After Party with Emily Jashinsky - What the Feds AREN’T Saying, and Creepy Epstein Emails, with Evita Duffy-Alfonso, PLUS Olivia Nuzzi’s Cringe Book

Episode Date: November 18, 2025

Emily opens the show with a dramatic reading from Olivia Nuzzi’s forthcoming memoir about her alleged affair with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., including a hilarious anecdote about his ‘brain worm.’ Th...en Emily is joined by independent journalist Evita Duffy-Alfonso and the two discuss major developments in the case of Jeffrey Epstein, the twisted emails he exchanged with prominent men, and why MAGA wants the files released. The two then turn to new developments in the cases of would-be Trump assassin Thomas Crooks, and accused Charlie Kirk assassin Tyler Robinson, including stunning details about their online profiles and reports both were involved in the ‘furry’ culture. Then Emily breaks down the cancellation of Red Scare’s Dasha Nekrasova and why it may be a sign of things to come, and more. Masa Chips: Ready to give MASA or Vandy a try? Get 25% off your first order by going to http://masachips.com/AFTERPARTY and using code AFTERPARTY. PreBorn: Help save a baby go to https://PreBorn.com/Emily or call 855-601-2229.  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 Good evening. Welcome to After Party. Tonight's guest is Avita Duffy Alfonso, but first, the news. Our nation teeters on the brink of madness sent into this time of tribulation by the promise of America's next great memoir. American Canto, the autobiographical account of Olivia Nassi's alleged affair with then presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Kennedy denies this love, was at all requited. Nuzi, though, refers to him in this aspirational act of literature as the politician, an act so brave and yet so subtle. It sends the mind reeling, spinning, burning with empathy, and the prose so purple it'd make a Wyoming sunset seet with the envy of a thousand spurned New York magazine writers. Imagine where power like that could take us, harnessed into this grand project we call democracy or perhaps into the pages of our quintessential millennial memoir.
Starting point is 00:01:21 Without further ado, we turn now to Vanity Fair, where American Canto was excerpted today. I would take a bullet for you, the politician said. He always said that. Please don't say that, I said. I always said that. From his mouth, the bullet theoretical launched the bullet possible. I did not like to think about it, about the armed man at his speech, or the armed man who broke into his home, or the armed men he paid to guard him from armed men who sought to harm him, while the federal government denied his pleas for protection from the security agency whose modern protocols were carved by the same bullets that cut boughs from his family tree and cut the track of the American experiment.
Starting point is 00:02:13 I did not like to think about it just as later. I would not like to think about the worm in his brain that other people found so funny. I loved his brain. I hated the idea of an intruder therein. Others thought he was a madman. He was not quite mad the way they thought, but I loved the private ways that he was mad.
Starting point is 00:02:41 I loved that he was insatiable. In all ways, as if he would swallow up the whole world just to know it better if he could. He made me laugh, but I winced when he joked about the worm. Baby, don't worry, he said. It's not a worm. A doctor he trusted had reviewed the scans of his brain, obtained. by the New York Times, he said, and concluded that the shadowy figure was likely not a parasite at all. He sighed. It was too late to interfere with what had already vaulted from the sphere of meme to the sphere of screwy legend, but at least I did not have to worry about the worm. That was not a worm
Starting point is 00:03:32 in his brain. We turn now to a postscript from Ryan Liza just released. Liza is, of course, ex-lover, who was violated by this alleged lust for Kennedy, and he has since claimed on where else his substack that Nuzzi was, quote, sleeping with Mark Sanford. Sanford, yes, of hiking the Appalachian Trail fame. Lizza now takes us to the scene of a bedroom, their bedroom, where he finds a missive scribbled on Kempton Hotel Stationery. As I tidied up the desk, something on the Kipton Stationary caught my eye. I started to read, quote, if I swallowed every drop of water from the tower above your house, Olivia had written, I would still thirst for you. Unfortunately, the lack of a water tower on our
Starting point is 00:04:37 our Georgetown home's roof ruled me out as the notes intended recipient. I flipped to another page and saw a name in the first line of an unfinished love letter to him that included enough details to confirm a physical relationship and a hint of some kind of falling out. My heart stopped when I realized who he was. All right, everyone. This, dear friends, is Washington, D.C. where moralizing, hipsters cloak their burning desires for control over your life in ironic detachment and bemused neutrality all well behaving privately like people you would let nowhere near your own children if you knew what was actually going on so we can conclude
Starting point is 00:05:29 from these two beautiful nay historic excerpts that Olivia Nussie and Ryan Lizzie actually were perfect for each other All right, next. Evita Defi Alfonso will be with us. But first, but first, if you've ever read the label on a typical bag of chips, you know it's often a science experiment of seed oils, MSG, artificial dyes, and mystery ingredients.
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Starting point is 00:07:29 That was the best part, the sincerity of the Vanity Fair article. That was Nuzzi's writing. That was an excerpt. Excerped. Oh, okay, okay. That was her. That's how seriously she takes herself. Got it. And I also, I will say, Emily, I have tried Masa Chips. My little sister is a Maha movement fanatic. And she said, yeah, she said they were amazing and that they're all clean. So I tried them. They were actually very good. It's insane when you look on the back of the thing. Like, this is an actual experience I've had. You look on the back of the bag. You're like, there's no way. This is just three ingredients. It makes you feel like an idiot for eating anything else. Oh, yeah. That's what people are fat. I did a whole thing. Christian Justice, our former colleague at the Federalist, it's not the high calorie count. It is all of the chemicals that we are constantly ingesting. So a maha chip, you can count me in.
Starting point is 00:08:17 There you go. All right. Well, Aveda, on board the Masa Chip movement. Now, Aveda, there's some serious news that I want to get your take on because we're getting more and more updates from the story about Thomas Crooks, the alleged shooter, the shooter of Donald Trump, who of course got him. on the head, in the ear, literally shot the President of the United States in the head during a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania in July of 2024. New details are emerging in that case from sources talking to Tucker Carlson and Miranda Devine. We're going to get to that.
Starting point is 00:08:50 We are also going to get to hilarious and tragic updates in the Jeffrey Epstein email dump from his estate to the House Oversight Committee last week. Some new Trump poll numbers and maybe a little bit of Scott Galloway on Bill Moore about what remote work. is doing to younger generations of Americans. So Avida, let's go ahead and start with Donald Trump's remarks today in the Oval Office on the Epstein release. So whether House Republicans should vote to compel the release of more documents in the government's possession related to Jeffrey Epstein. Here's the president. You urge House Republicans to vote in favor of this Epstein release bill they're going to vote on tomorrow. I just want to be super clear on your position. Do you want to see that past the Senate?
Starting point is 00:09:35 Would you sign that bill if it gets to your desk? I do want to say, here's what I want. We have nothing to do with Epstein. The Democrats do. All of his friends were Democrats. You look at this Reid Hoffman, you look at Larry Summers, Bill Clinton. They went to his island all the time, and many others. They're all Democrats.
Starting point is 00:09:56 All I want is I want for people to recognize a great job that I've done on pricing or on affordability because we brought prices way down. on way lower, on energy, on ending eight wars and another one coming pretty soon, I believe. We've done a great job. And I hate to see that deflect from the great job we've done. Okay. So obviously, Evita, this comes after the Trump administration and the president himself. First, stoked intrigue about Epstein, and you and I would agree with that, reasonably so, over the course of several years, especially in the context of saying Bill Clinton was implicated, potentially Larry Summers, who will get to in just one moment, of course, was
Starting point is 00:10:40 implicated. And now the president says, all right, well, after he got a lot of criticism, the administration got a lot of criticism from both you and I for some stonewalling over the last several months, he's saying, yes, go ahead, release them. And Avid, I'm wondering if your interpretation of his pivot here is not necessarily in response to, like, Marjor Taylor Green and Thomas Massey continuing to hammering the drum so much as it is the election results over the last couple of weeks where it seems like Trump, he's mentioned it a couple of times since the off-year elections where Dems ran up some significant margins, higher than expected margins in places like New Jersey and Virginia, that the president realizes affordability and economics are on the minds of average voters. So what do you ascribe this pivot? Well, I mean, I think he wants to talk about his wins. You know, I was just comparing price of gas. I mean, it's gone down by a dollar and a half in Wisconsin where I'm doing my driving compared to the Biden admin, the worst or the worst.
Starting point is 00:11:41 So, I mean, I understand why he wants to talk about his wins, right? This is a president that always wants to talk about his wins. I will say this, Emily, I'm not convinced that this is really going to cause any satisfaction anyways. Like, I think there's a move to, okay, we can't be having Jeffrey Epstein in the news cycle every other day is going through the president's mind but is a release of files and private communications between Epstein and random business leaders or politicians going to help anything. I think what the American people want to know really is was Jeffrey Epstein attached to
Starting point is 00:12:18 American or Israeli or other foreign intelligence? We want to know that. That's the question that everybody wants answered. And releasing private communications is not going to do that. So that the prevailing question, the big problem, the elephant in the room is going to continue. And I hope that the president and people around him realize that. Well, yeah, this is an important point. And I wonder if that's part of what's factoring into his decision because you can either have a world where the Epstein news cycle continues and you look like you're stonewalling or you can have a world where the Epstein news cycle continues and you look like you are engaging in disclosure.
Starting point is 00:12:58 And so I feel like there's no if there's no either or, right? Like it's, I'm sorry, there's no both or there's no third option. As I'm stumbling through this, I still have the, the worm in my brain about Olivia Nuzzi and the Kennedy brain worm, allegedly. But there's no third way. You're going to have an Epstein. You're going to have continued drip drips in the Epstein case, no matter what. He has hacked emails that were leaked. Republicans released 20,000 from the estate that are going to continue to be put together like pieces of a puzzle.
Starting point is 00:13:28 going into the future, people are going to continue to get asked questions about the relationship with Epstein. It's just not fading away. And so without a third option, maybe you might as well at least look like you're on the side of disclosure. Yeah. Well, I mean, and maybe that's what's running through their minds. And I think a lot of Americans, especially conservatives who put in this admin, voted for President Trump, will say, you know, we'll give them the benefit of the doubt in a lot of situations. I'm somebody who, when I look at the evidence, do I think Jeffrey Epstein, killed himself. It's really hard for me to believe that. But if Dan Bongino and Cash Patel are saying Jeffrey Epstein definitely killed himself, okay, I might be willing to buy that. I'd like to see some,
Starting point is 00:14:10 you know, some more evidence than just, you know, a tape with a minute missing out of it, or however many, however long it was, that there was a gap in the film. But we need to know the heart of the question, right? When Alex Acosta says, Jeffrey Epstein belonged to intelligence, and that's why I gave him a sweetheart deal in Florida, what is that? mean? Who are you talking about? Who told you he belongs to intelligence? These are the questions that need to be answered. And so, yeah, I mean, Emily, that might be in the calculation that we want to this to go away. We want to act like we're on the side of disclosure. It's not going to go away without a lot more information coming out. Also, the decision that this admin has made to not
Starting point is 00:14:49 prosecute anyone. There's, Prince Andrew is now completely off the hook after being, you know, very credibly accused of assaulting a minor, thanks to Jeffrey Epstein. And now he's just free to travel internationally because I guess the United States government is no longer pursuing charges against anyone. This is all very bizarre. People are going to keep asking these questions. And Prince Andrew, of course, we're not allowed to call Prince Andrew anymore because he's been stripped of his prince title over this, basically. So, Evita, on that note, I guess I'm curious why you think it is, this is sticky with MAGA, because my read on the last maybe six or so months since Pambondi and Bindergate is that the administration and Trump himself thought that if they said, all right, case closed, we can't go any further without harming people, et cetera, it would kind of fade into the background. I don't think anybody was under the illusion that it would just go away, but that it would sort of fade a bit. into the background and people would stop making so much noise about it. But why do you think it is?
Starting point is 00:15:57 You know, I remember talking to a congressman before August recess, Republican congressman before August recessed right after they passed the beautiful bit, one big beautiful bill, as they called it, they were saying they did expect to get questions about Epstein and that people in their district do care about it, which is normally not what you would hear from Republican congressmen about, you know, some issue if they thought it was a distraction. So why is it, do you think people continue, like MAGA people continue to care so much about the Epstein case? this gets to the heart of what MAGA is. Maga is anti-corruption. Maga is a full populist revolt against the deep state. And when we think about what's animating MAGA, well,
Starting point is 00:16:34 people are thinking about, you know, the murder of John F. Kennedy. We're going back to the Promise Software scandal, to Muskegon to, you know, like every single government malfeasance instance that there is, and there are many of them. And Jeffrey Epstein is especially animating because he's recent. The people who are involved are still alive. The people who are involved, many of them are still in government and ruling over us. And so, okay, we're not going to get to the bottom of who killed John F. Kennedy. We're not going to know the ins and outs of what role, if any, our government or another government played.
Starting point is 00:17:10 But we should be able to get to the bottom of Jeffrey Epstein because his co-conspirator is currently alive in prison. A bunch of other people who were friends and associates of his still have lots of power in this country and money and presumably we should be able to get to the bottom of this. And for some reason, we're not. And that's very frustrating to MAGA, who, again, is anti-establishment and is animated by not just this issue, but decades of government malfeasance and scandal. This is the one thing where we've said we want the truth on this top, just this one. Just give us Jeffrey Epstein. And they haven't felt satisfied by that.
Starting point is 00:17:45 Let's now turn to the state documents, 20,000 of which were released by the House Oversight Committee, actually Republicans on the host. House Oversight Committee last week under James Comer, which reveal, as Matthew Stoller put it, it's basically like if the guys from American Psycho were emailing each other on their iPads. That's what we're looking at as the curtain has been pulled back on their many emails back and forth with Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein's correspondence with people like Larry Summers, Michael Wolfe, Gleine Maxwell, herself, and other very wealthy, very powerful. people. I want to focus just for one moment here on Larry Summers. Let's put F7 up on the screen. This is actually an article from the Harvard Crimson. Summers was, of course, the president
Starting point is 00:18:31 of Harvard, during which time he steered lots of money from Jeffrey Epstein to Harvard. So actually, this is what the article picks up on from the emails. When former Harvard president, Lawrence H. Summers was pursuing a romantic relationship with a woman he described as a mentee, he turned to a longtime associate for guidance, convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. I'm going to keep reading from this crimson article because it is like just so disgusting and in so many different ways. Here it is. In a sequence of text and emails between November 2018 and July 5th, 2019, think about those dates. That's the end of Epstein's life. Summers turned to Epstein for advice on his pursuit of the woman.
Starting point is 00:19:23 Epstein was quick to chime in with assurance and suggestions, describing himself in November 2018 message as Summers wingman. The messages became public, et cetera. Now, here is another one. Summers, who has been married since 2005, told Epstein he thought the woman was reluctant to leave him because she valued his professional connections. Epstein told him in one June 2019 text, He is doomed to be with you.
Starting point is 00:19:49 Now, bear in mind, Larry Summers was the Treasury Secretary under guess which president, Bill Clinton, President Bill Clinton. Now, Summers, of course, as we mentioned already, is married, at least was married, at the time of these emails back and forth. Epsine at one point said she's already beginning to sound needy, smiley face. nice, just absolutely disgusting, disgusting. And want to add one more thing that Matthew Stoller figured out and everyone should subscribe to Big his newsletter if they haven't yet. He noticed that this woman is actually a daughter of a belt and road official in China. And Summers is basically like, I want to just use the phrasing that Stoller had on it because it was so, he put it so well, Basically, that as Summers was engaged in this weird back and forth, I'm sorry, it was
Starting point is 00:20:52 Ryan Grimm, who put it this way. As he's steering this money from her dad, he's also trying to sleep with the daughter. So it's like one of the, she explicitly, as Stoller puts it, she quote, explicitly thanked Summers for supporting her dad. Yeah. What the hell, Evita? Seriously. Yeah. I mean, and what's amazing to me is that he still has a job. He's like a tenured professor at Harvard still. And the Crimson Review reported on that as well, which, by the way, I think there are a student paper. So kudos to them for this reporting. It's really awesome. But yeah, I mean, it's incredible. I mean, he's basically going to the expert of sleazyness and inappropriate behavior to get advice on how to be sleazy and inappropriate with somebody who is his underling. and I think he's getting pretty good advice from Jeffrey Epstein. And this goes to show just how powerful people Jeffrey Epstein was in connection with. I mean, a former, you know, official in the Clinton admin, the president of Harvard University,
Starting point is 00:21:55 the most powerful prestigious university in the country, who still has a very powerful role at that university. So, yeah, I mean, it's incredible. And I think more and more people are going to be exposed for what, for their relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. and there's a lot more that I think is going to come out. Yeah, and Summers has just in the last several hours said he is now taking a step back from public life. And I found that Ryan Grimm post I was looking for.
Starting point is 00:22:21 He mentions, quote, Larry Summers pursuing the daughter of a top Chinese official involved with Belt and Road and supporting him in order to sleep with his daughter is, I mean, what do we even do with this? The Center for American Project wants to put Summers in charge of major parts of its goofy, quote, project 2029. That's real. Summers was supposed to have a major oversight role over something called Project 2029 to come up with the Democratic parties, essentially its answer, to Project 2025, if a Democratic president is elected in 28. And Avita, these emails, beside the one that I just read, it is a constant back and forth
Starting point is 00:22:55 between Larry Summers and Jeffrey Epstein. You could even, like, eliminate the whole belt and road aspect of this, which, as Stoller says, if he should, if he has a security clearance, it should be out the freaking window at this because he's doing all this on a damn Gmail, on a Gmail. He's going back and forth with Jeffrey Epstein, who to your point about intelligence connections, Evita, we have seen in the hacked emails and DropSight has lots of stories on this,
Starting point is 00:23:19 running around with a hoop a rock, the former Defense Minister of Israel, Prime Minister of Israel, manipulating geopolitics, and here's your former Treasury Secretary, former President of Harvard, getting relationship advice, bouncing ideas constantly off of Jeffrey Epstein.
Starting point is 00:23:34 Yeah, the Robert Maxwell, you know, angle is also fascinating. I mean, that's, that's the father of Gilane Maxwell, who was a longtime girlfriend, and is basically a unconfirmed but confirmed, you know, massad asset. So the ties here are very explicit to intelligence. We just have to confirm them. I'll say this about President Trump. You know, he's, I think if they had something like a smoking gun on him, that President Trump was involved in trafficking of children, like with Jeffrey Epstein, we would know about it. Like, I do believe that whatever the reason is for President Trump not wanting a lot of these files to come out initially, wanting to remove, you know, all the focus on it. I don't think that he is somehow a pedophile.
Starting point is 00:24:17 I'm not going down that path. I think it's interesting that when he's talking about releasing the files now, he's saying, okay, you want to go Democrats? Let's release them because there's a lot of your friends who were implicated here. And he's right about that. I mean, this is, I mean, and this is the thing about blackmail and intelligence is they're, getting dirt on everyone. Okay, you want to release the files. We're all going down. And it's a problem for Democrats to make this an issue of President Trump and Republicans when clearly Jeffrey Epstein was tied to Democrats, was getting blackmail on Democrats, in my opinion, he probably was.
Starting point is 00:24:50 And probably had more, I think he had more friends with Democrats and he's Republicans. If you just look at the number of people he was associated with, these are Democrat voters and donors by and large. So, yeah, I mean, I think Trump's like, you want to go, let's go. And I don't think Democrats are going to like the results here. No. I mean, clearly, if they wanted the, if they thought this stuff was more damaging to Donald Trump than to themselves, they would have released it during the Biden administration in all likelihood. But what is the one entity that Republicans and Democrats are incentivized to cover up for alike? It's the intelligence community. And so I think that's why there's clear reluctance,
Starting point is 00:25:24 whether Republicans or Democrats are in office, to divulge everything. But we have to be careful not to get distracted by sort of the tawdry details and stay focused. focused on, to your point, Evita, obviously the consequences for foreign policy and for domestic policy, too. So let's actually read this other email where Larry Summers, this is in October of 2016, this is F8, says, Jeff, how plausible is idea that Trump is real cocaine user? Epstein replies, can someone from the development office show Rothschild around Harvard sat? I mean, Larry Summers responds, yes, let's briefly discuss. Can you have her write me? Incredible stuff.
Starting point is 00:26:12 Here's another one from Jonathan Farcus, who is married to a department store heiress. I believe that's how he came into all of his money, a fixture on the New York socialite scene, apparently. Amazing. He is married to Summers Farcas, who is served on the committee to choose Trump's White House fellows, also confirmed recently to be U.S. ambassador to Malta. So her husband, Farkas, is going back and forth in 2017 with Epstein about his paramour, about his mistress, essentially. And at one point just says, Jeffrey, please help me here.
Starting point is 00:26:52 Is she a hooker? Jeffrey, please help me here. Is she a hooker? Epstein, by the way, says he knows that she is notorious. careful she is notorious, et cetera. Evita, this is, like, you've had some glimpses into this world just because of like your family
Starting point is 00:27:15 has been in this world a bit, one of the few political families that remains normal. But this seems almost unbelievable. Like it seems stuff you couldn't actually even write. Well, and Emily, this is why you're like, why is MAGA fixated on Jeffrey Epstein? It's like, this gets to the heart of the issue. Like we feel like our elite class is corrupted.
Starting point is 00:27:37 It's rotten to the core. And the people want to know the truth. They wanted to come out because they feel in their bones that we are being ruled by really evil people. And a lot of that, I mean, even I look at people, you know, people make fun of PizzaGate a lot. It was crazy. It was a conspiracy. And yes, some pizza PizzaGate was a conspiracy. But what wasn't a conspiracy were the emails.
Starting point is 00:28:01 and cooking. And I mean, some of that stuff was actually real, that leaders in our government, people close to the Clintons, were involved in some very bizarre behavior. So I don't know. I think that people just, they feel like a reckoning needs to happen. And Trump was part of it. And they wanted to go farther. So, yeah, just on the on the Pizza Gate point, what is real from all of that, despite where
Starting point is 00:28:25 that conspiracy theory went is the art collection was absolutely insane. The pedesta art collection was. completely insane and disgusting and reprehensible and went far beyond just the sort of sophisticated palette of a cosmopolitan elite. And that was kind of the kernel that all of the rest of the stuff exploded from, which ended up being very convenient for the Clintons and the Podestas, by the way, because some of the real stories about this disgusting art collection and how normalized everyone parting at the Podesta house around it was, they could easily then chalk up as a distraction or they had a nice distraction to say, well, this is a crazy conspiracy theory, which a lot of
Starting point is 00:29:10 it was. A lot of it was a crazy conspiracy theory. If you look at your, thank you for saying, the Podesta paintings were, they were grotesque. If you look them up, it's children in very compromising positions. They are naked and chained or being abused. I mean, it's an overt glorification of child abuse and pedophilia. That's just what it was. And for some reason, I mean, he was literally profiled on the art in his house by like a respectable magazine. I think it was the architecture digest. Is that right? I forget. It might have been. Yeah. And then he was having people over to his house for parties. Why is this normal? Why is that like a normal thing that nobody thought was weird in Washington, D.C.? Why is that? It's a question that people have.
Starting point is 00:29:58 of, and I think it's a fair one, and it's not a conspiracy that he's clearly a weirdo, a sicko, and a lot of people think it's normal in that city. Right. And, yeah, that is, it's a great point. Before we take a quick break, Avita, the other thing I wanted to note is just you have these very, very powerful men so casually emailing back and forth with Epstein about women. And I think that's very interesting in and of itself that, you know, you have Epstein referring to himself as Larry Summers wingman and Summers is eager to have these conversations to pick Epstein's
Starting point is 00:30:35 brain. Epstein is colluding with Michael Wolfe or is better said as Michael Wolfe is colluding with Epstein. Epstein was clearly trying to stir up rumors about Donald Trump to Michael Wolf who was obviously working on a book about Donald Trump, a kind of hit piece book on Donald Trump and just the casualness. I mean, you see it right there. This is a man who is convicted. this is a man who is openly kind of cavorting with intelligence. And here you have very, very powerful people. We're talking about socialites. We're talking about the former president of Harvard, former Treasury Secretary, just bouncing questions about their mistresses off of him. It's very telling. I mean, don't you think that detail just sort of on its face is very telling? Well, and I think it's especially, I'm sorry, it's just so telling of the left as well. I mean, these are like Democrat men, leaders in the party. Bill Clinton, of course, is one of them who was. who was very close to Jeffrey Epstein and was the President of the United States
Starting point is 00:31:30 addressed the DNC in this last cycle and they're the champions of women and of course they're not champions of women. They are abusers of women in many cases, at least the ones who are associated with Jeffrey Epstein and there is a deep hypocrisy in that.
Starting point is 00:31:48 All right, we're going to take a quick break and we'll be back with Evita Defi Afonso in just one moment. But first, over the years, I have been clear about this. I'm not just pro-birth. I'm pro- life. And being pro-life, it's amazing. It means standing with mothers, not only before their baby is born, but long after. And that is exactly why I partner and partner very proudly with the wonderful people over at pre-born. Pre-born doesn't just save babies. They make
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Starting point is 00:32:56 that's pre-born.com slash Emily. Certainly love pre-born. We are back now with independent journalist Avita Duffy Alfonso, whose reaction I need to get to recent reporting from Tucker Carlson on Friday and then Miranda Devine in the New York Post today
Starting point is 00:33:15 about the case of Thomas Matthew Crooks who obviously shot President Trump, whether or not he acted alone, is still in question. We have had so low. little information released about the investigation into Thomas Crooks and into this vacuum, new reports from Tucker Carlson and Miranda Devine entered. Now, on Friday, Tucker reported on source material, and I want to focus on these sources
Starting point is 00:33:43 in particular, Evita, because there's a lot to break down about where this information may be coming from. So Tucker posted about a 30-minute documentary on Friday. everyone should go and watch it. It is a pretty quick thing to consume. He said, quote, in late September, we received a tip from a source. He told us he gained access to some of Crooks' accounts. Tools commonly used by private investigators were part of how the source got his or her hands on the information. And Tucker said the key lead was using Crooks' phone number, which was listed in documents that had been obtained from America First Legal. obviously Stephen Miller's group before he went into the administration. Now, Miranda Devine's report sources this information to, quote, an enterprising source who uncovered Crooks' hidden digital footprint. The source told Miranda, the danger crooks posed was visible for years in public online spaces. His radicalization, violent rhetoric, and obsession with political violence were all
Starting point is 00:34:45 documented under his real name. The threat wasn't hidden. So, Evita, some of the information that was uncovered by the source who used, again, we're talking about private investigator tools, certainly what the FBI would have had access to at the bare minimum. And we certainly know the FBI would have had access to more, even via subpoena power. You have public posts on an account associated with Crooks' phone number and email that start as being pro-Trump.
Starting point is 00:35:15 And then in 2020, flip to being virulently anti-Trump. The pro-Trump posts or the pro-Trump era in Crooks' life is very violent. He's posting explicit calls for violence. It would be unimaginable to think this hadn't tripped someone's radar up at the FBI at the time. Maybe they really are that bad. I actually doubt that. But the FBI either way said after, this was when they were testifying just a couple of weeks after Miranda points this out. A week later.
Starting point is 00:35:47 So this is a week after the shooting, Ray's deputy, I'm sorry, this is a week after Chris Ray told Congress that the Bureau had found nothing in Crooks' online history that, quote, pointed to a motive or political ideology. A week later, Ray's deputy, Paul Abatei, told Congress that comments posted on one of Crook's social media accounts, quote, appear to reflect anti-Semitic and anti-immigration themes to espouse political violence and are described as extreme in nature. We now know those comments started in 2019, especially, as being sort of anti- anti-immigration, anti-Semitic, and then became violently anti-Trump, and that was not disclosed. Are you buying a Vita that they only had seen Croix's posting that was sort of right-coded pro-Trump? I mean, I'm not buying it at all. I mean, this is the Biden FBI who told us that Christopher Ray testified to Congress and he essentially lied by omission by not telling us the full, picture that this kid, starting in 2020, became radically anti-Trump, violently anti-Trump. I think what Tucker Carlson is calling for here, if you watch the video, there's a lot of information, but really good information, it's really succinct.
Starting point is 00:37:03 We just want to know the truth from this FBI. We really haven't got, we've got really bad information from the Biden FBI. Now under the Trump FBI, we're asking for information. were the, who were the FBI agents who were at the gun range that Thomas Crooks also happened to go to? Did they ever make contact with him? Was the FBI aware of the violent rhetoric that Thomas Crooks was espousing under his real name? We have surveillance. Our federal agencies have surveillance that is kind of rhetoric and behavior online.
Starting point is 00:37:38 And they certainly compile a list of people to watch out for. Were they aware of him? And if not, why weren't they aware of him? These are like very simple questions that can be answered readily by our current FBI. And for some reason, Cash Patel has told Congress, specifically Ron Johnson, who's been asking for this information for a long time, my senator in Wisconsin, that he can't give the information because there's a trial, an upcoming trial. Well, I don't know who they're prosecuting because Thomas Crooks is dead. Well, another detail from all of this is, well, actually, why don't I just let Tucker Carlson say it? Let's roll this out of Tucker discussing Crooks' online presence.
Starting point is 00:38:17 The digital comments we obtained were posted between 2019 and 2020, when Thomas Crooks was between 15 and 17 years old. They show two things. First, that Thomas Crooks was not some secretive lone wolf who never warned anyone that he was planning violence, just the opposite. Second, they show a man who started out as a radical Trump supporter whose views on the president transformed changed completely during COVID. The FBI lied about that fact and pretended that Crooks was a right-winger. At 117 a.m. on July 20, 2019, Crooks commented on the CNN video. He said Donald Trump was the literal definition of patriotism.
Starting point is 00:38:57 Seven hours later, he commented on an MSNBC video. He wrote, I hope a quick, painful death to all. the deplorable immigrants, an anti-Trump Congresswoman, who don't deserve anything this country has given them. That these sorts of comments continued for months and became increasingly violent. And yet in early 2020, crooks seemed to change radically. On January 23rd of that year, he referred to, quote, Trump's stupidity. In February of 2020, he called out Trump's supporters as, quote, too brainwashed to realize how dumb you are. I mean, literally you guys sound like a cult at times.
Starting point is 00:39:32 In August 2020, Thomas Crooks issued what sounds a lot like a digital manifesto. Quote, in my opinion, the only way to fight the government is with terrorism-style attacks. Sneak a bomb into an essential building and set it off before anyone sees you. You're telling me that didn't make it onto the FBI's radar. Track down any important people or politicians, military leaders, etc., and try to assassinate them. Okay, so it's very hard to believe.
Starting point is 00:39:59 The FBI had evidence of the right codest. stuff that Tucker just went through from 2019 and the trail just died when he flipped left and was talking about like terrorism plots openly in YouTube comments, which are absolutely surveilled in 2020. If it is just unfathomable, none of that makes sense whatsoever. And what happened to him also doesn't make sense. I mean, Tucker points out that some of the source material shows he has interaction with someone named Willie Teppas, who is linked to a European Antifa group and that Crooks' YouTube comments seem to stop after the interactions with Teppas, who also seem to be encouraging violence on behalf of Crooks. I mean, this story has gone from
Starting point is 00:40:46 weird to weirder. I mean, it's gone from weirder to even weirder, basically, hasn't it? And Willie Teppas, I guess, is part of a group, a foreign group that has been declared by the State Department as a terror organization, I guess a foreign terror organization. So I would presume, as is what we're saying, we would presume that the federal government would be surveilling the communications of American citizens with declared terror organizations. Again, it doesn't make sense that they're completely unaware, that they've been completely unaware of any of this. And to the credit of the current FBI, they haven't said that they weren't aware necessarily.
Starting point is 00:41:27 They just haven't said anything, and I think people are getting antsy. I think the president of the United States is frankly getting antsy. Miranda Devine has reported out in the piece that you mentioned in the New York Post that the admin is not happy that we haven't had any answers on these questions. I think they deserve them. Somebody, I'm looking at your live chat right now, Emily, somebody commented MK Ultra. And I don't know if it's MK Ultra, but I will say his behavior is quite bizarre. I don't know if they really discontinued MK Ultra or if they got.
Starting point is 00:41:57 the information they needed and the program still continues it lives on the maybe our CIA still uses it to radicalize people we don't know um and the point is that there's no trust and so to just say um and this current FBI trust me bro we got it handled he's a lone actor and you know we got it we got it handled it's just not going to be enough mk ultra of course a reference uh to the CIA confirmed CIA program that was experimenting on unwitting American citizens uh with drugs for years during the Cold War, and that's where I think Tucker was alluding to why Crooks' body was cremated without the county coroner who said he would have been aware, being aware of what was actually going on in this case. Would there have been toxicology that could have been
Starting point is 00:42:47 challenged or raised questions? That sounds wildly conspiratorial and it seems extremely bizarre and hard to believe. But Avita, actually the entire story is hard to believe. So I'm wondering, obviously, you know Dan Bonjino. I don't know if you know Cash Patel. You probably know Cash Patel. But what are you looking to see from them going forward in this case? Listen, I mean, I know Dan. I don't know Cash. I've met Cash once. But I don't think that either of these men are trying to hide the truth. I don't think that because I remember
Starting point is 00:43:26 when the assassination attempt happened and I'm somebody who can uniquely talk to speak to this, I mean, Dan was horrified and we covered it every single day for months. Like he, on his show, he was relentlessly covering the story. Like, you can look
Starting point is 00:43:42 back at the archive of Dan Bonjino shows and he cared about this topic very deeply and he was furious about what happened. I just think we need more transparency. And I also want to point out, you know, as you talk about all of these issues, Jeffrey Epstein, Thomas Crooks, even the pipe bomber, which we're not going to get tonight. But I mean, this is another issue that's going, that's been kind of going viral on the internet. They're probably dealing with a very hostile agency. We have two good guys
Starting point is 00:44:09 who were in at the top. And we can't, you know, deny the fact that there is probably a lot of inaction. You're dealing with something that happened under the Biden admin. And who knows what information is left, if any, at all, that could point to a conspiracy if there is one. I don't know. I know that Dan cares about this issue. So it's hard for me to say, Dan is in on some sort of conspiracy, as some people are suggesting, because I just don't believe that that's true. But there are so many weird things, Emily. So you're right. He should have not had been cremated so quickly because then no other agencies other than the FBI were able to actually look into his body and do their own report or do their own investigation.
Starting point is 00:44:49 You had the FBI cleaning off the top of the building the very next day. Why were they doing that? Usually, I guess, according to Tucker Carlson, they have that job outsourced to a third party. But the FBI themselves, under the Biden admin, did this. The parents of Thomas Crooks, interestingly, very lower class individuals, they couldn't pay for his funeral fees. But for some reason, they've been able to acquire a very high-end expensive lawyer to lawyers to represent them. How did that happen?
Starting point is 00:45:17 Who's paying for it? There are so many questions that are unanswered, and trust me, bro, was just not going to cut it. Well, let's move on to the parallels between Crooks, as we learned from Miranda Devines' report and the suspected shooter, Tyler Robinson, in the Charlie Kirk assassination. Miranda uncovered information that showed Crooks had, quote, two possible accounts on deviant art, a site that hosts fan art and has become notorious for its community of furries, people who identify as anthropomorphized animal characters and or are sexually. attracted to them, one of the deviant art accounts linked to crooks, shared just one post, a repost of a towering, muscular female bodybuilder and a slight man in his underwear. Now, there's a YouTuber named Turkey Tom, who has a video with about a million views that was posted a couple of weeks back. And Turkey Tom, interestingly, and yes, I am seriously referring
Starting point is 00:46:12 to him as Turkey Tom, because that's what he goes by, said he got a message from a third party. close to both Tyler Robinson and Lance Twiggs, Robinson's lover, who was close to both of them and remained in contact with them for like six years, was in Discord service with them. And the only other people who have this knowledge, according to Turkey Tom, is the FBI who also redacted some of these messages in order to prevent the identity of the source from coming out. Now, the source or from being revealed. So the source said that Lance Twiggs had said he was taking black market, H.R.T was growing breasts, that after the election, Tyler Robinson had become much more political left wing, that Twigs would be doodling erratically in ways that made people think needed an exorcism. And also, of course, that Tyler had a deviant art where Tyler Robinson went by they, them, and an accountant. on something called Fur Affinity.
Starting point is 00:47:16 And so just to be clear, I mean, let's go ahead and roll this clip of Turkey Tom about Tyler Robinson's online presence. This is S3. Tyler had a few blurbs of unusual online presence that I hadn't seen. For example, he had a deviant art under his older handle, Crafton 247, where he lists himself as they slash them. It's not possible for this account to belong to someone else that created it after the assassination as it was created two years ago.
Starting point is 00:47:42 Then we have another account with the same exact handle, this time on Fur Affinity. But there doesn't seem to be any significant activity on it, just like on DeviantArt. And for those of you who don't know, Fur Affinity is like the furry website. It's the number one furry website, okay? But Tyler clearly set most of his settings to more private options, which, again, is pretty reflective of the kind of guy he was. Given the testimony from Tyler and Lance's friend, even people who knew them in real life and frequented their living space, only ever caught glimpses of the exact nature of
Starting point is 00:48:12 their relationship based on the last few months prior to charlie kirk's assassination as far as i understand they weren't really having anyone over and their output of messages to their online friends also significantly decreased okay evita so uh you and i have gone back and forth for years privately when we chat um because i have interviewed many parents um whose children fell into um the the these sort of pains of gender dysphoria and we're trying to socially transition or medically transition and a lot of times what i almost every time actually what i would hear is that their children were into anime world and this sounds like uh cringe millennial uh lecturing a zoomer like a vita on this but uh i think there's something to i mean basically
Starting point is 00:49:04 first of all just every zoomer is into anime i get that uh i do think there's something there's a sort of dark side of online anime world, if you're like really into the forums, that plays with gender. And when gender became so politicized after 2016, there became a political element to that type of posting. You are already laughing at me. So tell me why I'm wrong, Evita. I just, I just don't think that's true, Emily. Like, that, like, anime is a medium. Like, it's like saying, like, it's those damn phones. It's like, yeah, but I also could have the hollow app on my phone. You know, it's, I don't, I don't think that anime in it of itself is evil or is a pipeline to transgenderism, certainly various Reddit forums or Discord channels where I guess they're into anime transgenderism is not good. It's bad. It'll lead you down a bad path. But you could say that about any discord chat or any Reddit forum that's not necessarily anime. That could lead down the path of transgenderism. I don't think anime is the source here.
Starting point is 00:50:13 I do think that this kid was certainly, what's interesting when you actually listen to the full Turkey Tom video is the people that were in his, in his Discord channel, the one that, of course, came forward and was giving this citizen journalist, all the information actually knew Lance and said that he really was in a bipartisan group chat. there were a lot of different opinions going on here. Nobody was really transgender that he knew of other than Lance. Some people were actually sort of conservative and espoused sort of conservative ideals and Christian ones
Starting point is 00:50:51 after it was revealed that their friend in the chat was arrested for the murder of Charlie Kirk. So I don't know. I think it's kind of interesting that people are blaming certain mediums and even the medium themselves, even discord is not really indicating. that that was the cause of the of the radicalization. Yeah, I think that's ridiculous. I don't disagree with that. I am, though, let's talk about the similarity here with Crooks and Robinson, just in that, you know, we're going to hear a lot about being very online and all of that, like angry young men. I mean, I guess there are some, some eerie parallels that you have, you know,
Starting point is 00:51:35 It's kind of awkward, loner-type young guys-ish. And they both happen to have some furry world connections. In fact, they both had accounts on furry websites, it looks like, and went by they-them. Actually, I shouldn't say they both had accounts on furry websites because crooks, I think we're just talking about a deviant art, which is like people who do graphic design and animation use deviant art. So that's not necessarily telling, but they had they-them pronouns. or Crook said they-them pronouns, and we see Robinson with they-them pronouns as well.
Starting point is 00:52:12 That's that to me, whether or not anime was a gateway drug. Let's speak to just how odd that is in and of itself, Evita. Well, I mean, it's something that we're not really allowed to talk about anymore. I mean, the LGBT movement says that all of these identities are identities that you're born with, that they're unchangeable, and that there is no mental health element to any of this. and clearly there is. I mean, how many mass shootings have we seen in recent memory where somebody is identifying, not has their given sex?
Starting point is 00:52:45 I mean, it's too many to count these days. And so to deny the mental health element, I think is a misstep. I also think it's a misstep to deny the spiritual element. I mean, one of the most disturbing and yet fascinating parts of that video, Emily, is the report, unproven. but still the report that Lance's parents kicked him out of the house because they said he was demonically possessed. Well, what does that say? That his friend was saying he was acting demonically possessed as he was talking to chat GPT for hours and hours on end in random symbols and in Greek and Latin.
Starting point is 00:53:24 My Catholic alarm bells are going off. This kid was possessed. Like I'm totally freaked out by it. And I do think maybe it's not anime that's a gay drug. Chat GPT could be it. I don't know if you agree with that, Emily, but I am deeply disturbed by the amount of conversations people are having with chat GPT, people being driven to suicide or I guess weird sexual ideations or even communicating as if they're talking to a demon in random symbols and in Greek and Latin,
Starting point is 00:53:54 that is deeply disturbing to me. Yeah, there's some very disturbing examples of chat GPT's outputs coming out of nowhere, like left field with the craziest responses. Megan Basham posted one recently, just like jaw-dropping stuff. And we're all bearing the realization, as we learned it, that the guy who is now alleged to have started the fire in California last January was fantasizing or using ChatGPT to sort of fuel fantasies of arson and wildfire. And that story is like going absolutely nowhere, another young band. I'll just So I guess I'm curious in your perspective of the chicken and egg question, I mean, it's just like, is it, is it that the gender confusion produces this, is the gender confusion what gives way or what kind of gives birth to the misery and the agony and the loneliness and the confusion? Or does something come before that? And it's sort of a symptom. of a deeper rooted spiritual problem, mental health problem, is it sort of that we see so many
Starting point is 00:55:09 mentally unwell people who are dabbling in gender confusion just because they're mentally unwell and that's sort of in vogue right now for Gen Z people on the internet? Or is it that they get exposed to confusing gender stuff and then go down these rabbit holes that pull them deeper into misery. Well, I think obviously before somebody starts to identify as not their given sex, there has to be a spiritual discontent initially. But the dressing, the outward expression of gender dysphoria, maybe actually genital mutilation or of hormone therapy and all the different things that they do, chemical castration, that I think exacerbate. the spiritual crisis because then you are you are outwardly not acting out biological reality you are
Starting point is 00:56:05 you are giving the middle finger to god himself would be my Christian perspective and that will I think fuel the mental illness fuel the spiritual crisis within you and so I mean I think it's so so scary to see how many young people are falling down this rabbit hole it is a social contagion hopefully it's growing out of fashion. I think slowly it is. But there are still way too many people who before they can buy a scratch-off ticket are having their bodies, their minds, and their spirits literally destroyed by this cancerous ideology that clearly is cancerous. I mean, you'll know them by their fruits. What are we looking at right now? This is a destruction of the soul and of society with the social contagion. Right. Avida, I want to get your take on this
Starting point is 00:56:53 clip of Scott Galloway on real-time with Bill Maher, November 14th, so last Friday about how changes in society and work culture since the pandemic have affected younger people. Here's S-7. The second worst thing to happen to young people is remote work. One in three relationships begin at work. This is where you find friends, mentors, and mates, and especially young men, need the guardrails of a workplace. But in my view, the worst thing that's happened to young people is the anti-alcohol movement. I've had Huberman on, who I'm a big fan of an Antion, and my point is that the risk to your 25-year-old liver are dwarfed by the risk of social isolation. In sum, think of all the amazing relationships you've had in your life, and be honest.
Starting point is 00:57:36 Did alcohol play a role? In some, get out, drink more, and make a series of bad decisions that might pay off. Yes. Avita, you are both Maha and Wisconsin. How do you reconcile these two? Okay. Well, I don't drink. And it's not some valiant choice. Like, oh, I'm, I'm anti-drinking. I just, I don't like alcohol. I don't think it tastes good. I don't think it makes me feel good. And I don't drink. And I will, but okay, but I'll say, I do think that it contributes to some anti-social behavior at young people. It's just kind of an excuse not to go out, not to see people. You'd prefer to, I mean, there's so much entertainment now. There is Netflix. There is scrolling. There is like chat GPT. You can have a conversation with that sometimes it feels, I think for a lot of young people draining to even go outside and put in the effort of making friends. And so maybe not drinking alcohol is kind of an excuse. I think you can always go out. When somebody asked me out to go for a drink, I just get a non-alcoholic drink and still hang out. I mean, it shouldn't be a deterrent if you want to be healthy and you don't want to drink alcohol. I also think that the work thing is fascinating and probably true. But I can't really compare it to anything, Emily,
Starting point is 00:58:55 because like a classic Zoomer, I've never had an in-person job. I did have one in-person job. I worked in the basement of my school library where I worked with one other person in book lending, and it wasn't really an office space. So I really have never had an in-person job. I don't know what I'm missing, but probably something. There's probably some truth to that. Yeah, and especially when you think about those, what you just said is so important that you don't have anything to compare it to, because I think that's something your generation is going to struggle with a lot. And it's not, you know, every generation has its own problems. And that's, I would be silly to deny that there's, or to say that there's some type of generational hierarchy at
Starting point is 00:59:33 this point. But your generation does not have the before pandemic kind of young professional experience. And some people seem to be taking that in like a trad direction. And then other people seem to just be bearing themselves deeper in these online rabbit holes. So assure us, Evita, that there are normal people out there who are having normal human experiences. Well, I think there's a lot of young people who know that we are missing something and they're striving for normalcy. Like a lot of them in, I mean, people will talk about the Trump numbers with young people and they're like, oh, he's not doing great with them. No, it's not because they're becoming more Sora Mamdani for a lot of young people.
Starting point is 01:00:18 It's that they don't think he's being right-wing enough. Like that is where we are with a lot of young people, especially young men. They are thirsting for traditionalism, for conservatism, because we literally have hit rock bottom. We have seen our friends be tranced. We have been subjected to critical race theory, the mass mandates, and no prom and no sports. And it's destructive. And the antisocial behavior and people are looking for something different. And they want something new.
Starting point is 01:00:46 And I think right-wing populism is very attractive to a lot of young people. And there is really a golden ticket opportunity for Republicans if they're willing to take it. Evita Defi Alfonso, it's so fascinating to check in with you. Independent journalists, make sure to give Avita a follow. Thank you for staying up late and coming on the show. Thanks for having me. Always a pleasure. Okay.
Starting point is 01:01:11 Let's close the show by. talking about the crazy case of Dasha Nekrosova, of Red Scare fame, of course, being canceled by her talent agency in the Year of Our Lord 2025. It reminded me immediately of this incredible post on X from earlier this month. This is from Maya Luna, who said in response to this NHL post in November of 2022. Transwomen are women. Trans men are men. Non-binary identity is real. That is from the official National Hockey League X account. Maya just said, take me back. Take me back. It is crazy to think back on 2022, which was not that long ago, three years ago, and realize posts like this from the NHL
Starting point is 01:02:10 were absolutely 100% the norm and that was radicalizing to younger generations because they saw these corporate accounts maybe they were on the left maybe they're in the center, maybe they're on the right but especially people on the left would see these major corporations saying things like trans women are women, trans men are men, non-binary identity is real
Starting point is 01:02:30 and they look at it and say, okay, you are a major corporate entity and you are right now just doing like rainbow washing to protect yourself and you see that growing up and think this is there's something deeply weird whether you're the left right or the center I think we we kind of forget how some of those posts actually affected younger people on the left who looked at that and just saw it for how ridiculous it was granted from a left wing perspective. But everyone, left and right, could look at that and just laugh. Nobody wanted to say it aloud at the time. But now we can look back. It's just been three years and laugh at the hilarity of the NHL, thinking it made some sort of profound statement, which really executives were
Starting point is 01:03:23 using as a shield by posting that trans men are men and trans women are women. But my point is this feels like a different era. And again, it happened really quickly. The change happened really quickly, but it's not over. And this has been a persistent theme here on After Party, because you'll remember a couple of weeks into the show, I went to the Aspen Institute as a fellow at this year's Aspen Ideas Festival. And my dispatch from there, we had Bot Younger Sargon on the show, my dispatch was basically like, holy smokes. These people are stuck in 2022, and it wasn't the zoomers. it was the millennials. It wasn't Gen X. It was the millennials. Maybe some boomers. But mostly it was the millennials who still had the pronouns in the bio. We're still doing breakout affinity groups. So based
Starting point is 01:04:15 on race and gender, sexual orientation, still sort of engaging in that type of organizing. And it was fascinating. So here we have the case of Dasha from Red Scare being, I'll put this up on the screen. This is a New York Post report. Succession, actress Dasha Nekrosova, dropped by talent agency after podcasts with far-rate commentator Nick Fuentes. They go on to say the post says Dasha Nekrosova, a podcaster, an actress who appeared on Succession, has been fired from her talent agency Gersh following a controversial podcast appearance. The spokeswoman for the agency confirmed the news to variety. The actress 34 was let go after she and her co-host, Anna Kachian, had far-right commentator Nick Fuentes on their Red Scare podcast.
Starting point is 01:05:03 Just pausing for a moment, that happened weeks ago. Fuentes was on Red Scare weeks ago. Before he was on Tucker's show, this happened weeks ago. So Dasha Necrosova is an actress and a podcaster. You may detest Nick Fuentes. You may think he is a scourge on the body politic. I think he is obviously bigoted. You can think all of those things.
Starting point is 01:05:39 And then realize the absurdity of an actress who is not a politician, who is not a lawmaker, but has a talk show podcast where love, nothing but love for Anna and Dasha, who I've been listening to since they started, they don't even turn on their microphones sometimes. Like the last episode, like they had recorded like 10 minutes and then realized they didn't have the microphones on. This is insane. It's insane. And everyone can see that it's insane now and people can say it aloud.
Starting point is 01:06:17 But we are getting a glimpse of the future, which is as we come up on a year after the 2024 election, the vibe shift election, and we go into the Trump 2.0 resistance. people are once again going to start feeling emboldened to if they believe in canceling someone once again bringing that cancel culture back when you're at like for example a talent agency and you start to be concerned that someone could cost your bottom line or that you are going to it's not worth the trouble of standing up and defending someone who again is an actress
Starting point is 01:06:58 She's an artist. What is the Camille Polly a line that I love so much from the middle of the Me Too movement? This was in, when I say it was the Hollywood reporter in the middle of the Me Too movement, she said the idea of the artist as a moral paragon was, quote, a sentimental canard of Victorian moralism. Beautiful line, perfect line, and a great reflection on Me Too from the thick of it at the time. But this idea that artists should be moral actors. I mean, this Red Scare people love because it's this totally unfiltered exploration of popular
Starting point is 01:07:35 culture and politics. It is, it is not developing party platforms. It's not involved in any sort of partisan project whatsoever. It is literally two people who barely know how to use the microphones. Again, I say that with all love and respect, talking about politics and pop culture in the most casual way that you could imagine. And I actually think the podcast is a great outlet for people who, especially over the course of the Me Too movement and then cancel culture and Trump 1.0, Trump 2.0, had all of these thoughts in their head. And nobody was saying them aloud. There weren't a lot of people who were just talking. And the people who were willing to talk helped get us to a better place. But us kind of being in that post-vib shift or better place right now doesn't mean that millions of millennials who are now haunting the hall. of human resources, departments, and, you know, the world of marketing and public relations are
Starting point is 01:08:35 just going to give up, especially as we get further and further from what felt like the vibe shift. So these examples, there will be many such cases to come, and the absurdity of it all remains true. It remains as true as it was in 2022 when the NHL was tweeting that trans men are men. Here we are in 2025 saying the same thing once again. All right. That does it for us on today's edition of AfterParty. Make sure to subscribe, subscribe, subscribe. It helps us enormously. You can shoot me an email at Emily at Double Makeare Media.com and we'll see you back here on Wednesday with another edition of After Party.

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