26.000 They added some more on.

00:13:27.000 Now they want to have $150 million on.

00:13:29.000 The untold story of this bill is this big, beautiful bill is a secret bill.

00:13:39.000 They just want more military money.

00:13:40.000 They want more tanks.

00:13:42.000 They want everything to please the military industrial complex.

00:13:46.000 And I think this is the untold story of this bill.

00:13:49.000 Senator, thank you for your time.

00:13:50.000 I wish we had more time to go through this.

00:13:52.000 We might not agree.

00:13:53.000 I want the big, beautiful bill to pass largely because I agree with everything you say, but I believe we're in the midst of a national immigration crisis and we need mass deportations. 0.99

00:14:00.000 And I think it gets that 80% quotient.

00:14:03.000 And so, Senator, my hope is that we can figure out this debt ceiling objection that you have because we'd love to have your vote.

00:14:09.000 Because also, remember, it does defund Planned Parenthood, which you and I both have cared about for quite some time.

00:14:15.000 A lifelong vote.

00:14:15.000 And I'm with you.

00:14:16.000 I'm with you.

00:14:16.000 I'M DONE FOR VOTING FOR THE BILL.

00:14:19.000 Separate out the debt ceiling so I don't have to give up all of my principles and I'll vote for the bill.

00:14:24.000 Senator, thank you so much.

00:14:25.000 Appreciate your time.

00:14:26.000 Thank you.

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00:15:21.000 So I agree with a lot of Rand Paul sentiment, without a doubt.

00:15:26.000 But you must deal with the majority that you have, and that is a three-seat House majority.

00:15:32.000 Now, again, I didn't want to turn this into a debate at all.

00:15:35.000 You heard in his interview he was receiving enough antagonism.

00:15:39.000 That's not going to bring him towards a yes, so we wanted to have a good conversation.

00:15:42.000 Nor do I think he deserves or should be a recipient of antagonism.

00:15:46.000 Are you kidding me?

00:15:47.000 He's been amazing on foreign wars and the Afghanistan stuff and the boondoggles, and he's been amazing on anti-IRS stuff and Fauci.

00:15:56.000 I mean, let's just be honest about it.

00:15:58.000 We've got enough enemies.

00:15:59.000 Blessed are the peacemakers, one of my favorite verses.

00:16:02.000 Blessed are the peacemakers.

00:16:04.000 I don't think we as Christians are peacemakers nearly enough.

00:16:07.000 But let me respond to something now that I think is important.

00:16:11.000 If Rand Paul got his way, And we isolated the debt ceiling in its own vote.

00:16:18.000 Let's not fool ourselves.

00:16:20.000 Chuck Schumer will absolutely extract his pound of flesh because you will then need to get to 60 votes.

00:16:27.000 So basically, this is an opportunity to raise the debt ceiling via a 50-vote threshold so that we get zero Democrat concessions.

00:16:37.000 Instead, let's say that we don't raise the debt ceiling as part of this reconciliation bill.

00:16:43.000 And then we go towards another government shutdown.

00:16:46.000 Chuck Schumer will say this is going to be a Trump shutdown.

00:16:49.000 This is a Trump shutdown.

00:16:50.000 That's what he'll say.

00:16:51.000 And then he'll say, John Thune and Speaker Johnson, here's 15 things that I need.

00:16:56.000 And he'll probably get seven of them.

00:16:59.000 And they'll be like transgender stuff and green energy stuff and foreign aid and the reconstitution of USAID.

00:17:07.000 and it will neuter so much of our leverage.

00:17:22.000 Let me say that again.

00:17:24.000 This will deprive Chuck Schumer and the Democrats from having any leverage this entire Congress.

00:17:32.000 So while I agree with Rand Paul on principle, we shouldn't be raising the debt ceiling.

00:17:36.000 It should be a day of shame.

00:17:37.000 Legit.

00:17:38.000 Respect.

00:17:39.000 Totally get it.

00:17:41.000 What we're talking about here is you'll actually make the Democrat Party stronger.

00:17:46.000 And Rand Paul says, and I'll due respect to him, he says, well, the Democrats always vote for every debt increase.

00:17:52.000 Yes, they vote for every debt increase once they get concessions.

00:17:56.000 Remember, they've been very happy to shut down the government multiple times until they get concessions and then we cave.

00:18:04.000 Democrats are getting whipped up into a frenzy again.

00:18:07.000 He says they'll never agree to stop raising the debt.

00:18:09.000 Well, it used to be that, and that they never agreed to a government shutdown, but they did that in Trump's first term.

00:18:14.000 In fact, we've seen this time and time again.

00:18:18.000 Democrats tend to get more extreme over time, so if you are tired of Democrats getting wins in D.C., then you kind of need to include the debt ceiling in the reconciliation bill, otherwise you're going to throw it back to a 60-vote threshold.

00:18:32.000 We've seen this whole play before.

00:18:35.000 And I want to just repeat one other point here, and there's a lot on the border that I do want to respond to, which is, it's not even worth it.

00:18:44.000 There's a lot.

00:18:45.000 I got 45 seconds.

00:18:46.000 There's a lot here.

00:18:48.000 CBP spends months analyzing the terrain to develop this calculation, which includes motion sentence, monitoring systems, video systems, underground electric cables, anti-tunnel systems, paving and tiling new roads, etc.

00:19:01.000 The border price is high to make sure it gets done.

00:19:03.000 No excuses.

00:19:05.000 Now, Rand Paul is right, though.

00:19:07.000 Out of all the places where I think his objection probably has the greatest spirit is the increase in defense spending.

00:19:16.000 It's interesting how that one has not got a lot of attention, the kind of Pentagon bloat.

00:19:21.000 Separate topic for another time.

00:19:23.000 But the debt ceiling is a very important point because if we went to a 60-vote threshold, You would make Chuck Schumer powerful again.

00:19:32.000 And this reconciliation bill makes him weak and powerless and without a victory for multiple years.

00:19:41.000 You ever notice how the power always seems to go out right when you need it most?

00:19:45.000 Whether it's a heat wave, a summer storm, or goodness gracious, God forbid, a tornado or a hurricane, just too many people running the AC at once, our fragile grid cannot keep up.

00:19:54.000 That's why I got the Grid Doctor 3300 solar generator from my Patriot Supply.

00:19:59.000 This thing is an absolute beast, 3300 watts of off-grid power that keeps my fridge, freezer, lights, even medical devices running whenever grid power fails.

00:20:08.000 And right now, they've got a crazy deal going.

00:20:10.000 When you buy the Grid Doctor 3300, they'll throw in two waterproof 200-watt solar Don't believe what you see.

00:20:39.000 Believe what you are told by the state.

00:20:43.000 That's what Maxine Waters has to say.

00:20:45.000 I want to welcome Kalen Dalamita, a TPUSA Frontlines reporter, and also Anthony Cabasa, independent journalist.

00:20:53.000 They were both on the ground in L.A. doing hero's work.

00:20:57.000 Hello to you both.

00:20:57.000 Let's play the cut from Maxine Waters here.

00:21:00.000 He's just like, it's so incredible.

00:21:02.000 Play cut 369.

00:21:03.000 Don't think that somehow, because they called out the National Guard, there was violence.

00:21:09.000 There was no violence.

00:21:10.000 I was on the street.

00:21:11.000 I know.

00:21:12.000 And I went from downtown detention back out into the community, talking to people, what happened in Paramount, what happened in Compton, what happened in Inglewood.

00:21:22.000 So, first of all, get it straight.

00:21:25.000 And don't just rely on what you're being told or the few incidents that you saw.

00:21:31.000 Few incidents that you saw.

00:21:33.000 Kalen, what is the truth of what you were reporting on on the lines of front lines in Well, the truth is that these are not a few incidents.

00:21:42.000 It's widespread and it's completely intentional.

00:21:46.000 And that's just the truth of the matter.

00:21:48.000 You can look anywhere around downtown LA and you'll find broken, destroyed.

00:21:56.000 Windows businesses, looted businesses.

00:21:58.000 They destroyed Waymos.

00:22:00.000 They've destroyed a countless number of cop cars.

00:22:06.000 We've seen that footage of people throwing cinder blocks and other things at those police cars that were on the freeway, the 101.

00:22:14.000 And this is all very reminiscent of what we saw in 2020.

00:22:18.000 A lot of these people are likely not from Los Angeles.

00:22:23.000 They're likely from elsewhere, but they're opportunists, they're parasitic, and they're here just to cause chaos.

00:22:30.000 So I'm going to follow up with that in a second.

00:22:34.000 I have a question.

00:22:35.000 So Anthony, independent journalist, Anthony Cabasa does great work.

00:22:39.000 Anthony, what percentage of these people that were doing this were quote-unquote professional agitators versus just rank-and-file people participating?

00:22:48.000 Yeah, thank you so much for having me, Charlie.

00:22:50.000 So what I've been seeing on the ground, I'm actually in L.A. proper, and so I've been able to get to these protests since they began on Friday.

00:22:58.000 You have Gavin Newsom that is saying that he's calling in the National Guard, and that is why the escalations have escalated now to violence, but that's just simply not the truth.

00:23:10.000 I've been there since day one, which was Friday, and that was a protest against the ICE raids that have been ramping up here in Los Angeles.

00:23:18.000 You have a lot of these small organizations here locally that put these things together.

00:23:21.000 You have the Black Lives Matter LA chapter.

00:23:24.000 You have the PSL, which is a party of socialism and liberation, which is an oxymoron.

00:23:29.000 There's no liberation through socialism.

00:23:31.000 And there's also the DSA, the Democratic Socialists of America.

00:23:34.000 On top of that, you have these teacher unions and the SEIU that are making sure that there's flyers for everybody, making sure that masks are being delivered for everyone, that everyone has food and water.

00:23:53.000 That is a city next to Compton, California.

00:23:55.000 I actually exclusively posted a video that I found of a pallet of bricks conveniently located to where ICE agents were setting up to go out and raid.

00:24:06.000 It was actually a setup for them.

00:24:08.000 It was a staging area for them to go out into multiple cities.

00:24:10.000 But then a local city councilman, a lot of people don't know this, it was a local city councilman.

00:24:16.000 That just so happened to be around that location, saw a DHS agent car go inside of the staging area.

00:24:22.000 He put out a video saying DHS is getting ready to raid this Home Depot because the staging area was set in front of a Home Depot.

00:24:30.000 And that's when people started to come and attack the DHS agents was because of the city council member that made this video saying, guys, they're getting ready.

00:24:38.000 Be ready.

00:24:39.000 Make sure you come out here and protest peacefully.

00:24:42.000 But of course, we know that led to violence.

00:24:45.000 So, Kalen, you've seen a lot of these type of demonstrations.

00:24:50.000 What, if anything, was there like a command and control type operation?

00:24:55.000 And walk us through some of the more graphic elements of what you witnessed on the ground.

00:25:00.000 Right.

00:25:00.000 So as far as command and control, I think a lot of that is, you know, I'm speculating is going to be on any internal comms, but what I've seen, I,

00:25:22.000 You have a lot of the same sort of agitative individuals up front in front of police officers, just continually hurling insults, things that are racist, things that are absolutely disgusting.

00:25:38.000 To these law enforcement officers.

00:25:41.000 And then you'll have people sort of behind that that will continually throw things and continually push forward until law enforcement has to start using less lethal weapons to get these people to back off.

00:26:01.000 But yeah, there are There's something more there that doesn't necessarily appear obvious just to anyone who is just viewing these things for the first time.

00:26:19.000 So, Anthony, what is the truth here of this?

00:26:24.000 There were bricks and rocks and cinder blocks being stored, and do you have a sense that any of this is paid or organized?

00:26:32.000 Oh, absolutely.

00:26:34.000 You know, to list the small group of organizations, you have the SEIU, you have the Local Teachers Union, UTLA, that's out there funding all of this.

00:26:42.000 You have the PSL, Party of Socialism and Liberation, you have Black Lives Matter. 0.98

00:26:46.000 All these organizations have money, you know.

00:26:51.000 They're putting out all these links online to help donate to fight back, quote-unquote, fascism.

00:26:56.000 You need to help us fight Trump and this fascist Gestapo that are descending upon Los Angeles.

00:27:01.000 So that's why you see that it's very well organized.

00:27:03.000 You see it's out there that, for some reason, there's pallets of bricks conveniently located.

00:27:08.000 I actually discovered two different sites.

00:27:09.000 The first one was kind of dismissed because I discovered the pallet of bricks next to a Home Depot.

00:27:14.000 So there was a lot of people trying to deflect and say, well, of course, it's a Home Depot.

00:27:18.000 But if you watch that video, It's the only pallet with cylinder blocks out there.

00:27:24.000 There's no pallet of fertilizer.

00:27:28.000 There's no pallet of anything else Home Depot sells.

00:27:31.000 The only pallet that was out and that was used by the protesters was the cylinder blocks that were just conveniently located right in front of the staging area.

00:27:38.000 And then on Saturday night, I also went and discovered that there was bricks right next to downtown LA.

00:27:44.000 And this was just a random.

00:27:46.000 That's the video you're showing right now.

00:27:48.000 This was on a corner tucked in, hidden from a plain view, but somehow protesters were able to make their way into it.

00:27:54.000 And so what we're seeing here, right, kind of going back to what I had said, was that...

00:28:17.000 that that is what activated President or what led to President Trump.

00:28:22.000 Activate the National Guard and then essentially the Marines to act as interim until the National Guard is able to get on scene.

00:28:28.000 But another thing that's very important to note is that people are trying to make it seem like it's the National Guard's presence that is inciting the violence, the fact that they're handling protesters.

00:28:38.000 That couldn't be further from the truth.

00:28:39.000 The reality is the National Guard is being used solely for the purpose of protecting federal buildings.

00:28:45.000 That's it.

00:28:45.000 That's the only location they're in.

00:28:47.000 I haven't seen any National Guard make arrests, use weapons.

00:28:51.000 Hit protesters to any capacity.

00:28:53.000 And what this does for people that are wondering, well, what's the National Guard there for?

00:28:57.000 What you have to understand is you've got to look back at the George Floyd riots, which I also covered from beginning to end all the way to Derek Chauvin's verdict in Minneapolis.

00:29:06.000 I was there on the ground.

00:29:07.000 What you need to remember is police resources are already limited in Los Angeles because not only are they under-resourced and under-staffed, but you have the pandemic that just, you know, we're kind of still kind of going through that.

00:29:20.000 A lot of first responders were fired for failing to obey city mandates on masks or vaccines or what have you.

00:29:27.000 And so what this does is it gives the law enforcement the time and the effort to be able to solely focus on arresting protesters and containment while the Federal National Guard and potentially the Marines are only going to be taking care of the buildings.

00:29:45.000 TikTok has helped U.S. businesses contribute over $24 billion for the U.S. economy.

00:29:51.000 And we go so viral on TikTok, we get billions and billions of views.

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00:30:04.000 Now they're hiring more staff to keep up.

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00:30:20.000 TikTok is helping small businesses thrive, and that's adding up to more jobs and more growth.

00:30:24.000 And over $24 billion flowing into the U.S. economy.

00:30:27.000 Our most viral platform is TikTok, and by far.

00:30:31.000 Learn more about TikTok's contribution to the U.S. economy at TikTokEconomicImpact.com.

00:30:36.000 We are winning the next generation at Turning Point USA and on the Charlie Kirk Show.

00:30:40.000 Large in part thanks to us getting the message out at TikTok.

00:30:43.000 Go to TikTokEconomicImpact.com.

00:30:48.000 Kalen Dalamita and Anthony Cabasa are with us.

00:30:50.000 Guys, I want to ask you some specific questions about how you do what you do, but I want to make sure you both plug.

00:30:55.000 Your social.

00:30:57.000 Kalen first and then Anthony because that's how you guys really grow your platform.

00:31:01.000 Kalen first.

00:31:02.000 Thanks, Charlie.

00:31:05.000 You can follow me on X or Instagram at from Kalen.

00:31:10.000 That's F-R-O-M-K-A-L-E-N. 1.00

00:31:16.000 Really, it's just a matter of being brave and staying out there, knowing what to look for and what to watch out for.

00:31:25.000 When you're on the ground, because in a lot of ways, you're watching out for these agitators.

00:31:30.000 You don't know who they are.

00:31:32.000 They're extremely unpredictable and violent.

00:31:35.000 And so you're watching out for them, then you're also trying to make sure that you're not going to be mistaken for one of them while you're If you see a burning American flag, let's go document that.

00:31:53.000 If you see somebody breaking into a store and they're robbing all the Jordans, let's go document that.

00:31:59.000 If you see them screaming and hurling insults or throwing things or you find a pile of bricks or anything like that, there are certain things that we need to document in order to In order to really tell the full story, because we know the mainstream media won't be doing that.

00:32:17.000 So Anthony, let me ask you, first plug your social, Anthony, and then I want to ask, walk your audience through what you do.

00:32:23.000 You embed yourself in these crowds.

00:32:25.000 I hope everyone in the audience understands.

00:32:26.000 Kaylin and Anthony, they could get killed doing this.

00:32:29.000 I know you guys know this.

00:32:30.000 They could get seriously hurt.

00:32:31.000 These are very, very dangerous environments.

00:32:33.000 This is not just like, oh, you know, we're going to look at it.

00:32:36.000 They are up right next to the agitators, right next to the rioters.

00:32:41.000 I mean, they smell the funk of these lowlifes. 1.00

00:32:46.000 Anthony, plug your social and tell us about that.

00:32:49.000 I think the audience needs to develop an appreciation of the grittiness and the balls that you guys have.

00:32:55.000 Anthony.

00:32:55.000 Thank you so much, Charlie.

00:32:57.000 Yeah, so if you guys want to follow me on social media, I go by informedwithanthony, as in like you are being informed.

00:33:03.000 So informedwithanthony on all socials.

00:33:06.000 That's true social.

00:33:07.000 That is Instagram, TikTok even.

00:33:10.000 We're showing the truth there of what's happening in LA.

00:33:12.000 And then just on X, it's just my name, anthonycabasa underscore.

00:33:16.000 You guys can check me out there.

00:33:17.000 That's where I'm posting most of my footage is on X because thankful to Elon Musk that bought it.

00:33:22.000 You know, I covered the riots of George Floyd under Twitter 1.0, and I was actually banned the entire time of the riots.

00:33:29.000 And so I'm just thankful that Elon bought X so that we can have free speech again and maybe make some money in the process.

00:33:36.000 I'm an independent journalist.

00:33:42.000 I've been doing independent journalism since 2017.

00:33:44.000 I am a U.S. veteran.

00:33:46.000 I have a family.

00:33:47.000 I have a wife and three kids.

00:33:48.000 We live in L.A. County.

00:33:50.000 I'm just one of those conservative journalists and just one of those conservative Christians.

00:33:54.000 That yes, we could just get up and leave.

00:33:56.000 You know, we can just sell our home and move to Tennessee, move to Florida.

00:33:59.000 But I just believe that there's also a need for people to stay and fight.

00:34:04.000 And so that's the model that I live by.

00:34:06.000 We have to stay here and fight.

00:34:08.000 I don't want to cede a single inch of America to communists, to Marxists, to liberals.

00:34:13.000 These people will not run me out of my home.

00:34:15.000 I will stand up and fight no matter what.

00:34:17.000 And that's what I do with my journalism.

00:34:18.000 What people need to understand is about the mainstream media is when you have Antifa and these Marxists Fox News is not welcome.

00:34:31.000 If you work for Fox News and they recognize you, they will bully you until you leave, and if not, it can escalate from there.

00:34:37.000 But I have been tear-gassed.

00:34:39.000 I've been shot at.

00:34:40.000 You know, it's part of the work.

00:34:42.000 I actually have, believe it or not, emails from ACLU and other left-wing kind of law firms that are begging me to join their lawsuits against Donald Trump and the federal government.

00:34:53.000 Unbelievable.

00:34:54.000 Because I'm an independent journalist recording.

00:34:56.000 But look, as a veteran myself, I understand getting in the thick of it.

00:35:00.000 I understand that it's kind of like guerrilla warfare style journalism.

00:35:04.000 We don't have these fancy cameras worth thousands where we can just zoom in.

00:35:08.000 We don't have a helicopter to zoom in via a camera like most of the news do.

00:35:12.000 We have to get in there.

00:35:13.000 And sometimes, yes, we get hit by police with rubber bullets or ricochets, whatever it might be.

00:35:19.000 I've been tear gassed way too many times.

00:35:21.000 I actually have.

00:35:26.000 I'm not allowed inside the home smelling like funk, so we kind of have to do that stuff on the outdoor.

00:35:31.000 But yeah, I'm very supported by all my audience members.

00:35:35.000 I've got about 200,000 on Instagram.

00:35:38.000 A lot of people have been donating to my links, and so it's just great.

00:35:41.000 We're going to continue the work no matter what.

00:35:43.000 Let me just say one final thing here, which is very important.

00:35:45.000 Can we show some of the images, guys?

00:35:46.000 and I'll brag both on Kaitlin and Anthony here.

00:35:48.000 You guys understand, all these images we're seeing here are sourced from independent journaling.

00:35:54.000 Understand this, that if we do not have front lines, we don't have Anthony, we would not have the stories here.

00:36:01.000 We would not have the truth of what's really going on.

00:36:03.000 Instead, it would be synthesized and filtered through a media lens.

00:36:09.000 So God bless you both, guys.

00:36:10.000 Thank you so much, Anthony Cabasa and Kalen Dalamita.

00:36:12.000 Thank you, guys.

00:36:13.000 Thank you, Charlie.

00:36:14.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:36:15.000 Email us, as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:36:18.000 Thanks so much for listening, and God bless.

The Charlie Kirk Show - June 11, 2025

Can I Change Rand Paul's Mind on the BBB?

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