The Tucker Carlson Show - Tucker and Chris Cuomo Debate JFK⧸Epstein Files, DOGE, Joe Rogan, NATO, Transgenderism, and DEI

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00:00:18.120 So last time we talked was a year ago, and...

00:00:22.620 You somehow look younger.

00:00:24.360 I feel worn out and fatter. I've been on the road for too long!

00:00:28.920 But first day of Lent, I'm getting right now.

00:00:31.420 But anyway, it's been a year since we talked about this, and last time we talked, I think you were still like...

00:00:37.660 And I probably was too little off-balance from being vomited out of television world into the great beyond.

00:00:44.620 But I was thinking about you this morning, and I was thinking, I bet he's really grateful he's not at CNN now.

00:00:49.340 So, it gives me no particular joy to say this, but you were right.

00:00:55.760 Well, okay.

00:00:57.660 Don't get used to it.

00:00:58.660 It's the last time you'll hear it in this conversation.

00:01:00.460 You said, give it time, embrace doing what you're doing, and don't look for the acceptance of where you were.

00:01:29.780 Yes.

00:01:30.780 And that was really good advice.

00:01:33.080 It's not easy to do.

00:01:35.780 But News Nation has been what I would call a blessing in my life.

00:01:41.480 I didn't know it at the time.

00:01:44.880 And, like, so my brother's running for mayor.

00:01:48.520 My bosses, and of course, they had the benefit of going to school on what happened with me at CNN.

00:01:52.660 Yeah.

00:01:53.260 But the embrace, the willingness and acceptance of, wow, this is great for your family.

00:02:05.420 You know, this is great for your brother.

00:02:07.100 We're excited for you guys.

00:02:09.480 I like, I thought it was like a test, you know, that if I seemed okay about that, they'd be like, aha, we knew we.

00:02:16.440 And the difference, the change of one conversation of them saying, well, we're with you, we support you.

00:02:26.320 And I said, well, I'm going to just tell the audience, though, I'm not going to cover the race, obviously, because I'd have a conflict.

00:02:32.120 And they were like, yeah, duh, they know that.

00:02:34.840 If you feel like you have to say it, say it.

00:02:37.340 And I realized, wow, they really believe in what I'm doing here and supporting me.

00:02:45.120 I love that.

00:02:45.860 And so there's just a really profound gratitude.

00:02:49.040 So there's not this weird hypocrisy where they encourage you to have your brother on because he's famous in the news, is what CNN did to you.

00:02:55.220 From my perspective, watching, they encourage you, hey, Chris, call your brother, have him on.

00:02:59.580 And then, like, a year later, like, oh, wait, you were talking to your brother, you're fired.

00:03:04.320 Yeah.

00:03:04.680 Like, it's too fake.

00:03:06.380 Look, as we both know, in every business, and especially in ours, you do what you have to do to protect yourself.

00:03:15.760 And if it's, you know, if it's me or you, and I put myself in a position where I was vulnerable, then it's going to be me.

00:03:23.420 And that's what happened.

00:03:24.440 And I accept it.

00:03:25.680 I don't blame CNN.

00:03:26.960 This was really about two people making decisions about my life, not the organization.

00:03:32.600 I miss the people.

00:03:33.740 I wish the place well.

00:03:34.760 That is all true.

00:03:35.640 But I have a connection with News Nation and these guys where I am anxious to bleed for them.

00:03:43.240 I am excited about putting it all on the line every day, anywhere in the world.

00:03:49.180 Because, because of my upbringing and my disposition, when I know you're there for me when you don't need to be, it's not necessarily, you know, there are a lot of big names that you could grab in the media right now.

00:04:01.320 But for News Nation to give me the chance and to let me do it and to support me and to support me when Andrew decides that he's got to be in public service, can't put a price on it, could never be grateful enough.

00:04:16.280 So, from a year ago until today, I now know that.

00:04:22.320 And there is something comforting about that.

00:04:25.480 It's an ugly business.

00:04:26.720 It's an ugly time. 0.97

00:04:27.820 The ugliest business.

00:04:28.400 All the wrong things are being rewarded.

00:04:30.500 But I'm in the right place for me.

00:04:32.640 It's funny, I mean, I don't want to spend two hours beating up on the media because everyone hates them already, but it is, it's been almost two years for me since I haven't worked in the media.

00:04:44.620 And it's weird how you, when you do work there for your whole life, you just accept that, like, yeah, everyone lies all the time and it's totally treacherous and people who claim to be your friends actually hate you and every dispute is settled with a lawyer.

00:04:57.580 It's like, oh, it's so disgusting, but you just accept that's, like, the way things work, but that's not how things work outside the media.

00:05:04.180 Nowhere else in your life.

00:05:05.740 You know, it's part of politics and media, right?

00:05:10.440 They're certainly related, if not married.

00:05:14.560 And I think that the biggest frustration, look, you and I both know there are lots of great men and women who do the job for the right reasons.

00:05:21.960 But as a culture, it's okay in the media for me to destroy you by a standard that I would never want imposed on me.

00:05:32.880 And there is something that is really dangerous about that.

00:05:37.240 Oh, I agree.

00:05:37.720 When, well, I don't want you to know about my life, but you, we're going after.

00:05:44.300 100%.

00:05:44.820 And that dichotomy, let's call it, that paradox is really.

00:05:51.020 Well, it's hypocrisy.

00:05:52.240 Yes.

00:05:52.620 And it's really dangerous.

00:05:54.260 And look, unfortunately, it works so well.

00:05:58.080 You know, if I were to cover you in any situation and put a positive spin on it, that's a puff piece.

00:06:07.060 It's weak.

00:06:08.160 Cuomo's been red-pilled.

00:06:09.680 He got bought up by that preppy, smiley chucklehead. 0.65

00:06:12.920 And if I then say, well, I sat with Tucker, and as I knew it, devil's spawn.

00:06:17.840 Ooh, that was a hard-hitting piece.

00:06:19.860 You know, he really came at him.

00:06:21.320 They're such children.

00:06:22.640 The commodity is negativity.

00:06:24.900 If you want to be a hard journalist, you better say something negative about somebody.

00:06:28.700 It's a proxy for insight.

00:06:29.960 I just interviewed Sam Bankman-Fried yesterday from jail.

00:06:32.740 It hasn't aired yet.

00:06:33.780 But, and I actually really enjoyed the conversation. 0.97

00:06:38.320 And about five minutes in, I was like, oh, shit, I haven't asked him a single mean question about his business. 0.97

00:06:42.080 Well, he's in jail for 25 years, so I thought, I don't really need to make the case that he did something wrong. 0.99

00:06:46.980 A jury's already, you know, already decided that.

00:06:49.940 And I think it's okay to, like, have a conversation with the guy.

00:06:53.540 I don't, and then I thought, well, I'll probably be criticized for sucking up to Sam Bankman-Fried.

00:06:57.320 And I thought, I don't care, actually.

00:06:59.060 Well, look, you're in a unique position, right?

00:07:00.960 Because, one, you have no boss.

00:07:04.280 Two, the media is already not looking to be a friend to you.

00:07:08.460 You don't think so.

00:07:09.060 So you don't have to impress anybody.

00:07:12.680 I'm not going to win them over.

00:07:14.020 Margaret Brennan's not going to text me congratulations.

00:07:17.140 You can do whatever you want to do.

00:07:19.460 And there's a lot of freedom in that.

00:07:21.200 And, of course, there are challenges of you having to support yourself and find opportunities and build your own infrastructure.

00:07:26.640 You know, there's a lot of entrepreneurial stuff that you and I never had to deal with before.

00:07:29.820 That's for sure.

00:07:31.060 So you can just have a conversation with him.

00:07:34.060 Because the media doesn't know what to do with digital and independent media.

00:07:39.140 The instinct was to disrespect it.

00:07:41.180 Oh, of course.

00:07:41.940 Right?

00:07:42.460 Marginalize it.

00:07:43.260 And I think on a reporting level, that's still safe ground.

00:07:46.500 I mean, what's popping on digital media isn't investigative reporting per se.

00:07:50.300 There are some, Taibbi, Schellenberger, stuff like that.

00:07:52.440 But Barry Weiss at the Free Press.

00:07:54.340 But it's mostly hot takes.

00:07:57.740 But now that we're realizing in our society, and I'm very excited about it, power is shifting back to people and from institutions.

00:08:05.600 And that's really uncomfortable for some people.

00:08:07.780 Yes.

00:08:08.140 I think the Democrats are in a weird place where they seem like, which is such anathema as Mario Cuomo's kid.

00:08:13.260 He was so anti-establishment.

00:08:14.860 But they seem pro-establishment defenders of the status quo.

00:08:18.740 And I think that's a really dangerous place to be right now because I think power is shifting towards being disruptive of institutions and of the elites in a very real way.

00:08:31.160 And digital media is much better positioned to be empowered by that than what they're now calling legacy media.

00:08:38.560 I don't buy into that as a pejorative, but I see it.

00:08:42.440 And I see that people are really open to getting a – two things are happening at the same time.

00:08:48.600 Siloed? 0.95

00:08:49.300 Absolutely.

00:08:49.700 But also, people are realizing that they can reach out and get different versions of events and takes on things in a way that they couldn't before.

00:09:00.240 And I think that's really exciting, and the media doesn't know what to do with it.

00:09:03.740 It's amazing.

00:09:05.440 And, you know, I think the most influential people in media – I think you have to put Rogan at the top of that – you know, kind of don't work for anybody.

00:09:12.720 Nope.

00:09:12.900 And it's just so interesting.

00:09:15.580 If you look at the ads on a Margaret Brennan show, it's like, you know, Nissan and Joe Rogan, it's like prostate health cures.

00:09:22.700 It's like the whole – guys like Rogan have become rich, famous, influential completely outside the conventional structures.

00:09:31.720 Certainly Rogan.

00:09:32.600 Certainly Rogan.

00:09:33.320 But all of them.

00:09:33.960 I mean, all of them.

00:09:34.440 Megyn Kelly is enormously influential.

00:09:36.840 I haven't seen her ads, but like –

00:09:38.720 But she's still corporate-backed, right?

00:09:40.180 She's Sirius XM.

00:09:41.440 She was Fox, as you well know.

00:09:44.360 Didn't work for her at NBC, which really wasn't a surprise to anybody in there.

00:09:48.860 You know, it's being a network anchor, being a storyteller, being a host that is accommodative of broad audiences that are looking to be inoffensive.

00:09:59.660 Yes.

00:10:00.020 That's a very different skill set that she clearly was going to struggle with, so I wasn't surprised by that.

00:10:04.920 But she's Sirius XM.

00:10:07.480 Now Rogan is Spotify, but he built that all himself.

00:10:11.440 But you're wondering, though, but still, I mean, Rogan is, you know, in some sense, like, bigger than Spotify.

00:10:16.560 He could leave Spotify.

00:10:17.860 I think Megyn could leave Sirius. 1.00

00:10:18.440 I was surprised he took the deal.

00:10:20.100 Right.

00:10:20.260 I was surprised he took the deal.

00:10:21.260 Well, it gives him a lot of freedom.

00:10:22.720 But here's my question.

00:10:23.720 You see every kind of mid-sized independent business in America getting scooped up by private equity.

00:10:31.240 So every veterinary practice, every dental office, TAC places, cemetery associations.

00:10:37.320 Like, there is this inexorable trend toward, like, conglomerates.

00:10:42.100 Yes.

00:10:42.800 Small independents getting scooped up by some big umbrella group.

00:10:46.860 That's going to happen in media, I would think.

00:10:49.920 We are presently realizing.

00:10:53.660 So there was that big wave of deals that you and I missed in the podcast space where people were just throwing money to have a footprint in it.

00:11:01.100 Right.

00:11:01.460 Rogan was the biggest of those deals.

00:11:03.520 Right.

00:11:04.960 But then it went away.

00:11:07.560 And when I got into it, I'm all self-financed because, well, I was damaged goods.

00:11:12.180 But people weren't looking to just throw money at a podcast because no one was making money on those deals.

00:11:17.240 It was like relearning the Howard Stern lesson that they paid him all that money at SiriusXM.

00:11:21.740 And it's like, you know, what was the yield?

00:11:24.580 Now, different people are starting to buy up podcasts that are traditional media companies.

00:11:31.260 And they are the seed capital behind the private equity behind those organizations are starting to buy up these properties again.

00:11:41.040 See, it freaks me out because the reason independent media are credible is because they're independent.

00:11:46.960 Yes.

00:11:47.380 They're not controlled.

00:11:48.420 Yes.

00:11:48.700 Now, I struggle with that a little bit.

00:11:50.700 That absolutely can be true.

00:11:52.240 And again, Taibbi, Schellenberger, okay?

00:11:54.640 Yeah.

00:11:55.000 But I don't dismiss, and Barry Weiss, I don't like leaving her out.

00:11:57.780 Free Press is a really cool thing that she's building there. 1.00

00:11:59.960 And I like that she's able to do something that I never saw at a news organization before, which is she's decidedly pro-Israel, okay?

00:12:08.880 She's Jewish, and beyond her own cultural and religious affinity, she has an ideological one.

00:12:14.340 And she owns it, and she's out there for it. 0.66

00:12:16.360 You may disagree.

00:12:17.420 That's okay.

00:12:17.940 But you know, whereas the world that you and I grew up in, media-wise, they had all these opinions, but you'd never know it.

00:12:27.780 You know what I mean?

00:12:28.360 You'd have to glean it from what you saw on camera.

00:12:30.400 Nobody ever came out and said it, you know, that we think that this is right.

00:12:34.080 We think this is wrong.

00:12:35.800 Very, very rarely.

00:12:37.700 So what I like about it is I believe that there's space for all of it, okay?

00:12:44.240 When I got into this business 25 years ago, they told me, you know network news is dead, right?

00:12:49.220 The number one show on television is World News Tonight.

00:12:52.560 So the idea that it's dead, it's not dead.

00:12:55.120 It's just changing, and there's stratification.

00:12:57.720 But I do think there's a challenge afoot.

00:13:00.380 People in every different platform have to reconnect with their constituency.

00:13:05.560 Trust is at an all-time low with every kind of institution.

00:13:09.420 Now, within that is a burden for the media, but also an opportunity.

00:13:12.940 That's why I'm so excited that I may have been in the wrong place at other phases in my career,

00:13:18.040 but I'm in the right place right now because, like, News Nation is like one pebble on the beach at a time of,

00:13:24.840 hey, everybody's going crazy about this, not us.

00:13:28.280 Tariffs are kind of scary, and they can hurt prices, but Trump does this, and he's looking to get something done.

00:13:37.380 Let's not microanalyze him saying tariffs, like, this is definitely going to happen this way forever,

00:13:42.380 and let's see what happens.

00:13:44.840 News Nation, we're allowed to do that.

00:13:46.900 Most outlets have to pick a side.

00:13:49.480 Tariffs, best thing, like Fox News.

00:13:51.960 Tariffs are great.

00:13:52.840 We can't wait.

00:13:53.440 This is going to be great.

00:13:54.320 It's going to unleash the economy.

00:13:55.160 Get rid of the income tax.

00:13:57.520 MSNBC, this is the worst.

00:13:59.100 It's going to crush the economy.

00:14:00.300 You got to have a take.

00:14:01.360 You got to have a side.

00:14:03.360 News Nation is able to harness the independent mentality of, there's a plus minus on this, right?

00:14:10.480 And we're going to have to see here, right?

00:14:12.240 There's going to have to be some patience, right?

00:14:14.080 And I love that space.

00:14:15.760 It's harder.

00:14:16.740 It's way harder than saying, I hate Trump or Trump was sent by Jehovah.

00:14:22.580 You know, those are much easier positions, but I believe in the potential.

00:14:26.360 Well, honesty is kind of the point.

00:14:28.380 I mean, I think you should be allowed to arrive at whatever conclusion you sincerely arrive at,

00:14:32.420 and you should be able to tell people that that's your job.

00:14:34.680 And if you work at a place where, like, you know that you can't say something you believe is true,

00:14:39.560 it's the wrong place for you.

00:14:40.920 I agree.

00:14:41.720 But look, we're benefiting from the change.

00:14:43.880 Do you feel that there are things that you, it's an unfair question to ask you with the camera's going?

00:14:47.480 It's the only kind you ask, Carl.

00:14:48.440 I just specialize in that.

00:14:50.820 But do you feel like there are things that you can't say?

00:14:54.360 Like, if you came to a conclusion now,

00:14:56.940 I don't mean about, like, some individual sex life or, like, nasty personal attacks,

00:15:01.400 but I mean, like, a policy position that you came to that you would be like,

00:15:04.780 oh, I probably can't say that.

00:15:05.840 No, I'm there to say it.

00:15:08.800 So really, you don't feel like there are any red lines?

00:15:11.600 My bosses are very worried about you advancing agendas that you don't disclose.

00:15:16.320 Me or one?

00:15:19.480 Me.

00:15:20.060 You know what I mean?

00:15:20.760 Well, if you come to News Nation, then yes, you too.

00:15:23.060 But right now, it's, you know, hey, look, if you feel that way, just, you better say it.

00:15:27.720 Don't just stack your show with guests that are all on one side of something.

00:15:32.000 Oh, I love that.

00:15:32.460 And then pretend you're fair.

00:15:33.960 So be honest.

00:15:34.460 Don't do that.

00:15:35.240 Yeah, be transparent.

00:15:36.860 The same thing.

00:15:37.440 Be transparent.

00:15:38.080 And you may be wrong, right?

00:15:39.480 That happens often.

00:15:41.980 But own it, correct it, move on.

00:15:44.700 Do not hide the ball.

00:15:46.600 They really say that?

00:15:47.800 The 100%.

00:15:49.000 Because also remember.

00:15:49.960 Well, I admire that.

00:15:50.660 I'll just say I admire that.

00:15:51.560 News Nation is owned by a company that really knows local TV, right?

00:15:57.540 They own the most local TV stations.

00:15:59.580 What is, what has the most currency in media still?

00:16:04.360 Visual media, local news.

00:16:06.140 The boss of me directly, I have like 10 bosses, starting with Dusty on up.

00:16:11.960 But the, Mike Korn is an ABC News pro who did every job.

00:16:17.060 So he's not a corporate guy.

00:16:19.400 He was in the field.

00:16:20.860 He knows how to edit.

00:16:21.800 He was in the control room.

00:16:22.820 He was, you know, he did all the jobs.

00:16:24.420 He's written the pieces.

00:16:25.160 So he knows the alchemy of journalism.

00:16:27.540 So he understands when someone's faking the funk and what's transparent versus what is trickery.

00:16:34.340 So they've got a good setup there for it.

00:16:36.640 However, I'm still a Cuomo.

00:16:38.280 And it was really important to me when Andrew decided he was going to run that I had to go to them and say, I work for you.

00:16:45.500 What do you want me to do on this?

00:16:47.200 Do you want me to, I offered, do you want me to take a leave for dependency of the campaign?

00:16:53.240 I'm not running the campaign.

00:16:54.300 I'm not part of the campaign.

00:16:55.940 That's not going to happen.

00:16:57.240 But if you think, you know, haven't lived through this before, I don't want to hurt News Nation.

00:17:01.460 What you're doing is so important, way more important than me.

00:17:05.740 Do you want that?

00:17:07.060 Now, obviously, they said no. 0.99

00:17:09.540 You're being silly and traumatized. 0.98

00:17:13.260 But that was helpful also. 0.99

00:17:15.600 So can Andrew win?

00:17:17.900 Can he win?

00:17:18.680 Yes.

00:17:20.320 So I should say I know Eric Adams and I like him.

00:17:23.320 Eric Adams can win.

00:17:24.980 I am highly distressed by how dirty and chaotic and dangerous New York is.

00:17:31.020 I'm really, really bothered.

00:17:32.080 I almost don't even care about the ideology.

00:17:33.980 I don't care what, you know, rent control debates or tax.

00:17:37.080 I just want to be safe walking down the street.

00:17:39.380 I get it.

00:17:40.000 And he doesn't seem to have been able to do that.

00:17:42.840 Well, let's defend Eric Adams, shall we?

00:17:44.780 I have.

00:17:45.660 I'd like to hear you do it.

00:17:46.720 And so have I.

00:17:47.560 Um, why your brother's running against him?

00:17:50.780 That's, that's not what my family is about.

00:17:53.800 If Andrew is the better choice for the voters in the primary, then he'll win.

00:17:59.240 If he isn't, then he'll lose.

00:18:01.240 And you sign up for that when you decide to get into it.

00:18:04.000 Um, do I want him to win?

00:18:05.420 Of course.

00:18:05.940 He's my brother.

00:18:06.980 Uh, I don't even vote in New York City.

00:18:08.260 So it's, it's, uh, you know, this is a family thing for me, but all you got to do is Google

00:18:13.900 it.

00:18:14.980 I believe the indictment against Eric Adams was weak sauce.

00:18:18.560 Yeah.

00:18:19.140 And yes, I heard much, much later that they had more.

00:18:23.680 They never put it out.

00:18:24.780 An indictment is already just probable cause.

00:18:26.700 It's the lowest layer of a prosecutorial instrument.

00:18:29.080 It's totally immoral for the government at any level to impugn your character without

00:18:33.220 charging you.

00:18:34.000 If you have the evidence, charge me.

00:18:35.320 And they charged him, but they should have brought out whatever they said they had.

00:18:38.240 What they said is everyone looked at the indictment.

00:18:40.200 It's like, wait, you accepted airline upgrades.

00:18:42.360 And by the way, every member of Congress does that all the time.

00:18:45.520 I believed it was weak sauce.

00:18:47.100 Now other people disagreed with me.

00:18:48.600 That's fine.

00:18:49.280 But I didn't know my brother was doing anything politically when I started my coverage of

00:18:53.780 Mayor Adams.

00:18:54.500 And I believe Trump's deal with him is not fair to Eric Adams.

00:18:59.020 Should have pardoned him or dismiss the charges with prejudice, meaning you can't bring him

00:19:03.880 again.

00:19:04.100 Because think about it, Tucker, if I have that deal with you is right now you're fine.

00:19:08.240 You do what you want to do.

00:19:09.360 But we're going to reassess after this event in the future.

00:19:12.980 That means everything to you.

00:19:15.260 And then we'll see if I'm going to prosecute you.

00:19:17.940 It does seem a little like a leash.

00:19:20.020 And I don't think it's fair.

00:19:21.060 So, you know, your criticism, your analysis of, hey, I think he should have been doing

00:19:25.760 other things.

00:19:26.720 My take on that is, OK, and the voters will decide that.

00:19:30.760 But the guy has the biggest gorilla in the world staring at him like he's food.

00:19:38.060 And he's supposed to focus on his job.

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00:21:21.440 Tucker says it best.

00:21:23.140 The credit card companies are ripping Americans off and enough is enough.

00:21:27.740 This is Senator Roger Marshall of Kansas.

00:21:29.860 Our legislation, the Credit Card Competition Act, would help in the grip Visa and MasterCard

00:21:36.320 have on us.

00:21:37.680 Every time you use your credit card, they charge you a hidden fee called a swipe fee, and they've

00:21:42.740 been raising it without even telling you.

00:21:45.140 This hurts consumers and every small business owner.

00:21:48.100 In fact, American families are paying $1,100 in hidden swipe fees each year.

00:21:54.560 The fees Visa and MasterCard charge Americans are the highest in the world, double candidates

00:22:00.240 and eight times more than Europe's.

00:22:02.520 That's why I've taken action, but I need your help to help get this passed.

00:22:06.540 First, I'm asking you to call your senator today and demand they pass the Credit Card Competition

00:22:12.900 Act.

00:22:13.980 Paid for by the Merchants Payments Coalition.

00:22:15.580 Not authorized by any candidate or candidates committee.

00:22:17.880 www.merchantspaymentscoalition.com.

00:22:21.340 That's fair, but that was later in his term.

00:22:25.720 He didn't take crime seriously.

00:22:27.620 Nobody did.

00:22:28.200 And so my question is, let's try and take your brother, Ann Adams, out of it.

00:22:31.980 If you were running for mayor of New York, what would you run on?

00:22:34.600 Free pizza.

00:22:35.160 You like it.

00:22:38.000 Now that they're no more dollar slices.

00:22:39.320 You're going to attack it, but now that you like it, you've thought about it.

00:22:41.400 I do like pizza.

00:22:42.300 I, obviously, a lot, too much.

00:22:45.500 I've given up pizza for a while.

00:22:46.820 Look, we both know the city very well, right?

00:22:49.100 New Yorkers deserve their reputation.

00:22:54.200 It's a tough place.

00:22:56.000 And it is a place where the rules have to mean something.

00:23:01.320 It is too many people in too small a space to have anything chaotic.

00:23:09.780 A little bit of a problem blows up really fast in that city.

00:23:15.840 One, two, three, four, five things happen in the subway.

00:23:18.440 It's like 5,000 things happen in the subway.

00:23:20.620 The feel becomes magnified.

00:23:24.780 Yes.

00:23:24.980 So, having grown up, right?

00:23:26.960 I mean, I'm born and bred.

00:23:28.260 I remember life in the 70s.

00:23:32.780 And that's how people talk today.

00:23:36.280 I think I could make a case that statistically, it ain't the 70s in a lot of different ways

00:23:41.380 for the better.

00:23:43.120 But, that's how they feel.

00:23:44.960 And I haven't heard this talk.

00:23:46.260 I haven't seen people on the subway, as I do now, unless they're in their 20s and therefore

00:23:50.840 unable to look up from their screen because they've been completely destroyed by these

00:23:55.860 devices.

00:23:56.740 Everyone's looking around now on the subway.

00:23:59.080 When you're walking on the street, eyes are up.

00:24:01.960 You know, people have their hands out.

00:24:03.960 Just like it was when it was in the 70s.

00:24:06.920 I remember, people were afraid.

00:24:08.180 When you say you're going to the city, people talk to you like you need to have a plan.

00:24:12.840 And that's corrosive.

00:24:14.800 It hurts property values.

00:24:16.360 It hurts the corporate interest in being there.

00:24:18.880 So, New York is a place that uniquely needs to have that sense that things are under control.

00:24:25.800 And that is not an easy job.

00:24:28.080 Not an easy job. 0.50

00:24:28.900 Well, it just takes a fascist to do it.

00:24:31.620 No, it does.

00:24:32.760 By fascist, I don't mean some... 0.82

00:24:34.180 The way that just slides out of your mouth. 0.58

00:24:36.380 It's true.

00:24:36.940 A fascist?

00:24:37.660 Yeah, like Bloomberg.

00:24:39.840 I don't mean...

00:24:40.220 He wasn't a fascist.

00:24:41.340 It doesn't mean fascist in like hating people on the basis of ethnicity or anything like that.

00:24:44.340 I mean like someone who enforces the rules and is not embarrassed about it at all.

00:24:48.660 It's just like, I'm sorry, that's against the law.

00:24:50.040 We're not putting up with it.

00:24:50.700 Not for one second.

00:24:51.540 No, you can't.

00:24:52.380 And by the way, you're smoking weed on the street?

00:24:55.720 How about no?

00:24:56.820 Like, no.

00:24:57.720 We're not...

00:24:58.440 A little bit of Singapore in New York City.

00:25:01.440 Honestly, as someone who travels a lot, I find it really embarrassing going to New York.

00:25:04.720 I find the airport's embarrassing.

00:25:06.260 The drive-in is embarrassing.

00:25:07.380 I'm an American.

00:25:07.980 I love my country.

00:25:08.940 LaGuardia is the number one airport.

00:25:10.680 It's my brother's signature achievement.

00:25:12.860 LaGuardia is the number one airport in the country.

00:25:14.540 It's way...

00:25:14.980 I don't know by what standard.

00:25:16.580 I think it's way better.

00:25:17.580 I agree.

00:25:18.480 But like, it took like 20 years to do that. 0.99

00:25:20.920 It was pathetic. 0.99

00:25:22.000 It's just like, build a freaking airport. 1.00

00:25:23.780 Like, everyone else does it. 0.97

00:25:24.560 It's hard.

00:25:24.980 Andrew was the only one who could get it done.

00:25:26.380 Before, two days ago, I texted my wife with this picture. 0.97

00:25:28.300 I was like, this is what we could have if people would just stop being ridiculous. 0.97

00:25:31.920 Well, but look. 0.96

00:25:32.520 Build something beautiful.

00:25:33.620 Maintain it.

00:25:34.180 It's not that hard.

00:25:34.580 I agree.

00:25:35.540 But the reason I come at you about saying you need a fascist is...

00:25:40.420 I shouldn't have used the word fascist.

00:25:41.800 But I mean, you need like...

00:25:42.740 That's why I'm here, Tuck.

00:25:44.440 You just need...

00:25:45.620 You need someone who's committed to protecting the weak.

00:25:50.440 Yes.

00:25:51.120 But here's the difference.

00:25:52.680 And I know what you mean.

00:25:54.160 What I'm saying is this.

00:25:55.100 And it's worth examining right now with what people are worried about with the Trump administration.

00:26:01.780 Is it's got to be bigger than you.

00:26:05.120 The problem with fascist is it's not about you.

00:26:07.980 Okay?

00:26:08.380 It's not about Trump.

00:26:09.560 It's not about who is the mayor of New York City.

00:26:11.400 There's a system.

00:26:12.840 There are institutions.

00:26:14.360 There is law and order.

00:26:15.740 And you've got to work within that.

00:26:16.740 And you've got to be zealous about wanting those things to work for the right people the right way.

00:26:21.140 But it can't get any bigger for the individual.

00:26:25.020 Well, I would just strongly agree with that.

00:26:27.760 I'm totally opposed to cults of personality.

00:26:29.660 Because Bloomberg was not fascist.

00:26:30.780 I don't...

00:26:31.020 He was good at using the system.

00:26:32.460 That's a term that I...

00:26:34.140 That's why you got three terms.

00:26:35.240 Yeah.

00:26:35.820 Look, I hate...

00:26:37.800 I think it should be legal for politicians to name things after themselves.

00:26:40.680 No politician should ever have anything named after himself.

00:26:42.860 That's my view.

00:26:43.900 Because we're paying these people.

00:26:45.260 They're our servants.

00:26:45.820 Why are they taking our money to build money and spend to themselves?

00:26:48.860 So, I'm against all self-aggrandizement by anybody, actually, especially politicians.

00:26:53.240 I'm just saying, it's the greatest city in the greatest nation on earth. 0.99

00:26:57.540 And it looks like garbage. 0.99

00:26:59.020 Like, it smells. 0.99

00:27:00.120 It's dirty.

00:27:00.820 It doesn't work very well.

00:27:01.840 It's like, it's not acceptable.

00:27:03.040 Travel around the world.

00:27:04.260 Not everyone lives like that.

00:27:05.720 Right.

00:27:05.860 And we don't have to.

00:27:07.100 So, like, let's just make it worthy of the great nation that it represents.

00:27:10.280 Look, I think there are a lot of people who feel that way.

00:27:12.820 And I could explain it away.

00:27:14.860 There are a lot of things that would be really hard to control that are at play in New York City.

00:27:19.000 But it doesn't really matter at the end of the day.

00:27:20.860 It's how people feel.

00:27:22.480 And look, I listen to my brother very carefully about this.

00:27:26.120 But as someone other than his kids, I mean, there's nobody that Andrew matters more to than me.

00:27:34.020 Andrew raised me.

00:27:35.420 He's not just my brother.

00:27:36.760 He's 13 years older than I am.

00:27:39.300 Everything I'm into are all his hobbies and attributes.

00:27:43.860 Because he taught me all these things.

00:27:44.920 My father was so committed to public service that he was away a lot when I was young.

00:27:49.620 He was in Albany.

00:27:50.800 And we were in Queens.

00:27:52.120 So, Andrew taught me how to throw a ball.

00:27:54.980 Taught me how to ride a bike.

00:27:56.120 Taught me how to tackle.

00:27:57.300 Taught me how to defend myself.

00:27:59.100 Taught me why you're there for your family and how.

00:28:02.300 Taught me about why you got to keep the driveway clean.

00:28:04.700 And how to work on cars.

00:28:06.000 Like, all these things.

00:28:07.460 How to fish.

00:28:08.160 How to boat.

00:28:08.440 All these things was my brother.

00:28:13.040 So, I am really, really attached to him and his well-being.

00:28:20.180 And when you hear someone that you love and care about say,

00:28:24.080 Hey, I think I'm going to go run for office again.

00:28:25.740 I've got to serve.

00:28:27.940 I know why that sounds great to New Yorkers.

00:28:32.280 But to me, it's you want more of that?

00:28:36.320 That is the dirtiest, most unfair, savage business in the world.

00:28:45.120 There's no chance.

00:28:46.740 It's like he's telling me he wants to go wrestle a Komodo dragon.

00:28:50.240 You know what I mean?

00:28:50.840 It's like, hey, I really got to do this.

00:28:52.980 You're going to bleed.

00:28:54.780 They're actively going to try to hurt you.

00:28:57.760 With no regard for the merits.

00:29:00.860 And we call it the game.

00:29:02.940 But it's like Thunderdome.

00:29:04.100 So, as someone who loves him, why would I be excited about him wanting to expose himself to that?

00:29:10.840 Of course not.

00:29:11.500 But, look, when I hear him, it's like, you know, I almost tear up because it's so much like my father.

00:29:17.600 My father used to describe public service.

00:29:19.880 You know, my father hated that I went into the media, by the way.

00:29:23.340 I'm sure this is hard.

00:29:24.320 I'm sure my therapist could have like a whole field day.

00:29:26.780 I don't even open that box of chocolates with my therapist because I know I'd be paying for the rest of my life about just explaining that.

00:29:31.580 But his problem with it was, why do you want to be part of a group that just criticizes people who are trying to get things done when you could actually be trying to get something done?

00:29:44.080 And that's why he believes in public service.

00:29:46.760 Andrew is the same thing.

00:29:48.000 He skips right past the price of entry, which I could never get past it. 0.99

00:29:54.400 I'd be like, no way I'm going to have a hundred Tucker Carlson's chewing on my ass like a dog toy every day. 0.99

00:29:59.180 Not going to happen. 0.99

00:30:00.000 I won't be able to handle it.

00:30:01.640 I want to fight them all the time.

00:30:04.080 And he goes right past that to the, all of these ideas about what he could do in that capacity and what needs to be done.

00:30:11.820 And I'm like, yeah, but you have to go through this gauntlet to get to this place just to try to do this really hard thing.

00:30:19.880 And he looks at me like, and, and, so you got to, I got to support him.

00:30:27.880 I mean, I'm for that level of intensity.

00:30:29.360 You just cannot let people wreck the city.

00:30:33.400 You can't let them live on the sidewalk.

00:30:34.520 That's how he feels.

00:30:35.300 You can't let them smoke weed in the parks.

00:30:36.920 I agree with you.

00:30:37.740 I would just want somebody else to deal with it.

00:30:39.520 Yeah.

00:30:40.220 No.

00:30:41.240 Because it's, look, it's such a hellscape right now.

00:30:43.740 Look what works in politics.

00:30:44.980 If I'm running against you for anything, okay, strategy is simple.

00:30:50.920 We've got to destroy him.

00:30:52.280 What can we find on him?

00:30:53.380 Well, actually, I think the lesson is it doesn't work because Trump is now the president.

00:30:56.640 Well, that is true.

00:30:58.200 He did overcome.

00:30:59.320 I mean, they went after his family.

00:31:00.460 They tried to put his sons in jail.

00:31:02.360 He did overcome.

00:31:03.100 They tried to put him in jail.

00:31:03.580 Right.

00:31:03.820 They shot him.

00:31:04.260 But he is, he is a unicorn also.

00:31:08.240 He is the true Teflon Don.

00:31:09.760 But it's an inspiration, like, you know, whatever you think of Trump or what he does, he's basically

00:31:14.560 saying the same things he was saying 25 years ago.

00:31:16.880 You can pull the tape on Larry King Live about tariffs, about immigration, about foreign policy.

00:31:23.440 He's basically, I mean, he's changed, of course, on a lot of little things, but on the big things,

00:31:27.340 exactly the same.

00:31:28.220 And he just kept going.

00:31:30.460 And it worked.

00:31:32.300 So, well, I think that maybe Trump is a lesson that there are limits to what the personal attack is.

00:31:36.680 That's what I was going to say, is that I think that he's more of a symptom than he is a cause.

00:31:47.940 People, the election message was, you guys are focusing on things that don't matter to us the way you want them to.

00:31:58.100 And what does matter to us doesn't matter enough to you.

00:32:02.040 And what they saw in Trump were two main things.

00:32:06.040 One, the personification of this, that you are trying to destroy this guy on a basis that we are not really okay with.

00:32:14.020 And the second thing is that he wants to disrupt all the things that we believe need disruption.

00:32:22.640 And his views between the cancel culture and different cultural wars, as we call them, Donald Trump, for whatever you want to say about him negatively, approximated normal to the American voters more than the Democrats did.

00:32:42.020 And that's the message.

00:32:44.020 Well, the training stuff just scared the crap out of everybody.

00:32:46.660 But that's an example of what I'm saying.

00:32:49.560 I think there are many examples.

00:32:51.160 But that one was, like, so florid and crazy that, and it's still going on, that I, to this day, I don't understand it.

00:33:00.040 And we live in a world where there are always going to be people who want to wear women's clothes or whatever. 1.00

00:33:04.480 Oh, I understand it.

00:33:06.240 Look, you saw it.

00:33:07.160 You saw it.

00:33:07.660 To elevate trannyism to, like, the top of the agenda list. 1.00

00:33:09.980 I can explain it to you very easily.

00:33:12.740 It's readily apparent.

00:33:14.320 And look, we saw the same mistake on display when the president addressed Congress.

00:33:21.260 Okay?

00:33:21.860 That is not a time for you to be obnoxious.

00:33:25.760 If he wants to be obnoxious, fine.

00:33:28.520 You are there at a respect for the office.

00:33:30.860 There are rules of decorum in that place.

00:33:32.520 I believe there should be rules of decorum in all places, in media and politics.

00:33:37.600 But there aren't.

00:33:38.520 But there are there.

00:33:39.820 And they willfully and wantedly abused them to make a point that they are against Trump.

00:33:48.020 And it was a bad look for the Democrats.

00:33:52.780 What is it an extension of?

00:33:54.400 We, as Democrats, they will tell you, we are resisting who he wants to abuse and what he wants to destroy.

00:34:03.480 Like what?

00:34:04.940 Trans are a unique minority in this country.

00:34:07.620 They are uniquely targeted.

00:34:09.640 They need protection.

00:34:12.280 We are going to protect them.

00:34:14.260 Okay?

00:34:14.720 But this particular aspect of the issue, guys my size who decide to become female and play against my daughter in high school,

00:34:22.120 that is not what you need to protect them from or against.

00:34:26.900 That's something that doesn't make sense.

00:34:28.740 Nope.

00:34:29.760 We have to hold to the purity of the cause of protecting this minority group.

00:34:36.080 Yeah, but you're not protecting them.

00:34:37.120 You're protecting the people that are playing against them because they're 230 pounds.

00:34:40.800 Yeah, it almost never happens.

00:34:41.920 But if it happens once, it's something that never needed to happen.

00:34:45.620 The purity test, the absolutist nature of binary politics, that if you are for something, you have to be all in on it beyond any conception of reason.

00:34:58.480 That's what we're dealing with in our politics.

00:35:00.320 That's what that issue is.

00:35:01.240 Well, of course, I can think of a million topics on which that is true.

00:35:04.460 I think...

00:35:04.820 I see that with guns on the right, by the way.

00:35:06.560 Maybe right.

00:35:07.220 You know, I'm an absolutist on that.

00:35:11.000 I could tell you why.

00:35:11.780 It's not even that interesting.

00:35:13.220 But what I think...

00:35:14.520 But, you know, the right to self-defense is a part of natural law.

00:35:18.340 The idea that a man can become a woman by wishing it so is not only a violation of natural law, it's a violation of nature itself. 1.00

00:35:25.560 It's, like, inherently insane.

00:35:26.920 It's a denial of physical reality.

00:35:28.700 And so why...

00:35:30.380 So if the argument is, you know, there are people with weird sexual impulses who we shouldn't, like, scapegoat and hurt, I mean, I'm totally in agreement with that.

00:35:39.180 It is a perversion of live and let live.

00:35:42.080 But to force the rest of us to tell a lie...

00:35:46.580 That's the perversion.

00:35:47.320 That's where...

00:35:48.300 That's when you feel like, well, this is a spiritual attack, actually.

00:35:51.180 Well, it doesn't have to be a lie.

00:35:53.080 In the interest of live and let live, right, which is a signature American freedom, or should be, right?

00:35:59.100 You don't want these people to live the way they want to live.

00:36:01.440 You are infringing on their rights.

00:36:02.680 We will protect them.

00:36:04.240 Now, I understand the political philosophy behind that.

00:36:09.020 But once it entered a realm of where the people that you say you're trying to protect are now a problem for another group that need protection also, which are these kids, they didn't click into the common sense.

00:36:24.120 No, it's more than that, though.

00:36:25.040 It's like the idea that the government should be involved in people's sex lives is a shocking concept to me.

00:36:32.540 I don't think it should be.

00:36:33.600 Me either.

00:36:34.500 And they're promoting homosexuality, promoting it. 1.00

00:36:39.140 And I'll tell you how we know that they're promoting it, because its incidence has risen dramatically.

00:36:43.660 Now, when I was a young man, there was a debate over what percentage of the population is gay.

00:36:48.560 I was never anti-gay, for the record, and I'm not now.

00:36:51.180 But it's an interesting question.

00:36:52.660 They would say, you're born that way. 0.99

00:36:53.920 You're born gay. 1.00

00:36:55.060 So you cannot criticize someone on the basis of his immutable characteristics. 0.98

00:36:58.360 Great.

00:36:58.900 I totally agree with that.

00:37:00.340 But then we saw the absolute incidence of self-reported homosexuality, like, triple.

00:37:05.180 So clearly, people aren't born that way.

00:37:06.920 You know, 30% of eighth graders were born gay?

00:37:10.100 No, that's not true.

00:37:11.280 And so there's been this dramatic rise that none of us are allowed to notice.

00:37:15.120 It's like, you can't notice that.

00:37:16.220 Well, why?

00:37:17.020 Okay.

00:37:17.400 Yes, I can.

00:37:18.800 And I'm sort of thunderstruck by it.

00:37:21.520 Like, what is that? 0.94

00:37:22.500 And it clearly is a manifestation of the deeper truth, which is maybe some people are born gay,

00:37:29.080 but people can also be moved towards self-identifying as gay.

00:37:34.080 And that's exactly what's happened.

00:37:36.260 So why?

00:37:37.220 Anyway, so, like, I don't think that's good.

00:37:40.640 I don't think that's good.

00:37:41.500 And I also don't understand why the government should be taking my tax dollars to convince people

00:37:47.400 that certain forms of sex are better than others, particularly non-procreative sex. 0.67

00:37:51.240 Like, what the hell is that?

00:37:52.540 Well, look, it's an easy legal and moral backstop that government should not be in the business of type.

00:38:01.880 Okay?

00:38:02.340 That's easy.

00:38:03.540 There's plenty of things that government should be doing that isn't necessary.

00:38:07.160 I believe that is an extension to how people choose their own bodies and how they use them.

00:38:15.080 I believe in reproductive rights.

00:38:16.540 I think it is a right.

00:38:18.140 However, I see gay acceptance a little differently.

00:38:22.260 Secondly, the difference of a generation from our kids to us is it's much safer to say that you're gay now than it was. 0.93

00:38:30.260 You used to get beat up.

00:38:31.440 You used to get ostracized.

00:38:32.580 You used to get excluded.

00:38:34.180 That happens less now.

00:38:35.340 It still happens, but it happens less.

00:38:36.860 Is there also a cultural formation that we see, like in America?

00:38:42.640 Everything goes in these big swings in different directions.

00:38:45.580 Always reaction formation.

00:38:47.240 Are we more gay-friendly in our culture, aggressively so, assertively so, than we were when we were growing up?

00:38:54.580 Yes.

00:38:55.640 Can that make it more attractive to young people who are struggling and trying to figure themselves out?

00:39:00.460 Maybe.

00:39:01.820 And that's why I remember when I was in college, there were a lot of people who were gay in college who weren't gay afterwards.

00:39:08.200 Now, a lot of them were gay in college and gay afterwards, but I think there's something to experimenting and certain people play out with identity.

00:39:14.440 No, it's like, okay, but I just want to get to the core question, which is where does this come from, being gay?

00:39:20.560 Is it inborn?

00:39:22.460 We were told you're born that way.

00:39:24.040 Okay, so where's the gene?

00:39:25.600 There isn't one.

00:39:26.860 I don't know the genetics, but I do believe.

00:39:28.760 Well, no one has isolated a gene.

00:39:29.820 But you haven't noticed when you were raising your kids that there would be certain kids that you were like, I think this kid's going to be gay. 0.83

00:39:36.260 A hundred percent. 0.83

00:39:37.000 Oh, yes.

00:39:37.880 But like where they were too young to be mimicking it.

00:39:41.100 I absolutely did notice that.

00:39:42.960 And so I'm not saying there's not a genetic component.

00:39:45.660 I'm just saying, and I don't know the answer is the truth.

00:39:48.740 But what I do know is if you've got a third of middle schoolers saying I'm not heterosexual, that's not.

00:39:54.740 Plays to a fad.

00:39:55.500 That's not more than it does.

00:39:56.800 That's not inborn at all.

00:39:57.540 I think that there's two things can be true.

00:39:59.600 You can have that.

00:40:00.460 It's easier to be accepted today.

00:40:02.920 I'm not saying that it's the same.

00:40:05.280 I'd still believe that when people are gay, it's like the main descriptor of them.

00:40:09.040 Whereas you and I don't identify or, oh, Tucker Carlson, you know him, straight guy, you know.

00:40:12.680 But when you're gay, you still get labeled that way.

00:40:15.820 But I think two things can be happening at the same time, that there is a culture of persuasion in, let's say, in a guided or misguided sense of acceptance.

00:40:26.460 And I think it is safer for people to come out now than it was a generation ago.

00:40:30.400 Yes, both are true.

00:40:32.260 But I guess the point I'm making is it's really clear that the federal government, state governments, local governments, and NGOs are promoting homosexuality among kids. 0.88

00:40:42.100 Obviously true to me.

00:40:43.040 And transgenderism among kids.

00:40:45.080 And my point is that is not acceptable. 0.91

00:40:48.940 And when I was a child, if an adult went up to a kid in a park and started talking to him about his sex life, you could shoot the guy because that's not acceptable to talk to other people's children about sex, period.

00:41:00.740 And now it's not only acceptable, it's the rule, and it's paid for by my tax dollars.

00:41:05.120 And I'm just saying, like, that's really destructive.

00:41:08.400 Look, it is a very persuasive argument.

00:41:10.520 I don't know.

00:41:11.460 It certainly hasn't been my experience in my kids' schools, public and private, that I felt that they were being indoctrinated.

00:41:20.260 They didn't have Pride Week.

00:41:21.300 Into anything.

00:41:21.940 Or Pride Month or Pride celebrations.

00:41:22.740 I mean, look, I don't remember it specifically.

00:41:25.440 But even if they did, let's say they did, I can't prove that right now, but let's say they did, that to me is not the same thing as indoctrination.

00:41:34.720 I have no problem with adults and children being exposed to different belief systems and different ways and different cultures.

00:41:45.100 I have no problem with tolerance.

00:41:47.580 Now, indoctrination is a different word.

00:41:49.760 Well, Pride is not tolerance.

00:41:51.140 Pride is the opposite of tolerance.

00:41:52.940 Pride is a celebration.

00:41:54.500 Right.

00:41:54.700 And so you're celebrating certain sex acts with other people's kids, and I just think right there you've crossed a line.

00:42:01.860 Well, Pride Week doesn't have to be children, right?

00:42:04.080 When you have the, you know, the St. Patrick's Day parade, it's not making people be Irish.

00:42:10.720 I totally agree.

00:42:11.900 I'm talking about kids.

00:42:13.280 I'm talking about schools.

00:42:13.840 You're talking about in school.

00:42:14.360 And by the way, I don't have any problem with heterosexual pride, gay pride.

00:42:19.740 You know, people are happy about the way that they live.

00:42:22.900 That's fine.

00:42:23.360 I have a huge problem with schools or governments getting involved in the sexuality of children. 0.99

00:42:32.660 Yeah, I 100% agree.

00:42:33.860 But every school does it. 0.84

00:42:34.920 There's not one school that doesn't have gay promotion.

00:42:36.660 Their job is to keep everybody safe.

00:42:38.540 No, but it's not safe.

00:42:39.480 It's promoting it.

00:42:40.600 No, I got you.

00:42:41.480 I get what would bother you. 0.81

00:42:42.660 I'm saying their job is to keep kids safe, which means if my kid is gay, your kid can't beat them up on that basis.

00:42:49.860 That's the role of the school.

00:42:51.700 That's the rule of the law is, you know, people have to be able to live and be free and safe.

00:42:57.340 It's different to you trying to teach my kid to be gay.

00:43:00.800 If that's going on, obviously, it would be a problem. 0.67

00:43:02.760 I mean, I think if I've never experienced a massive percentage of middle schoolers are gay in general, possessions are overrated. 0.99

00:43:09.300 But there are some things you really would not want stolen.

00:43:13.080 And to me, family shotguns, including a whole bunch of them I got from my father, are at the top of that list.

00:43:19.880 So I keep my dad's shotguns in a Liberty safe because it's safe and it's also really attractive.

00:43:27.460 Liberty safe just created something really cool.

00:43:29.120 It's a limited edition safe that commemorates the inauguration of Donald Trump, America's 47th president.

00:43:34.560 The original design celebrates Trump and his swearing in while upholding Liberty's commitment to building their safes right here in the United States.

00:43:42.580 And they went all out on this one.

00:43:44.300 It's the special 47 edition.

00:43:46.620 It features a one of a kind artwork that pays homage to the president.

00:43:50.640 It's very, very cool.

00:43:52.560 Not all safes are created equal.

00:43:53.800 There are plenty out there.

00:43:54.760 And a lot of the manufacturers slap an American sending name on the label, but they are not made here.

00:44:00.720 They're from China or other foreign markets.

00:44:02.680 Liberty safes are made in the United States.

00:44:06.060 For over 30 years, Liberty has made its safes right here, and that matters.

00:44:10.340 Because when you buy a Liberty safe, you're supporting American workers and American values.

00:44:14.520 Their products are more than just a place to protect your dad's shotguns, for example.

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00:44:20.140 So celebrate this historic moment.

00:44:22.160 Secure the things that you want to keep forever in a Liberty safe.

00:44:26.860 Visit libertysafe.com or find a Liberty dealer or retailer near you to order your limited edition safe today.

00:44:33.740 Liberty safe made in America.

00:44:35.480 Let me ask you a question that for some reason seems to have sunk beneath the waves.

00:44:40.100 Because the JFK story, 62 years ago, the president's murdered.

00:44:44.580 It's pretty clear that the story we were told isn't true.

00:44:48.440 And it bothers people because it gets to a core question, which is, is the president capable of making independent decisions?

00:44:57.040 Or is there a threat of physical violence against all American presidents that persists?

00:45:04.480 Well, we know there's a threat of violence because we just watched our president get shot in the head.

00:45:08.460 Of course.

00:45:09.140 But from whatever group has been able to keep these files secret for 62 years.

00:45:16.860 So my question to you is like, what is that?

00:45:18.420 Why have these been secret for so long?

00:45:19.960 Look, you know, the idea of the deep state to me is a convenience more than it is a reality.

00:45:27.560 It's a boogeyman.

00:45:29.820 Why don't they put it out?

00:45:31.220 Because institutions protect themselves, Tucker, as we both know.

00:45:34.440 Really?

00:45:34.740 And there is clearly information in those files that are going to make the CIA look bad.

00:45:39.880 Just the CIA?

00:45:40.800 Well, whatever.

00:45:41.620 Different agencies.

00:45:42.280 No, no, no, whatever.

00:45:42.980 I mean, let's.

00:45:43.960 Well, I don't know because I haven't seen them.

00:45:45.280 But it could be the FBI, it could be the CIA.

00:45:47.920 Okay, so I've always thought that.

00:45:49.960 And then in January, you know, there was a scramble over who's going to get what jobs in the new administration.

00:45:54.720 And at one point, there was someone who was being discussed for a job in the intel world.

00:46:00.460 And a member of the SSCI, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the Senate Intel Committee, went to the people making the decision and said, you cannot hire this person because this person will be certain to push for the release of the JFK files.

00:46:14.960 So this is in, this is a fact.

00:46:16.240 So this is in 2025, less than two months ago.

00:46:20.120 And you have a sitting member of the United States Senate whose main goal is to keep those files secret.

00:46:28.440 And then you have to ask yourself, what is that?

00:46:29.980 Yeah.

00:46:30.780 Exactly.

00:46:31.520 Why?

00:46:32.140 Yeah.

00:46:32.500 Why?

00:46:33.040 Were they even alive?

00:46:33.520 And even now, of course, no one was alive.

00:46:35.800 It was 62 years ago.

00:46:36.740 Yeah, I know.

00:46:37.060 And by the way, the institution, no one can even tell you who the CIA director was and who, do you remember the name of the CIA director?

00:46:43.320 John McCone, I think, 1963.

00:46:45.840 But that person is like completely lost to history except a specialist.

00:46:48.900 And the CIA has already been through 50 years ago, the Church Committee hearings, 1975, where we sort of know they're sassing people, dosing people with acid, all this stuff.

00:46:56.900 It's like the CIA has already been discredited.

00:46:59.660 So if you're telling me that six weeks ago, a member of the United States Senate was trying to keep someone out of a job in order to keep these files secret, that is to protect the CIA, I don't believe that for a second.

00:47:12.480 So what do you think it is?

00:47:12.980 I don't know.

00:47:14.060 But this is, I mean, there's no one at the CIA who is involved.

00:47:19.600 Then.

00:47:19.840 Actually, yeah, who's involved in the Kennedy assassination.

00:47:21.740 There's no one in America who's involved in the Kennedy assassination.

00:47:23.980 So here's what I know.

00:47:24.760 So, first of all, I don't believe that the CIA has been completely discredited.

00:47:28.920 I believe in the institutions.

00:47:30.280 They have to be checked.

00:47:31.320 You know, the media used to be in the business of checking the institutions.

00:47:33.860 Now we're in the business of like defending them tacitly because we have a president that attacks them all the time.

00:47:38.820 But the. 0.80

00:47:41.280 So Mike Pompeo gets in there.

00:47:43.000 He's in charge of the CIA.

00:47:44.340 Trump says, I'm releasing the files.

00:47:46.220 Right.

00:47:46.400 OK, somebody says something to Mike Pompeo that he then goes to the president of the United States and says, you can't release these things.

00:47:53.440 And Trump acknowledges it.

00:47:55.620 Now, do I believe that Trump did it under threat?

00:47:59.260 No.

00:48:00.120 I think that Trump just decided that whatever he was being told made sense.

00:48:05.160 But it's it's and I'm speaking of Trump or Pompeo is a very sinister person.

00:48:09.160 And you're absolutely right.

00:48:10.180 Pompeo was the driver behind that.

00:48:11.640 But who's driving Pompeo?

00:48:13.300 I mean, it doesn't actually make sense.

00:48:14.900 The story doesn't make sense.

00:48:16.280 And by the way, we we have the file numbers of most of the files that have not been disclosed.

00:48:21.240 So it's like Trump issues an executive order on January 23rd saying you're going to release this stuff.

00:48:25.940 They kind of can't not release it.

00:48:28.100 And yet now it's the first week of March and they haven't released it.

00:48:31.560 So pressure is currently being applied on the administration not to release those files.

00:48:36.320 It seems that way.

00:48:37.400 By whom?

00:48:38.260 I don't know.

00:48:39.600 Some like mid-level analyst at CIA who just doesn't want to discredit the institution he works for.

00:48:44.560 I don't think so.

00:48:45.760 Like, what is that?

00:48:46.840 I don't know.

00:48:47.280 Who?

00:48:47.520 I don't believe it's the Rockefellers, the Pope and I don't believe I'm not even guessing.

00:48:53.200 All I'm saying is we can say with certainty that there is a force acting on these people, a very serious force to the point where they're embarrassing themselves because they promise they didn't release this and they haven't.

00:49:04.540 Look, I don't I don't disagree with what the hell is that?

00:49:07.460 I don't know.

00:49:07.960 But it's not just that.

00:49:08.920 Right now we get this weird story about the Epstein files.

00:49:11.780 Like, who even cares?

00:49:13.440 You know what I mean?

00:49:13.940 Like, who I want released?

00:49:15.920 I believe in transparency.

00:49:16.860 I think it's the route to trust.

00:49:18.720 And it's not just because I'm in the media.

00:49:20.140 It's just common sense.

00:49:21.680 But A.G.

00:49:22.580 Bondi, I don't have any reason to be anti-A.G.

00:49:24.680 Bondi.

00:49:25.520 And she says she's going to release the files.

00:49:27.600 And I don't even care that they released them to their pod people. 0.99

00:49:30.520 I mean, I thought that was stupid. 0.97

00:49:31.820 But I mean, that's fine. 0.99

00:49:32.680 They want to do it.

00:49:33.180 They do it.

00:49:34.180 They're playing the preference.

00:49:35.240 Okay.

00:49:36.240 Now, then there's a story about, well, the New York FBI, they hid all the files.

00:49:40.260 And then we're going to have to get them.

00:49:41.720 We're going to fire this guy who's supposedly, by most accounts, is a pretty solid guy that they had quit.

00:49:47.580 Well, where are the files?

00:49:49.380 Where are they?

00:49:50.480 And because I thought Trump was the antidote to this.

00:49:53.100 And to me, the heartbreak has already come and gone.

00:49:55.660 UFOs, to me, is the best example of what you are picking up.

00:50:01.040 Can we just back up?

00:50:01.440 And I totally agree.

00:50:02.480 I just want to just linger for one second on the Epstein things.

00:50:05.980 So what is that?

00:50:07.820 I mean, once again, you clearly have a force that's applying measurable pressure on the people who should have the power.

00:50:16.660 The elected president of the United States should have the power under our system.

00:50:19.020 That's called democracy.

00:50:20.000 And his appointees have derivative power from him.

00:50:23.420 But they appear to be powerless in the face of some other source of power.

00:50:28.040 And the question is, what is that source?

00:50:29.260 I don't know.

00:50:29.800 And where's your boy Kash Patel?

00:50:31.340 I mean, he went in there to supposedly bust all this up.

00:50:34.260 I can't answer that.

00:50:35.100 He put out this weird tweet, you know, that was very general.

00:50:38.680 Like, you know, things are going to change and we're going to do this.

00:50:41.560 After we learn that someone under his control now, right, because he's the head of the FBI, in that office that's under him, why wasn't he there?

00:50:51.180 Why didn't he go there and say, give me the files?

00:50:52.800 Give them to me.

00:50:53.340 Weren't you just saying the deep state's not real?

00:50:55.300 I don't know.

00:50:56.120 I don't believe in the deep state as a boogeyman.

00:50:58.040 What the hell is going on?

00:50:58.760 But look, they're his guys.

00:50:59.980 I'm just saying, why didn't he go there and say, give me the files?

00:51:02.640 So let's just use logic.

00:51:04.060 I can't answer that question.

00:51:05.040 I think it's a great question.

00:51:07.020 But let's just use logic for one second.

00:51:09.200 Clearly, if you watch this, in my case, for the same as you, 35 years, watching this stuff carefully and somebody, you know, gets in the office, I'm going to do this, that, and the other thing.

00:51:17.980 And then, like, five days later, they're like, well, actually, someone has called that person to say there's something you didn't know.

00:51:25.920 Here are the consequences of doing that.

00:51:27.940 Someone has applied very serious pressure on this person.

00:51:30.960 Pressure so serious that that person is willing to humiliate himself.

00:51:35.000 So wait a minute.

00:51:35.720 Here's the part I don't understand.

00:51:36.280 So who's that person exerting the pressure?

00:51:37.760 But you are uniquely qualified to get this answer because one of us can call the president of the United States right now and ask him.

00:51:48.060 And the other one is me.

00:51:49.880 So why don't you know?

00:51:52.360 That's a great question.

00:51:53.740 It's the only kind I ask.

00:51:54.560 So what I brought to it was the knowledge that a member of the Senate Intel Committee, I'm not guessing, called over and said, you cannot appoint this person.

00:52:02.880 So why don't you expose that person, first of all, so we can start chasing after him or her?

00:52:05.820 Tom Cotton of Arkansas did that.

00:52:07.800 Tom Cotton?

00:52:08.660 Yes, correct.

00:52:09.520 And did you ask him?

00:52:10.380 I haven't.

00:52:10.920 No, I haven't asked him. 0.81

00:52:11.920 What the hell is going on with you?

00:52:13.360 I'd like to. 0.84

00:52:17.220 And kind of makes people suspicious of you, by the way.

00:52:20.000 Go ahead.

00:52:20.320 Because if you know that Tom Cotton said you can't pick this person because—

00:52:26.020 That is correct.

00:52:26.740 And then you didn't go to him and find out why?

00:52:29.740 Well, I need to sit down with him.

00:52:30.840 I'm not sure that he'll do an interview with me.

00:52:33.180 With you?

00:52:33.940 I'm waiting.

00:52:34.500 You are like the spirit animal of that administration.

00:52:39.060 No, no, no.

00:52:39.220 But it's a fair—look, it's a fair question.

00:52:41.800 It's a totally fair question.

00:52:43.040 And the answer is, I hadn't thought to do that.

00:52:45.860 And there's a lot going on.

00:52:47.220 And I've been distracted.

00:52:49.620 And I've kind of been—

00:52:50.200 Now I think you're part of the deep state.

00:52:52.000 Oh, wow.

00:52:52.560 And just like that.

00:52:53.260 You think that?

00:52:53.740 I probably wouldn't be saying any of this if I was part of the deep state.

00:52:56.100 Unless that's what they would do, is make me think that it exists.

00:53:00.060 But you're not sure because it's actually you.

00:53:02.680 One of the worst things that ever happened to me ever is last year when I was interviewing Putin.

00:53:07.260 And it was such a long interview, and it was being translated, and I couldn't always hear the translation very well.

00:53:12.540 And apparently in it, he says, you applied to work at CIA, which I did.

00:53:16.340 You know, I'm not hiding that.

00:53:17.680 I didn't get in.

00:53:19.400 And your father worked for the Intel World and all that.

00:53:22.060 I didn't hear him say that.

00:53:23.240 I did not hear him say that.

00:53:25.180 And I have been living with that ever since.

00:53:28.040 I have nothing to do with any of that for whatever it's worth.

00:53:30.620 But the number of people have texted me, but like, oh, you're working for the CIA.

00:53:33.660 It's like, no, actually, nobody believes more strongly in radical reform at CIA than I do with, I would say, some knowledge of the subject.

00:53:43.280 Look, I mean, people can think I work for the deep state.

00:53:45.660 I don't.

00:53:46.640 I don't think there is a deep state.

00:53:48.660 Here's all I'm saying.

00:53:49.700 Someone is applying massive pressure to elected officials and has for a very long time.

00:53:55.300 And I would like to know who that is.

00:53:56.440 Ask Mike Pompeo why he told.

00:53:58.160 Oh, I have.

00:53:59.140 Oh, I have.

00:53:59.940 And when I got into it with Mike Pompeo.

00:54:01.740 No, I mean, I've talked about this before.

00:54:04.300 I don't want to be boring.

00:54:05.140 But I, when.

00:54:06.420 I tell you to ask Dan Crenshaw, but he's not going to take it.

00:54:08.600 No, he's not.

00:54:09.180 He's not going to call him a liberal.

00:54:10.620 But you wonder, Dan Crenshaw is, Dan Crenshaw is emotionally out of control.

00:54:17.140 And I feel for it.

00:54:18.320 Honestly, I'm not.

00:54:19.080 Stop provoking him then.

00:54:20.980 I didn't even provoke him.

00:54:23.080 I just pointed out.

00:54:24.360 I just pointed out.

00:54:26.420 You provoked him.

00:54:27.480 I saw it on stage.

00:54:28.800 His state was just invaded by Mexico.

00:54:30.800 And he's worried about Ukraine.

00:54:31.980 It's like, what?

00:54:33.040 Wake up, son.

00:54:34.160 Here are your duties.

00:54:34.880 Let me put them in order to your family, to your community, to your voters, to your state, to your nation, and maybe Ukraine down there at the bottom. 0.98

00:54:42.080 But anyway, that's all I was saying.

00:54:43.180 Here's my point.

00:54:44.240 Please.

00:54:44.500 I am really concerned, not just because, you know, I am curious and I want to get to the bottom of mysteries, which is true.

00:54:54.000 But I'm really concerned that the failure to disclose big things like details about the murder of a president in a democratic country, republic, that that will convince people that our system itself is fake.

00:55:09.240 And it's kind of hard to argue that it's real.

00:55:11.560 I totally agree.

00:55:12.360 If you can't even know who killed the president.

00:55:15.020 Transparency is trust.

00:55:15.760 62 years later, Mike Pompey was working to keep American citizens from knowing who murdered their president.

00:55:21.500 Who are you working for, Mike Pompey?

00:55:22.680 And we just had an election.

00:55:24.300 What is that?

00:55:25.000 And by the way, I just want to say one more time, you cannot convince me.

00:55:27.860 I'm not some world expert in the CIA, but I've certainly watched it closely over the years.

00:55:31.800 It's not the CIA.

00:55:32.620 The CIA.

00:55:34.020 CIA is like a huge federal agency with all kinds of different components and warring tribes within.

00:55:38.880 And, like, there's no CIA.

00:55:41.400 Bill Burns is not, like, calling Trump and being like, don't release the files.

00:55:49.020 I agree.

00:55:49.520 Just credit CIA.

00:55:50.240 But, look, the president knows.

00:55:51.440 We just had an election where he was hammering on these things.

00:55:54.700 And even with UAPs or UFOs, whatever terminology you want, we couldn't get more information.

00:56:01.240 These things are all over the place.

00:56:03.060 Sure, some are helicopters.

00:56:04.300 Some are fixed wing.

00:56:05.000 Okay.

00:56:05.620 Not all of them.

00:56:06.960 And they don't know?

00:56:08.100 Of course they know.

00:56:09.080 They spend hundreds of millions of dollars on the programs.

00:56:11.440 And then we get all our hopes up, right?

00:56:13.900 The media loves Mocking News Nation about this because they think that, oh, Cuomo thinks they're little green men in the basement of some building.

00:56:21.600 No, I don't.

00:56:22.760 It's about knowing that we spend hundreds of millions of dollars and use special operators to do things that you won't tell us about.

00:56:30.560 And at a minimum, you should say, well, here's why we won't tell you.

00:56:33.920 So what are they?

00:56:35.020 That's exactly right.

00:56:35.920 Well, so, but what are they, do you think? 0.99

00:56:38.100 I don't know what the fuck they are. 0.99

00:56:39.140 The point is that they know and they won't tell us things. 0.99

00:56:43.380 And I think it is anathema to democracy.

00:56:46.020 Can I, of course, I agree with everything you're saying except one specific point, which is I'm not sure they know.

00:56:51.700 They have programmed, they certainly know more than we do.

00:56:54.280 Put it that way.

00:56:54.780 They do.

00:56:55.140 They may know that they don't really know, which is the scariest thing of all.

00:56:59.640 And I've certainly called a lot on this topic.

00:57:01.920 I've stopped talking about it in public.

00:57:03.240 I've tried to stop thinking about it because it's just one of those things that drives you crazy.

00:57:07.700 But my strong impression is that they don't really know, that there isn't a consensus on this and that they're not, you know, from Russia or China.

00:57:17.300 He campaigned on it.

00:57:18.480 It was supposed to be a no brainer.

00:57:20.200 And then they put out exactly what the Biden organization did.

00:57:22.280 No, I'm aware of that.

00:57:23.500 Administration.

00:57:23.780 I'm aware of that.

00:57:24.660 And I'm aware of that.

00:57:27.760 I mean, that's just my view.

00:57:29.660 I could be completely wrong, but I don't think it's as simple as they know exactly what's going on and they're hiding it.

00:57:34.480 Well, again, these are your people.

00:57:35.860 Why don't you talk to them?

00:57:36.780 They love you.

00:57:37.400 Oh, my gosh, I have.

00:57:38.580 So what do you got for me?

00:57:39.540 And I think.

00:57:40.000 Come all the way down here.

00:57:40.980 We don't know.

00:57:41.620 Cross all these bridges.

00:57:42.680 We don't know.

00:57:43.100 And I think that's kind of the scarier answer is.

00:57:45.740 Flying over military bases.

00:57:47.900 Shutting them down.

00:57:48.800 And you.

00:57:49.120 Shutting down military bases.

00:57:50.280 Yeah.

00:57:50.420 And you don't shoot them down and then figure out what it was.

00:57:54.060 Maybe you can't, you know, so that's so look, I mean, I think we're getting to the same answer.

00:58:00.920 If if there is a very obvious mystery that's publicly known, there's public pressure to solve the mystery to divulge what, you know, and you don't.

00:58:08.480 Yes.

00:58:09.080 Then there's there's a real reason behind it. 0.96

00:58:11.300 It's not just ass covering. 0.94

00:58:13.100 Or do you have the arrogance to believe that you don't have to tell me? 0.97

00:58:16.600 No, not anymore.

00:58:17.760 Not anymore.

00:58:18.360 Because now that, you know, especially in this administration that was elected on the promise of transparency, there's there's a real reason because there's tons of counterpressure.

00:58:28.460 People are aware, like, where the hell are my Kennedy files?

00:58:30.700 What's going on these things over New Jersey?

00:58:32.220 You said they were over your house in Bedminster.

00:58:35.660 What is it?

00:58:36.640 You know, and what is this Epstein thing?

00:58:38.200 Which all of us watched.

00:58:39.920 George Stephanopoulos is having dinner with us.

00:58:41.780 Everyone, you know, is over at Epstein's house.

00:58:43.440 Like, Ehud Barak is there every day.

00:58:45.220 Like, what the hell is this? 0.75

00:58:46.840 Who killed this guy? 0.85

00:58:47.920 He was clearly killed, obviously.

00:58:49.840 He wasn't committed suicide.

00:58:51.260 Look, just start there.

00:58:52.380 Show us the files that substantiated the theory of his suicide.

00:58:58.700 Just show them to us.

00:58:59.680 Or where's your investigation into his death, which you promised Attorney General Barr that you're going to do.

00:59:04.200 Show us.

00:59:04.540 And you never did.

00:59:05.360 Yeah.

00:59:06.140 So I guess what I'm saying is if you take three steps back, you're like, wait, this really is.

00:59:10.280 This isn't just, you know, maybe some of the details are wrong.

00:59:12.400 Or certainly stories like this draw all the wackos like a bug light, for sure.

00:59:16.060 And they come up with these fantastical theories to explain it.

00:59:18.980 But just the knowable facts, the confirmed facts, suggest something really, really big.

00:59:24.440 Like, the moment that I never thought much about the Epstein story until I realized that the Republican, two-time Republican Attorney General Barr lied about it.

00:59:34.680 Why would Barr lie about this?

00:59:36.680 Epstein's a big Democratic donor.

00:59:39.300 Barr was not close to Trump.

00:59:40.640 He's not covering for Trump.

00:59:42.460 What is that?

00:59:43.440 And I don't know the answer.

00:59:44.560 But that was the moment where I was like, whoa.

00:59:46.780 All of a sudden, Bill Kristol's lawyer is involved in this, which he was.

00:59:51.900 You know, I don't know.

00:59:52.660 There's just a lot.

00:59:53.440 There's a lot there.

00:59:54.160 There's so much there that it starts to make you nervous.

00:59:56.340 And it makes you think, like, maybe the – it's not just that things are screwed up on the margins, but maybe at the core is something really dark.

01:00:04.740 I don't know.

01:00:05.740 I don't either.

01:00:06.420 Look, this is the problem with the vacuum of information, right?

01:00:09.820 Is that you then start speculating about why they won't just tell you these things.

01:00:15.360 And I'm not.

01:00:16.300 I'm not going to speculate on it because I don't know, and I don't even have, like, really good theories.

01:00:21.240 I do have some theories, but they could be completely wrong.

01:00:23.700 All I'm saying is a rational person arrives inevitably at the conclusion that there's a real reason these have not been disclosed.

01:00:31.360 Maybe.

01:00:31.720 It's not just entropy.

01:00:32.760 I have a conspiracy theory about it.

01:00:35.300 I'm not so sure anymore.

01:00:38.460 So we love the word patriot, okay?

01:00:41.460 We love it.

01:00:41.920 We love to say that we're patriots.

01:00:43.780 I don't know.

01:00:45.680 I don't know.

01:00:46.680 I don't know anymore.

01:00:47.560 When I look at the Trump administration, I'm not accusing anybody of anything treasonous.

01:00:54.560 I'm just saying there seems to be a lot of currency these days in destroying things.

01:00:59.220 And I've never seen a president in our lifetime say that everything in government is bad.

01:01:08.220 Trump is the only president, even his speech, which I thought was well-written and well-delivered for what he wanted to try to achieve,

01:01:15.000 which is, hey, I got a lot of balls in the air.

01:01:17.640 Forget about me promising what would happen day one.

01:01:20.440 Stuff's going to get worse before it gets better kind of vibe, which I get why he wanted that speech given what's happening in the polls.

01:01:26.940 But justice doesn't work.

01:01:30.200 The elections don't work.

01:01:32.260 Wall Street is corrupt.

01:01:35.780 None of the institutions of government can do everything.

01:01:38.220 All the tax dollars are wasted.

01:01:39.740 It's like I keep getting the same message from them.

01:01:43.180 And Musk, to me, has been a huge disappointment.

01:01:47.540 I believe the man is a genius, okay?

01:01:49.960 He has done remarkable things.

01:01:52.520 He doesn't know that the federal judiciary is able to check the executive.

01:01:57.620 He doesn't know that Social Security, the trust fund, isn't part of our debt structure.

01:02:02.680 I can't believe a genius doesn't know these things.

01:02:05.780 So then why would he be messaging this way unless he doesn't want people to like the justice system?

01:02:11.600 He doesn't like people to want Social Security.

01:02:14.380 He doesn't want them to believe that government can do anything.

01:02:16.980 And I don't understand that as a political message from a guy who's in charge of everything now.

01:02:22.940 And what is underlying it in terms of your real ambition?

01:02:26.200 I think I can answer some of them.

01:02:28.680 I think Elon, you know, builds electric cars and rockets and tunneling equipment and telecom, you know, satellite-based telecom, etc., etc.

01:02:39.220 He's a builder of things.

01:02:40.320 He's a businessman.

01:02:41.100 He's an engineer.

01:02:42.940 You know, I'm not surprised he doesn't know the details of how Social Security is structured at all.

01:02:47.640 And I'm not surprised that as a naturalized American, he's not, you know, didn't grow up a schoolhouse rock and doesn't understand the three branches perfectly.

01:02:56.920 His job, from what I can tell, is to deal with the one thing that nobody has dealt with, which is, which will be the end of the country, which is the country's bankruptcy.

01:03:06.240 So the debt is, what, 36.9, something like 37 trillion.

01:03:12.180 Revenues last year, 2024, total federal revenues were under 5 trillion, okay?

01:03:20.420 So that doesn't work.

01:03:22.820 And at a certain point, you know, the people who are floating in the country, the bond buyers, the foreign bond buyers, like I'm not, you know, this doesn't, and everything will collapse.

01:03:30.200 And that's been known for a long time.

01:03:33.920 No one has dealt with it.

01:03:35.080 And from what I can tell, Elon's job is to try and get the spending down.

01:03:40.620 And no one's been able to do that.

01:03:42.020 Well, get the spending down has to be in the budgeting process. 0.93

01:03:45.840 To me, it's a penny-wise, pound-foolish notion.

01:03:48.940 I'm okay with getting rid of waste, fraud, and abuse. 0.75

01:03:51.380 You and I grew up listening to both parties argue when the other one was in power that there was all this waste, fraud, and abuse, and you had to curtail it.

01:03:59.740 And I know it's true.

01:04:01.220 It's always been true.

01:04:02.420 Nobody has ever looked for it and failed to find it.

01:04:04.760 I'm okay with them doing that.

01:04:05.920 But I'll tell you what, if they had called up Carlson and Cuomo and said, would you guys like to serve your country and see what you can find in terms of waste, fraud, and abuse?

01:04:15.960 And we said yes.

01:04:17.280 I'll tell you what we wouldn't do is keep going off half-cocked every day about what we were finding when we weren't sure.

01:04:27.640 We would not do that.

01:04:28.980 We would have immediately come to an agreement.

01:04:30.880 Yeah, we'd probably get-

01:04:31.740 Let's look.

01:04:32.620 Let's find stuff, okay? 0.99

01:04:34.680 And then we're going to go to Congress, and we're going to say, look at all this shit we found. 0.98

01:04:39.400 And because we don't trust them, we would then go public with it at the same time. 0.99

01:04:43.140 Yeah, I don't think that's-

01:04:44.120 We would have a blue ribbon commission, and we'd present our findings.

01:04:46.500 But he is going off half-cocked.

01:04:48.080 None of that's worked, and I feel like-

01:04:50.620 Look, we don't know if it's going to work or not.

01:04:54.000 I'm praying that it does, because I think it's our last chance to save the country.

01:04:57.420 I'm fine with it working.

01:04:58.060 I want it to work.

01:04:58.820 I feel like he's working against his own goals by getting things wrong all the time.

01:05:02.940 Maybe, but big picture, he's right.

01:05:05.620 So USAID, which I grew up around in Washington, I really grew up around it.

01:05:11.580 I can just tell you firsthand, having seen it, it is a force for evil in the world.

01:05:15.860 I think it does probably good things on the margins, but bottom line, it is destabilizing

01:05:20.500 other governments.

01:05:21.280 It's a form of the ugliest kind of imperialism, totally detached from American interests.

01:05:25.380 It's really bad.

01:05:26.140 And the more you know, that's why it's so shocking to read it all, the more indefensible it becomes.

01:05:30.440 The Secretary of State disagrees with you.

01:05:32.960 He may or may not.

01:05:34.460 I'm just saying, you know, he's from Miami.

01:05:36.640 I'm from D.C., so I just tell you, I have, I think, deep exposure to this, and there's

01:05:42.000 no doubt.

01:05:42.540 By the way, USAID gets zeroed out.

01:05:45.740 How many third world presidents complained about that?

01:05:48.300 Did you see any being like, oh my gosh, we want our aid?

01:05:50.660 They don't want American aid in that form, because it destabilizes democratic governments.

01:05:56.240 It overturns the culture of the country.

01:05:58.040 Oh, you need more trans athletes.

01:06:00.360 They hate it, and there's nothing they can do about it.

01:06:02.620 I don't think a single foreign president in a poor country complained when we shut off

01:06:07.120 that aid, because they didn't want it.

01:06:08.560 So that tells you right there.

01:06:10.120 Now, that's a minuscule part of the entire federal budget.

01:06:13.220 Agreed.

01:06:13.560 And he just happened to start with the agency that's investigating him.

01:06:17.480 I don't think USAID is an investigative arm.

01:06:20.940 Okay, they do.

01:06:21.380 Okay.

01:06:21.720 Well, whatever.

01:06:22.360 Elon's being, you know, attacked on many sides.

01:06:24.960 This was before anything happened.

01:06:26.480 Look, I'm just saying, you and I wouldn't have picked an agency that was looking into

01:06:29.620 one of us without letting people know that.

01:06:31.220 I'm not even aware of that.

01:06:32.420 And why didn't he tell us?

01:06:33.520 I just think, big picture, the government is strangling the country.

01:06:38.340 I don't think there's any doubt about that.

01:06:39.820 What does that mean?

01:06:40.480 It means that the richest place in the United States is the one place that produces nothing

01:06:45.540 but bureaucratic jobs, D.C.

01:06:47.200 It's the richest place, and it's the highest concentration of wealth in the United States.

01:06:51.300 The counties around D.C. are the richest.

01:06:53.160 They're like, the majority of the top 10 are in D.C.

01:06:55.600 And all that money is federal money.

01:06:57.720 None of those people can ever be fired or are.

01:07:00.280 It's not even clear what they're doing.

01:07:01.960 A lot of their budgets are classified.

01:07:03.960 The Intel EIC, it's like, you don't even know what they're spending.

01:07:06.860 They own businesses around the world.

01:07:08.460 This is a fact.

01:07:09.520 I mean, they'll admit it if you ask them.

01:07:11.460 And basically, there's no Democratic control over any of this.

01:07:14.280 The voters have no say in how this money is spent.

01:07:17.300 And the people spending it are beyond any kind of correction.

01:07:20.900 There's nothing you can do about it.

01:07:22.000 And so it's truly out of control in a way that makes democracy impossible.

01:07:26.580 And it's also they're acting in its own interest.

01:07:28.680 So and then there's the debt overhang, which really threatens in an imminent way to make

01:07:33.200 all of these conversations just irrelevant.

01:07:35.680 If we're a poor country, they can't support, you know, a military and can't keep up with

01:07:40.980 our own infrastructure.

01:07:42.120 Then like none of this stuff even matters.

01:07:43.980 So do you believe that the answer is to change the institutions, to destroy the institutions?

01:07:50.740 What do you think the answer is?

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01:07:54.940 When things go haywire, they're the ones who show up and make you safe, protect you, not

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01:08:02.920 Most people agree they're heroes.

01:08:05.020 But what happens if they can't show up?

01:08:08.000 First responders cannot be everywhere all the time.

01:08:11.620 And if there's an emergency, particularly a big emergency, there aren't enough to go around.

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01:09:32.760 My sense is that you're not going to get anywhere unless, and I think this was their calculation, 0.96

01:09:41.760 you come out like a freaking wild animal out of a box. 0.99

01:09:46.520 So fast, so hard that you intimidate the shit out of everyone into silence long enough that 0.99

01:09:53.360 you gain momentum to continue the process of paring back government. 0.97

01:09:57.140 But you really have to immediately occupy the moral high ground.

01:10:00.920 You need to, you can't like get into debate with Benny Thompson over, you know, funding of this or that agency.

01:10:07.800 You really have to get up here and look down at Benny Thompson and say,

01:10:11.760 I can't believe that you're participating in this scam for decades that hurt this country,

01:10:16.740 impoverished its citizens.

01:10:18.560 You did this.

01:10:19.340 And it's only from that posture that you have any power to negotiate the reforms necessary.

01:10:24.740 You sort of have to do what the trans lobby, the human rights campaign did,

01:10:28.720 which is you sort of come out of nowhere and rather than sort of make the case that,

01:10:32.060 hey, don't beat up trans kids, which I'm for, don't beat up trans kids or anybody. 0.78

01:10:36.740 They come out and they're like, you're a transphobe. 1.00

01:10:38.880 We're going to pick at your house and kill you if you say anything. 1.00

01:10:41.720 And people are like, holy shit, they're so intimidated that they just kind of go along with your program. 1.00

01:10:45.520 I think a functional country doesn't operate that way, but this is not a functional country. 0.99

01:10:52.420 This is a country that is like more dysfunctional than we will admit to ourselves.

01:10:56.480 And that may be the only option for reform.

01:10:58.900 But one thing that I think no one, no honest person can disagree with,

01:11:02.560 we need reform like immediately on every level.

01:11:05.400 Our military needs to be reformed.

01:11:06.940 The budgeting process needs to be reformed.

01:11:08.940 The way that our economy is structured clearly benefits just a tiny percentage of the population.

01:11:14.220 That's not sustainable.

01:11:15.560 Et cetera, et cetera.

01:11:16.200 Like we need reform badly.

01:11:17.560 We can't keep doing it this way.

01:11:19.040 Well, we've been saying that a long time.

01:11:20.600 I know.

01:11:21.360 And Trump is the first.

01:11:23.060 And again, I don't know if it's going to work.

01:11:24.160 I'm praying that it will because it's this country is the last hope of the world.

01:11:27.100 I really believe that more than ever, having just come back from other countries.

01:11:31.500 That's why we have to make our kids travel because everybody thinks America is the worst place in the world until you go somewhere else.

01:11:38.680 Dude.

01:11:39.240 Yes.

01:11:40.120 You know, the thing that we need to preserve, I'm more convinced.

01:11:42.020 That's why I'm a little worried about all the bashing of our institutions.

01:11:45.700 Reform?

01:11:46.560 Sure.

01:11:47.260 Do it better.

01:11:48.240 Do it differently.

01:11:49.040 Do it less.

01:11:49.640 Do it more.

01:11:50.100 Whatever it is.

01:11:51.000 Sure.

01:11:51.580 But the idea that there is no more justice in America.

01:11:55.300 I don't believe that.

01:11:56.960 All the elections are rigged.

01:11:59.200 I don't believe that.

01:12:01.380 You know, we can't function.

01:12:02.740 It's demonstrably false.

01:12:04.660 So making things better is fine if you have the ideas and the wherewithal to make it happen.

01:12:09.920 But what I'm sensing from this administration is it's all broken, tear it all down.

01:12:18.280 And that's easy to say, but I don't know that it's good.

01:12:23.480 Well, it's actually easy to do.

01:12:24.860 It's easy to tear things down, much easier than it is to build them.

01:12:28.460 And you want to be careful of revolutionary moments.

01:12:30.800 I mean, very few improve things.

01:12:33.460 Ours did, I think, in this country 250 years ago.

01:12:36.280 Very few others did.

01:12:37.140 I can't really think of any that did.

01:12:38.080 Well, we had an oppressive force.

01:12:39.420 You know, interestingly, and this is something I'm very anxious for you to explain to me.

01:12:44.480 So I get fired and I'm watching the Ukraine war.

01:12:47.540 And it was personally maddening to me because I had not covered a conflict since I got involved in the business.

01:12:54.720 So I'm watching.

01:12:55.900 The whole country's behind Ukraine. 0.98

01:12:57.160 When did you get fired?

01:12:58.560 Right there, like 20, 21.

01:13:00.200 When did I get fired?

01:13:00.820 Yeah.

01:13:01.240 So right when the Ukraine war broke out, I was fired.

01:13:04.240 And it was very, it was a real reinforcer to me about how much I had lost, right?

01:13:08.760 But anyway, I was much more concerned about what was happening in Ukraine.

01:13:11.580 So everyone's on board.

01:13:12.880 They're blue and yellow ribbons all over my neighborhood.

01:13:15.040 I was not on board at all.

01:13:16.380 Well, the country was.

01:13:17.600 The Republicans were and the Democrats were.

01:13:18.840 Yes.

01:13:19.060 And I kept hearing, boy, you know, it's like they're kind of like us, you know, they're fighting against this oppressor and trying to shut it off so they can be their own way and get away from the kleptocracy and everything else.

01:13:29.660 And then Trump has that bad phone call with Zelensky leads to an impeachment that I thought was a complete waste of time.

01:13:36.300 You were never going to remove them.

01:13:37.300 And it's a political operation, so I didn't know why they did it, but that's their choice.

01:13:41.760 They went their way.

01:13:44.040 Then Biden comes in.

01:13:46.340 Everybody's still doing what they were doing to try to help Ukraine.

01:13:49.680 Biden is slow walking it, not giving them what they needed.

01:13:53.500 The wrong kind of ambivalence.

01:13:55.060 Now Trump comes back and all of a sudden all the people who are in favor of Ukraine on the right now say that it's a kleptocracy and Zelensky is a bad guy and Putin, you know, not so bad. 0.74

01:14:07.020 Russia, not so bad. 0.95

01:14:09.440 Their concerns about NATO, pretty justified.

01:14:11.480 It's really NATO and America that has done the wrong thing here and forced Russia's hand.

01:14:17.440 And Ukraine and Zelensky kind of did, too, and they're really dirty and they're stealing all our money and selling all our stuff. 1.00

01:14:22.880 I don't believe any of it.

01:14:26.700 And I hear it all the time.

01:14:28.820 You are a big purveyor of this and I want to understand it.

01:14:32.340 How did everything change this way?

01:14:34.320 Well, it changed because politicians in general, with some exceptions, but not many, have no principles at all.

01:14:40.900 And they do what's popular, what they think is popular.

01:14:43.220 And they respond just to one stimulus, which is election.

01:14:47.240 That's it.

01:14:47.880 And if they think something will get them reelected, they'll say it.

01:14:50.340 And if they don't, they won't.

01:14:51.240 And so they're just, I mean, that's just what they are.

01:14:55.120 I don't think it's even worth being mad.

01:14:56.580 I mean, they're like animals whose behavior is really predictable or machines.

01:15:01.080 You know, you can program to do a certain thing and you know it's going to do that thing every time.

01:15:04.040 So the fact that, like, these guys are standing up and being like, oh, you know, Zelensky, who was my blood brother last week, is now a bad guy.

01:15:09.920 Like, of course they're saying that.

01:15:11.360 I've said the same thing, I think, since day one, which is this is not in our interest at all.

01:15:15.180 And we've really hurt ourselves and we've dislodged the dollar from its preeminence.

01:15:21.220 And that has consequences people are not thinking through.

01:15:24.480 And Russia, of course, has an interest in what happens in Ukraine.

01:15:28.420 And of course, they don't want American missiles on their border any more than we'd want Chinese missiles in Tijuana. 0.87

01:15:34.100 Like, that's of course, of course, that's a real thing.

01:15:37.260 And moreover, the thing that you want if you're thinking big and you should if you run America, the thing you fear most is the alignment of Russia with China, because then you unite the world's largest country, the largest nuclear arsenal with the world's largest economy and the world's largest population.

01:15:51.400 And that becomes a block that many others gravitate to.

01:15:54.940 We're calling it the BRICS now. 0.95

01:15:56.300 And that becomes, you know, something that you can't resist, that controls global trade routes, that controls global currency, and that reduces you, the United States, to the bitch position very fast. 0.93

01:16:07.360 Understand. 0.92

01:16:07.920 But even within that, the premise is Russia bad, China potentially bad. 0.67

01:16:13.740 What does bad even mean?

01:16:15.320 I mean, like.

01:16:16.140 Russia bad means they are consistently invested in what's bad for America. 0.94

01:16:21.420 Putin is a constant.

01:16:23.260 Well, they certainly are now.

01:16:24.420 I mean, they're aligned with China.

01:16:25.880 So, yeah, that was not true at the beginning of 2022.

01:16:30.080 And so.

01:16:30.780 But invading Ukraine was wrong, what they did. 0.94

01:16:35.320 And Ukraine did not start that war.

01:16:37.340 Well, the whole thing was wrong.

01:16:38.300 No, Russia invaded Ukraine.

01:16:40.560 Yes. 0.98

01:16:40.940 For one specific reason, despite all the lying from Ann Applebaum and the Atlantic Council and the professional liars and morons in Washington who got us into the Iraq war and Libya and Syria and every other. 0.99

01:16:50.920 Disaster. 0.98

01:16:51.300 I've never apologized or been penalized for it.

01:16:53.540 The truth is that Russia's concern was that Ukraine remain not part of NATO.

01:16:59.360 They want to control Ukraine to some extent. 0.63

01:17:02.300 It's their neighbor in the same way that we want to control, I don't know, Canada or Mexico. 0.88

01:17:06.220 You don't have to, you know, run the municipal elections in the country.

01:17:10.560 But you don't want like if you had a government in Canada that was like bent on destroying the United States, you would overthrow the premier of Canada because you can't have that.

01:17:18.500 It's your neighbor.

01:17:19.460 You're a great power.

01:17:21.100 And that's how Russia sees itself.

01:17:22.520 Now, you could say, well, that's against international law or whatever, but that's the way nations behave.

01:17:26.640 And great nations have an expectation.

01:17:28.240 They're not going to have an enemy on their border if they can help it.

01:17:30.400 But NATO isn't inherently an enemy.

01:17:33.660 It is to protect against the illegal and wrongful annexation of sovereigns.

01:17:41.320 Okay, Ukraine is not sovereign and Ukraine's government was installed in a coup by the CIA in 2014.

01:17:49.040 So it's not a sovereign nation.

01:17:50.520 Well, hold on.

01:17:51.660 It's a satellite of the United States.

01:17:52.320 Ukraine's regime.

01:17:53.000 We installed their government.

01:17:54.360 They're not sovereign.

01:17:55.500 What?

01:17:56.120 Ukraine is a sovereign, as you know.

01:17:57.720 In what way?

01:17:58.500 Russia had put a puppet in. 0.63

01:18:00.980 There was a democratic revolution there that Zelensky wound up winning that election, second round of voting.

01:18:08.180 And that was to remove the Russian puppet who went back with a lot of money into Russia.

01:18:15.460 No, you're, you're, yeah, whenever.

01:18:17.360 I mean, you're skipping over.

01:18:18.340 That's actually not at all what happened.

01:18:19.760 Zelensky did not become president in 2014, which was when Maidan happened.

01:18:22.820 No, but I'm saying that's, Maidan Square was a reaction to a Russian puppet regime in that country.

01:18:28.780 Well, we called it a Russian puppet regime.

01:18:31.220 Where did the guy go back to?

01:18:32.880 Well, he fled to Russia.

01:18:34.340 Yeah.

01:18:34.800 On the verge of getting killed.

01:18:35.920 But the bottom line is Russia wanted a friendly government in Ukraine.

01:18:41.620 Okay.

01:18:42.660 I get it.

01:18:43.640 The United States, which is nowhere near Russia or Ukraine, went across the Atlantic Ocean to install its president in Ukraine in a coup.

01:18:52.500 That's a fact.

01:18:53.220 And they were caught on tape doing it.

01:18:55.660 And Bob Kagan's wife was caught doing that. 0.99

01:19:00.000 You can listen to the tape.

01:19:01.060 And so, okay, I guess both are bad.

01:19:04.520 But if you're being an adult about it, you understand that great powers have an interest in not having other people's nuclear weapons on their borders.

01:19:11.860 That's just a fact.

01:19:12.580 And you could say, well, it shouldn't be a fact, but it is a fact.

01:19:15.440 But we don't have nuclear weapons on the border.

01:19:19.420 The only nuclear weapon.

01:19:20.840 Well, really?

01:19:22.760 So NATO doesn't have nukes.

01:19:24.480 Look.

01:19:24.760 In Ukraine?

01:19:25.400 No.

01:19:25.900 Okay.

01:19:26.620 Their concern was—

01:19:27.820 And Ukraine used to have a lot of nukes.

01:19:29.060 Okay.

01:19:29.200 And they agreed to get rid of them on the basis of protection from Russia. 0.93

01:19:32.040 Those were Soviet nukes.

01:19:33.960 Right.

01:19:34.160 And that was negotiated by the United States.

01:19:35.600 Right.

01:19:36.240 Okay.

01:19:38.540 All I'm saying is if you're thinking about it from the perspective of what's good for the United States,

01:19:43.160 you do not want Russia becoming in close military alliance and economic alliance with China.

01:19:49.560 You don't want that.

01:19:50.440 Agreed.

01:19:50.640 Because that becomes a block that you can't defeat.

01:19:52.600 Understood.

01:19:52.920 From which you will soon be taking orders.

01:19:54.940 And every administration has understood this.

01:19:56.780 The Biden administration went to the Munich Security Conference in February of 2022

01:20:02.760 and had the Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, say at a press conference,

01:20:06.480 Tuzlensk, we want you in NATO.

01:20:08.080 NATO didn't want Ukraine.

01:20:10.380 There never was a referendum in Ukraine what the Ukrainians wanted.

01:20:14.040 We want you to be an American satellite with American weapons in your country. 0.95

01:20:17.420 She said that knowing that was the red line.

01:20:19.680 Putin's like, look, I just don't want Ukraine in NATO.

01:20:22.380 That's it.

01:20:22.740 You've had all these countries around my borders in NATO.

01:20:25.580 I don't know why you're doing that.

01:20:26.840 I still don't know to this day why we're doing that.

01:20:28.380 That's an aggressive, offensive move.

01:20:30.100 But you cannot have Ukraine. 0.98

01:20:31.620 It's too big.

01:20:32.260 It's too important.

01:20:33.040 Our energy pipelines go through it.

01:20:34.420 No.

01:20:35.860 And they insisted on doing this.

01:20:37.680 And Putin gave a speech immediately after in Russia.

01:20:41.100 No Americans ever watched it.

01:20:42.340 You should.

01:20:42.740 But it's really interesting saying this NATO thing is too much.

01:20:45.700 We have to invade and we're doing it.

01:20:47.140 Those are the facts.

01:20:47.920 OK, so the question is, why would you do that?

01:20:51.700 Ukraine is not sovereign.

01:20:52.760 It never was.

01:20:53.580 You know that Ukraine cannot beat Russia in a conventional war.

01:20:56.780 Russia's got 100 million more people in much deeper.

01:20:58.760 But that doesn't mean you let them roll over.

01:21:01.040 And Ukraine is a sovereign.

01:21:02.200 It's its own country.

01:21:03.720 In what sense are they making independent decisions?

01:21:05.440 I'll give you an example.

01:21:06.000 In April of 2022, two months after this war started, it's very clear that Russia is going 0.93

01:21:10.720 to win.

01:21:11.320 It's just a much bigger country.

01:21:13.140 Period.

01:21:13.460 Period.

01:21:14.660 And so the Ukrainians and the Russians start having peace talks.

01:21:18.360 And they move them around a bunch of different places.

01:21:19.980 They wound up in Istanbul, Turkey.

01:21:21.540 And they have a bunch of different data points.

01:21:25.180 The first is no NATO.

01:21:26.280 The second is what do we do with Crimea, which since 2014 had been like Russian aligned.

01:21:31.920 They took it, by the way.

01:21:33.860 They took it.

01:21:34.640 They took it.

01:21:35.540 What do you do with that?

01:21:36.440 There's a Russian military naval base there, as you know.

01:21:39.260 And what do you do with Donetsk and Lugansk in the eastern part of Ukraine?

01:21:43.220 They basically reached terms in Istanbul.

01:21:46.380 Two months into the war, all of a sudden, the former prime minister of Great Britain,

01:21:51.500 Boris Johnson, shows up in Kiev and delivers a message from the Biden administration.

01:21:55.440 No, no peace.

01:21:56.740 You are not allowed to negotiate a peace.

01:21:58.420 This is he's telling a, quote, sovereign country this.

01:22:02.360 Some unemployed, you know, indebted Brit is showing up on behalf of the United States

01:22:07.960 to lecture the so-called president of Ukraine about what he can do with his own country.

01:22:12.180 It's not sovereign in any sense.

01:22:13.880 And they break off the peace talks.

01:22:16.820 This is all like, I'm not making this up.

01:22:18.660 Look it up. 0.97

01:22:19.920 And a million more Ukrainians die. 0.69

01:22:21.640 The country is totally destroyed forever.

01:22:23.420 And then Zelensky goes and changes the law in Ukraine to allow foreigners to buy farmland

01:22:29.820 in Ukraine, to buy the soil of Ukraine.

01:22:31.800 So you wind up with a country whose population has just been killed, that no longer owns its 0.98

01:22:35.700 land.

01:22:36.920 So big American companies, multinational companies, you want to just buy Ukraine.

01:22:41.460 That's the total destruction of a European nation.

01:22:43.960 And in the United States, we feel like, oh, no, we're fighting on behalf of Churchill.

01:22:47.800 No, we just destroyed Ukraine because we want to fight Russia. 0.96

01:22:51.720 And now that is the core, the desire of the American foreign policy established to have

01:22:56.240 a war with Russia.

01:22:56.880 That does not make any sense to me.

01:22:58.040 I'm not a Putin lover.

01:22:59.880 I don't speak Russian.

01:23:00.900 I've got nothing to do with Russia.

01:23:02.080 I just don't understand why it's in America's national interest to be at war with Russia.

01:23:05.300 It's not.

01:23:06.280 And these are people with very deep emotional hatred of Russia.

01:23:10.380 I can't even speculate as to where that comes from.

01:23:12.460 But it's real.

01:23:13.180 I've certainly seen it a lot.

01:23:14.740 And it's not consistent with our interests as a nation.

01:23:17.240 It's not helped the United States at all.

01:23:18.700 It's hurt us.

01:23:20.040 We spent over $100 billion when we're bankrupt.

01:23:23.480 And all we've achieved is destroying this nation that didn't really do...

01:23:26.620 The poor Ukrainians didn't do anything. 1.00

01:23:28.840 It's horrible what we've done.

01:23:31.020 Zelensky articulates a very different case, right?

01:23:33.900 What's his case?

01:23:34.840 His case is he wanted America and Europe to help them fight back Russia because Russia

01:23:38.880 wants to reestablish the USSR. 0.62

01:23:41.080 And he wants to keep Ukraine sovereign.

01:23:44.780 Of course, he has cultural and geographic issues in the eastern part of his country.

01:23:50.340 And that has been an ongoing problem for them.

01:23:52.740 I was in Ukraine when the Russian separatists shot down that Malaysian Airlines plane, lied

01:23:58.500 about it, wouldn't let the bodies be reclaimed.

01:24:00.860 It was a whole thing.

01:24:01.360 Putin installed a guy named Borosky, who was supposedly a prime minister of Donetsk. 0.99

01:24:06.020 It was all bullshit because that's what Putin is. 0.98

01:24:08.540 So they wanted help. 1.00

01:24:10.680 They want to stay sovereign.

01:24:13.500 America was helping them with that. 0.97

01:24:15.800 And now all of a sudden, Zelensky's a thief.

01:24:19.520 They're stealing all our money.

01:24:21.540 They're selling all our weapons to Mexican cartels.

01:24:24.260 None of these things are true.

01:24:25.620 Well, that is true.

01:24:26.620 Why?

01:24:26.940 No, it is not true.

01:24:28.300 It's not true.

01:24:28.780 Just, I'll just go in order.

01:24:32.340 Give me the point of it and then we can talk to particular.

01:24:34.020 Ukraine, just to define sovereignty.

01:24:35.460 Sovereignty is the freedom to make independent decisions.

01:24:39.680 And Ukraine does not have that and has never had that since 2014 when its government was

01:24:44.060 installed by an American coup.

01:24:46.360 Zelensky would say he was democratically elected.

01:24:49.240 Well, he's not democratically elected.

01:24:50.480 He's passed his term.

01:24:52.060 Well, but-

01:24:52.500 And so by what authority does-

01:24:53.660 Hold on, let me question.

01:24:54.920 Go ahead, go ahead.

01:24:55.160 By what authority does Zelensky negotiate on behalf of this country, rule his country?

01:25:00.140 He just put his main political opponent under indictment and froze his personal funds under

01:25:08.420 internal sanctions, the security services of Ukraine.

01:25:11.860 Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

01:25:14.140 I don't know.

01:25:14.940 We just went through the same thing in this country.

01:25:17.000 It sounds like dictatorship, by the way.

01:25:19.060 No, but he's not a dictator.

01:25:20.600 And that's-

01:25:21.160 Then by what authority does he rule Ukraine?

01:25:22.860 So, well, here's how.

01:25:23.660 He was elected and now under their constitution, he does have the ability to stall elections

01:25:29.620 and operate under martial law during the conflict.

01:25:32.740 So you're comfortable with people saying, I'm going to-

01:25:34.440 No, he could certainly have an election if he wanted.

01:25:36.100 If he wanted, but he is empowered-

01:25:37.820 But he doesn't want an election.

01:25:39.100 You're from a political family.

01:25:39.900 It's the same thing with Israel right now.

01:25:41.720 They're not having elections either because they're in the midst of an active conflict.

01:25:45.040 It's not a time for transition of power.

01:25:46.620 Okay, but I don't know why we make excuses for dictatorship.

01:25:50.700 It's not a dictatorship.

01:25:51.460 Of course it is.

01:25:52.140 Any unelected leader who has the power-

01:25:55.220 He was elected.

01:25:56.100 He was elected.

01:25:56.780 Actually, he has a presidential term.

01:25:58.740 Right.

01:25:59.260 If Joe Biden just said, you know what?

01:26:01.240 We're in a conflict right now.

01:26:02.620 I can't have elections.

01:26:03.520 I'm canceling the election.

01:26:04.480 Or if Donald Trump-

01:26:05.080 But there's a constitutional provision for this.

01:26:07.400 If, okay.

01:26:09.260 He could have an election whenever he wanted.

01:26:11.220 He could have election right now.

01:26:12.100 No one doubts that, actually.

01:26:13.980 And his opponent was calling for that before he was just shut down by the Ukrainian intel services a week ago.

01:26:19.820 So there's no authority.

01:26:22.760 He doesn't have democratic authority over his country.

01:26:24.800 What he has is a lot of NATO weapons.

01:26:26.480 And to your second point, he has absolutely, as a matter of fact, the Ukrainian military has sold those weapons on the black market around the world.

01:26:37.460 And they have-

01:26:37.980 These are facts.

01:26:39.080 They've run up in the hands of, among others, the Mexican drug cartels, the Taliban, Hamas.

01:26:45.480 Hamas in Gaza.

01:26:46.840 Fact.

01:26:48.180 And a lot of other groups.

01:26:50.000 And it's incredibly destabilizing, by the way.

01:26:52.360 The United States did this years ago in Afghanistan, as you know, and sent a bunch of Stinger missiles to the Mahajidine in 1979 and 80 to fight the Soviets. 0.91

01:26:59.840 And those missiles caused huge problems for all of Southwest Asia for, like, 20 years.

01:27:04.400 And so this is a big deal.

01:27:05.760 And I don't know why people feel like they have to lie about it.

01:27:08.880 Now-

01:27:09.360 I don't know that it's about lying about it.

01:27:11.340 I don't agree that those are facts.

01:27:13.340 I just don't believe that the Ukrainian military-

01:27:16.340 You know what?

01:27:17.520 Because I'll tell you why.

01:27:18.240 I'll bet you my car that in the next-

01:27:20.460 What kind of car is it?

01:27:21.460 Some crappy-

01:27:22.580 Oh, then I'm not going to bet that.

01:27:23.500 Okay.

01:27:24.660 No, I don't have nice cars.

01:27:25.800 I'll admit that.

01:27:26.900 I've never bought a new car that I know of.

01:27:28.320 I do, so we're not doing a swap.

01:27:29.200 Okay.

01:27:29.640 But anyway, the point is, no one believes me.

01:27:35.000 I know someone who bought some of the weapons.

01:27:37.400 I'm just, you know, whatever.

01:27:38.660 I can't-

01:27:39.040 Well, first of all, you would have to substantiate who it is that you knew.

01:27:42.840 Do you believe the most corrupt country in Europe, which is so corrupt that NATO didn't want it as a member, you believe it's outside the realm of possibility that facing defeat, the leaders of that military would not sell the weapons that they're getting from the West?

01:27:55.740 You cannot substantiate a claim on the basis of mere suspicion that because-

01:28:01.180 It's not mere suspicion!

01:28:02.180 Hold on a second.

01:28:02.480 I know someone who bought some of the weapons!

01:28:04.560 I believe that you think that.

01:28:06.080 What I'm saying is-

01:28:07.120 I don't think that.

01:28:07.300 I know it!

01:28:07.840 I'm saying that, well, you know that they say it.

01:28:10.440 You don't know whether they did.

01:28:11.440 And I'll tell you why I'm suspicious.

01:28:13.300 Because the missiles that Russia put out those pictures of were from like 2014, and they didn't even have javelins then.

01:28:25.580 So, the idea that Ukraine could have been selling weapons that were taken from a different time as an obvious ploy by Russia to make them look bad is, to me, propaganda.

01:28:38.040 And not proof that they did it.

01:28:39.940 Okay.

01:28:40.720 Are you texting while I'm having a conversation with you?

01:28:43.020 I'm texting right now.

01:28:44.080 Very rude.

01:28:45.000 No, no, I'm texting on WhatsApp right now on this exact subject.

01:28:50.340 Tucker, I'm not saying you're lying.

01:28:52.080 I'm saying I'm disagreeing that it's a fact that the military there is spending weapons that they very much need to Mexican cartels.

01:29:01.040 Why does Mexico's cartels need to get weapons from Ukraine when they get them across our border with straw buyers all the time? 1.00

01:29:08.040 I mean, to me, it doesn't even make sense from a practicality standpoint, but it seems like-

01:29:11.920 Straw buyers? You can get surface-tier missiles from straw buyers? 0.65

01:29:13.820 No, not surface-tier missiles.

01:29:15.020 No, no, no.

01:29:15.680 Small arms.

01:29:16.340 Small arms.

01:29:16.880 No, small arms.

01:29:17.660 Small arms, you know, small arms you can buy anywhere.

01:29:19.860 No, no, no.

01:29:20.320 I'm talking about weapons systems.

01:29:21.420 But this is not documented stuff, and it seems to want to smear Ukraine to make them the bad guy and make Russia the good guy.

01:29:27.380 It's not a matter of smearing Ukraine.

01:29:28.780 Okay.

01:29:29.400 This is one of those topics that I'm just going to-

01:29:32.720 I'm not mad at you.

01:29:33.940 No, no, no.

01:29:34.400 It's a conversation.

01:29:35.280 I'm mad because I know this is true.

01:29:38.480 I'm not saying you're wrong.

01:29:39.780 I'm saying I don't know it.

01:29:41.220 It's a fact, and unfortunately, I can't, and maybe I shouldn't have brought it up because I can't name the person who told me this.

01:29:46.780 I don't want you to expose a source.

01:29:48.460 I'm not going to.

01:29:49.100 But what I'm saying is, look, people do bad things with money that we give them.

01:29:54.300 I have a huge amount of knowledge on this one topic.

01:29:57.020 I'm wholly ignorant of many topics.

01:29:58.420 I know a lot about this topic.

01:29:59.300 And you think Zelensky's a bad guy who's a dictator?

01:30:01.360 What I'm telling you is the Ukrainian military has sold huge amounts of American-supplied, NATO-supplied weapon systems around the world.

01:30:10.360 And that they're purchasable now by governments and armed groups and are being purchased.

01:30:16.540 And why hasn't it been documented?

01:30:17.900 I'm just telling you that if this will be documented, and I got that directly once again from someone who purchased quite a few of those weapons who I know personally and in another country and knows a lot about this.

01:30:36.960 It runs a military and it's just frustrating because I can't say beyond that.

01:30:44.700 Look, my point is not to frustrate you, Tucker.

01:30:48.460 It's to understand this mentality of framing Ukraine and Zelensky as the bad guy.

01:30:53.660 It's not.

01:30:54.160 Look, it's noting the facts.

01:30:55.920 The guy's not elected.

01:30:57.180 He is elected.

01:30:58.700 His term has been expended constitutionally.

01:31:01.760 Would it be comfortable if we were, well, we are in a war with Russia right now, if Donald Trump, no, it is a war with Russia.

01:31:08.880 Americans have died. 1.00

01:31:09.720 It's a proxy war.

01:31:10.720 It's a war that we're funding. 0.52

01:31:12.400 We're not on the ground there.

01:31:13.700 What do you mean?

01:31:13.960 There are many Americans in Ukraine fighting.

01:31:15.840 U.S. military is not in the ground.

01:31:18.380 Yes, there are.

01:31:19.200 Look, I know that there are.

01:31:20.480 What are you talking about?

01:31:21.960 They're not actively fighting Russian forces.

01:31:24.420 What do you mean they're guiding weapons into Russia?

01:31:26.800 Yes.

01:31:27.180 What do you mean they're not actively fighting?

01:31:28.520 They're absolutely actively fighting.

01:31:29.700 Have we declared war?

01:31:31.320 Of course not.

01:31:31.920 We didn't declare war in Vietnam or Korea.

01:31:34.460 That doesn't mean anything.

01:31:35.760 Did in Iraq. 0.84

01:31:36.200 We haven't declared, I guess we did.

01:31:38.200 That went well.

01:31:39.060 There was a congressional vote.

01:31:40.820 Of course.

01:31:42.080 But the point is, if Trump were to say we're at war with Russia, I can't have an election, I would say that's not legitimate.

01:31:49.620 You do not have the authority to extend, and I don't care, you know, what pretext you make up for it.

01:31:55.340 You can't put your opponents in jail.

01:31:58.080 Well, you can't, but more than anything, what I'm saying is that this is scary.

01:32:02.100 It's not even blaming Zelensky.

01:32:03.700 There are many power centers within Ukraine.

01:32:05.740 There's the military, the intel services.

01:32:07.360 There's the president's office.

01:32:09.060 There are competing political groups.

01:32:11.960 People say the same things about us, by the way.

01:32:13.680 Of course.

01:32:14.000 It's true.

01:32:14.440 It's true.

01:32:15.220 Especially true here.

01:32:16.000 It's a huge country.

01:32:17.480 I'm not even blaming Zelensky directly.

01:32:19.640 I'm saying this is the largest country in Europe.

01:32:21.880 We have poured billions of dollars in pretty high-tech weapons systems into this country, and we're not keeping track of them.

01:32:29.420 We also have biolabs throughout the country.

01:32:32.140 We have biolabs.

01:32:33.340 And we're about to have more of a footprint because the mineral deal will put American companies on the ground in those areas that are right now war zones.

01:32:41.280 All I'm saying is we've funded the worst war Europe has seen since World War II for three years.

01:32:47.200 That entails an awful lot of weapons, including bioweapons.

01:32:50.260 I'm not guessing.

01:32:51.000 This is a fact.

01:32:52.300 Tory Newland said it in a conversation with the now Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, in the Senate on camera.

01:32:58.620 So there are biolabs in Ukraine with biological weapons in them. 1.00

01:33:02.220 Who the hell is keeping track of this stuff?

01:33:03.800 That's all I'm saying.

01:33:04.760 It's not an attack on Zelensky.

01:33:05.940 We have a moral obligation to keep track of this stuff.

01:33:08.340 There's never been an audit.

01:33:09.160 I have no problem with that. 0.99

01:33:10.020 It's fucking crazy. 0.98

01:33:11.400 I have no problem with keeping track of it. 0.99

01:33:12.900 Talk about destabilization of the world.

01:33:14.880 Like, why are we doing this?

01:33:16.480 So do you believe that we should just back out of what we're doing there now and let Russia take it? 0.91

01:33:22.020 Russia take it?

01:33:23.060 I don't know.

01:33:23.920 At this point, Russia has—we're not in charge. 0.71

01:33:27.480 Russia just won.

01:33:28.800 They beat us in their war.

01:33:30.600 In case you haven't noticed, Russia outproduced in munitions NATO, including the United States, four to one.

01:33:37.540 So we just lost the war.

01:33:39.020 So we are not negotiating from a position of strength.

01:33:42.060 Sorry.

01:33:42.720 I'm not taking Russia's side. 0.93

01:33:43.880 I'm on America's side.

01:33:44.680 This is terrible for us.

01:33:45.640 We've exposed how weak we are.

01:33:47.180 We couldn't beat Russia, which many members of the U.S. Senate assured me was, quote, a gas station with— 0.96

01:33:53.340 That was McCain's line. 1.00

01:33:55.380 What a fucking idiot that guy was. 1.00

01:33:57.060 What an idiot he was. 1.00

01:33:58.560 I knew him and I liked him, but he was like an idiot. 1.00

01:34:01.460 A gas station with nuclear weapons. 1.00

01:34:03.000 Really?

01:34:03.280 See, I saw it the other way, which is we thought Russia was going to roll over Ukraine, and they have been unable to really move the line.

01:34:12.440 They rolled over us.

01:34:13.440 They took a big chunk of eastern Ukraine, and for three years we've progressed toward bankruptcy trying to stop it, and we've not been able to. 1.00

01:34:21.440 They won.

01:34:22.560 This is bad.

01:34:23.460 It's bad for American prestige.

01:34:24.940 It's bad for the projection of American power.

01:34:26.720 Everyone knows what we're capable of and what we're not capable of.

01:34:29.540 It's divided our country. 0.99

01:34:30.800 All these dumb— 1.00

01:34:31.440 Ukraine—people are flying foreign flags in front of their houses. 1.00

01:34:33.780 See, I feel that the division is forced in this country.

01:34:38.420 That, to me, it seems pretty basic, that Russia can't have Ukraine because it doesn't stop— 0.65

01:34:44.220 We can't.

01:34:44.480 What are we going to do?

01:34:45.440 It doesn't stop at Ukraine.

01:34:46.140 We already—but, okay.

01:34:47.880 But at some point—

01:34:48.720 Then it's Estonia and Latvia and—

01:34:50.160 Estonia.

01:34:51.980 You know, it's always some chick, that blonde chick. 1.00

01:34:54.980 I'm president of Estonia.

01:34:57.060 You know, a country of five million people that have vented the sauna.

01:35:00.360 By the way, I'm part Finnish.

01:35:01.760 I'm not against Estonia.

01:35:03.140 I'm sure it's great.

01:35:04.040 But the idea that some woman who's never been in the armed service, like, setting military policy for the EU, you know, we're going to do this. 0.73

01:35:11.260 We're going to—you can't do anything.

01:35:12.420 You don't have an army.

01:35:13.700 Britain's army is smaller than the U.S. Marine Corps.

01:35:16.400 NATO, which is a coalition that includes, by the way, Turkey, it's like this huge coalition, couldn't beat Russia.

01:35:22.080 That is the fact.

01:35:23.300 I don't want that to be the fact.

01:35:24.500 That is the fact.

01:35:25.580 So Americans are like, well, we can't allow this.

01:35:28.060 Well, what are you going to do about it?

01:35:29.160 I don't say that it's a fact because we are not fighting in earnest in that country.

01:35:32.860 So what—okay, so what would you—I'm just—okay, here are the terms.

01:35:36.560 We have a nuclear-armed power, largest nuclear arsenal in the world, that is fighting for its very life that is aligned with China, okay, which is the largest economy in the world.

01:35:43.000 Well, I don't know that Russia is fighting for its life.

01:35:44.780 I think Putin forced this situation.

01:35:46.460 Okay, whatever.

01:35:47.340 Leaving aside moral culpability, I'm just saying it's a big deal for them.

01:35:50.480 It's on their border.

01:35:51.200 It's their border, okay?

01:35:53.200 So we don't like it.

01:35:55.940 We weighed in on the other side to fight Russia. 0.75

01:35:58.700 We haven't won.

01:36:00.320 So now what are our options?

01:36:02.400 Like, actually, what are our options?

01:36:05.620 The options are what President Trump is doing right now, which is to try to get the parties to the table and draw a line in the sand and make a deal, right?

01:36:13.980 That's the only option I see.

01:36:14.900 I don't see any other options.

01:36:15.820 But maybe—I'd love to hear what they are.

01:36:16.900 No.

01:36:17.340 I mean, there's never any other option.

01:36:19.540 Unless you want to actively fight and take territory and occupy—

01:36:24.420 Who's going to actively fight?

01:36:25.320 There are no Ukrainians left. 1.00

01:36:26.380 Well, look, both sides are manpower poor, right?

01:36:30.840 You know the stories about Russia emptying the prisons.

01:36:33.240 Russia has 100 million more people.

01:36:35.320 140 million people.

01:36:36.640 100 million more people.

01:36:37.820 But have you ever heard of us emptying out the prisons?

01:36:40.880 I mean, why does he have to do that?

01:36:42.060 He's in a desperate place.

01:36:42.940 Because he doesn't want his citizens to have to fight an unpopular war because he's worried about his popularity because he wants to stay in power.

01:36:49.840 So it's easier to send convicts to the front.

01:36:51.920 They have done this for centuries.

01:36:53.300 I'm against it, but I'm just saying that's the fact.

01:36:56.120 The point is—

01:36:56.940 You think Putin is concerned about his popularity in a place where he kills all of his opponents on a regular basis?

01:37:02.120 He's very concerned about his popularity.

01:37:03.320 Really?

01:37:03.840 When he completely engineers the outcome of everything that happens?

01:37:07.300 Russia is a very complicated place with a lot of different competing power centers, including the FSB, which—

01:37:12.180 And how has he stayed in power so long?

01:37:13.980 Because he's really good at politics, and he pays very close attention to what the public thinks.

01:37:19.160 Very close.

01:37:19.820 He's got the military—just like any country.

01:37:22.140 It's a—first of all, the—

01:37:24.000 You know how lousy life is there for people, right?

01:37:26.820 Well—

01:37:27.260 And not just because of the economic sanctions right now.

01:37:29.400 It just has been.

01:37:30.080 I mean, you know, do you talk—

01:37:30.800 Have you been there recently?

01:37:31.840 Recently, no.

01:37:32.540 I've been there twice.

01:37:32.960 We're not allowed in.

01:37:33.560 I've been there twice in the last year.

01:37:35.160 Why are you allowed in?

01:37:37.460 I don't know.

01:37:38.140 I'm an American.

01:37:38.440 Friend of Putin, that's what.

01:37:39.200 I'm a—

01:37:39.640 Whatever.

01:37:40.300 Friend of Putin.

01:37:40.940 Because I believe in seeing things and reaching my own conclusion.

01:37:43.480 Oh, me too.

01:37:43.940 I'm just—I'm not allowed in there as a journalist.

01:37:45.780 I'm sure you could call right now, and they will let you in, and you should go.

01:37:48.460 You just wouldn't let me out.

01:37:49.660 Wind up like Paul Whalen, and you wouldn't be arguing my case.

01:37:53.420 But look, here's the point.

01:37:54.760 No, no.

01:37:55.100 Russia—Putin does not have absolute control of his country, and there are all kinds of potential rivals.

01:38:01.420 He's been there for 20 years.

01:38:02.380 You sound more sympathetic towards him than towards Zelensky.

01:38:04.820 I mean, I'm definitely more sympathetic to Putin than Zelensky for the following reason.

01:38:10.380 I judge—I'm not—and I'm not sympathetic to Putin in the sense that I don't want to move to Russia.

01:38:14.700 I don't see Russia as, like, a close friend of mine at all, or a free country, or anything like that.

01:38:20.400 I'm just saying I think it's fair to judge leaders on how they do for their country.

01:38:26.180 They have one job.

01:38:26.920 Do a good job for your country.

01:38:27.820 Make it better.

01:38:29.420 And—

01:38:29.820 You think Russia's doing well?

01:38:31.700 A lot better than Ukraine. 0.94

01:38:33.620 I mean, a lot of Ukrainians have fled Ukraine to Russia.

01:38:36.400 A lot.

01:38:37.060 A lot.

01:38:37.560 Well, yeah, they're under siege right now.

01:38:39.300 No, but I'm just saying, like, Russia actually, for a country at war, is thriving.

01:38:46.560 You know, I think it's got deeper problems.

01:38:47.760 War's not good for any economy over time or any country over time.

01:38:50.560 But there's been such a massive infusion of Chinese investment into Russia in the past couple of years that people in, say, Moscow, city of 12 million, you know, they don't feel a privation that populations under war typically—

01:39:03.520 But there's a reason he made that deal with North Korea to have their people backing them up on the battle lines. 0.62

01:39:07.520 I'm sure.

01:39:08.240 I'm sure that's exactly right.

01:39:09.400 I mean, there are a lot of theories on that.

01:39:10.880 I've heard a lot of things.

01:39:11.400 But here's the only point that I'm making from an American perspective.

01:39:15.480 Americans fall into this trap, which is a childish trap, where they superimpose, like, a really clear moral dichotomy onto foreign conflicts where there's, like, a great guy and an evil guy.

01:39:26.200 Yes.

01:39:26.460 And they're able to do that because they don't know anything, because they've never been anywhere, and they don't actually—they're leaders I'm talking about—don't kind of take the time to understand that they don't understand.

01:39:35.960 The more you know, the more you realize you really don't know, because do you speak Russian?

01:39:39.660 I don't think so.

01:39:40.220 So, like, how the hell do you know what's going on?

01:39:41.660 You don't know.

01:39:42.580 The best you can do is, like, be open-minded and let evidence guide your conclusions.

01:39:46.700 So, from an American perspective, what we've learned is the U.S. capacity for projecting strength through the military is a lot less than we thought it was.

01:39:58.300 We couldn't beat Russia. 0.96

01:39:59.280 We didn't beat Russia.

01:40:00.000 They won.

01:40:00.740 Do you really think that America was putting the full force of its might into that situation?

01:40:06.100 Short of nuclear conflict, yes.

01:40:07.660 Zelensky has done nothing but complain about us not giving them what they needed.

01:40:12.200 We gave them, like, high Mars.

01:40:13.940 Everything we're giving them—

01:40:14.960 I mean, you know, because you've been studying the situation, I've been there twice during the conflict, and it's like World War I-level warfare there.

01:40:23.700 No, it's not.

01:40:23.900 So, it's not like we're using our most—now they're using drones from, like, retail.

01:40:27.060 It's the most high-tech warfare ever conducted.

01:40:31.200 In fact, it's so high-tech, it's moving so fast that I don't think most people even understand what's going on there.

01:40:38.720 But it's a war by drone.

01:40:39.280 They were digging trenches.

01:40:40.620 Yeah, now there's been an infusion of drone technology that they're using.

01:40:44.020 But my point is, like, what Americans can't—you just need to, like, change your mind a little bit on this.

01:40:49.020 We don't have the power to do everything that we want around the world.

01:40:53.820 Agreed.

01:40:53.980 We certainly can't do it simultaneously.

01:40:55.480 Agreed.

01:40:55.800 And my concern about entering into hot wars with anybody is that you expose your weakness.

01:41:02.660 If you enter into a hot war with someone, you have to win.

01:41:05.220 Otherwise, everyone knows how weak you are.

01:41:07.660 And then—

01:41:08.180 But you don't think that's true for Russia, that they don't look really weak because they couldn't roll over Ukraine?

01:41:13.740 They said it would be done in three days. 0.87

01:41:15.300 But the truth is, it's a silly conversation.

01:41:19.800 Russia's nuclear weapons, it is hypersonic weapons. 0.52

01:41:22.740 Russia could eliminate Ukraine in about 10 seconds. 0.67

01:41:25.340 Well, it's bombing residential areas.

01:41:27.580 It's going after infrastructure where they know civilians are, so it's not like they're holding out.

01:41:32.580 I mean, let's, like, let's just be honest.

01:41:35.240 And I hope they never will, and I hate war, and I hate that Ukrainians are dying. 0.99

01:41:39.100 By the way, let's say, of course they could, their nuclear capabilities.

01:41:42.400 Are you joking?

01:41:42.860 They have hypersonic weapons.

01:41:43.960 But they're not.

01:41:44.920 So why?

01:41:45.000 They could take out the entire city like that because—

01:41:46.580 But they're not.

01:41:47.200 Because that's World War III.

01:41:48.460 That's why.

01:41:49.000 Right.

01:41:49.340 And they want to get out without a nuclear exchange.

01:41:51.560 Right.

01:41:52.380 And what I worry—it's not a defense of Russia.

01:41:54.920 By the way, anybody who's trying to avoid a nuclear exchange, I'm on your side.

01:41:59.020 Yes.

01:41:59.460 And that would include almost no Republican members of the Senate, okay?

01:42:03.320 They're all, like, full-blown.

01:42:04.820 They're old.

01:42:05.580 They don't care.

01:42:06.860 Like I said, they don't care about their grandkids or humanity itself.

01:42:09.100 Or whatever.

01:42:09.640 They're totally willing to risk nuclear war.

01:42:11.600 Although Lindsey Graham just took a step backwards, which I thought was surprising. 0.98

01:42:15.140 It's completely silly.

01:42:15.940 He's blaming—look, a lot's going to come out. 0.65

01:42:19.160 We reached an impasse on the question of whether Ukraine is selling weapons.

01:42:22.980 They are.

01:42:23.800 That's a fact.

01:42:24.720 And I'd bet my house on it, okay?

01:42:26.120 I know that to be true.

01:42:27.340 But I can't tell you how I know that.

01:42:29.200 So I'm going to have to just wait to be vindicated, I guess.

01:42:31.080 But it's not a debate.

01:42:31.900 I'm just saying that it seems that the line has shifted and now Ukraine is the bad guy. 1.00

01:42:36.080 Okay, we haven't heard anything about Ukraine for the past three years.

01:42:41.420 You were required—and I got fired over this, so I know.

01:42:44.320 You were required to pretend that Zelensky, who I think is a complicated person for whom I feel sorry, actually.

01:42:49.740 I feel like he's a pawn among bigger powers, okay?

01:42:52.540 I feel bad for Zelensky.

01:42:54.120 But we were required to pretend that he was Jesus and that Vladimir Putin was Satan.

01:42:59.780 And my only point is that's not true, actually.

01:43:01.940 It's way more complicated than that.

01:43:03.620 Both of them have good and bad qualities.

01:43:06.100 And moreover, it's not our fight.

01:43:08.900 Like, what are we doing there?

01:43:09.840 This whole thing is so nuts just because you're mad at Russia for some reason that you'll never say out loud.

01:43:16.100 We have to take our country to war there?

01:43:18.340 And by the way, can I just say something?

01:43:20.060 Sure.

01:43:20.500 Why—I mean, this war has, like most wars that we fight, been promoted by some of the richest people in our country.

01:43:29.040 And I'll name one, Ken Griffin, who is a hedge fund billionaire, has really pushed hard, and I've seen it, behind the scenes to force Republican politicians to support bigger payments to the Zelensky government.

01:43:42.180 And it's like, Ken Griffin's a multi-billionaire.

01:43:45.140 He's probably, I don't know, millions of dollars on lobbying on this issue, but he hasn't spent billions on Ukraine.

01:43:50.120 He could send billions of his own money to Ukraine.

01:43:52.380 A lot of the Ukraine war supporters could do it.

01:43:54.140 They could also go fight the war.

01:43:55.120 They're conscripting 50-year-old men, guys with Down syndrome.

01:44:00.380 The videos are all over the internet, and they're real.

01:44:02.620 I hear from people in Ukraine on the sub—

01:44:04.560 Those videos I've seen.

01:44:05.840 Yeah.

01:44:06.380 So I haven't noticed any—Bill Crystal's not fighting in Ukraine.

01:44:10.200 Why is that?

01:44:11.060 Why is Ken Griffin not sending billions to Ukraine?

01:44:13.340 No, what they're doing is pressuring the U.S. media, pressuring the U.S. Congress to do something that they themselves are not willing to do.

01:44:21.080 Up to and including sending American troops, which we have in Ukraine, risking their lives.

01:44:26.140 Why isn't Ken Griffin doing that?

01:44:27.840 I just want to say, I think it's one of the most immoral things I've ever seen.

01:44:30.840 I think that you're headed in the right direction now, because I believe that that—

01:44:35.480 You support the war, go pay for it, go fight it. 0.58

01:44:37.220 That complaint that the wealthy and powerful are feeding off the rest of us, I think is the one untapped reservoir of populist sentiment in this country.

01:44:50.360 We have a system right now—

01:44:51.500 I don't think we're allowed to say that.

01:44:52.780 Well, we have a system where the corporations, right, get to do whatever they want with the money that they make.

01:44:58.840 And they get to work the system to pay as little as possible into the rest of us.

01:45:02.920 They still pay more.

01:45:04.300 And obviously, the taxes are paid more by the wealthy than by those who aren't wealthy, but we find ways around it.

01:45:10.320 And the government then subsidizes those same corporations, even though they don't take care of their own workers.

01:45:18.320 And I think that how the powerful are able to leverage our government is the main fight that we need to have.

01:45:24.660 So you'll have like—let's say Walmart is a great and egregious example.

01:45:27.920 They have more of their people on SNAP as a percentage, their workers, than any other corporation.

01:45:34.020 Yet, they're making a lot of money, and then what do we say?

01:45:36.680 Well, they're allowed to give it to their shareholders.

01:45:38.220 That's capitalism.

01:45:39.240 Oh, but we—Tucker Carlson and Chris Cuomo—

01:45:41.760 We subsidize them.

01:45:42.500 —have to subsidize more workers.

01:45:44.480 I think that that's the main fight.

01:45:46.300 Now, obviously, it's not Ukraine.

01:45:47.480 But what I'm saying is rich people imposing their will on the U.S. government to do what they want for them is a real thing.

01:45:53.760 I couldn't agree more.

01:45:54.900 However, I think—and I agree with what you said about Walmart completely.

01:45:59.320 Why should I subsidize your workers? 0.85

01:46:00.860 And not just Walmart.

01:46:01.800 It's all of them.

01:46:02.360 I agree.

01:46:03.080 Well, it's capitalism.

01:46:03.760 But I don't actually think—it's capitalism.

01:46:04.720 I don't think that that's the greatest threat to our democracy or our freedoms or our country.

01:46:11.200 I think the—because, look, Walmart, huge—world's biggest retailer, or was, powerful company, obviously.

01:46:19.660 It's got a board of directors.

01:46:21.360 It's got shareholders.

01:46:23.000 It's a publicly traded company.

01:46:24.780 You can buy Walmart.

01:46:27.180 There's some accountability inherent in that structure.

01:46:29.700 If you have someone like Ken—not to beat up on poor Ken Griffin, who, you know, I don't think Ken Griffin's evil. 0.91

01:46:34.880 It's just silly.

01:46:36.040 But I'll just name him again.

01:46:38.760 Ken Griffin is like this independent multibillionaire who's got massive—and there are a lot of these guys—with massive political influence because of the money that he has.

01:46:48.700 And there's no accountability at all.

01:46:50.420 We can do—there's no board of directors of Ken Griffin.

01:46:52.880 He just is a billionaire.

01:46:54.260 He is his own power center.

01:46:56.680 And he's what we would call, if he were Russian, an oligarch.

01:46:59.760 We put sanctions on him.

01:47:00.900 Yeah, that's the new word in the American vernacular, and I'm okay with it. 0.99

01:47:04.140 I think it applies—

01:47:04.860 No, but that's the real threat because, like, a guy like that—

01:47:07.280 I agree.

01:47:07.820 —can own his own media outlets.

01:47:10.140 I agree.

01:47:10.560 Can own his own politicians.

01:47:12.120 He can—I mean, it's—

01:47:12.880 I don't know why you're not talking about Musk in the same way.

01:47:16.020 All the tech bros, which I think is a really benign and casual label for these guys, he's doing everything that we're supposed to be worried about happening in this society right now.

01:47:28.920 And again, I'm not anti-Elon Musk.

01:47:31.940 I'm not.

01:47:32.460 I think he's a genius, and I just—I think that there are things that are happening right now.

01:47:38.320 I can answer your question, and I don't think it's an unfair question at all.

01:47:40.840 Because I do think the world that produced Elon is a world you need to think about a little bit.

01:47:48.800 I think there are some—definitely some threats.

01:47:51.380 Elon specifically will always have my love because he did the most important thing, which is restore free speech in the United States through X.

01:48:01.140 And he took—because, you know, free speech doesn't mean anything if you can't actually speak to an audience.

01:48:05.900 Like, I can, you know, lecture the mirror in my living room, but it doesn't mean anything.

01:48:09.820 I have to be able to talk to other people in order to convince them.

01:48:12.500 And there was no place to do that at scale.

01:48:15.280 All the social media apps were controlled, completely controlled.

01:48:18.820 And he has given a real measure of free speech back to the United States, to its citizens, which is really the difference between slavery and freedom is being able to say what you think.

01:48:30.320 I mean, there's kind of, like, a free man can say what he believes is true, and a slave can't.

01:48:34.240 It's that simple.

01:48:34.980 So if you want to remain free and not enslaved, then you have to have free speech.

01:48:39.420 And no one else seemed to agree with that except this, like, South African guy.

01:48:43.000 The South African, like, rock—

01:48:44.820 It is—maybe it's ironic.

01:48:46.280 I don't know.

01:48:46.680 I mean, I'm highly opposed to immigration, but I have to say, including my best friend, a lot of the best people I know are immigrants, and they appreciate America for what actually makes it great, which is its core freedoms.

01:48:58.660 What do you mean you're against immigration?

01:49:00.440 We have too much immigration, and we've made the country totally unstable. 1.00

01:49:02.680 No, there's a difference between too much and none.

01:49:05.120 Well, I'm not against immigration.

01:49:06.260 You just said that.

01:49:06.980 In theory, we need to shut down all immigration right now until we can retain or regain equilibrium and, like, figure out what it is that holds us all together as a nation. 0.98

01:49:16.980 It's too chaotic.

01:49:17.760 It's too crazy right now.

01:49:18.880 No more people, period.

01:49:20.000 None.

01:49:20.740 Cap it right now.

01:49:21.620 And then just cooling off, period.

01:49:23.700 30 or 40 years.

01:49:24.820 Cooling off from what?

01:49:25.620 This is all stuff that Trump has stoked as the biggest problem we have.

01:49:30.960 It is the biggest problem we have, and I'll tell you exactly why.

01:49:33.100 Because it creates chaos and disunity.

01:49:36.480 If you have a continental-sized country like we do, the main question you have always, every day, you're thinking about all the time.

01:49:43.080 How do we hold together?

01:49:44.500 How do 50 states not become 50 countries?

01:49:47.180 I mean, that will naturally happen, right?

01:49:49.220 Because each governor sees himself as Caesar.

01:49:51.720 So how do you keep them cohesive?

01:49:54.300 And the only way to do that is, short of force, you could just, like, get nukes and tell everyone to obey.

01:49:59.700 But short of that, short of becoming a totalitarian country, it's by consent.

01:50:04.400 It's because everybody thinks we're in this together.

01:50:06.420 We're all Americans.

01:50:07.580 We have this in common.

01:50:09.260 And it used to be race and religion.

01:50:11.400 It no longer is.

01:50:12.900 Okay.

01:50:13.560 So what is it?

01:50:15.720 Crickets.

01:50:16.580 What is it?

01:50:17.300 What is it that we all have in common?

01:50:20.000 And no one is even trying to answer that question.

01:50:22.600 And until you can answer that question, you are going to move toward disunity.

01:50:26.240 The drug cartels will take over, you know, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and they'll be their own thing.

01:50:30.600 And, you know, New England will be its own thing.

01:50:32.240 And, you know, God knows what will happen, but it'll break apart.

01:50:35.260 Because that's just the nature of people, of human society.

01:50:37.680 So we need a period where we can think through what it is to be an American, what unites us, what's our civic religion.

01:50:45.260 It can't just be everyone's gay.

01:50:47.380 That's not enough.

01:50:48.780 Pride flag is not enough to hold a country together.

01:50:51.140 What is it?

01:50:52.020 And immigration makes it impossible because it's too much churn. 1.00

01:50:54.640 And things change too fast.

01:50:56.040 Who are these people?

01:50:56.820 It's how we've populated the country.

01:50:59.140 Not at this scale.

01:50:59.900 We've never had immigration like this as a portion of population. 1.00

01:51:02.840 We've never had it.

01:51:03.780 This is, and by the way, it's happening at exactly the time when technology is certain to, like, overturn our economy and employment structure.

01:51:11.100 Like, AI is going to change everything.

01:51:12.400 It's too much change at once.

01:51:14.080 People's brains can't handle this much change.

01:51:16.100 And whoever opened the spigot and flooded our country with 15 or 25 million illegals in the past four years should be in prison for the rest of his life. 0.98

01:51:27.120 That's the worst thing that's ever been done to this country.

01:51:29.160 And I don't know if we can recover from it.

01:51:30.980 And I think it'll become obvious as soon as there's an economic downturn that, like, the fundamentals have not been tended to at all.

01:51:41.080 I'm really worried about it.

01:51:42.680 Look, I understand that you're worried about it, and I understand why you would be, right?

01:51:46.360 But I just wanted to say—

01:51:47.100 It's being preached to you for years.

01:51:49.200 No, it's not preached to me.

01:51:49.840 I notice it.

01:51:50.500 I notice it.

01:51:50.980 Well, but I'm saying, look, this is—

01:51:52.480 How many Americans want their kids to serve in the military now?

01:51:55.140 Very few.

01:51:55.860 Right.

01:51:56.520 So that's a huge change.

01:51:57.060 That's been true for a long time, by the way.

01:51:58.240 Not a long time.

01:51:58.840 Longer than the last four years.

01:52:00.460 Oh, for sure.

01:52:01.140 Oh, it precedes Biden, for sure.

01:52:03.120 But not the last 20.

01:52:04.420 Not the last 20.

01:52:05.100 I don't think you can look at immigration as an unprecedented bad in America.

01:52:10.700 It is America.

01:52:11.900 Otherwise, you don't have one.

01:52:13.040 Not at this scale.

01:52:13.880 Not at this scale.

01:52:14.560 It's too many people, and there's no effort.

01:52:15.580 But even if you wanted to look at the people, even if you want to say there are 15 million people who aren't supposed to be here, they all came in illegally. 0.87

01:52:22.080 Okay.

01:52:23.260 One, you see how easier it is to say that than to do something about it, right?

01:52:27.380 Because he was going to come in and round them all up, and now—

01:52:29.880 It's an unsolvable problem.

01:52:31.000 Well, the question is, is it a problem, or is it a challenge, and it is a mixed bag?

01:52:36.920 You have 7 million open jobs in the country that are necessary.

01:52:40.020 What does that tell you?

01:52:41.000 You don't have enough people to fill them.

01:52:42.580 Okay.

01:52:43.720 So that means that the 15 million people haven't taken everybody's jobs and—

01:52:48.220 Why are they in government benefits?

01:52:49.220 Saturated the market.

01:52:51.280 Why are we giving government benefits to people here illegally? 1.00

01:52:54.100 It's a legitimate political question.

01:52:56.240 No, no, no.

01:52:56.600 It's not a political question.

01:52:57.560 It's a social question.

01:52:58.920 It's like a core question.

01:52:59.760 It's like, if you want them to fill these jobs, why are you subsidizing them not to work?

01:53:03.380 Well, it's not that they're subsidizing them not to work.

01:53:05.800 Why are you subsidizing them at all?

01:53:07.600 Because that was a political—that's what I'm saying.

01:53:09.200 It's a political decision.

01:53:10.100 They decided to do that.

01:53:11.160 You could decide not to do that.

01:53:12.520 Now, they don't get social security benefits.

01:53:14.760 Very often, you'll hear—

01:53:15.820 Well, they're young people.

01:53:16.520 They don't care.

01:53:16.580 But you have a third of—and again, these are all rough estimates, because to your point

01:53:20.640 about tracking, we don't do this well here either.

01:53:22.420 You have a third, let's say, maybe close to a half of illegal entrants working in this

01:53:29.040 country whose employers pay into social security for them.

01:53:32.440 No, I know all these numbers.

01:53:33.360 They do not get any of the benefits of that.

01:53:35.600 Right.

01:53:35.620 So we should be grateful to the Haitians.

01:53:36.780 No, no, no.

01:53:37.100 To the Haitians. 0.85

01:53:37.680 I know.

01:53:37.900 Not grateful.

01:53:38.680 Right.

01:53:38.880 But you've got to see it as a mixed bag.

01:53:40.960 It's not they are a little demon scene running around.

01:53:43.360 I see it as the greatest failure this country's ever presided over, which is the failure to

01:53:48.040 encourage its own citizens to buy into the country sufficient to have kids.

01:53:51.620 You have to have an economy that allows young people who aren't rich, whose parents aren't

01:53:55.380 rich, to get married and have kids.

01:53:57.560 And we haven't done that.

01:53:58.540 And the middle class is now the minority of the country.

01:54:00.720 It's super hard for people to get married and have kids.

01:54:02.960 And so rather than fix that problem, because it would, I don't know, make Larry Fink less

01:54:07.840 rich, you have to import people because, oh, we need workers. 0.97

01:54:11.240 Well, what about, I mean, we both grew up in a world where people had kids and they don't

01:54:14.660 now.

01:54:15.440 And whose fault is that?

01:54:16.380 It's our leader's fault.

01:54:17.180 That's like a core fault.

01:54:18.560 That's like a true sin.

01:54:19.820 Well, it's always been both, right?

01:54:21.000 I'm second generation in this country.

01:54:22.820 So you've always been doing both.

01:54:24.100 You've been having babies and you've been bringing in people because that's the American,

01:54:27.140 that's the American opportunity.

01:54:28.920 No, but what you haven't had is the birth rate just like ending for native born Americans

01:54:32.540 ending.

01:54:34.080 And then, and then you have the thing I referred to earlier, which is the chaos of, of change.

01:54:40.100 Change produces chaos.

01:54:41.240 Now, hopefully there's, again, an equilibrium that is achieved over time, but.

01:54:45.220 You don't think Trump made a boogeyman of illegal entrants in this country by saying

01:54:49.560 they're the bad hombres, they're all bringing the murderers. 0.66

01:54:53.000 And you know that the crime rate among that population isn't the same as the native population. 0.98

01:54:56.960 A single crime by illegal aliens is unacceptable. 0.82

01:54:58.960 Illegal immigration is unacceptable. 1.00

01:55:00.460 The one is too many.

01:55:01.920 It's a very convenient standard, though.

01:55:03.360 It's not.

01:55:03.920 We don't use that anywhere else.

01:55:05.400 You're not from here.

01:55:05.660 You're not American. 1.00

01:55:06.420 What are you doing here?

01:55:07.140 You broke laws of my country to get here.

01:55:09.060 Yes. 1.00

01:55:09.280 And you expect me to like it and me to kiss your ass and me to give you housing vouchers 1.00

01:55:13.240 and food stamps and free education for your kids. 1.00

01:55:15.460 What?

01:55:16.100 I didn't sign up for that.

01:55:17.140 I was born here.

01:55:18.200 I'm not.

01:55:18.560 I actually like immigrants.

01:55:19.500 I was just trying to say.

01:55:20.840 Elon Musk, my best friend and business partner, like a million immigrants I love.

01:55:25.240 But inviting people in illegally, immediately putting them on welfare, when they have no

01:55:31.320 relevant skills to a tech economy, which they don't.

01:55:34.380 A lot of them can't read.

01:55:35.520 We don't know the real names.

01:55:37.660 How is that good for America?

01:55:38.980 In no sense is it.

01:55:39.760 It's the destruction of America.

01:55:41.160 And everyone knows that.

01:55:42.280 And everyone's so paralyzed by race guilt, they can't say it.

01:55:45.680 But it's not about race.

01:55:46.780 It's about a basic question that any country has to ask itself, which is, what do I have

01:55:52.020 in common with my neighbors?

01:55:53.140 Why are we all in this together?

01:55:54.460 I got nothing in common with my neighbors now.

01:55:56.440 We don't speak the same language.

01:55:57.800 So how is this a country?

01:55:59.120 Like, these are not questions that racists ask.

01:56:02.720 These are questions that any normal, logical person would ask.

01:56:05.820 Like, what is this?

01:56:07.260 That's why no one wants to fight for the country.

01:56:09.520 Because they're attacking people who are born here. 0.96

01:56:12.020 Our wars are fought by white men from the South and the Midwest. 0.68

01:56:16.240 I mean, actually fought.

01:56:17.800 And that's provable.

01:56:19.500 That's just a fact.

01:56:20.220 You have a lot of minorities in the military also.

01:56:22.980 You could argue it's one of their last avenues to equality.

01:56:26.620 But every war that this country has fought so far has been disproportionately fought by those 0.99

01:56:31.460 two groups.

01:56:32.040 And those are exactly the groups that our leadership class hates.

01:56:34.860 Hates.

01:56:35.180 And it's constantly, diversity is designed to hurt those, to hurt those people. 0.92

01:56:39.260 But most of the leadership class are those people.

01:56:41.820 You're absolutely right about that.

01:56:43.500 You're absolutely right about that. 0.98

01:56:45.140 The war on whites is being waged by whites. 0.94

01:56:47.320 It's 100% true.

01:56:48.520 What is that about?

01:56:49.180 I'm not Sigmund Freud.

01:56:50.120 I don't know.

01:56:50.920 I'm just telling you that if, you know, our entire media establishment and not just our,

01:56:56.720 like, the vibe, the law, diversity is designed to discriminate against those people.

01:57:02.200 So why do they fight your wars?

01:57:04.100 That's just true.

01:57:05.180 And then normal people, I put myself in this class, are like, I don't even know what it

01:57:09.940 is that we're fighting for.

01:57:12.020 More trans people or whatever.

01:57:14.080 Like, what is this project about?

01:57:15.900 These are all answerable questions, by the way.

01:57:17.940 All is not lost.

01:57:19.320 I'm just saying you need to just pause and think through the basics.

01:57:23.740 I think the country is the best country in the world, totally salvageable.

01:57:28.340 We can turn this around.

01:57:29.960 I'm not talking about the economy.

01:57:31.400 I mean, the social fabric, which is much more important than the economy.

01:57:34.520 But we need to do it now and take it seriously and not just, like, listen to AEI and measure

01:57:40.540 everything in GDP. 1.00

01:57:41.620 Those people are stupid. 1.00

01:57:42.940 So you don't understand what it is to be American anymore. 1.00

01:57:45.820 Will you tell me?

01:57:47.400 I think that...

01:57:48.020 We've got 350 million people here.

01:57:49.360 What unites them?

01:57:50.740 The opportunity.

01:57:52.320 What opportunity?

01:57:52.920 Economic opportunity?

01:57:53.460 Opportunity to live a life of your own making.

01:57:56.400 To succeed or fail on your own merits.

01:57:59.080 Okay, so the meritocracy.

01:58:00.460 To be judged by what you do, not what you look like.

01:58:03.140 That's right.

01:58:03.640 Okay.

01:58:04.300 So every institution in American life, almost without any exception at all, has abandoned

01:58:09.220 that standard and now has something called DEI or diversity hiring.

01:58:13.420 Not anymore.

01:58:14.220 You just had an administration strip it all out.

01:58:15.940 They all do.

01:58:17.080 Still in place.

01:58:17.900 I mean, they're fighting it.

01:58:19.500 But where were you when every institution decided to hire on the basis of sex and race,

01:58:25.620 which is the opposite of the standard you're describing?

01:58:29.000 Why did they do that?

01:58:31.940 That's a really interesting question.

01:58:33.720 I mean, from my perspective, it's an attempt to destroy the West.

01:58:39.440 And because that...

01:58:40.180 I mean, what is the West?

01:58:40.760 You said it yourself.

01:58:41.660 What is America?

01:58:42.420 You said it's a place where you can rise or fall on your own merits.

01:58:45.780 And that's the one thing that's been destroyed.

01:58:48.820 So I actually agree with you.

01:58:50.020 But we don't have that anymore.

01:58:51.340 It was destroyed.

01:58:52.220 Was it destroyed when women were given the vote? 0.99

01:58:55.960 Or when minorities were given the vote?

01:58:57.900 Of course not.

01:58:58.560 Okay.

01:58:58.920 Because there had been a system that was limiting.

01:59:01.680 But women were given the vote in 1919 and minorities were given... 0.99

01:59:06.640 Well, minorities had the vote in a lot of places.

01:59:08.600 Some they didn't.

01:59:09.380 But the Civil Rights Act was 1965.

01:59:11.440 So it's been 60 years.

01:59:13.180 So the point is, look, I get that...

01:59:15.280 I get what the frustration with DEI was.

01:59:17.880 I understand...

01:59:18.640 No, no, no.

01:59:18.860 It's not the frustration.

01:59:19.780 It's that it gets to the fundamental question of what is it...

01:59:22.420 I asked you, what's an American?

01:59:23.640 You said, you don't want us to be an American.

01:59:24.840 I said, I really don't.

01:59:25.620 I want to.

01:59:26.520 And I think we need to figure that out.

01:59:27.960 And you said, I know what it is.

01:59:29.400 It's anyone who comes here can rise or fall on his own merits.

01:59:32.620 And I said, where were you when that was destroyed?

01:59:35.700 It's totally destroyed.

01:59:36.780 And we need to rebuild it. 0.98

01:59:37.860 It's not about white men being mad, white rage. 0.94

01:59:42.140 Thank you, Mark Milley. 0.69

01:59:43.500 It's about the principle that undergirds the whole country.

01:59:47.980 It's what it is to be American.

01:59:49.320 And they took it away.

01:59:50.560 And no one said anything about it.

01:59:51.760 And anyone who did was called a racist.

01:59:53.280 No, it's not.

01:59:53.700 Listen, I get the cancel culture concerns.

01:59:56.760 It's not cancel culture.

01:59:57.780 It's like fundamental, dude.

01:59:59.100 What...

01:59:59.600 Since we don't have...

02:00:00.540 No, I'm saying being called racist for saying what you just said

02:00:03.620 is a function of cancel culture.

02:00:05.060 It's unfair.

02:00:05.620 Who cares about that?

02:00:06.260 But what I'm saying is this.

02:00:07.140 You didn't have minorities being given the opportunities 1.00

02:00:12.200 because they were minorities.

02:00:13.880 That was something that America wanted to correct

02:00:16.140 because it is the opposite of equality.

02:00:19.660 Okay.

02:00:20.160 And it was the same with women. 0.96

02:00:22.000 And that's what you should be trying to do.

02:00:25.420 No.

02:00:25.940 Not to the exclusion of anyone else.

02:00:27.540 Not to the exclusion of merit.

02:00:29.040 But you don't want people held back because of what they are.

02:00:32.080 It's really simple.

02:00:32.200 Either people, as you said, I'm just quoting you, my oracle.

02:00:36.320 Thank you.

02:00:37.220 That what it is to be an American is to participate in a system that judges you in the basis of what you do.

02:00:42.320 Yes.

02:00:42.560 And who you are, where you came from, what your parents did, or what they look like.

02:00:45.060 Land of opportunity.

02:00:45.960 Land of opportunity.

02:00:47.020 And I pressed, what does that mean?

02:00:48.020 And you said what I just said.

02:00:49.260 And so every institution in American life to this day, the meaningful ones, the universities, the large corporations, the federal government, to this day has abandoned that and moved aggressively in the other direction.

02:01:04.600 There are federal set-asides, the ladders of success, the merit badges that we require to enter these institutions, mostly in education, totally determined by race and sex.

02:01:16.260 And that's the opposite of what you said.

02:01:19.160 So then, and that's been going on for 60 years.

02:01:21.500 So, okay.

02:01:23.740 So clearly it's not the land of opportunity.

02:01:25.160 What is it?

02:01:26.140 No, I believe it is.

02:01:26.800 It's a giant piñata party where the most aggressive person gets the biggest pile. 0.98

02:01:30.880 So Larry Fink is the richest guy because he elbowed people in the face the hardest.

02:01:34.120 I mean, that's kind of what it is, actually.

02:01:35.500 There is a little bit of who and how the system gets worked, but I would disagree that it has been destroyed.

02:01:43.420 I would disagree that, because you still have whites in dominant positions everywhere that you can measure. 0.92

02:01:49.980 It's not about whites. 0.71

02:01:51.040 It's about people.

02:01:52.260 It's about human beings.

02:01:53.260 Are you going to judge the person on the content of his character or the color of his skin?

02:01:56.160 But you weren't judging them on the content of their character.

02:01:58.500 And when you see, if you look at corporate studies of what diversity does to them, it increases productivity, increases market reach.

02:02:07.500 You're talking about the McKinsey study from 2018, which has been, it's a joke.

02:02:10.820 It's a joke.

02:02:11.440 It's been utterly debunked.

02:02:12.600 And they were selling their diversity consultants.

02:02:14.880 I'm not referring to that study, but I remember what you're talking about.

02:02:18.060 There's no study that shows hiring people on the basis of skin color makes a company more effective.

02:02:20.860 Not on the basis of skin color.

02:02:22.160 It's that you remove the restriction.

02:02:24.940 There are no restrictions.

02:02:25.720 That you won't hire them as often because of their skin color.

02:02:29.360 Why not just color?

02:02:29.740 Then, okay, I have a simple solution for this.

02:02:31.500 It's called standardized testing.

02:02:33.200 And it was created in order to solve the problem that you described, which is bias.

02:02:38.280 And so standardized testing was a good faith effort by the WASPs, by the way, who ran the big American universities, to be fair.

02:02:47.680 They're trying to be fair.

02:02:48.420 It's like, okay, let's just pick people on the basis of their intelligence, their aptitude.

02:02:51.920 It's an aptitude test.

02:02:53.040 Right.

02:02:53.140 And that kind of worked, actually.

02:02:56.420 It elevated not just WASPs, but, you know, Jews and Catholics and black people and everybody was judged on the basis.

02:03:04.360 And it was imperfect, of course, but basically it worked.

02:03:07.080 And it's why America dominated the world because it had the smartest people in positions of power.

02:03:11.140 And then at the apogee, the top, we abandoned it.

02:03:15.560 And we're like, oh, this isn't working.

02:03:16.980 What do you mean it's not working?

02:03:17.820 It's totally working.

02:03:18.780 It's working because then we get the cream of all the other countries. 0.93

02:03:21.480 The smartest people around the world move here, including some of my friends.

02:03:24.700 The best.

02:03:26.240 And then we abandoned it.

02:03:27.500 And we're like, well, that's unfair.

02:03:28.620 How is it unfair?

02:03:29.180 It's the definition of fairness.

02:03:30.380 You're judging someone without even knowing what he looks like or his sex on the basis of his performance.

02:03:35.740 How is that unfair?

02:03:37.260 They never explained.

02:03:38.120 They just took it away.

02:03:39.220 And now it's gone.

02:03:40.080 And now in federal contracting, if you're a woman-owned business, why do I have an interest in a woman-owned business? 1.00

02:03:45.480 I don't care who owns the business.

02:03:46.300 I just want a good business.

02:03:47.100 You're ignoring the impact of the Trump administration, which has been—

02:03:50.420 Well, it's been six weeks.

02:03:51.700 I know, but I'm saying you strip it out.

02:03:53.720 You'll see what happens.

02:03:54.820 I don't think diversity is our problem.

02:03:57.280 And standardized testing, I don't have a problem with it.

02:03:58.940 I never said diversity was our problem.

02:04:00.320 I'm not saying you did.

02:04:01.160 I'm stating it as a proposition.

02:04:02.440 What I'm saying is that the testing assumes equal starting points.

02:04:08.940 If you and I are both going to take a standardized test right now in an area that I am prepared for and you're not, then we're not going to do the same.

02:04:17.320 Well, go ahead and prepare for it then.

02:04:18.720 I mean, I don't know what to say.

02:04:19.660 What's a better way to do it?

02:04:20.680 The point—I'm not saying there's a better way.

02:04:22.900 I'm saying that I don't have a problem with standardized testing.

02:04:25.560 I don't have a problem with SATs and people having to use them to get into educational institutions.

02:04:31.480 I don't have any problem with it.

02:04:32.580 I'm saying that you also have to be open to the reality that the kids aren't going to do the same on the test when one has had a good education and one has not had a good education.

02:04:41.560 But it's not—you know, there's a lot of science behind that.

02:04:43.200 And the truth is darker and harder to deal with, okay, which is that intelligence is the product of environment to some extent, but it's mostly genetic.

02:04:52.120 And intelligence is a lot of factors in success, but intelligence is the single most important over time in big populations.

02:04:59.000 Smarter populations do better.

02:05:00.480 They make more money, they go to jail less often, they stay married.

02:05:04.200 Singapore is a more successful society than the United States for this reason, okay?

02:05:09.040 So that's the truth.

02:05:10.500 If you have a meritocratic society, the smartest people will have most of the money and most of the success.

02:05:17.140 And that doesn't seem fair to people is the truth, actually.

02:05:21.980 And as we got better at sorting the smart people and sending them to Harvard and McKinsey and, you know, on to private equity, it became more obvious.

02:05:31.240 No, it's true, though.

02:05:32.080 It became obvious that the meritocracy was producing an incredibly lopsided society.

02:05:36.840 And that freaked people out and it felt unfair to them.

02:05:39.900 And two people in the early 1990s wrote a book on it, Dick Hernstein and Murray, and it was called The Bell Curve.

02:05:48.580 And it had a chapter on race in it, which was, you know, made a lot of people mad.

02:05:52.740 And they could have taken that chapter out and it would have been, I think, the transformative book ever because it described what I just said, which is the meritocracy produces an outcome that you may not be ready for, actually, because it's rooted in nature and you can't change it.

02:06:09.260 And Head Start, which was designed to increase the IQ of poor kids, didn't work.

02:06:12.900 And no one even wants to talk about it anymore.

02:06:15.020 It's really hard to change people's intelligence.

02:06:17.380 And intelligence turns out to be the main predictor of economic success.

02:06:20.840 So these are super complicated questions, but I know that a system that rewards people on the basis of race and punishes others on the basis of race creates hatred and division.

02:06:32.000 I don't think the point is, I don't think you have to do it that way is what I'm saying.

02:06:35.820 And I understand.

02:06:36.700 I can't get into college.

02:06:38.080 If two people apply to college and they're different colors and the one with the lower SAT score is admitted because of his race, that's penalizing the one who was not admitted.

02:06:47.520 I understand, which is why it's no longer the law of the country.

02:06:49.340 It's true in every college in the United States, as you know, especially the selective ones, including the one you went to.

02:06:53.480 But they changed the law.

02:06:54.940 They lie.

02:06:55.920 And the Harvard case showed that.

02:06:57.660 You can say they did this with the UC system in California, which was once a great system when I grew up in that state.

02:07:02.840 And it's now a joke because of this.

02:07:05.960 But they basically found out that they were just like, we have too many Asians, can't have too many Asians. 0.85

02:07:10.400 That's exactly right.

02:07:11.300 What was interesting to me about the case is that it wasn't white people.

02:07:13.780 It was Asian people who were saying that they were being discriminated against.

02:07:17.240 So basically, the way they shut down the conversation is by making everyone feel guilty about slavery, which no living person anything to do with at all and no living person I've ever met supports.

02:07:24.900 I couldn't be more opposed to it.

02:07:26.640 That's why I'm for free speech, because I'm against slavery.

02:07:28.340 But it's also it's not a coincidence that people of color, specifically African-American, are at a different socioeconomic level, given how they were introduced to the country.

02:07:40.040 Right.

02:07:40.280 Because race is completely fabricated.

02:07:43.180 There is no such thing as race.

02:07:44.500 We made it up.

02:07:45.320 I don't even know what you're talking about. 0.99

02:07:46.440 You cut open a black guy and a white guy. 0.95

02:07:49.300 Their genetics are the same. 0.99

02:07:50.780 That's OK.

02:07:51.700 We made race.

02:07:52.300 I don't know what you're saying.

02:07:53.820 We made race.

02:07:54.160 We made it.

02:07:54.760 We made it a thing.

02:07:55.480 Just because you look different doesn't mean you're a different species.

02:07:58.320 So we created it.

02:07:59.500 Hold on.

02:07:59.780 No one's saying anyone's a different species.

02:08:01.260 I'm not saying that you are.

02:08:02.800 I'm saying that.

02:08:03.300 I think we may be getting into science a little too deep.

02:08:05.440 No, I'm saying the science is very simple.

02:08:07.520 She created race. 1.00

02:08:08.920 And wait, wait, hold on.

02:08:10.180 Wait, I don't know what you're talking about.

02:08:11.120 So you're saying that there's no there are no differences between the races.

02:08:14.880 So, for example, the genetic predisposition to certain diseases is fake.

02:08:19.720 There are cultural.

02:08:21.580 There are ethnic.

02:08:22.280 How is that cultural?

02:08:22.920 There are ethnic pockets.

02:08:24.320 Right.

02:08:24.580 So Italians have certain things that are more common because of that group of animals breeding with each other than you'll have with Irish people or with Polish people. 0.99

02:08:34.100 Sure, sure.

02:08:34.740 And then as they all make the change.

02:08:36.200 So you acknowledge genetics is real.

02:08:37.940 Of course genetics is real.

02:08:38.940 Okay, so how is it?

02:08:39.520 Genetics is everything.

02:08:40.240 What I'm saying is that race. 0.98

02:08:42.280 Whoa! 0.71

02:08:43.300 What I'm saying is that race. 0.98

02:08:43.860 So genetics is everything, but race is fake.

02:08:46.480 Race is a social construct.

02:08:48.220 Okay.

02:08:49.380 Well, race is a social construct in some ways.

02:08:52.220 Yeah.

02:08:52.560 But there's no doubt that there are significant.

02:08:56.440 I don't.

02:08:56.920 Look, Irish and Italians are different cultures, right?

02:08:59.780 But they're the same people.

02:09:01.760 They're just different cultures.

02:09:03.340 Speak different ways.

02:09:04.500 Eat different things.

02:09:05.120 They look the same people.

02:09:05.840 They don't look the same, and they're not genetically the same.

02:09:08.120 That's not true.

02:09:08.800 They are genetically the same.

02:09:10.140 Well, that's untrue.

02:09:11.200 It's factually untrue.

02:09:13.260 And you can see it in all kinds of ways.

02:09:15.300 What's the percentage of redheads in Sicily? 1.00

02:09:17.480 Pretty high?

02:09:18.520 I doubt it.

02:09:19.440 Okay.

02:09:19.620 So what you're saying doesn't make any sense at all.

02:09:21.780 But that doesn't mean it's genetic.

02:09:24.580 It's just where people decide to be.

02:09:25.840 No.

02:09:26.240 Hair color is determined by genetics.

02:09:27.660 It's not a cultural construct.

02:09:28.480 I know, but I'm saying that having-

02:09:29.880 And neither is height or eye color or IQ.

02:09:31.780 I'm sorry.

02:09:32.080 Having more redheads in Italy is not just about genetics. 1.00

02:09:35.800 It's about where people populate, right?

02:09:38.960 Like, you could take a huge, like, look at Sicily, right?

02:09:42.640 Look at the history of Sicily.

02:09:43.700 When North Africa winds up being there, right? 0.99

02:09:47.200 And in power, you wind up having that mixed into the chemistry of everybody who's Sicilian.

02:09:52.960 Because genetics are real.

02:09:54.420 That's exactly right.

02:09:55.140 The race as a thing we created.

02:09:58.320 Okay.

02:09:58.760 I'm not exactly sure I understand the distinctions that you're drawing.

02:10:02.700 I'm just saying that different people, different groups of people, and different individuals have different genetic makeups.

02:10:10.080 They're not wildly different.

02:10:11.080 We're all members of the same species.

02:10:12.360 We are all created by God as a Christian.

02:10:14.160 I believe that.

02:10:15.440 But we didn't have these problems when people were Christian because the underlying assumption was that God created everyone.

02:10:21.180 Everyone has a soul.

02:10:21.880 It's only when this became a secular society that hates God that you could treat people like animals and objects.

02:10:28.520 Well, slavery was during a time where it was a pretty heavy Christian influence.

02:10:31.400 Slavery is nothing compared to AI and transhumanism.

02:10:34.200 Nothing.

02:10:34.860 How so?

02:10:36.180 Well, because slavery, you know, evil though it is, it still exists, by the way, around the world.

02:10:41.280 But it's evil.

02:10:43.200 And Christians got rid of it. 1.00

02:10:44.760 No other group did.

02:10:45.760 Christians got rid of that. 1.00

02:10:46.820 Because they thought it was evil because they thought God created each person.

02:10:48.900 But even under most, certainly in the United States, even under slavery here, evil as it was, slaves were still considered human.

02:10:58.780 They didn't possess the same rights.

02:11:00.960 But AI and transhumanism, transhumanism specifically, seeks to redefine what a human being is.

02:11:08.180 When you merge people with machines, then you don't acknowledge the existence of a soul.

02:11:12.560 If you believe that each person has a distinct soul, that God cares about each person, like a speck of sand on the beach, each person is accounted for and watched over by God and cared for by God and has a destiny.

02:11:23.420 How could you merge that person with a computer?

02:11:28.840 Because once you do that, then you don't have to acknowledge the soul.

02:11:31.760 Then you can treat that person like the object that you've made him into.

02:11:35.580 And, of course, we don't even discuss this.

02:11:37.780 But whatever.

02:11:38.200 The point is, look, my only point is, this is a super complicated topic, as I think we're proving.

02:11:44.000 And there are always unintended consequences of any system that you set up.

02:11:49.000 But I know, from just watching the world and watching the United States, that the second you make race a key for appearance, whatever you want to call it, genetics, a key component in awarding or punishing, then you make everybody hate each other and you wind up like Rwanda. 0.92

02:12:08.760 You don't want to create differences.

02:12:10.040 You want to create similarities.

02:12:11.060 Well, there are differences, but you want to find commonalities.

02:12:13.320 Yes, and I think that, look, that's what the land of opportunity is all about.

02:12:16.940 But you treat people as individuals. 0.99

02:12:18.740 Why do I give a shit if someone's a woman or black? 1.00

02:12:21.100 I care about that person, him or her. 0.99

02:12:24.100 Are you a good person?

02:12:25.120 Do you do a good job?

02:12:26.060 I care about you.

02:12:27.060 Yes.

02:12:27.340 I don't care about all your ancestors.

02:12:28.520 People look like you.

02:12:29.860 This whole phrase, this term that we use, community, is totally fake. 0.80

02:12:34.100 There's no black community or white community or gay community.

02:12:37.340 They're only people.

02:12:38.920 No woman ever gave birth to a community. 1.00

02:12:40.860 That's not a thing.

02:12:41.580 God doesn't care, but he cares about people, individuals.

02:12:43.520 It's a social construct.

02:12:44.980 No, but it's a way for politicians to dehumanize people, actually. 1.00

02:12:48.960 I hate it.

02:12:49.560 Or fragment people.

02:12:50.820 But to treat them as less than human.

02:12:52.560 You're not Chris Cuomo.

02:12:53.720 You're part of the Italian community.

02:12:55.500 You're part of the buff 50-year-old community.

02:12:57.960 You're part of the former talk show host community or whatever.

02:12:59.840 Like, that makes you less than who you are.

02:13:02.900 No, your name is Chris Cuomo.

02:13:04.020 You have a soul.

02:13:05.680 God knew you before you were born.

02:13:07.320 You have a destiny after you die.

02:13:09.060 Like, to call someone a community? 1.00

02:13:10.700 Fuck you, actually. 1.00

02:13:11.500 I get all the metaphysical aspects of it. 1.00

02:13:13.780 What I'm saying-

02:13:14.060 It's the core of it.

02:13:14.980 But what I'm saying is, when you discover that women aren't given the opportunities because 0.95

02:13:21.320 they're women, or blacks aren't given opportunities because they're black, in America, that's 1.00

02:13:26.100 something that we see as corrective, that you want to address that. 0.91

02:13:29.600 Well, the correction has made the problem worse.

02:13:31.160 We saw leeches as corrective, too.

02:13:33.260 We saw radium theory as corrective, too.

02:13:35.820 Like, just because you claim it's medicine doesn't mean it's not poison.

02:13:39.140 And this has been poison.

02:13:40.620 And this has poisoned our country.

02:13:41.960 It's made everyone way more race-conscious.

02:13:43.400 We're roughly the same age.

02:13:45.160 People were not half as race-conscious when we were kids as they are now.

02:13:48.200 They weren't half as angry about race as they are now.

02:13:51.260 And that's a byproduct of the system that was supposed to make things better.

02:13:54.040 It made it much worse.

02:13:54.740 And our politics.

02:13:56.020 I mean, look, the Trump administration, which I think is a very interesting aspect about our

02:14:01.040 conversation.

02:14:02.100 Think about it.

02:14:03.360 You and I have sat together, I don't know how long, if it goes past like that.

02:14:07.000 But we haven't even talked about anything in the news, really.

02:14:11.100 I mean, we're talking to Ukraine.

02:14:12.060 I had deeper questions for you, Chris Cuomo.

02:14:13.740 And I love it.

02:14:14.440 But I'm saying that's the beauty.

02:14:15.860 That's the beauty, right?

02:14:17.060 That's the beauty of the forum, of the freedom, of what we're able to do here, which you would

02:14:21.980 never be able to do just by time, let alone by subject inclination.

02:14:26.500 We are very divided.

02:14:28.080 And we are divided in ways that I haven't experienced before.

02:14:33.820 I agree.

02:14:34.080 And I think that a big part of it is that it works.

02:14:38.680 It's working for people who want power and to keep power.

02:14:42.660 Division sells these days.

02:14:45.520 It is, and maybe it always has, and that's why we know what a demagogue is, but there's

02:14:49.340 no positive opposite term that the Greeks gave us.

02:14:52.020 It's easy to play on people's outrage.

02:14:54.160 But when I see the Trump administration, he came in fomenting division.

02:15:01.160 And I thought it was a very tricky sell for him because if what I hear about him is true,

02:15:06.420 which is he wanted to win again because of legacy mode and be remembered is great.

02:15:10.920 You can't be great as a divider.

02:15:12.800 There's no American figure in our history who was great because they were a divider. 0.97

02:15:18.280 Every American leader has been a divider.

02:15:20.300 Every leader is a divider by definition.

02:15:22.800 Us versus them. 1.00

02:15:23.900 The enemy versus the homeland.

02:15:26.460 You know, the first presidents of the United States drove the loyalists to Nova Scotia.

02:15:29.760 Some of them were my relatives, so I know that.

02:15:31.300 Um, so you will divide.

02:15:33.520 The question is on what basis?

02:15:35.720 And the thing that I worry most about in a country this diverse is racial division because 1.00

02:15:40.460 it doesn't go away and those wounds just remain forever.

02:15:43.580 Or certainly for generations, we've seen that with slavery, which I do think has left scars.

02:15:47.980 I would not deny that.

02:15:48.980 It's clearly real.

02:15:50.220 So anybody who foments racial division is committing a graver sin than average.

02:15:55.280 And to see Trump get the support of a multiracial coalition, which he did, is the most hopeful

02:16:02.200 thing ever.

02:16:02.940 And so if in the end it becomes Trump against the people who've wrecked our country in the

02:16:09.660 permanent bureaucracies, I'm, you know, I think that's a pretty good outcome.

02:16:13.680 When you see what he's doing right now, you don't see him as, as trying to break things

02:16:20.120 in order to fix them?

02:16:21.280 There's no question.

02:16:22.320 There's no question.

02:16:23.240 And I think you make a fair point.

02:16:24.700 And in general, I am on the side of builders over destroyers because I think it's much

02:16:30.520 easier that, you know, I hate vandalism and, uh, just on a gut level, I hate it.

02:16:35.460 I believe in building and improving, but I do think in this case, and I think it's tough

02:16:40.860 and I think it's a tough balance.

02:16:42.640 You know, you can get into a frenzy of destruction.

02:16:44.400 We just break things because they're there.

02:16:47.300 I can't think of anything that the administration is telling us is good and works in our society.

02:16:52.460 Well, let me put it this way.

02:16:53.640 I've watched vandalism in the last, really since Memorial Day 2020, when the George Floyd

02:17:00.900 riots began.

02:17:02.720 I've watched vandalism on a scale I never thought I would ever see in this country, not just

02:17:06.260 physical vandalism, but vandalism of our cherished institutions, whether it's the Episcopal

02:17:10.840 church that I grew up in, the St. George's school, the high school I went to, which I

02:17:13.820 love, totally destroyed by this.

02:17:15.220 Um...

02:17:16.220 You got any juice with that school, by the way?

02:17:18.100 They won't let me on campus.

02:17:19.520 They won't?

02:17:20.000 No.

02:17:20.180 Shoot, my daughter just applied.

02:17:21.460 Oh, it's a beautiful school.

02:17:22.780 I met my wife there and there's a lot about it.

02:17:24.660 I sent my children there.

02:17:25.040 Does she have any juice there?

02:17:26.980 I don't know.

02:17:27.300 She's married to me.

02:17:28.200 I'm not going to...

02:17:28.740 I won't use this.

02:17:29.900 I won't use this, but I'm definitely asking you about it after.

02:17:32.420 It's a funny story.

02:17:33.160 This is like my favorite.

02:17:34.520 So they...

02:17:35.460 Some...

02:17:35.940 A guy who I really like, who was a member in our class there, called my wife, maybe my

02:17:41.120 wife is hilarious, about five or six years ago, and it's like, you know, we're raising

02:17:43.880 money for this new tennis center, and she was captain of the tennis team.

02:17:46.840 I played tennis, mostly smoked cigarettes, but hacked around on the court.

02:17:50.380 And in the 80s, and like, we're trying to raise this money for tennis, and she's like,

02:17:54.040 how much are you trying to raise?

02:17:55.840 It's like, it's $11 million or something like that.

02:17:59.100 My wife's like, you know, I feel for you.

02:18:01.960 I've been in this position, raising money for a school.

02:18:03.780 You have to call these people.

02:18:05.140 I love the school.

02:18:06.340 I met my husband.

02:18:07.020 They were married there.

02:18:08.160 My dad was a headmaster.

02:18:09.200 You know, we love the school.

02:18:11.180 I'll just pay the whole thing.

02:18:12.760 I'll just...

02:18:13.060 You don't have to call anybody else.

02:18:13.780 We'll cover the whole amount.

02:18:16.460 He's like, really?

02:18:17.280 And she goes, I just have one request, that you name it the Tucker Carlson Tennis Center.

02:18:21.920 The guy's like, uh...

02:18:24.220 Uh...

02:18:27.020 Let me check it out.

02:18:28.160 And I was like, oh, you're not going to do that?

02:18:31.740 And he's like, um...

02:18:33.620 Um...

02:18:34.140 He's such a nice guy.

02:18:34.940 Super uncomfortable.

02:18:35.960 He knew that if he went back to the school and said,

02:18:39.700 we paid for the whole tennis center with one donation.

02:18:43.340 Yeah, no, they turned it down.

02:18:44.380 Not that we were going to give $11 million for a tennis...

02:18:46.400 I don't even have $11 million, but if I did,

02:18:48.300 I wouldn't give it to a tennis center and a boarding school.

02:18:50.520 But, um...

02:18:51.980 Isn't that funny?

02:18:52.740 So that's how they feel about me.

02:18:53.580 And you are able to laugh at it because?

02:18:58.860 Because I'm happy.

02:18:59.660 I've had a really happy life, and we have a really close family.

02:19:02.220 And you also don't respect the basis of their rejection.

02:19:05.040 Of course not.

02:19:05.840 And I know what my sins...

02:19:06.980 That's the key.

02:19:07.440 I know what my sins are, and I've committed a lot of them, and I...

02:19:10.840 Who hasn't?

02:19:11.380 I'm ashamed of myself in a lot of ways, but...

02:19:13.380 Who isn't?

02:19:14.100 I'm not ashamed of anything I've done there, you know, at all.

02:19:17.440 But I'm saying, like, who isn't?

02:19:19.040 So I think it's important.

02:19:20.380 I think you should be.

02:19:21.420 I think you should definitely be ashamed of what you've done wrong, and I am.

02:19:24.260 But I also think that you should know what you did wrong

02:19:26.560 and be ashamed for the things that are wrong

02:19:28.740 and not ashamed for the things that aren't wrong.

02:19:30.640 You shouldn't just be ashamed because of how people see you

02:19:32.660 or how they decide to judge you.

02:19:33.840 Exactly.

02:19:34.380 I agree.

02:19:34.780 And I also, look, I also agree that we're seeing things

02:19:37.880 that we haven't seen in ways.

02:19:41.500 Some of it is because we have reach, right?

02:19:43.660 Because we have so much more media now

02:19:45.980 and ability for things to be seen technologically.

02:19:48.900 But we also do have a growing level of acceptance

02:19:54.460 of destructive and negative ideas.

02:19:59.160 Look, what bothered me and my big boogeyman is,

02:20:04.480 God forbid there was another 9-11.

02:20:07.340 Would we come together?

02:20:09.300 I want to say yes.

02:20:10.460 I don't know.

02:20:11.520 Certainly, I know how President Trump would handle it,

02:20:13.620 and it would not be the way President Bush did it.

02:20:14.980 You've imported a lot of foreign conflicts into this country. 0.87

02:20:17.500 I just want to say that.

02:20:18.400 Meaning?

02:20:19.480 Meaning that one of the byproducts of immigration 1.00

02:20:21.220 is people bring their ancient resentments with them,

02:20:23.560 and that should not be allowed.

02:20:26.140 Period.

02:20:27.040 Like, you want to come to our country for the opportunity,

02:20:29.380 for the freedom, great.

02:20:31.000 But you cannot, once you arrive,

02:20:33.320 use the things that you're mad about in your home country

02:20:35.500 to influence my foreign policy.

02:20:37.420 My family's been here a long time.

02:20:38.460 That's not allowed.

02:20:39.080 It's not your country, actually.

02:20:40.300 We're welcoming you,

02:20:41.920 but you can't bring your ancient hatreds with you.

02:20:45.340 And a lot of different groups have.

02:20:47.580 And it affects our foreign policy.

02:20:49.820 I really resent it.

02:20:50.860 It's my money,

02:20:51.900 my children's lives,

02:20:52.860 on the line,

02:20:54.720 and my country.

02:20:55.920 So, you know,

02:20:56.480 a normal country doesn't allow that.

02:20:57.980 They had a protest of Bangladeshi workers

02:21:00.440 in the UAE earlier this year,

02:21:02.360 and they weren't mad at the government of UAE.

02:21:04.740 They were mad at some issue back in Bangladesh,

02:21:06.460 and they marched down the street,

02:21:08.100 and the government of UAE deported them that night.

02:21:10.800 Not because they're mad at them,

02:21:11.640 but, like,

02:21:11.960 we don't import foreign conflicts in our country

02:21:13.880 because it's not,

02:21:14.680 these aren't our problems.

02:21:15.600 And yet,

02:21:16.160 and yet,

02:21:16.680 here's a counterfactual.

02:21:17.880 What do we see happening in Europe right now

02:21:19.940 that isn't happening here?

02:21:21.460 Them having huge numbers of Muslims

02:21:25.020 from different ethnic extracts

02:21:27.680 in that part of the globe

02:21:29.220 coming into societies,

02:21:31.160 not assimilating.

02:21:32.420 I agree.

02:21:32.800 That's certainly what the French are dealing with

02:21:34.260 and what the UK is dealing with

02:21:35.440 to a little bit of a lesser extent.

02:21:36.760 In America, 0.65

02:21:38.180 that hasn't happened.

02:21:39.340 Yes,

02:21:39.780 we're farther away,

02:21:40.840 we'll see.

02:21:41.000 But,

02:21:41.560 hasn't happened.

02:21:42.780 Muslims come into this country, 1.00

02:21:44.060 it's one of two countries on the face of the planet

02:21:45.860 that have more Jews than Muslims,

02:21:47.400 probably won't stay that way.

02:21:48.900 But when they come into this country, 1.00

02:21:50.680 they assimilate.

02:21:52.040 And we don't do what the French allowed, 1.00

02:21:54.400 which is to have them all living together

02:21:57.020 and separate from the rest of the society.

02:21:59.060 America is about to assimilate. 0.81

02:22:00.500 That's historically been true.

02:22:01.640 The only things,

02:22:03.560 having spent a long time in Europe,

02:22:04.560 I would say,

02:22:05.480 one,

02:22:05.920 I think it's unfair to blame,

02:22:07.620 it's like everyone blames the European populations,

02:22:09.500 like,

02:22:10.580 you know, 1.00

02:22:10.880 you're Algerians or killing people with machetes on the street 1.00

02:22:13.340 because you're a racist. 1.00

02:22:14.360 That's not fair. 0.95

02:22:14.980 It's their country.

02:22:15.780 They're the indigenous population.

02:22:17.180 This was imposed on them by their leaders.

02:22:18.740 Don't blame them.

02:22:20.120 A.

02:22:20.340 B.

02:22:21.060 Europe is just way smaller.

02:22:22.520 It's way smaller.

02:22:24.160 And so the United States is so big

02:22:25.940 that I've spent my whole life here.

02:22:27.840 There are a lot of parts of the country.

02:22:28.780 I don't know what's going on there.

02:22:30.580 And I travel a lot in this country

02:22:32.920 and I go to places and I'm like,

02:22:33.860 what is this?

02:22:34.380 It bears no resemblance to what I thought was here.

02:22:36.480 Totally different.

02:22:37.560 Go to Portland, Maine.

02:22:39.080 It doesn't look anything like the Portland, Maine you remember.

02:22:41.760 And there's no evidence people are assimilating at all.

02:22:45.120 You go to Lewiston, Maine,

02:22:46.020 and they imported all these Somalis there 30 years ago.

02:22:49.120 They've never assimilated at all, at all, in any way. 0.95

02:22:51.840 They've just kind of taken over downtown Lewiston.

02:22:53.740 It's a slum.

02:22:55.040 It's dangerous.

02:22:56.400 And there's no assimilation whatsoever.

02:22:58.800 No English is spoken.

02:23:00.620 And so, you know, I think the lessons of Europe,

02:23:03.780 the United States, I think,

02:23:04.440 did a really good job of assimilating immigrants,

02:23:06.220 your grandparents, you know,

02:23:07.180 when the great Southern European wave of immigration

02:23:09.680 came at the turn of the last century.

02:23:11.000 And they really like self-conscious,

02:23:12.540 like all public schools like taught civics

02:23:13.940 and like this is what it's been American.

02:23:15.320 Learn English.

02:23:16.500 Like, did your parents even speak Italian?

02:23:18.880 Oh, yeah.

02:23:19.600 Oh, they did.

02:23:20.040 But what did my grandparents want?

02:23:23.280 Be American.

02:23:24.000 Exactly.

02:23:24.540 No, but that's exactly right.

02:23:25.840 Speak the language.

02:23:26.800 Be American.

02:23:27.440 They were discouraged from speaking Italian

02:23:29.560 except in the house

02:23:30.240 because my grandparents didn't speak English.

02:23:32.020 Exactly.

02:23:32.420 Right.

02:23:32.520 And that, I think, was the rule.

02:23:35.160 And, you know, whatever the language was.

02:23:37.720 So that's no longer true

02:23:39.520 because when we make any effort

02:23:41.120 to make people American

02:23:43.300 because we can't define what American is.

02:23:45.620 And we need to do that now

02:23:47.280 and just require that everyone who lives here

02:23:49.360 buys into the same,

02:23:50.960 some species of the same program.

02:23:52.200 I don't think we should be North Korea about it, 1.00

02:23:53.520 but we need to have a unifying idea

02:23:55.900 or else we will break apart.

02:23:57.520 Do you believe directionally

02:23:59.320 this administration is going the right way?

02:24:03.540 Well, I think they've identified some things

02:24:05.300 that are really wrong

02:24:06.100 and in the first six weeks

02:24:08.440 have made way more progress

02:24:10.640 than I ever would have thought

02:24:11.480 at fighting those things.

02:24:13.680 So, but, I mean,

02:24:14.740 we have some very, very serious problems

02:24:17.120 and are they equal to that?

02:24:19.900 If anyone is, they are.

02:24:21.080 I, they've amazed me in the first six weeks,

02:24:24.240 but, you know, there's a lot coming.

02:24:28.140 There could be an economic reset,

02:24:30.380 probably likely will.

02:24:31.360 I mean, these are cyclical to some extent.

02:24:34.180 And then there's also the technology question.

02:24:36.280 There's the AI question.

02:24:37.840 And I just don't understand

02:24:39.300 what you're going to do

02:24:40.180 with 15 million new unskilled workers

02:24:43.260 in a society that doesn't need workers.

02:24:46.500 And I'm really worried about that.

02:24:48.060 I don't know who thought of that.

02:24:49.600 Like on the, on the cusp of the AI revolution,

02:24:51.640 let's open the borders to Haiti. 0.81

02:24:53.200 Like what, what are you doing?

02:24:55.600 That's like the greatest crime

02:24:56.880 that's ever been committed against this country.

02:24:58.420 And I, I hope I'm wrong.

02:24:59.740 I'm often wrong.

02:25:00.520 So I hope I'm wrong.

02:25:01.440 I really hope I'm wrong here.

02:25:03.800 That seems like suicidal to me.

02:25:06.400 I think it is.

02:25:07.020 I think that the biggest question,

02:25:08.780 and look, I don't have the answer,

02:25:10.080 but the biggest question is how to unify,

02:25:13.580 how to take your fingers

02:25:14.440 and make them into a fist.

02:25:15.460 What worried me, look, what was,

02:25:17.960 I got married two months after 9-11.

02:25:22.420 I got engaged 11 days after 9-11

02:25:24.680 because of 9-11,

02:25:26.000 because I realized the preciousness of life.

02:25:28.640 And I thought that was going to happen all the time.

02:25:30.560 I thought it was the new normal,

02:25:31.720 that they were just going to be 1.00

02:25:32.500 blowing shit up all the time. 0.99

02:25:33.880 I thought that too. 0.99

02:25:34.380 And my wife made the, you know,

02:25:36.340 the one bad decision that she's made

02:25:39.200 since I've known her,

02:25:40.360 which is she agreed to marry me.

02:25:42.500 And-

02:25:42.660 Was it a tough sell?

02:25:43.900 Oh yeah.

02:25:44.460 If it hadn't been 9-11,

02:25:45.540 she would have never said yes.

02:25:46.960 She'd probably- 0.97

02:25:47.780 You leveraged a terror attack to win her.

02:25:49.460 She could get out of it now

02:25:50.480 on the basis of impossibility of contract

02:25:52.500 because of duress.

02:25:53.480 So when I saw, like for me,

02:25:55.900 like even like a January 6th to me,

02:25:58.040 it was,

02:25:58.780 we don't all come down on the side

02:26:00.880 of what is right and wrong collectively anymore.

02:26:03.800 You know,

02:26:05.720 that when George Floyd happened,

02:26:08.720 people going down the streets in protest,

02:26:10.780 they're going to be angry.

02:26:11.480 They're going to say angry things.

02:26:12.780 It's not going to be peaceful in terms of speech.

02:26:15.280 Okay.

02:26:16.380 Destroying buildings,

02:26:17.340 and that's okay.

02:26:18.120 Taking over cities,

02:26:19.160 and that's okay.

02:26:19.900 Not okay.

02:26:20.920 We should have all felt that way.

02:26:22.480 We always had until that point.

02:26:24.400 No, fair.

02:26:25.200 January 6th.

02:26:26.800 The,

02:26:28.000 you don't do that.

02:26:28.920 You don't go bust it into the Capitol.

02:26:30.600 Everybody should have been on the same page.

02:26:32.320 Instead,

02:26:33.240 it was,

02:26:33.800 well,

02:26:33.920 what about George Floyd

02:26:35.180 and the Black Lives Matter stuff?

02:26:36.880 That type of discontinuity

02:26:39.080 is very unsettling to me.

02:26:41.880 We all know what's right and wrong

02:26:43.460 on very gross levels.

02:26:45.720 Okay.

02:26:46.580 And when you ignore those things for advantage,

02:26:49.920 you start getting into a dangerous situation.

02:26:51.820 I don't know that we do.

02:26:53.240 I mean,

02:26:53.520 one of my core beliefs

02:26:54.800 is that

02:26:56.140 shouldn't kill kids.

02:26:58.420 Totally opposed to abortion.

02:26:59.780 I think it's like

02:27:00.260 the most obviously evil thing

02:27:01.480 we've ever done.

02:27:02.880 And I,

02:27:03.660 I know a lot of really nice people

02:27:05.460 I like a lot

02:27:06.160 who totally disagree with me.

02:27:07.980 And I don't know why they do,

02:27:09.820 but they do.

02:27:11.540 And that's like a core.

02:27:13.500 I mean,

02:27:14.040 abortion's not just like some boutique,

02:27:15.860 even,

02:27:16.060 I'm not an evangelical,

02:27:16.860 by the way,

02:27:18.120 for the record.

02:27:19.040 But I just have always thought like,

02:27:20.560 what?

02:27:20.840 You can't do that.

02:27:21.900 I don't care how we can be.

02:27:22.940 This is a baby. 1.00

02:27:23.580 You can't fucking kill babies. 1.00

02:27:25.840 But most people I know 1.00

02:27:27.500 in my affluent world

02:27:28.800 totally disagree.

02:27:30.620 So I think,

02:27:31.420 and I just would say

02:27:32.280 that's like a core disagreement.

02:27:34.860 So I think,

02:27:36.740 I think there are a lot of deep disagreements,

02:27:39.300 like real disagreements

02:27:40.980 that have,

02:27:42.280 you know,

02:27:42.500 preexisting

02:27:42.960 and maybe haven't surfaced.

02:27:44.520 Right.

02:27:44.680 But here's the difference.

02:27:45.780 And in terms of what it is to be America,

02:27:47.700 what is our national religion?

02:27:52.220 Yeah,

02:27:52.620 exactly.

02:27:52.880 It is the law.

02:27:54.560 The law is our natural religion.

02:27:56.740 Religion is a set of rules, 1.00

02:27:57.980 right?

02:27:58.160 You have faith.

02:27:59.020 You have faith.

02:27:59.860 I have faith.

02:28:00.560 I choose to have faith.

02:28:01.540 Can't prove

02:28:02.180 there's a basis of my faith,

02:28:04.360 but I choose it.

02:28:06.100 Religion is a set of rules. 0.99

02:28:07.480 Our set of rules is the law.

02:28:09.580 That's what unites you in this country.

02:28:11.220 That's why it's so important. 1.00

02:28:12.200 That's why politicians love to fuck with it 1.00

02:28:13.680 as much as they do 1.00

02:28:14.400 because they know it's the essential fabric

02:28:16.400 is that you have fairness under law.

02:28:20.760 So abortion, 1.00

02:28:23.820 reproductive rights,

02:28:24.920 however you want to term it,

02:28:26.200 you can feel however you want to feel about it.

02:28:29.080 I can feel however I want to feel about it.

02:28:31.120 Then we have the law.

02:28:32.560 Right now,

02:28:33.120 the law is you decide state by state.

02:28:35.560 Okay.

02:28:36.080 It is the first reversal of a right

02:28:38.060 in our lifetime

02:28:39.340 where a right had been recognized

02:28:42.760 and then removed.

02:28:45.080 That was very politically destabilizing.

02:28:47.540 I thought it turned out not to be in the election.

02:28:50.440 Turned out it was in the midterms.

02:28:51.720 It's not the first.

02:28:52.200 I mean, no,

02:28:52.540 we had the Volstead Act.

02:28:54.300 No, but this is where there was...

02:28:56.400 You had a right to drink

02:28:57.260 and then you couldn't

02:28:58.140 and then you could.

02:28:59.040 No, that's a privilege.

02:29:00.500 We had a right to run

02:29:01.360 for more than two terms as president.

02:29:03.600 That, again,

02:29:04.740 is not a natural right.

02:29:06.980 It was.

02:29:07.500 It was in the Constitution.

02:29:08.680 There was no...

02:29:09.280 You had a right to run for president.

02:29:10.280 But that is...

02:29:11.280 You took it away.

02:29:12.260 That is different than...

02:29:15.420 Because it doesn't have

02:29:16.020 an organized, screechy,

02:29:17.360 unhappy lady lobby. 0.99

02:29:18.100 No, no, no, no.

02:29:18.540 How many terms you have as president

02:29:20.640 is...

02:29:21.600 It's guaranteed in the Constitution.

02:29:22.740 You can run for president.

02:29:23.640 Is not...

02:29:24.220 But you can amend the Constitution.

02:29:25.920 Well, that's what I'm saying.

02:29:26.700 You can amend the Constitution.

02:29:27.040 Well, we make all kinds of changes.

02:29:29.500 We consider some things rights

02:29:30.840 and then we decide they're not rights.

02:29:32.360 I mean, there's no natural law

02:29:35.640 that would support abortion. 0.99

02:29:37.620 Of course not.

02:29:38.240 That's insane.

02:29:39.020 You can't take...

02:29:39.600 Well, no, the natural law

02:29:40.520 would be control over your own body.

02:29:42.240 No, the natural law would be

02:29:43.400 a person has a right to be alive.

02:29:45.980 That supersedes your control

02:29:46.960 of your own body.

02:29:47.140 But when is it a person

02:29:48.720 has rights attached to it?

02:29:50.020 Well, we'll just start with

02:29:51.160 when the child can live outside the womb.

02:29:53.540 There's no debate there.

02:29:54.740 That is not the line

02:29:55.980 that was drawn even in Roe v. Wade.

02:29:58.700 I'm just saying

02:29:59.760 there are plenty of states

02:30:00.640 that happens all the time.

02:30:01.200 That is a more generous assessment

02:30:02.320 to people who believe

02:30:03.140 in reproductive rights

02:30:04.080 than the law had been

02:30:05.140 under Roe v. Wade.

02:30:05.680 Thousands of kids are aborted

02:30:06.820 every year post-viability.

02:30:09.300 It's just a fact.

02:30:10.340 And they say, well, the child...

02:30:11.920 You know, there's lots of reasons for it,

02:30:13.140 but...

02:30:14.400 So, I mean...

02:30:15.420 Late-term abortions

02:30:16.720 are almost not a thing.

02:30:19.680 They happen incredibly infrequently.

02:30:21.780 Slavery is almost not a thing.

02:30:23.180 No, but I'm saying that statistically.

02:30:24.620 The idea that we had to focus

02:30:26.080 on late-term abortion

02:30:26.980 was pure politics,

02:30:28.600 not practicality.

02:30:29.740 Rape on subway platforms

02:30:29.940 is almost not a thing.

02:30:31.300 But I'm concerned about it.

02:30:32.280 I don't want it

02:30:33.080 because it's wrong.

02:30:34.540 And any time a child

02:30:36.200 who can live outside the womb 0.96

02:30:37.160 is murdered,

02:30:38.220 like, I'm upset about it.

02:30:39.460 And I don't care

02:30:40.080 how often it happens.

02:30:41.020 It happens one time.

02:30:41.840 If it even could happen,

02:30:42.740 I'm opposed to it.

02:30:43.340 It's a baby.

02:30:44.000 It wasn't part of the law.

02:30:45.440 Okay, but I'm just saying it happens.

02:30:46.720 But the viability standard...

02:30:48.280 The Good Mocker Institute 0.55

02:30:48.860 has the numbers.

02:30:49.980 You can look it up.

02:30:50.500 So, anyway,

02:30:51.580 I'm just saying, like,

02:30:52.940 okay, it's a right.

02:30:55.160 No, these are political institutions

02:30:56.780 that respond to the public will

02:30:59.060 or what they think it is.

02:31:00.200 But what about human rights?

02:31:01.360 What about natural rights

02:31:02.500 that are bestowed by God

02:31:03.620 that aren't supposed

02:31:04.240 to be infringed on by men?

02:31:05.840 Isn't one of those

02:31:06.600 the control and sanctity

02:31:08.180 of your own body?

02:31:09.040 I don't think that's...

02:31:09.840 I mean, I'm not the Yale

02:31:11.400 law school graduate here,

02:31:12.340 but I'm not...

02:31:13.400 I would...

02:31:13.960 They don't teach you

02:31:14.700 about God-given rights

02:31:15.740 in law school because that's...

02:31:16.960 That's not our founding document

02:31:18.000 is God-given rights.

02:31:19.000 But that's not a secular...

02:31:20.840 That's not a secular understanding.

02:31:22.560 It says that in the document!

02:31:24.340 The Constitution

02:31:24.940 does not mention God.

02:31:26.260 The Declaration of Independence does.

02:31:27.380 Oh, sure,

02:31:27.780 but that's not our operative document.

02:31:29.120 The Constitution is.

02:31:30.400 And our Constitution

02:31:31.200 does not mention God.

02:31:32.440 Nothing is predicated on God

02:31:33.800 except our separation

02:31:34.940 of church and state.

02:31:36.140 We don't identify rights.

02:31:37.960 So, how are the rights

02:31:38.400 in the Bill of Rights,

02:31:39.560 how are the rights...

02:31:41.520 Articulated.

02:31:42.240 ...explained?

02:31:42.800 As a function of the collection.

02:31:44.920 Especially the Bill of Rights,

02:31:47.240 which you just referred to.

02:31:49.000 Because they sent it out

02:31:50.100 to the states,

02:31:50.780 and the states came back

02:31:51.680 with their recommendations.

02:31:52.420 But like...

02:31:53.100 Okay.

02:31:54.640 We say they're God-given,

02:31:55.940 but the problem with that

02:31:56.660 is you live in a secular society.

02:31:57.860 So, what if somebody

02:31:58.580 doesn't believe in God?

02:31:59.400 Do they not have rights?

02:32:00.120 Of course they do.

02:32:01.660 Of course they do.

02:32:02.620 They're attached

02:32:03.080 by their collective.

02:32:04.280 Yeah.

02:32:04.560 Well, the...

02:32:05.240 Yeah.

02:32:05.860 The First Amendment says

02:32:07.160 that the government

02:32:08.460 can't have religious tests.

02:32:09.800 So...

02:32:10.120 But I guess that you could just...

02:32:11.580 Whatever.

02:32:12.400 Rabbit hole.

02:32:12.960 But I think we can just, like,

02:32:15.060 stick with the Bill of Rights

02:32:15.880 and just...

02:32:16.380 We could start there.

02:32:17.520 Yeah.

02:32:17.960 And say that, you know,

02:32:20.180 those are the rights

02:32:20.760 that our government exists to protect.

02:32:22.400 Right?

02:32:22.780 Wherever they emanate from.

02:32:24.380 And the first one

02:32:25.160 is the freedom of speech.

02:32:26.000 And when you see

02:32:26.540 the entire leadership class

02:32:29.700 of the country

02:32:30.200 opposing the first right

02:32:32.260 enumerated in the Bill of Rights,

02:32:33.420 then, you know, 0.99

02:32:33.680 the whole project is bullshit 1.00

02:32:34.780 and the people running it 1.00

02:32:35.820 don't believe in it.

02:32:37.000 And you set the stage

02:32:37.960 for a revolution,

02:32:38.900 which is really scary.

02:32:40.620 Here's my problem with it.

02:32:41.620 I am totally with you

02:32:43.620 about having to tolerate

02:32:45.840 the things that you don't like

02:32:47.180 and you don't want to listen to

02:32:48.320 in a democracy.

02:32:49.760 100%.

02:32:50.280 Marketplace of ideas.

02:32:52.320 100%.

02:32:52.800 And I would even argue

02:32:54.780 that it is better

02:32:55.840 to have more ideas

02:32:57.460 that are offensive

02:32:58.160 because it makes it easier

02:32:59.180 for the better ideas

02:33:00.300 to rise to the top.

02:33:02.640 I honestly believe that.

02:33:03.680 I'm very worried

02:33:04.460 about any kind of concerted effort

02:33:06.600 to limit speech.

02:33:08.120 100%.

02:33:08.600 Here's what I'm struggling with.

02:33:12.780 Our jurisprudence

02:33:14.060 has moved

02:33:14.720 in the opposite direction

02:33:17.400 as our culture.

02:33:18.240 Our culture

02:33:18.740 has been getting

02:33:19.740 a little bit more

02:33:21.020 finicky

02:33:22.440 with what it likes

02:33:23.520 people talking about.

02:33:24.640 Censorious.

02:33:24.880 That's cancel culture. 0.99

02:33:26.280 Censorious.

02:33:27.280 The law has been expanding.

02:33:29.040 Right?

02:33:29.320 When you look back

02:33:30.000 at Chaplinsky

02:33:30.640 in the 1920s,

02:33:31.920 1940s jurisprudence,

02:33:33.480 they used to say

02:33:34.420 at the Supreme Court level,

02:33:35.480 you know,

02:33:35.660 the First Amendment

02:33:36.220 wasn't created

02:33:36.980 for Tucker Carlson

02:33:37.840 to figure out

02:33:38.360 how to say 1.00

02:33:38.720 the meanest shit 1.00

02:33:39.500 he can to Chris Cuomo 1.00

02:33:40.620 and be protected from it.

02:33:42.560 And then you had

02:33:43.380 fighting words doctrine,

02:33:44.840 which is,

02:33:45.300 hey,

02:33:46.060 Tucker Carlson

02:33:46.580 can't walk up

02:33:47.140 to Chris Cuomo

02:33:47.640 and say something

02:33:48.160 about his mom

02:33:48.840 and expect not to get

02:33:49.580 a punch in the nose.

02:33:51.060 And then they expanded

02:33:52.080 it even more.

02:33:52.860 And then he said,

02:33:53.240 well,

02:33:53.320 you can't say

02:33:55.020 fire in a crowded theater.

02:33:56.400 Yeah,

02:33:56.580 you probably can

02:33:57.700 under the Supreme Court law.

02:33:59.380 There's a new test

02:34:00.460 of whether it's

02:34:01.280 reasonably conceived

02:34:03.180 to create violence.

02:34:05.040 So they kept

02:34:06.620 expanding the rights.

02:34:07.880 So the First Amendment,

02:34:08.880 jurisprudentially,

02:34:09.720 from the Supreme Court,

02:34:10.760 has been getting

02:34:11.440 broader and broader.

02:34:12.440 And I wonder

02:34:13.280 if it has come

02:34:14.660 with a culture cost.

02:34:16.200 And I don't like

02:34:17.180 to look at Mike Tyson

02:34:18.200 as any kind

02:34:19.120 of philosophical basis,

02:34:20.820 but he said once,

02:34:23.420 social media

02:34:24.320 has made people forget

02:34:25.320 that sometimes

02:34:25.940 what comes out

02:34:26.440 of your mouth 0.78

02:34:26.820 is going to get you 1.00

02:34:27.400 punched in the face. 1.00

02:34:28.200 That's right. 0.56

02:34:28.760 And I do wonder

02:34:30.400 these days,

02:34:31.240 maybe it's the

02:34:32.020 angry old man

02:34:33.000 in me coming out,

02:34:34.060 but do you think

02:34:35.100 we've gone too far

02:34:36.660 in allowing things

02:34:38.560 to be okay

02:34:39.740 to be said,

02:34:40.880 not as political thought,

02:34:42.780 but as invective,

02:34:44.660 as insults,

02:34:46.100 and how people

02:34:47.160 are allowed

02:34:47.600 to treat each other now?

02:34:48.920 And if I do anything

02:34:49.980 about it,

02:34:51.000 if you do anything

02:34:51.860 about it,

02:34:52.980 you're the one

02:34:53.520 in trouble.

02:34:54.760 I would say there,

02:34:55.920 I would just make two

02:34:56.740 Slippery slope,

02:34:57.520 I know,

02:34:57.840 but I struggle.

02:34:58.260 No,

02:34:58.520 not slippery at all.

02:34:59.500 There are two

02:34:59.900 obvious points to make.

02:35:01.060 One is that

02:35:02.040 if you live in a society

02:35:02.920 where you're not allowed

02:35:03.620 to criticize the people

02:35:04.500 in charge,

02:35:05.060 you live in a tyranny.

02:35:06.060 Yes.

02:35:06.900 As in Ukraine. 0.67

02:35:07.820 Agreed.

02:35:08.880 Not about Ukraine,

02:35:09.800 but I agree with the principle.

02:35:10.620 Well,

02:35:10.640 they murdered Gonzalo Lira

02:35:11.900 for criticizing the government,

02:35:13.120 so yeah,

02:35:13.780 and we have done that here,

02:35:14.940 and I'm opposed to,

02:35:15.900 so that's like a super easy test.

02:35:17.340 If you are not allowed

02:35:18.320 to criticize the people

02:35:19.280 who have more power

02:35:20.020 than you do,

02:35:21.060 you're not living

02:35:21.720 in a free country.

02:35:22.200 I still think it's weird

02:35:22.920 that you look at Ukraine

02:35:23.660 and not Russia

02:35:24.160 for the immediate example.

02:35:25.240 I'm not funding Russia, 1.00

02:35:26.360 and my tax dollars

02:35:27.320 are funding Ukraine,

02:35:28.420 so that's kind of why

02:35:29.900 I have a special interest.

02:35:31.100 Any country that we fund,

02:35:32.360 we have a right

02:35:32.900 to look carefully

02:35:33.780 at where our money's going.

02:35:34.720 No issue with that.

02:35:35.820 Any country.

02:35:36.700 Okay.

02:35:37.400 So,

02:35:37.820 I would say that.

02:35:38.740 And the second point is,

02:35:39.780 of course,

02:35:40.400 I think the public discourse

02:35:41.380 is completely out of control.

02:35:42.800 I think pornography 0.99

02:35:43.360 is disgusting, 0.90

02:35:44.260 and I think

02:35:44.700 the cruelty

02:35:46.220 that I see

02:35:47.280 all the time

02:35:48.100 is shocking to me

02:35:49.680 and really sad,

02:35:50.520 and I hate it,

02:35:51.280 and there's clearly

02:35:52.740 like some deep rage

02:35:53.980 going on inside people.

02:35:54.840 I think I understand

02:35:55.720 where it comes from,

02:35:56.880 but I'm totally opposed to it.

02:35:59.100 Well,

02:35:59.180 what do you do about it?

02:36:00.680 Well,

02:36:01.240 all I can say for myself

02:36:02.600 is I try not to add to it.

02:36:03.740 I certainly have added to it,

02:36:04.940 you know,

02:36:05.680 sometimes,

02:36:06.280 and I'm sorry about that.

02:36:07.640 I really try not to now.

02:36:10.280 Probably should have

02:36:10.800 started a little earlier,

02:36:11.900 but I still do.

02:36:14.000 But anyway,

02:36:14.680 I don't know what you do about it.

02:36:15.760 I don't know what to do.

02:36:16.540 Just try and,

02:36:17.100 you know,

02:36:17.340 model reasonable,

02:36:19.000 decent.

02:36:19.780 Last thing I'll say,

02:36:20.720 I think it's

02:36:22.560 the most important thing

02:36:23.820 when you're talking

02:36:24.420 to another person

02:36:25.160 to remember

02:36:25.620 that it's a person

02:36:26.260 you're talking to.

02:36:27.900 I saw something happen.

02:36:29.420 People are going to get

02:36:29.940 angry at me about this.

02:36:30.960 But by the way,

02:36:31.680 I think that

02:36:34.020 as much as this

02:36:36.320 is remarkable for people,

02:36:37.400 I don't care

02:36:38.140 about why people

02:36:39.260 are interested in you

02:36:40.060 and I talking

02:36:40.560 to each other.

02:36:41.940 I know

02:36:42.840 it's part of the solution.

02:36:44.920 And it doesn't matter.

02:36:45.680 People can listen to this

02:36:46.540 and think everything

02:36:47.600 that we both just said

02:36:49.080 is completely a waste

02:36:50.200 of the time

02:36:51.440 that they spent watching it.

02:36:52.380 I'm okay with that.

02:36:53.860 I still know

02:36:54.900 that it's part of it

02:36:56.300 because one,

02:36:56.880 when we were working

02:36:57.480 at two different places,

02:36:58.260 we would have never

02:36:58.800 been allowed to do this.

02:36:59.800 Yes.

02:37:00.100 And part of being

02:37:01.340 in those places

02:37:02.000 would be adversarial

02:37:03.000 with each other.

02:37:04.220 And you were much better

02:37:05.460 at that than I was,

02:37:06.340 by the way.

02:37:07.000 But... 1.00

02:37:07.320 I'm truly an asshole 1.00

02:37:08.520 deep down. 1.00

02:37:10.000 It's not that deep.

02:37:11.080 But what I'm saying is

02:37:12.920 I know that

02:37:14.240 we're not supposed

02:37:14.960 to be doing this

02:37:15.440 and we're some of

02:37:16.060 the only ones who do.

02:37:17.080 Yes.

02:37:18.060 And I appreciate you

02:37:19.700 and respect you for that.

02:37:21.520 I'm hanging out

02:37:22.360 at a place

02:37:22.780 that I love to go to

02:37:23.500 during the summertime

02:37:24.120 and there are MAGA hats

02:37:25.940 all over the place.

02:37:28.060 A guy in the MAGA hat

02:37:29.480 is a little drunk,

02:37:31.780 a little out of it

02:37:32.380 and gets into it

02:37:34.240 with somebody

02:37:34.820 who does not have

02:37:35.620 a MAGA hat on.

02:37:37.060 And eventually,

02:37:38.620 the guy without

02:37:39.180 the MAGA hat on

02:37:40.160 smacks the MAGA hat

02:37:41.960 off the guy's head. 0.73

02:37:43.480 The guy gets angry, 0.92

02:37:45.160 punches the guy

02:37:45.980 who smacked it 0.99

02:37:46.760 off his head.

02:37:49.980 Cops come, 0.82

02:37:51.740 arrest the MAGA hat guy

02:37:53.800 because he punched

02:37:54.620 the other guy in the face

02:37:55.460 and there are all

02:37:55.880 these other people there.

02:37:58.120 And I was going

02:38:00.340 to talk about it

02:38:01.320 on the show

02:38:02.060 and didn't

02:38:03.440 because I realized

02:38:04.380 that what I was going

02:38:05.040 to say was not

02:38:06.340 embracing of the law

02:38:08.000 but to me

02:38:10.460 felt like

02:38:11.420 what would have been

02:38:12.220 right in the situation.

02:38:14.200 And I have never

02:38:16.220 really figured this out.

02:38:17.780 I could read a hundred,

02:38:18.860 I could give you

02:38:19.320 a hundred different arguments

02:38:20.140 of what's right

02:38:20.640 and what's wrong.

02:38:22.120 But how I feel

02:38:24.180 is

02:38:25.360 when the guy

02:38:27.340 smacked the hat

02:38:28.820 off the head

02:38:29.740 of the other guy,

02:38:30.840 it seemed

02:38:32.760 to me

02:38:33.380 that it was

02:38:34.180 not more wrong

02:38:35.500 than the guy

02:38:36.200 punching him.

02:38:38.560 You know,

02:38:38.940 it didn't seem

02:38:39.580 like he had high ground.

02:38:40.720 You smacked the hat

02:38:41.820 off the guy's head. 0.73

02:38:42.620 Before that,

02:38:43.020 it had been this

02:38:43.560 and there was plenty

02:38:44.600 ugliness

02:38:45.260 going back and forth. 0.97

02:38:46.920 He then smacks

02:38:48.060 the hat off.

02:38:48.720 The guy punches him.

02:38:49.480 He didn't hit him

02:38:49.980 with a two-by-four

02:38:50.840 but he punched him.

02:38:52.280 He opened him up.

02:38:53.040 He was bleeding.

02:38:54.720 And

02:38:55.080 everyone I would

02:38:56.980 talk to about it

02:38:57.600 would say,

02:38:57.940 well,

02:38:58.020 come on,

02:38:58.400 Chris.

02:38:58.580 I mean,

02:38:58.820 you can't do that.

02:39:00.480 Why?

02:39:01.920 Because it's the law.

02:39:03.400 Okay,

02:39:03.640 why is it the law?

02:39:04.820 Because we want

02:39:05.480 to enforce civilization.

02:39:06.600 But we're not

02:39:07.200 that civilized.

02:39:08.440 I get it.

02:39:09.040 We give ourselves

02:39:09.840 too much credit

02:39:10.540 for civility,

02:39:11.320 especially in America.

02:39:12.680 Everything we embrace

02:39:14.300 is violent

02:39:15.440 and aggressive.

02:39:16.700 Why does everybody

02:39:17.340 like The Rock?

02:39:18.100 Because he's a great actor?

02:39:19.340 No,

02:39:19.860 it's that symbology

02:39:21.420 of what he represents

02:39:22.780 as a male.

02:39:24.140 And

02:39:24.540 I know

02:39:26.440 that it's wrong

02:39:27.260 but I feel like

02:39:28.380 you can't be

02:39:29.800 punching everybody 0.58

02:39:30.380 in the face 1.00

02:39:30.800 that you disagree with.

02:39:31.660 I know,

02:39:32.260 of course.

02:39:33.880 But it's now like

02:39:35.080 we empower people

02:39:37.120 to be their

02:39:37.760 absolute worst

02:39:39.660 all the time

02:39:40.880 and they gain

02:39:41.820 advantage of it.

02:39:43.100 People say things,

02:39:44.180 they're not just

02:39:44.600 criticizing you.

02:39:46.220 They don't just

02:39:46.700 criticize me.

02:39:47.320 Oh,

02:39:47.440 I know.

02:39:47.940 They say

02:39:48.680 horrible things

02:39:50.300 about people,

02:39:51.860 their families,

02:39:52.820 whatever it is.

02:39:54.440 And I don't know

02:39:55.620 how that's making

02:39:56.260 us any better.

02:39:57.080 Is that just

02:39:57.560 what we have

02:39:58.140 to tolerate

02:39:58.700 to be in a democracy

02:39:59.760 or have we 0.88

02:40:01.440 fucked it up? 0.93

02:40:05.080 It's pretty clear. 0.57

02:40:06.020 I mean,

02:40:06.240 of course,

02:40:06.720 I know exactly

02:40:07.220 what you're saying

02:40:07.660 and I agree with you

02:40:08.380 and I think

02:40:09.100 that none of that

02:40:11.440 is an excuse

02:40:12.360 for the people

02:40:12.860 in power

02:40:13.180 to shut down

02:40:13.620 criticism of themselves

02:40:14.640 as has happened

02:40:15.280 in Europe and Australia.

02:40:16.540 Hope it doesn't

02:40:17.000 happen here.

02:40:17.500 On the other hand,

02:40:18.920 I do think,

02:40:19.640 you know,

02:40:19.900 if you don't think

02:40:20.620 of other people

02:40:21.160 as human,

02:40:22.280 there's no limit

02:40:23.320 to what you can do

02:40:23.900 to them.

02:40:24.440 And I do think

02:40:25.040 that's like

02:40:25.500 the key thing

02:40:26.160 to remember

02:40:26.500 is these are people,

02:40:27.680 they have identical value

02:40:29.120 in the eyes of God

02:40:29.860 that you do

02:40:30.440 and you should

02:40:32.400 always remember that

02:40:32.960 no matter how pissed

02:40:33.480 you are at them

02:40:34.020 and no, 1.00

02:40:34.380 you can't kill them. 1.00

02:40:35.820 No, no, no. 0.99

02:40:36.360 Of course.

02:40:36.940 But I'm saying that,

02:40:38.120 I don't know, man.

02:40:38.840 I just feel like

02:40:39.320 we're getting less civilized

02:40:40.700 even though the law

02:40:41.400 is expanding.

02:40:43.140 Can I say one last thing?

02:40:44.180 Go ahead.

02:40:45.920 Yeah,

02:40:46.360 thank the internet

02:40:47.020 for that.

02:40:48.760 I am

02:40:49.560 thrilled

02:40:51.140 that you're

02:40:52.760 enjoying yourself

02:40:53.760 outside of

02:40:55.060 the confines

02:40:56.400 of the business

02:40:56.820 we are both in.

02:40:57.720 And even if I disagree

02:40:58.500 with you on certain things,

02:40:59.320 I just think

02:40:59.760 it's inspirational

02:41:00.940 to see a free man.

02:41:03.220 I appreciate you.

02:41:04.680 I like coming down

02:41:05.440 to see you.

02:41:06.400 And I think that

02:41:07.400 the point is

02:41:08.120 as simple as that,

02:41:08.880 Tucker.

02:41:09.820 We're not going to agree

02:41:10.840 on everything,

02:41:11.740 okay?

02:41:12.960 But I know you do

02:41:13.980 because there's not

02:41:14.480 one Sicilian man

02:41:15.320 in America

02:41:15.680 who doesn't love Trump.

02:41:16.560 There's not one.

02:41:17.280 And I don't believe

02:41:18.000 you're that man.

02:41:18.460 They're saying

02:41:19.000 I've done a survey

02:41:19.700 of every Sicilian man

02:41:20.660 in America

02:41:21.040 and every Sicilian man

02:41:21.960 in America

02:41:22.300 in his heart

02:41:22.880 is like,

02:41:23.300 you go Trump.

02:41:23.660 Well, finally then

02:41:24.440 I'm special.

02:41:24.980 I don't believe you.

02:41:25.720 Because I am Sicilian

02:41:26.720 and I definitely

02:41:27.420 don't love Trump.

02:41:28.560 You and your brother

02:41:28.580 secretly love,

02:41:29.140 I know that you do

02:41:30.080 and I know that if I-

02:41:30.660 He can speak for himself.

02:41:31.260 If I know if I could

02:41:32.100 x-ray your Sicilian soul, 1.00

02:41:33.540 you'd be like,

02:41:33.960 you go big orange!

02:41:36.080 Big orange!

02:41:37.760 What I'm saying is this.

02:41:39.700 I believe that,

02:41:41.680 look,

02:41:41.940 you're going to have

02:41:42.580 people say,

02:41:43.260 why are you talking

02:41:43.800 to that guy?

02:41:44.360 I'm going to have people

02:41:45.040 say,

02:41:45.280 why are you talking

02:41:48.460 because conversation

02:41:50.020 is the cure.

02:41:51.740 You don't have to agree

02:41:52.600 but you've got to listen

02:41:53.720 and you have to feel

02:41:55.560 each other out

02:41:56.200 and you've got to

02:41:56.980 take it in

02:41:57.620 and I'm happy to do it

02:41:59.000 with you

02:41:59.220 and I look forward

02:41:59.700 to doing it again.

02:42:00.960 Amen.

02:42:01.460 Thank you.

02:42:02.340 Good to see you, man.

02:42:07.380 We want to thank you

02:42:08.220 for watching us

02:42:08.840 on Spotify,

02:42:09.760 a company that we use

02:42:10.700 every day.

02:42:11.340 We know the people

02:42:11.760 who run it,

02:42:12.280 good people.

02:42:13.300 While you're here,

02:42:14.340 do us a favor,

02:42:15.100 hit follow

02:42:16.020 and tap the bell

02:42:17.460 so you never miss

02:42:18.200 an episode.

02:42:19.340 We have real conversations,

02:42:20.740 news,

02:42:21.080 things that actually matter.

02:42:22.480 Telling the truth always,

02:42:23.660 you will not miss it

02:42:24.620 if you follow us

02:42:26.020 on Spotify

02:42:26.500 and hit the bell.

02:42:27.460 We appreciate it.

02:42:28.020 Thanks for watching.

The Tucker Carlson Show - March 10, 2025

Tucker and Chris Cuomo Debate JFK⧸Epstein Files, DOGE, Joe Rogan, NATO, Transgenderism, and DEI

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