The Megyn Kelly Show - Weekend ＂Best Of＂： Bill Maher, Riley Gaines, Shawn Ryan, Charlamagne tha God, and More

00:00:00.580 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, live on Sirius XM Channel 111 every weekday at New East.

00:00:12.040 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show and this weekend, best of special.

00:00:17.360 We've had a busy few weeks here, and I wanted to bring you some of the highlights that you may have missed.

00:00:22.840 If you spend any time on X, you likely saw some of my interview with Bill Maher.

00:00:28.000 I like Bill, but he was off, let's say, let's, shall we say, on a few key elements of some big stories in the news over the past couple of years.

00:00:36.920 And we'll bring you some of the highlights that went pretty viral.

00:00:40.080 Also, I sat down with Sean Ryan for two hours recently for our yearly Memorial Day show.

00:00:45.760 It was an incredible interview. I think you're really going to love it if you missed it.

00:00:48.740 And we'll bring you my favorite exchange.

00:00:51.660 Also, Riley Gaines for her first time on The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:55.300 Oh, it's like hard to believe. How is that possible?

00:00:58.460 I don't know. It just kind of worked out that way.

00:01:00.420 But we talked about so much, and we finally got the chance to really talk in person about what she's been through

00:01:06.360 and how she became a real activist in this gender insanity lane. 1.00

00:01:13.020 Another first-time guest on the show, Charlemagne Tha God, was on the show recently.

00:01:17.100 And I got a lot of feedback on this one. Some mixed reaction, but most people really loved the interview.

00:01:23.520 It was a really interesting conversation.

00:01:25.440 Plus, after the New York City business records trial verdict, I had to share my instant analysis and reaction.

00:01:31.440 That's included here in part. I think you'll enjoy it if you missed it.

00:01:34.860 But I also wanted to tell you something important.

00:01:37.640 Tomorrow, we start Fraud Week here on The MK Show.

00:01:42.020 We're going to bring you a series of true crime shows all based around fraud in one way, shape, or form.

00:01:50.580 Now, I don't want to tell you too much because part of the fun is watching and listening to it unfold yourself.

00:01:57.720 But there are five very compelling stories, including my own. Enjoy.

00:02:03.960 I do think there's a difference between it was stolen, you know, the nonsense with Dominion voting machines and all that, versus it wasn't fair.

00:02:16.320 What wasn't fair?

00:02:18.260 Oh, my God, don't get me started.

00:02:19.700 What wasn't fair?

00:02:20.740 How about the suppression of the Hunter Biden left tax story? Just for one.

00:02:24.140 Oh, for fuck's sake. Really? 0.99

00:02:26.680 Oh, then we're not as alike as you think.

00:02:30.260 Okay. 0.99

00:02:30.620 That's a stupid non-story. 1.00

00:02:32.740 Says who? 0.99

00:02:33.960 There are polls that show some 10 to 12 percent of the electorate says they would have changed their mind had they seen it, had they known about it.

00:02:39.960 It wasn't right.

00:02:40.700 It wasn't right to suppress it. 1.00

00:02:42.640 But nobody gives a fuck about Hunter Biden's dick. 1.00

00:02:46.540 Nobody. 1.00

00:02:47.340 You're talking about yourself.

00:02:48.620 I'm telling you there are data to show people did care.

00:02:52.100 They say they would have changed their vote.

00:02:54.120 Nobody who was going to vote for Trump anyway or Biden anyway.

00:02:58.780 It wasn't about Hunter Biden's man parts.

00:03:01.680 It was about the scandal of his corruption and his dad's corruption.

00:03:06.680 Bill, I used to think that that Hunter Biden was a hot mess and Joe Biden was embarrassed by him but had to deal.

00:03:12.740 Now I really think he was doing Joe Biden's bidding.

00:03:15.900 Joe Biden is the bad guy who sent his drug addled son out there to collect money.

00:03:21.800 That's what the laptop shows.

00:03:24.660 And that's more important than what I was bringing up about not abiding by election results, not not respecting what always made this country great.

00:03:33.040 The peaceful transference of power.

00:03:35.200 See, I don't disagree with you on that.

00:03:36.460 You're not going to get me to say it was a great thing the way Trump behaved.

00:03:38.980 I don't have to get you to agree or disagree.

00:03:40.900 You're obviously someone who looks at an elephant and a mouse and cannot tell which one is bigger.

00:03:45.580 I disagree.

00:03:46.680 I know.

00:03:47.240 That's projection by you because I look at Joe Biden.

00:03:49.180 No, I mean, that's how I see you.

00:03:50.520 Well, let's talk about—

00:03:52.040 Why are you telling me this?

00:03:53.560 I mean, this is just typical right-wing talking points, the evil Hunter Biden and the evil Joe Biden.

00:04:02.040 And look, do I like them?

00:04:03.760 No, I don't particularly like them.

00:04:05.080 I think they're very flawed.

00:04:05.960 Listen, listen.

00:04:06.680 It's not nearly on the scale.

00:04:08.200 You're misstating my argument.

00:04:09.740 You're misstating my argument.

00:04:10.820 Hunter Biden just now on the laptop was brought up as evidence of how the election was not fair.

00:04:15.740 He's not a reason necessarily to not vote for Joe Biden.

00:04:19.440 The reason not to vote for Joe Biden is his policies.

00:04:22.360 You're not woke.

00:04:23.300 He's as woke, or at least his policies are, as they come.

00:04:26.480 The open border bill?

00:04:28.260 How could anybody vote for somebody who keeps this border open with the number of rapes and the number of murders and the numbers of crimes going on with these immigrants? 1.00

00:04:36.480 But again, these are the normal sorts of issues we've always had in this country that should be taken care of through the normal process we've had.

00:04:46.000 You're talking about the difference between this and something fundamental, which is our democracy.

00:04:54.320 The fact that you have to respect who wins an election or else you don't have the kind of country we've always had before.

00:05:02.100 I mean, I feel like we keep going around the rose bush about this, and we're not going to make any progress.

00:05:08.580 So let's stop talking about it.

00:05:10.520 But, you know.

00:05:12.100 I just I mean, you keep saying sort of I'm nuts because I don't see the difference between the elephant and the mouse.

00:05:16.900 And I'm telling you, I identify them differently than you do.

00:05:19.660 Hillary Clinton, of course, is the original election denier.

00:05:22.180 I'm sure you voted for her in 16. 1.00

00:05:24.220 Well, she's not an election denier. 0.99

00:05:25.880 She absolutely was the OG election denier. 0.95

00:05:28.780 She first of all, she came out before the sun had risen to concede the election to Trump.

00:05:35.900 And then spent the next four years saying he was illegitimate.

00:05:39.380 He was an illegitimate president.

00:05:41.040 She. 0.93

00:05:41.580 OK, well, first of all, saying she didn't say he was an illegitimate.

00:05:45.000 She did.

00:05:45.520 You tell me exactly what she said.

00:05:47.020 She said those exact words repeatedly.

00:05:50.400 OK.

00:05:50.840 I mean, she conceded the election, whether whether you're interpreting her disappointment at losing it as the same thing as Trump not conceding it.

00:06:02.620 I don't know that that's where you're getting it from.

00:06:04.840 But again, it's a tremendous false equivalency.

00:06:07.580 You could ask Hillary Clinton right now who won that election. 1.00

00:06:10.600 She will tell you Donald Trump won.

00:06:12.660 Now she knows she has to because of what Trump has done.

00:06:15.760 She came out that night.

00:06:17.420 She conceded the election.

00:06:18.960 She put in a purple suit and conceded the election. 0.99

00:06:21.340 And then spent the next four years trying to convince us it was not legitimate.

00:06:25.480 Just saying, look, it's not the same as Trump.

00:06:27.180 What Trump did was far more severe.

00:06:29.480 I'm not going to deny that.

00:06:30.720 But don't try to tell me that Hillary Clinton wasn't an election denier and Jamie Raskin and a whole host of Democrats who are now in prominent positions on Capitol Hill.

00:06:39.320 Doesn't make it great what Trump did.

00:06:41.440 But they don't have clean hands either.

00:06:43.220 But you bypassed the immigration question.

00:06:45.640 I mean, like that a lot of Republicans.

00:06:47.140 I'm not bypassing it.

00:06:47.400 I think it's a disaster.

00:06:48.560 I think I think.

00:06:49.140 How would you put this guy back in there for four more years to leave the doors open?

00:06:52.720 And like it was so much better under Trump?

00:06:54.980 Yes, it was better under Trump.

00:06:56.560 Are you kidding me?

00:06:57.240 It was somewhat better.

00:06:58.600 Oh, Bill.

00:06:59.180 It was somewhat better.

00:07:00.360 Go look up the immigration rates.

00:07:01.960 Yeah, I know.

00:07:02.300 Illegal immigration rates. 0.78

00:07:03.260 I agree.

00:07:03.800 For 2020.

00:07:04.700 For 19 to 20.

00:07:05.840 I'm not defending Biden on immigration.

00:07:07.820 I don't I don't understand why it's so difficult in this country to stop people coming through the border.

00:07:13.320 I don't.

00:07:13.680 And I watched that 60 Minutes piece.

00:07:16.500 They did on it a couple of months ago.

00:07:18.200 And they had films of people coming through this hole and the border patrol just watching them and basically waving.

00:07:26.540 I don't understand why.

00:07:28.160 I don't understand why this country can't accomplish something like that.

00:07:31.440 It doesn't seem like it's impossible.

00:07:33.680 But so many things in this.

00:07:34.900 Well, that's what's so aggravating.

00:07:36.020 We can accomplish it.

00:07:36.840 We can we can stop what's happening at the southern border.

00:07:39.300 We just won't under Joe Biden.

00:07:40.920 And he keeps pretending like he has no agency on it.

00:07:43.480 But he does have agency.

00:07:44.600 There are a lot of executive orders he could do just like Trump did.

00:07:47.340 He won't.

00:07:48.400 And you know why?

00:07:49.380 It's because of the people who use the word latinx who are trying to lecture him that it's not humane to enforce our borders.

00:07:56.740 Yeah, I would agree with that.

00:07:57.800 The left wing, because they're so afraid always of being called racist, they let that color every issue and very often wind up with terrible policies that wind up not helping people of color. 0.54

00:08:14.660 Don't you think that's what's happening to him on the trans issue, too, which is my big issue that I mentioned off the front?

00:08:19.000 Well, I think what Joe Biden is is a guy who does not want to fight with the left wing of his party.

00:08:23.660 He sees that as I don't think he understands a lot of what's going on in the left wing.

00:08:28.920 I mean, I doubt if he heard the word trans before he was president.

00:08:32.280 But that's that's what he has chosen to do.

00:08:37.260 He does not want to fight with AOC.

00:08:38.960 He thinks that's where the energy in the party is and he's not completely wrong.

00:08:42.200 So he just kind of goes along with that kind of stuff.

00:08:46.120 Yeah, that's that's one thing that's not great about him.

00:08:48.620 But again, in this country, maybe gender is not binary, but politics is.

00:08:53.880 You only get two choices.

00:08:55.300 That's right.

00:08:55.860 You get Donald Trump, a criminal election denier who is going to transform this country into an authoritarian place like we've never seen before.

00:09:06.400 Or you get Joe Biden with all his flaws. 0.99

00:09:09.280 Also a criminal.

00:09:11.520 OK, what is his crime again?

00:09:13.580 Special Counsel Robert Hurst said he committed felonies, but he wouldn't indict him because he was a well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.

00:09:20.100 He couldn't get a conviction in front of a jury.

00:09:22.840 And what was that crime?

00:09:24.540 That was the classified documents all over his basement, his garage, everywhere.

00:09:29.180 Well, OK, again, a false equivalency.

00:09:31.900 They both had classified documents.

00:09:33.480 Here's the difference.

00:09:35.000 Immediately, Biden, he shouldn't have had them.

00:09:37.620 Immediately, he said, oh, sorry, my bad, and gave them back.

00:09:40.960 That's why he didn't get charged with obstruction.

00:09:43.060 But Trump has two classified documents, pieces to his case.

00:09:46.540 One is you had them.

00:09:47.720 And the second is you obstructed justice when we demanded them back.

00:09:50.620 So, OK, against Biden, you don't get charged with obstruction.

00:09:53.500 But number one, where's the classified documents charged against him?

00:09:56.280 He's also a felon.

00:09:59.980 You've got your story.

00:10:01.060 You know, look, if you see it that way, that's what I have to deal with.

00:10:07.000 You're asking me why I see it differently than you do.

00:10:10.180 The contest between the two of them.

00:10:11.740 And I'm telling you.

00:10:12.540 It's that convincing.

00:10:13.200 It's fair enough.

00:10:14.380 I mean, they both should not have had classified documents.

00:10:18.040 One by the toilet, one by his Corvette.

00:10:20.840 OK.

00:10:21.340 One?

00:10:22.700 One.

00:10:23.700 Multiple.

00:10:24.600 Many.

00:10:24.940 No, I'm talking about one person.

00:10:26.380 OK.

00:10:26.620 One of them.

00:10:27.400 OK.

00:10:27.760 I'll copy.

00:10:28.220 Right.

00:10:28.500 One Trump.

00:10:29.360 One Biden.

00:10:30.220 They both did that.

00:10:31.720 The difference is Goofus and Gallant. 0.91

00:10:34.040 Goofus said, anything I touch is mine forever.

00:10:37.440 Go fish.

00:10:38.700 And the other one said, oh, yeah, my bad.

00:10:42.240 And I'll immediately return them.

00:10:43.900 That's very funny.

00:10:44.600 You're taking me back to my childhood with that reference.

00:10:46.280 But why can't the difference be one actually had the ability to declassify documents and

00:10:51.900 keep them because he'd been the president and one didn't because he should have been looking

00:10:55.940 at documents only in a skiff while a sitting U.S.

00:10:59.360 senator, and clearly he stole classified documents that he wasn't entitled to and never had the

00:11:04.940 ability to declassify them.

00:11:07.500 Yeah.

00:11:09.460 Maybe you know more about that than I do.

00:11:11.400 I don't remember that part of it.

00:11:12.640 And I always don't trust anything I hear until I vet it from the other side because everybody

00:11:18.500 sort of has their one-sided view of it.

00:11:20.660 And narrative is more important than truth.

00:11:22.740 I know this is the right-wing narrative.

00:11:25.260 I'm not like that, Bill.

00:11:26.680 I care about facts.

00:11:27.840 I practiced law for 10 years.

00:11:29.360 I want to get the cases right more than I want to get clicks.

00:11:33.200 And I have a lot of lefties who watch me.

00:11:35.040 So I'm not like that.

00:11:36.960 All I can tell you is those are the facts.

00:11:39.260 And Joe Biden also has behaved in a grossly, grossly extra-constitutional manner.

00:11:44.900 Not only the nonsense of trying to skirt the Supreme Court on the eviction moratoriums and

00:11:52.360 the student loan, quote, debt forgiveness, which he's bragging about skirting them on,

00:11:57.220 but the four indictments, which obviously the White House was behind and promoted and

00:12:02.580 wanted, four indictments of a former sitting president, which we've made it almost 250 years

00:12:07.800 without doing.

00:12:08.640 If that's not extra-legal and weirdly non-normy, I don't know what is.

00:12:13.860 What are the four indictments we're talking about now?

00:12:16.620 The two federal indictments against Trump and the one in New York and the one in Georgia.

00:12:20.640 Oh, you're talking about the Trump indictments.

00:12:21.820 Yeah.

00:12:22.100 I'm saying this administration 100% was behind at least those two federal ones.

00:12:27.320 And there's evidence they were behind the other two, or at least in coordination, though

00:12:31.000 they deny it.

00:12:31.800 They were behind them.

00:12:33.080 It wasn't Trump committing those crimes?

00:12:35.060 Do you really think, you don't think that Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton could have

00:12:39.500 been indicted for what they did when he left office with all the furniture?

00:12:42.500 I don't remember.

00:12:43.600 If somebody kicked the tires of the Clinton initiative, the foundation, you don't think

00:12:47.120 they could find something?

00:12:48.060 I think they did kick those tires a lot.

00:12:50.760 I'm not sure what they found, but I don't think it was much.

00:12:54.300 I don't remember Bill Clinton ever calling up.

00:12:56.680 Hillary Clinton could have been indicted post her run. 0.86

00:12:58.840 As I was saying, I don't think, I don't remember Bill Clinton calling up a secretary of state

00:13:03.300 and saying, I need you to find me 11,000 votes.

00:13:06.420 You don't find that to be a bit of a smoking gun.

00:13:08.760 I don't.

00:13:09.180 Here's why.

00:13:09.680 Because I've listened to the whole phone call.

00:13:11.460 I have too.

00:13:12.960 And what he's saying is, I'm only behind by some hundred thousand, whatever the number

00:13:17.660 was.

00:13:18.160 He said, so I want a recount and what I, I want you to start counting.

00:13:22.780 And all I need is this number.

00:13:25.580 So basically once you get to that number, you can stop counting.

00:13:27.720 Look, I, I don't want to have to defend, defend Trump on his denialism about the election

00:13:32.500 because I'm more on your team on that, but I understand why it's not a smoking gun as

00:13:37.700 you just put it.

00:13:40.240 Okay.

00:13:40.820 Well, you know, people see things differently.

00:13:42.920 They do.

00:13:43.580 Yeah.

00:13:43.980 So this is why you feel like a man without a party because your team feels like you do

00:13:49.040 on the Trump stuff.

00:13:50.020 They hate Trump, but they're not with you when it comes to your anti-wokeism.

00:13:56.460 So what is, where does that leave you?

00:13:58.060 Who do you go out to dinner with?

00:13:59.640 Lots of people.

00:14:00.520 I mean, I feel like more people than ever are on team me, whatever that is, because, you

00:14:07.740 know, they're the normies in the middle who don't want to be ideologically captured by

00:14:12.780 either side.

00:14:13.600 That's who I feel like I speak for people who are not afraid to call out their own team.

00:14:19.020 If you have a team or a team that you are more on the side of, when they do stuff that's

00:14:26.120 goofy.

00:14:26.900 And I think they appreciate it a lot.

00:14:29.140 I mean, I notice in my standup shows, you know, the audience is kind of half and half

00:14:33.520 and the liberals will laugh at woke nonsense and the conservatives will laugh at Trump jokes.

00:14:42.060 Um, most people in this country, I think, understand that there are deep defects on both sides.

00:14:49.560 Yeah.

00:14:50.460 And they just want, they just want the extremists who seem to have the megaphone on either side

00:14:56.340 to go away or stop being so powerful.

00:14:58.960 You know, everybody is like, why can't we just be, you know, common sense?

00:15:02.920 And why can't we just, you know, be the people in the middle?

00:15:05.900 But at the end of the day, no one sort of stands up for that because it's just so easier

00:15:11.140 to pander to the people who are a team, because those are the people who wind up scaring the

00:15:17.120 other people.

00:15:17.760 I mean, certainly on the left, that happens.

00:15:19.600 I've said it many times.

00:15:21.040 The problem with wokeness is nobody ever gets canceled for being too woke.

00:15:25.060 That's how you wind up with men can get pregnant. 1.00

00:15:32.200 We're staying in this nice resort in Sedona.

00:15:34.400 Uh, uh, we got a, uh, guarded gate and I pay attention to that kind of stuff because

00:15:39.120 of my background.

00:15:41.000 And, uh, a lot of the guys knew me that worked in there for the, from, from my podcast and,

00:15:46.180 and wanted to talk.

00:15:47.180 Well, this, we were there for a week.

00:15:48.760 The last day I walked through and it's this old, uh, old man in there.

00:15:55.660 And he's wanted to talk to me.

00:15:57.000 Me and my wife had gone up to a hike because I was like, I just, I got to get the hell out

00:16:00.360 of here.

00:16:00.700 Maybe a hike will make me feel better.

00:16:02.160 Walk back down.

00:16:03.020 And, and this guy starts trying to talk to me.

00:16:07.200 It's dark at this point.

00:16:08.180 I had already kind of surrendered.

00:16:09.480 Like I've done, I didn't feel good, but I'd kind of made my decision.

00:16:13.260 Like I'm not doing this anymore.

00:16:15.360 And, um, I'm kind of looking at him over the shoulder, like, I'm, I'm, I'm not in the

00:16:21.080 mood to like strike up a conversation. 0.98

00:16:23.220 And, but my wife starts talking to him and I'm like, shit, I just want to go to my room. 0.98

00:16:31.000 So I turn around and this guy, this guy read my mind from front to back. 0.97

00:16:39.520 And I mean, like, I've never had that happen.

00:16:44.700 And it wasn't, it, it, I mean, it was descriptive.

00:16:48.380 It was, it scared the shit out of me because I was like, how are you, how, how are you in

00:16:54.320 my head?

00:16:55.460 And, uh, he started rattling off all these thoughts that I was having on that entire

00:16:59.820 hike.

00:17:00.160 And he's like, this stuff that's going on in China, that's not your fight anymore.

00:17:04.680 And this stuff that's going on with the kids, that's not your fight either.

00:17:09.520 And this stuff that's going on with the trans community, that's not your fight.

00:17:13.340 And, and I, my, I had shut down.

00:17:16.520 I was like, well, how was this guy in my head right now?

00:17:20.480 So freaked me out.

00:17:22.740 We're walking back to, to our bungalow.

00:17:25.500 We were in a place where it was like, kind of like a duplex and, um, where I'm

00:17:30.040 one side, somebody else on another side, we got there.

00:17:33.140 We got, when we got to Sedona, uh, my best friend that I was referring to earlier, his

00:17:39.220 name's Gabe.

00:17:39.800 He, he died of a, of a heroin overdose, uh, later on.

00:17:44.800 But, uh, Gabe was a seal.

00:17:47.560 Gabe was a pro hockey player.

00:17:49.620 Gabe was a fighter.

00:17:50.940 Uh, we was into MMA.

00:17:52.480 Gabe was at the agency with me.

00:17:54.280 And no matter where Gabe was, Gabe was always, always known as a protector.

00:17:59.360 Like no matter what unit he was in, no matter what, who he was with could be the, the, the,

00:18:06.760 the manliest of all men.

00:18:08.500 Like everybody knows Gabe has got you.

00:18:12.700 And, and he was my best friend.

00:18:15.920 Well, we get there and we see this guy and he looks identical.

00:18:18.820 He could be Gabe's identical twin.

00:18:20.640 I mean, you could see differences, but same brow line, same jaw line, same build, same

00:18:25.920 walk, same three day shadow, same everything, uh, muscular.

00:18:31.700 And me and my wife were both like, man, that looks exactly like Gabe.

00:18:35.860 And everywhere we would go, this guy was at, if we were at the pool, this guy was at the

00:18:41.140 pool.

00:18:41.360 If we were going on a hike, this guy was coming back from a hike.

00:18:43.880 If we were out in town getting dinner, he was out in town getting dinner and, and we

00:18:49.960 had, we had always thought it was weird because I'd, I'd kind of had a breakdown on the plane,

00:18:54.180 uh, to Sedona.

00:18:57.100 And so I was in a vulnerable spot.

00:18:59.540 My wife knew it.

00:19:00.360 I was in a vulnerable spot.

00:19:01.680 I knew it.

00:19:02.280 Uh, I was with my buddy, Dave and he knew it.

00:19:06.360 And it was just odd that Gabe, who's always known as a protector is like every, this guy

00:19:11.620 that looks identical to him is, is everywhere.

00:19:14.220 Well, it turns out right from that gate, we walked to our bungalow and it turns out this

00:19:21.920 guy and his family is staying right across the, the thing from us.

00:19:26.920 And we hadn't seen him all week.

00:19:28.580 And I'm like, that was weird. 0.99

00:19:30.100 And on the way back, I'm telling Katie, I'm like, Holy shit. 0.98

00:19:32.820 Like, I think, I think that was God that was reading my mind. 0.99

00:19:36.640 And she's like, yeah, Sean, that was God.

00:19:40.500 And I'm like, I can't believe this.

00:19:42.620 Like, how is this happening?

00:19:44.240 And, and she's like, Sean, God's always been around you.

00:19:47.960 You just don't make time for him.

00:19:50.680 And, uh, I knew that to be true.

00:19:53.380 So we get to the bungalow, Gabe staying across the way or the, the lookalike, whatever, uh,

00:19:59.560 you want to call it.

00:20:00.520 He's, we find out he's staying right across.

00:20:02.600 This is all within like 10, 15 minutes.

00:20:04.500 Then we go in and I, I am, I'm crying and I'm like, I can't believe this is happening.

00:20:09.340 And right before, also right before we went to Zona, uh, a good friend of mine, uh, his

00:20:16.400 name was Dan Cirillo died.

00:20:18.620 Uh, he was kind of the only, he was a seal, uh, and a businessman and he lived in Franklin.

00:20:25.620 And I don't have a lot of people that I can relate to, uh, where I live now in Franklin.

00:20:33.040 And Dan is one of those guys that, that he's very successful.

00:20:39.200 He owned a couple of hospitals.

00:20:40.780 He owned a, a, a big security business.

00:20:44.240 And he's like one of the few people that I can sit down with and talk business and talk

00:20:48.400 friends.

00:20:48.760 And he doesn't need anything from me and I don't need anything from him.

00:20:51.600 And those, you know, those relationships get hard to come by.

00:20:54.760 And, uh, so we hit it off really fast and then he died on a hunting trip with his son,

00:21:00.840 had a heart attack and, um, and, uh, but Hey, I mean that if there's a way to go, good

00:21:08.660 on him.

00:21:09.220 But, uh, anyways, his daughter who I had never met, I'm having this breakdown in the, in the

00:21:16.120 hotel.

00:21:16.540 And, uh, his daughter, I heard my phone go, go awful.

00:21:22.760 I was talking to Katie and as soon as we kind of finished what we were talking about, about

00:21:27.540 what was going on, I checked my phone and it's from his daughter and, and, uh, it's this text.

00:21:38.480 I'd never even met her before.

00:21:40.880 And, uh, she says, she must've got my number from her dad's phone.

00:21:46.520 And, and, uh, she said, Hey Sean, um, this is Taylor, Dan's daughter.

00:21:53.120 And I just walked into my dad's gun room for the first time since he had passed away.

00:21:59.560 And he grabbed me by the arm and told me that I needed to contact you because you knew a side

00:22:06.780 of him that nobody else knew and that he wanted me to tell you that he loves you just the way

00:22:14.160 that you are and that you're doing exactly what you should be doing.

00:22:18.580 And then, uh, I'm trying not to lose it right now, but, um, but, uh, so that was like the

00:22:27.000 third thing all within, like I said, 10, 15 minutes. 0.98

00:22:31.100 And I was like, Holy shit, like there's no denying this one. 0.98

00:22:36.940 Exactly. 0.99

00:22:38.040 And, uh,

00:22:38.760 Hello brick wall.

00:22:39.920 Yeah.

00:22:40.880 And so, you know, I grew up Catholic and never really took church seriously.

00:22:46.720 Uh, I never did.

00:22:50.380 And then when I left home, I never really went back and, and it kind of lost faith.

00:22:54.440 And, um, I'm not saying I wasn't a believer.

00:22:56.480 I just didn't really care and I didn't think about it and, uh, I had definitely no time

00:23:01.360 for, for God.

00:23:04.080 And so I took that as a, I mean, that was like a slap in the face and I, I had decided

00:23:10.240 I needed to get serious about faith and at least look into it.

00:23:13.120 And, and so I started looking into it and, and it's, and it's been great.

00:23:17.340 And, and, you know, to be honest, it's the only thing I can find that makes any damn sense

00:23:21.520 anymore and it's all, it's all in that book.

00:23:24.620 Everything we're seeing happening right now is in that book.

00:23:27.040 Is that how you started just reading the Bible?

00:23:28.900 I did.

00:23:29.740 I did.

00:23:30.100 I started trying to read it from front to back and, and, uh, I wasn't really getting

00:23:35.120 anywhere.

00:23:35.720 And then shocking stuff in that old Testament.

00:23:37.980 Yeah.

00:23:38.380 If you go that way.

00:23:39.600 Yeah.

00:23:40.100 And, um, but then turns out, uh, as it turns out my entire team, I'm really close with my

00:23:47.000 team, um, my podcast team, the guys that, that work for me and, and make it what, what it

00:23:53.600 is.

00:23:54.540 And, uh, turns out one guy's was raised Southern Baptist, super well-versed in the Bible.

00:24:00.020 My editor, Darren, uh, grew up a Jehovah's witness and, uh, escaped, escaped it. 1.00

00:24:07.180 But, but knows, I mean, knows that book from front to back.

00:24:11.060 Um, um, um, my it guy, Adam, uh, devout Catholic knows it all, everything.

00:24:20.340 Elijah, my production manager, he's the Southern Baptist guy.

00:24:24.380 And they kind of started pouring into me and, and a lot of my buddies that were in the seal

00:24:31.180 teams, uh, Eddie Penny really kind of paved the way for all of this.

00:24:35.880 I think, uh, Eddie Penny was, uh, we were a team two together and then he went on to dev

00:24:42.080 group and, uh, just like, oh, mom, like, I mean, not who you would expect to come to

00:24:50.520 faith, but he was my Christmas episode, uh, a couple of years ago.

00:24:55.600 And ever since he came on and gave his testimony of how he came to everybody that's been on

00:25:04.260 the show has brought it up and, um, and he became kind of a mentor of mine.

00:25:09.640 So I called Eddie and told him and I said, Hey, this is what happened.

00:25:14.700 I don't really know where to start.

00:25:16.420 I don't really know what this means.

00:25:18.600 Uh, and we had a conversation and, uh, he goes, he was like, Oh man, he's like a lot of

00:25:26.880 us have been praying for this to happen.

00:25:28.900 Wow.

00:25:29.340 And that kind of freaked me out.

00:25:30.900 I was like, well, what do you mean?

00:25:32.260 And, uh, he's like, we've been waiting for this.

00:25:35.220 He's like, you have a big voice and, and this needs to happen.

00:25:40.980 And so that was at about midnight.

00:25:43.820 I'm now I'm getting into some other kind of weird synchronicity, uh, coincidences.

00:25:48.700 And so about 12 hours later, I had a meeting that Adam, uh, my T guy had scheduled with me

00:25:55.820 at noon and Eddie was telling, Eddie was telling me during the conversation, he was, he was

00:26:03.460 talking about guardian angels and all this other stuff that was spiritual warfare, stuff

00:26:07.660 that I know like nothing about.

00:26:09.660 Well, fast forward 12 hours.

00:26:11.960 I'm talking to Adam.

00:26:13.220 I didn't know what this meeting was.

00:26:14.360 I thought it was about email marketing or something.

00:26:16.320 And, uh, he wanted to talk to me about spiritual warfare and guardian angels.

00:26:23.180 Wow.

00:26:23.720 And I was like, it was literally like almost the exact same conversation as I had had with

00:26:29.760 Eddie Penny.

00:26:30.340 You're like, that's not on the dropdown menu of message manager.

00:26:33.800 I know.

00:26:34.280 And they're not friends.

00:26:35.980 I mean, Adam is with all due respect.

00:26:38.760 They had coordinated those two guys. 0.98

00:26:40.280 Eddie is a built like a shit brick house, a dev group operator. 0.99

00:26:46.240 And Adam is a IT computer nerd who I love to death. 0.98

00:26:51.480 And, uh, so no, they don't, they don't, there's no cross pollination.

00:26:55.360 They're not friends.

00:26:56.140 I've never spoken exact same conversation at noon, come home for lunch from my studio to,

00:27:01.940 uh, to be with the wife and kids and, um, Adam, uh, and, and anyways, I go back to

00:27:10.180 work.

00:27:10.500 I look at my clock in my truck and it says it's four 44.

00:27:14.580 I look at the odometer.

00:27:16.660 It says 444 miles left to E and this is four hours and 44 minutes after my conversation with

00:27:23.120 Adam about guardian angels.

00:27:25.700 So I look up the meaning of four 44 and it is your guardian angels want you to know that

00:27:32.540 they have got you.

00:27:35.420 Um, and, um, and, uh, I've had some great mentors and. 0.99

00:27:40.740 Um, and I'm just, I'm just, I'm like, holy shit, man. 0.85

00:27:41.120 Like we just had two conversations about guardian angels and now I'm saying four 44 everywhere within. 0.91

00:27:47.540 Yeah.

00:27:48.740 And, and, and it's in the meaning of it.

00:27:53.300 Supposedly according to Google is your guardian angels want you to know that they've got you.

00:27:58.920 And, um, and so I've been in it ever since and, and, uh, I've had some great mentors and

00:28:04.920 started going to church that didn't last very long.

00:28:08.600 And, uh, and, uh, now we have, we have a, a group of, there's four families, including

00:28:15.120 us, uh, a lot of trust, very close, uh, friends of ours.

00:28:20.180 And we, we just have a discussion every week, every, every Tuesday.

00:28:24.880 So when I get home today, that's, that's, that's what we're doing.

00:28:28.880 And, uh, it's cool.

00:28:30.640 You get to ask the tough questions.

00:28:32.740 You can't, you don't need to be embarrassed.

00:28:34.460 You're not going to offend anybody.

00:28:35.660 You don't feel judged like you're going to church every, you know, I always feel like

00:28:40.100 I'm being judged.

00:28:41.000 Oh, hello.

00:28:41.920 We're Catholic.

00:28:42.620 Yeah.

00:28:43.460 Built in.

00:28:44.560 And, uh, and, uh, and there's none of that.

00:28:46.800 And, um, man, you know, when you, when you kind of take all of the BS, the religion kind

00:28:53.560 of injects into, uh, end of your journey of building relationship with, with the creator

00:29:01.620 and Jesus, it's really interesting.

00:29:05.320 And it can be a lot of fun.

00:29:06.780 I know what you're saying.

00:29:07.700 I have, my audience knows I've been having a not unrelated struggle on that exact score.

00:29:14.260 Really?

00:29:14.760 Yeah.

00:29:15.380 Yeah.

00:29:15.820 I'm, um, I'm Catholic, lifelong Catholic.

00:29:18.160 And I started the process of having my first marriage annulled.

00:29:23.140 And instead of like bringing me closer to God or setting me in a path that I thought would

00:29:28.040 land well, it really has kind of alienated me.

00:29:31.360 And, um, it's caused a bit of a crisis of faith, you know, like who are these middlemen 0.82

00:29:36.860 I have to go through in order to have a clean relationship with God?

00:29:40.080 That doesn't make any sense to me.

00:29:42.220 I think God loves me.

00:29:44.040 And God sees me in a loving marriage with three wonderful kids who have two great parents

00:29:50.160 who are in love and he's thrilled and he will accept me into his kingdom when it's all said

00:29:57.460 And if he doesn't, it's certainly not going to be because I didn't get a paper, I got a paper

00:30:02.340 divorce from Dan, but I didn't get an annulment from a priest, you know, and then Mary dug in a 1.00

00:30:08.440 Catholic church.

00:30:09.260 It doesn't make any sense to me.

00:30:12.120 So that's sort of where I am right now.

00:30:14.240 I'm still wrestling with it.

00:30:15.140 I got tons of great feedback, by the way.

00:30:16.680 Thank you to my audience.

00:30:17.580 Cause so many thoughtful emails on it, you know, from Catholic, um, listeners, but also

00:30:23.700 just Christian listeners who don't believe in that, you know, middleman thing either.

00:30:28.640 I haven't resolved it.

00:30:30.840 Well, I'll keep my opinion to myself, but the middleman is a lie.

00:30:40.780 There are no middlemen.

00:30:43.600 It's just about you and your relationship and that's it.

00:30:47.040 Tell us about mental toughness and how your dad made sure you had it.

00:30:56.320 Well, I am so fortunate to have, I didn't realize this at the time, but of course, as

00:31:00.360 you get older, I realized now how fortunate I am to have two amazing parents who love each

00:31:06.800 other very much, who taught me how to be an independent thinker, how to call out an injustice

00:31:13.280 when you see it.

00:31:15.100 Um, so I could not be more grateful for my parents who were both high level athletes.

00:31:19.500 Uh, my mom, she was a division one softball player. 0.99

00:31:21.640 My dad, uh, he's an sec hall of famer football player, uh, went on to play for the Eagles.

00:31:27.940 Um, it's been a good bit in the NFL.

00:31:30.180 And so, um, them having that background inclined, uh, was a big part in me playing sports, I guess

00:31:38.260 I'll say.

00:31:38.620 But when I was young, probably eight years old, um, my dad, he did some different business

00:31:45.680 endeavors.

00:31:46.020 And so I went with him on a business trip to Memphis, Tennessee, and I will never forget

00:31:52.000 we are at this hotel.

00:31:53.480 I normally, of course, you know, never really traveled with just my dad.

00:31:56.920 It was always all of us as a family, but it was a fun little bonding trip.

00:32:00.000 So we're at this hotel and he says, Riley, come, come down to the lobby with me.

00:32:03.980 And I'm like, okay, you know, what are we doing?

00:32:06.020 He takes me to the pool at this hotel.

00:32:10.020 It's outside.

00:32:10.780 It's in the middle of December.

00:32:12.200 And he's like, jump in.

00:32:13.580 I'm like, dad, I'm not jumping in that pool.

00:32:16.060 It's freezing.

00:32:16.620 He pulled back the tarp.

00:32:17.500 He said, no, you're going to jump in.

00:32:18.460 This is your first lesson of mental toughness.

00:32:21.140 Uh, you're going to jump in and you're not going to say you're cold.

00:32:24.400 You're not going to, to shiver.

00:32:26.140 And I'll tell you when you can get out.

00:32:27.960 I'm like, dad, this is child abuse.

00:32:29.620 You can't make me do that.

00:32:30.520 I'm calling mom.

00:32:31.280 Um, but I listened to him.

00:32:33.860 I jumped in, uh, confused.

00:32:36.000 You know, what is this for?

00:32:37.800 Finally, after five minutes or so of treading in the water, he said, okay, you can come out.

00:32:41.620 And then we go back to the room.

00:32:43.200 I'm still shivering.

00:32:43.980 I'm like, dad, what was that about?

00:32:46.260 He said that, like I said, you need to learn mental toughness because physical toughness.

00:32:50.840 Yeah.

00:32:51.140 It's important, but mental toughness will take you further.

00:32:53.840 Um, there's no such thing as cold, Riley.

00:32:57.760 He said, there's such thing as an absence of heat, but there's no such thing as cold.

00:33:01.420 It's a mental state.

00:33:02.380 You think you're cold.

00:33:03.300 He said, you're not really.

00:33:04.400 And I will never forget that.

00:33:05.860 It has stuck with me since.

00:33:07.220 And every time when I was swimming or practicing and I began to, you know, your legs burn, you

00:33:12.440 feel your body filling with lactic acid.

00:33:14.900 You're tired.

00:33:15.480 You're in pain.

00:33:16.060 I thought to myself, pain isn't real.

00:33:17.700 Just a feeling that I'm having.

00:33:19.280 It's fleeting.

00:33:19.800 It's in the moment, but not real.

00:33:22.460 So this is the difference between you and virtually everybody.

00:33:25.440 I mean, I remember talking to some Navy SEALs about this and that's how they get through

00:33:29.000 training.

00:33:29.320 Like I, I don't feel the pain.

00:33:30.620 I don't feel the lactic acid.

00:33:32.040 I tried that at my very next workout and it was not true.

00:33:35.920 It's not true.

00:33:37.360 We mere mortals do feel pain, but it's those lessons that I learned when I was young.

00:33:44.040 My dad was right because they have transcended beyond athletics.

00:33:47.760 Um, I'm able to do what I do now with a smile on my face with an incredibly light heart, not

00:33:55.760 worrying, not caring, not feeling anxious or stressed about, um, what we're up against

00:34:01.740 because I know what I'm standing for is the right thing.

00:34:05.540 This brings me to something I've always wanted to ask you.

00:34:08.080 So my audience knows I used to be on the wrong side of this whole issue, you know, and I played

00:34:14.300 clips of myself at NBC feeding into all of this, you know, I, I was still in the mindset

00:34:19.660 of be compassionate.

00:34:21.900 It's a very small group.

00:34:23.080 They're very badly bullied and using the pronouns.

00:34:25.280 Even when I launched the show, um, not so much on the other stuff, but on the pronouns I

00:34:29.740 was still using, uh, when I launched the show and then I started, you know, I remember when

00:34:35.100 you, I like, it was a defining moment for me to watch you kind of go off on, it was, it

00:34:41.960 was very powerful.

00:34:42.840 It was very fiery, but I needed to see that.

00:34:45.080 So I don't know if, if you know, just how many people you've inspired and influenced since

00:34:51.260 taking that stand.

00:34:52.600 That, that was a big decision for me to, to turn on the pronouns naturally.

00:34:56.400 And, you know, like you, there've been so many women who've inspired me.

00:34:59.300 You're one of them, but Kelly J Keen, Helen Joyce, Abigail Schreier's book.

00:35:04.180 There's just been, you know, all these other great women who were to this party nice and

00:35:08.440 early and have been waving the flag saying, hold on, hold on, hold on.

00:35:12.140 Um, JK Rowling, how, how brave she's been all of it.

00:35:15.380 But I always wanted to ask you about when you were swimming and Leah Thomas, you found

00:35:22.840 out you're going to have to swim against him.

00:35:24.800 So what, how did your mind work at the time to say, I'm going to do it?

00:35:31.120 So we found out in about November of 2021, actually, let me take you a little further

00:35:36.740 back.

00:35:37.000 So I finished my junior year, um, at university of Kentucky, ultimately placing seventh in

00:35:42.580 the country, which it wasn't a best time, but I was proud of this.

00:35:46.600 You're top eight, you're an all American.

00:35:47.920 It's a pretty high honor, but I knew I was capable of more.

00:35:51.440 So it was kind of right then and there that I placed seventh, my junior year that I set

00:35:55.220 a goal for my senior year to win a national title.

00:35:57.180 And so I'm right on pace to achieve this goal about midway through my senior season.

00:36:02.700 I was ranked third in the nation in the 200 freestyle trailing the girl in second, a girl 0.98

00:36:06.900 I knew very well, uh, by a few one hundredths of a second, but the summer who was leading

00:36:13.380 the nation by body links, my dad was a swimmer that none of us had ever heard of before.

00:36:19.080 Not me, not my teammates, not my competitors, not my family, not my coaches, none of us.

00:36:23.320 It was the first time we became aware of a swimmer named Leah Thomas, lots of red flags

00:36:28.600 at the time.

00:36:29.380 Keep in mind, we hadn't seen a photo of this person or else things probably would have been

00:36:32.860 a little more clear.

00:36:34.220 Um, but we really continued to stay in the dark until an article came out disclosing that

00:36:41.140 Leah Thomas is actually will Thomas and swam three years on the men's team that you pin

00:36:45.580 before deciding to switch to the women's team. 0.90

00:36:47.680 Whereas you said ranked, I mean, was mediocre at best.

00:36:51.660 He was a less than average male swimmer still competing at the division one level.

00:36:56.160 So obviously he was a good swimmer.

00:36:58.340 Yeah.

00:36:58.500 But just not compared to the other men, but not when it came to national rankings or achievements.

00:37:03.880 Um, when I found out about this, naturally we were shocked.

00:37:09.660 Um, but really when I think about how I felt, it was like this, this overwhelming sense of

00:37:15.380 relief, like, Oh, that makes sense.

00:37:19.100 Duh.

00:37:19.300 It's a man.

00:37:19.880 That's why he's beating everyone in the country by so much in multiple events.

00:37:23.780 Duh.

00:37:24.720 And I didn't think much about it because I thought surely, I mean, it didn't even cross

00:37:28.740 my mind that the NCAA wouldn't see a problem with this.

00:37:31.220 They won't let him compete with us at NCAAs that the pinnacle of our sport, they'll put

00:37:36.500 a policy in place.

00:37:37.460 I'm sure they already have one in place.

00:37:39.040 This isn't really an issue.

00:37:40.220 He's a man.

00:37:40.680 Uh, so I was, I was very relieved, um, until I found out that the NCAA did not see it that

00:37:47.500 way.

00:37:47.780 They didn't see it the same way that me, again, my teammates, my coaches, uh, anyone

00:37:52.020 with any amount of brain activity saw this issue.

00:37:54.520 They saw no problem with it.

00:37:56.420 But even still those three weeks, I mentioned how we found out about three weeks before that

00:38:01.480 meet in March of 2022, even after finding out leading up to that meet, I am almost ashamed

00:38:09.060 to admit it, but I still felt this like sheer sense of curiosity, almost intriguement.

00:38:15.940 You know, what is this going to look like?

00:38:18.240 Is he as tall as Instagram pictures make him look, uh, is he going to sandbag it?

00:38:22.620 Will he be in our locker room?

00:38:23.680 I mean, there were so many questions that we didn't have answers to that there was a

00:38:28.060 sense of intriguement, but I'm ashamed for feeling intrigued.

00:38:31.400 I really am because upon getting to that meet, um, seeing the tears that I saw from the girls

00:38:38.600 who placed ninth and 17th and missed out on being named an all American by one place, seeing

00:38:43.380 the tears from the moms in the stands, watching as their daughters are being obliterated in

00:38:48.440 the sport that they once loved, feeling the extreme discomfort in the locker room, hearing

00:38:52.580 the whispers, cause that's what they were.

00:38:55.040 They were whispers of, of anger and frustration from these girls who just like myself had worked

00:39:01.460 our entire lives to get to this meet.

00:39:04.400 Uh, I remember specifically actually when my feelings really shifted because, um, this was

00:39:09.840 like a week long meet and you swim prelims in the morning.

00:39:12.520 You have to qualify top 16.

00:39:13.960 You come back that evening, you swim finals, and that's where you'll achieve your overall

00:39:17.420 national ranking.

00:39:18.580 And so that first day of competition, I'm watching prelims of the 500, um, which is the

00:39:25.240 event that Thomas would that evening go on to win a national title in, and I'm watching

00:39:28.960 prelims.

00:39:29.620 There's about eight heats or so.

00:39:31.580 Um, my team was sat next to Virginia tech, one of the, the swimmers from Virginia tech.

00:39:36.760 She swam in one of the, the earlier heats she had just finished.

00:39:39.740 She came back to the pool deck, stood by me.

00:39:42.760 I knew her.

00:39:43.500 I didn't know her that well.

00:39:45.420 I really only knew her name and what event she swam.

00:39:48.540 Uh, we're watching the final heat swim.

00:39:51.300 This is the event where she knew she was right on the cusp of making top 16.

00:39:56.220 The final heat concludes.

00:39:58.180 Thomas is swimming.

00:39:58.980 Thomas dominates.

00:39:59.840 She looks up at the scoreboard and she realized she placed 17th.

00:40:02.700 And I will never forget because she looked at me again, not even really knowing her.

00:40:07.660 And she grabbed me, my hand with tears running down her face.

00:40:11.560 And she said, Riley, I just got beat by someone who didn't even have to try.

00:40:14.820 I mean, I have chills telling it again.

00:40:16.340 I have to, I have chills listening.

00:40:17.720 And that's when those feelings shifted to utter heartbreak.

00:40:20.920 And I realized the severity of what we were dealing with.

00:40:24.040 This wasn't just a circus or a funny ha ha, like SNL skit moment anymore.

00:40:27.840 This was real life. 0.91

00:40:29.160 And that's when, that's when I decided what cowards we have leading us, our coaches,

00:40:35.820 even coaches who I love and respect and who knew this was objectively wrong.

00:40:41.340 But then it was very hard for you to say anything about it as the competitors that they knew

00:40:45.280 what would happen to you.

00:40:46.080 Of course.

00:40:46.900 Yeah.

00:40:47.300 But they were more worried about their own heights.

00:40:48.820 Of course.

00:40:49.640 And again, I understand because the risk and the threats, they're real.

00:40:52.560 I'm not sitting here saying that it's easy.

00:40:54.340 Well, actually I am.

00:40:55.380 It is easy to say that there are two sexes.

00:40:58.220 That's not hard to say.

00:40:59.760 But very few have said it, right?

00:41:00.860 Paula Scanlon spoke out.

00:41:02.860 You Penn swimmer, you spoke out.

00:41:05.240 But almost no one, no one else that I know of.

00:41:08.300 No, there's been very, very few.

00:41:10.480 Very few.

00:41:10.920 People think it's either, either, of course, they're terrified.

00:41:13.660 They're scared.

00:41:14.260 They believe it when, when their universities or administrators tell them they won't get

00:41:17.640 a job or they'll not, they won't get into grad school or they'll lose their friends

00:41:21.060 or people genuinely think it's not their problem.

00:41:23.560 They think, oh, well, I'm done competing.

00:41:25.280 It happened to me, but I'm moving on.

00:41:28.020 It's, it's onto the next thing.

00:41:29.120 It won't happen again.

00:41:30.940 Really?

00:41:31.880 I know.

00:41:32.380 It's incredibly selfish.

00:41:33.320 I saw you on The View yesterday where they were trying to zero in on you and Biden and

00:41:42.160 this presidential race.

00:41:43.300 And those ladies really, really, really wanted you to say that you endorse him.

00:41:48.860 You didn't want to do it, but eventually you admitted, okay, it's, it's kind of a binary

00:41:53.440 choice here.

00:41:54.320 I mean, it's basically a binary choice and that you're not going to vote for Trump.

00:41:57.980 So why wouldn't you just be explicit about it?

00:42:01.540 I wondered about the hesitation.

00:42:04.700 Simply because I'm, you know, I'm not, I'm not a fan and, you know, I don't think that,

00:42:09.020 you know, an endorsement, like people think that me not wanting to endorse means that

00:42:14.340 I'm not voting, which I think is the strangest, strangest thing ever.

00:42:17.620 There was another moment in that conversation where I even said, hey, that's third party

00:42:20.980 candidates.

00:42:21.880 Whoopi told me she'll beat my behind if I bring up, you know, third party candidates.

00:42:26.300 So I just think it's kind of strange where we are as a culture and as a society, where

00:42:30.580 it's almost like there's either one of two extremes.

00:42:34.360 And if you're a person who just, you know, simply chooses to be objective, simply, you

00:42:38.900 know, chooses to look at, you know, both candidates and say, hey, I think there's some right things

00:42:43.940 here.

00:42:44.220 There's some wrong things there.

00:42:45.320 There's some good things here.

00:42:46.240 There's some, you know, good things over here.

00:42:48.520 Like just me being able to explore both options are, are all options that are out there.

00:42:53.620 For some reason, it, it, it bothers people and I don't, I don't understand why they were

00:42:57.820 really pressing you.

00:42:59.420 They were like, do, do Biden a solid.

00:43:01.880 They wanted you to go to your audience and say, vote for Biden.

00:43:05.020 And it was very strange.

00:43:06.480 Like, you know, you've got some magic wand that's going to turn this thing.

00:43:10.040 If you just say I endorse, can I ask you about third parties?

00:43:13.360 Would you consider RFKJ?

00:43:14.760 Uh, I mean, I've, I've looked at all of them.

00:43:18.380 I've looked at RFK.

00:43:19.300 I've looked at Marianne Williamson.

00:43:20.600 I've looked at, uh, Cornel West.

00:43:22.180 Like I've looked at all of them.

00:43:23.260 I've been looking at third parties since, you know, 2016, like, you know, like 2016,

00:43:30.400 people would say we didn't have the best options.

00:43:32.340 Right.

00:43:32.680 But, uh, I felt like Hillary Clinton was, you know, overly qualified to be president, 0.99

00:43:36.620 but it's not like I didn't explore everything I explored after, after president Obama, I

00:43:40.220 explored everything.

00:43:41.160 I explored conservatives.

00:43:42.660 I explored, you know, the Green Party.

00:43:44.820 I explored Democrats.

00:43:46.200 I feel like that's what you should do as an American citizen.

00:43:49.280 You know, I don't, I don't think the two party system, um, you know, has been, has been

00:43:52.860 the best thing for us here in America.

00:43:55.060 And I don't think there's anything wrong with exploring, exploring everything.

00:43:57.880 I'm, I'm actually shocked that there hasn't been a third party candidate that's been able

00:44:01.540 to come along and like really galvanize people, especially being that America seems to

00:44:06.400 be, you know, so disappointed in the choices that we have now.

00:44:09.360 Do you think that there's like more pressure on you to quote endorse because you're black

00:44:17.080 and there's a presumption that you have some influence with black voters who not by huge

00:44:22.380 margins, but by some margins are migrating from the Democrat to the Republican party,

00:44:27.240 or at least from Biden to Trump.

00:44:28.900 I think, I think people, I don't know if people are necessarily, and I see the numbers, like

00:44:34.040 I think I said, what 22% of people, 22% of black people may vote for Donald Trump.

00:44:38.360 I think that number is overstated a little bit, but, uh, my guy, Tim Ryan, you know, who

00:44:42.320 used to be a, a, a, a congressman in Ohio, Tim Ryan always, well, Senator in Ohio, I'm

00:44:46.480 sorry, Tim, Tim Ryan used to always, he talks about the exhausted majority.

00:44:51.240 And I think that's what most people are in this country.

00:44:53.680 We're the exhausted majority.

00:44:55.720 So it's not even just about being tired of, you know, Democrats are being tired of Republicans.

00:45:00.400 People are just tired of politics, period, you know?

00:45:03.940 And I think that's what you're seeing a lot of now.

00:45:06.940 Like even, you know, having the conversation about, you know, who I'm choosing to vote for.

00:45:12.120 Listen, I've said it over and over what I think about both candidates, right?

00:45:17.340 And it's, it's only May.

00:45:19.060 I don't know what's going to happen between now and November.

00:45:22.360 I don't think much is going to change, but if these people want people to be, if these

00:45:26.460 parties want people to be more energized about their candidates, maybe they should just run

00:45:30.300 better candidates.

00:45:31.720 You know?

00:45:33.100 I don't think it's rocket science.

00:45:35.960 You, in the book, you write about your background.

00:45:39.340 You grew up pretty poor, uh, in a single wide trailer and spending most of your time running

00:45:45.640 around through the woods and had very hardworking mom, had a more complicated relationship with

00:45:50.320 your dad.

00:45:50.720 Did you ever think that that kid, right?

00:45:52.740 Who was learning how to catch a rattlesnake on his spare time would be in the position now where

00:45:58.160 it's like your magic words of, I endorse this candidate would be so important, right?

00:46:05.980 To political TV shows and pundits.

00:46:08.320 No, not, not on that aspect.

00:46:09.840 I always knew that I was, you know, here to do something.

00:46:13.380 I always felt that in my spirit.

00:46:14.740 I used to be in my grandmother's yard in Monks Corner, South Carolina and the field, like

00:46:19.960 there used to be a field in front of her yard that used to separate my grandmother's 0.95

00:46:22.960 house and like, uh, my cousin Gloria's house.

00:46:25.740 And it's, it's back when I was smaller, the field seems so big, but it's actually not that

00:46:29.580 big, but I used to always be acting like I was on a stage and I used to be acting like,

00:46:33.680 you know, I was performing right.

00:46:35.720 And it was always like I was in, in a rock band.

00:46:38.540 And then, you know, as, as I got older, it was like, I was a rapper.

00:46:42.120 So I always knew that I was, you know,

00:46:44.740 supposed to be delivering some kind of message.

00:46:46.960 And this is might sound kind of crazy to some people, but I remember meeting a medium back

00:46:52.280 in 2006.

00:46:54.560 And, um, you know, he, he said to me, he goes, you know, he was just talking to me and he

00:46:57.960 said, you know, you're going to achieve a lot of your goals relatively easy, but I just

00:47:01.220 want you to know that, you know, uh, when you get the way you're supposed to go, you're

00:47:05.020 here to deliver a message.

00:47:06.460 And, uh, that same medium told me that he saw like a microphone in my future and he

00:47:12.380 was talking about radio.

00:47:13.460 And he said he, he, he was naming different radio personalities and it was, it was not

00:47:18.740 spooky at the time, but it was just like, Hmm.

00:47:21.320 He even told me I was going to have a daughter.

00:47:23.300 And that was in 2006.

00:47:24.680 I didn't have my first daughter until 2008.

00:47:26.100 So long story short, I always knew I ended up having four long story short.

00:47:31.280 I always knew that I was here to, you know, be on a platform of some, some sort, but I

00:47:37.140 didn't know that it would be, I didn't know I would be captain Saber Joe in an election.

00:47:43.200 You know, I think I read the book and I really enjoyed it.

00:47:46.800 And I think what makes you special is your extreme ability to be introspective, reflective

00:47:53.640 about your life to keep challenging yourself, to keep change, keep changing, keep growing.

00:47:58.940 And you're very, very honest about what you perceive as your own shortcomings, whether

00:48:03.780 it was early on in your marriage, something you addressed, whether it was the life lessons

00:48:08.780 you took from your dad and your uncle, and you're sort of growing up, which you realized

00:48:12.420 as an adult, weren't so great, or even right down to, we don't have to get into it, but like

00:48:16.900 the size of certain man parts that you just like Howard Stern style, put it out there,

00:48:22.320 Charlemagne, I have to say you're a brave man.

00:48:26.700 I don't know if you call it brave.

00:48:28.240 I just, I think that we lack self-awareness, man.

00:48:30.480 And I think that one of the main reasons that, you know, a lot of people just aren't being

00:48:35.260 honest with themselves, which is why the book is called Get Honest or Die Lying, is because

00:48:38.880 it's so easy to be real with other people, but it's so hard to be real with yourself.

00:48:44.320 And, you know, they have all of these cliche terms, like I keep it real, but usually the

00:48:47.820 people who keep it real can only do that with others.

00:48:50.360 But man, when that mirror gets in front of them, it's very hard for them to have those

00:48:54.780 like super honest conversations with they self.

00:48:57.420 And my whole life, that's what I've, you know, challenged myself to be, just honest.

00:49:02.100 Because, you know, my dad used to always tell me something when I was young.

00:49:04.780 He was like, man, when you lie to me, you're not lying to me, you're lying to yourself.

00:49:09.720 And that's something that just always stuck with me.

00:49:12.120 And you can kind of tell the people who are lying to themselves in our society.

00:49:16.900 And I went on, I went away on a spiritual retreat, you know, earlier this year, me and

00:49:20.560 my wife.

00:49:21.060 And one of the things that came up for me during that time away was stop lying to yourself

00:49:26.540 and stop volunteering those lies to other people.

00:49:29.700 And that's, that's literally what, what, what I wrote this book for.

00:49:32.460 I wrote this book for people to stop lying to themselves and stop volunteering those lies

00:49:35.860 to other people.

00:49:36.360 All right, I've got to read you this because my fourth grade boy was at an end of year

00:49:42.600 ceremony just two days ago.

00:49:44.580 And my husband and I went and their fourth grade teacher read to this class of boys the

00:49:48.540 following poem, which speaks exactly to what you're saying.

00:49:51.180 I cried.

00:49:51.680 I'm not going to lie.

00:49:52.420 You're a dad.

00:49:53.160 You can be able to relate, but it's called that guy in the glass.

00:49:56.740 It's by Dale Wimbrough.

00:49:58.060 And it goes as follows.

00:49:59.420 When you get what you want in your struggle for self and the world makes you king for a day,

00:50:03.440 then go to the mirror and look at yourself and see what that guy has to say for it.

00:50:08.480 Isn't your mother, brother, or friends whose judgment you must pass.

00:50:11.600 The person whose verdict counts most in your life is the one staring back at the glass.

00:50:17.960 You can go down the pathway of years receiving pats on the back as you pass, but your final

00:50:23.800 reward will be heartache and tears.

00:50:27.100 If you cheated that guy in the glass, that's exactly what you're saying.

00:50:31.640 That's a theme of your book in some ways.

00:50:33.960 Powerful words.

00:50:35.040 Whoever that was who wrote that, they remixed Michael Jackson's Man in the Mirror.

00:50:38.680 I just want you to know I'm talking about the man in the mirror.

00:50:43.840 Man in the mirror.

00:50:45.060 Yeah.

00:50:45.500 I'm asking him to change his way.

00:50:48.500 That's all that is.

00:50:49.540 But whoever wrote that is absolutely positively true.

00:50:51.840 The hardest thing for us to do is look in the mirror every day and be honest with ourselves.

00:50:56.380 And I literally challenge myself every day.

00:50:59.300 I wake up every day.

00:51:00.460 And before I'm honest with anybody else, before I'm telling anybody else about what I think

00:51:05.640 they may be doing wrong, or if I give them compliments on what they're doing right, I

00:51:09.900 talk to myself first.

00:51:11.700 That inner voice in your head, the things you tell yourself are really the most important.

00:51:16.840 And that's what I do every morning.

00:51:19.360 It's something you've worked at.

00:51:21.840 You've cultivated.

00:51:23.500 You talk in the book about the therapy you've been through, all the way down to, I don't

00:51:28.360 know if this, this didn't exactly come from your therapist, but you have a spiritual guru

00:51:32.660 in your life as well.

00:51:33.620 And the tree hugging, you're a tree hugger, but not exactly in the green new deal sense

00:51:40.240 in a different kind of way.

00:51:41.820 Explain.

00:51:42.800 Yeah.

00:51:43.700 It's a, it's a chapter called tree hug the block.

00:51:45.880 And, you know, I just talk about the benefits of, you know, doing things like forest bathing,

00:51:50.220 you know, walking around in your yard with your shoes off and your socks off and just doing

00:51:55.180 grounding exercises, you know, going up to trees, putting both hands on the trees, putting

00:51:59.560 your forehead on the tree, taking a few deep breaths, you know, saying a prayer, you know,

00:52:03.600 sometimes, you know, just, just sitting shirtless with your back to the tree, you know, me and

00:52:10.020 one of my spiritual advisors, her name is Yadi Alba, we laugh because, you know, she always 1.00

00:52:13.960 says, you know, lay down in the ground, face, face down, ass up, right. 0.66

00:52:17.820 And just, just let the, let the earth just feel the earth.

00:52:21.420 And man, you'd be surprised how when you're stressed out or if, you know, you're,

00:52:25.180 you know, battling like about a depression or your anxiety levels are high, you'd be

00:52:29.080 surprised how that just brings you right back to center.

00:52:32.120 And, you know, we used to laugh, you know, back at, back in the day at the people who

00:52:35.520 used to consider themselves, you know, tree huggers, you'd be like, oh man, they just

00:52:39.360 high.

00:52:40.040 Everything, everything is great when you're high.

00:52:42.180 And guess what, Megan, they right.

00:52:43.960 You know, when you walking around doing some grounding in the backyard, even when you're

00:52:48.840 not high, it really does feel great.

00:52:50.880 And it really does bring you back to center in a real way.

00:52:53.100 I like the beach too.

00:52:54.940 I like walking, you know, barefoot on the beach.

00:52:56.820 You know, I would hope I'm, I would hope the only time you're walking on the beach is

00:53:00.740 barefoot, but walking on the beach, barefoot, going in the ocean, you know, you know, being

00:53:05.040 in the ocean, looking right up at the sun, saying a prayer directly from the water to

00:53:08.460 the sun, man, all of that brings you back to center in such real ways.

00:53:12.500 I know you say in the book, if you, if you're feeling self-conscious about hugging a tree

00:53:17.120 of actually hugging a tree, putting your face up against the tree, start small, maybe

00:53:21.700 just sit with your back up against the tree.

00:53:23.640 So people don't think you're crazy, but you could kind of graduate to a full five minute

00:53:27.240 hug of a tree and it actually could be transformative.

00:53:30.160 That's such a beautiful way of dealing with anxiety, which you admit you have dealt with

00:53:34.780 for years versus just taking a pill, which is what the medical community will push on you

00:53:39.500 these days.

00:53:40.600 Oh, absolutely.

00:53:41.640 You know, I'm not, I'm not against, you know, anybody who needs medication, you know,

00:53:45.480 for certain things.

00:53:46.320 But, you know, personally, I've, I've, I've never had to use it.

00:53:49.780 I remember my father, even when I was young, when they were trying to put me on like Ritalin

00:53:53.100 as a child, you know, my father was like, no, he did, you know, back then though, it

00:53:56.960 wasn't, you know, he don't need Ritalin cause he don't need to just be on medication.

00:54:00.600 It was, he don't need no Ritalin.

00:54:01.860 He needs that beat.

00:54:02.760 Right.

00:54:03.040 So, but even now it's like, I don't, we don't, we don't necessarily medicine shouldn't

00:54:08.040 be the first option all the time.

00:54:10.740 You know, I feel like, you know, this is a glorious earth that we, that we're on and

00:54:14.540 like, there's a lot of natural remedies and holistic remedies that we could be, you know,

00:54:18.820 tapping into that bring us those same results.

00:54:21.700 A lot of those things in the pharmaceutical, pharmaceutical world do.

00:54:26.380 So how did you make it so big in radio and now podcasting too, with the kind of anxiety

00:54:33.860 that you suffer from?

00:54:35.600 And as you were growing up, you talk about how it was very much social anxiety.

00:54:39.520 How, how did you get over that?

00:54:41.260 How do you deal with that to this day?

00:54:43.240 That's the strangest thing about anxiety, right?

00:54:45.700 Like anxiety creeps up on you at weird times.

00:54:49.260 It's those times when you're just literally laying on your couch at home.

00:54:54.240 And then all of a sudden you get up and you start checking to see if all the doors are

00:54:58.240 locked, right?

00:54:59.560 Or, or, you know, um, like, like you can be laying on the couch and there's a ceiling fan

00:55:05.420 going and you just start thinking to yourself, what if that ceiling fan, you know, flies

00:55:09.140 off and like cuts my head off. 1.00

00:55:11.080 Like it's just the stupidest, strangest things. 1.00

00:55:13.260 But when it comes to like getting in front of a microphone and talking to millions of 0.99

00:55:19.100 people, yes, there's a level of anxiety there, but for some reason it doesn't give you, you

00:55:25.020 know, those same panic attacks of just going through regular everyday life.

00:55:31.340 I have no idea why I'm able to get in front of a microphone and, you know, talk to millions

00:55:37.100 of people effortlessly, but I can't be in a party with 50 people without wanting to go

00:55:43.880 home, you know, cause I'm already having a panic attack.

00:55:46.840 Cause I'm thinking about, you know, the worst possible scenarios happening.

00:55:50.680 I am too, but it's usually that guy over there is going to come over here and talk

00:55:54.540 to me.

00:55:55.000 It's not about the ceiling fans.

00:55:56.540 Oh God, I don't want to do that.

00:55:58.500 That is actually another reason I wrote this book.

00:56:01.520 That's, that's, that's why I think small talk sucks because I don't think they understand

00:56:05.160 when you're a person who's already dealing with anxiety and you've had to say prayers

00:56:10.420 and do breathing exercises and, and, and, and put your beads on, right.

00:56:14.720 And all your, all your other things just to show up in the world, the last thing I want

00:56:20.240 to do is have a meaningless conversation with a stranger, like at least come into my life

00:56:26.540 or come up to me and bring me a conversation of value that may ease, you know, whatever

00:56:32.520 it is I got going on.

00:56:34.120 I tell a story in the book about, I tell a story in the book, how I was at the airport

00:56:38.320 and, you know, you know, I'm a person who's been attacked in the street a couple of times,

00:56:42.480 right?

00:56:42.760 Like right here, right here in New York city, you know, just for things that I've said

00:56:45.720 on the radio, like, you know, back in the day though, not, not anything recently, but

00:56:48.560 like over a decade ago.

00:56:50.040 And, but I'm still, you still have that PTSD from things like that.

00:56:53.120 So I'm at the airport and this guy comes up to me and he's trying to talk, but he's

00:56:58.880 like not really saying anything.

00:57:01.260 So automatically I'm on alert.

00:57:03.720 And then he finally goes, he's stuttering and he's telling me that he has a speech impediment.

00:57:09.040 So he's asking me to bear with him while he gets out what it is he's trying to get out.

00:57:15.620 He cut the small talk, you know, and he told me exactly what it was from the beginning.

00:57:21.140 So that one little moment eases my anxiety and lets me know, okay, this person isn't,

00:57:26.140 isn't a foe.

00:57:27.260 He's not, he's not any type of opposition in any way, shape or form.

00:57:30.240 He just has something he wants to say to me and it's hard for him to get out.

00:57:33.400 And if that, if that individual who has a speech impediment can let me know that we

00:57:38.860 can do the same thing, we should be able to tell people, Hey man, I don't want to talk

00:57:43.300 about that right now.

00:57:44.580 And if we ever linked social anxiety to the hatred of small talk, I have to say, I too

00:57:52.580 hate small talk and have a fair amount of social anxiety, not anxiety in the regular lane,

00:57:57.600 but social anxiety.

00:57:58.800 And I, I had never linked the two.

00:58:01.880 This is actually a, an insightful thought that one is causing the other, because I like you

00:58:08.220 am much more comfortable when the conversation is substantive.

00:58:11.620 Yes.

00:58:12.200 And you think about it, right?

00:58:13.460 It's a link because when somebody says, okay, Megan Kelly, you have to be this place at seven

00:58:19.600 o'clock at night, you're already dreading all the things, you know, you have to do in order

00:58:25.080 to get to this place.

00:58:26.020 And if you got something to do the next day, you're like, I'm going at seven.

00:58:30.060 I'm going to be out by eight.

00:58:31.840 I want to be back home in my bed by nine o'clock.

00:58:36.000 And I hope when I, when you get there, you're thinking about all the conversations people want

00:58:39.560 to have with you.

00:58:40.580 You're thinking about, you know, what people are going to try to get from you.

00:58:44.600 Cause a lot of, a lot of it is, is people just trying to take from your energy at these

00:58:49.800 places.

00:58:50.140 It's not a lot of pouring into you when you, when you go to these events, so stuff like

00:58:57.140 that, man, it's like, yes, it does cause a lot of, a lot of social anxiety. 0.96

00:59:00.680 And it's another reason why I keep telling people small talk sucks.

00:59:04.400 I'm Megan Kelly, host of the Megan Kelly show on Sirius XM.

00:59:08.280 It's your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations with the most interesting and

00:59:13.320 important political, legal, and cultural figures today.

00:59:16.660 You can catch the Megan Kelly show on Triumph, a Sirius XM channel featuring lots of hosts

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00:59:23.980 Great people like Dr. Laura, Glenn Beck, Nancy Grace, Dave Ramsey, and yours truly, Megan Kelly.

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01:00:06.700 This is ridiculous.

01:00:10.300 What a sad day. 0.99

01:00:14.440 The country's been disgraced.

01:00:16.540 That's what's happened.

01:00:18.800 Alvin Bragg and this judge have disgraced the country.

01:00:22.600 We made it, what, almost 250 years without doing this.

01:00:28.200 And now, because of falsified business records, we've convicted, as a felon, a former president

01:00:38.300 of the United States.

01:00:39.580 You don't think we could have done something like this to Bill Clinton or Hillary Clinton

01:00:44.280 or others?

01:00:46.400 We had a standard.

01:00:48.060 We didn't do this in America.

01:00:50.460 We aren't a banana republic, or at least we didn't used to be.

01:00:54.960 And don't forget what's happened in this Trump case in which he's now been found guilty of

01:00:59.920 all 34 counts against him, which was overcharged to begin with.

01:01:04.120 It shouldn't have been a case at all.

01:01:05.720 And once charged, it should have been one count.

01:01:07.820 The whole case boils down to the same alleged scheme, but they stretched it into 34 counts

01:01:15.160 by saying, and that check, and that check, and that check, and that invoice, and that

01:01:19.860 invoice, it was all part of your scheme.

01:01:22.480 So now he looks like Al Capone convicted on these 34 counts.

01:01:27.560 But the idea all along was to stop him from becoming president again.

01:01:34.500 That's the idea behind this prosecution.

01:01:37.740 That is the idea behind Letitia James bankrupting his company that he built, and along with his 0.77

01:01:44.440 dad from the ground up in New York, the city that just turned on him.

01:01:48.840 That was the idea behind E. Jean Carroll and her sexual assault case brought 30 years after

01:01:56.220 the fact, alleging a sexual assault slash rape in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room.

01:02:02.560 A case she couldn't even remember, the year of the alleged rape in.

01:02:08.480 And that's the idea behind Fannie Willis and Jack Smith times two.

01:02:14.180 Stop it.

01:02:15.480 Stop him.

01:02:17.280 Stop Trump.

01:02:18.300 Why did they wait?

01:02:20.220 Why didn't these cases come until right before the presidential election?

01:02:23.900 The Democrats have been wringing their hands.

01:02:26.260 Wasn't in time.

01:02:27.740 We're not going to be able to call him a convicted felon unless you speed these things up.

01:02:31.040 The judge in the D.C.

01:02:35.020 January 6th case saying, I'll rush back.

01:02:38.120 I'll come back from my European vacation.

01:02:39.780 Don't you worry.

01:02:40.780 If we get Supreme Court opinions allowing my case to go forward with Jack Smith, I'll be

01:02:44.360 there.

01:02:46.120 We've heard about the concern that Fannie Willis, her case is going up in appeal, but she's going

01:02:51.060 to try to find some way to pedal to the metal it.

01:02:52.820 But we've heard even in that January 6th case before Judge Chetkin, there may be a plan to

01:02:59.680 try to get him tried.

01:03:01.660 Even after he wins, if he wins in November, we could have a trial of the president elect

01:03:09.000 in an effort to get him another conviction so they could convince electors to be unfaithful

01:03:16.820 on January 6th of 2025.

01:03:20.640 And that's where this whole scheme, and here it is a proper word, is corrupt.

01:03:27.320 It's a before and after moment for America.

01:03:31.600 What just happened today is a line we can't uncross.

01:03:37.020 And these Democrats will rue the day they decided to use lawfare to stop a presidential

01:03:46.000 candidate.

01:03:47.320 I'm not talking about violence.

01:03:49.440 I'm talking about tit for tat.

01:03:51.860 You just wait, and it won't be Hunter Biden the next time.

01:03:57.540 It's going to be Joe Biden.

01:03:59.640 It could potentially still be Barack Obama.

01:04:02.640 It could still potentially be Hillary Clinton. 0.99

01:04:05.680 We're going to have to look at what the statutes of limitations are on the various crimes they

01:04:10.640 surely committed.

01:04:11.620 We're going to have to look at passing laws to revive those dead crimes, felonies or misdemeanors,

01:04:19.260 so that those cases can be brought out of time.

01:04:23.580 That's what may be in the interests of justice, just like they did for E. Jean Carroll, with

01:04:28.980 a New York state law that was passed so that she could sue him.

01:04:35.280 That's what happened.

01:04:37.740 Turnabout is fair play.

01:04:39.360 And John Yoo, an amazing lawyer who worked in the Bush administration, Department of Justice,

01:04:45.700 has a great piece out today talking about how that's the only way they'll learn.

01:04:52.020 The only way to save the republic now is to give them a taste of their own medicine.

01:04:57.160 That's it.

01:04:58.960 That's it.

01:05:00.480 They tasted blood today.

01:05:03.100 They're the wolves with the bloody piece of meat in their mouths.

01:05:07.060 That doesn't stop the wolf from coming back for more.

01:05:09.700 The only thing that will stop him is if he loses a limb of his own.

01:05:15.240 And I'm sorry, but the Democrats started this game in the same way the Republicans upped

01:05:19.600 the ante when it came to, for example, the filibuster fight.

01:05:23.440 The Democrats got rid of it for lower court judges.

01:05:26.420 Mitch McConnell said, you will rue the day because we're going to be in control of this

01:05:30.380 chamber one day and you're going to lose the filibuster at the higher level court and

01:05:34.000 you'll be sorry.

01:05:35.300 That's what needs to happen here.

01:05:37.240 Who's getting indicted next?

01:05:38.380 Joe Biden, maybe Jill Biden.

01:05:41.840 How low can we go?

01:05:44.620 You may not want to see it.

01:05:47.400 That that ship has already left port.

01:05:50.280 That horse has left the barn.

01:05:52.540 That's where we're going.

01:05:54.420 So before you celebrate too much over at MSNBC and CNN who are positively gleeful, gleeful

01:06:02.600 over this absurd conviction, you wait and ask yourself, ask yourself, what kind of Pandora's

01:06:09.440 box has been opened here?

01:06:10.600 Here was President Trump moments after the guilty verdict today.

01:06:15.240 This was a disgrace. 0.90

01:06:19.700 This was a rigged trial by a conflicted judge who was corrupt. 0.90

01:06:25.900 It's a rigged trial, a disgrace.

01:06:29.380 They wouldn't give us a venue change.

01:06:31.500 We were at 5 percent or 6 percent in this district, in this area.

01:06:37.400 This was a rigged disgraceful trial that the real verdict is going to be November 5th by

01:06:45.640 the people.

01:06:46.160 And they know what happened here, and everybody knows what happened here.

01:06:51.340 You have a sore respect, D.A., and the whole thing.

01:06:55.660 We didn't do a thing wrong.

01:06:57.820 I'm a very innocent man.

01:06:59.500 And it's okay.

01:07:02.060 I'm fighting for our country.

01:07:03.240 I'm fighting for our constitution.

01:07:05.240 Our whole country is being rigged right now.

01:07:07.760 This was done by the Biden administration in order to wound or hurt an opponent, a political

01:07:15.140 opponent.

01:07:16.180 And I think it's just a disgrace.

01:07:18.780 And we'll keep fighting.

01:07:20.160 We'll fight till the end, and we'll win because our country's gone to hell.

01:07:24.320 We don't have the same country anymore.

01:07:26.460 We have a divided mess.

01:07:27.900 We're a nation in decline, serious decline.

01:07:31.260 Millions and millions of people pouring into our country right now from prisons and from

01:07:36.840 mental institutions, terrorists, and they're taking over our country. 0.92

01:07:41.940 We have a country that's in big trouble.

01:07:44.560 But this was a rigged decision right from day one with a conflicted judge who should have

01:07:49.800 never been allowed to try this case, never.

01:07:52.780 And we will fight for our constitution.

01:07:55.000 This is long from over.

01:07:56.340 Thank you very much.

01:07:57.900 Good for him.

01:07:59.480 Long from over is absolutely right. 0.99

01:08:01.760 This will be reversed.

01:08:03.720 It will be reversed.

01:08:05.620 This will not stand.

01:08:06.720 Mark my words.

01:08:07.980 Even in a New York appellate court system that is weighted with Democrats on the bench,

01:08:12.220 the highest court in New York is called the Court of Appeals.

01:08:15.160 It's not completely corrupt.

01:08:17.040 It just overturned the conviction of Harvey Weinstein because he wasn't given a fair trial.

01:08:22.140 They are capable of reaching a rational decision.

01:08:25.260 And if they're not, this could be appealed up higher still to the U.S. Supreme Court.

01:08:29.820 There were state constitutional violations here and there were federal constitutional violations

01:08:35.140 here.

01:08:35.500 Let me ask you a question for those of you sitting at home who listen to this show.

01:08:39.360 What was the underlying crime?

01:08:42.040 What did the jury find Trump was trying to cover up with this falsified business record?

01:08:48.060 Was it federal election campaign law violations?

01:08:52.460 Was it tax law violations?

01:08:55.900 Was it additional business records violations?

01:08:58.040 Do you know?

01:08:59.340 No, you don't.

01:09:00.300 Neither do I.

01:09:01.400 No one knows.

01:09:02.680 Neither does Donald Trump.

01:09:03.880 Good luck.

01:09:04.980 Good luck's filing your appeal.

01:09:06.760 He's in the same position he was in when he had to stand up first and argue the closing

01:09:10.260 argument before he had even heard the prosecution's theory of the case.

01:09:13.380 Now he's got to go up to the appellate court and try to guess.

01:09:16.020 Gee, I don't really know what I've been found guilty of.

01:09:18.680 I guess falsifying business records through unlawful means and the unlawful means were.

01:09:23.360 Uh, uh, I don't know.

01:09:29.220 I don't know.

01:09:30.980 We're not sure if the jurors took door number one, door number two or door number three.

01:09:34.400 That's the position he's in.

01:09:36.020 Alvin Bragg ran for office on a promise to get Trump, a Soros backed DA who doesn't want

01:09:47.100 to enforce the criminal law against anyone.

01:09:50.020 That's why we were all leaving New York in droves because of his policies and the policies

01:09:57.700 of his old boss, the old mayor in New York.

01:10:00.980 And this guy promised, if you elect me, I'll get him.

01:10:06.940 Remember this?

01:10:08.020 When I was at the AG's office, I sued Trump over a hundred times for his administration's

01:10:11.960 misconduct and brought a case against the Trump foundation and held him accountable.

01:10:16.620 I'm the candidate in the race who has the experience with, with Donald Trump.

01:10:20.780 I was the chief deputy in the attorney general's office.

01:10:23.860 We sued the Trump administration over a hundred times.

01:10:26.840 I know how to, to litigate, uh, with him.

01:10:29.140 I also led the team that did the Trump foundation case.

01:10:31.840 So I'm ready to go wherever the facts take me.

01:10:34.720 I'd be hard to argue with the fact that that's, that'd be the most important, uh, most high

01:10:37.940 profile case.

01:10:39.040 Uh, and I've seen him upfront and seen the lawlessness that he can do.

01:10:41.900 So I do have a lot of experience, uh, with the former president.

01:10:45.720 I think it's important to elect someone who is well-prepared to pick up wherever, um,

01:10:50.780 the sitting district attorney leaves off.

01:10:52.340 If, if, if Brock would be one of the most consequential cases, um, in the history of

01:10:56.600 local enforcement and we need someone who's ready on day one.

01:11:00.720 He should be disbarred.

01:11:03.120 He should be disbarred.

01:11:04.200 That's how much damage he's done to the justice system.

01:11:06.800 That guy moments after the verdict was read tweeting out today, a jury found Donald J.

01:11:13.220 Trump guilty in all caps.

01:11:15.360 He's so excited on all, all caps again, 34 felony counts.

01:11:20.960 You go guy.

01:11:22.620 You must be so happy.

01:11:24.020 You lived up to your campaign promises. 0.99

01:11:25.640 I'll give you that one hell of a politician, one shitty prosecutor whose obligation is to 0.97

01:11:31.320 uphold the rule of law and to seek justice, justice, not just convictions. 0.98

01:11:37.480 That's what you're after.

01:11:38.780 Just convictions in the case of Donald Trump.

01:11:41.020 That's all I want.

01:11:42.180 Just give me the big C so I can get him.

01:11:44.560 Like I promised.

01:11:46.020 He's so proud today.

01:11:47.420 Just like the AG in New York is so proud of bankrupting Trump's business or doing her level

01:11:52.480 best.

01:11:53.500 And we could go on.

01:11:55.840 FYI at this hour, Trump's donation website has crashed.

01:12:01.320 You can feel, you can feel the number of people going there to pony up dough they didn't

01:12:07.880 think they had.

01:12:09.000 They thought they had given their last donation.

01:12:12.020 People are hurting right now.

01:12:13.500 Tons of inflation.

01:12:14.320 Thanks to Joe Biden and other problems that we're all suffering.

01:12:18.400 They're donating.

01:12:19.700 And I'm sure it's by the tens of million.

01:12:23.160 This will be a financial windfall for the Trump campaign and arguably for America.

01:12:28.980 This jury, the jury of the American voters, will be heard on November 5th.

01:12:36.260 They will have the final word.

01:12:38.920 And in the meantime, Donald Trump will hear the term convicted felon every day, everywhere

01:12:46.220 he goes.

01:12:47.200 The sentencing will not take place until July 11th.

01:12:56.140 That is four days before the Republican National Convention.

01:13:00.300 That's the big event.

01:13:02.140 They have the balloon drop.

01:13:04.440 The candidate's family shows up.

01:13:06.460 It gets the party excited for their nominee.

01:13:10.780 Like, what's his vision of the country versus the other guys?

01:13:14.800 How could he help my life?

01:13:17.440 What might he do that could make things better for my kids versus what the other guy's promising?

01:13:22.980 Let me hear the platform.

01:13:24.180 Let me hear your surrogates. 0.73

01:13:25.640 Let me hear you and what you stand for.

01:13:28.060 And instead, they've decided to corrupt it, this judge, of course, of course he has, by

01:13:36.140 saddling Trump with his sentencing four days before it starts, one week before he accepts

01:13:40.420 the Republican nomination for president of the United States.

01:13:44.760 He'll be sitting in a New York courtroom, and there is a decent chance he's going to be

01:13:50.280 wearing an ankle bracelet.

01:13:52.120 I don't think Trump's going to get jail time.

01:13:54.760 I've said that from the beginnings.

01:13:56.420 Garagos took me on on that.

01:13:57.580 He said anybody not named Trump would.

01:13:59.740 I don't think he's going to get jail time.

01:14:03.280 But it's not outside the realm of possibility.

01:14:05.820 Not with this judge.

01:14:07.760 Not with this DA.

01:14:09.660 Both sides have to submit their recommendations, what they believe should happen.

01:14:14.060 That's going to happen by, I think, June 13th.

01:14:17.640 And what do you think this DA is going to seek?

01:14:20.100 Do you think the DA is going to say, released on his own recognizance, community service,

01:14:24.180 what do you think he's going to recommend?

01:14:25.620 And this Judge Mershon has done everything Alvin Bragg has asked him to.

01:14:31.080 Everything.

01:14:32.180 Alvin Bragg won 99.99% of the motion practice in front of this judge.

01:14:39.120 Thanks for listening to The Megan Kelly Show.

01:14:44.860 No BS, no agenda, and no fear.

The Megyn Kelly Show - June 09, 2024

Weekend ＂Best Of＂： Bill Maher, Riley Gaines, Shawn Ryan, Charlamagne tha God, and More

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