The Megyn Kelly Show - Explosive Rittenhouse Trial Moments and COVID Testing and Vaccines, with Robert Gruler, Dr. Michael Mina, and Brian Dressen ｜ Ep. 201

00:00:00.480 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:12.180 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show and happy Veterans Day.

00:00:17.160 We begin today with the extraordinary developments in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, a case that has captured national attention.

00:00:23.120 The now 18-year-old stands accused of intentionally murdering two people and trying to murder a third at a Black Lives Matter riot in August 2020 in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

00:00:34.040 That riot took place in the wake of the lawful police-involved shooting of Jacob Blake, a man resisting arrest who pulled a knife on cops, who was then shot seven times by an officer.

00:00:44.860 Days later, then 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse went to Kenosha to protect the city from the planned riot, burning, and looting.

00:00:53.120 He was given an AR-15 by a friend in Kenosha and was heard on tape saying he wanted to help act as a medic and to keep the peace.

00:01:01.800 Chaos ensued, and Kyle shot three people.

00:01:05.140 For over a year, the media has condemned this kid as a vigilante domestic terrorist who went on an unjustified killing spree.

00:01:13.120 No open-mindedness to his claim of self-defense, nor the videotapes that clearly back that up,

00:01:23.120 or of others, when police would not or could not.

00:01:26.360 Here's a sample of that media coverage.

00:01:28.440 Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old vigilante.

00:01:31.140 Kyle Rittenhouse, the vigilante.

00:01:33.220 Kyle Rittenhouse, the armed teenage vigilante. 0.95

00:01:35.780 A 17-year-old vigilante, arguably a domestic terrorist, picked up a rifle, drove to a different state to shoot people. 0.82

00:01:42.120 Kyle Rittenhouse, a guy who's deeply racist, went with weapons to a Black Lives Matter protest, looking to get in trouble. 0.87

00:01:49.920 He did, he murdered a couple of people. 0.94

00:01:52.020 Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old kid, just running around, shooting and killing protesters.

00:01:59.000 You see the 17-year-old, who was radicalized by Trumpism, took his AR-15 to Kenosha and became a killer. 0.94

00:02:06.080 A white, Trump-supporting, MAGA-loving, Blue Lives Matter, social media partisan, 17 years old, picks up a gun, drives from one state to another with the intent to shoot people.

00:02:20.200 A 17-year-old boy who drove across state lines with an AR-15 and started shooting people up, including a guy with a skateboard.

00:02:32.620 There's so much misinformation and that butted soundbite, I don't even know where to begin.

00:02:38.260 I don't even know where to begin.

00:02:40.240 Kyle Rittenhouse's former lawyer was on the show yesterday saying there will be libel lawsuits, more than one.

00:02:45.660 The Rittenhouse trial began on November 2nd, and it has been an utter disaster for the prosecution.

00:02:51.220 Rittenhouse does not deny shooting the three men in question, two of whom died, one of whom was severely injured in the arm.

00:02:56.560 Instead, he argues that he acted in self-defense.

00:03:00.420 Self-defense is an absolute defense, and it is up to the prosecution to disprove it.

00:03:06.740 Here, the prosecution is trying to do that by arguing that Rittenhouse provoked the attacks upon him, thus rendering the claim of self-defense unavailable.

00:03:16.320 First, a brief primer on the relevant law.

00:03:21.140 In Wisconsin, a self-defense claim generally will not prevail if the man raising it provoked the attack in the first place.

00:03:29.900 Now, there are two kinds of provocation.

00:03:32.560 Intentional, for example, goading someone you want to kill into attacking you so that you can murder him.

00:03:39.240 That's not what happened here and doesn't seem to be what the prosecution is arguing, though with this DA, we cannot entirely rule it out.

00:03:46.420 But then there's unintentional provocation.

00:03:49.900 OK, unintentional provocation, which can but doesn't always prevent a defendant from claiming self-defense.

00:03:58.620 That's at the heart of this case.

00:03:59.980 Unintentional provocation is where a man engages in unlawful conduct that is reasonably likely to provoke a violent response.

00:04:12.700 Unlawful conduct that is reasonably likely to provoke a violent response.

00:04:18.520 If you do that, you might lose your ability to claim self-defense.

00:04:22.160 That's what the DA says Rittenhouse did here.

00:04:24.820 He says the unlawful conduct was Rittenhouse carrying a rifle while under 18.

00:04:29.980 Which is a misdemeanor in Wisconsin.

00:04:33.400 This quite simply is a joke.

00:04:36.480 All right.

00:04:36.920 First of all, just carrying a gun illegally is not likely to provoke a violent response.

00:04:43.520 Do you know how many people were carrying illegal firearms that night in Kenosha?

00:04:47.060 Why didn't each one of them provoke a violent response?

00:04:49.880 The mere carrying of a gun illegally or not is not by itself a violent provocation.

00:04:58.380 Second of all, there are real questions about whether the Wisconsin law applies to long guns like the one Kyle had and still more questions as to whether the law in question here is too vague to withstand constitutional muster.

00:05:14.840 Andy McCarthy's got a great piece about this on National Review, which you should read.

00:05:18.980 But let's assume for now that Wisconsin's gun law will be upheld and that Kyle was breaking it.

00:05:24.480 And further, let's assume that the prosecution can convince a jury or this judge that a reasonable person would have known that unlawfully carrying an AR-15 was likely to provoke violence.

00:05:38.160 Okay, already we are in legal la-la land, but let's do it.

00:05:41.640 Let's go there.

00:05:43.300 Rittenhouse still, still would have the right to claim self-defense if the violent response that did happen was an attack on his life.

00:05:54.180 The law recognizes that.

00:05:55.820 In other words, a man doing something unlawful that provokes someone to attack him need not simply sit back and let himself be killed.

00:06:04.600 The law recognizes that.

00:06:07.460 That's Rittenhouse's argument, that he was not breaking any gun laws, that even if he was, doing so by itself was not likely to provoke a violent response just by carrying a gun that you didn't have the law right to carry.

00:06:20.960 And that even if it was, Rittenhouse still had the right to defend his own life when the violent response was attempted murder.

00:06:29.200 So does the evidence support Rittenhouse's claim that his life was threatened by each of the men he shot?

00:06:38.420 The answer is clearly yes.

00:06:41.080 And this case, in my legal opinion, should never have been brought.

00:06:45.500 By the way, all of this, the facts and the law, are impeccably spelled out by Andrew Branca over at Legal Insurrection.

00:06:52.340 And my thanks to him for his thorough analysis and reporting in this case.

00:06:55.440 He's been great.

00:06:56.480 So let's take them one by one.

00:06:58.540 The three men who were shot.

00:07:00.620 Number one, Joseph Rosenbaum, 36.

00:07:03.460 Rosenbaum was a convicted child molester on medication, only recently released from a mental facility, none of which the jury will hear because it's not technically relevant since Rittenhouse didn't know it at the time.

00:07:14.560 Still, it helps us understand Rosenbaum's behavior that night, which was erratic and threatening.

00:07:19.200 Now, Rittenhouse testified yesterday that Rosenbaum chased him and threatened to kill him.

00:07:26.440 This is all on tape.

00:07:28.740 Rittenhouse says he was trying to retreat from Rosenbaum, yelling, friendly, friendly, friendly.

00:07:34.500 If you watch this later on YouTube dot com, you can see the video that is playing while I speak.

00:07:39.060 But he says Rosenbaum continued pursuit.

00:07:42.020 That's when Rosenbaum's friend Joshua Zeminski fires a shot in the air, causing Rittenhouse to turn. 0.99

00:07:48.060 He sees Rosenbaum charging at him, yelling, fuck you and trying to grab Rittenhouse's gun. 0.99

00:07:56.760 Listen. 0.99

00:07:58.460 And as I'm turning around, Mr. Rosenbaum is, I would say, from me to where the judge is coming at me with his arms out in front of him.

00:08:12.720 I remember his hand on the barrel of my gun.

00:08:16.140 So you turned around?

00:08:18.180 Yes.

00:08:18.840 And as you see him lunging at you, what do you do? 1.00

00:08:22.660 I shoot him. 0.95

00:08:23.840 And how many times did you shoot? 0.99

00:08:26.040 I believe four.

00:08:27.120 That exchange was witnessed by, among others, Daily Caller video journalist Richie McGinnis, who took the stand in this case and testified as follows.

00:08:38.080 And you've already established that after the shooting, Mr. Rosenbaum never says it worked, correct?

00:08:45.780 Correct.

00:08:47.900 You don't know, as you sit here today, what Mr. Rosenbaum was thinking, do you?

00:08:55.080 You mean at the time of the shooting?

00:08:56.580 Yes.

00:08:57.300 Or at any point in his life.

00:08:58.980 I mean, you have no idea what Mr. Rosenbaum was ever thinking at any point in his life.

00:09:02.960 You have never been inside his head.

00:09:04.920 You never met him before.

00:09:06.200 You don't know.

00:09:07.000 I've never even I've never exchanged words with him.

00:09:09.600 That's what your question is.

00:09:10.800 So your interpretation of what he was trying to do or what he was intending to do or anything along those lines is complete guesswork, isn't it? 1.00

00:09:20.420 Well, he said, fuck you. 1.00

00:09:21.800 And then he reached for the weapon. 1.00

00:09:26.600 Rittenhouse.

00:09:27.040 Now the focus of an angry mob after the shooting of Rosenbaum begins to run.

00:09:33.320 He says he was heading for a police barricade to surrender himself to the cops, but that the incensed mob followed him, threw things at him and may have pushed him.

00:09:42.080 The videotape shows Rittenhouse fall.

00:09:44.340 Watch it here if you're watching this on YouTube later.

00:09:47.080 The videotape shows him fall.

00:09:48.360 Rittenhouse says just before he went down, a man named Anthony Huber swung his skateboard at Rittenhouse like a bat and that it did hit Kyle.

00:09:58.040 Once Rittenhouse is down, which you can see right here, you can clearly see him being attacked from multiple flanks.

00:10:04.620 An unidentified man in heavy work boots tries to jump kick him in the face, but misses.

00:10:10.320 Rittenhouse fires his gun at that man, but Rittenhouse misses, too.

00:10:13.400 And that's when Anthony Huber, Huber, the second man killed, appears on tape with his skateboard and begins to beat Rittenhouse for what Rittenhouse is the second time now with that skateboard, this time over the head.

00:10:26.540 Rittenhouse described this exchange on the stand yesterday.

00:10:29.240 As I'm running, at first I'm in the sidewalk and Mr. Likowski, Jason Likowski is in the sidewalk and I stop to talk to Mr. Likowski for a brief second.

00:10:45.320 I remember telling him that I just shot somebody and I need help to get to the police because the crowd, there was a, not a crowd, a mob was chasing me.

00:10:55.580 And did Mr. Likowski offer you any help?

00:10:58.440 I don't remember.

00:11:00.900 What do you do then? 0.98

00:11:02.340 I continue to run after hearing people say, people were saying cranium him, get him, kill him.

00:11:12.580 People were screaming and I just was trying to get to the police running down Sheridan Road. 0.58

00:11:17.780 What I remember is running past Anthony Huber and as I'm running past Mr. Huber, he's holding a skateboard like a baseball bat.

00:11:28.800 And he swings it down and I block it with my arm trying to prevent it from hitting me, but it still hits me in the neck.

00:11:36.200 Mr. Huber, immediately after I'm kicked in the face, runs up as I'm sitting up to try to get up and get to the police.

00:11:45.720 I'm on my back and Mr. Huber runs up.

00:11:53.620 He, as I'm getting up, he strikes me in the neck with his skateboard a second time.

00:11:59.280 Then what happens?

00:11:59.980 He grabs my gun and I can feel it pulling away from me and I can feel the strap starting to come off my body.

00:12:09.480 And what do you do then?

00:12:11.240 I fire one shot. 0.57

00:12:12.400 Huber then takes a final few steps off to the side and dies shortly thereafter.

00:12:20.860 Within seconds of the Huber attack, Rittenhouse is attacked by another man, Gage Grosskreutz.

00:12:28.060 Gage had a loaded handgun.

00:12:29.880 It was concealed without a valid license, a charge the state has opted not to pursue.

00:12:35.260 Gage appears to first raise his hands and surrender as he sees Rittenhouse with his rifle.

00:12:40.320 Rittenhouse does not fire.

00:12:41.520 Then Gage charges Rittenhouse.

00:12:44.960 Gage points his own handgun directly at Rittenhouse from just a few feet away.

00:12:51.800 And only at that point does Rittenhouse fire his weapon, wounding Gage's arm.

00:12:58.220 When you were standing three to five feet from him with your arms up in the air, he never fired, right?

00:13:06.260 Correct.

00:13:06.700 It wasn't until you pointed your gun at him, advanced on him with your gun, now your hands down, pointed at him, that he fired, right?

00:13:17.280 Correct.

00:13:17.720 This is all clearly self-defense.

00:13:23.100 It's classic self-defense.

00:13:24.880 That was made clear during the prosecution's own case.

00:13:27.700 In my view, there was no need for the defense to put Kyle Rittenhouse on the stand.

00:13:30.940 But when they did, the prosecution floundered time and time again.

00:13:35.160 First, Kyle was humanized.

00:13:38.440 As I pointed out, the media has painted this kid as a monster in front of the jury pool and the country.

00:13:45.100 Now, this is really just a kid, one who's been through hell this past year thanks to an overzealous prosecutor, a dishonest media, and public figures who don't care at all about facts appearing to smell blood in the water.

00:13:59.600 Yesterday, it all seemed to catch up with Rittenhouse, who broke down on the stand.

00:14:02.900 Once I take that step back, I look over my shoulder, and Mr. Rosenbaum, Mr. Rosenbaum was now running from my right side, and I was cornered from in front of me with Mr. Zeminski.

00:14:24.520 And there were – there were three people right there.

00:14:43.860 Take a deep breath, Kyle.

00:14:52.060 That's – whatever.

00:14:54.520 This is not some career criminal.

00:15:02.420 This is a kid that made the wrong decision that night, who felt frustrated by the lack of police presence and the ongoing destruction of property, and decided to do something about it, which is not the way.

00:15:13.600 I mean, you can understand why, but it's not the way.

00:15:15.980 He knows that himself now, whose life has been completely upended.

00:15:21.580 Yes, two men are dead.

00:15:22.720 But you can see why it happened.

00:15:26.420 You can see how it happened.

00:15:28.300 So in the wake of that testimony, did the media or these know-it-all activists do any self-reflection?

00:15:35.980 You tell me.

00:15:37.440 LeBron James just tweeted out, quote,

00:15:39.840 Hakeem Jeffries, the head of the House Democratic Caucus, tweeted, lock up Kyle Rittenhouse and throw away the key.

00:15:57.640 Do you know anything about law, about criminal law, anything at all?

00:16:01.420 Have you bothered to look into it, even a little?

00:16:04.120 Have you followed the trial at all before you decided to make a public comment from that post? 0.98

00:16:09.560 Disgusting. 1.00

00:16:10.560 Dishonest. 0.97

00:16:11.080 And the natural product of what happens when the false ideological social justice crew meets actual fact-based courtroom justice, where truth and fairness still matter?

00:16:23.600 Joining me now to discuss it all is Rob Grueler, a criminal defense attorney and founding partner of R&R Law Group.

00:16:32.460 Rob, thank you so much for being here.

00:16:34.600 So what do you make of my assessment of this case?

00:16:37.200 First of all, Megan, thank you so much for having me.

00:16:40.260 I absolutely think it was brilliant.

00:16:42.180 I agree with you completely.

00:16:43.420 I've been following this case since August of 2020 when it happened.

00:16:47.460 And I agree with your assessment that this case should have never been brought in the first place.

00:16:52.040 We covered the probable cause statement, the original documentation that was supposed to justify the charges.

00:16:58.560 And when we read through that, paragraph by paragraph, a lot of the evidence that you just sort of revealed to your audience was in that document.

00:17:06.980 We heard from Richard McGinnis, even, who was sort of he wasn't shot, but he was a reporter who was running behind Rosenbaum.

00:17:14.380 And he came out and confirmed a lot of the same things that we heard from other government witnesses, that Rosenbaum was the aggressor, that he was using the N-word, screaming that at people at supposedly a BLM protest,

00:17:26.300 that he was the provocateur, he was the ultimate aggressor.

00:17:30.980 And that set in sequence a series of events that led to the subsequent shootings.

00:17:35.600 And so when you just break this down individually, you look at every alleged victim, whether it's Rosenbaum or Grosskowitz or Huber,

00:17:42.640 it seems pretty consistent that Kyle Rittenhouse in every instance was defending himself.

00:17:48.160 And so for people like me, I'm a defense attorney.

00:17:50.700 I was able to sort of watch this at day one and see these facts clearly and communicate them on my YouTube channel.

00:17:58.040 I was very frustrated by what I heard from the media.

00:18:00.600 As you described, you said a lot of people were commenting on this case and characterizing it in a completely erroneous legal way that made it difficult to have a serious conversation about it.

00:18:10.960 And this isn't some hardened criminal, like you said.

00:18:12.980 This is Kyle Rittenhouse.

00:18:14.380 At the time, he was 17 years old.

00:18:16.460 He was frustrated with his environment in the middle of what many officers, even in this trial,

00:18:22.540 Pep Moretti was an officer who came out and testified in the government's case in chief that they were in the middle of a war zone.

00:18:28.120 And so not ideal for a 17-year-old young man to be over there, but he was there.

00:18:33.020 And the fact that he was assaulted, attacked by multiple individuals, in my humble opinion, justifies him in his use of self-defense.

00:18:41.220 And I think that what Thomas Binger has been doing throughout this trial has been really underhanded to sort of set in in motion this caricature that he's this lawless, reckless maniac running around Kenosha just trying to shoot people.

00:18:53.040 Yeah, he he made it sound like trying to find this.

00:18:58.420 I think it's soundbite number five, like he that Kyle Rittenhouse went there wanting to kill, intending to kill.

00:19:06.140 Listen to the D.A. soundbite five.

00:19:09.100 Good morning, Mr. Rittenhouse.

00:19:10.360 Good morning.

00:19:12.220 Everybody that you shot at that night, you intended to kill, correct?

00:19:16.760 I didn't intend to kill them.

00:19:18.300 I intended to stop the people who were attacking me. 1.00

00:19:22.260 By killing them? 0.95

00:19:24.680 I did what I had to do to stop the person who was attacking me. 1.00

00:19:29.880 By killing them?

00:19:31.520 Two of them passed away, but I stopped the threat from attacking me. 0.99

00:19:36.460 By using deadly force?

00:19:38.140 I used deadly force.

00:19:39.520 That you knew was going to kill.

00:19:42.060 I didn't know if it was going to kill them, but I used deadly force to stop the threat that was attacking me.

00:19:47.700 You intentionally used deadly force against Joseph Rosenbaum, correct?

00:19:53.240 Yes.

00:19:53.740 You intentionally used deadly force against the man who came and tried to kick you in the face, correct?

00:19:59.640 You intentionally used deadly force against Anthony Huber, correct?

00:20:04.340 Yes.

00:20:04.640 You intentionally used deadly force against Gage Grosskreutz, correct?

00:20:09.020 Yes.

00:20:09.340 I mean, that's not in dispute that he intentionally used deadly force.

00:20:13.440 That's not in dispute.

00:20:14.300 But trying to get him to say he wanted them to die?

00:20:17.600 I mean, what a swing and a miss.

00:20:20.140 Well, you just saw it.

00:20:22.480 Yeah, that wasn't a good attempt.

00:20:23.860 And we saw a lot of this with Thomas Binger throughout this trial.

00:20:26.760 It was a lot of filler, just a lot of attempts to sort of ask the same question five, six different ways.

00:20:32.120 And I think that the jury really starts to get sort of tired of that.

00:20:35.320 I mean, I got tired of it listening to it.

00:20:37.300 I'm a lawyer.

00:20:37.840 I sort of geek out about this stuff.

00:20:39.620 And, you know, that sequence of questions was asked sort of in different permutations all throughout the trial.

00:20:45.120 Wait, let me let me show them that.

00:20:46.440 Let me hold hold the second part of your thoughts.

00:20:48.440 I'd love to get your the audience to hear what you're talking about.

00:20:51.440 Here's the prosecution going at it again.

00:20:53.420 Soundbite six.

00:20:55.400 Mr. Rosenbaum was chasing me.

00:20:57.660 I pointed my gun at him and that did not deter him.

00:21:01.180 He could have ran away instead of trying to take my gun from me.

00:21:05.120 But he kept chasing me.

00:21:06.480 It didn't stop him.

00:21:08.620 Mr. Rittenhouse, you're telling us that you felt like you were about to die, right?

00:21:16.240 Yes.

00:21:16.920 But when you point the gun at someone else, that's going to make them feel like they're about to die, right?

00:21:23.200 That's what you wanted him to feel.

00:21:24.980 No. 1.00

00:21:25.840 You wanted him to get the message from you that if you come any closer, I'm going to kill you. 0.98

00:21:32.120 That's why you pointed the gun at him, right? 0.85

00:21:33.940 I pointed the gun at him to deter him from I pointed the gun at him so he would stop chasing me.

00:21:40.680 It's amazing.

00:21:41.680 Kyle Rittenhouse is smarter than this DA.

00:21:43.920 I mean, that's every exchange.

00:21:45.080 This is what I want to wind up thinking.

00:21:46.360 This kid is smarter than this DA.

00:21:47.840 He does.

00:21:49.600 He's got a ton of courage.

00:21:50.880 I was really impressed with him yesterday.

00:21:52.620 You know, I mentioned or you mentioned that maybe you'd have some questions about putting Kyle Rittenhouse on the stand, but he did an outstanding job.

00:22:00.060 There were some some areas where I think his attorneys maybe could have jumped in to, you know, object and protect him a little bit more.

00:22:05.220 But by and large, I mean, Kyle Rittenhouse, think about this young man.

00:22:08.280 And I was communicating about the stressors and the pressures that exist upon anybody in the criminal justice system.

00:22:14.300 But not to mention an 18 year old young man who is facing decades in prison, who is dealing with homicide charges, who's looking at a jury panel of now 18 people, all judging him.

00:22:25.540 He's got a year of the media beating up on him for a year and a half.

00:22:28.860 I even think some people in the Biden administration used his image as a white supremacist.

00:22:32.980 And so, you know, you have this discussion about whether he should have taken the stand and the pros and the cons.

00:22:38.720 And you can get into that till the end of the earth.

00:22:40.420 But he did.

00:22:41.060 He took the stand.

00:22:41.720 I think a big part of it is he wanted to clear his name.

00:22:44.400 He wanted to make sure that he could rebut all of the allegations that were were coming his direction, even if they weren't necessarily criminal legal charges.

00:22:53.540 They were still, you know, accusations his direction.

00:22:55.920 And he cleared a lot of them up and he did so, you know, masterfully.

00:22:59.360 I think that the defense gave the prosecution sort of an opportunity on a silver platter and they totally blew it.

00:23:06.380 Yes, exactly.

00:23:07.180 Exactly. 0.89

00:23:07.580 To get him on the stand and to be that inept as the prosecutor prosecution and your cross-examination. 0.93

00:23:13.360 It's embarrassing.

00:23:14.800 We're going to talk next about why the defense has filed a motion for a mistrial with prejudice.

00:23:20.220 They want this thing kicked and in a way that it could not be refiled.

00:23:24.480 And why now some are coming after the judge as racist.

00:23:29.260 Much more with Rob right after this.

00:23:30.820 So one of the other, I mean, there were so many bad moments from this DA, the assistant district attorney, Thomas Binger, to choose from.

00:23:44.640 But one of the other areas in which it fell flat that the audience can hear for themselves is where he was questioning Rittenhouse about whether Rosenbaum, the first man killed, ever said he would take Kyle's gun.

00:23:58.960 This is soundbite number eight.

00:24:00.380 Listen, tell this ends.

00:24:02.800 What was the risk to you of death or great bodily harm at the moment you killed Joseph Rosenbaum?

00:24:15.140 If I would have let Mr. Rosenbaum take my firearm from me, he would have used it and killed me with it and probably killed more people if I would have let him get my gun.

00:24:26.980 Mr. Rosenbaum never said anything to you about taking your gun, did he?

00:24:33.240 He didn't say anything, but he tried to take my gun.

00:24:36.460 And whoever's got that gun is a threat to everyone else?

00:24:39.200 If he would have taken my gun, he would have used it against me.

00:24:45.040 He didn't say anything to me about taking my gun.

00:24:48.080 He just tried to take it.

00:24:50.360 It's been very strange to try to tease out what Mr.

00:24:54.240 Binger's acceptable standard of self-defense would be, because we've already heard from a number of the different alleged victims in this case that they've done something that is sort of aggressive, a little bit provocative.

00:25:06.420 Again, we heard from Rosenbaum physically chasing Rittenhouse, but apparently that doesn't qualify.

00:25:12.000 We heard about Anthony Huber, who was swinging a skateboard over the head and hitting Kyle Rittenhouse in the head.

00:25:17.960 Apparently that doesn't justify self-defense.

00:25:20.180 And then we saw from Gage Grosskowitz that he actually pointed a gun, his hands were up, but then actually reengaged Kyle Rittenhouse, who then used self-defense at that moment as well.

00:25:29.820 But every single time that Thomas Binger asked Kyle Rittenhouse about this, he sort of makes it appear that that was totally unreasonable.

00:25:36.900 And so it's, you know, we're sort of joking about this on the Internet and on LawTube and LawTwitter that the only time that it would actually be justified is maybe if Kyle actually was shot or actually got stabbed in the middle of an actual physical assault taking place.

00:25:51.140 Maybe then Binger would be OK with self-defense.

00:25:53.400 Yeah, that's right. So and by the way, what's with Binger asking all the open questions, right?

00:25:57.760 You don't do that on cross. You only it should be yeses and nos on cross only.

00:26:01.400 That's it. You you drive the dialogue. You don't let the witness drive the dialogue.

00:26:06.100 OK, so the judge and Binger, the the ADA, got into it yesterday.

00:26:12.060 And let me just set up this soundbite.

00:26:14.480 So basically, Binger did two things that ticked off the judge and the defense counsel.

00:26:18.740 Number one, he tried to bring into evidence Kyle Rittenhouse saying a couple of weeks prior to this incident in watching some sort of property damage.

00:26:27.820 I think he just watched it online, right? He wasn't even there.

00:26:30.480 I wish I had my gun so I could, like, shoot these guys. 1.00

00:26:33.460 It's just like bullshit rhetoric, right? 1.00

00:26:35.580 Fill me. Fill me in on that, Rob. Fill that out. 1.00

00:26:37.440 Yes, it's a 17 year old kid who's just, you know, it's kind of body talk.

00:26:41.900 And there was a prior incident back in August where Kyle Rittenhouse was in the area, in the vicinity.

00:26:47.620 There was a CVS video where apparently he was outside of CVS.

00:26:51.380 And there's somebody recording footage of him watching shoplifting happening and saying something to the effect, if I had my weapon, I would be able to stop this from occurring.

00:27:02.100 And so what Thomas Binger wanted to do is bring that in as evidence and sort of show that Kyle was acting in conformity with that prior statement.

00:27:11.640 And so the way he fleshed this whole thing out, it was very underhanded, in my opinion.

00:27:14.880 But he started to walk down a line of questioning with Kyle Rittenhouse about property and about property defending property and says, you know, you can't shoot Rosenbaum to protect property, right?

00:27:26.300 You can't use deadly force in order to save car source, which is the property that we were talking about there.

00:27:31.500 And so he gets Kyle to agree a number of times that, yes, I agree.

00:27:35.520 You can't use self-defense to protect property.

00:27:37.860 So then he says, well, then why did you say that in that earlier August 17th or 15th date to that person who was recording you outside the CVS?

00:27:46.540 And that at that moment, there was an objection from the defense.

00:27:50.800 And the judge had already known that this was an issue that was discussed during the pretrial proceedings, that this shouldn't have been considered to be a wide open door for the prosecution to just walk through.

00:28:00.400 Judge wanted Binger to give him some some.

00:28:04.920 Acknowledgement that this might be coming so the judge could issue a ruling.

00:28:07.860 And when Binger didn't do that, the judge really scolded him aggressively, right?

00:28:11.940 Because the judge in the pretrial motions had said, I don't think I'm going to let that in.

00:28:15.620 And when you're when that is said to you as a as a lawyer, that means if I try to get it in, I got to get the judge's approval before I go here.

00:28:23.620 I can't just spring this in front of the jury because I've already been admonished by this judge.

00:28:27.960 He doesn't think it's coming in.

00:28:29.340 And that's what the judge got so mad about.

00:28:30.500 That was one.

00:28:31.160 And the second the second sin committed by Binger was he said is followed as follows to to Kyle Rittenhouse.

00:28:39.640 He basically questioned his his Fifth Amendment right not to count, not to testify.

00:28:44.140 So Binger comes up and says to him, this is the first time you've told your story since August 25, 2020, isn't it?

00:28:51.340 And you've had the benefit of seeing countless videos of your action that night and hearing the testimony of 30 some witnesses who have testified in this case.

00:28:59.080 And the defense attorney, Mark Richards, objected.

00:29:02.020 That was sustained.

00:29:03.920 And the judge was mad.

00:29:05.640 Why?

00:29:05.840 Well, because that's sort of the rule number one is you don't comment on a defendant's right to remain silent.

00:29:13.660 I mean, it's in the Constitution.

00:29:14.660 It's a pretty sacred right.

00:29:16.400 And it's one of the first things that I would I've never been a prosecutor, but I would imagine they tell you when you're going to trial practice as a lawyer, you know, don't cross those sacred constitutional boundaries.

00:29:25.340 And Thomas Binger is not an inexperienced attorney.

00:29:28.280 The DA's office over there in Kenosha is not very big.

00:29:31.500 I think we did a count of all the different county attorneys there, something like nine to 12 different attorneys.

00:29:36.240 And so you could presume that if a case of national importance comes across their desk, they're going to give it to somebody who they consider to be highly litigious, somebody highly competent who's been doing it for a while.

00:29:45.800 And so that presumably was Thomas Binger.

00:29:47.900 And Thomas Binger gets out there and in front of the jury starts commenting on the right to remain silent and a defendant's constitutional protection in that regard.

00:29:56.580 Then starts to even thread the needle a little bit further by trying to get that other evidence admitted from the CBS video that took place earlier in August.

00:30:06.160 And so the judge is just seeing a very experienced trial attorney looking like they might be intentionally trying to cause a mistrial or straddle that line in a way that is not permissible.

00:30:17.020 Yeah. So that was some speculation that that the DA was trying to cause a mistrial is normally a mistrial is the case gets dismissed in the middle of the of the trial without prejudice.

00:30:28.440 So you get a second try. And I mean, normally it's the defense attorney who wants a mistrial because you get the advantage of seeing the prosecution's whole case and then you get another bite of the apple.

00:30:37.720 Right. You're better positioned in trial, too.

00:30:39.420 But right now, the defense doesn't want a mistrial because they're winning if they want a mistrial.

00:30:44.360 They want it with prejudice, which they did ask for at the end of yesterday's proceedings based on the things that you just mentioned.

00:30:50.940 But just here is some of the judges leading up to now the accusations that this judge is some sort of a racist.

00:30:58.060 This well-respected judge, he's, I think, the most senior judge in the Kenosha Circuit Court.

00:31:03.120 So he is calling Binger to task for those two errors that you just outlined.

00:31:09.040 Here's some of that exchange.

00:31:11.420 First of all, Your Honor, this was the subject of a motion.

00:31:14.580 I'm well aware of that. And the court left the door open.

00:31:19.480 For me, not for you.

00:31:21.440 Why would you think that that made it OK for you without any advance notice to bring this matter before the jury?

00:31:27.980 You are already, you were, I was astonished when you began your examination by commenting on the defendant's post-arrest silence.

00:31:40.440 That's basic law. It's been basic law in this country for 40 years, 50 years.

00:31:45.400 I have no idea why you would do something like that.

00:31:48.140 And it gives, well, I'll leave it at that.

00:31:52.460 So I don't know what you're up to.

00:31:53.840 He's acknowledged that he's used this gun to protect property.

00:31:57.760 He's also just acknowledged that he knows he can't do that.

00:32:01.640 I am attempting to impeach him now with the prior August 10th incident, 15 days prior,

00:32:08.000 involving the same gun where he is threatening to use that gun to protect property.

00:32:12.700 He didn't have the gun, wasn't it? 0.86

00:32:14.940 Your Honor, he is saying he wished he did so he could shoot people.

00:32:18.440 You know, there's a lot of difference between commenting about something when you haven't got a gun

00:32:23.820 and threatening someone when you do.

00:32:26.720 Just hours ago, I said I had heard nothing in this trial to change any of my rulings.

00:32:32.400 So why?

00:32:33.300 That was before the testimony, Your Honor.

00:32:33.980 Pardon me?

00:32:34.440 That was before the testimony.

00:32:36.060 Don't get brazen with me.

00:32:37.140 You knew very well, you know very well that an attorney can't go into these types of areas

00:32:45.640 when the judge has already ruled without asking outside the presence of the jury to do so.

00:32:50.840 So don't give me that.

00:32:51.500 I thought, this is my good faith explanation to you, and if you want to yell at me, you can.

00:32:57.780 My good faith feeling this morning after watching that testimony was,

00:33:01.660 you had left the door open a little bit, now we had something new, and I was going to probe it.

00:33:06.300 I don't believe you.

00:33:08.680 There better not be another incident.

00:33:10.180 I'll take the motion under advisement, and you can respond.

00:33:18.200 When you say that you were acting in good faith, I don't believe that, okay?

00:33:22.440 Let's proceed.

00:33:24.400 Everybody in good faith.

00:33:27.700 Not a good day for the prosecution.

00:33:29.440 Not at all.

00:33:31.080 Not at all.

00:33:31.960 And to be fair, I don't believe him either.

00:33:34.020 I think that he was intentionally trying to kind of squeeze that one through.

00:33:37.900 If you did listen to the pretrial proceedings in a little bit more depth, then you would have seen that they discussed a lot of this stuff.

00:33:44.460 And the judge is a little bit different than some other jurisdictions.

00:33:50.160 So, for example, if you say this judge, compare him to Judge Cahill that we saw in Chauvin, just a little bit of a different demeanor.

00:33:56.220 He's a little bit more loose, sort of likes to hear stuff on the fly.

00:33:59.800 We didn't have a lot of resolutions on the pretrial proceedings, a lot of these motions in limine.

00:34:03.860 And so he did say, yes, at a later time when the evidence comes up, when the time is right, you need to flag this for me, Mr. Prosecutor, Mr. Defense Attorney, so that I can make a decision about where this line of questioning goes or where this evidence should, whether it should be admissible or not.

00:34:18.540 And from my watching of it, it felt like there was a pretty clear understanding that that was going to be how this was going to work.

00:34:25.860 It's you ask for permission when you get there.

00:34:28.640 You don't just get to decide, well, the judge didn't make a ruling on this, so I'm just going to try to escape this one through.

00:34:33.960 And you might you might excuse a prosecutor for making a mistake if they're a first year prosecutor or this is not a case of national importance.

00:34:42.260 But this is Thomas Binger.

00:34:43.820 This case has been in national news for almost 18 months now.

00:34:47.440 And so it's something that I think the judge is exactly right to presume that maybe there's something else going on here.

00:34:55.820 Not not in evidence yet, but it does feel underhanded because the judge said pretrial.

00:35:01.620 I'm predisposed not to allow this.

00:35:04.300 And, you know, very well, as a lawyer, you have to ask permission.

00:35:07.860 It's not your courtroom. It's the judge's courtroom.

00:35:10.160 He or she gets to set the rules. You're just there to follow them.

00:35:13.140 And the last thing you want to do is take off the judge.

00:35:14.800 The judge is getting guff for like being tough on the prosecutor.

00:35:17.440 The prosecutor provoked it. When I talk about provocation, he provoked that.

00:35:21.400 So what what now specifically is the defense basing its motion for a mistrial with prejudice on?

00:35:29.000 Was it the Fifth Amendment thing that the attempt to get the that other CVS comment in or both or more?

00:35:35.580 It's the idea that the prosecution might be intentionally trying to cause a mistrial.

00:35:41.220 So there was a break later that afternoon and defense attorney Corey Chirifisi went out, did some research with his defense team and came back and he cited a case.

00:35:49.140 I don't remember what it was, but he says, Judge, there's two things that you need to consider here moving forward.

00:35:53.780 Number one, whether the government, the prosecutor's conduct was intentional.

00:35:57.780 So, you know, did they intend to do these things? Was this a mistake?

00:36:00.940 Was this an accident that they commented on this or tried to get this evidence introduced?

00:36:05.220 Doesn't feel like that to me.

00:36:06.320 I think you can probably check the box on that, that even prosecutor Binger said, I want to ask him about this.

00:36:12.480 It's sort of the next line of questions in his notes.

00:36:14.860 And he was going barreling ahead right into those without ever getting permission from the court.

00:36:19.720 So was it intentional?

00:36:21.700 Maybe yes or no.

00:36:22.700 But if that if that element has been met, then you can move on to the second element, which is that the court finds the judge makes a finding that the government may have been doing this or was, in fact, doing this to cause a mistrial.

00:36:34.920 You know, it's such sort of a boneheaded mistake that when you're in the middle of of a trial, in particular, a middle of the defendant's testimony where you start to try to, you know, walk along those constitutional lines, not so that it's a direct violation where you get in trouble, you get a bar complaint, you lose your law license, nothing like that, but enough that it just kind of crosses that line so that the case is tainted and you have to have a mistrial.

00:37:01.160 And if the court makes that finding that maybe these highly experienced prosecutors were trying to tip the scale so that they can get a do over, as you mentioned earlier, they know that they're losing.

00:37:12.120 And so if if they lose, they can't get a do over.

00:37:15.780 But if they get a mistrial, they can.

00:37:17.740 And if there's that little bit of sort of underhanded nefariousness there, if the court makes that finding, that would justify a motion to dismiss with prejudice so that they cannot bring this back.

00:37:27.060 It would be the end of the case for Kyle Rittenhouse.

00:37:29.620 Oh, my gosh, that would be huge for the defense.

00:37:32.600 Do we know how the judge is feeling?

00:37:33.900 He's announced to the jury he thinks the case will wrap up, I think he said, on Tuesday.

00:37:37.420 The fact that he didn't grant a mistrial, you know, right then and there, does that mean it's not going to happen?

00:37:43.120 So he did take it under advisement.

00:37:45.100 I still think that it's probably unlikely that it does get granted.

00:37:49.060 A lot of people are saying the fact that he took it under advisement is a good thing.

00:37:52.640 You know, oftentimes a judge will just say no and make a ruling right there on the record.

00:37:56.960 So at least he is thinking about it.

00:37:58.860 He is considering it.

00:38:00.340 And if you compare that with a lot of the other clips that we have seen and testimony from the trial, the judge has been very unhappy with this prosecutor consistently.

00:38:09.260 Even in some of the clips you played here today said, I warned you about that this morning and you're continuing to do it again.

00:38:14.760 Don't let it happen again.

00:38:16.300 But I still think it's probably a little bit of a long shot just because this judge has made multiple statements saying that he wants to make sure this is done the right way.

00:38:25.420 He wants to make sure the jury is considered to be the fact finder.

00:38:29.680 So I don't think that the judge politically wants to take this away from them.

00:38:33.200 I think he wants to allow the process to work itself out without causing anything that would derail this long process because it has been a long one.

00:38:41.880 Especially in a case this carefully watched to take it away from the jury and say it can't be refiled.

00:38:48.900 I mean, that would just be incredibly bold.

00:38:50.880 And I would say in the prosecutor's defense, it was a sin.

00:38:55.300 I don't think it was a dismissal with prejudice level sin.

00:38:59.100 I know other lawyers disagree with me.

00:39:00.500 I just think if he had sort of gotten all over Kyle and said, you know, you didn't testify.

00:39:05.240 You didn't say anything because you knew you were guilty.

00:39:08.100 You didn't want to take a position that now we're talking, but like just sort of this is the first statement you've made since the beginning.

00:39:14.860 It's not OK, but it's not that bad.

00:39:18.380 Yeah, it was weaselly.

00:39:19.540 It was not kind of the right thing to do.

00:39:21.500 He had, I think, some plausible deniability there.

00:39:24.020 He could go back and reference the judge's prior statement and said, well, you left the door open.

00:39:28.040 And the judge did. And, you know, this is sort of the downside of having a little bit of a looser format in your courtroom where you don't have all of the motions and eliminate ironed out before the trial even starts.

00:39:40.120 So, you know, Thomas Binger, I think, was exploiting that to some degree.

00:39:43.640 I think that if you're going to be an aggressive litigator, you're always sort of, you know, pushing the envelope a little bit, not doing anything unethical, but you're trying to win.

00:39:51.780 And that's the sort of the point of being a strong advocate is you're you're using the tools that are in front of you.

00:39:57.760 I don't excuse anything Binger did, but I'm just saying, like, I don't know that it rises to the level of the trial goes away immediately and can't be refiled.

00:40:05.100 But I will say, you know, you're in there as a prosecutor.

00:40:06.960 You're you're supposed to be on the side of justice.

00:40:09.400 You're actually not supposed to be on the side of get a conviction.

00:40:12.840 It's supposed to be that on the side of justice and you're representing the state and its interests.

00:40:18.120 And so he has sort of a higher calling and he's not living up to it, that you're not supposed to behave like that.

00:40:24.600 Listen, that exchange and and some others now are bringing some fire on this judge, a very well respected guy.

00:40:32.280 I guess his longest service longest serving circuit court judge in Wisconsin.

00:40:36.520 And there was a moment where his cell phone rang and it played a certain tune.

00:40:41.400 And that's going to play into these accusations that he's some sort of a racist.

00:40:45.420 We're going to pick it up right there after I squeeze in this quick break.

00:40:49.560 More with Rob right after this.

00:40:50.840 And remember, folks, you can find the Megan Kelly show live on Sirius XM Triumph Channel 111 every weekday at noon east and the full video show, which you really should watch today.

00:40:59.860 Go ahead and subscribe if you haven't, because you can see all the videos along with my monologue at the opening and some clips, too.

00:41:05.740 And you subscribe to our YouTube channel, YouTube dot com slash Megan Kelly.

00:41:08.960 If you prefer the audio podcast, just go ahead and subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Pandora, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:41:14.540 Now you'll find our full archives that have over 200 shows.

00:41:24.840 So this judge, his name is Bruce.

00:41:26.960 It's it's written Schroeder, but it's pronounced Schrader.

00:41:29.680 It is. Yeah.

00:41:30.640 And Schrader, I think, sounds a lot more tough.

00:41:35.080 Like Shredder. 0.92

00:41:36.520 Yes, that's what I call my little Strudwick Shredder, because that's what he's doing to everything, destroying it.

00:41:41.500 My puppy. Sorry, it's a longstanding issue.

00:41:43.480 So the judge has made a bunch of pretrial rulings, one of which was you may not refer to the three men shot to whom died, one of whom did not as victims.

00:41:55.920 But you may refer to them as as looters, rioters or something else.

00:42:03.420 Can you can you just expand on that?

00:42:05.020 Because this is this is now at issue.

00:42:07.580 Yeah. Causing a lot of contention for a lot of the commentators out there.

00:42:10.640 But the idea being, you know, that the word victim has some some negative connotation to it.

00:42:17.020 It sort of implies that somebody was wronged at the outset at the conclusion of a crime.

00:42:22.140 And it is also legally significant.

00:42:25.820 It means that somebody was the actual victim of a crime.

00:42:28.480 So it's got sort of this public perception of being a negative word and a legal connotation to it as well.

00:42:32.840 And so when you're talking with a judge about a criminal defendant who has not been adjudicated or convicted of anything yet, has not been found guilty at all, that person is still innocent.

00:42:44.340 They still retain the presumption of innocence.

00:42:46.160 And so even though it might make the prosecution feel good to start labeling Gage Grosskruitz and Anthony Huber as the victims, they have not been legally found to be the victims yet.

00:42:57.360 Kyle Rittenhouse still maintains the presumption of innocence until that's until that's disproven.

00:43:01.940 It's not fair. It's not right to call them that because it's not legally accurate.

00:43:06.300 Right. We're trying to figure out who the real victim was here.

00:43:09.180 So the judge in the midst of how long is the soundbite with the with the with the phone?

00:43:14.400 We don't have much time or. Oh, yeah.

00:43:16.960 OK, listen, listen to this. His phone rang and here is the sound.

00:43:22.540 The actions that I had talked about.

00:43:28.240 We're done in bad faith.

00:43:30.480 It's that I think was proud to be an American.

00:43:34.080 Now, listen to what Ellie Mistel of he's a justice correspondent for the nation, Harvard undergrad,

00:43:38.640 Harvard Law School, his summation of this judge.

00:43:42.300 And we've heard this elsewhere. Take a listen.

00:43:44.260 So if you look at all the decisions that Bruce Schrader has made, they have been heavily balanced and weighted towards Rittenhouse towards his defense.

00:43:53.380 There I see very few neutrals decisions in his history.

00:43:57.860 What we have is a judge who, from my perspective, has prejudged the trial in favor of Rittenhouse and has decided, again,

00:44:05.640 even at the pretrial stage to use every bit of his power to put his thumb on the scale towards Rittenhouse's side,

00:44:14.160 not just saying that these people can't be called victims.

00:44:17.940 Look, legally speaking, they were victims of homicide.

00:44:21.300 That's just a fact. But fine.

00:44:23.380 You want to say they can't be called victims because of the nature of the self-defense defense?

00:44:27.520 All right. You can kind of defend that decision.

00:44:30.180 But then he says they can be called looters, rioters, and arsonists, which is ridiculous.

00:44:35.280 The surviving victim hasn't been charged with looting, rioting, or arson.

00:44:40.220 So calling him a victim is just factually inaccurate.

00:44:42.720 So calling him a rioter is just factually inaccurate.

00:44:46.140 So you see what I'm saying? When you put the one and one together, you end up with two.

00:44:50.160 When you put one plus one plus one plus one plus one together, you end up with five.

00:44:53.860 And that's what Schrader is.

00:44:57.120 He has made a series of decisions.

00:45:00.160 Each one perhaps may be individually defensible, but in totality lead to the impression of a biased, racist judge

00:45:08.800 with his Trump rally cell phone that is trying to get Rittenhouse a walk.

00:45:16.140 Wow. Your thoughts on that?

00:45:18.660 Well, when you start to lose the argument, I think you just start to cry foul.

00:45:21.880 You start screaming about racism and bigotry and all sorts of biases and prejudices.

00:45:26.500 I don't see that from this judge at all.

00:45:28.360 This judge has talked about the Constitution a lot.

00:45:31.300 He's talked about the Roman era.

00:45:34.120 And he's got a lot of depth when it comes to the way the Constitution works and how it was assembled.

00:45:39.140 And so I don't think that some of his comments in favor of the Constitution are anything to consider to be racist.

00:45:46.080 I think he's just being a good judge.

00:45:47.460 By the way, apparently he has a longstanding rule of not allowing prosecutors to refer to people as victims before his juries.

00:45:57.240 He thinks that that's something the jury gets to decide.

00:45:59.540 So this is not a Kyle Rittenhouse thing.

00:46:01.340 This is a judge with a longstanding practice.

00:46:04.420 We'll continue to follow it.

00:46:05.800 We really appreciate your expertise, Rob.

00:46:07.440 And keep an eye on the trial and keep an eye on sources like Rob and this show.

00:46:12.180 If you want honest analysis, because the mainstream media, you heard how they're going to spin this.

00:46:16.320 And they will right through the verdict.

00:46:17.920 All the best, Rob.

00:46:18.480 Hope we can talk again soon.

00:46:19.880 In our next hour, we're going to start talking COVID, the vaccines, the new therapeutics.

00:46:25.320 Don't go away.

00:46:32.920 Joining me now is Brian Dressen.

00:46:34.840 He's a chemist based in Utah, and his wife, Brianne, took part in a U.S.-conducted trial of the AstraZeneca COVID vaccine with disastrous results.

00:46:46.380 And now they're speaking out about it publicly.

00:46:49.240 Hours after taking the very first dose, Brianne began to feel dizzy and her symptoms continued to worsen, eventually leaving her unable to walk.

00:46:57.000 When the trial information was released, you know, her participation in the trial, to the Dressen's surprise, Brianne's data was not accounted for.

00:47:05.180 It wasn't it wasn't in there.

00:47:06.280 They didn't mention what happened to her.

00:47:08.240 They say the CDC knows about the severe symptoms that some people are experiencing and the harm to vaccines that the vaccines pose to children.

00:47:15.520 And now they're fighting to share her story in the short story of others like her.

00:47:18.460 Brian, thank you so much for being here.

00:47:20.480 Thank you for having me.

00:47:21.340 This is a nightmare.

00:47:22.580 You guys testified before the FDA panel when they were considering the vaccine for five to 11 year olds.

00:47:29.360 And your wife did take place in this trial for AstraZeneca.

00:47:33.120 And she was living a healthy, robust life prior to this.

00:47:35.940 She wasn't somebody somebody who had some sort of chronic illness or psychological issues that continue to make her feel ill at every turn.

00:47:45.680 She was fine.

00:47:46.240 Yeah, she was absolutely fine.

00:47:47.980 Healthy, hiking mountains, you know, taking care of the kids, rock climbing, skiing, all of all of the things that we love to do.

00:47:55.080 So she decides to take place in the in the trial of the AstraZeneca vaccine, which is widely used in Europe.

00:48:01.020 Why? Why did she decide to do that? 1.00

00:48:03.680 So me being a scientist, we're a science loving family.

00:48:07.380 We were concerned about COVID.

00:48:09.060 We wanted to, you know, protect our family.

00:48:11.600 We wanted to further the science.

00:48:12.940 We wanted to help end the pandemic.

00:48:14.220 And so she was presented with the opportunity to to partake in the trial and chose to sign up.

00:48:20.220 You know, she was so confident in, you know, the vaccines being developed that, you know, she would be able to get a vaccine potentially and then not have to experience COVID herself and help protect her family and her community as well as further the science.

00:48:33.900 And so when did she take place in the first in the trial?

00:48:36.400 So she had her first dose November 4th of 2020.

00:48:40.780 So just over a year ago.

00:48:42.540 OK. And what happened?

00:48:43.700 So right after she got the shot, we were driving home and she said something doesn't feel right.

00:48:51.380 She had tingling down her arm where she got the shot.

00:48:54.460 She started to notice that her vision was changing.

00:48:57.720 Her ears became very, very sensitive to sound.

00:49:00.740 Her eyes were so sensitive to light.

00:49:02.660 She had to put on the darkest sunglasses.

00:49:04.300 Later that night, she had the typical vaccine response that they tell you to expect, you know, the fever and all of those things.

00:49:11.820 But that had resolved by morning.

00:49:13.720 However, she experienced new symptoms that next morning.

00:49:17.040 She couldn't really walk properly.

00:49:19.160 Her left foot was sort of slumping, she calls it.

00:49:22.200 She was walking into doorways.

00:49:24.280 The sound and light sensitivity were severe.

00:49:26.440 She was still experiencing the numbness and tingling.

00:49:28.840 And the symptoms just kept progressing and getting worse.

00:49:33.040 We called the test clinic.

00:49:35.140 They didn't respond for a couple of days.

00:49:37.300 Finally, they responded, brought her in, did an exam, said, you know what?

00:49:41.740 There were a couple of instances of transverse myelitis and MS in the previous trials.

00:49:46.480 You might have MS and you should go see a neurologist.

00:49:49.200 Oh, my Lord.

00:49:49.760 So we ended up in the ER three days later.

00:49:52.220 They did all of the tests that they could, ruled out any of those, you know, pre-existing type conditions.

00:49:58.060 And essentially said, we don't know what's going on, but best of luck to you and sent her home to continue to decline.

00:50:06.440 We went to the ER two more times and then a fourth time and she was finally hospitalized.

00:50:12.560 At this point, she couldn't walk.

00:50:14.540 She was incontinent.

00:50:16.260 She was peeing her pants.

00:50:18.020 She still had to wear earmuffs to be anywhere that wasn't a dark room.

00:50:22.280 She had extreme sensitivity to sound.

00:50:25.640 You couldn't touch her.

00:50:26.700 She couldn't brush her teeth.

00:50:28.820 I mean, it was just a hellacious experience.

00:50:32.060 How old is she at this point?

00:50:34.180 She's 39 years old at this point.

00:50:36.360 Oh, my goodness.

00:50:37.180 Now she's 40.

00:50:38.840 So who do you go to specifically, the people running the clinic?

00:50:43.340 Like, who do you call to say, you need to know this happened?

00:50:47.220 Right.

00:50:47.500 So each of the clinical trials, you know, they're, they're essentially performed by all these trial sites and all of the different states and cities.

00:50:56.460 And so we, we call the test clinic.

00:50:59.000 That's what they call these.

00:51:00.040 So they're the ones who administer the shots and, you know, collect the data and then send it on to, in this case, AstraZeneca.

00:51:06.640 And so that, that's who we called was the doctors at the test clinic to say, you know what, something's not right here.

00:51:13.220 Something's going on.

00:51:15.000 And they, they didn't offer any, they didn't offer any help to you.

00:51:19.560 You were on your own in dealing with the fallout from it.

00:51:22.380 And then it's, it seems like, you know, the other shoe to drop was when you saw her negative outcome was not included in the results of the clinical trial.

00:51:35.500 Right.

00:51:36.300 So the clinical trial report wasn't released until last month, but I was a little bit suspicious given that the test clinic sort of didn't seem super interested.

00:51:45.820 The feedback we were getting from AstraZeneca was essentially, we need a diagnosis.

00:51:51.840 We need a diagnosis, anything that would essentially absolve them of any responsibility.

00:51:57.620 Right.

00:51:57.820 So I was concerned in January.

00:52:01.220 So this happened in November.

00:52:02.500 In January, I reached out to the NIH to, you know, see if they had any thoughts on this.

00:52:10.080 And to my surprise, they actually responded really quickly.

00:52:12.560 We had a telehealth visit with doctors at the NIH.

00:52:16.600 They wanted to bring her out for testing and possible treatment. 0.84

00:52:21.680 However, this was January and, you know, the NIH is located in Maryland.

00:52:26.320 And around this time, we had a lot of civil unrest and other things going on.

00:52:30.400 They weren't sure with the inauguration, if they could safely bring her out.

00:52:35.020 And so they weren't able to bring her out at this time.

00:52:38.460 And they offered to talk to her doctors locally to try and get them to perform the proper tests to come to a proper diagnosis.

00:52:48.020 But even with their involvement, our local doctors were still incredulous.

00:52:52.840 And because none of the test results would come back, you know, abnormal, they just said, well, this might be all in your head.

00:52:58.800 It's probably just anxiety.

00:53:00.020 You can't walk because you have anxiety.

00:53:01.800 Oh, my gosh.

00:53:04.020 So, I mean, was any did anything show up on any test?

00:53:07.840 Because one of the things I read was that she started to suffer severe brain damage and was obviously advised by those running the trial not to get the second dose.

00:53:17.540 Was that something that manifested in a CT scan or something?

00:53:20.980 No, so all of the adverse reactions were essentially symptomatic until we actually were able to go to the NIH and get proper testing done.

00:53:31.740 And so all of these symptoms, you know, the neurological decline and everything else was very, very concerning.

00:53:39.200 But nobody really knew what to do with it because when you do the, you know, the CT or the MRI, everything looks normal.

00:53:47.100 All of her testing essentially was coming back normal.

00:53:49.680 Hmm. So did you ever make it to the NIH?

00:53:53.600 We did. We went to the NIH in June where they did a whole battery of testing and she was eventually diagnosed with a bunch of vaccine-caused injuries.

00:54:03.600 So the NIH acknowledged that?

00:54:06.120 Yes.

00:54:07.260 So how does it wind up that as recently as last month, her negative vaccine-caused injuries are not in the report?

00:54:15.400 Exactly.

00:54:15.880 So in a clinical trial, essentially the participants are given an app on their smartphones where they report any of the side effects.

00:54:24.680 However, the only side effects you're allowed to report is a bulleted list of selected adverse events.

00:54:31.420 The things like fever, muscle aches, injection site pain, headache, you know, tiredness, things like that.

00:54:38.040 There is no free form where you can write, you know, I can't walk anymore or I can't be in bright light or my ears are so sensitive or any of the other things that she experienced.

00:54:48.340 So you have to call the test clinic, explain to them what's going on, and then it's up to them to report up the chain, right, with potential reporting and clinician bias, you know, the adverse events.

00:55:01.940 And they didn't?

00:55:03.640 It would appear not.

00:55:05.500 Oh.

00:55:06.600 When they said it's a vaccine-caused injury, did they explain what the injury is that's causing all these symptoms?

00:55:13.380 So their hypothesis is that it's an immune-mediated response to the spike protein that in certain individuals results in severe neurological injury.

00:55:24.900 Oh, my gosh.

00:55:26.960 So you, here's a, I know you connected with Senator Ron Johnson and Senator Mike Lee, and your wife gave some testimony before a Senate committee about what has happened to her.

00:55:37.360 We've got a clip of that so we can see Brianne here.

00:55:40.900 Watch.

00:55:42.280 We all suffered the same constellation of symptoms, and we reached out to our elected representatives, both blue and red.

00:55:49.620 We reached out to the COVID committee.

00:55:51.860 We then reached out to the media, being repeatedly told that we can't make the vaccines look bad.

00:55:57.740 We reached out to our state health boards, our state health departments, all of them persisting in the narrative that if this was really happening, the CDC and the FDA would have said so.

00:56:11.420 We are completely on our own.

00:56:15.400 We need the CDC to acknowledge us.

00:56:18.220 They know about the issues with the clinical trials.

00:56:20.400 They know about the deaths.

00:56:21.520 They know about the lack of follow-up on VAERS.

00:56:23.600 They know about the injuries to children.

00:56:25.760 They know about the suicides as the results of months-long suffering.

00:56:30.880 They know about the aggressive censorship.

00:56:33.280 They know about the media censorship.

00:56:35.280 They know about the scientific censorship.

00:56:37.580 They know all of it.

00:56:40.780 Oh, my gosh.

00:56:41.880 That is literally chilling.

00:56:43.460 I got the chills listening to that.

00:56:45.100 Why don't we hear more of it?

00:56:47.740 Why?

00:56:48.620 Why are they stifling these stories and any discussion of them on places like Facebook?

00:56:53.200 I think they're afraid that any discussion or if any word got out, it would lead to vaccine hesitancy, right?

00:57:01.380 They want everybody to get a shot.

00:57:03.000 And if you tell them that some people aren't doing well with it, you know, it would increase the number of people who might not get the shot.

00:57:09.540 And you're not, you're actually not vaccine hesitant.

00:57:13.480 Is it true you actually got vaxxed after this happened to your wife with a different vaccine?

00:57:19.540 That is true.

00:57:20.440 I was vaccinated with the Moderna vaccine in March and then the second dose in April, so five months into her injury.

00:57:27.580 This is crazy that they wouldn't allow you to tell your story because I understand you've formed a group.

00:57:32.020 You've found other people who are suffering similarly.

00:57:35.380 And is it true that you continue to be censored by places like Facebook?

00:57:39.900 Oh, definitely.

00:57:41.000 I mean, we had that event in D.C. just a few weeks ago, the beginning of November.

00:57:47.400 And immediately following that event, several of the support groups were shut down.

00:57:52.140 And as soon as they become aware, they hunt them out and shut them down, which really limits people's ability to find support.

00:58:00.640 I mean, these these are people who are very, very injured.

00:58:03.500 They're suffering greatly.

00:58:04.500 A lot of them are suicidal.

00:58:05.920 And the only support they have is through the other injured.

00:58:08.880 And so cutting them off from that, we don't know what harm comes from that.

00:58:12.840 That is immoral.

00:58:13.940 That is immoral.

00:58:15.240 And, you know, it's supposed to be informed consent to getting these vaccines.

00:58:19.080 You can't give informed consent if you don't understand the full panoply of risks, including from somebody like you who's not anti-vax.

00:58:26.620 I mean, you're not telling people not to get it.

00:58:28.180 You're saying you should know what the risks are.

00:58:31.000 And so you tell me what you think.

00:58:32.820 Do you guys have kids?

00:58:34.680 We have two kids.

00:58:35.520 Yes, the seven and nine year old.

00:58:37.180 So what do you think now about the, you know, because now they've approved it on an emergency basis for five to 11 year olds.

00:58:43.400 Already we have an approval for 12 and up.

00:58:45.340 And now in more and more places that they are making and will make it mandatory for kids as young as five.

00:58:54.320 Right.

00:58:55.180 So I actually spoke in the advisory committee meeting for the FDA's review of the Pfizer data for the five to 11 year olds.

00:59:04.940 I have significant concerns in the amount of data that was actually collected.

00:59:09.400 They only used approximately 3,100 kids in the trial.

00:59:14.960 To put that in perspective, the standard clinical trial usually involves 30,000 to 50,000 people and lasts like two years.

00:59:22.900 So this was a trial that was significantly underpowered.

00:59:26.540 And the safety subset was only followed for two and a half weeks.

00:59:30.260 It's not nearly long enough to determine if there's any adverse events that persist.

00:59:36.200 You know, it's not a large enough sample size.

00:59:38.180 They don't follow them long enough.

00:59:40.540 And in Pfizer's own data, they were unable to determine that there was a medical benefit to vaccinating this young of an age group.

00:59:48.440 So they chose to model what the risk-benefit analysis would look like.

00:59:54.000 So they chose five scenarios and they had what the rate of COVID spread was, the assumed vaccine effectiveness, as well as one risk, which was myocarditis, which we know is an actual risk to these vaccines.

01:00:10.260 And it seems to increase in probability the younger the people are that receive it.

01:00:16.340 And so they did these models.

01:00:17.820 And only in one of those scenarios did the benefits appear to outweigh the risks.

01:00:22.620 And that was when COVID was assumed to be spreading very, very rapidly.

01:00:27.200 In all of the other scenarios, the risks outweighed any benefit to the vaccine.

01:00:31.780 And this was in the FDA's model of the Pfizer data.

01:00:35.380 Oh, my.

01:00:35.700 I saw a written report to this effect the other day.

01:00:38.080 And the population is some 28 million, right, of kids in that age group.

01:00:43.540 So you're talking about 3,000 kids and the population is 28 million.

01:00:48.160 And we're supposed to believe.

01:00:49.220 I mean, it's wonderful when the doctors reassure us that it's safe, it's safe, it's safe.

01:00:52.580 But the truth is they actually don't know more than you just said.

01:00:57.640 Right.

01:00:57.920 Yeah.

01:00:58.080 We don't know what the long-term safety aspects of these vaccines are.

01:01:03.260 Science just does not know.

01:01:04.480 And do you believe that our public health officials, I mean, the NIH, I'm encouraged that they had you out there and actually did the testing and concluded what they did.

01:01:12.820 But do you believe that they're complicit in, for lack of a better term, the cover-up of these cases and this data?

01:01:20.180 Interestingly enough, the NIH was very communicative from January on.

01:01:27.320 And we've actually had meetings, Zoom meetings with the heads of the FDA.

01:01:31.500 And after we had those meetings and brought up the NIH information, the NIH has since gone dark.

01:01:38.200 They will no longer talk to any of the injured.

01:01:40.760 My wife wasn't the only one that went out there. 0.98

01:01:42.760 There was approximately 50 to 60 vaccine-injured individuals who went out to the NIH for testing and treatment, and none of them are getting any more response from the NIH.

01:01:52.320 Is it all AstraZeneca?

01:01:54.520 No.

01:01:55.660 No.

01:01:56.000 This is, AstraZeneca wasn't approved in the U.S.

01:01:58.700 Right.

01:01:59.000 So the vast majority of the vaccine injured in the U.S. are from the other brands.

01:02:03.420 And the injuries are all the same of this neurological time.

01:02:06.540 Okay, let me ask you, having met them, having met the other people, is there reason to believe these are kooks, these are people, you know what I mean?

01:02:14.780 Because that's what a lot of people think, they're just psychosomatic, they needed attention, they found a way of creating this sort of injury so they could, whatever, have more time at home.

01:02:24.380 These are the things you hear.

01:02:26.560 Right.

01:02:27.020 No, absolutely not.

01:02:28.040 I mean, these are real people with real stories, real moms, real sisters, real dads, real children, you know, that they're real people, and they're suffering, and they're doing it alone.

01:02:41.360 Would you tell people to get the vaccine for themselves, for their children?

01:02:45.800 I think that we need full and informed consent.

01:02:48.820 So I think all of the information needs to be provided, and then you can make that choice for yourself.

01:02:54.560 If you believe that you're in a risk category where it makes sense, I would say that, yes, you should get the vaccine.

01:03:00.540 However, for most healthy young adults, and certainly children, the risks begin to outweigh any benefit of the vaccine.

01:03:10.300 And I know they told you, don't give it to your kids, because obviously what happened with Brianne.

01:03:14.980 And now, of course, your kids will not be given an exception to go into the restaurants in New York or San Francisco, because they have a legitimate medical exemption.

01:03:22.940 No one cares. And these schools, the L.A., they've gotten rid of recognition, a lot of these places, of even medical exemptions.

01:03:29.200 That includes our school, where the only medical exemption they'll give you for your child is if he or she, not the parent, had an adverse reaction to the first shot.

01:03:38.540 You have to stick the needle in them and see how they do.

01:03:42.160 It's insane that you guys would be in that position, too.

01:03:45.320 So how's Brianne doing now?

01:03:49.120 She has made some improvement.

01:03:51.360 She can walk again.

01:03:52.820 She's able to be around the family.

01:03:56.160 The sound sensitivity has reduced the light sensitivity, those sorts of things.

01:04:01.140 She still has this electrical sensation throughout her whole body 24-7.

01:04:06.360 And then the other symptom that's most plaguing is what most people describe as internal vibration, as if you had like a whole mess of cell phones inside your body or a massager that is just sort of vibrating all the time.

01:04:21.580 Gosh.

01:04:22.460 Oh, please send her our love and best wishes for a full recovery.

01:04:27.260 And, I mean, I just applaud your courage in speaking out.

01:04:31.520 You were trying to help.

01:04:32.800 You're pro-vaccine.

01:04:34.140 You volunteered so that you could get this thing approved and help everybody.

01:04:37.840 And this is the thanks you get.

01:04:39.620 A cover-up, no return phone calls, even though they've acknowledged it's a vaccine injury.

01:04:46.120 This is dreadful.

01:04:47.680 Brian, thank you for speaking out and all the best to you and your family.

01:04:52.520 Thank you for having me.

01:04:54.640 My gosh.

01:04:55.180 Wow.

01:04:56.280 That's unbelievable.

01:04:58.180 We're going to continue the discussion next when we're joined by Dr. Michael Minna, an immunologist and epidemiologist and physician at the Harvard School of Public Health.

01:05:06.060 We'll talk about this case.

01:05:07.480 We'll talk about the new COVID antiviral pills and how he says at-home testing can put an end to this pandemic.

01:05:20.480 Oh, still so moved by my last guest in that story.

01:05:23.500 And joining me now to discuss it more is immunologist, epidemiologist and physician at the Harvard T.H.

01:05:30.020 Chan School of Public Health, Dr. Michael Minna.

01:05:32.560 Dr. Minna has been a champion for COVID testing.

01:05:35.220 Testing, I say, since the beginning of the pandemic.

01:05:36.960 He thinks it is the key to keeping us out of future lockdowns, making your holiday plans safe, saving lives and potentially helping us take those masks off and ending all the vaccine mandates, too.

01:05:48.540 Thank you for joining us, Dr. Minna.

01:05:49.840 Now, what do you make of Brian's story?

01:05:52.120 I mean, I found him very credible and I find the whole thing really disturbing.

01:05:55.280 Well, when we're talking about potential adverse effects of vaccines, we have to always place those in the context of what would happen otherwise if you got infected.

01:06:06.100 I've spoken long before COVID.

01:06:08.400 I have spoken with many, many groups over the years about concerns around vaccines, around vaccine safety.

01:06:16.520 And I think that it is absolutely right for people to have personal concerns about vaccine safety because this is something it's one of the few things that we actually put into people when they're healthy and to protect them in the future.

01:06:32.220 And so when we're talking about potential inflammatory effects, like we just heard, we have to recognize that they might occur associated with the vaccine, but they also occur associated with the infection.

01:06:46.700 And I think oftentimes that piece is lost.

01:06:49.400 And so from a public health perspective, it becomes, which I will distinguish from the personal choice, but from a public health perspective, we have to weigh the costs and benefits at a whole aggregate community level.

01:07:04.140 And sometimes that means that we have to recognize that despite having potential, and I say potential because we're not sure, adverse effects of a vaccine, sometimes the risk of that is so much lower, even though they might be real, than the risk of the actual infection and those exact same types of effects happening after somebody gets infected, that it just makes it, it clearly pushes the balance towards the vaccine.

01:07:32.440 But that's not to say that these types of, that these types of events don't exist.

01:07:38.760 I think they do.

01:07:40.520 But I do not believe from a public health perspective that they are, that they would warrant a rethinking of whether or not the vaccine is appropriate to give to individuals at a public health level.

01:07:54.060 What about, doesn't this totally undermine the mandates though?

01:07:58.000 I mean, there are a lot of people out there are going to hear that story.

01:08:00.300 Could be deemed by the NIH to be a vaccine injury and say, I don't think it's worth the risk for me.

01:08:09.200 And I should be, what if, what if there's a woman sitting at home right now who says that to herself and she's forced to get the vaccine or lose her job, right?

01:08:17.640 By, let's say she's a New York city cop, right?

01:08:20.260 Something like that.

01:08:21.080 Shouldn't it be her choice?

01:08:23.980 Well, I have, I mean, when it comes to that, I would argue for myself here that I am not a bioethicist.

01:08:32.780 You know, vaccine mandates are, have to be looked at through many angles.

01:08:37.260 And I look at it through, you know, one or two angles and the president of the United States looks at it through different angles for me.

01:08:44.480 And I do think that there's arguments to be made on both sides.

01:08:48.520 There's personal choice about whether or not you need to have something put into you that could protect you, but could also have a very, and I want to emphasize, very minimal risk.

01:08:59.000 But a real risk, even if it's extremely minimal, you know, that should probably be somebody's choice.

01:09:06.620 But the question is, does, you know, does society deem that the population level risk of not mandating a vaccine, does it overwhelm the risk to individuals, to the small minority who do end up having some sort of adverse reaction?

01:09:22.800 And that is, I would argue that it's really for, it's for society to choose.

01:09:29.620 And, you know, I can speak about biology and medicine, but whether or not, you know, when it comes to freedoms and liberties, I think I can give my own end of one opinion, but I don't think it's worth very much.

01:09:40.200 How do we know it's minimal risk when you have the people who run the clinical trials and the drug makers keeping results like Brianne's out of the public eye?

01:09:53.080 How many more Brianne's are there?

01:09:55.820 Well, so it's a really good question.

01:09:57.860 On the one hand, we have the clinical trials that occur initially, and then we have, especially with these vaccines, a massive, massive post-market ongoing evaluation.

01:10:10.000 And what I can say is we haven't seen the number of adverse effects becoming so significant that we actually start to think that it's a real reason to recommend against vaccination.

01:10:25.640 But what's the data? What data are you looking at?

01:10:28.360 I mean, I'll tell you just anecdotally, but this, this, I can speak to this firsthand.

01:10:32.160 A female friend of mine of childbearing age, when the first thing broke about Johnson & Johnson, you know, causing blood clots, and they said there are six women who have had blood clots.

01:10:41.720 She, she had a blood clot right after getting J&J.

01:10:45.080 She got it in her finger.

01:10:46.000 She called the doctor.

01:10:46.620 She's like, what do you think this is?

01:10:47.680 And I said, blew up like a, like a red balloon after I got the vaccine.

01:10:51.400 He was like, get to the hospital right now.

01:10:53.620 So she went and they did all these therapeutics on her.

01:10:56.440 They wouldn't use heparin because I guess you can't have that after you just had the J&J vaccine.

01:11:01.600 So they used all these sort of homeopathic things on her. 0.99

01:11:04.040 She had about 12 doctors taking care of her because they really didn't want a negative effect from the J&J or any other vaccine.

01:11:10.780 She was not one of the six.

01:11:12.060 She wasn't counted.

01:11:13.660 And this is, it had happened prior to them announcing we've had six, right?

01:11:17.480 So I just, there's reason to question these numbers.

01:11:20.660 And I, I had the vaccine and I would recommend the vaccine.

01:11:23.800 I had Pfizer, but I, these are some of the reasons why I questioned the mandate.

01:11:28.080 And I really question it when it comes to children who don't need this vaccine.

01:11:33.960 Yeah, I do think, I mean, we have like, just to be very clear, we have given millions and millions and millions of vaccines.

01:11:40.580 And the problem has always historically been with vaccine adverse effects.

01:11:46.280 And again, I do not want to pretend like they don't exist.

01:11:49.740 I do want to be clear that they're rare.

01:11:51.920 But the problem with them is that because vaccines are one of the only medical interventions that we actually give to people during a period of health,

01:12:00.240 we have almost no tolerance for, for error and for any sort of adverse effect, which is good.

01:12:08.560 But what is often lost is that side effects from a vaccine rise to the top very quickly and become compounded in the media.

01:12:16.980 But what is not discussed very much is that those identical side effects do occur when somebody gets the infection itself as well.

01:12:26.580 And so that is often lost.

01:12:29.600 And so it's very easy to talk about the side effects from a vaccine while pretending like the side effects from the actual infection don't exist because they're not side effects.

01:12:40.140 They're, you know, we think of them as real effects of the infection that we're trying to avoid.

01:12:43.540 But I guess this is the way that I balance it.

01:12:46.300 And I do want to, like, I don't, I personally don't ever pretend to think that anyone's side effects are not real.

01:12:55.040 I believe that they are the, anytime we initiate an inflammatory response in somebody's body, we cannot pretend that that doesn't come with a risk.

01:13:03.360 But the way that I look at it is that that same inflammatory response or a much worse one does also occur with the infection.

01:13:11.100 And I think it's not as clear cut a story, but when it comes to mandates, I think it's absolutely reasonable to be having this discussion.

01:13:19.720 But 100%, I think we should all be having the discussion and it's not wrong to talk about it and try to figure out what is the best path forward for society.

01:13:29.840 A news item to our listening audience.

01:13:33.200 And then I want to ask you about testing and also these new therapeutics, which, you know, maybe those those two things are the answer to vaccine hesitancy and all of this.

01:13:42.360 But just an update on the on the news.

01:13:44.920 California, this is according to a Wall Street Journal article, is increasingly scrutinizing doctors who are providing medical exemptions to parents for their children who are subject to the vaccine mandates.

01:13:56.780 One doctor's one doctor's in trouble for, quote, considering parental input on the risks to their child.

01:14:03.260 That's crazy.

01:14:03.760 Who else are you going to listen to?

01:14:04.780 It's like the kids.

01:14:06.560 My kids have no idea what their medical history is.

01:14:09.260 A judge recommended that this one doctor that that her license be revoked the one who listened to parental input. 1.00

01:14:16.560 And so more and more doctors who give you a medical exemption are coming under scrutiny for giving them to you.

01:14:22.980 That's disturbing.

01:14:24.100 Right. Because it's like like I said, Brian and Brianne, if they were at my school, their kid would have to take the vaccine, even though their kids clearly should not take the vaccine, given what's happened to their mom.

01:14:35.200 So it's crazy.

01:14:36.080 OK, so let's talk about alternatives that are now more and more in the news and potentially becoming available.

01:14:42.280 Let me just start with the therapeutics before we get to the testing.

01:14:44.860 So Pfizer has got one now and Merck has got one now.

01:14:49.140 Pfizer is going to seek approval.

01:14:50.840 I guess they haven't yet, but they apparently they had such great results.

01:14:53.460 They're no longer taking new patients in their clinical trial due to the the overwhelming efficacy, they say, of their new therapeutic and experimental pill that treats covid.

01:15:03.040 They say it could cut hospitalization rates by nearly 90 percent.

01:15:06.200 They say in the clinical trial it prevented death in 100 percent of the cases.

01:15:10.320 Because you have to start it within three days of symptoms.

01:15:13.720 So you've got to get to it fast.

01:15:15.200 I don't know what the Merck one requires.

01:15:17.520 But Scott Gottlieb, former FDA commissioner, says the pandemic could be over by January.

01:15:22.280 And he's on the board of Pfizer, we should point out.

01:15:23.900 But thanks to the Pfizer and Merck therapeutics.

01:15:26.560 So what do you make of those?

01:15:27.400 Yeah, I think that this is a tipping point or at least a real game changer in this pandemic.

01:15:34.020 The fact is, if we what we really want to avoid during the pandemic is our severe outcomes.

01:15:40.580 And if we have therapeutics that can limit and potentially prevent the most severe outcomes, then it really changes the balance of the overall risk of this pandemic to society.

01:15:52.260 And but one of the most important pieces here is what you mentioned, which is that these drugs have to be started very fast.

01:16:01.140 You know, they generally have an EUA that says that they need to be started within three days or three to five days.

01:16:06.900 But the reality is the benefit does start to fall off quickly with each passing day.

01:16:13.020 And so the quicker that we can get people diagnosed and get them a therapeutic, you know, ideally delivered to their door.

01:16:21.800 And we can talk about what I call test to treat is going to be crucial.

01:16:26.800 And that's also where we'll also discuss rapid tests and how we can use testing and greater availability and access to fast tests to our major advantage here.

01:16:38.680 When we consider that we now have therapeutics coming down the pipeline that are really going to be life saving entities.

01:16:45.580 Mm hmm.

01:16:46.160 All right.

01:16:46.400 So let's talk about testing.

01:16:47.580 What's I confess?

01:16:48.580 I haven't really been paying attention to the status of testing at home testing, you know, since the beginning when it was impossible to get a test.

01:16:55.640 And people were like, unless you knew or related to Andrew Cuomo, you know, how has that come along?

01:17:02.380 Where are we now in terms of testing and its availability?

01:17:06.640 And what would you like to see?

01:17:09.560 Yeah, I mean, I think testing in the U.S. has been one of the greatest failures of this pandemic.

01:17:14.760 We've done it all wrong in what I would argue has been wrong.

01:17:18.860 We focused on the wrong metrics around the test at the expense of focusing on the metrics that would actually curb transmission.

01:17:27.600 And so all of 2020, we had a real focus on laboratory PCR testing for the most part.

01:17:33.740 And even when tests were taking 7, 10, 12 days to return, we were still recommending, you know, we, the scientific community, we're still recommending that people got tests to limit transmission.

01:17:46.800 But when you have a test that's taking 5, 7, 10 days, it's essentially absolutely pointless from a public health perspective.

01:17:54.120 You need a test result that's going to be given very fast so that if you're infectious, you know your results before you go out and infect other people.

01:18:03.220 And you need that test to be accessible.

01:18:05.640 A test once a month or a test once you're feeling symptomatic isn't sufficient if your goal is to stop transmission.

01:18:12.740 And so given that backdrop, something I've been calling for since really April or May of 2020 has been to increase accessibility in the United States to rapid tests, tests that people can have in their home.

01:18:27.480 So that the moment you start to feel symptoms or the moment your friend calls you and says, hey, you know, I just turned up positive and we had dinner last night together.

01:18:35.260 You might want to test yourself.

01:18:36.620 There's no barrier to entry for somebody to get tested.

01:18:39.020 We need inexpensive tests to just be at our disposal, similar to Band-Aids.

01:18:44.680 We don't go out and buy Band-Aids when our child gets a cut.

01:18:47.900 We have them in our cupboard already so that we can put them on and stop the bleeding when it's necessary.

01:18:53.240 And it's the same thing with COVID tests.

01:18:56.620 If we can put these fast, accessible, simple tests into people's homes, then we can really do a good job at stopping transmission, even in the era of vaccines.

01:19:06.960 Do they exist?

01:19:07.620 Obviously, I know you can go into the clinic for a rapid test.

01:19:12.280 Yeah, so they do exist now.

01:19:14.100 It's been a very long slog to try to work on how to encourage scientific bodies and the FDA and such to understand these tests, as I think of them as transmission indicating tests.

01:19:28.060 They're tests that turn positive when you're infectious and they don't turn positive when you're not infectious, unlike a PCR test, which stays positive for way too long.

01:19:37.280 And these tests do exist now.

01:19:38.460 But as people have noticed, they're very hard to get.

01:19:41.240 They go to Walmart or CVS and they find that they're sold out over and over and over.

01:19:46.740 And and but finally, the government is trying to increase accessibility and scalability of these tests.

01:19:52.960 But it is taking time.

01:19:54.400 And, you know, I've been probably the world's greatest advocate for trying to improve testing access in this country and globally.

01:20:01.400 But there is a part of me that's starting to wonder, you know, this is too little too late.

01:20:05.420 I don't think so.

01:20:06.220 But, you know, I am frustrated that these tests were not in every individual's home, you know, a year ago.

01:20:11.300 Yeah. Did we put any of that money, you know, that we put towards finding vaccines and so on behind this?

01:20:17.940 Not really. You know, the U.S. has been has generally historically been very, very poor at recognizing what are appropriate uses of money when it comes to public health.

01:20:28.380 We have a very biomedical centric enterprise when it comes to how we allocate funds.

01:20:34.860 And so if it's something you can inject into you, great, we'll dump all the funds into it.

01:20:38.300 But if it's something that really is designed to stop transmission and work at a public health level, the public health strategies themselves are generally underfunded.

01:20:47.300 And that's why, for example, when the vaccines finally did come about, it was like a shock to the system.

01:20:52.500 Nobody knew how to really allocate them and actually distribute them in the states.

01:20:56.700 You know, it's kind of a surprise that we put all this money into developing the biology behind it.

01:21:01.700 But then the logistics and the real public health part of it was sort of short sighted and not really developed enough.

01:21:08.300 Like, why wasn't Fauci talking about this? Because this is an easy sell.

01:21:11.420 I mean, even the most vaccine hesitant wouldn't be opposed to testing and making sure they don't have it, even if they don't want a vaccine, especially with these new therapeutics coming out.

01:21:21.840 They would 100 percent get a test and probably get a pill to stop hospitalization or death.

01:21:27.720 So, I mean, why don't why don't we put more energy into this?

01:21:31.300 Do you think? I don't know.

01:21:32.680 Oh, well, it's been interesting.

01:21:34.900 It's and I have I've talked to both sides of Congress, Senate, you know, the White House, both administrations.

01:21:40.940 This is one of the most bipartisan efforts that could be in place.

01:21:46.740 We've published on it an enormous number of times the last 18 months.

01:21:50.360 It appeals to everyone because, like you say, everyone is happy to know if they, you know, if they're testing, especially this can be a test that is done in the privacy of your home.

01:21:59.580 So those folks in the country who don't want the government involved.

01:22:02.740 Yeah, exactly.

01:22:03.380 You can use a test at your own counter and nobody has to know the result.

01:22:07.280 That's right. And then you at least don't go outside.

01:22:09.400 I know a lot of people who are like, I don't want the government knowing I have it.

01:22:11.800 So fine, you know, in the privacy of your own home. 1.00

01:22:14.380 And then, of course, unless you're just a complete jerk, you would not go out in public and start breathing on a bunch of people. 0.98

01:22:20.880 So what what about antigen tests and antibody tests are do we have those at all readily available? 0.98

01:22:29.860 And how could they play into getting all of this over with faster?

01:22:35.080 Sure. So the fast test that I'm talking about now are the antigen tests.

01:22:38.740 And an antigen test is a test that detects the protein, which is called an antigen in scientific terms of the virus.

01:22:47.180 And so the antigen tests are existing.

01:22:50.040 Those are the ones like the Abbott test and the Quidel and the Illume that was just recalled.

01:22:54.380 These are antigen tests.

01:22:57.180 Antibody tests are different, and they are the tests that look at the person's immunological response to the infection or the vaccine.

01:23:06.920 And these tests also exist.

01:23:10.300 There was a slew of these tests that were really poorly created and just not accurate back in early 2020.

01:23:19.180 And these were fast antibody or immune tests.

01:23:23.260 And that kind of put the whole the FDA and the government, everyone kind of like pushed down antibody tests.

01:23:28.400 Antibody testing and understanding immunology of pathogens is what I normally do in my research.

01:23:35.260 And so it's been frustrating to see that even these antibody tests have been sort of downplayed.

01:23:40.620 But now we're starting to see that they are becoming more available.

01:23:44.080 There's one company that does it with just a swab of your gums.

01:23:47.080 You take a swab of your gums and you can get a good antibody result.

01:23:50.660 And I think we're underutilizing those because what we could do is we could say, hey, do kids really need two vaccines to be or does any person really need two vaccines to be considered fully immunized if they've already been infected and have a strong antibody response?

01:24:08.580 Maybe what we could do is we could take these fast antibody tests.

01:24:12.900 And when somebody goes to get their first vaccine, they also take an antibody test.

01:24:17.120 And if the antibody test is positive, then they get one vaccine because they've already been infected based on the antibody positivity.

01:24:25.380 And then they are considered fully vaccinated without or fully immune without having to get their second dose.

01:24:31.900 Now, that type of efficient public health thinking just has more or less been absent.

01:24:36.720 And I don't know why.

01:24:38.020 You know, it's it's as though the scientific and policymaking bodies have decided or deemed that we can't trust immunity from infection.

01:24:47.680 But when we have perhaps half of all Americans having been infected, we should at least leverage that.

01:24:54.220 And we can't we can't turn back time.

01:24:55.720 I don't want people to go out and get infected so that they only have to get one dose of a vaccine.

01:24:59.380 But the fact is, many people have been infected and we can't undo that.

01:25:03.920 So we may as well utilize it to our benefit.

01:25:06.020 Well, and I think that there's a real role there, but we haven't really brought it for kids in particular, because the negative effects of the covid vaccine on like young teenage boys tend to come after a second shot, like the myocarditis and so on.

01:25:18.700 And so what if you could avoid that altogether?

01:25:21.800 If you have to get a shot, you have to get vaccinated.

01:25:24.080 Perhaps you could at least avoid the second shot if you've had covid and the antibody show.

01:25:28.840 But I'm sure a lot of my audience out there is saying, why do you need even one shot if you have the antibodies?

01:25:35.060 You know, you've got natural immunity.

01:25:36.780 That is real.

01:25:37.600 Study showed it's 27 times more effective at preventing infection, reinfection as the vaccines.

01:25:45.120 And this is why a lot of people say we, like some countries in Europe, should be counting natural immunity already as an exemption to these vaccine mandates.

01:25:55.960 Yeah, I do think that we should at least be considering it.

01:26:01.080 You know, do I am I going to get up here and say to you that I don't think we should give a single dose vaccine for people who are immune?

01:26:07.140 Probably not.

01:26:07.880 The reason I would say that is because we do know that the that the vaccine kind of supercharges the the immunological memory for people who have been infected.

01:26:19.380 Do I want to say that maybe we don't need both vaccine doses?

01:26:22.840 Absolutely.

01:26:23.380 I think there's good data to support that.

01:26:26.040 But I think going to say that people who have any antibody level don't need to get a vaccine.

01:26:31.700 You know, that's not I would say that the data is less robust to suggest that.

01:26:37.660 But I do think we should absolutely be considering it.

01:26:41.080 You know, and especially we should really be looking at what are called immune correlates of protection.

01:26:46.400 So can we come up with quantitative values, quantitative antibody values that would say whether somebody who has been infected actually has sufficient immunity that they don't need any vaccine or not?

01:27:00.380 And what's this called?

01:27:00.980 That's something called again.

01:27:02.920 Well, these are this is just an area of sort of medical research called correlates of protection.

01:27:09.000 We look at trying to say, you know, just I'll give fake numbers for a moment.

01:27:13.440 But if you have above 100 antibody level, maybe you're protected, you're very well protected from infection.

01:27:20.780 And if you're below, you're not.

01:27:22.720 And we've done this for a long time with measles titers, for example, for health care professionals.

01:27:28.400 Every few years, health care professionals get a measles antibody titer drawn.

01:27:33.180 They look at the amount of antibody people have and they say, your antibody levels have fallen too far below.

01:27:39.180 We'll give you a booster or it is.

01:27:41.880 That is so brilliant.

01:27:42.800 That puts an end to this whole debate about whether the vaccine gives you better immunity or the covid infection.

01:27:48.820 It's like, well, let's just see what your immunity is.

01:27:50.720 Let's just look at it.

01:27:51.420 OK, like we don't have to prioritize one over the other.

01:27:54.900 Let's just see what it is.

01:27:56.060 And then you can make the decision, you know, what to do from there.

01:27:59.160 I don't think most people want covid, especially seeing, you know, what it does to older people and so on.

01:28:04.680 But they don't also want to be ordered around by Uncle Sam and what to do with their health care.

01:28:09.820 All right. Listen, I want you if you're willing to stick around, because I know our audience is calling in and folks, you can call in right now.

01:28:15.440 It's not too late.

01:28:16.620 Call in right now because our doctor friend Michael staying with us.

01:28:20.080 Dr. Minna, 833-44-MEGYN, 833-44-MEGYN, which is 446-3496.

01:28:26.620 Calls right now and free medical advice.

01:28:29.540 No, it's not medical advice, but just thoughts on your questions next.

01:28:35.860 We've got physician Dr. Michael Minna, and he's got thoughts on your questions.

01:28:40.320 We're going to kick it off with Mike in Arkansas.

01:28:42.280 What's your question for Dr. Minna?

01:28:44.000 I called my doctor and asked about the testing to see what my antibody level was.

01:28:49.120 And she said that she's not a big advocate for it because it's only about 40 percent accurate.

01:28:53.320 So that's really what my question is.

01:28:55.580 How accurate are they and what does it actually mean?

01:28:58.800 Go ahead, Doc.

01:29:00.520 Yeah, so that's a that's the question that we're trying to figure out.

01:29:03.340 I wouldn't say that 40 percent accurate.

01:29:05.720 I'm not quite sure where where the where your physicians come up with that number.

01:29:09.520 But what I would say is we're still trying to understand how to interpret what the results

01:29:15.560 of somebody's antibody test actually mean.

01:29:18.440 But in general, if you're looking at just a positive or a negative, somebody says, yes,

01:29:22.640 you're positive for antibodies.

01:29:24.940 Now, what you don't know, given the tests that are available right now, is it low positive,

01:29:29.940 high positive?

01:29:31.520 And so we need to keep developing the technology a bit more.

01:29:35.280 But in general, you can assume that if you are positive at the very least and you've

01:29:40.040 never been vaccinated, it means you've been exposed.

01:29:42.540 And if you have been vaccinated, it means you probably have you clearly have some immunity

01:29:46.540 from it.

01:29:47.100 But how immune and how protected is still something we're trying to work out those new

01:29:52.260 tests for.

01:29:53.340 We got to work.

01:29:53.900 We got to figure that that one out.

01:29:55.340 Thank you for the call, Mike.

01:29:56.360 Let's go to Natalie in North Carolina.

01:29:58.580 Natalie, what's your question for our doctor?

01:30:01.280 Hey, guys.

01:30:02.100 So I had COVID in November of 2020.

01:30:06.700 And around August of this year, I went into my local doctor's office and had the antibody

01:30:12.340 test done.

01:30:13.320 And my antibodies or the immunity level was 1,500.

01:30:18.080 So my question is, how often should you take the antibody test to check your level?

01:30:25.840 Yeah.

01:30:26.520 So it's a similar-ish question, but I can't speak to that particular number.

01:30:32.080 The interesting thing with antibody values is it's really like 1,500.

01:30:38.100 I can't interpret if that's high or low without knowing more about the exact test.

01:30:41.960 But what I can say is that one thing we should be thinking about doing and that I've advocated

01:30:48.140 quite a bit for is that we should offer people antibody tests every few months.

01:30:53.820 And the idea there is that some people retain their immune memory very well, and some people

01:31:00.780 do not retain their immunity very well, just like people's regular memory.

01:31:05.020 Some people have good memories.

01:31:06.060 Some people have bad memories.

01:31:07.660 And one thing we could do is we could say, hey, do this test once every three months for

01:31:15.780 nine months and see if your antibody levels are staying flat and high or if they're dropping

01:31:20.440 off really quick, and we could actually use that to determine maybe who needs a booster,

01:31:25.520 who doesn't, who will be protected next year, who won't be.

01:31:29.040 And I think we have a lot of ways that we could be using these antibody values and the numbers

01:31:34.120 that we're not currently doing.

01:31:35.800 But I would say every few months is probably if you're wanting to track your antibodies,

01:31:39.480 it's not a day-to-day thing.

01:31:40.900 It's more like test today, test again in three months, and see where you're at.

01:31:45.920 You don't have to do it every week, for example.

01:31:48.320 What could this testing do in terms of our treatment options?

01:31:52.820 How could it change them?

01:31:54.900 Yeah, so testing, I would argue that testing with the antigen test, the tests that actually

01:32:01.340 look for the virus, can be one of the most powerful tools we have today now that therapy

01:32:06.940 is coming around.

01:32:07.940 So we talked earlier about how it needs to be started fast.

01:32:11.180 So I have this idea, you know, what if Medicare or however positioned these tests in every

01:32:18.620 person's home who's high risk and just said, you know, here's three tests.

01:32:23.080 If you use them, we'll send you more tests.

01:32:25.460 And anytime somebody felt symptoms, especially somebody who's at risk of severe complications

01:32:30.840 with COVID, they just pull out a test and they do a proctored test, you know, a telehealth

01:32:36.840 proctor test where you actually get on, you scan in your test and up pops a proctor, they

01:32:41.940 watch you do the test.

01:32:42.860 And the reason you want that is because then if you're positive, you can immediately get

01:32:48.020 a prescription.

01:32:48.760 And within 12 hours, you could have a therapy show up at your door that you could start,

01:32:53.920 you know, we could actually be in a world where we start treatment within 12 hours of,

01:32:58.820 you know, first having symptom onset.

01:33:00.380 It could totally, uh, greatly eliminate the need for hospitalization.

01:33:04.340 And of course, especially these numbers from Pfizer are true, right?

01:33:08.560 A hundred percent reduction of death is pretty good.

01:33:11.600 Uh, Dr.

01:33:12.000 Mena, thank you.

01:33:12.760 We appreciate your expertise and we appreciate our viewers calling in.

01:33:16.200 Uh, tomorrow we've got comedian Jim Brewer.

01:33:18.140 He's hilarious.

01:33:19.120 Don't forget to check us out on youtube.com slash Megan Kelly and download the show.

01:33:24.180 Thanks for listening to the Megan Kelly show.

01:33:26.640 No BS, no agenda, and no fear.

01:33:34.340 We'll see you next time.

The Megyn Kelly Show - November 11, 2021

Explosive Rittenhouse Trial Moments and COVID Testing and Vaccines, with Robert Gruler, Dr. Michael Mina, and Brian Dressen ｜ Ep. 201

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