Kirsten Fleming of the New York Post joins me to talk about all the things New York City, including the mayor's plan to raid the city's rainy day fund, raise taxes on the rich, and spend like a drunken sailor.
00:00:56.000The 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.
00:02:13.000Okay, so he said we're forced to raid our rainy day fund 407.
00:02:19.000In order to get to this point of closing the gap on both this fiscal year and the next fiscal year, we are forced to raid the rainy day fund, the retiree health benefits trust reserve, and to increase property taxes across these other years.
00:03:19.000So there is this backstory behind this, right?
00:03:22.000So Kathy Hochul is considered in New York terms, not to all of us out in the real world out here, but in New York terms, she's considered sort of more to the center, a centrist Democrat.
00:03:33.000And she's saying that these are off the table.
00:03:35.000We're not going to raise property taxes because, or well, property taxes, Zoron can do all on his own.
00:03:41.000But the wealth tax, he would need Kathy's help, Hochul's help to do.
00:03:46.000But she's already given him $1.5 billion from the rest of the state and injected it into the city's budget, which, by the way, Kirsten, is $127 billion.
00:03:56.000The entire budget of the state of Florida is 117.
00:04:00.000So like the maths don't math up for me here.
00:04:03.000Now, Mayor Adams is saying that he left a fund of $9 billion behind.
00:04:19.000I mean, he had some wasteful stuff going on.
00:04:21.000But the idea is if you do have waste and you have issues going on, you cut spending.
00:04:28.000You don't keep promising like he's Oprah.
00:04:31.000He's like, you get more, you get more.
00:04:32.000And it's like putting more into the freebies, the incentives.
00:04:36.000And he wants, like, you know, in terms of he's always advertising even to migrants, like he wants to shell out way more money for migrants.
00:04:43.000He wants to shell out all of this money for things that we don't need.
00:04:45.000He wants to increase the spending that we're going to be giving to each public school student, decrease the class size, all of these things where it's like, buddy, why don't we start cutting some of the fat?
00:04:56.000Because we got a lot of fat in this place.
00:04:58.000So that's really what it comes down to.
00:05:00.000He is unwilling to make compromise and he just wants his way and he wants his DSA agenda.
00:05:06.000Well, this is what's crazy about this.
00:05:08.000It almost feels like he's holding Kathy Hochle hostage.
00:05:34.000But I think this clip spells it out really well for 11.
00:05:38.000There are two paths to bridge this gap.
00:05:40.000The first is the most sustainable and the fairest path.
00:05:44.000This is the path of ending the drain on our city and raising taxes on the richest New Yorkers and the most profitable corporations.
00:05:51.000The onus for resolving this crisis should not be placed on the backs of working and middle class New Yorkers.
00:05:57.000If we do not fix this structural imbalance and do not heed the calls of New Yorkers to raise taxes on the wealthy, this crisis will not disappear.
00:06:06.000It will simply return year after year, forcing harder and harsher choices each time.
00:06:12.000And if we do not go down the first path, the city will be forced down a second, more harmful path.
00:06:18.000Faced with no other choice, the city would have to exercise the only revenue lever fully within our own control.
00:06:25.000We would have to raise property taxes.
00:06:28.000So if you're raising property taxes, this is just amazing, by the way.
00:06:32.000He's like, awful decision or even more awful decision.
00:06:36.000Welcome to the warmth of collectivism.
00:06:38.000We have no choice other than all of the policies that I have chosen.
00:06:55.000There's a lot of middle class housing.
00:06:57.000Immigrants who became homeowners in like South, you know, South Brooklyn and the Bronx and Queens, Staten Island.
00:07:05.000And the, you know, the, um housing prices keep rising.
00:07:10.000But the reality is, you know, and it's going to be passed on to the renters as well.
00:07:14.000So this is not the fix that he's selling it as.
00:07:18.000And, you know, he's trying to manipulate everything and make it seem like, look, if Kathy doesn't do this, look what the establishment dems did.
00:07:28.000And that's just, that's, it's a manipulation.
00:07:30.000So it just feels like this is the same old playbook.
00:07:33.000It's like, it kind of reminds you of, you know, the problem with socialism, eventually you run out of somebody else's money, Margie Thatcher.
00:07:42.000But it's like you promise utopia, you fail because, you know, math is math.
00:07:47.000And then you tax and spend to deliver utopia, you fail again.
00:07:50.000And then you run out of money to tax and spend.
00:07:53.000So you scapegoat the last remaining productive people in your society.
00:07:56.000And then when that fails, you just seize the means of production and you hold them over a barrel until you get what you want.
00:08:01.000I mean, what, what as a New Yorker, what is ever, like you said, the smell is off the rose or off the socialist.
00:08:10.000But I mean, you know, I don't mean to be a pessimist here, but it's hard to have faith in the good common sense of New Yorkers when they keep, you know, it seems like they want to rush down this socialism path.
00:09:10.000So it really does put pressure on these people who, like me, or like working class New Yorkers, who can't just like pack a bag and buy a place in Florida.
00:09:24.000I am hoping that common sense will prevail and that Kathy Hocha will hold strong.
00:09:29.000And because either way, it's a, it's a bad, bad outcome.
00:09:32.000But it's funny because, you know, all these, you know, he had this, his tenant advisor who has called homeownership white supremacy and you have weaver just go through her Twitter account.
00:09:45.000So you have all these people and you're like, wow, they're really radical.
00:09:48.000But what they've done, they're already working.
00:09:50.000They're already like crafting the machine to be in place for when this stuff falls apart.
00:09:54.000Well, and you, you did a great piece, by the way.
00:09:56.000I recommend everybody read it about the Champagne Socialist.
00:09:59.000There's that one guy, the one guy that you find all his old tweets like complaining about American Airlines and France Air and all this stuff.
00:10:11.000And by the way, just so we're clear, Momdani let 18 people die on the streets of New York just in the cold, refused to move out the homeless people.
00:12:09.000Coleman Young was the mayor of Detroit, and his stated goal, well, not stated, but his whole idea that it would get revealed later, was that kick every basically make it so unpleasant, but I hold on to power.
00:12:49.000I wish I could have told Charlie about this before I remembered it.
00:12:52.000Well, you know, more before everything that happened, which there was a mayor of Boston about 100 years ago, also a Democrat.
00:13:01.000And there's literally a study that creates a hypothetical effect where it's in the political interest of a ruling elite to make a city worse with the knowledge that your opponents will move out faster and your base will stick around or will move out last.
00:13:16.000And so you deliberately make a city worse to make sure that you keep control of it.
00:13:41.000We should not live in a country where one state becomes so unbearably, so poorly run that they have to leave their family homes where they were born, where they were raised, where their grandparents were born and raised.
00:13:50.000That shouldn't be an America that we allow to happen.
00:13:52.000This is why we have people like Steve Hilton on this show, because it's still important to fight for California.
00:13:56.000It's still important to fight for New York.
00:13:58.000It's still important to call out the commies.
00:14:00.000And by the way, Charlie raged against this, and I completely agree.
00:14:03.000You had George Will go on and say, well, maybe New York needs a tough dose of socialist medicine and then they're going to correct course.
00:14:10.000Do you have any idea what Mamdani, the damage that Mamdani and his apparatches can do in a city like New York, the systems that they can set up, the processes, the personnel, the budget shortfalls, the taxes?
00:16:33.000I mean, it's the only right answer to give in that instance.
00:16:37.000He was also asked about the midterms, and I thought he had another great answer, 413.
00:16:42.000The question we're going to put to the American people is: do you want to give the government back over to the people who frankly burned down the house and made most Americans much less wealthy and much less safe?
00:16:53.000Or do you want to double down on the president's leadership, which has helped us recover from some of the problems caused by Joe Biden and then has built a lot on top of it?
00:17:03.000Because so much of what we've done over the last year are things that are going to pay long-term dividends for the American people.
00:17:36.000I think a lot of us believe this administration has been more successful because of the setback of 2020.
00:17:42.000But I mean, the Biden years were still really bad and caused permanent damage to this.
00:17:46.000We have still millions of illegals in this country that are flooding your DMVs and your hospitals and your schools and your roadways that should not be here, that are flooding your jails, frankly.
00:17:55.000Incredibly enough, the best way to win is to win.
00:17:58.000Well, and by the way, this there, okay, and I wonder if JD's answer would have been different on the midterms after the Fabrizio, because I think this happened before the Fabrizio slides.
00:19:09.000And for those under 16, direct messages are turned off.
00:19:13.000Only their friends can comment on their videos.
00:19:15.000And that kind of approach matters because feeling confident and comfortable about these platforms your teenagers are on shouldn't mean digging through a bunch of menus and trying to set everything up yourself and worrying that you got it wrong.
00:19:27.000TikTok is taking a proactive approach.
00:19:29.000Their protections are built in from the moment those teenagers join so that safety and peace of mind for parents is there right from the start.
00:19:37.000All of this is to say, when safety comes first, discovery and creativity can follow without fear.
00:19:44.000Learn more by going to tick tock.com/slash guardiansguide.
00:19:55.000We get more young people under the age of 35 to have equity in the system, not the Democrat version of equity where they want to have redistribution, but actually, are they paying a mortgage?
00:20:05.000Do they own stuff or are they permanent renters?
00:20:08.000A permanent renting class in this country is the prerequisite, is the leading ingredient for radical politics that nobody wants to see.
00:20:16.000We need to reinvigorate the ownership economy, and then all of a sudden, when you own stuff, you're less likely to burn down a Wendy's and vote for candidates like Zilron Mamdani.
00:21:22.000You know, we all love Charlie and so thankful for him and his legacy.
00:21:26.000You know, he was spot on in talking about young people wanting to own a home.
00:21:30.000You heard the vice president yesterday talking about what the Trump administration has done thus far to help first-time home buyers to help Americans achieve the American dream in owning a home.
00:21:42.000You know, so many things have happened so far.
00:21:45.000You know, just in January of 2026, over 5 million Americans were able to refinance their home, making their monthly payments go down.
00:21:54.000The sales of single-family homes have gone up.
00:21:59.000The amount of money that you need to afford your home has gone down, which is at a five-month high.
00:22:05.000And so if you look at President Trump, he's making and taking bold actions to help American people to be able to afford and buy a home.
00:22:13.000You saw with banning institutional, large institutional investors from buying single-family homes.
00:22:19.000These homes are for the American people and not for corporations.
00:22:22.000I know at HUD, you know, last year we helped 1 million people in America be able to afford a home, including 500,000 first-time home buyers.
00:22:31.000We also made it so that FHA-backed mortgages no longer will go to illegal aliens coming in our country.
00:22:39.000And so under President Trump's leadership, American people are a priority and the only priority in home affordability is at the top of mind.
00:22:47.000Yeah, and it's interesting this, you know, and I've seen it debated, Mr. Secretary, about, you know, the impact of illegal immigration on the housing supply and the affordability of homes, right?
00:22:59.000So to what extent does undocumented immigration contribute to the strains on the housing supply?
00:23:24.000And I have some interesting stats for you.
00:23:26.000About 59% of illegal alien families use one or more welfare programs here in America, costing us about $42 billion a year.
00:23:36.000And if you look at some of the blue states around our country, nearly 100% of the increase in rental demand in New York and California is because of illegal immigration.
00:23:48.000But since we have President Trump and this administration and Secretary Noam and others, since our border is secured now, you look at rent prices have gone down in the last five or six months because our border is secure.
00:24:02.000And so the impact of illegals coming across our border unchecked, unvetted, not only strains our housing supply, not only takes it up, but these are houses and spaces that should be used by the American people.
00:24:14.000And so under President Trump's leadership, you see these numbers coming down.
00:24:31.000And I just mentally link that with a tent I would always see outside the Home Depot that was selling torta sandwiches that only spoke Spanish.
00:24:40.000And that disappeared as soon as ICE operations thought or began.
00:24:44.000And I suspect that there's a link between those two things.
00:25:04.000I think the liberal economists, they don't want to admit this, but when you flood the nation with millions of people and we're building, what, like a million new homes a year, and you flood it with, you know, 10, 15, 20 million people, whatever that number is, of course you're going to see prices go up.
00:25:19.000And it's not like all these people are living in destitute lives.
00:25:22.000Some of them have actually pretty good incomes and they can afford a pretty decent home.
00:25:26.000Look at this graph here, Mr. Secretary, 448.
00:25:29.000This is the average income needed to buy a home versus the medium income in the country.
00:26:26.000Thank you for that and thank you for showing that graft and that chart.
00:26:30.000I think that all of the policies that we've talked about under President Trump and the vice president alluded to this yesterday, when you bring down cost and you raise supply, more people in America can afford a home.
00:26:46.000There was a stat that I read the other day that the income of Americans is increasing.
00:26:52.000And because that income is increasing and housing affordability little by little, tick by tick, really is coming down, you'll see that gap on your chart, you know, even be tighter.
00:27:04.000And so I know from a HUD standpoint with our FHA and our Ginnie Mae programs helping first-time homebuyers where generally you have to have less of a down payment.
00:27:16.000Like I said, last year we helped over a million people, 500,000 first-time homebuyers.
00:27:21.000And if you look at these things all working in concert together, that gap will close as incomes go up, as affordability and costs go down.
00:27:31.000You know, the American people, and I think because of the One Big Beautiful Bill, and I'm kind of going to, you know, go aside here, the One Big Beautiful Bill and the policies inside, I think this year in 2026, you hear Secretary Basson talking about a lot.
00:27:44.000The American people will benefit from this policy and more money will be in the pockets of American people across our country as it pertains to housing affordability, energy, taxes, and things of this nature.
00:27:57.000So I am very encouraged that this year, not just for housing affordability, but across the board from an economic standpoint, that the American people will benefit and thrive this year coming.
00:28:46.000Cutting rates is not the entire picture.
00:28:48.000Cutting rates is not the whole thing because the price is still high, but it will unlock more capital for people that are right on the edge of purchasing a home.
00:28:58.000Yeah, I mean, that sounds like it's basically the president's plan, for example.
00:29:02.000Secretary Turner, you're not the Fed chair.
00:29:04.000We got Warsh coming in in, I believe, May, and I think the market is basically anticipating a rate cut in May.
00:29:12.000We'll see how deep it is and if that materializes.
00:29:16.000But this idea that we've got to get first-time homebuyers and bring that medium age down, I saw a stat actually that real incomes have gone up about $1,200 under the Trump administration, but people don't feel it yet.
00:29:28.000And by the way, your tax return is going to be 11% higher than it was the year before on average.
00:29:33.000So you've got all of these indicators that people are going to have more money in their pocket.
00:29:37.000They're going to be able to afford more, but they're still living, they're still digging out of four years of Biden inflation.
00:29:43.000And it just, you know, I don't, I think sometimes the market doesn't feel it yet.
00:30:14.000And so President Trump and his administration really inherited a fiscal mess, if you will.
00:30:20.000But just in a short period of time over this last year with the One Big Beautiful Bill, which is the largest working family tax cut in American history, the policies therein will be a big benefit to Americans throughout this calendar year of 2026 as you see home supply going up and costs going down.
00:30:41.000You know, for the median age of a homebuyer to be 40, that is way too high.
00:30:47.000Owning a home in America really is the greatest step to creating wealth and generational wealth for a family.
00:30:56.000And so getting people in our country who are not supposed to be here, getting them out of our country, increasing the supply, bringing the price down.
00:31:06.000Andrew and Blake, I mean, this is a great formula for American prosperity.
00:31:11.000And I believe that we're on track to do it day by day and step by step.
00:31:17.000But I'm encouraged and I would encourage your viewers and others to continue to be faithful, continue to work hard, continue to pay attention to what's going on in our economy, the good things that are happening, and know that with great anticipation, there's more to come.
00:31:31.000I have to ask you, Secretary, did you watch the halftime show?
00:31:35.000You are a former professional football player, defensive back.
00:31:39.000You played for the Washington Redskins, the Chargers, the Denver Broncos.
00:31:43.000You were a standout at the University of Illinois.
00:31:58.000Well, listen, when you said the halftime show, the first thing I thought about was the Super Bowl halftime show.
00:32:03.000I did get to see many of the highlights from your halftime show, and I'm so grateful for you all that you made the investment in time and talent and resources and energy.
00:34:18.000That's the Winter Olympic medal count in Asia.
00:34:20.000So it's all kind of, it's like, have you ever seen how China maxes its medal count in the Summer Olympics?
00:34:26.000They just, it's such a like a, like the stereotype of like Asians studying for an exam or something where they figure out like, what are the sports that have tons of medals and not a ton of people do them?
00:34:38.000And so they went really hard at diving because there's a ton of diving medals and it's not a big sport that, you know, gazillions of people do.
00:39:39.000Obviously, you can't see it if you're on podcast, but if you're watching us now, you'll be able to see she's crying there after what happened.
00:39:45.000And if you zoom in on that top image, I don't know if they can, but it's circled.
00:39:50.000She is wearing a trans kind of pride flag heart pin.
00:39:58.000So she'll have that form of pride, if not the same.
00:40:00.000That was her waiting for the score to come in.
00:40:02.000So she's sitting there crying, knowing that she messed up her jump.
00:40:35.000One last piece of breaking news here before we leave you for the rest of the show.
00:40:40.000It looks like we mentioned the potential war in Iran.
00:40:44.000Breaking news, Justin, is Israeli emergency services and the Home Front Command have been instructed to prepare for war as officials assess imminent, and that is a quote, imminent U.S. strike on Iran.
00:40:57.000And that is according to Yenet News Service.
00:41:09.000If what happens, I imagine we'll probably.
00:41:11.000I did check with some sources in the break, and it does appear that, you know, historically, yes, you could conclude that a kinetic strike would be imminent, but there does not look to be enough resources for a ground invasion or holding land or something like that.
00:41:26.000So we're going to have to wait and see and see what happens.