The Charlie Kirk Show - July 12, 2022


How Much is Too Much Funding for Ukraine? With Senator Kevin Cramer


Episode Stats

Length

33 minutes

Words per Minute

168.90453

Word Count

5,602

Sentence Count

405


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Transcript

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00:00:00.000 Hey, everybody.
00:00:00.000 Today in the Charlie Kirk show, I asked the question: what do the Democrats have planned for the midterm elections?
00:00:05.000 I'm afraid there is a plan that we aren't seeing.
00:00:08.000 And then my conversation that ends in clarity, but certainly not agreement, with Senator Kramer from North Dakota.
00:00:15.000 I'd be curious your thoughts on the conversation and how you think we handled it and his response.
00:00:20.000 We definitely disagree.
00:00:22.000 Email us your thoughts, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:00:24.000 That's freedom at charliekirk.com and subscribe to the Charlie Kirk Show podcast.
00:00:28.000 Take out your podcast app and type in Charlie Kirk Show.
00:00:31.000 Get involved with Turning Point USA today and come to our student action summit at tpusa.com/slash SAS.
00:00:36.000 That is tpusa.com/slash S-A-S.
00:00:40.000 I love hearing from you.
00:00:41.000 So email me your thoughts, freedom at charliekirk.com, and support the Charlie Kirk Show at charliekirk.com/slash support.
00:00:47.000 Buckle up, everybody, here we go.
00:00:49.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.
00:00:51.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campuses.
00:00:53.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.
00:00:56.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.
00:01:00.000 I want to thank Charlie.
00:01:01.000 He's an incredible guy.
00:01:02.000 His spirit, his love of this country, he's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created.
00:01:09.000 Turning point USA.
00:01:10.000 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.
00:01:19.000 That's why we are here.
00:01:22.000 Brought to you by the Loan Experts I Trust, Andrew and Todd at Sierra Pacific Mortgage at andrewandTodd.com.
00:01:30.000 I want to ask this question, which is: who do we think we're dealing with?
00:01:34.000 Let's go back in the time machine.
00:01:38.000 You kind of think back to a time when we thought we were going to win massively.
00:01:46.000 I remember being at Mar-a-Lago.
00:01:48.000 Producer Andrew was there with me for one of the book launch parties for the MAGA doctrine.
00:01:54.000 If my memory serves me correctly, this was in late February of 2020.
00:01:58.000 And oh, times were good.
00:02:01.000 It's kind of the beginning of the tale of two cities.
00:02:04.000 It was the best of times, and yet it was the worst of times.
00:02:07.000 It was the best of times because it felt like it was the best of times.
00:02:11.000 It was the worst of times because we didn't quite realize what was happening under the surface.
00:02:16.000 There was a subterranean risk that was emerging.
00:02:20.000 You see, we were at Mar-a-Lago, and Jair Bolsoniro was there.
00:02:24.000 It was Kimberly Guilfoyle's birthday.
00:02:27.000 The good times were flowing.
00:02:30.000 Tucker Carlson was there.
00:02:32.000 It was a who's who of a typical winter Saturday evening at Mar-a-Lago.
00:02:39.000 But I would say some people were there, a couple people, Tucker in particular.
00:02:45.000 Tucker was there actually to warn Trump about COVID ahead of the curve, as always, saying, You better take this seriously because this could end up being a massive risk to your presidency.
00:02:56.000 The economy was great.
00:02:58.000 We were exporting oil.
00:03:00.000 The border was largely secure.
00:03:02.000 We weren't involving ourselves in foreign entanglements.
00:03:05.000 Our enemies feared us.
00:03:06.000 Our friends respected us.
00:03:08.000 Times were great.
00:03:09.000 And I remember that evening at Mar-a-Lago, Jair Bolsoniero was there.
00:03:15.000 The birthday parties.
00:03:16.000 The times were flowing.
00:03:17.000 It felt like the great Gatsby all over again.
00:03:21.000 It was the roaring 20s, you could say, in February of 2020.
00:03:27.000 They were talking about inauguration plans for the coming January.
00:03:31.000 There was a cockiness that almost permeated the air.
00:03:35.000 There was an attitude that we got this.
00:03:38.000 There is nothing they can throw at us.
00:03:40.000 We're the incumbent president.
00:03:42.000 The economy is fabulous.
00:03:44.000 They're going to nominate either a socialist or a dementia-filled candidate.
00:03:50.000 The mainstream media was even writing stories saying Trump will be very difficult to beat.
00:03:56.000 And then everything changed.
00:03:59.000 That night actually has been written by many journalists and authors and will be by historians for years to come as kind of the last party before the fall.
00:04:10.000 I was there coincidentally with some just some supporters and friends and board members celebrating the release of MAGA Doctrine, making the New York Times bestseller list.
00:04:22.000 And I remember waking up extremely early the next morning with a sense of anxiety.
00:04:28.000 And I was just reading stories on the New York Times and reading stories in the Washington Post and reading stories on CNN, reading stories on Breitbart.
00:04:34.000 I said, this COVID thing might actually metastasize and materialize into something big.
00:04:42.000 And in the coming days, we all remember where we were when all of a sudden dominoes started to fall, where NBA games started to get canceled.
00:04:52.000 I remember we had a turning point USA Southern Regional Conference in Charleston, South Carolina.
00:04:57.000 And I saw for the first time a worker with a mask.
00:05:03.000 And I remember turning to one of our team members: I said, why is that person wearing a mask?
00:05:09.000 It was a foreign sight.
00:05:11.000 And little did I know that piece of cloth over the face of that hotel worker was a harbinger for our reality to come.
00:05:21.000 And I thought back to the good times at Mar-a-Lago, the otherwise bulletproof Trump agenda in 2020 that all came collapsing down.
00:05:34.000 Then the lockdowns occurred.
00:05:37.000 We cut off travel to China 15 days to slow the spread.
00:05:42.000 Massive spending, trillions of dollars of spending to jumpstart the economy.
00:05:46.000 Families across America were going into crisis mode, saying we got to protect our family at all costs.
00:05:51.000 Now, we were never into the COVID paranoia on this program.
00:05:55.000 We were leading the charge.
00:05:56.000 Remember, schools got closed.
00:05:57.000 We stood against that.
00:05:59.000 People fully trusted Anthony Fauci and the orthodoxy, people that have sent all of a sudden, wow, I totally was misled by them.
00:06:08.000 But I'm taking you back in time for a reason because I'm starting to feel the very same sort of spirit of arrogance, the inevitability of victory that I felt on that February Saturday evening that felt like the end of the roaring 20s.
00:06:26.000 I could go through the polling.
00:06:28.000 It's astra, it's it's a beyond implosion.
00:06:32.000 Joe Biden has a 33% approval rating, 64% won a new candidate in 2024.
00:06:37.000 He's a mockery, he's a joke, he's a punchline.
00:06:41.000 It's cataclysmic.
00:06:43.000 We know that.
00:06:44.000 But I wouldn't be doing my job if I was just going to tell you everything was just fine.
00:06:48.000 I've lived through too much.
00:06:49.000 I've seen too much in my short 10 years of doing this.
00:06:53.000 That's what the people on television do because they don't think deeply about things outside of Tucker Carlson and a couple others.
00:06:59.000 The polling is incredible.
00:07:02.000 Over only 1% of voters, 18 to 29, strongly approve of Biden's performance.
00:07:07.000 1% of younger voters.
00:07:10.000 Only 18% of voters somewhat approve, younger voters.
00:07:13.000 Older voters actually approve of Joe Biden more than younger voters.
00:07:17.000 It's a total implosion.
00:07:19.000 So is it time to start measuring for curtains and shopping for dumb perion and what ridiculous antique glass you're going to sip the champagne in?
00:07:30.000 Have we learned nothing?
00:07:34.000 Over the last couple years, we have seen lie and change, disruption.
00:07:39.000 You're trying to tell me the very same cartel of criminals, the very same group of ruling class elites, they're going to phone it into the midterms when their entire agenda is at stake.
00:07:53.000 We're just supposed to believe now that victory is inevitable.
00:07:56.000 Have we done enough to fix our elections and ban drop boxes?
00:07:59.000 Praise God.
00:08:00.000 They've done that here in Wisconsin thanks to a judge.
00:08:02.000 It's amazing.
00:08:04.000 It hasn't happened in Arizona.
00:08:05.000 It hasn't happened in Georgia.
00:08:07.000 What I'm trying to say is we need a wake-up call, everybody, because I'm afraid that some of the apathy and the arrogance, not by many of you, but by the elites, by the decision makers, we're going to win this thing.
00:08:19.000 I'm telling you, do not drop our guard.
00:08:22.000 I lived through that moment and it can change immediately and suddenly and rapidly.
00:08:28.000 You can go to bed one night thinking you're going to win the White House and you could wake up the next morning realizing it's all in total, complete jeopardy.
00:08:38.000 Biden's Health and Human Service Secretary, Javier Becera, came out yesterday and said, Well, there's a strong chance we'll see a resurgence of the virus this fall, right before the midterm elections.
00:08:50.000 Play cut 34.
00:08:52.000 What I will tell you is that come the fall and winter, most everyone who's an expert on pandemics and these viruses will tell you that strong chance that we'll see a resurgence of the virus, whether it's the variants that we have now or new variants, and we got to be ready.
00:09:13.000 Are we ready?
00:09:14.000 Or is there an inevitability that seems to be setting in?
00:09:19.000 I want your thoughts on this.
00:09:21.000 Do you think we should be confident, cocky, that we're going to win no matter what?
00:09:25.000 Do you trust the process?
00:09:27.000 Do you think we've done enough since 2020 to fix our elections?
00:09:31.000 Or are you like me and you're trying to say, hold on, everybody, there might be something more to the story here?
00:09:37.000 You guys can always email us freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:09:39.000 I'm curious to hear from you.
00:09:40.000 I learned so much from our audience.
00:09:42.000 Best audience on the planet.
00:09:46.000 I might be the paranoid guy.
00:09:48.000 I fully admit it.
00:09:50.000 But the downside of me being wrong is I was too anxious for a couple of months.
00:09:55.000 The upside is I might get us into a heightened state of awareness that could actually save our republic because we're not measuring curtains and buying champagne glasses when we should be knocking on doors and trying to win elections.
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00:10:51.000 That's noblegoldinvestments.com.
00:10:56.000 I want to ask the question: is there something deeper going on here?
00:11:00.000 I mean, the numbers, right track, wrong track, are just so awful.
00:11:03.000 But I'm going to walk through kind of what prompted this thesis here today and we could try to figure it out together.
00:11:08.000 And I want your thoughts.
00:11:10.000 So the changes weekly, right track, wrong track.
00:11:15.000 81% of the country believes we're on the wrong track.
00:11:18.000 81%, 19% on the right track.
00:11:23.000 And I know exactly what you're thinking.
00:11:24.000 Who the heck are the 19% of people that think we're on the right track?
00:11:30.000 Lobbyists, people connected to the kingdom of Washington, D.C., I'm not sure.
00:11:35.000 81% believe the country is on the wrong track.
00:11:40.000 75% of men, 79% of women, interestingly enough.
00:11:45.000 71% of people 18 to 39.
00:11:48.000 Usually 60% is a red flag for politicians.
00:11:52.000 Here's my current hypothesis or my question, if you will, which is: I ask our guests quite often: why aren't Democrats adjusting their strategies and policies instead of driving their Democrat Party off the cliff?
00:12:10.000 And I'll be very honest, I have been very let down and dissatisfied with some of the answers from some of our guests, and they've said some other wonderful things, but it's not really making sense to me.
00:12:22.000 They say, oh, well, you know, the Democrats are going to Democrat.
00:12:25.000 Like, okay, that doesn't really make a lot of sense.
00:12:26.000 Let's think deeper here.
00:12:27.000 What's really going on?
00:12:29.000 I want you to first understand, I think you all agree with this, that are really in the grassroots of things in the weeds.
00:12:36.000 This question, and what some people would call paranoia, which I fully admit it might be paranoia, it's out of great respect for our opponents, who are typically phenomenal chess players.
00:12:50.000 Something does not feel right.
00:12:53.000 You see, Bill Clinton and Dick Morris and some of the best Democrat operatives famously had triangulation tactics.
00:13:00.000 They wouldn't bumble or stumble through the news.
00:13:04.000 I've never seen worse data than what I'm looking in front of us.
00:13:08.000 And we could go one step after the other.
00:13:09.000 Wow, terrible, terrible.
00:13:11.000 Young people, blacks, Hispanics, they're down everywhere.
00:13:14.000 And yet, Democrats continue to intentionally drive the country off the cliff, which scares me and should scare you.
00:13:21.000 So there's two explanations.
00:13:23.000 Well, three.
00:13:24.000 The conventional explanation is this, which is wrong.
00:13:29.000 And unfortunately, most ruling class Republicans and most media members give this explanation.
00:13:34.000 Oh, Biden doesn't know what he's doing.
00:13:36.000 He's just a puppet.
00:13:37.000 He's full of dementia.
00:13:37.000 I think this is wrong.
00:13:38.000 I think that's totally wrong.
00:13:41.000 The other two potential explanations of the question is: why aren't they adjusting?
00:13:45.000 Is this.
00:13:46.000 Number one, there's a secret plan for the midterms.
00:13:49.000 Now, some people say, oh, Charlie, take away the tinfoil hat.
00:13:52.000 That sounds nuts.
00:13:53.000 Have we learned nothing over the last couple of years of what these people are willing to do?
00:13:58.000 Mass mail and balloting, locking down the country.
00:14:00.000 Do they have a deeper plan for the midterms?
00:14:03.000 Or the third option is they're perfectly okay with the politically cataclysmic hit.
00:14:09.000 They want World Economic Forum-style policies at any cost whatsoever.
00:14:14.000 Politics, who cares?
00:14:17.000 So last time they went to great lengths to hide their corner-cutting and their shenanigans.
00:14:24.000 If the Biden regime is being influenced by our enemies, then one good tactic for them would be to cheat and not hide it.
00:14:32.000 This way they could potentially ferment violence and conflict, which would serve the interests of our enemies and globalists trying to weaken our country.
00:14:43.000 I know a lot of you have to stop yourself short when you start thinking like this and you say, Man, this doesn't, does this add up?
00:14:51.000 Does it make sense?
00:14:52.000 Because what we are seeing is the worst, the lowest approval rating for a political regime of my lifetime.
00:14:59.000 It makes Richard Nixon look like Gandhi.
00:15:04.000 It makes the most unpopular politician that you could possibly imagine.
00:15:10.000 It makes comedists look like Marcus Aurelius.
00:15:13.000 I mean, it's beyond anything we could possibly grasp.
00:15:18.000 Yet it should be the question: why are they doing this?
00:15:22.000 What do they have planned?
00:15:25.000 What is, and this is the way that we as conservatives always need to view things, which again might drive you mad, but I'm never going to be taken off guard again by another one of these asymmetrical interventions.
00:15:38.000 What is the subterranean risk?
00:15:42.000 What is happening below the surface that they aren't telling you?
00:15:50.000 Hey, everybody, Charlie Kirk here.
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00:16:52.000 Okay, I want to play a piece of tape here.
00:16:54.000 It's remarkable of CNN talking about Joe Biden's collapse.
00:17:00.000 And again, I'm all willing to kind of delight in the jacuzzi of the misery of the Democrats imploding.
00:17:08.000 But I'm not ready to pop the champagne yet.
00:17:11.000 Let's play the CNN clip.
00:17:12.000 I want to make sure I get the tape number here.
00:17:15.000 I think it's 24.
00:17:17.000 Let's play the CNN clip, whichever one it is.
00:17:19.000 Play the CNN clip.
00:17:21.000 Nearly two-thirds of Democratic primary voters want a different nominee.
00:17:25.000 Two-thirds.
00:17:25.000 If you break it down by age, 94% of Democratic primary voters under the age of 30, 94% say they don't want Biden.
00:17:35.000 That is a stunning number.
00:17:38.000 It's a stunning number.
00:17:39.000 When CNN says that, I still get a little bit nervous that there's something else going on here.
00:17:44.000 With us right now to help unpack what is happening, the Chinese Communist Party buying up farmland in North Dakota.
00:17:50.000 And also telling what's happening in the U.S. Senate is someone from a phenomenal state, one of my favorite states in the country, North Dakota, Senator Kramer.
00:17:57.000 Senator, welcome to the Charlie Kirk Show.
00:17:59.000 Charlie, it's good to be with you.
00:18:01.000 I'm sorry it's taken so long for me to hook up, but I'm glad our schedules work today.
00:18:05.000 And yeah, there's some pretty big topics to discuss for sure.
00:18:08.000 And our little rectangular blank spot in the middle of the North American continent, North Dakota, plays a role.
00:18:16.000 It really does.
00:18:17.000 We have a ton of North Dakota viewers and watchers and listeners.
00:18:21.000 And I tell people all the time, America is a freer place because of North Dakota.
00:18:25.000 So, Senator, let me first start by asking about the story that has been popping up.
00:18:29.000 And you have spoken out against this, which is the Chinese Communist Party purchasing farmland right near the Grand Forks Air Force Base.
00:18:40.000 It is potentially a corn milling plant, but the majority owner is a CCP member.
00:18:47.000 Can you talk about this?
00:18:48.000 What does the Air Force leadership say about this?
00:18:50.000 And I'll be very blunt.
00:18:52.000 Why is the state government of North Dakota allowing this to happen?
00:18:57.000 So, well, a couple of things, Charlie.
00:19:00.000 First of all, with respect to your last question, that would be a better question for the governor and for the Commerce Department, probably.
00:19:07.000 But I would say this about North Dakota, and you've been there a lot, as you say, and you have a lot of fans for sure.
00:19:15.000 But, you know, North Dakota is not a place that's hurting financially or economically, as you probably know.
00:19:21.000 We have a very good, robust, very modern agricultural community that does very well.
00:19:27.000 We do a lot of value-added agriculture.
00:19:29.000 We know how to market our products, the commodities, as well as add value to them.
00:19:34.000 And we, of course, have a robust energy sector, a robust technology sector, robust bio sector.
00:19:41.000 We have a lot more job openings and we have jobs.
00:19:43.000 So my question is, are we so desperate as to need a corn milling facility on the very northern edge of corn country near Grand Forks at a time when, frankly, economically, we need more people, not necessarily more investment.
00:20:03.000 Now, combine that with the fact that this is an investment coming from China.
00:20:09.000 Again, you said that the main principal being a pretty active member of the Communist Chinese Party.
00:20:15.000 Now, that raises all kinds of obviously red flags.
00:20:19.000 And we ought to be concerned about that.
00:20:21.000 My fundamental, though, my foundational concern, Charlie, I don't want to say it's less about the Grand Forks Air Force Base and its vulnerability to spying.
00:20:30.000 I mean, that certainly is important, but it's really about our strategy as it relates to China at all.
00:20:36.000 And as our friend Robert Lighthizer often says, we should have a strategy that is a strategic decoupling from China, not a closing up to China, not seeking and accepting more of their investment.
00:20:51.000 Because say what you want, whether they're going to spy on UAVs that fly in and out of Grand Forks or satellites that are downlinking to the Grand Forks Air Force Base, or whether they're just influencing the community, China has a pretty awful track record.
00:21:09.000 And I don't know why we would invite them into our backyard.
00:21:12.000 That's what makes me uncomfortable.
00:21:14.000 Yeah, I totally agree at the decoupling.
00:21:16.000 I suppose where the frustration, though, comes from a lot of voters and people in North Dakota is something that you articulated, which is inviting them in.
00:21:26.000 So the governor of North Dakota courted this particular investment.
00:21:29.000 It wasn't just like the CCP, you know, randomly selected this as a site.
00:21:34.000 Maybe they did, but there was a lot of courting there.
00:21:36.000 Do you think that there should be a matter of policy to say that the Chinese Communist Party shouldn't be able to buy farmland in North Dakota?
00:21:43.000 Well, first of all, when it comes to farmland, and it's an important distinction in North Dakota, North Dakota is the only state in the country that has a prohibition on corporate farming.
00:21:53.000 In other words, Car Guild or ADM cannot own a farm and farm it, nor can a pipeline company or a transmission company.
00:22:03.000 If you're going to put a pipeline in North Dakota, you have to make a deal with the local farmer.
00:22:08.000 You can't own the land and then farm it if you're a corporation.
00:22:12.000 So we have very strict, strict anti-corporate farming laws, something which, by the way, a lot of conservative people have opposed over the years and for decent reasons.
00:22:23.000 I mean, an individual farmer's land is his land.
00:22:26.000 He should be able to benefit from it however he or she wants.
00:22:30.000 So it gets a little bit complicated, right, philosophically.
00:22:34.000 With regard, though, to this, it does get murky, right?
00:22:39.000 And of course, as you know, there's other issues, you know, people like Bill Gates buying up a lot of farmland, making a farmland investment and through a trust or an individual.
00:22:49.000 And, you know, things change, right?
00:22:52.000 Things change over the course of time.
00:22:53.000 People's motives matter.
00:22:56.000 You know, globalism is on the rise, if you will.
00:23:01.000 And some of this, Charlie, is why Donald Trump is so immensely popular in North Dakota, because long before he made America first, not just a bumper sticker, but a real policy, North Dakotans were populists.
00:23:14.000 And we're not as bright red as some people think.
00:23:17.000 We've never been deep blue, but we've always been rather populist.
00:23:21.000 And this sort of attitude comes from that populism.
00:23:24.000 So when a country like China that has demonstrated in multiple ways their interest in using predatory financing, whether it's through their Belt and Road initiative in places like third world countries where they've leveraged their generosity for for land, for ports, for airports, for strategic locations.
00:23:50.000 That raises this to a whole new concerning level, quite honestly.
00:23:54.000 And that's why the corn milling facility near Grand Forks concerns me.
00:24:00.000 And I just think we can do a lot better in terms of attracting investment than that one.
00:24:05.000 Yeah, I think that you hit on something important, which is motives matter.
00:24:10.000 And so when the second or third wealthiest man in the world, Bill Gates, start to go buys North Dakota farmland, he's not doing that to go live a country life, right?
00:24:20.000 He owns over 247,000 acres of farmland across.
00:24:23.000 It's very obvious what he's doing.
00:24:24.000 It's either for control or a hedge on investment.
00:24:27.000 And you bring up a really important point, which is you're right.
00:24:30.000 The puritanical conservative response is, it's my land.
00:24:33.000 I can do whatever I want.
00:24:35.000 But there is kind of this new component where it's like, wait a second, I want to live in a nation that is not a colonial experiment of some sort of out-of-touch tech billionaire combined with what the Chinese Communist Party wants.
00:24:49.000 So I am not in favor of sending military aid to Ukraine, nor is a lot of our audience.
00:24:54.000 Can you tell us why you believe that's in the best interest of our country?
00:24:58.000 And also, you voted for the $40 billion of the last bill, but not the first bill.
00:25:03.000 What amount of money is too much to send to Ukraine?
00:25:06.000 Because we just did $1.7 billion or more.
00:25:08.000 Where's the line?
00:25:09.000 Because we're up near $56 billion now.
00:25:12.000 Sure.
00:25:12.000 Well, I don't know that the line is a dollar amount, Charlie.
00:25:15.000 I think each request or each requirement, each demand, each circumstance requires its own discovery, if you will.
00:25:26.000 I don't think we should do a whole bunch necessarily at one time.
00:25:29.000 I think that we should do smaller tranches just for the purpose of renegotiating, reassessing not only the situation on the ground, but our NATO allies, what are they doing?
00:25:39.000 Are they doing what they need to be doing?
00:25:42.000 Is the money being used for the things it's supposed to be used for?
00:25:44.000 Are the weapon systems going to the people they're supposed to go to?
00:25:47.000 Is it really helping fight back communist intrusion for the cause of freedom?
00:25:53.000 But in general, the reason that I support it, and the reason I think Ukraine's the good guy in this fight, quite honestly, is if for no other reason, you know, I do believe that Vladimir Putin is evil.
00:26:05.000 I think Vladimir Putin wants to, he harbors the fantasies of restoring the Soviet Union in as much as he can.
00:26:14.000 And that the first wave of that was Crimea.
00:26:17.000 The next wave is where we are now.
00:26:20.000 I don't know that he plans on stopping.
00:26:22.000 I don't know why he would stop if he gets parts of Ukraine or all of Ukraine.
00:26:26.000 And then it becomes obligatory after that.
00:26:29.000 As you know, as a NATO leader, as a NATO country, Article 5 obligates us to defend another NATO country should they be attacked.
00:26:39.000 And holding back Russia is the main purpose of NATO.
00:26:43.000 So really the price of letting Ukraine fall to Russia, to the United States taxpayer and to the cause of liberty, I think is very, very high.
00:26:54.000 The other thing I would say, and this is a little bit maybe on the fringe or into the future, but one thing we are seeing, one benefit we're seeing that we haven't seen in a long time, and that is not just a unified Europe, but a friendlier Europe to the United States.
00:27:09.000 When it comes to things like energy policy, food policy, trade policy, whether it's bilateral trade policies or a European U.S. trade policy, they've always sort of snubbed their noses at us.
00:27:20.000 They don't want our food because they don't like the way we grow it.
00:27:24.000 They don't want our energy.
00:27:26.000 And yet now they need what we have.
00:27:28.000 And I do think there's an opportunity for the good guys, if you will, to form a stronger alliance in all the right ways.
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00:28:23.000 Senator, the concern I have, and a lot of people have with that issue in particular, is that we're afraid we're getting into another endless foreign proxy war that does not directly threaten United States interests.
00:28:35.000 For example, Putin's already bordering a NATO country in Kalingrad Oblast, million-person military base bordering Poland.
00:28:41.000 And it feels as if the urgency and the speed and the rapidity that Congress meets to go send 56 billion to Ukraine while our border remains open.
00:28:51.000 I know you want to secure the southern border, so it's not fair to pin that on you.
00:28:55.000 But do you understand some of the maybe unease that some of your voters or constituents might have towards this topic that we're getting ourselves in another potentially 20 or 30 year debacle while our country falls apart?
00:29:08.000 Certainly I do, Charlie, but I do think Europe is far different than the Middle East.
00:29:13.000 First of all, second of all, you're exactly right.
00:29:15.000 We need to secure our southern border.
00:29:17.000 America should come first, and America's immediate security and its own borders should be the highest priority, and they are for me.
00:29:24.000 But there's obviously more bipartisan support on the Ukrainian-Russian front, which is also important to me.
00:29:31.000 So all that said, obviously we want to avoid a long-term debacle.
00:29:36.000 And this is going to be a longer war than a lot of people thought.
00:29:39.000 Not because we want a long war, but because Ukraine has fought Russia back better than anybody thought they were going to, other than the Ukrainians themselves.
00:29:48.000 I think they were always confident that they'd be able to wage a decent defense against Russia.
00:29:53.000 So Ukraine's not going to roll over.
00:29:55.000 Ukraine is a fledgling democracy, but they're not a democracy like the United States.
00:29:59.000 They are not a representative republic.
00:30:01.000 We often hear about the frustrations of the corruption of a Ukrainian government, the oligarchs that have influence over Ukraine.
00:30:11.000 But they are experimenting with the same things that built America, you know, a free market, elected officials.
00:30:17.000 I think Vladimir Zelensky is a pretty good example that a person that never served in office before can come in and run an election campaign against a sitting president and win.
00:30:28.000 Those are values that we cherish and we want to promote.
00:30:32.000 But Ukraine is a very big area.
00:30:34.000 And I know you know that this, and anybody wants to look at a map or a globe, I think it's always helpful to see how big Ukraine is, how many resources they have, both in energy and certainly in agriculture and food production.
00:30:47.000 It's a significant piece of real estate in the middle of Europe.
00:30:51.000 So while Russia maybe borders another NATO country, the idea that they would suddenly border a whole bunch of NATO countries is very unnerving to those other countries and to the United States.
00:31:03.000 And I think you can call it a proxy war if you want.
00:31:06.000 I think some people do, and I think that's not an inappropriate.
00:31:08.000 I think it's an appropriate perhaps term.
00:31:11.000 But I just think the prospects of losing Ukraine to Russia could be much, much more costly than winning this war.
00:31:19.000 Yeah, but I just, I'm sorry, Senator.
00:31:21.000 I just got to push back a little bit here, though.
00:31:23.000 I mean, you're saying that you can't put a number on the money to spend there.
00:31:26.000 Already spent more money than the North Dakota GDP.
00:31:29.000 Eastern Ukraine wants to be part of Russia.
00:31:31.000 They speak Russian.
00:31:33.000 I mean, at any point, it is a proxy war, right?
00:31:36.000 We're the primary funders of this.
00:31:39.000 And Zelensky is far from kind of the poster child for democracy.
00:31:45.000 I mean, needless to say, he's allying with some of these sort of fringe forces.
00:31:50.000 We're not going to really agree here, but we do have clarity, which I think is important.
00:31:54.000 Just posing thought here for the audience, Senator Kramer from North Carolina.
00:31:57.000 Sure.
00:31:58.000 Well, remember, remember it wasn't Ralph Reagan that referred to the enemy of my enemy as my friend.
00:32:04.000 And that was, of course, in the Middle East.
00:32:07.000 This is Europe.
00:32:08.000 This is a much closer proxy, obviously, and I think a much higher priority than previous long-term skirmishes that we've gotten involved in that turned into very long-term wars and very expensive.
00:32:19.000 So, yeah, we disagree on this, Charlie, but it's not an unreasonable disagreement.
00:32:23.000 I mean, I certainly respect your position and listen to a lot of people that agree with you.
00:32:27.000 And at the end of the day, put it all together with whatever I know in terms of details as well, try to make the best decisions possible.
00:32:35.000 Senator Kramer says a lot about you for the willing to have this dialogue.
00:32:38.000 It's hard to do sometimes.
00:32:40.000 So we want to thank you for that.
00:32:42.000 And most elected officials don't want to come on the program because they're afraid of just that.
00:32:46.000 So we have clarity, but not agreement, which is what is the cornerstone of a functioning civilization.
00:32:50.000 Senator Kramer, thank you so much for your time.
00:32:52.000 Charlie, thanks for the opportunity.
00:32:53.000 It was my pleasure.
00:32:57.000 Thank you so much for listening, everybody.
00:32:59.000 Email me your thoughts as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:33:01.000 Thank you so much for listening.
00:33:03.000 God bless.
00:33:06.000 For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk. com.