The Charlie Kirk Show - Defunding Woke, Once and For All

00:00:03.000 My name is Charlie Kirk.

00:00:05.000 I run the largest pro-American student organization in the country fighting for the future of our republic.

00:00:11.000 My call is to fight evil and to proclaim truth.

00:00:14.000 If the most important thing for you is just feeling good, you're gonna end up miserable.

00:00:19.000 But if the most important thing is doing good, you'll end up purposeful.

00:00:24.000 College is a scam, everybody.

00:00:26.000 You gotta stop sending your kids to college.

00:00:27.000 You should get married as young as possible and have as many kids as possible.

00:00:31.000 Go start a turning point, you would say college chapter.

00:00:33.000 Go start attorney point, you'll say high school chapter.

00:00:35.000 Go find out how your church can get involved.

00:00:37.000 Sign up and become an activist.

00:00:38.000 I gave my life to the Lord in fifth grade.

00:00:41.000 Most important decision I ever made in my life, and I encourage you to do the same.

00:00:45.000 Here I am, Lord use me.

00:00:48.000 Buckle up, everybody.

00:00:49.000 Here we go.

00:00:56.000 The Charlie Kirk Show is proudly sponsored by Preserve Gold, the leading gold and silver experts, and the only precious metals company I recommend to my family, friends, and viewers.

00:01:09.000 Alright, welcome back to the Charlie Kirk Show.

00:01:11.000 I'm Andrew Colvid, executive producer of this fine show, joined by Mikey McCoy, chief of staff to everything.

00:01:20.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:01:21.000 We we um so one of the things that uh Charlie loved most was Hillsdale College, and he took all the online courses.

00:01:30.000 You should check it out, Charlie for Hillsdale.com, Charlie for Hillsdale.com.

00:01:34.000 But uh more than that, he just loved some of the great thinkers that were a part of that amazing institution.

00:01:40.000 And we, you know, we just talked about Oxford Union, which is not part of Oxford or Cambridge, but it is, you know, sort of by name, it's connected to it, but it's an institution that's really important.

00:01:50.000 And Hillsdale is tremendously important here in the United States of America.

00:01:54.000 We have Dr. David Azrad from Hillsdale.

00:01:58.000 He is a an assistant uh professor and research fellow at Hillsdale College's Van Andel Graduate School of Government, and he's probably of all the professors been the most frequent guest uh from Hillsdale on the Charlie Kirk show.

00:02:12.000 So we're honored to have him on our show today.

00:02:15.000 Dr. uh Asrad, thank you so much for making the time and joining us.

00:02:19.000 No, thank you for having me.

00:02:20.000 And uh I I'm glad you're carrying on Charlie's legacy and you you didn't uh cancel the show.

00:02:25.000 Good for you.

00:02:26.000 Thank you so much.

00:02:27.000 Yeah, we you know, I'll never forget, and I don't know if I've said this on the show, but you know, it was basically a day or two after I remember Erica looked at us and she's like, You have to keep the show going.

00:02:38.000 They will not cancel my husband's voice.

00:02:40.000 They will not.

00:02:41.000 And you know, I do feel and I know we've talked about this.

00:02:44.000 We we feel like we have a like a Charlie GPT thing in in my head.

00:02:49.000 It was because we were having a discussion about something yesterday, and I was like, I know Charlie would disagree with me on this, but this would be my perspective.

00:02:55.000 And everybody's like, Charlie would definitely disagree with you on that.

00:02:57.000 I was like, I know, I hear him in my head.

00:02:59.000 Um, but this would be our little collision of ideas.

00:03:03.000 Yeah, but you look, you you knew him much better than I did, but uh, wasn't he all about disagreement?

00:03:09.000 I mean, isn't that the saddest?

00:03:13.000 I mean, aside from the personal human tragedy, is that they murdered someone who dedicated his life to dialoguing.

00:03:20.000 And uh, you know, I have hot Mediterranean blood in me. 0.66

00:03:24.000 I could have never demonstrated the patience and the forbearance that Charlie had listening to these morons ramble, say the dumbest possible things, and the genuine patience he exhibited in talking to them, and that's who they murdered.

00:03:41.000 I mean, they killed the guy who I think best represented the conservative ideal of dialoguing with the other side, which really raises the question whether, you know, uh we should keep on dialoguing with these people.

00:03:55.000 Oh, interesting.

00:03:56.000 Well, yeah, let me know what what are your thoughts, Doctor?

00:03:59.000 I mean, you know, we just watched this No Kings rally, and I I confess I was having I was having similar thoughts.

00:04:05.000 I mean, if you're going we just had the Oxford Union folks on talking about what they saw as there was a president-elect that celebrated Charlie's murder, said let's effing go on a private WhatsApp group message, and there's a vote of no confidence that succeeded to oust him from this role.

00:04:24.000 And it's not that we're anti-free speech, but there is a line that you can cross and polite society, whatever you want to call it, common decency, common values in in the West.

00:04:34.000 Like, there is a line where we say, I'm not arresting you for for doing that.

00:04:39.000 We're not suggesting that, but there, but you do not deserve to represent uh this debate.

00:04:44.000 You do not deserve to hold this position.

00:04:46.000 You do not deserve to be a teacher of, and by the way, we're still waiting on Lucy Martinez, STEM teacher at Nathan Hale Elementary School, who motioned to her her neck with a with a with her hand, uh mocking Charlie's assassination. 0.91

00:04:59.000 For her, we're waiting for Lucy Martinez to be fired. 1.00

00:05:02.000 There is a line.

00:05:03.000 And so maybe explain what you're what you're thinking there, Doctor.

00:05:06.000 I mean, look, I'm not trying to suggest that everyone on the left uh longs for violence and it's completely unreasonable.

00:05:14.000 There are still some, I think, genuine liberal voices on the left.

00:05:18.000 You know the famous line, I disagree to the death with you, but I'll fight no rather than I disagree with what you say, but I'll fight with the death for your right to say it.

00:05:26.000 Um there are reasonable Democrats.

00:05:30.000 The problem I see is that there is a growing chorus of radical, fundamentally illiberal voices.

00:05:39.000 We should not call them liberals.

00:05:41.000 They're opposed to free speech, they don't believe in democracy, they don't respect the outcome of elections.

00:05:46.000 And what worries me is that the supposed centrist liberal sane voices on the left don't stand up to them.

00:05:55.000 They always see threats coming from the right.

00:05:58.000 So the people on the left who say that I believe in dialogue and free speech and democracy, you know, Victor Orban, Donald Trump, Boukele, Charlie Kirk, immediately full-blown freak out.

00:06:11.000 I mean, this is fascism coming to America.

00:06:13.000 Meanwhile, BLM, Antifa, No Kings rally, uh, assassinating or trying to assassinate public officials, murdering Charlie Kirk, silence, muted condemnations, or basically the sense that, well, he practically deserved it, or we're better off without him.

00:06:32.000 And, you know, the real threat to democracy in America today comes from the left.

00:06:38.000 I think the right recognizes it.

00:06:40.000 Uh, and uh I would basically call on the reasonable voices on the left to realize that the threat today is on the left, but it's almost as if it's in their DNA, and they have a very, very hard time recognizing threats to their left.

00:06:56.000 They're just comfortable fighting quote unquote fascists.

00:07:00.000 I think that's uh spot on.

00:07:02.000 And I, you know, I did a whole segment in hour one, Doctor, where I listed off all the tyrannical impulses or actions of the left during the last four years of Joe Biden that we don't hear anything about now.

00:07:13.000 All we're told is that you know, we are enabling this dictator, and we're gonna rue the day when they get power back because they're gonna it's like we already rude the day that Joe Biden was elected, and all of us got targeted.

00:07:25.000 Charlie had to be questioned in front of the J6 committee.

00:07:27.000 I mean, this this is what we had to do.

00:07:29.000 And you know, it was a there's other examples that we could discuss.

00:07:34.000 But I mean, here's the thing.

00:07:35.000 I mean, they targeted grandmas, they went after uh Catholic schools, they said Hunter Biden's laptop was was uh Russian disinformation.

00:07:43.000 They obscured or hid the or censored the origins of COVID.

00:07:47.000 I mean, there is example after example after example after example, uh, tried to throw Trump into prison.

00:07:53.000 So we've already lived through uh their totalitarian impulses, yet they have the gall to tell us that we're the ones.

00:07:59.000 So this is what's fascinating.

00:08:00.000 So Corinne Jean-Pierre is on this book tour uh media blitz, and she's kind of making a fool of herself everywhere she goes. 0.99

00:08:08.000 I mean, even Colbert last night was like, you lied about you know, uh President Biden's mental decline.

00:08:14.000 She said, No, I promise I didn't.

00:08:16.000 And it's like everybody, even Colbert's like, okay, I I want to be really sweet to you, but you're leaving me no choice because like even we've given up the goat on that.

00:08:24.000 So here, but here's what's crazy.

00:08:26.000 She goes on MSNBC this morning, and she's saying she she needs we we need to see more teeth, more fire. 0.95

00:08:32.000 Play cut 167.

00:08:34.000 Right now, in this moment, it is there's an existential threat.

00:08:38.000 Our democracy is hanging by a thread.

00:08:40.000 Some people will say, would say we're already an authoritarian regime.

00:08:44.000 And I need to see teeth, I need to see fire, and not just me.

00:08:49.000 Many people are worried and concerned.

00:08:51.000 So, Dr. Azarod, we we heard a lot of people say that, you know, maybe after November uh 2024, we're gonna see the Democrat Party moderate.

00:08:59.000 But no, they Want more fire, more teeth.

00:09:01.000 I guess they want to see more activists in the streets uh celebrating uh political assassinations.

00:09:07.000 I don't know what she what she wants. 0.83

00:09:09.000 And look at the unhinged diagnosis.

00:09:12.000 I mean, what evidence is there that we live in a tyranny that Trump is trying to be a king?

00:09:18.000 I mean, the guy ran on we should secure our border, I'm gonna deport illegals, I'm gonna go after the worst excesses of wokeness, and uh I believe in economic growth. 1.00

00:09:29.000 You may not agree with these ideas, but he was duly elected, he won the electoral college by decisive margin.

00:09:36.000 Not that it matters, but he also won the popular vote by um, I think it's two million votes.

00:09:42.000 And so where exactly is the threat to our democracy?

00:09:46.000 You brought up the the list of things that happened under Biden.

00:09:50.000 I always ask my students, setting aside what you think about the particular policy.

00:09:56.000 What do you think is a greater threat to democracy to enforce the existing laws on the books that were duly enacted by Congress and signed by presidents that say that if you enter the country illegally, you should be deported, or to basically announce de facto open borders that we will no longer enforce the laws, not on something that doesn't matter crucially, let's say underage drinking, or you know, an adult smoking pot in his basement.

00:10:26.000 Doctor, but rather in allowing the country to be flooded by third world immigrants. 1.00

00:10:31.000 I totally agree with you.

00:10:32.000 If you know, they don't look at just you know turning a blind eye to legitimate laws and asylum laws, immigration laws as a form of tyranny, but it is because they were they are laws that govern our society.

00:10:45.000 If you're gonna ignore whole sets of laws outright, just because you don't like them anymore, then you are that is a dereliction of duty, that is a treasonous act, certainly, and that is a form of tyranny, is it not?

00:10:59.000 Yeah, I mean, look, I mean, I I guess it goes down to look, what does tyranny mean?

00:11:04.000 What does democracy mean?

00:11:05.000 Uh, I don't think you need an advanced degree, you know.

00:11:08.000 I think 10 minutes on Wikipedia could allow you to figure out that democracy should mean that you have elections, the people choose a leader, and then within the bounds of the rule of law, he gets to carry out his agenda.

00:11:22.000 And then tyranny would be the naked abuse of power with complete disregard for the rule of law.

00:11:28.000 Uh, we were not a tyranny under Biden.

00:11:31.000 I mean, otherwise he would not have lost the election.

00:11:34.000 But there are clear tyrannical impulses on the left, which, by the way, go back a long time.

00:11:41.000 Um, you know, there's uh if your readers want to do a bit of reading, it's it's a tedious essay, but it's quite insightful.

00:11:48.000 Herbert Marcusa, who's considered one of the founders, the fathers of the new left in the 60s, another bad German export to America, wrote an essay on repressive tolerance, in which he basically redefines tolerance and democracy to mean what the left wants and justifies violence and censorship against the right in the name of their conception of democracy.

00:12:12.000 And it's a revealing essay because he just says the quiet part out loud.

00:12:17.000 Democracy means the left, democracy means violence and censorship against the right.

00:12:24.000 And that's basically the the way they look at it.

00:12:26.000 I think Karim uh Saint uh what's her name?

00:12:29.000 Saint Pierre or Saint Jean, I mean, remember Jean-Pierre uh has never I mean, I don't think she's read many books.

00:12:36.000 I can't even believe she wrote one, to be perfectly honest with you.

00:12:39.000 But um that idea is alive and well.

00:12:42.000 They've come to basically redefine democracy as our policy preferences, and if you disagree with this, you're a fascist.

00:12:50.000 And they just I mean, at this point, I think I saw a poll.

00:12:53.000 87% of Democrats think that Trump is a fascist.

00:12:57.000 What does that mean?

00:12:58.000 But what it does is it lays down the predicate for justifying violence.

00:13:03.000 Because if he is a fascist, then why shouldn't we kill him?

00:13:05.000 Wouldn't we have been better off had we murdered Hitler? 0.97

00:13:07.000 Yeah, you're 100% right.

00:13:09.000 They dehumanize so they can justify.

00:13:13.000 Hey everybody, this is Andrew Colvet, executive producer of the Charlie Kirk Show.

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00:14:17.000 Mikey McCoy, chief of staff here at Turning Point USA.

00:14:20.000 Actually, I want to welcome him into the conversation, Dr. Azarat.

00:14:23.000 He's sit he's with me here in studio.

00:14:25.000 Mikey, go ahead.

00:14:26.000 The floor is yours, Mike.

00:14:27.000 Yeah, Doctor, you I think there's uh a place where you graduate beyond reason, and the left is really good at doing this.

00:14:34.000 Um, men being in women's restrooms is beyond reason. 1.00

00:14:38.000 Teachers that you entrust with your children doing finger guns at their neck in a no king's rally to mock Charlie Kirk's death is beyond reason.

00:14:46.000 And arresting grannies for being on the steps of the Capitol during January 6th is beyond reason, especially when those same people who celebrated the arrest of old ladies for for being on the steps of the Capitol, then then hit Trump saying that there it's not an insurrection and he shouldn't try to stop crime in some of our biggest cities by uh enacting the insurrection act. 0.72

00:15:07.000 And so, Doctor, the left is headed um to uh uh increasingly to a place where they just do not care about common sense or reason, and I'm a little worried.

00:15:19.000 Uh uh there's institutions like Hillsdale, but at these woke universities, I I'm worried that these teachers are continuing to teach their students um that reason no longer matters.

00:15:30.000 And uh this isn't just on universities, this is uh a thing as a whole when it comes to the left.

00:15:36.000 What are you seeing when it comes to that?

00:15:38.000 But let me give you some good news.

00:15:40.000 Um, the sixties radicals uh were a lot of these ideas basically entered the American bloodstream and became mainstream.

00:15:50.000 Look, the 60s was a failure because they failed to destroy the country, but it succeeded insofar as these people grew up, got PhDs, cut their hair, and became the professors who run the universities that are the nerve center of the regime and that credential and train the elites.

00:16:08.000 But the 60s radicals, I think were genuine revolutionaries who all in all did not want to be another brick in the wall if you're old enough to get a Pink Floyd reference.

00:16:18.000 I think the professors today and many of the students are bought for the most part small sold.

00:16:25.000 They do not have the courage of their convictions.

00:16:28.000 They talk a big game, but if you were to apply the slightest bit of pressure, I believe most of them would fold like lawn chairs.

00:16:37.000 Let me give you maybe a flippant example.

00:16:39.000 Threaten to revoke their parking privileges at the call at the universities, say at in red states at public universities.

00:16:47.000 If uh they don't start behaving, if they stop pushing the crazy trendy agenda, most of them will fall, fold.

00:16:55.000 We're not we're dealing with an enemy that in a sense appears impressive because their pieties appear to be authoritative, they make so much noise, they control the institutional high ground.

00:17:06.000 But on the other hand, my experience from debating them, reading their works, interacting with them, suggests that most of them are not true fanatics, they're just not used to encountering real opposition.

00:17:19.000 And I think Trump's agenda on the second term on the universities gives us a glimpse into what could be possible, but we need a lot more of that, and we need red state governors uh to start putting pressure on their universities.

00:17:32.000 It is completely unacceptable that public universities in red states are subsidized by tax dollars and continue to promote and teach completely unhinged theories.

00:17:43.000 You know, I would say to Governor DeSantis, shut down every sociology department at a public university in Florida. 0.93

00:17:50.000 It's a free country.

00:17:51.000 If you want to study sociology, go to Rollins College or go to another state.

00:17:55.000 But we, the taxpayers in Florida, will not subsidize these corrupt disciplines.

00:18:00.000 Same things with environmental studies, women's studies, queer studies, black studies.

00:18:04.000 If it's got studies in it as a rule of thumb, it's a corrupt bogus discipline.

00:18:08.000 Shut it down.

00:18:09.000 Charlie would be uh cheering you on right now, Doctor.

00:18:11.000 So what what do you say to the rebuttal though?

00:18:13.000 Where then they just say, Well, I thought you were for pro-free speech.

00:18:16.000 This is like Nazis burning books.

00:18:18.000 Well, I I'm not forbidding the teaching of these disciplines.

00:18:21.000 I'm saying they will not be subsidized by tax dollars.

00:18:24.000 So I brought up Rollins College as a private liberal arts college in Florida.

00:18:28.000 Let them teach whatever the hell they want.

00:18:30.000 But why are red states subsidizing uh, you know, entire disciplines that are corrupt and don't contribute to the common good? 0.73

00:18:39.000 Look, why do we have public universities?

00:18:41.000 They're meant to serve the common good.

00:18:42.000 We can exercise a judgment and say that certain disciplines do not, and we won't subsidize them.

00:18:48.000 We'll shut them down.

00:18:49.000 Go teach it some somewhere else.

00:18:51.000 I I it's not, you know, not teaching a book is not the same thing as forbidding its distribution.

00:18:58.000 You know, when you go to Barnes and Nobles and they have these BS displays of banned books, removing a book from a public library is not forbidding Amazon to sell it.

00:19:08.000 It's saying the tax dollars are not going to be wasted on this garbage.

00:19:13.000 You wrote an article in 2016 talking about the new red scare, and you basically made the argument that most people, most Gen Zers and millennials, when they say we like socialism, and they they you know, these polls that we've all seen, they don't actually know what kind of social well they don't know what it means.

00:19:26.000 They think it just means we like being nice and maybe a little bit more subsidized health care or whatever.

00:19:31.000 So you wrote this article 2016.

00:19:32.000 I read it this morning, I was like, wow, I just I mean, talk about holding up.

00:19:36.000 I mean, this thing just aged like a fine wine.

00:19:38.000 What uh what are young people when they say they like communism or socialism or out with the you know protesting or they're on TikTok or whatever?

00:19:46.000 What do they actually mean?

00:19:47.000 Yeah, so my point was simple.

00:19:49.000 I wrote this when Bernie Sanders really first flared up nationally and became a big thing.

00:19:55.000 And conservatives were you know ripping out their hair saying, Oh my god, have we learned no lessons from the Cold War?

00:20:00.000 Marxism is coming to America.

00:20:02.000 And my point was simply that Bernie Sanders and the overwhelming majority of people who say that they like socialism are not Marxist communists.

00:20:13.000 They don't want the government to nationalize the means of industry, they don't believe in dialectical materialism, they don't think that the state will one day wither away.

00:20:21.000 They've never read the communist manifesto, and if I don't think they have the IQ to read it, and if they tried to read it, they'd find it boring because it doesn't talk about gays, climate change, women contraceptives, abortions, and minorities.

00:20:34.000 My point was simply that uh a lot of people post-financial crisis in 2008 are very angry at capitalism, and that what Bernie Sanders calls democratic socialism, I think is really just New Deal liberalism, i.e.

00:20:51.000 You keep the private sector, the government doesn't nationalize companies, but you have a lot of taxes on the wealthy, you have a lot of free government programs, and then you heavily regulate the private sector to prevent it from you know polluting, uh discriminating, abusing workers or consumers.

00:21:12.000 Doctor, you're preventing it from growing.

00:21:14.000 That's what you're doing.

00:21:15.000 Yeah, but but continue on.

00:21:16.000 I apologize.

00:21:17.000 Yeah, so look, that's not free markets, it's not capitalism, but it's not Marxist communism.

00:21:23.000 I think the interesting question, the challenge would be would in the long term, will it lead to actual communism?

00:21:31.000 So this was Hayek's argument and the road to serfdom is that this insneering of the market by the government, ratcheting by ratcheting, step by step, inevitably will lead to full-blown socialism.

00:21:46.000 Um I don't know about that.

00:21:48.000 That's you know, to quote Yogi Bera, I hate making predictions, especially about the future.

00:21:53.000 But I just see in the young people who clamor for socialism.

00:21:57.000 I mean, what they're basically saying is give me free stuff.

00:22:01.000 Uh and by the way, you know, there's a lot of that in America already.

00:22:04.000 I mean, we have a huge welfare state.

00:22:07.000 We give a lot of quote unquote free stuff to the poor, a lot of quote unquote free stuff to the elderly.

00:22:13.000 They're saying, well, give free stuff to everyone else.

00:22:16.000 So we have Medicare and Medicaid.

00:22:18.000 Well, then why not, you know, for the poor and the elderly, give it to everyone else.

00:22:21.000 We want free college, free daycare, free this, free that.

00:22:25.000 Um, I don't approve uh of the longing, but uh, this is not Marxism.

00:22:30.000 So we should counter it, but understand understand it for what it is, and it goes way back in the American tradition.

00:22:36.000 I mean, it's basically a new deal liberalism.

00:22:38.000 Yeah.

00:22:39.000 Yeah, that's right.

00:22:40.000 I'm glad you got to explain that because that that nuance is important.

00:22:42.000 We have to know the enemy that we're fighting, and we have to we have to address it head on for what it is, not what it's not.

00:22:48.000 And I think there's just a lot of confusion.

00:22:50.000 I think you're right.

00:22:50.000 A lot of young people just want free stuff, and they think, well, why can't we have you know free health care for everybody?

00:22:55.000 Well, you know, uh, if we could find a way to pay for it, uh maybe it's not a terrible idea.

00:22:59.000 But in the in the meantime, as uh Margaret Thatcher said, the problem with socialism, you eventually run out of other people's money.

00:23:05.000 So we're always going to be confronted by the shackles of reality.

00:23:07.000 Dr. Azrat, thank you so much for joining us and making the time.

00:23:10.000 Thank you for having me.

00:23:11.000 I enjoyed the conversation.

00:23:12.000 Yeah, same very much.

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00:24:30.000 So really quick, uh, couple news items just to get out of the way.

00:24:35.000 The there was a planned meeting uh between the US and Russia that has been called off.

00:24:41.000 Marco Rubes called that up, so I want to make sure the audience knows that.

00:24:44.000 Um so they're having productive calls, but the meeting has been called off.

00:24:47.000 Um so the little saber rattling uh and all that.

00:24:50.000 And then another news uh John Brennan has been referred for criminal charges by Jim Jordan.

00:24:55.000 So those are topics that we're gonna probably have to unpack tomorrow, but that that is all breaking.

00:25:00.000 Uh and uh it's very fascinating stuff.

00:25:04.000 And uh we will we will get to it, I promise.

00:25:07.000 But uh we're in in the meantime, we're gonna welcome Jordan Harman from Angel Studios.

00:25:11.000 Welcome to the set.

00:25:12.000 Um you walked in and you said what is I think you know, the first time that when you come to this set and you see Charlie's empty chair, it it is a bit surreal.

00:25:22.000 Yeah, I mean, it's um I mean, obviously the last time I was here, the you know, we had lunch with Charlie, and I remember um talking to him during lunch and asking him, you know, do you ever worry about something, you know, some crazy going and doing something crazy on one of these campuses, and he's like, you know, if that's the way God takes me, then that's the way I go.

00:25:40.000 And obviously that hits differently now because it's like you know, he's not here anymore.

00:25:45.000 And so um, yeah, and it it's it's surreal for so many.

00:25:49.000 I have so many emotions walking into this room because it's uh, you know, he just he was one of the best of us.

00:25:54.000 Yeah, well said.

00:25:55.000 I mean, Mikey can attest.

00:25:57.000 I mean, we I think we all had our moment like that with him where we talked about that stuff, and he was incredibly courageous and brave.

00:26:07.000 And and and with I mean, with with that being said, like over the last 12 years since we started Angel, it's obviously grown over the years, but we've gone through some many ups and downs.

00:26:16.000 And Charlie, from the moment we met him, became a fan of what we were doing, and he he defended us in in the ups and the downs.

00:26:22.000 I think that's kind of a testament to what many people have said is when they were in their hardest times.

00:26:28.000 You know, I was chatting with Will Sharf uh a couple weekends ago, and he was just saying he was in his darkest moment, and the first person to call him and text him was Charlie.

00:26:36.000 You know, like classic.

00:26:37.000 It's just that's just who he was.

00:26:38.000 And so, you know, there was many times whether it was through controversies or frustrations or people, you know, angel going through different times in our company's history.

00:26:47.000 Charlie was pretty co I mean, he was constant.

00:26:49.000 Like he was there, he wanted a sport, he loved what we were doing, and so man, I'm I'm just honored and grateful to be here.

00:26:54.000 Well, thank you for making the time to come out.

00:26:56.000 But uh Mikey, I don't know if you want to chime in on that, because that's so char what you're explaining is like so Charlie.

00:27:01.000 Yeah, when when somebody's down, the first person to reach out to them, that's Charlie.

00:27:05.000 And it's he's also the most loyal person ever, and that it it didn't matter if you had done something so bad, if he was loyal to you, he would he would step up for you and be there when you needed somebody the most.

00:27:16.000 And it's typical him.

00:27:17.000 So I'm not surprised.

00:27:19.000 Yeah, he's always an uplifting guy.

00:27:21.000 Yeah, and you actually, you know, you guys put out a video um, I guess like the week after it happened, like maybe a week after whatever, and you just you honored Charlie.

00:27:29.000 I thought it was so well done, and I thought it was so tasteful, you know, because there was people trying to I I think I don't know, they just would do it wrong.

00:27:37.000 They do it in a way that was just not quite right, and you just did it in a way where you you were um honoring Charlie's legacy, you were honoring what he meant to you, what he meant to Angel, and you were it's just it was like a heart cry of just your mourning and your grief, and um I thought it was just really beautiful,

00:27:53.000 and I t I I I remember sent it to a bunch of people and I said, like, listen, if you want to honor Charlie, this is the model, this is how you do it, because it it really you could just see it came from your your heart, and and I knew that it you you were reflecting in the piece of just like everything that Charlie had meant to to you guys personally, but what he had helped how he had helped champion your company and and how devastated you were that he wasn't there to do that anymore for you.

00:28:17.000 Yeah, I'm I think you know, there I it's funny because you say that I was I've read this message multiple times, and I'm sure that anybody who's had a direct relationship with Charlie has probably gone back through their messages and read messages from him.

00:28:29.000 But I remember, you know, one of the last messages he sent me was because we had, you know, obviously King of Kings had blown up.

00:28:35.000 He had been a huge part of promoting that because he loved it for his kids and his family.

00:28:38.000 And I, you know, I I deeply wish he could have seen David, the movie coming out this Christmas, because it has that same impact.

00:28:43.000 But his text messages said, because I was I was just saying thanks for fighting the good fight, and he said, Thank you.

00:28:48.000 And then he always included an incredible scripture, you know, that was always so timely.

00:28:53.000 Romans 10 9, because if you confess your mouth that Jesus is the Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you'll be saved.

00:29:00.000 And he said, Let's share the truth of the resurrection daily with boldness and love.

00:29:04.000 God bless you, my friend.

00:29:05.000 Wow.

00:29:05.000 So he's just I mean, he's just that's like everything he did was his testimony in Jesus Christ.

00:29:11.000 And it's just like it's man, sorry.

00:29:13.000 I told myself I was not gonna get emotional today.

00:29:15.000 Trust me.

00:29:16.000 And uh, and it's impossible.

00:29:17.000 It's my wife might have had many tears.

00:29:19.000 So anyway.

00:29:21.000 Yeah.

00:29:21.000 Um You know, it's one of those things like we have this terrible reality that we live in where like people either think we're being like too happy or too sad or we're not doing it right, and it's like everybody's a critic, everybody's a critic.

00:29:35.000 It's like you know, it's it's um it's one of those things where it's not I mean, you know, the mourning process is not linear and it comes in waves.

00:29:45.000 It does.

00:29:46.000 And you take it, Mikey.

00:29:49.000 Yeah, yeah, you're I mean he's you got that northern Europe that's still he um yeah, he lived his faith every day.

00:29:57.000 Um and every morning he would send a scripture to he would go through his phone and just send off a scripture everybody and um we we talk a lot about people just living their faith.

00:30:08.000 And uh we I've had a conversation with Erica and and Frank Turk about how Charlie, when he was killed, died at the peak of his faith.

00:30:16.000 And it was like he had loved the Lord the most at that moment in time.

00:30:21.000 Yeah.

00:30:21.000 And how much he was reading the Bible and how much he was studying it and prepping for it.

00:30:27.000 That entire campus tour, he had a big notebook of of things to reference.

00:30:33.000 It was the binder, but then he had a second binder that was all just Bible oriented.

00:30:38.000 And what Andrew said, these things were prove me wrongs, they're debates, but they're really tent revivals, and he was always proclaiming the name of Jesus at these things, and it it was it's an amazing thing, it's a challenge for all of us to not just live our faith, but hopefully one day we can die at the peak of our faith.

00:30:53.000 That that's super powerful.

00:30:54.000 I I well said, I wish I there was parts of me that wishes I had been, because I mean he was in Utah.

00:30:59.000 He was five minutes from our office of you know, when he when he was killed, and so that that assassination would happen, I was actually in New York City because we were going public the next day.

00:31:09.000 And I got the message on Liberty Island with my wife and kids, and I was standing behind the Statue of Liberty when I got the message, I was like, This can't be real.

00:31:17.000 Like one, I knew he was at UVU.

00:31:19.000 Had we not been going public that week, I probably would have been there at UV U with you guys at the tent.

00:31:24.000 But I was like, um, you know, I saw the message and I was standing by and and and it just like it this huge like it's so linen that it was like the first the first thing I thought of was like, God, why did you let them take like the one of the best of us who's just like driving this forward?

00:31:38.000 And then it kind of came into my mind, no, it's because he's one of the best of us that God let him take him because and and that God was gonna it became clear in my mind that God was going to use that moment to do something special.

00:31:50.000 And then you look the last like you know, month and a half and how incredibly powerful it's been.

00:31:55.000 I I do believe, although I wish I could have been there.

00:31:58.000 I'm glad Jeff and Neil made it to the memorial, but I I had some conflicts with family stuff, but I do believe that that memorial service probably I say probably has a caveat, but I believe it was the most broadcasted moment of testifying of Jesus Christ that's ever happened in human history.

00:32:17.000 Yeah, yeah, I I definitely believe it.

00:32:19.000 It's at least one singular moment.

00:32:21.000 Yeah, I mean, we tracked over a hundred and twenty million streams just like from our stuff, and there was countless.

00:32:28.000 I mean, I'm telling you, countless of uh other accounts that were just taking the stream and broadcast so we had no idea how many how broad it was, but at least 120 million, but probably let's just say double that, maybe triple.

00:32:39.000 Who it's like God said, I'm calling you home, and I'm gonna accelerate your mission.

00:32:43.000 You know, one of the things that I heard from multiple people was this vision, and the fact that you hear it from multiple people almost I think it actually strengthens the fact that it's that it's probably true, is that and it's it's hard for me to talk about, especially because you got the emotions for me uh flowing, but so I'm gonna try my best here.

00:33:03.000 But um, you know, that they saw this picture of Charlie standing before the Lord, and right as it happened, and that he was perplexed, he was joyful, you know.

00:33:14.000 He's in he's standing before the Lord.

00:33:15.000 He's of course there's joy there, but he's also perplexed, and he looks back and he said, I want to go back, you know, I want to go back to Erica and I have this mission.

00:33:21.000 And and God was like, and Jesus was like, Yeah, you can go.

00:33:25.000 Um, but before you do, um, I want you to see the harvest if you stay and if you come home.

00:33:31.000 And he the Lord showed him the harvest, and Charlie said, Okay, Lord, I'll come home.

00:33:35.000 I love that.

00:33:36.000 And I love that.

00:33:37.000 And I I believe that we are we are just at the very beginning of seeing what the harvest ultimately will be, and how many more um Charlie Kirks there's gonna be just born out of this moment, and how much how many, you know, make heaven crowded, uh, was what Charlie and Erica used to always say to each other.

00:33:55.000 And I think um I think that Charlie's life is ultimately the the embodiment of that very idea.

00:34:01.000 And when we started the Charlie Kirk show, we knew that we needed to have a back end team that could really run our online store, and that's why we turned to Shopify.

00:34:14.000 We didn't know where to start, we didn't know what we were doing, but we knew that the folks at Shopify could help us out, and they certainly have.

00:34:19.000 That's where we run all of our merch sales and everything else that you can get at the Charlie Kirkstore.com at Charlie Kirkstore.com.

00:34:26.000 It's an amazing partnership.

00:34:28.000 And I can tell you from experience, our team loves using Shopify.

00:34:32.000 Seamless, easy, transparent, the user-friendly nature of Shopify is extraordinary.

00:34:37.000 Did you know that Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world, and 10% of all e-commerce in the US, from household names to brands just getting started, is run by Shopify.com.

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00:35:13.000 So turn your big business idea into Shopify on your side.

00:35:18.000 Sign up for your one dollar per month trial and start selling today at Shopify.com slash Charlie.

00:35:25.000 Go to Shopify.com slash Charlie.

00:35:27.000 That's Shopify.com slash Charlie.

00:35:30.000 I just, you know, for what it's worth, I mean, you know, the King of Kings, Charlie will Loved promoting that project because it was right on Easter, and you know, it was one of like there's I'll be honest, there's some projects you guys would do that.

00:35:48.000 He was more enthusiastic than others.

00:35:50.000 But came in King of Kings, King of Kings was one of the top top ones.

00:35:54.000 Cause I mean, what's not to love about it was just about Jesus and um It really was like Easter and for kids for you.

00:36:01.000 Really big.

00:36:02.000 And I know Charlie played a big role in that because I kept hearing like Charlie, Charlie's, you know, his reads are amazing, and like he's really getting a lot of people out to this thing.

00:36:09.000 So maybe just in the minute we have in this segment, tell us uh about that particular project and what he did for it, and then we'll talk about uh the truth and treason in Young Washington coming up.

00:36:18.000 Yeah, I mean, Charlie, obviously with King of Kings that came out at Easter.

00:36:21.000 It was it was for us that we the Angel Guild, our membership that has to green light every project before we ever take it out in the distribution.

00:36:29.000 They gave that one of the highest rated ratings we've seen to date, and it really was kind of the passion of the Christ for kids where they could go and experience something that was monumental, and there were so many moments actually in that movie where we saw people would send in footage of kids just in tears watching Christ be crucified, but in this way that was approachable and meaningful, and I think Charlie caught that vision like right off.

00:36:53.000 And so he went into that and just was constantly doing his reads and talking about it more than he ever needed to.

00:36:59.000 And uh, and then it did have an impact.

00:37:00.000 It ended up being the number one uh biblical animated opening of all time.

00:37:04.000 Um, and uh it's coming up on 80 million in the global box office, which is absolutely remarkable.

00:37:09.000 Oh, that's fantastic.

00:37:10.000 And uh our team went and found your your tribute to CK video, so we're gonna play that in just our good friends at Angel Studios.

00:37:19.000 I love Angel Studios, amazing new film, uh, this holy week.

00:37:24.000 Phenomenal.

00:37:25.000 Because I think about Charlie's life and how much of a support he was of Angel.

00:37:30.000 It's hard not to feel so grateful for what he did.

00:37:32.000 He supported us in our darkest days and in our brightest hours as a company.

00:37:37.000 Jeff and I and Charlie were doing lunch together.

00:37:40.000 We asked him, he said, Are you are you at all worried about one of these college campuses?

00:37:44.000 And he just said with so much peace in his eyes and so much peace in his heart.

00:37:49.000 If that's how God takes me, then that's how I'm supposed to go.

00:37:52.000 And I feel like that was a clear message that Charlie's life is a testimony to Jesus Christ, his Lord and Savior, and his relationship with him was the most important thing that he would want the world to remember about his legacy.

00:38:06.000 Man, are we grateful to have gotten to be a little connection in the multitude of connections that he made throughout his life because it was so impactful to us.

00:38:17.000 Thank you, Charlie.

00:38:18.000 Love you.

00:38:19.000 We miss you.

00:38:20.000 We're gonna continue to drive forward the good news.

00:38:24.000 Beautiful tribute that you did uh in the media aftermath.

00:38:27.000 I just thought it was so so well done and and so heartfelt.

00:38:30.000 So thank you for that.

00:38:31.000 But you have uh Truth and Treason.

00:38:33.000 That one's the the one that's coming up soon.

00:38:36.000 It just came out this last weekend.

00:38:37.000 Oh, it did.

00:38:38.000 Opening weekend was this last weekend.

00:38:39.000 It's you can go get tickets right now.

00:38:41.000 I apologize.

00:38:42.000 Um, no, no, you're good.

00:38:42.000 I I the interesting thing about this film is it's been the director's been working on it for almost 20 years, and we've been involved for a little almost you know half a decade.

00:38:50.000 And this film, um, when the whole Charlie thing happened, it was this moment where like this film is more timely than ever.

00:39:00.000 It's a you know, it's about this young man who and tell me if this sounds familiar.

00:39:04.000 You have this young man who sees culturally his entire society going in a direction that he thinks is absolutely atrocious.

00:39:12.000 Yeah, and he takes his faith and truth and words, and he goes and types out these words into pamphlets and spreads them all over Hamburg, Germany to try to get truth out to the German people in a way, and and you know, i anybody who's who's experienced real fascism, you know, you can't you can't say what you want to say.

00:39:33.000 Yeah, exactly.

00:39:34.000 And uh, and so this but this this young man, his name is Helmut Hubener, it cost him his life.

00:39:40.000 And so when the whole Charlie thing happened, we were releasing this movie literally in the next month, and we were just like, wow, what this is Charlie's story.

00:39:46.000 It's this young man who spoke truth, who was unapologetic about his faith, and uh and he he sacrificed everything for it.

00:39:54.000 And he died at what 17 years?

00:39:55.000 17 years old.

00:39:56.000 He's the youngest resistant fighter to ever be executed.

00:39:56.000 Oh my goodness.

00:39:59.000 That's that's just uh that's incredible.

00:40:01.000 Uh an incredible story and terribly tragic.

00:40:04.000 Um, but a really powerful film here.

00:40:07.000 Um 172, it's a little bit longer uh trailer, but I I want to I just want to be able to soak in it because uh these these uh this content is really important for our culture, so I want to soak in it.

00:40:17.000 172.

00:40:18.000 Look what I found.

00:40:20.000 I'm looking at a little red leaflet which cools the fear of the great deceiver of the people.

00:40:27.000 And enough people find out what's really going on and stand up.

00:40:32.000 I'm in.

00:40:35.000 You just have to take the first step.

00:40:40.000 Must be stated.

00:40:41.000 It's just treasonous actions are inexcusable.

00:40:45.000 There it is.

00:40:48.000 I think it's just a matter of time though.

00:40:50.000 I could hide you.

00:40:52.000 Mr. Big Short Resistance Vice.

00:40:55.000 You can't even talk to that guy at work.

00:40:57.000 You never know who's watching.

00:40:59.000 We know what happens if they hurt you.

00:41:02.000 You thought this through before you planned your little code, right?

00:41:08.000 You're trying to get us all killed.

00:41:11.000 I'm not afraid to die.

00:41:15.000 Edward knows that we can see through.

00:41:22.000 The truth will prevail.

00:41:23.000 The truth will prevail.

00:41:30.000 Yeah.

00:41:30.000 I mean, that's powerful.

00:41:32.000 And you know, something that Charlie was very well aware of is that if you speak the truth clearly, boldly, and you call out the lies of a culture.

00:41:40.000 In this case, obviously, this was Nazi Germany, but if you do it in, I mean, the same thing happened to you know, lots of people actually.

00:41:47.000 We think it was Socrates, wasn't it?

00:41:49.000 For speaking the truth.

00:41:50.000 When you speak the truth and you you you attack the gods of any age, the the false gods of any age, um, then you are confronting powers that um that are hostile.

00:42:02.000 And and that's what this story is essentially about.

00:42:05.000 For for me, and I I look at this story in a very unique way, in that um, there's been this really uh disconcerting behavior that's been happening culturally where the far left is framing everybody as Nazis and Trump is Hitler, and this this story goes into what real fascism looks like.

00:42:24.000 Like what we're experiencing today, where people get like you wouldn't be able to do a no kings protest in Nazi Germany.

00:42:30.000 You know, that that that doesn't exist.

00:42:32.000 No, and so I do think it's important that we get out there and that we we put our foot down and we say enough's enough on the the this branding of anybody who has an alternate opinion or is a conservative or a more liberty-minded person as becoming a calling them a fascist or that they're they're a Nazi.

00:42:52.000 Well, and we're running out of time here, and I apologize, but you also have Young Washington coming up, right?

00:42:56.000 Yeah, an amazing movie.

00:42:58.000 That's gonna be huge.

00:42:59.000 I the 250th.

00:43:00.000 I wanna, yeah, for the 250th anniversary, which also sort of reminds me of Charlie, uh, as I do think of him as a modern founding father.

00:43:08.000 Um, but I want to make sure people, if they want to see it, where do they go?

00:43:10.000 They go to Angel, you can go to Angel.com slash Kirk.

00:43:13.000 You'll see all of our stuff on there.

00:43:15.000 Um, if you want to specifically look up uh the Young Washington Project, just still go to Angel.com slash Kirk.

00:43:20.000 You'll see all of our projects, upcoming anyone that's streaming currently and all the ones that are in theater.

00:43:25.000 So again, we're grateful, honored to be here.

00:43:27.000 So grateful for Charlie, his legacy and what you guys are doing.

00:43:30.000 Thank you so much.

The Charlie Kirk Show - October 22, 2025

Defunding Woke, Once and For All

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