The Michael Knowles Show - Friendly Fire： The LATEST Somali Scandal

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00:00:15.120 I gotta bring my kid to an appointment.

00:00:20.060 Do you know you have a wife?

00:00:22.700 You know I have six kids?

00:00:24.900 We got a lot of kids.

00:00:26.020 I gotta go different places.

00:00:26.800 that's pretty that's going to be my excuse i'm sitting at a uh hotel in clearwater florida right

00:00:34.560 now just waiting on your water you know doing i i am i'm thinking of the conversion i think it's

00:00:41.600 time yeah full scientologist mode no i'm not i'm not and i don't want to offend any of the

00:00:45.540 scientologists in the audience by the way not doing that i'm not i'm just here i'm giving a

00:00:50.480 speech i was doing a debate last night up at dartmouth i found out meti hassan how was how

00:00:56.400 was that i watched some segments of it but so it was a real delight because it was one of those

00:01:02.120 debates where they actually score it at the end you know like it's a monk right yeah i saw that

00:01:06.720 i saw that you won yeah that was good i did thank you i was i was really pleased to win

00:01:11.080 many we had a nice dinner afterward you know it was it was great that i was able to vindicate

00:01:15.920 the president and he you know was not vindicated but the thing i really love about it is i found

00:01:21.780 out what did you say his beeper didn't go off i know someone told me to use the beeper line i

00:01:29.340 didn't it was mostly above the belt but the one thing i found out after is apparently meddy has

00:01:34.280 written a book called how to win every debate which i now want to put on my mantle that's true

00:01:39.620 how to win every debate except to michael knowles anyway it was it was a good time but i missed the

00:01:44.120 big debate last night which i hope we get to in the show which is the california governor debate

00:01:47.760 yeah i mean that that was the thing that happened and uh it was it was like did i miss anything

00:01:53.980 right now promises to each other uh i don't know are we even taping right now i don't know i'm

00:01:57.620 still having makeup put on me and applied so i'm hoping this is great content matt do you think

00:02:02.760 this is great it'll just be a running gag that throughout the next throughout the next segment

00:02:07.280 i'll just have hands coming in and adjusting my hair and putting makeup on my face i still think

00:02:12.360 was it ann culture who referred to john edwards as the brett girl or was that yeah that was an

00:02:17.660 I want to make sure. So we still have Matt for 93 seconds, I think, which means this is Friendly Fire.

00:02:34.300 Welcome, everybody, to Friendly Fire. Very, very excited to have all of you here,

00:02:39.780 especially this week because The Daily Wire broke this major story thanks to our intrepid

00:02:45.060 Luke Rosiak, where he discovered, I think, 150 gazillion dollars worth of fraud coming out of

00:02:52.140 Ohio. This after the great exposés from Nick Shirley and Chris Ruffo, Minnesota fraud,

00:02:58.980 California fraud. I guess what singles this one out a little bit is that this is a Republican

00:03:03.900 state. It shows you just how bad the fraud was. And look, I'm actually speaking to some financial

00:03:09.580 officers right now. Weirdly enough, that's why I'm on the road right now. And it occurred to me

00:03:13.800 When I was a kid, you know, and you guys, you've all been in politics a very long time.

00:03:17.700 I remember we would hear that waste, fraud, and abuse was actually not that bad.

00:03:21.900 And you'd hear that from the Republicans because the Republicans wanted entitlement reform.

00:03:25.360 And you heard it from the Democrats because they wanted to keep doing their waste, fraud, and abuse.

00:03:29.300 Am I just enumerate or something?

00:03:32.600 Am I missing out on the magnitude?

00:03:35.580 It seems to me that the waste, fraud, and abuse actually is that bad.

00:03:39.780 i'm gonna wait for matt to talk because if he does not talk then then it's going to be a real

00:03:45.520 problem yeah i uh well i've only got i've only got three minutes so i'll um i'll give my spiel 0.57

00:03:52.260 about somalis somali fraudsters which is they're bad i oppose them i'm a i'm a i'm against it we 0.85

00:03:58.840 should deport them all um it here's what i think about the fraud though the the most the most 0.98

00:04:06.020 shocking thing about it, the most infuriating thing about it is just how, and this is what

00:04:11.120 you take from Luke Rosiak's report and from Nick Shirley's and from others who have looked into it,

00:04:15.820 it's just how obvious it is. It's like it didn't require, you didn't have to go undercover

00:04:21.180 for years to infiltrate their scamming gangs. All you have to do is just show up,

00:04:27.740 like one guy with a camera just shows up to one of these places and looks around and it becomes

00:04:33.740 incredibly obvious that these are all shell companies and that none of this is real.

00:04:38.860 So the fact that it's so obvious, that it's so easily exposed, just makes it all the more

00:04:45.700 shocking that this didn't happen earlier. And in particular, in a place like Ohio, that's a red 0.98

00:04:50.480 state. I mean, this is, it's maybe easy enough to understand it in a blue state because they have

00:04:54.840 the political, you know, motivation to look the other way. But this is happening in red states,

00:05:00.740 too. And, uh, so it's, it's very easy to expose and easy to crack down on. I wish it happened a

00:05:05.720 lot sooner, but now that it's happening, it's a, it's a good thing. And, and, uh, we've got to go

00:05:10.260 all the way, deport, deport all these people. Well, one of the things I want to know is how

00:05:14.740 do we actually, how do we rent one of the, I want to own one of these buildings. I feel like the

00:05:18.720 upkeep on the building is fantastic, right? I mean, like you have that, you have 300 people paying you

00:05:22.560 rent and nobody in the actual building, which means your, your overhead is non-existent. That

00:05:27.940 is that is a fabulous deal for the landlord and that's that was the first one from my mind there

00:05:32.820 you go how do i get in on this was my it was my move exactly there you go ben thinking like a

00:05:38.660 landlord i'm sorry no but the thing that i find to be so ridiculous about uh the conversation around

00:05:47.480 this is that this is in part the consequence of republicans pushing an idea years ago one that i

00:05:56.220 myself thought sounded like a good idea, including a lot of smart people, to block grant money to all

00:06:03.240 these states. That basically we would just take money out of the federal government, send it in

00:06:08.660 a block portion to these states, and then they could set up their own programs that they would 0.86

00:06:13.360 presumably manage more responsibly than the terrible bureaucrats in Washington. It turns out

00:06:19.480 that bureaucrats can be terrible anywhere, including in Ohio. And it's the kind of situation 0.87

00:06:24.760 that unfortunately, I think, is far more rampant in people's communities than maybe they understood

00:06:31.480 before this whole conversation started, that all of this kind of money flow from D.C. that goes

00:06:38.280 there, there are a lot of people there who are totally willing to stand in line to fill out forms

00:06:43.060 to do the basic DMV crap that they need to in order to apply for these Medicaid grants and the

00:06:50.520 like and get a lot of money out of it. And, you know, frankly, I think, you know, the next time

00:06:56.800 that I need to renew something at the DMV, I need to find somebody from one of these Somali families 0.99

00:07:01.540 to go and just go through the process for me because they're clearly far more efficient at it 1.00

00:07:04.820 than I am. Now, listen, we're about to dive into all that great Ohio waste, fraud, and abuse.

00:07:12.080 But first, this story from The Daily Wire's very own Luke Rosiak only exists because we have loyal

00:07:18.120 mission-driven members. Luke spent two months digging through a treasure trove of Doge data.

00:07:22.440 Thank you very much, Elon. And he was on the ground in Ohio investigating. This type of

00:07:27.020 investigative work takes resources and independence from woke corporate sponsors and political

00:07:31.540 pressure. It takes, in other words, you. It has already caught the eye of the vice president's

00:07:37.340 fraud task force. Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican nominee for governor of Ohio, says he wants to

00:07:43.440 prosecute aggressively if he is the next governor. Jim Jordan, Ted Cruz, Rick Scott, they're all

00:07:48.420 paying attention. This is what mission-critical conservative journalism looks like. If you want

00:07:52.780 to support reporting that holds power accountable, become a Daily Wire member right now at

00:07:56.920 dailywire.com slash subscribe. So my question on all the ways for unabuse is, yeah, to your point,

00:08:02.100 Matt, yes, we don't like it. All the, Matt, are you leaving already? Okay, goodbye, Matt.

00:08:08.520 But the thing that we are concluding is, of course, get rid of all the Somalis who shouldn't be here. 1.00

00:08:16.480 Yeah, he's out. 1.00

00:08:18.200 I feel like I made the show, so I had the best contribution.

00:08:23.440 I've already covered this subject, and, you know.

00:08:27.360 You don't want to leave, too.

00:08:30.640 Can I get out of here also?

00:08:31.860 I don't want to get out of here because you're going to miss out on a very substantive political discussion,

00:08:37.940 which is, I was talking to Luke about this when he broke the story.

00:08:42.540 So Luke says, yeah, you know, the issue is all these fraudsters,

00:08:45.740 they're getting paid money from the government in order to reimburse them for taking care of their family members.

00:08:51.500 And this is a health care program that says, all right, 0.99

00:08:54.920 if you don't want to just ship your granny off to some Jamaican employee 0.94

00:08:58.020 and you actually want to take care of her yourself, but you can't do that because you've got to work, 0.91

00:09:01.820 well, here the government's going to give you those very same health subsidies

00:09:04.220 that you give to a separate employee so that the granny can be taken care of by a family member. 1.00

00:09:09.880 And what's tough for me about this, I'm not a libertarian, I'm a traditional conservative, 0.99

00:09:13.600 is I kind of like that in principle. It's obviously so open to fraud and abuse. I hate that.

00:09:19.560 But I don't hate the idea that we're prioritizing elderly people being taken care of by their family

00:09:25.420 rather than by some random employee. I hate all of it. It's called having a family and your family

00:09:33.480 should take care of you, like period. And I should not have to be paid by the federal government to

00:09:37.780 take care of my family. This is my general proposition in life. Like there is one thing

00:09:41.700 if you are in dire need, in dire poverty, and, you know, we're all trying to help make sure that

00:09:46.320 your kids get fed or something. I mean, we have programs for that. But the idea that you have to

00:09:49.640 pay me in order to go spend an hour with mom and redo her is, that's just bad family stuff to me.

00:09:55.580 Like this is the biggest problem, I think, on maybe the integralist, right? This idea that

00:10:01.100 the government has a role in everything that virtue should actually just fill. And this is

00:10:04.540 why when people say, you know, capitalism is emptying America of her virtue, it's like, well,

00:10:09.040 no, you can be virtuous and also think that the federal government ought not spend my money

00:10:14.340 paying you to go visit your mom. And in fact, one of the things that you learn when you raise kids

00:10:18.860 is that when you incentivize kids to do the things that they should do, they end up doing it less

00:10:23.300 often, actually. Like if you have an expectation that your kids do chores, for example, without

00:10:27.840 compensating them, they will do chores and they will be better about it than if you actually

00:10:31.420 pay them to do their chores. Because you pay them to do their chores, now they feel like they're

00:10:34.900 giving you a service in exchange for the thing. And so without the pay, they're going to stop

00:10:38.700 doing the thing, right? It's a Pavlovian incentive structure. And so I think one of the things this

00:10:44.400 comes down to is, you guys have both seen Cinderella Man? There's that great scene

00:10:48.700 in Cinderella Man where Russell Crowe is James Braddock. He's a down-on-his-luck boxer

00:10:55.000 and he ends up on welfare and he goes and he becomes champion and he goes back to the welfare

00:11:00.360 office with the roll of bills and he puts it back through the slot and he gives it back okay there

00:11:05.020 is not a single human in america who would do that with any form of taxpayer benefit today

00:11:10.300 and that says something about our sort of collective morality and i think it's also one

00:11:14.140 of the reasons one of the things that's sort of fascinating is that this story that luke uncovered

00:11:18.480 here has done outsized political work i mean the reality is that it's it's you know you've got all

00:11:22.620 police politicians, vice president on down, who are taking notice of this and saying they want

00:11:26.240 to do something about it. But I will say that in terms of sort of spectacular traffic, you know,

00:11:30.680 gigantic public attention, it hasn't done the same sort of numbers. And I think the reason for that

00:11:35.460 is not because of the quality of the story. The story is incredible. I think the reason for that

00:11:39.180 is because people do not think of it anymore because of the size and scope of the government

00:11:43.140 as a massive sin to defraud the government. They don't understand that when you're defrauding

00:11:47.260 the government, you're defrauding your fellow taxpayers. That when you do this sort of stuff,

00:11:50.720 What you are actually doing is robbing human beings. There's a person on the other side of the check. And this is the problem with these gigantic social welfare systems. If you are a Republican and you're only going to make the case that they need to be more efficient, these social welfare systems, these social welfare systems, if we just could get them more efficient, then they would be good.

00:12:06.860 then you're arguing at the margins the reality is that many of these social welfare systems

00:12:11.600 have actively deprived people of virtue i mean just to take a quick example uh you know social

00:12:18.340 security i understand why it exists no one's arguing for it to go away on a practical level

00:12:21.760 but one thing that social security has done is it has crowded out investment for the future for

00:12:26.800 people because they believe they are getting a check from the federal government and it's also

00:12:30.180 crowded out people taking care of their parents and planning for the future in terms of their

00:12:34.240 financial making sure that their parents are taken care of and so what used to be a sort of

00:12:38.340 familial aspect has turned into a governmental aspect now you can argue that that's made elderly

00:12:42.120 people more prosperous that's fine it is a gigantic social welfare system that's bankrupting the

00:12:46.180 country but it is true that governmental systems tend to crowd out individual virtue and social

00:12:52.300 virtue and so i think that's a huge component of this i mean why don't any of these people who are

00:12:56.380 defrauding people millions of dollars feel guilty they should feel guilty also but also i think one

00:13:02.240 of the things we have to keep in mind is that like if we're going to pay people to take care of

00:13:07.260 their elderly relatives should we be paying like boomer grandparents to watch my kids because that

00:13:15.820 I mean the same kind of idea is kind of there right you know it's like wait a minute maybe 1.00

00:13:20.680 this will be a lot easier if we just pay all the boomers who already have taken so much money out 0.87

00:13:25.140 of the system uh to spend more time with their grandchildren which is something that shows up

00:13:30.220 and poll after poll after poll of younger parents.

00:13:33.040 Well, and how about, since you make the point, Ben,

00:13:34.960 that these elderly boomers have already taken so much money out of the system, 1.00

00:13:38.440 how about we just force them, we repeal the 13th Amendment 1.00

00:13:41.440 and force them to watch all the grandkids for free,

00:13:44.180 and we say, look, now we're even.

00:13:45.560 We're not going to get Social Security, but you have to watch the kids.

00:13:48.680 Exactly, exactly. 0.99

00:13:49.480 Speaking of the kids, we have Mary Morgan Olihan, 0.98

00:13:51.040 who I believe is joining from the White House.

00:13:53.380 I do want to say, we are talking.

00:13:55.960 Oh, yes.

00:13:57.580 I just want to say real quick.

00:13:59.040 We are talking on the day that we learned in the passing of the late, great Peter Ferrara, who is the originator of the idea of the Social Security accounts that you are talking about, Ben, which obviously would have made everyone much wealthier if they had actually put them into practice.

00:14:17.340 And so shout out to him, phenomenal economist and a great guy in terms of the Washington social security reform scene, which is not exactly the most thriving social scene.

00:14:31.720 Nothing makes me feel older than social security reform because I'm actually old enough to remember when all the Republicans were asking for that.

00:14:40.280 And now that is deader than disco.

00:14:42.500 Another thing that makes me feel old is Mary Margaret Olihan, who is young and vibrant and beautiful.

00:14:46.740 Mary Margaret you are at the White House as far as I can tell I am and I've been enjoying listening

00:14:52.740 to you guys hey I just have to say that Cinderella Man is my favorite movie of all time I think it is

00:14:58.820 such an American amazing story and the scene that Ben was talking about where James J Braddock goes

00:15:03.560 to give his welfare check back is one of the best scenes of all time so Ben thank you for bringing

00:15:09.060 that up also if you want to pay me for going home to take care of my sister I'm definitely open to

00:15:14.440 it. She's sick. So I will be taking care of her tonight. So if that's on the table, we could 1.00

00:15:19.400 definitely talk about it. Well, at the White House, since they're looking into all the waste

00:15:25.040 fraud and abuse that you, like I, want to avail yourself of, the vice president, J.D. Vance, is

00:15:29.660 leading the fraud team. And it's great that they've announced that initiative along with these

00:15:35.460 stories. Obviously, there was the story to California and Minnesota, like Shirley, Chris

00:15:39.560 Rufo. And then Daily Wire's Luke Rosiak came out with this wild story and novel in the sense that

00:15:45.700 it's in a Republican state. So what are they going to do about it? Well, J.D. Vance says they're

00:15:51.080 going to do something about it. He said, if true, and they're looking into it, they're going to take

00:15:55.200 extreme action on this. He's already, obviously, as you all know, he's already taken a lot of action

00:15:59.840 in states like California, Minnesota, all over the country. We've been pressing for a little

00:16:04.440 more information to see if we can get the vice president's office to tell us exactly what they're

00:16:08.620 doing. But for now, this is a huge start. It's a massive win for Daily Wire for Luke that our

00:16:14.340 reporting is being taken so seriously. It's all over the airwaves. I was at the gym this morning

00:16:18.820 and I'm seeing it on every network. So this is really exciting and something that I'm very proud

00:16:23.480 of. On the part of the White House, you know, J.D. Vance was speaking about fraud last night. He was

00:16:28.900 in Illinois, I believe, and talking about this, emphasizing really strongly, trying to get

00:16:35.140 Americans to understand that, like you guys were saying, not everyone is fully enraged by the

00:16:40.880 thought of this fraud because we're kind of used to it at this point. We're used to the government.

00:16:44.720 We're used to thinking that our tax dollars are being wasted. Well, J.D. Vance was really speaking

00:16:49.160 in, I would say, more colloquial, casual terms, trying to get the audience and Americans to

00:16:53.760 understand the gravity of the fraud that is going on and why they should care so much

00:16:57.520 and why they should trust him, that he is doing something about it.

00:17:01.660 Gentlemen, does the issue move the needle in the midterms?

00:17:05.200 To me, it's a layup, obviously. 1.00

00:17:06.800 You got these foreigners bilking the taxpayer for this insane kind of fraud. 1.00

00:17:10.920 And so it would move me. 1.00

00:17:13.820 But do you think it will play or are people just so used to it?

00:17:18.380 I think that unless you connect it to a broader program of slashing these programs and restructuring

00:17:23.520 these programs, it's very difficult to see it moving the needle.

00:17:25.920 And this is kind of what I was referring to earlier.

00:17:27.780 As long as the Republican Party is the party of, yeah, we should have these gigantic social welfare systems, but we'll just make them slightly more efficient.

00:17:35.240 And the Democratic Party is, that's ungenerous, and you should spend more money on them.

00:17:39.040 I think you lose that argument every time.

00:17:41.260 The whole point of the, if you go back to the original sort of iteration of the pushback against the welfare state, which really had to wait until Ronald Reagan, the sort of welfare queen argument, right?

00:17:51.440 the idea that people are driving around Cadillacs based on welfare, that was an argument that was

00:17:55.220 not devoted to the idea that people were bilking the welfare system purely and so we should crack

00:17:58.940 down on the fraud. The idea was we may need to cut welfare entirely or we need to heavily chop

00:18:03.880 into welfare. We need to completely restructure the system as it works. And that culminated,

00:18:07.840 of course, in actual welfare reform in the 1990s under Newt Gingrich, which is, I still think,

00:18:12.820 one of the single most transformative things Republicans have done over the course of the

00:18:15.440 last half century. Well, now you look at what Republicans are talking about and they're saying,

00:18:19.820 OK, you know, we'll do the Doge. Doge will save us all the money because we'll go and we'll eliminate this line item that shouldn't have happened.

00:18:26.220 Or we'll do an investigation. We'll cut this little piece of fraud out. That's not going to get anybody animated.

00:18:31.300 The argument here is that Medicaid itself has huge systemic flaws and you need to remove those gigantic systemic flaws because Medicaid has turned into a gigantic fraud program that is not helping the people it was set out to help.

00:18:45.460 And many of the people who set out to help don't actually need the help of Medicaid, because, again, depending on where you are, you're talking about people who are many times over the actual poverty line or receiving aid from the federal government.

00:18:57.660 If you don't have a program on the Republican side to actually go small, this is why big government conservatism is never going to last very long.

00:19:04.400 You'll have spates of it in reaction to even bigger government liberalism.

00:19:07.380 But I think that at a certain point, I know it's controversial and I know it's falling out of fashion.

00:19:11.340 At some point, conservatives may have to argue again for smaller government, not just, quote unquote, more efficient government.

00:19:17.700 So, I mean, look, sorry, go, Ben.

00:19:20.280 I was on the 1998 Social Security and Welfare Reform Commission.

00:19:26.400 That's how old I am.

00:19:28.200 And Clinton and Gingrich and that kind of thing that did all that stuff.

00:19:32.160 And the thing that I'll keep – I want people to keep in mind is as much as welfare reform was a phenomenal achievement at the time that it happened, that's one program.

00:19:43.020 Like you never saw that spread the way that it ought to to other programs as well in terms of work incentives, in terms of the demands of actually having people follow the money and make sure that it's not going to people who don't deserve it.

00:19:56.760 And so then you end up with these massive systems that, as Ben says, they're piggy banks for people who do crime and they do crime very efficiently, it turns out, and they're very organized at it. 0.89

00:20:07.140 You have a low trust sort of population of immigrants combined with a high trust population of Minnesota or Ohio or California, et cetera. 0.88

00:20:18.300 And they can just reap the benefits of knowing how to fill out all the forms, knowing that nobody can really ask questions, because if you do, you're just going to get called a racist. 0.86

00:20:27.240 And I think that that's something that has to be overcome by Republicans confronting this stuff and taking it on and calling for the end of some of these programs.

00:20:37.140 I mean, just saying these things, should these things even exist?

00:20:40.820 Let's maybe start with that question as opposed to trying to find different paths toward efficiency

00:20:46.420 or the like, which is what we normally hear from the kind of DC think tank set of we can

00:20:51.720 tweak this and we can turn this knob and things will work a little bit better.

00:20:55.820 And I just, I don't, I don't necessarily see this Republican class.

00:21:00.280 I just was talking to Kevin McCarthy right before we started this about what they should

00:21:04.960 do to try to hold back the wave.

00:21:07.080 I'm not sure I see this Republican class coalescing around that argument in time to have it actually affect the election.

00:21:14.100 Well, and even forget about the Republican class.

00:21:16.000 I think about just the Republican base or the ordinary Republican voters, because, Ben, the vision that you're you're promoting.

00:21:22.920 Look, I remember it. I have it. I was cheering on that vision for a while.

00:21:26.620 I was working on campaigns for entitlement reform. And I remember just as well as all of you do.

00:21:32.740 It flopped. It didn't work. We'd been pushing for it.

00:21:35.020 I mean, really, even going back to George W. Bush was really pushing for Social Security reform.

00:21:39.320 And then Paul Ryan made this his raise on debt.

00:21:41.820 You had some of the fringier libertarian candidates like Ron Paul and others.

00:21:46.400 But that was the animating spirit of the Tea Party.

00:21:48.660 You know, we did it.

00:21:49.340 We gave it a really good shot.

00:21:50.920 And it seems to me that every time we really made that a big issue, we got completely blown out of the water.

00:21:55.840 And then in 2016, one of the big shifts that President Trump made, and it irritated a ton of conservatives at the time, is he said,

00:22:02.740 You know what?

00:22:03.400 I'm not getting into the entitlement thing.

00:22:04.780 I'm not going to cut Social Security. I'm not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid.

00:22:08.260 He leaned a little more economically populist, though, of course, he's still substantially a free trader.

00:22:13.700 But nevertheless, that built a really big coalition of people that I don't think we're going to get on board for Paul Ryan.

00:22:19.440 Well, I mean, I think that's I think that's true, Michael.

00:22:21.560 I also think that's why if we're asking why this is not a liver issue, the answer is if people see government programs in terms of here's the choices.

00:22:28.920 either we police fraud and maybe my program goes away or we don't police fraud and my program

00:22:34.700 stays, then people are going to tend toward, okay, whatever, man. Like, okay. So that, yeah,

00:22:39.580 that guy built the program, but I did get my Medicaid check. So, you know, as long as we're

00:22:43.180 spending- I'm a cheap artier, hands off my Medicare. That's still one of my favorite signs

00:22:48.040 that we saw in Iowa. Exactly. I mean, like that attitude is quite prevalent, but I think that it

00:22:53.640 means that it's never going to be the livest issue until you get back to it. So that's fine.

00:22:57.180 You can have a big government conservatism that doesn't make fraud, waste and abuse a live issue.

00:23:00.400 But I think it's very difficult to say waste, fraud and abuse are a giant issue for us.

00:23:04.820 Also, we are not touching any of these social welfare programs because they're just too important.

00:23:08.480 By the way, Kalshi has the chances on anybody being prosecuted in Minnesota, the child care fraud scandal.

00:23:16.280 And I believe that the chances right now, a little small here.

00:23:22.120 What do we have that at? 60 percent? Something like that?

00:23:25.160 that there will be a yeah there goes 77 percent of people believe that somebody will be charged

00:23:30.400 in the minnesota daycare fraud scan okay that sounds about right to me i'm sure somebody will

00:23:33.920 be charged there uh yeah mary margaret you know when when you're walking around the white house

00:23:39.200 and obviously the vice president is very very focused on digging up these sorts of cases

00:23:43.640 um yeah does he see this as being sort of a major political issue that republicans are going to be

00:23:48.660 able to to push because obviously i think some of us are skeptical what what do they think in

00:23:52.460 the white house about it well they kind of need it to be a major political issue and i think vance

00:23:57.640 in particular kind of wants it to be a major political issue uh not that the vance team has

00:24:02.840 told me this but reading between the lines look this is something that jd vance has been tasked

00:24:07.120 with as kind of his project he is the fraud czar in the same way that kamala harris was the borders

00:24:12.740 are and everyone at the white house has joked about how she failed so miserably at that right

00:24:17.720 so everyone jokes about how she failed so miserably at that this is his big chance his

00:24:22.520 big moment meanwhile we have marco rubio kind of edging up on the sides he's in the briefing room

00:24:27.180 yesterday he's getting all this positive attention so i gotta i gotta ask the question i gotta ask

00:24:32.060 the question we're seeing the glow up for marco happen we're seeing the wall street journal

00:24:36.520 headlines we're seeing like was he he seemed awesome but was he really that awesome in the

00:24:43.620 room? I mean, look, I was in there with, I don't know how many other reporters, so many. We were

00:24:50.400 so crowded. It didn't smell good. I had people's arms in front of my face. Everyone was laughing

00:24:55.080 at him. Everybody loved him. He was, as the youth say, he was rizzing the crowd. He enjoyed it. It

00:25:01.660 was very clear that he did. He worked in two different lines from popular music song that

00:25:07.260 I'm a little too young to actually realize the references. Maybe you guys know them better than

00:25:12.520 I do. Insane in the membrane. I feel so old, man. Why are you going to throw that in there,

00:25:18.420 Mary Margaret? I'm sorry. I have one question about it. Was he lying when he said that he

00:25:24.440 didn't know the names of the people in the room? Oh, he definitely didn't. I mean, think about it.

00:25:29.320 He was on Capitol Hill. Capitol Hill Press is very different than the White House Press Corps.

00:25:34.040 Someone like me, I think I've interviewed him like years and years ago, but it would have been

00:25:38.480 like a one-off, you know, at CPAC or something like that. It's not like the White House Press

00:25:42.000 and spending a lot of time over on Capitol Hill

00:25:44.180 or actually at the State Department.

00:25:45.680 So the reporters that he would know

00:25:47.300 were in the front row.

00:25:48.300 And I think I said this yesterday,

00:25:49.720 but he wasn't calling on the front row too much,

00:25:52.300 which as a member of the new media,

00:25:53.660 I kind of liked because he was calling on the aisles.

00:25:56.600 He was calling on people in the back.

00:25:57.880 He called on the guy right next to me.

00:25:59.600 So just bouncing around the room,

00:26:01.780 he was clearly a little overstimulated

00:26:03.440 by the vibe in there,

00:26:04.440 but anyone would be.

00:26:06.840 And I don't know, Ben,

00:26:08.060 I think he did a good job

00:26:09.640 and I think he really enjoyed himself.

00:26:10.940 And for the first time, I personally thought, oh, wow, maybe it's going to be him.

00:26:16.240 There's no job he can't do.

00:26:20.720 Yeah, it's true.

00:26:26.880 Is that it?

00:26:27.760 Just to follow up on what we were asking about when it comes to the fraud kind of thing.

00:26:33.700 You know, how much time does JD really have to spend on this?

00:26:37.080 Is his home state in terms of Ohio?

00:26:39.140 out. Is he going to kind of do something there? Is he going to get involved there in some kind of

00:26:43.820 greater respect? Do you know of any plans on the vice president's part to dive into that?

00:26:50.640 Well, the fraud team is taking it on. So this is what they do. They have a massive team here

00:26:55.060 at the White House. A lot of lawyers are involved, different people that I've actually known from

00:26:59.100 different parts of my career, whether they used to be on Capitol Hill or in different government

00:27:03.500 offices, they're all on this fraud team and they're digging in. Of course, the FTC is involved,

00:27:10.020 Andrew Ferguson, Stephen Miller, all of these people are zoning in on these issues. So

00:27:15.380 while I know their focus is on issues around the country, this is now one of the vice president's

00:27:21.160 top issues. And if it turns out to be true, I imagine that he would be delighted to be able

00:27:26.220 to take ownership of this fraud scandal, which we believe to be true. Absolutely.

00:27:31.160 I wonder a little bit outside of Washington, D.C., but obviously related.

00:27:35.620 You know, Vivek Ramaswamy last night won this massive victory in what was not really a serious Republican primary.

00:27:42.960 So now he's going to be the nominee.

00:27:44.540 But I think he's going to have a little bit of an uphill battle in Ohio.

00:27:48.120 Does the story, does the focus from the White House on fraud, and specifically does the Daily Wire report on fraud in Ohio,

00:27:55.640 how much juice does that give him in November?

00:27:57.820 Could that push him over the edge?

00:28:00.400 I mean, is this going to be another Luke Rosiak help someone over the edge like he did in Loudoun County and Glenn Youngkin?

00:28:07.560 It could be. You never know. I mean, Vivek would be wise to hop on this story and to really emphasize it as he already is a little bit doing.

00:28:16.800 But no, I talk about Luke's impact all the time and talk about that Loudoun County story.

00:28:21.200 I've written about it extensively.

00:28:22.700 There's no, truly no way to truly measure the impact that Luke's reporting had on that Virginia race and Glenn Youngkin becoming governor of Virginia.

00:28:30.800 So love to see that happen in Ohio as well.

00:28:36.280 Also, there's something else breaking right now, which I didn't get the full story on, but I do.

00:28:40.300 Speaking of criminals and fraudsters, who is this top Democrat politician who is having the feds show up at her house?

00:28:49.000 Right now we have Cal, she shows the vakes chances at 47%.

00:28:52.160 Maybe they go up because of Luke Rosiak. 0.98

00:28:53.940 I want to know the calciades on this top Democrat getting her house raided and going to prison.

00:28:59.640 Do we have any of the details?

00:29:01.260 This just popped up before we're filming.

00:29:04.080 So Louise Lucas is the top, is the most important Democrat in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

00:29:09.220 She is the octogenarian head of the state Senate for Democrats.

00:29:16.180 And she's also the one who big-footed Abigail Spanberger and said, no, we're not doing a 9-to-2 map. 0.98

00:29:22.440 We're doing a 10-to-1 map.

00:29:24.180 And Mary Margaret will know this as a resident of the Commonwealth.

00:29:28.000 That was something that was deemed too extreme even for Spanberger at the time.

00:29:33.200 She was worried about it.

00:29:34.160 And it's one of the reasons why they have questions at the Supreme Court of Virginia right now because of how extreme the map is. 1.00

00:29:39.120 She has long been considered one of the most corrupt members of the legislature in Virginia. 1.00

00:29:45.680 It's connected to a series of cannabis shops that she runs for profit in the Portsmouth region. 0.99

00:29:53.460 The FBI apparently raided her offices today.

00:29:57.780 Fox was reporting on it today, and there were people who were on the scene.

00:30:01.880 they were for hours taking out boxes of materials and other things, preventing staffers from coming

00:30:08.760 inside. And so we don't really know what the case is about yet or what they've been building it

00:30:14.460 toward. The irony of this, though, is it actually could be something that could benefit Spanberger

00:30:20.680 because she would get potentially a less radical Democrat leadership if Louise Lucas ends up going

00:30:29.540 down over some kind of uh potential criminal activity we'll have to wait are we watching

00:30:35.480 ozark because that'd be that'd be awesome i mean i feel like that's very very ozark

00:30:39.580 she just got like gigantic weed farms it'd be great it would be it would be amazing one of my

00:30:46.740 favorite parts of the story is the backlash online currently about fox news being at the

00:30:52.480 in the vicinity to document what was happening here so i think it was bill malusion that was

00:30:57.420 on the ground and clearly got a tip from the FBI that this was going to be happening. All these

00:31:02.780 liberals online, including Tim Miller, are complaining and saying, oh, how did Fox know

00:31:08.180 this was going on? And myself and a couple other people pointed out CNN got the exclusive when

00:31:13.980 Roger Stone was arrested by the FBI. They were there with their cameras. Many, many other such

00:31:19.240 instances. But now that Fox News happened to be on the scene documenting this raid, God forbid this

00:31:26.400 happened. So I've been amused by that from a media criticism perspective, because everyone's up in

00:31:32.520 arms about it. And they're all trying to say that she wasn't close to Spanberger, which is not true,

00:31:36.480 as Ben just pointed out. Yeah, yeah. The truth is that Spanberger, if you know the makeup for

00:31:43.940 coalition, she's a Northern Virginia person. She needed the support of people like Lucas to bring

00:31:49.100 along the black vote that was a little more skeptical about Spanberger being such a kind of 0.99

00:31:55.160 Nova Karen type when that sort of portion of the vote is so critical to winning in Virginia.

00:32:02.920 Now, turning from the East Coast over to the West Coast, one story we talked about at the top of the

00:32:09.880 show a little bit that I totally missed last night because I was doing my little debate over

00:32:14.400 in Dartmouth. There was a much bigger debate going on in California between the candidates

00:32:19.260 for governor. And it was all the looniest Democrats, minus Eric Swalwell, who we don't

00:32:26.900 need to get into any. Maybe we'll get some video clips of the debate. We don't need any clips of

00:32:31.060 Swalwell. All the clips of Swalwell are on Snapchat. They're not on Friendly Fire. But

00:32:36.940 when Swalwell was still in the race, there was a very good shot that you could have had a

00:32:41.180 Republican governor of California, just the way that the elections are conducted there.

00:32:44.840 I think this is a big reason why the Democrats sniped Swalwell on three different fronts.

00:32:49.260 on residency, on financial corruption, and then eventually on a sex scandal.

00:32:53.640 So Swalwell's out.

00:32:55.680 One, does this improve the Democrats' chances?

00:32:57.940 I think pretty obviously it does.

00:32:59.460 But two, did anything happen at the debate last night that is going to affect the race?

00:33:06.480 Well, no.

00:33:07.180 I mean, a Democrat's going to win.

00:33:08.240 I mean, I don't mean to be a downer, but there's a reason we all left the state.

00:33:12.420 I mean, California's beautiful, and it is mismanaged.

00:33:16.220 And I love Steve Hilton.

00:33:18.120 He's great.

00:33:18.600 and Chad Bianco is fine.

00:33:21.780 He's great.

00:33:22.380 I mean, but let's be real about this.

00:33:24.420 If they sneak through

00:33:25.500 with 17% of the vote

00:33:27.160 in a multi-candidate primary

00:33:29.180 and then they get through

00:33:29.940 to a general election

00:33:30.700 and Xavier Becerra versus Steve Hilton,

00:33:32.900 I'm highly skeptical

00:33:34.340 that the Republican ends up winning

00:33:35.640 that general election race.

00:33:37.460 And that seems like

00:33:37.960 that's the most likely scenario right now.

00:33:39.880 It was extraordinary to watch Democrats 0.93

00:33:42.460 try to outbid each other in being insane. 1.00

00:33:44.780 So Katie Porter, who is a nut job. 1.00

00:33:46.700 I mean, Katie Porter is so crazy. 1.00

00:33:49.520 You know, you remember there are these stories about Amy Klobuchar throwing binders at people. 0.97

00:33:54.040 Apparently, Katie Porter throws potatoes at people or something like this is this is the steaming potatoes. 1.00

00:34:00.100 Yeah. 1.00

00:34:00.740 She was chucking potatoes at people, which I like my my my baby.

00:34:04.700 The Batman costume was like the least crazy thing she did.

00:34:07.160 And last night, she said that illegal immigrants need to be given health care in California because Californians deserve it, which I mean, I sort of agree because they voted for it, but not the way that she thinks about it.

00:34:23.080 I mean, she means that illegal immigrants are Californians. 0.89

00:34:25.860 I think that Californians deserve it because they keep voting for this. 0.99

00:34:28.240 And so, you know, you keep voting for it, you deserve it.

00:34:30.260 But she said that.

00:34:31.740 Then you had Tom Steyer saying there wasn't enough of a wealth tax.

00:34:34.100 I mean, that's presumably why he's been taxing himself like 200 million dollars every election cycle, which is the only way that you can understand what the hell he is doing, because literally every election cycle is like, I'm running for dog catcher.

00:34:44.920 Here's 100 million dollars. And everyone hates him. And then he loses. And so he was up there doing that routine.

00:34:50.940 And then you had Becerra looking up there. He looked like a moderate, by contrast, while he called for the abolition of ICE.

00:34:56.480 It was just a cavalcade of idiocy and crazy. 0.99

00:35:01.200 And meanwhile, Steve Hilton is sitting there and he's looking at Chad and they're looking 0.99

00:35:04.120 at each other and they're like, I don't even know what's happening around me.

00:35:06.060 Like, California is such a disaster area that, you know, I'm telling people there they ought

00:35:10.780 to flee.

00:35:11.340 I've been saying this for a while.

00:35:12.640 I don't know.

00:35:12.980 What did you make of it, Ben?

00:35:14.760 Shapiro, Ben, before we get your opinion, I just want to point out, you know, on a little

00:35:19.220 bright side here, the bright side was that during the debate, Katie Porter's staffers

00:35:24.640 did not have to be around her.

00:35:26.940 And I think, do we have the clip?

00:35:28.360 Do we have the clip of the poor staffers?

00:35:33.120 That we're going to lose more than half a million Californians

00:35:36.340 dying prematurely to air pollution and other problems.

00:35:40.180 And the state could lose...

00:35:41.960 Get out of my shot.

00:35:44.920 I wanted to tell you that that's actually incorrect.

00:35:47.520 It's not that it's a left of vehicles.

00:35:49.740 It's that...

00:35:50.640 It's so bad.

00:35:51.480 okay it does okay you also were in my shop before that stay out of my shot okay i'm going to start

00:36:02.060 again with um electric vehicle saving us money jacob more water i want more no i'm joking you

00:36:08.600 don't actually look he actually got up i didn't i was just doing a bit klobuchar eating salad with a

00:36:14.260 with a with like a comb or something is like totally fine and normal compared to that no

00:36:19.540 But the problem I have, Shapiro, is that every morning my wife asks me, do you think Steve Hilton can win in California?

00:36:31.280 Do you think Spencer Pratt can win in California?

00:36:34.040 And I have to tell her no every morning.

00:36:37.160 I say no, they're not going to win.

00:36:39.180 It's not going to happen.

00:36:40.880 Hold on, Ben.

00:36:41.360 Before we get to your analysis of why the Republicans can't win, I just wonder what you made me think of when you say this is the first thing in the morning your wife turns to you.

00:36:49.000 I hope that when she turns to you, you are lying in a beautiful Helix mattress. That's what I do,

00:36:55.440 except when I'm on the road, which is why I look haggard because I have my beautiful Helix.

00:36:59.380 Helix uses a sleep quiz to match you to your perfect mattress. They've got great factors,

00:37:05.860 everything. Sometimes you sleep a little too hot. Maybe you want a little firmer. Maybe you want a

00:37:09.680 little softer. It is great. I am so into Helix. I have multiple Helix in my home. I am such a good

00:37:16.000 father that I've gotten Helix for my kids. It's award-winning. It's gotten great reviews from

00:37:21.080 outlets like Forbes and Wired. Everybody at the Daily Wire absolutely loves it. And I am looking

00:37:26.720 to get another one. That's right, yet another one, because I keep having these kids. They ship

00:37:31.300 directly to your door in the U.S. with free shipping, 120-night sleep trial, a limited

00:37:35.380 lifetime warranty, meaning you can test it risk-free, send it right back if it's not right

00:37:41.100 for you. With Memorial Day coming up, which is the unofficial start of summer, talk about

00:37:44.800 the importance of good sleep for your whole family, especially since the kids are home from school

00:37:49.620 and you've got all these things going on, okay? This is the time, folks. Get your Helix. Go to

00:37:56.020 helixsleep.com slash friendlyfire for 27% off site-wide. That is helixsleep.com slash friendlyfire

00:38:00.840 27% off site-wide. Make sure you enter our show name after checkout so they know that we sent you

00:38:06.320 helixsleep.com slash friendlyfire. Megan rolls over in the morning, says, Ben, honey, please tell

00:38:12.520 me there's no reason for like this is really unfair that michael knowles has apparently

00:38:16.600 checked the tag on our mattress in our house without my knowledge but yes we do actually

00:38:20.880 have a helix mattress so anyway um look the truth is that she says that because she loves

00:38:28.520 california she lived in la for for quite a while uh you know i'm sure ben you love california too

00:38:34.600 on some base level you know i'm not one of these people on the right who says screw them you know

00:38:40.360 with their beautiful weather and their relaxed mentality and, you know, everything like that.

00:38:47.060 It's more that I would like California to be a place that people could do business again,

00:38:51.480 could make movies again, for crying out loud, since they can't afford to make them in there

00:38:56.160 anymore. Unfortunately, I think they're just going to double down. They're just going to do the same

00:39:00.720 dumb crap again. And they're probably going to choose somebody like Becerra, who is one of the 1.00

00:39:05.380 worst cabinet appointees, by the way, when he actually was at when he was at HHS, something

00:39:11.480 that he had no business being in just because of the politics of the situation, because

00:39:16.380 he was put there basically to screw over pro-lifers and to do whatever the Biden White House

00:39:21.880 wanted him to do.

00:39:23.560 He's one of the most radical pro-abortion members of President Joe Biden's administration.

00:39:29.220 And he was also, you know, Kamala Harris, when she was attorney general of California,

00:39:33.440 She started that whole persecution of David Daleiden, but he really picked it up and carried it throughout the rest of his tenure there and was absolutely part of persecuting David Daleiden to this day.

00:39:45.260 So incredibly radical pro-abortion individual.

00:39:49.700 And, you know, Californians may have forgotten that over the past, I don't know, decade, but it is one of its top issues.

00:39:57.660 Would any of them be better than Russo?

00:39:59.160 Frankly, I got to admit, I'm kind of rooting for Katie Porter.

00:40:02.700 I'm a little rooting for Katie Porter 0.94

00:40:03.980 because, I mean, just for the amusement sector. 0.91

00:40:06.900 This is you putting on the Joker mask.

00:40:09.460 This is like, this is like-

00:40:10.520 Exactly, like Terry Bass in the Spencer Pratt commercial.

00:40:12.680 Chaos, chaos.

00:40:13.400 Exactly, exactly.

00:40:14.440 Well, I mostly just want to see the creative ways 1.00

00:40:16.580 in which she abuses staff. 1.00

00:40:18.300 I mean, like, it's giving me ideas.

00:40:19.600 I have an image of you on top of a pile of money

00:40:21.740 setting it on fire.

00:40:23.340 Like, that's what you're doing.

00:40:25.340 It's kind of wonderful.

00:40:25.900 I mean, come on.

00:40:26.860 And then in that commercial, 0.95

00:40:28.380 she made her people stand behind her holding whiteboards.

00:40:31.040 and then at the very end 0.65

00:40:32.420 she put a laugh track in

00:40:33.460 when she's like 1.00

00:40:34.300 get out of my shot guys

00:40:35.360 and then there's like

00:40:36.040 a laugh track

00:40:36.720 did you see her commercial

00:40:37.480 it's terrible

00:40:38.160 it's terrible

00:40:38.900 and I need more of this

00:40:40.000 like this is

00:40:40.520 it's like

00:40:41.600 cocaine to any

00:40:43.480 California resident

00:40:44.320 it is

00:40:44.720 it is

00:40:45.140 it is addictive wonder

00:40:46.500 and I have to say

00:40:48.000 like Katie Porter

00:40:48.620 is so much more amusing

00:40:49.640 so much more amusing

00:40:51.120 than Xavier Becerra would be

00:40:52.940 he just didn't be

00:40:53.520 another born

00:40:53.960 you know what

00:40:54.360 that is fair

00:40:55.060 as a business person

00:40:56.740 as a business person

00:40:57.960 it would be good

00:40:58.920 for the Daily Wire 0.98

00:40:59.920 to have Katie Porter 0.98

00:41:00.720 A hundred percent. She's so amusing.

00:41:02.520 I mean, she'd be like chucking things at people. 1.00

00:41:06.040 She might strangle a man on camera just to see him die. 0.94

00:41:08.720 Like, it would be incredible. 0.87

00:41:09.880 I mean, we actually, guys, we have the ad, apparently.

00:41:12.280 Apparently, we have the Katie Porter ad.

00:41:13.740 One of the worst political ads ever cut.

00:41:15.700 Really solid stuff here.

00:41:18.400 I'm Katie Porter, and I'm not like most people who run for governor.

00:41:22.340 I actually get what you're going through.

00:41:24.220 A single mom of three kids, I know what it's like to push the shopping cart.

00:41:28.340 My minivan has almost 200,000 miles.

00:41:32.200 I have a grown kid who may soon be living on my couch.

00:41:35.940 To give Californians what they need,

00:41:37.940 it's going to take standing up to Donald Trump,

00:41:40.320 calling out greedy corporations,

00:41:42.220 and stepping on some toes along the way.

00:41:44.760 Now, could you guys please get out of my shot?

00:41:49.120 I love the laugh track underneath.

00:41:50.580 The laugh track is the best part.

00:41:52.060 It's amazing.

00:41:52.860 And also, I do love that all of our politicians,

00:41:55.000 I remember a time when we used to, you know,

00:41:56.640 be aspirational toward our politicians a little bit.

00:41:58.920 And now every politician is like, 0.98

00:42:00.260 I'm a loser, just like you. 1.00

00:42:02.120 Look at my crappy car. 1.00

00:42:03.580 Look at my son, who's a complete bum. 0.99

00:42:05.340 And here he is living on the couch. 0.96

00:42:06.480 I'm just like you.

00:42:07.620 That's what I think of you. 1.00

00:42:08.920 You're also a loser who has 200,000 miles 1.00

00:42:11.060 on your minivan and a son 1.00

00:42:12.240 who's probably going to crash out on your couch

00:42:13.940 because he's a marijuana addict

00:42:15.440 who majored in theater arts at CSUN.

00:42:17.640 But like, yeah, solid stuff there from Katie.

00:42:20.280 I'm rooting hard for her.

00:42:21.300 Even right off the top, she says,

00:42:22.940 she says, I'm a single mother.

00:42:25.280 And you say, well, hold on.

00:42:26.140 There's some people who are single mothers like the dad runs off or someone dies or something. 0.95

00:42:30.320 But she's I'm a single mother because I poured scalding hot mashed potatoes on my husband and I physically abused him enough that he had actually a quasi moral case to separate from this lunatic.

00:42:44.840 I mean, Michael, Michael, don't cast aspersions at those of us who pour mashed potatoes on our on our loved ones.

00:42:51.720 I'm personally offended by this. I found solidarity there.

00:42:54.820 Don't, don't, don't, don't yuck my yum.

00:42:57.620 Stop that.

00:43:01.120 Is there an argument?

00:43:02.620 Look, you've actually, Ben, you have persuaded me that Katie Porter outcome is probably the,

00:43:07.000 is certainly the funniest outcome and probably the best outcome in California.

00:43:11.140 Assuming it's a Democrat, is there a Democrat who could take over who would be better than Newsom?

00:43:16.640 My worry is, I'll put my cards on the table.

00:43:18.840 Every time you get a new Republican president, the Democrats who called the last guy Hitler come out

00:43:23.440 And they say, you know, I actually really love George Bush.

00:43:25.860 The good old days of George W. Bush, who I called Hitler until 30 seconds ago.

00:43:29.220 Which is going to be really hilarious when they do it to Trump.

00:43:30.200 I don't want to be that.

00:43:32.080 Yeah, they're going to do it to Trump.

00:43:33.760 They're already kind of starting with J.D.

00:43:34.780 Strange new respect.

00:43:35.280 Donald Trump was never this crazy person like J.D.

00:43:38.580 Yes, oh, J.D. is too intellectual. 0.87

00:43:41.040 You already hear them starting to say this stuff.

00:43:43.360 So the question is, are we going to be that?

00:43:46.360 Are we going to say, well, you know, I'll tell you, I have a strange new respect for Gavin Newsom.

00:43:49.980 Or no, is Newsom as bad as it gets?

00:43:52.380 Yeah, no, no, no. 0.99

00:43:52.900 I think you'll get the strange respect for Gavin Newsom because they're psychotic. 0.90

00:43:56.380 I mean, Xavier Becerra is quite terrible.

00:43:58.580 Gavin Newsom, he still has his eye on the presidency.

00:44:01.240 So he actually has threatened to veto some things from the California state legislature.

00:44:05.020 Becerra will just veto.

00:44:06.020 We'll just let every single part of it through.

00:44:07.640 By the way, according to our sponsors over at Calci, the Calci market suggests 47 percent

00:44:11.800 of people think Becerra is going to be the governor.

00:44:13.940 37 percent think Tom Steyer.

00:44:15.820 Man, what the hell is wrong with that state?

00:44:17.260 Tom Steyer, seriously?

00:44:18.500 Yo, can I short that?

00:44:19.140 Only 10 percent think Steve Hilton.

00:44:20.620 I mean, by the way, the one that the one that I think would be also very amusing, I have to say, would be Antonio Villaregosa. 0.98

00:44:26.900 Villaregosa would be really, really amusing because Villaregosa is legitimately one of the dumbest people in America. 0.99

00:44:32.440 He is truly a not smart human. 0.99

00:44:34.780 And so the sort of Steve Carell of it would be incredible.

00:44:38.020 And watching him just bump into walls for four years.

00:44:40.440 So basically, I'm rooting for all of the underdogs, all of the underdogs, because I think that it will end up being Becerra.

00:44:47.140 It'll it'll be terrible.

00:44:48.620 And I feel bad for my friends in California.

00:44:50.880 I really do.

00:44:51.440 And businesses are going to flee. 0.54

00:44:52.860 One of the best parts of the debate is Katie Porter said we need illegal immigration because 0.75

00:44:56.200 that's the only way that we've actually received net population increase in California.

00:45:01.200 You're not supposed to say that part out loud.

00:45:03.420 You're not supposed to say that part out loud.

00:45:05.760 And it's also one of those things where, you know, and this is something that I think

00:45:09.740 Republicans need to be putting more of a front foot on going forward is the only reason 0.83

00:45:15.640 These states are holding on to the kind of flow of taxpayer dollars that they have received through all these programs is because of that, is because they welcome these illegals into their state to replace the American citizens who are fleeing for very logical and obvious reasons, going to places like Texas, going to places like Nashville.

00:45:37.620 They are moving out of those blue states because of those terrible policies, but the blue states are able to hold on to both congressional seats and the flow of taxpayer money because they import all of these illegals and basically say, we're just going to run our programs in order to feed more and more people this type of taxpayer dollars and keep more and more bureaucrats employed.

00:45:59.640 Right. Speaking of bringing people over, filling up the ranks, have you seen this trend? I don't

00:46:07.720 know if it's real or if it's just social media people babbling, but John Fetterman, who was

00:46:12.920 elected pretty left-wing, has consistently moved to the right, at least in his public statements.

00:46:19.280 And so now there seems to be an all-out push to get him to actually flip political parties.

00:46:23.980 Is there any chance that happens or no? That's all just wish-casting fake news.

00:46:29.380 I think that's really, really unlikely.

00:46:31.040 I think there's a possibility that he'd flip to independent.

00:46:33.660 I think he feels alienated enough from his own party that you could see him go unaligned

00:46:36.980 sort of, you know, the way that you saw in the past, I think Jim Jeffords was an independent

00:46:41.660 candidate.

00:46:42.140 Bernie Sanders still counts himself as independent, who caucuses with the Democrats.

00:46:45.680 That you could probably see.

00:46:46.460 And you could see that from Fetterman if, for example, he wanted to avoid a Democratic

00:46:50.140 primary, because a lot of the Democratic primary base is psychotic, like truly ambulatory 0.88

00:46:54.900 psychotic. 0.84

00:46:55.320 And they're very, very angry at him that he's not totally crazy about Trump or about Israel or about immigration.

00:47:00.460 And so if he's trying to avoid a primary, then he could be in sort of a Kyrsten Sinema situation where Sinema ended up trying to run as an independent specifically because the Democrats went so crazy.

00:47:10.800 But John Fetterman votes at a plus 90 percent clip for all the Democratic policies.

00:47:15.580 He voted consistently with the Joe Biden agenda when he was when when there was crossover there. 0.92

00:47:20.360 And so the idea that he is somehow a Republican just because he's not totally crazy, that does show, I think, how nuts the Democrats are.

00:47:27.260 You look at John Fetterman, who is a fairly traditional Democrat, meaning that he's very left-wing on economics.

00:47:32.740 He's somewhat left-wing on social issues.

00:47:35.200 And he's kind of middle of the road on foreign policy, but he's still pro-Israel and all the rest of this.

00:47:40.220 And they look at him and they go, he must be a Republican.

00:47:42.940 That's how crazy the Democrats have gotten. 0.99

00:47:45.280 I think, again, that's just an indicator of how nuts they are. 0.96

00:47:47.240 By the way, this is Barack Obama's fault.

00:47:48.680 I know everyone wants to blame Zoram and Donnie

00:47:50.400 or they want to blame Bernie Sanders.

00:47:51.660 This is all Barack Obama's fault, all of it.

00:47:54.180 Okay, but I don't know if you watched that interview

00:47:55.620 that he did with Stephen Colbert last night,

00:47:58.220 this crazy interview that he did with Stephen Colbert.

00:48:00.400 And in this crazy interview, he's talking about-

00:48:02.000 And are you saying that you don't think

00:48:03.220 Stephen Colbert should run for president?

00:48:05.220 I mean, you know-

00:48:05.840 Yeah, exactly.

00:48:07.440 I mean, I kind of think he should be-

00:48:08.660 Mary Margaret, what do you think about Stephen Colbert

00:48:10.340 as our next Catholic president? 0.98

00:48:14.120 Hey, I'm going to date myself again

00:48:15.980 and say that I don't care about Stephen Colbert

00:48:17.920 and none of my peers do either.

00:48:21.480 Wow.

00:48:22.500 She doesn't remember Mary Margaret.

00:48:24.400 Mary Margaret is so young

00:48:25.440 that she, 0.90

00:48:26.560 Mary Margaret is so young 0.74

00:48:28.620 that she most cares about things 0.71

00:48:30.800 that haven't even happened yet.

00:48:32.200 That is like the chasm 0.98

00:48:34.640 between the old men on this panel 0.75

00:48:36.780 and the hip, cool Mary Margaret.

00:48:38.560 But yes, I agree.

00:48:39.720 You know, he did try to...

00:48:40.660 There's younger than Mary Margaret

00:48:41.900 that is older than Mary Margaret.

00:48:43.600 There's younger than Mary Margaret

00:48:44.760 that is older than Mary Margaret.

00:48:46.660 But I will say that the that that that interview between Obama and Colbert is really telling because Obama is talking about Mamdani and he says Mamdani is so young and he's so fresh and he's got these great ideas like affordable housing, which, of course, no Democrat has ever run on except for legitimately like every Democrat my entire lifetime and several lifetimes before.

00:49:06.920 And and then he says and there's really nothing new about him like this, this whole kind of divide between the leftists and the traditional liberals.

00:49:12.740 That's really exaggerated.

00:49:14.260 Well, in Barack Obama's mind, it is, because Obama was always a wild, radical left winger

00:49:18.440 who was masquerading as a liberal.

00:49:21.260 He was never a traditional liberal. 0.91

00:49:22.880 He was always an insane leftist with true third worldist tendencies and his foreign 0.61

00:49:27.020 policy preferences.

00:49:28.240 And so this is all to be laid at the feet of Barack Obama.

00:49:31.940 By the way, I do have to mention right now that there has been, as you know, a deluge

00:49:35.380 of leftist tears since our very own Luke Rosiak's uncovering a massive fraud in Ohio.

00:49:39.900 You are in luck.

00:49:40.460 It just so happens leftist tears tumblers are buy one, get one free right now at the dailywire.com slash shop.

00:49:46.560 That's right. Buy one of the iconic beverage vessels.

00:49:49.240 You get a second absolutely free and give it to a liberal friend and then they themselves can fill it.

00:49:53.280 The best way you can help support the mission so we can keep doing, you know, awesome things like breaking massive stories about fraud and steals billions of dollars from taxpayers is by becoming a Daily Wire member and drinking those sweet leftist tears, stainless steel, hot or cold, only available at dailywire.com slash shop.

00:50:07.820 You may not be getting paid to spend time with your family members, but you can take advantage of this special deal for a limited time.

00:50:13.360 So get that Leftist Tears Tumblr right now at dailywire.com slash shop well.

00:50:17.880 These supplies last.

00:50:19.480 And I think you can shop with Ohio Medicaid vouchers at the Daily Wire shop.

00:50:24.000 Isn't that right?

00:50:24.600 I'm not on the finance team, but bring them on.

00:50:27.680 We'll have the accountants work it out.

00:50:29.100 Money is fungible.

00:50:30.600 Any concluding thoughts before I let you all go in the four corners of the world?

00:50:35.980 Sure.

00:50:36.260 Just one point that I was going to make about John Fetterman. Everything that you said is true, Ben, including the fact that it's not like a Joe Manchin situation. Joe Manchin had something like a 75 percent Democrat vote record in terms of staying in line. So there was a significant one out of four times he would break with his party.

00:50:55.460 Fetterman doesn't have anything like that. And that just tells you, I think, how scared someone like Barack Obama is of what his party has become, that he has to bend over backward in this interview with Colbert to basically say like, oh, yes, this is this is, you know, this is what I was about all the time.

00:51:15.000 To me, on a certain level, that's him admitting that his whole neoliberal kind of project of holding the Democratic base together into what I think he wanted to be the future kind of dominant coalition is a failure.

00:51:33.980 And the other thing is, it is kind of a return to his roots.

00:51:37.200 Like, this is going back to as extreme as he was when he was younger.

00:51:41.720 And so he's kind of doing the hipster play there, right? Where it's like, I was a fan of this all along. I was about this before anybody else was about it. And to me, that's an admission of failure because he wanted to create a permanent, bigger coalition for the Democrats.

00:51:58.360 he failed at doing it and now his party has been taken over by the most extreme elements within it

00:52:03.900 to the point that someone like Fetterman who's still with them 90 plus percent of the time

00:52:08.100 looks like somebody that they want to kick out of the party and maybe turn into you know somebody

00:52:12.960 who could be a deciding vote in the senate going forward so much for the coalition of the ascendant

00:52:18.820 we're back to the choom gang yeah yes marie margaret well i was just gonna say worse than

00:52:24.040 that. You have, you know, Democrat consultants now who are looking for younger, sexier, better

00:52:29.460 looking candidates. They've literally talked about this and it's been written about. They're

00:52:33.200 so aware of their electability problem that they're recruiting good looking men. There was

00:52:38.960 one in Maine, I believe, that talked like a robot. We got to I'll send you guys a clip later.

00:52:44.140 Insane candidates who are clearly not very electable, but are being chosen based on aesthetics

00:52:49.180 because they know that they're so behind in the aesthetics game. So there's so many different

00:52:53.760 issues Democrats are grappling with right now. That's amazing. I mean, no, they understand this

00:52:59.440 is a problem that they have to deal with. And so, you know, you talk about people like Gavin

00:53:03.160 Newsom. Well, he has the charm factor that so many politicians have always had. The rest of

00:53:08.460 that slot in California, you know, we have some laughable candidates. We have some old faithfuls

00:53:13.180 like Javier Becerra, but there is no one on the left right now who has the bare minimum likability

00:53:19.940 and interest that there are in so many candidates on the right.

00:53:23.660 So for Obama to remember that he was once the charm factor, he was once the darling

00:53:28.500 of the left, and there's no one left, and there's someone like Fetterman, who for all

00:53:33.340 intents and purposes is not a very exciting or likable candidate, who is slightly extending

00:53:39.160 an olive branch to the right, that just must cripple him.

00:53:42.880 And to look at the democratic field that he once thought was in his possession to see

00:53:47.820 it completely vanquished the way it has been. I think we'll see more moves from him soon,

00:53:52.840 more endorsements, more, more pushing on his part, because it's just, it's too much of a defeat for

00:53:57.820 him. You know, Mary Morgan, I was really excited because the Democrats called me and I thought,

00:54:02.440 maybe this means that I look really good. Maybe they think I'm really, but then it turns out

00:54:07.460 they were just looking for Rachel Meadow. I was really, I was really, maybe next time.

00:54:13.080 good to see all of you any final words or no we're out of here i don't know you want and i told you

00:54:20.020 so i like i told you so i definitely yeah i do not i don't even have my rachel maddow glasses on to

00:54:25.300 take one of your right it's not it's not i told you so i told you so for some others yeah i know

00:54:29.760 now you get you let the door open the door is open there's nothing i can do all right the door

00:54:32.940 has been open i must step through it here is the i told you so okay some of us have been claiming

00:54:36.760 for quite a while there are a bunch of people masquerading as conservatives who are actually

00:54:39.760 Democrats trying to destroy the GOP from within. And this week, they all came out and just said

00:54:43.620 it. So that's a note. That is a note. Okay. Candace Owens openly says that basically the

00:54:49.300 hardcore leftists and the psychotic right ought to get together and they ought to fight the

00:54:53.200 Epstein class. And then you had Tucker Carlson, who said to the New York Times that he wanted to 0.66

00:54:57.140 form a new party because he is so disappointed with President Trump. They had Nick Fuentes

00:55:01.340 saying that he is basically a just non-woke Democrat who's trying to undermine the GOP.

00:55:05.080 A moderate Democrat.

00:55:06.660 He said he's a moderate Democrat.

00:55:07.580 That was my favorite.

00:55:08.060 So I don't want to hear. Yep. So here's the thing, gang. When it comes to the 2026 elections,

00:55:12.620 if these things don't go the way that you want them to go or that I want them to go, recognize

00:55:16.400 that if the Republicans don't do well, they are going the way that a certain group of people

00:55:20.540 wants them to go. All of the people that I just mentioned. So if they turn around and they blame

00:55:24.940 anybody who is stumping for the Republicans in 2026 for things not going as well for Republicans

00:55:30.580 as they should have, then we should recognize the splinter faction that was undermining this

00:55:34.860 administration from the very word go in order to divide it and destroy it while claiming that 0.91

00:55:40.540 they wanted unity because that was bullshit from the first day well i think this is really 0.92

00:55:46.980 going to disappoint all our new muslim fans yeah that one i love because yeah when i saw the 0.98

00:55:54.000 moderate democrat thing i thought that was actually this declaration of an actual partisanship 0.98

00:55:58.200 and i really really like it because it made me think of that jim downey meme that sometimes

00:56:03.480 goes around Twitter, is like, Nick Fuentes, you mean the moderate Democrat? Yes, yes,

00:56:07.920 the moderate Democrat. That's what I'm thinking. Okay, on shifting partisan loyalties. Wonderful

00:56:13.780 to see all of you. I will see all of you on the very next Friendly Fire.

The Michael Knowles Show - May 06, 2026

Friendly Fire： The LATEST Somali Scandal

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