Bulwark Takes - Scott Jennings Threw a Fit on Live Television

Episode Date: May 2, 2026

Tim Miller, Sam Stein, and Will Sommer discuss a chaotic CNN panel blowup, the strange rise of Scott Jennings as cable news’ go-to defender, and the surreal world of MAGA-themed cruises—from a ��Gulf of America” getaway to a gay conservative cruise that left Tim stunned. They talk about the escalating Candace Owens feud and lawsuit drama, plus one of the weirdest political clips you’ll see all week—featuring Callista Gingrich.Tickets for our Bulwark Live shows in San Diego and Los Angeles in May: https://thebulwark.com/events

Hey, everybody. The trio is back. We are already being mean to each other in the green room. There hopefully is no HR people on this video. And we're excited to be here with you guys. Me and Sam are going to be in California, May 20th in San Diego downtown, May 21st in L.A. downtown. Get your tickets now. Well, Summer and I might have some live shows coming up too. We'll see. So just everybody's getting involved. Everybody's getting involved. Everybody's getting involved. News to be. It might be happening. But come on. down to SoCal. Come hang.

All right, guys, we've got a lot to cover today. A lot happening in the right-wing media. But we do want to start with what's happened at a legacy media outlet, which is CNN. Well, it's legacy media for now, I guess, until the Ellison's take it over and turn it into, I don't know, make Scott, have like four-hour blocks of Scott Jennings. I don't know what's exactly going to happen on CNN once Ellison's take over. you know, Barry Weiss's sister We'll probably have a show Four hours of Scott Jennings

TVD on what happens with Jake Tapper So I want to play last night Jennings was going after my boy Adam Mockler And things got a little heated That was even a curse And I thought we should watch that together I mean honestly they have been at war with us for 47 years We all know that Scott Jennings is more than happy

To defend a war with a country that starts with the letters IRA that we are currently failing That is going to put us trillions and trillions of dollars more in debt I was only a few years old while you were in the administration defending prior endless wars. Now, this war is failing. Eight weeks is endless to you? Okay, you said it was going to be four to six weeks. Wait a minute.

I debated you on TV four to six weeks ago and you said we were weeks away from it. Now you're making condescending remarks because you can't defend the fact that this war is not going your way. Wait, one more time. Not going. One political concession. Whoa. Honestly, I'm not going to have this guy's going to put on my face. Everybody hang tight.

Honestly. He's aware of this live television. Everybody calm down. Okay, we're having a debate. Got her although there in the corner. Wow. Sam, you've been on a lot of panels on cable news. You've had, there have been some heated moments.

That's a little different. I've never dropped an F bomb on a panel. At least I don't think I have. You definitely never pointed at somebody's face and dropped the Lovon at them. Yeah, okay, yeah. I was going to say, was Adam point? No, no, I mean, when Jennings turned around, like get your hand on my fucking face.

Like, he was pointing at Mockler telling the fucking stuff. I mean, I was going to make, that's lost cool. I was going to make the note of Haraldo being there. Haraldi must have been just absolutely, like, aroused by it all. It's like, this is like, this is Harald's shit, right? Like, he loves this shit. But also, like, the whole thing afterwards where Scott, like, felt like he needed to talk to Abby about, I'm not going to deal with this guy's hand in my face.

Like, I don't want, I don't want to deal with this hand in my face. His hand really wasn't in his face. So I don't know what prompted it. It didn't seem like that serious an attack. on Scott even. I don't know why did he blow up like that. I think what prompted it is a 19 year old was owning him and yeah, his manhood was in question and he couldn't he got triggered. I think his cortisol spiked. His cortisol spiked, but that's crazy that type of reaction. Yeah, I don't know. I think he felt like he got mugged very hard by Adam Mcler and he looks at Adam Mochler and it's like you're 12

and I can't and I'm losing badly to you and so I'm going to try I'm going to threaten to fight. I mean, It's kind of, it's Michael Tracy-esque a little bit. You know, it's like, meet me at the Hampton Inn after this, Adam McClark. I don't know, Will, what did you make of it? You're an expert in cortisol. Yeah, in cortisol spiking, yeah. You know, I think you're right on there, Tim. I think you can tell me, we have to also consider, you know, Kat Abugazela,

another kind of like young left-wing person is there, too. So I feel like Scott maybe felt already like a little embattled. And then, you know, the part where Adam just goes, you know, I was still in high school when you were effing up. buddy and you're doing it again and another disaster for you and then he just goes ah you know he flips out yeah i also just think look when i was on peers i think i brought this up on on our last trio but like i you know they can't peers can't find people to come on and defend the war but like when i was on like i agreed to someone to argue about the war and it was like supposed to be dug the person

that calls himself a pastor and michael knolls michael noles didn't show up and even dug is not like he's more excited about bringing slavery back than he is about this war like Doug wasn't like Doug was very kind of passive in his support for the war and so it's like it's hard to and they're handful out there and you know you can have Mark Tison and micro penis Marklevin I've been like they can't be on every panel you know and so it's tough and I think Scott is in a situation where he's like playing the heel role where he has to defend everything he's decided that that's his role and and it's like there's not a lot of good stuff to point to here Yeah, I think that's a big problem.

Do you think Scott doesn't actually support the war? And he just is having to, you know, that this is his livelihood as he has to just carry the water. Does Scott even think about what he really supports anymore, as I guess a question? You know, or is he fully in character. I think he's in character. I think he's in character.

People so, this is not me speaking. His characters are the war. Sure. I don't think I'm speaking out of turn here because I think other people have made this observation about Scott. But like, there's a, I didn't, I never seen. considered a major source of any variety. But like, I definitely talked to Scott over the course of years, many years ago. And he's definitely become much more Trumpified, much more Trumpified than what he once was. And I think it's been pretty lucrative to the guy, honestly.

Right? Like he, that's it. And he's opened a lot of doors for him. Yeah. Including this, Will flag this right before he came on. I want to go ahead and put this up in the screen here. This is the Gulf of America Cruise, a week at sea. with those who share your values and perspective. Scott Jennings is the main character there. Mike Gallagher, I thought that was Roger Stone until I read the words there, but that's Mike Gallagher is looking rough.

Larry O'Connor is like a local DC conservative talk radio. Larry O'Connor is the true? Larry O'Connor, I believe, just got bumped up to National. They were making a big deal about it this week. It's the 6 a.m. slot, though. So, you know, don't get too excited. 6 a.m. National Talk Radio.

So, yeah, Will. I mean, you know, the conservative cruises are a thing. Always been happening for a long time. But the Gulf of America cruise was Scott Jenner. Imagine being at sea for a week. Scott Jennings. And Larry O'Connor. I like that figure out of my fucking face.

I like how they're all in suit jackets in the picture as well. It's like, are these guys going to be shirtless? Am I going to have to see Scott Jennings' nipples if I go on this cruise? Well, you know, as you said, I mean, look, conservative cruises are a long-time tradition. You know, I believe our colleague Bill Crystal, at least, and maybe some others, have definitely, you know, hit the Lido deck once or twice. For sure. You know, and so, you know, in this case, I do think this is a bit lower rent. We're kind of going down.

I think national review is out of cruise. You know, it's bad. I mean, Scott Jennings is by far, like, the biggest deal person on this cruise. Yeah. How much do you get to be on this cruise if you're Scott Jennings do you think? Like, what do they pay in you here? Who's doing this cruise, by the way? I guess, I'll let you just put this in my, like, from my perspective.

How much would they have to pay you, Tim? I think $100,000. I think $100,000. A week at sea, you're trapped on a boat with people that, like, want to corner you. And all the time, I mean, if it's a conservative cruise, anything, I'm trapped on a boat. And I, and I'm like, I'm like a monkey in a zoo. Like, you're paying me to. go and just clap the chimes and like walk around and talk i have a life man i've got i've got friends

i've got family like what why would i want to do i don't i wouldn't take my family on a cruise i think a hundred thousand dollars is the number for for folks out there i would do it for 99 99 99 okay you get a deal what you look i mean i think this shows i i've never been on a cruise before i'm curious i was going to say look i mean you put me up three hots in a cop you know i'll do it there you go why not the will son of the vacation the Will Summer Bullwark Cruise is coming into focus right now. Oh, man. The name's right there.

We already have the pun. It's the Will Summer Cruise with the Bullwark. Yes. I like it. You could be the MC. All right. Well, this isn't the only cruise out there that I wanted to chat with you guys about. We have a cruise themed episode.

I came across this video on Instagram. I have a hate follow on Instagram, which is a gay conservative named Rob Smith. And occasionally, when I'm feeling a little feisty on Instagram, we'll argue with each other in the comment section of our Instagram post, which is a very healthy thing to do. Yeah. It's definitely what I should be spending my time on. But I came across

this and it caught my eye. This is Rob Smith from the first annual gay conservative cruise. Let's watch. All right, as you can see behind me, I am on the first ever gay, lesbian, conservative cruise. We are about to sail away right now.

All these red shirts you see behind me are gay and lesbian. being Trump supporters. It is absolutely incredible. Thanks to Steve for putting this on at right of center events. It's absolutely incredible. The energy has been so good. Everybody

is so happy to be here. Everybody is so happy to be an out and proud conservative. It's like a lot of fun. And I got to tell you, if you were not here this year, we've definitely got to be here next year. Where are they? Is that a parking? The other, I want to go also. Before we get your reaction. Everybody got a visual there. You can see the crowd size. Everyone there in the red

shirts. Matt, can we look at the other video where Rom gives his top takeaways from the cruise? I'm on the first ever gay and lesbian conservative cruise. Here are three things that I learned about the gay conservative movement. Number one is that it's actually a very diverse movement. You've got the people that will wear T-shirts that says like Hillary for prison, 2016. They'll wear Trump 45-47 hats. They're wearing Maga hats. They're super into like the online Maga thing. But also you have people that are just chill, Republican conservatives.

Make money. Don't want to pay taxes. You know, they voted for Trump, but they're not like super into all of that Maga stuff. So, you know, it's a very diverse group of people. The second thing that I learned is that gay conservatives blend within just basically mainstream straight world, probably better than a lot of the Alphabet Mafia does.

This is not the entire boat. We've got about a third of this boat, so there are straight men, women, and kids and all that stuff and everybody is just kind of like, you know, coexisting. Their children on the gay

conservative cruise? And number three, honestly, it's just gay conservatives are so much more normal than the Alphabet Mafia. I mean, look, people want to have their cocktails, you know, they're like, Imagine you sign up for a cruise.

Okay, it's you. You brought your mom along. It's grandma's there with you. You've got your three kids. You're going to the cruise. You get onto the ship. You're excited for dinner and a show, some time by the pool. And one third of the boat is conservative homosexuals and red t-shirts,

talking about how much they want to bang Rick Grinnell. Like, what? That is a nightmare. You're like, I thought I was just here to see Scott Jennings. Where's Scott Jenner? Oh, wait, where's Larry O'Connor? What boat company did this? Is this Carnival?

This is an affront. Whatever boat company did it, you cannot have a one-third full gig. If you can't fill up the boat, you can't have the cruise. Okay? I mean, we don't want a cruising, sauna time between these. fucking pudgy ass, gay homos. You can say this. Kids are running by.

Kids are running by? Yeah. There's a story. Can I tell you a story about this almost, this kind of happened to me, not to this degree. And I was younger. But my family was on a trip in Israel.

And I was like 12 or something, maybe 11. And we were at the Sea of Galilee. This is going places. And it happened to be New Year's Eve. And my sister, who's older than me, like wanting to party. And because she was like 13, 14, she wanted to actually go out and do something.

And so she organized our whole family, including my younger brother, who's like six years younger than me, to go on a boat on the Sea of Galilee that night. And so we're like, cool, we'll go on the boat. We all get on the boat and we look up and we notice it's all men on the boat. And it's just all men and just my family. And they're all dancing with each other. So we're stuck on the Sea of Galilee with a bunch of his gay Israelis for New Year's Eve for hours. So yes, this would be an equivalent of that, except they'd be conservative in this case.

Wow. That's quite the story. That was a formative moment for you, Sam. Yeah. Do you see anything? Was it? It was a great New Year's. Did you learn about poppers on that trip? I was 11 or 12. Actually, this does raise another question. How much would it, would you charge to go on that cruise? The gay conservative cruise. The gay conservative cruise. The gay conservative cruise. Buck 50? I think half a million. Just so you guys know, we had some technical difficulties, and I got Sam down to $49,000 on the Will's Summer Cruise.

So only 49,000. So Sam's probably happening for Sam. Well, what did you have? There been a lot of buzz about the gay conservative cruise. This is really the first time hearing of it. I mean, I think I was looking at this website, this right of center, you know, gay cruise operation. And, you know, I think for one of their cruises, it's like 30 people.

It looks like Rob's was a little bigger than that. I will say Rob is pretty willing to do stuff for a paycheck. I mean, he famously just took a couple months ago. He took a trip to Qatar and was just like, Qatar is an amazing American ally. So one other thing I wanted to note is like you can see kind of the quandary of the gay conservative where he's like, the big difference with us, we can be around kids. And it's like, okay. You know, I think liberal gay people can be around kids too.

I have kids. It's also very sure. It's like, we're normal. Are you? You guys are all there and you're matching red shirts and somebody apparently had a Hillary for prison shirt on it. That was, that's a decade old. Like, what is your definition of normal? So it's like the J.D. Vance was like the normal gays are with me. You know. I like how the, yeah, I like how the diversity is like, diversity is melting. Diversity in this case is somewhere like truly obnoxious t-shirts and others choose not to. Like, like, that's. That's the spectrum here, folks. Wow. It seemed like the turnout wasn't great. I guess it's really the big takeaway. I think that Rob is in, I think that Rob has a good grip going. I think he's realized this.

But, you know, it's just the whole notion that the MAGA movement was going to be really accepting and excited for gays. I feel like that's waning, you know. And this is the guy you engage on Instagram that night. Didn't see a lot of hotties with bodies on that quick. either. I guess I'll throw that out there. All right. We have a couple other things that want to update us on. Last trio video, we were discussing the Candace Loomer feud, which has escalated some. How could you escalate from Tramp Stamp and your husband is gay? You wonder? Well, this is how the screenshot

of Candice sending a text saying Erica killed Charlie? Oh, that was put out by by Turning Point USA. We saw Erica Kirk had this disastrous appearance where she dressed like a rapper or like a paramilitary. And then Turning Point said, oh, my gosh, we got to turn the heat up. And so they put out this text that Candace sent to a Turning Point employee who was kind of like under her sway and said, you know, you should ask Erica, why she killed Charlie Kirk, which is like pretty poor advice, I would say. But, you know, basically this is all really ramping up. Laura Lumer dug up Candice's husband's DUI arrest and his mugshot.

So things are going to be. Let's take a look. Let's take a look at that. He's kind of a handsome guy, George Farmer. It's too bad that he's in the clutches of Candace. You would think he could do better. Oh, and he's rich, too. And they got married within, you know, like a couple weeks of knowing each other.

It does raise questions. I don't want to be on the side of Candace, but it is a little curious to meet somebody immediately get married. When you have a lot of options, you know, generally you see the kind of minor, minor, minor notables, minor royals, you know, kind of playing the field a little more. So for a long time now, you know, people have been saying, when is someone going to sue Candace over this stuff? Obviously, Brigitte McCrone is suing her over the trans stuff. But Candice had not been sued over the turning point stuff. So then on Thursday, the head of Charlie Kirk's security, who as you can imagine was very implicated by Candice and all these theories, a guy named

Brian Harpole, he finally sued, represented by top DOJ official Harmeet Dillon's law firms. So you can see there's kind of like some official MAGA backing here. So he's suing over a truly bizarre, you know, of all Candace's ideas, she had had this guy on who argued he saw Erica and this Brian Harpole guy at a military base the day before the assassination, suggesting that it was kind of this like deep state plot. So now he's suing over that. Assume that Harmeet Dillon signed off on this and is orchestrating this. Well, you know, I have to assume that now that she's in government running the civil rights division,

I would assume she's like not that involved. But I mean, this is like an official like, well, you know, it is called Dillon Law. You know, so, you know, I do think that this is like a group that is very much like a conservative movement law firm. Like they've represented a bunch of other people in like defamation. They represented Lumer, you know, in the past. Now she's she's suing one of their lawyers or, you know, one of their attorneys did. Can we talk a little bit about the Erica Kirk appearance? The video she cut from the studio wearing looking like Jamarquire a little bit.

why why why why did she do that what's the explanation i'm not trying to like i'm honestly not trying to like i feel for her she has to do this shit and she went through another trauma at the white house correspondent association dinner and like what people give her a lot of shit and i'm not for that but it does seem like at some point she should recognize that the more she puts herself out there uh she's not doing herself any favors i guess does she need to do this i i've also that's my point i've also been sympathetic like i i i cringe a little bit at some more over the top attacks on her, particularly in the wake of her husband's death.

It's been going on for a while now. She decided to take over an organization that's a political organization, and with that comes criticism and mockery. Like the Drusky video, which was fucking hilarious. I serve a righteous God. And that is why we say

our prayers. hilarious. But like, I don't know. If I got assassinated next week, I don't think Tyler would take over the podcast. You know what I mean? It's kind of a rare thing. Like, every once in a while this will happen where a spouse will take over their, you know, it's usually the wife takes over their husband's mission. This does happen in politics from time to time. But like, she doesn't have to do it. I mean,

that's Andrew Colvin guy is like, seems like he's basically running deep USA anyway. He could have done that. They could have gone and done a search and found someone else, you know, whoever is the most impressive of the little Nazis running their various campus organizations. Like that person could have taken it over, right? Like, I just, it's strange. And she seems very volatile and emotionally unstable. And it's just like, why are you doing this? Yeah, I mean, I give her some leeway for the emotional instability.

But to your point, like, every time she goes public and this is, it happens every single time. It just doesn't really, I mean, she's just subjecting herself to the, this cruelty. Maybe something is just like, fuck the haters, right? But at the same time, it doesn't seem like she does herself any favors by doing these types of videos. She's also just not

that good at it, which is like the other thing. Right. Like, she's just not good at it. And it's like, okay. I mean, the things I'm not good at, right? If I was married to an NBA player and they got assassinated, I wouldn't take over their role as the shooting guard of the team. You know? Like, I can't,

I'm not good at that. I can, and she's, and she's not good at this. And so I just think that would be. Will, do the, do the people, is there any, like, internal TPSA gossip you hear about this or no? You know, I, I hear from sort of people, sort of like, tertiary TPP USA people. And I do think there is this sense of, like, I think after a couple, you know, a few months, people, I think cut her a lot of slack, because obviously she was grieving, facing these things. But I think, as we're saying here, you know, it's been a rough seven months in terms of her public image and stuff. And for me, I think what was so crazy was this outfit, this, like, this, like, like this all black, this kind of like, you know, whatever you want to call it.

It's like a cat burglar. Yeah, like a cat burglar. And so I think after like a couple months of being like, okay, I think my instincts are off. Even if you're going to stay in this role, I think maybe let's have a more, you know, conservative, sort of less ambitious look for this. You know, and the other thing I would say is that like, you know, she mentions the jerusky skit, which you mentioned him. I mean, she said, you know, I've been taking all these arrows.

You know, Candice Owen says I murdered my husband. there are comedians doing white face of me. I have comedians dressing up in white face. I have people saying I'm not fit to be CEO. And I have Candace Owens claiming I murdered my husband. And, you know, Ashley Sinclair and both my little Eunopoulos after that video came out, they said, look, like Charlie Kirk loved when he was lampooned in the mainstream media. Because obviously it's a sign of its success.

It kind of makes more people aware of him. They said he would have, you know, had Drewski done a white, face thing of him, he would have been dining out on that for six months. He maybe would have done a video with Drewski. And so I mean, I understand that she's not up for that. But at the same time, it's kind of like what the modern media environment requires.

Yeah. Rough all around for old, Erica. Okay. What else do we have here? I don't know what this is. I've just been told that there's a Kalista Gingrich FaceTune item that has been prepared for this video. And let's just take a look.

and I'll be learning along with the viewers. Hello. I'm Callistic Ingris, and I'm delighted to celebrate National Apprenticeship Week. What? As U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein, I've seen firsthand the power of apprenticeship. Play it again. Play it again. I was too far. I was scared. It's like an apparition. Hello, I'm Callistic Ingridge, and I'm delighted to celebrate National Apprenticeship Week. as U.S. ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein,

I've seen firsthand the power of apprenticeships. What is happening with her face? What is that? I don't know. Why did they do the blue screen behind her? I mean, that looks like the kind of thing in a movie that's like, welcome to the bunker. Like the world is, you know, it no longer exists.

That does seem like that. Can we just pull it up as a still? Can we pull it up as a still? I need to take one more look at it. Did they mean to it? What? But did they mean for the blue screen to have like a fake CGI backdrop on it and they just didn't Put in like was like supposed to be like Swiss the Swiss Alps or something like right there

Apprentices yeah and they felt like to like that's supposed to be from the leftovers like a situation I mean that is spooky that is spooky do you think her and nude are still kissing Yeah man they send they put up pictures all the time of them on the golf course that's that sort of gets to another point I mean famously, she's a big fan of face tune, right? Where you kind of like smooth out your face. And she doesn't give Newt the same treatment. Yeah. And so, you know, Newt will look like an old guy.

And then she has like a totally smooth face. So I kind of assume the same thing is going on here. Can I just tell everybody, look, if you want to do something to make yourself feel better, like to your face or to your body, I'm for it. Okay. I don't, I'm not, I don't do anything that would make you feel. I don't want to do anything that would inhibit your ability to be your true self. Just as an objective observer, though, if you overdo it on the face tuning, it is creepy.

It takes you into the uncanny valley. Like, I would rather see a couple of your wrinkles. Like, I would rather feel like you're a human that I can touch who breathes, who has a beating heart, you know, who gets excited in the bedroom. Right? Like, this doesn't not look like that. This looks like a strange apparition inhuman that is very scary and makes me want to run away from you. And I see this in my personal life. I see some people that overdo it on the face tune.

And I'm like, you know, a little light face tuning, you know, spruce things up a little bit. A little thought pick, sweet. But once you're teetering into, is this a human or is this some other kind of foreign species inhabiting our planet, that's a mistake. And if you just need, if you want somebody just to be a gut check for you on that, you can just, you just shoot me a message with the draft. And I'll do my best to review. We've really come full circle on this conversation. We started with hands being too close to someone's face. And we've ended with face tuning. Look at that. Well, there you go, Sam Stein. This is why you're usually in the host chair. We'll leave it there. Come see us in San Diego or Los Angeles. Subscribe to the feed. We're going, we are getting passed by some of these MAGA losers on YouTube subscriptions. So fucking subscribe. right now.

Please. And tell your friends to subscribe. And if you have a second account, just subscribe on that one too, just for fun. If we raise, and if we raise enough money from paid subscriptions, we will use those funds to pay for Tim to go on a gay cruise.

For Will Summer Cruise. Will Summer Cruise brought to you by the bulwark. We'll see you all then. Bye.