The Charlie Kirk Show - Antifa Attacks TPUSA In Berkeley
Episode Date: November 11, 2025TPUSA returned to UC-Berkeley on Monday night, and violent Antifa radicals went on the attack. A local student describes the scene, and then Blake and Andrew discuss the need for real consequences to ...stop Antifa’s war on civilization. Chris Rufo discusses the need for JD Vance to step forward as a great uniter of the GOP’s factions. Watch every episode ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com!Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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My name is Charlie Kirk.
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All right. Welcome back to the Charlie Kirk Show. It is Tuesday, November 11th.
Honor to be with you all. Stations across the country, Real America's Voice, streaming podcasts.
Thank you so much for joining us as always. I'm joined by Blake Neff, our not-so-secret weapon.
I'm Andrew Colvin, executive producer of this fine show.
We have lots to get to.
Yesterday, of course, was the two-month anniversary of Charlie Kirk's assassination.
And we had a campus tour event.
The final one of the This is the Turning Point tour.
We rebranded it after Charlie's assassination.
And it was at UC Berkeley, which is supposed to be the birthplace of the modern free speech movement.
This is a free speech movement and like persistent like layer of the worst, most like wretched elements of the ones that haven't moved to Portland or Seattle.
Yeah, Charlie visited the campus a few times.
I was with him on one occasion and we were struck by just this prevailing sense of nihilism and of depression.
It's a very, it's a very, I think, a dark place, but there are great people there.
And Antifa swarmed our event last night.
It became a massive news story, as most of you probably have heard by now.
And I want to get right into it because we have Lila Yusuf.
She is part of our Cal Berkeley TPSA chapter there.
She's a second year law student.
And she was stuck in the mob, had glass bottle and paint thrown on her.
And I want to welcome her to the show to give us her firsthand account of what she saw and witnessed.
Layla, welcome to the show.
Thank you so much.
Good morning.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, thank you for coming on and making the time.
I know it was probably a late evening for you all there and an eventful one.
So why don't you just start by telling us what happened, what you saw, and we're going to unpack this piece by piece here.
Sure.
It was absolutely a horrible experience with the Antifa book protesters.
Pretty much I finished class around 530.
I walked over from the law school
and kind of it was clear
that there were two different groups
it was the Antifa and the violent protesters
carrying their signs
at that point they had already started
mocking Charlie Kirk's death
shouting slurs like
Nazi, fascist, anyone walking by
wearing a maga hat or anything
with the American flag on it
I saw people stepping on U.S. flags
and so then
I ended up joining this line
of people to enter when all of a sudden I start hearing three loud booms and it sounded as if it was
as if it was almost a bomb or gunshots going off. I later found out it was I believe some car
revving or fireworks and then all of a sudden I see a glass bottle being thrown above the crowd
at the police officers and all of a sudden the police officers they kind of get into a formation
they put their visors on, and that's when the glass bottles get started getting thrown on us.
And so I at the time was standing with a police officer.
I was the first person in line in the barricade that at the time was open.
So I ran through the barricade, and I ran through the two lines of police officers,
and I kind of hid beneath the police officers to be protected from a glass shard and bottle that was almost a few inches from my head.
Yeah, and so just so everybody's clear about what actually happened, and, you know,
were so close to it that you probably didn't understand the tactical formations that were happening.
So these Antifa people, and I've got the whole rundown from our team, these Antifa thugs
tried to basically block off the one entrance to the venue.
It's 141. Throw it up.
Berkeley and fascist turning points youth-oriented campaign of incitement to violence.
Yeah. So what they're doing now is they're claiming that turning point is inciting violence
by holding a free speech event in Charlie's honor,
something he died for, something he was murdered for.
As always, our speech is violence.
Their violence is speech.
Yeah, exactly.
The whole upside-down bizarro world that is the radical left.
So what they did is they cordoned everybody,
they tried to block the one entrance.
And what happened was we were begging the police.
Our staff was begging the police to get involved to open this up.
And it wasn't until actual violence started happening that the police finally, you know, did something to block these people off and create, say, passage.
And they did sort of a thing that we experienced at UCLA a few years back where they played with the QR codes.
So a lot of, maybe you could speak into this later where a lot of people had QR codes.
And we have to use, sometimes we have to work with the university, especially in California, to, for ticketing systems.
And a lot of people were having issues with that.
Can you explain what was going on there?
what do you know about that? Yeah, so pretty much I like many others in the line, we had already
ticket, we had tickets, we had QR codes that we believed would work. And when we would reach the
front of the line, we were told that this didn't work because we had only filled out a student
interest form or not the correct form. We were pretty much all being told different things.
And I believe it was part of an orchestrated effort to ensure that the hall wasn't completely
full, that the students were allowed to enter. And as you mentioned, this was the one,
entry point. So, so we were kind of left with, we're stuck in this line, but I can't even leave
because I'm going to be attacked by these Antifa thugs. So it was, it was, we were pretty much
cornered. You were sitting ducks. Yes. Yeah, pretty much. And the QR codes, nobody knows why they
weren't working. I'm a Berkeley law student. I mean, you think that I'd use my Berkeley law email
to register for this event through Turning Point, through the, through the school, and somehow it's not
working it's it's for the number of people that i saw not working for it's it's it's very odd yeah you
yeah you almost yeah you almost assume that there was some sort of sabotage going on i mean i i i mean
i'm not trying to speculate wildly but it does feel and we've we've run into this before in
memphis we had a situation where the actual administration in the school were sabotaging our
events so it doesn't surprise me that you would go into a deep blue university and there would be shenanigans at
Blake I just I really it's really incredible to read this flyer they had because it
includes the line yeah put it back a few example it's in tiny text a few examples of Kirk
and turning points typical rhetoric should make clear that turning points actual method for
our university community is not about free speech or freedom of debate it is about the
intimidation of free speech especially in an academic setting it is about bringing an end
to free debate these people they they just accuse you of exactly
what they do. They're really
despicable, despicable vermin.
Well, and there was, you know, fights that broke out,
and I think we have the
the B-roll of this. They attacked our people.
They attacked. So what happened in this instance
is there was a guy out there with
a red freedom shirt, and it had a cross
on the back, and he was saying, Jesus is Lord,
you know, whatever, and
he's getting antagonized by these
people. And then
one of these Antifa goons
comes up and rips the cross
in his chain off of him. The guy
runs to go get it and then the guy proceeds to physically assault him, punch him, bloody him.
The cops in their defense probably didn't know who started it. They tackle both of them and
they arrest him. Yeah, this is the bird's eye view of this altercation. And you can see he
rips the chain, and then he's running after to go get it. And this guy just proceeds to just pound
him, grab him by the collar and punch him in the face a couple of times. The guy kept going
after him and before the cops ended up
tackling both of them and putting them both in
handcuffs. I don't know the status.
There was video of them taunting him afterwards. Yeah, and they
said, you're bleeding, white boy, you're bleeding. So then he
racial, so the other goons come up and they racially
taunt him for being a white guy.
And the guy that, you know, that
grabbed the chain certainly doesn't, he looked dead in the
eyes. Let's put it that way. Look dead in the eyes.
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We've got Lila, Yusuf from UC Berkeley.
So tell us what happened inside once you guys did get inside.
Actually, what happened with the ticketing system?
How did you ultimately get inside?
Yeah, so I got inside because one of the turning point staff members was very kind and helped me.
honestly walked me through every single gate because they were being for some reason even when
I had a QR code they didn't want to let me in so and even and when I got in I was like kind of
surprised because the room wasn't even full yet like I thought I wasn't being allowed in because
it was that capacity or something but they were simply just not letting people in for some
arbitrary rules but then I did end up getting yeah good and so what happened when you got inside
I mean, this was, I, the clips, I literally, I jumped out of my seat and I started clapping.
I was so proud of you guys because it was, it was like, I knew the hell outside.
I was getting calls from reporters that were stuck outside being like, can you get me in?
Can you get me?
The reporters were freaked out.
And so I had to connect them with turning point staffers to get them inside the building.
I know some of the audience members maybe questioned my judgment, but listen, anybody who stuck out in that melee, like, you know, you can make reporter jokes all you want, but nobody deserved to be stuck out there with the.
chaos and the violence that was happening out there. And so we got them inside. We made sure
they had a safe place to get to. What happened inside? Because it was beautiful.
It was phenomenal. Honestly, I mean, I've never been able to wear my MAGA hat for the past
year and a half that I've been at Berkeley. All Berkeley conservative students, and I say I speak
for pretty much all of us. We are ostracized. We are canceled. So to be able to hear
wonderful speakers like Rob and Frank kind of go into this notion of yes we have
conservative values and beliefs but we can't succumb to the pressures that they want us to
we can't join their cancel culture we have to love and not hate we have to remain true to
our principles and values and kind of doing it through a comedic fashion and just the full two
hours even the Q&A was wonderful I mean there was this one individual who asked a
question in a very rude derogatory manner
And Rob Schneider at the end told him, come shake my hand.
Come up and shake my hand.
And I think that that is symbolic of what us conservatives believe.
We are able to talk with people that we disagree with.
And that was this whole message of this entire event.
That's fantastic.
I mean, the clips were absolutely amazing.
And, you know, there's a, here's, we'll just give up people, you know,
let's just give a taste of inside because it was, it was an amazing, amazing moment.
Let's play 149.
This is UC Berkeley turning point chapter president.
He gave a great speech.
I was very proud of him as well.
John Paul Leon.
John Paul Leon.
There you go.
149.
It is clear to us which side is winning when your side becomes the violent agitators.
When you try to win with force and not through reason, you have lost.
And the reality is they would never come in and ask a question.
They're not trying to win honestly.
They have already lost the intellectual battle.
Their goal is to deserve the crowd.
silence those who disagree and destroy any ounce of conservatism that they can get their filthy paws on.
Well said. Lila, why don't you just sum it out? We've got two minutes left here. What has happened in the wake of Charlie's assassination on UC Berkeley's campus? What are you noticing? Are you seeing more courage? Are you seeing more attacks? The floor is yours.
Yeah, so at the law school in particular, I think the pressure has been heightened because the undergraduate campus is huge. I mean, it's,
It's almost 40,000 individuals, but the law school is small.
So each class is about 350 people.
And after the assassination of Charlie Kirk, I had people taking pictures of me because I was,
I'm somebody who is who is vocally conservative, being canceled, people saying we shouldn't
have just killed Charlie Kirk.
We should kill other people that think like him.
And kind of pushing this narrative forward.
And so people like John Paul, for example, and myself have said, have.
faced a lot of backlash for even, even the day I posted that Charlie Kirk got assassinated,
the amount of messages I got saying I should die just like him, and kind of this general rhetoric
within the student body, but also around the community as well. This is, it's not safe anymore
to walk around Berkeley as a conservative. It's a very dangerous place. Antifa is prevalent,
and it's a domestic terror group that needs to be handled with. And quite frankly, with all their
defund the police chance, I don't think the police are intervening enough and protecting the
students enough. The administration certainly isn't. So I certainly, of course, since the assassinations
of Charlie Kirk, people who before were afraid have been more empowered to speak, but that has come
with consequences, unfortunately, at Berkeley. Yeah, we really need to emphasize on that point.
Like, Antifa is basically, like, if we had a group that just in the South, if we had a group in the South,
that had a uniform and went around and terrorized people who were trying to hold speeches, you know,
like the Klan did.
back in the day like we'd be able to say this is a domestic terror group and should be targeted
accordingly and like when you have these antifa urchins who will harass any conservative event
in berkeley that is a domestic intimidation terror group yeah i mean to to blake's point it's a really
good point and uh you know and you brought it up lila that you do not feel protected you do not
feel like the cops are taking this seriously enough and we did have the president just you know
declare that antifa is a domestic terror group and i know treasury is working on kind of putting
together this loose network. They pop up cell by cell, but they do wear uniforms. Listen, if you're
going to wear the black block and you still want to, you still want to do this thing where you
identify yourself visually, then I think the authorities need to be empowered. And there was a lot of
that going around on X last night where people were like, listen, they're laughing in your face
to the administration's face because they're out there loud and proud and nobody's doing anything
about this. And students like you are getting caught in this violent culture, the subculture's
ideology that's trying to intimidate, bully and assault conservatives on campuses like UC Berkeley.
What would you like to see happen as a result of what we saw unfold last night?
I would like an extreme condemnation from the administration first and foremost. I would like
for heightened security for our events, any conservative events,
in general across campus.
And I want this university that once used to supposedly
champion itself as being, you know, free speech and all
to recognize that it's now not free speech.
It's free speech as long as they like it.
And if they don't, then you're gonna get a glass bottle
thrown at you or fireworks thrown at you.
And that's what we saw yesterday.
And no successful institution can succeed like this.
No law school can succeed like this.
How are these people gonna become lawyers
when they can't even engage in dialogue,
with people with whom they disagree with.
The resort is to throw a glass bottle at them.
So this is something that's very dangerous.
I want to see action from the administration
and not just through words, but also through action.
I want these students to be reprimanded.
There needs to be student conduct violations.
There needs to be charges against these people
that are inciting violence against
and trying to intimidate conservatives on campus.
There needs to be a stronger message sent to people.
I absolutely agree.
as long as there is not a full-throated condemnation and very serious accountability.
If a university receiving public funds, like, we have very broad federal laws on this.
If UC Berkeley is systematically not allowing conservative groups to have their constitutional rights express,
the ones that are protected on any public university campus, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly,
these have to be protected at public university campuses,
then the Trump administration should say you're not going to get,
any more money university of california yeah well absolutely but but but but with candidly these
cells need to be rooted out that too yeah i mean like there needs to be the university will help you
if they have an incentive to do it thousand percent well lilo we're proud of you thank you for
showing up last night thank you for remaining firm and bold and loud and proud and not being
cowed by these by these bullies these thugs these goons uh please stay safe uh and we will um we're just uh we're
grateful we're grateful for the front line student work that you guys are doing so god bless you and
we'll see you soon hopefully at am fest thank you have a good rest of your day all right you too
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So we have a great guest up next.
His name is Christopher Rufo.
He needs no introduction for most of you.
Christopher, welcome to the show.
Honor to have you.
And congratulations on your new show, Rufo and Lomas.
I appreciate it.
Thank you so much.
Yeah.
This is, I mean, I, we have a topic, a very clear topic that we're going to get to
about bringing together the disparate coalitions on the right.
However, I just want to encourage, the show that you're doing with Lomaz is going to be
a must listen to for, if you want to hear sort of, I would say, just really smart dialogue,
challenging the ideas, everything that's going on in X, all the chaos.
Maybe just tell us one more.
give us a few lines about about the show and why you guys are doing it yeah we're doing a show called
rufo and lopez it's me rufo and my friend jonathan lopez keeperman uh look we're both creatives
i was a documentary filmmaker lopez was an english professor and so we're trying to tackle
culture and politics through a different lens than people are used to in the kind of traditional
right-wing talk radio format we're trying to take all of the chaos out of the digital sphere
We're trying to break it down, dissect it, analyze it for people, and really serve as a trusted, responsible guide through the times that we're in.
And I think that's what the responsibility for all of us is to do right now.
We have a very chaotic politics.
We have a lot of infighting on the right.
And it's time for those of us who have the ability to step up and try to be a really kind of responsible guide, much like Charlie Kirk was for so many people.
yeah that's that's well well said in a good a good segue and blake's going to kind of bring us to your tweet 114 you you brought this uh this you tweeted this yesterday i instantly flagged it and i thought it was so important we got it here yeah so you just said it's become very clear in retrospect that charlie kirk was holding the right together and that we need j d vance to step into that role which will require settling disputes and laying out the boundaries of the coalition nixon figured out how to do this after
being vice president so and then someone said you know vance should have his own podcast we've had
him on a few times and we should hopefully do that again in the future but yeah i think that's
for those who aren't aware who are watching there's been a lot of discussion of this online because
there's been a lot of arguments within the right over you know for example when tucker
interviewed nick fuentes what are the barrier on the israel question on different on foreign policy
questions on a lot of stuff what's uh up for debate what's not up for debate what's beyond the pale
And, you know, Charlie was such a coalition builder.
He was so interested in keeping the focus on get wins against the left.
Don't, you know, Charlie would not have been having a big fight over what the right should believe a week before the elections in Virginia and New Jersey.
And I think it's very important to emphasize that.
And I'm glad you were emphasizing it, Chris.
Yeah.
And so, Chris, yeah, build on Y.D.
Why do you see him as uniquely positioned to be that person?
Well, look, I mean, I think, again, in retrospect, I saw it.
And, you know, I remember during the transition period, I talked with Charlie, and he called me and he said, hey, I need great names for people to staff the Department of Education.
I'm down at Mar-a-Lago.
We're trying to pick a great team.
And that's the moment that I realized that he was someone that in public had this huge role, but also in private.
He was essential in figuring out how to get good people together that were focused on the mission, that we're going to deliver results.
And I think I didn't quite understand that and appreciate that until after he was gone.
And then there's this sense of a void.
There's no one that can stitch together the various coalitions into the MAGA movement,
into the general right.
He was really just an incredible leader in that regard.
And as I'm looking around for other people who could fill his shoes and serve in that same capacity,
the first person that obviously comes to mind is the sitting vice president of the United
States. You know, J.D. has great relationships with all the various factions on the right. He,
of course, has the bully pulpit of being the vice president. That's actually quite helpful to be in a
powerful position. And he can really gatekeep in a unique way, kind of offering the access to the
White House, offering access to, you know, the office of the vice president. And then getting people in line.
And look, the right is facing this question now.
Obviously, it's very chaotic.
Many of us wish that we weren't doing it, for example, right before election.
But the cat is now out of the bag, and I think we need to resolve these questions sooner rather than later.
And I think the vice president has the authority, the credibility, and more importantly, the relationships to get the job done.
I could see why he would want to kind of let things maybe resolve naturally.
But I hope that he steps up, and I hope that he can be.
a galvanizing figure, hope he can be a figure that really sets the boundaries and also
sets the direction so that all of us can be more effective in our work.
Yeah, I want to let's, let's, Charlie was of course a big fan of the vice president.
I was about to say. Very hard for him to become vice president and senator before that.
And so let's go to the man himself. This is Charlie on J.D. Let's play 158.
We recognized his gifts early on. I saw the talent and I said, this is the guy.
this is the one. J.D. Vance has become such a warrior for our cause in the past six months.
J.D. Vance is acting and looking like the vice president that Donald Trump needs, the vice president
that Donald Trump deserves, and maybe beyond that, even the 40th president. We're a long way from
that. We shouldn't even think or talk too much openly about that, but he's a rock star. He's smart.
He's capable. He's humble. He's phenomenal. And what an upgrade from what we had during that last
administration.
Unclear if he's talking about Joe Biden's or Trump 1.0 there, but it probably would have
remained true from Charlie's perspective on either.
But yeah, I mean, listen, Chris, J.D. has the built-in advantage of not only being the
vice president, but, you know, Charlie in death somehow has taken on even more important
of a position within the movement symbolically, spiritually.
And, of course, the words that he spoke out and all these clips we have of him, he was in J.D.'s corner, a billion percent.
I can tell you this from the first time we had him on the show years ago when it was just talking about hillbilellity.
He'd always say, people would say, like, Charlie, you should run for president.
He's like, I don't need to.
J.D. can run for president.
Yeah.
Yeah. So that, I mean, that holds a significance within the conservative movement that Charlie was such a huge proponent of his.
Yeah, I think that's right. And I think, again, he really set the example.
if you see how Charlie dealt with right-wing racialism, right-wing conspiracism, the Groyper
movement more broadly. He was trying to create good boundaries that would benefit, and he understood
that sometimes there is addition through subtraction in a political coalition. There are certain groups
that you want to manage, and there are certain groups that you want to manage out, because ultimately
they detract. And the end of my tweet was a reference to Richard Nixon.
And if you look at the history of Nixon, Nixon was derailed in his 1962 campaign for California governor by the John Birch Society, which in that time represented a more extreme form of right-wing conspiracism.
They, of course, were famous for attacking President Eisenhower as a communist agent.
And by the 1968 presidential campaign, which Nixon won, and then in 72, which he won by an overwhelming margin, winning 49 states.
he learned how to successfully kind of cut through these thorny questions,
how to create a successful coalition that galvanized huge majorities,
and also how to edge out some of the negative influences,
some of the net negatives like the John Birch Society.
He had this sophisticated strategy of strategic distance
without getting sucked into a debate with the Birch Society.
And I think that for someone like J.D., a similar approach could be quite effective.
Look, again, Nixon won 49 states.
I think he has, he demonstrated one potential model for this that could be very important.
And of course, Nixon was, you know, formerly served as vice president.
And so that's why I think the historical example might be useful and might offer a plausible way forward.
Yeah, I think, I think, you know, there, this, this is.
is the debate.
I mean, what you've just isolated is the, you know, and Buckley played a big role with, you know, who was in, who was out.
I mean, it's a, it's, I can't tell you how many people have sent me the Buckley example going back to those days.
And, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a really tricky question.
It is a tricky one because, like, for example, you could say some of Buckley's influence meant that we had like that anti-intervention, anti-immigration faction of the,
right was was too low for too long and that caused a lot of damage to the movement and the country
arguably yeah no i think i think you have to get it right and i will say you know i mean let's just
name names let's just do it uh and chris you can you can either choose to engage or or not i mean
that's it's kind of what you're talking about the street well let's not get sucked down to it but
you know sucked down into this sort of like uh i would say counterproductive in fighting and i agree
with you that there are opportunities where we need to sort of say hey you know this is a this is a line
too far it's a bridge too far um but you know a lot of people we've said it on thought crime i think
we've said it on this show as well you know a lot of people are asking us to to distance ourselves
from from tucker given everything that has happened and i would say listen one of the last things
that we were asked to do or that charlie made very clear to us was that you know i will not be
you know morally blackmailed uh when it comes to tucker carlson he's my friend i believe in him
and you know listen we have a i i understand a lot of the pressure that comes
with the fallout from that interview.
I understand a lot of it.
But, you know, it's, there is a relationship there.
There is a history there with Charlie and Tucker.
And so just to say it, say it really clearly, that's not going to happen.
Now, debates, the collision of ideas at Amfest, trust me, we are pursuing every single means.
And I think it's a worthwhile debate to be having about what is our foreign policy?
What should it be with regards to how much we spend on four?
nations what you know is there a line between moral and financial support is there a line between
boots on the ground certainly i think the movement is consolidated and um i would say very united when
it comes to boots on the ground but there are really important conversations that deserve
to be challenged in a public forum uh from different perspectives this is lane schoenberger chief
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All right. This is more from when Charlie was singing J.D. Vance's praises in January. It's January 27th of 2025. So earlier this year, 159.
Getting behind J.D. Vance in 2000 and, what was it? 21. Yeah, that's right. 2021, we endorsed J.D. Vance. Very early. It's kind of like buying Bitcoin in 2013. It's a lot of upside. It's a lot of upside.
People hear him and go, wait, this guy is great.
He got vilified so much earlier, and it's got even better.
And everyone around me knows how much I believe in J.D. Vance.
I mean, I went all out twice for him, first on the Senate thing, and then on the vice presidential selection.
Yeah, I can personally attest of just how much Charlie, how much equity he put at, political capital he put into getting J.D.
to be selected as the vice president, to getting him to win the primary,
for the Ohio Senate race, Charlie believed in J.D. Vance. My goodness, J.D. Vance has been an
absolute hero in the aftermath of Charlie's assassination. He's anything we need. He's right
there to help. And he means it. And it's sincere. Blake, take us in. Yeah. Chris, we just want to
hear what you have to think about the elephants in the room, which is we're having this big
factional debate because not, it didn't start with it. But Tucker Carlson interviewed Nick Fuentes. Some
people said that's fine some people said we don't like it but you know whatever it's his show and some
people are saying this is beyond the pale and we should condemn it we're having faction fights at heritage
so we just wanted you to offer your perspective on that yeah how do we how do we approach it chris
well you know it's a it's a little it's a very complex question and i have a few parts to the
answer you know first off i think like many of us Tucker uh gave so many people on the right a great
start, a great boost, great support. I count myself as someone who really is grateful for what Tucker
has done. And so I think you give someone like that more latitude. If you're talking about the Fuentes
interview, my own personal preference would have been for Tucker to really interrogate Fuentes a
little bit more, challenges, opinions, really make it a kind of journalistic and adversarial
enterprise. However, I think that therefore, the call to, you know, banish Tucker, to banish, you
know, Kevin Roberts from Heritage, to banish anyone in that orbit is foolish. I think it's premature.
I think it is counterproductive. And, you know, in my own attempt, like I've texted with Tucker
subsequently, I've tried to give him my sense of how to think about the Fuentes or Groyper
phenomenon, how to approach it in a way that I think would be more productive. We exchanged
pretty cordial messages. And I think that is probably the best strategy moving forward to
recognize that Tucker does have an important place in the conservative movement. And even in places
of criticism, I think that we can try to debate those ideas. We can try to push people in a more
productive direction. I think this is what Charlie did with not just with Tucker, but with many other
people. And I am, well, I think that, look, there, again, there's always addition through
subtraction with people who are net negatives, very counterproductive, I think kind of racialist,
conspiracist factions, certainly fall under that. But, but, you know, this, this instinct to denounce,
to disavow, to draw red lines, to purge leadership, to do that kind of action, whether at Heritage
or now at ISI or in other institutions.
I think that is not the right way approach,
right approach.
And I think we get into an almost inverse of the BLM moment
where you have DEI-style struggle sessions
at conservative institutions.
I think that is a very bad idea.
Post the black square.
Post the black square, Chris.
It's like it feels like our version of post-the-black square,
which, by the way, Charlie raged against.
You don't like this aggressive,
moral coercion that just uses, you know, how dare you have this conversation, how dare you
have that thought? He was very against that. Well, Chris, that was really well said. I'm glad to,
I'm glad to hear that from you because you, you know, you're a smart guy and you've thought
deeply about these issues. And I would just say, you know, listen, let's put the, let's put
the Groyper phenomenon aside. Let's put all of that aside. I will tell you a thousand, with a thousand
percent certainty because I had dozens of conversations about this. The larger critiques,
the chew the meat, spit out the bones kind of critiques about what this country has done
when it comes to betraying young men, young white men, what it's done to break the social
compact and to label a lot of these groups as toxic, as beyond the pale, is not worth
fighting for, has done such extraordinary damage to our country that some of this backlash, it
needs to be harnessed and focused. And that's what was Charlie devoted his life to. You heard that
with Erica Kirk in her memorial speech that this was the guy that killed Charlie was the one that was
the same kind of guy that he was out on these college campuses trying to save. And that work must
continue. We must remember that some of these, yes, it comes out in gross and vile ways, but at the
core, there is a truth that we must acknowledge and be very, very serious about addressing. Final word to
you about 50 seconds, Chris. Yeah, think about it. I mean, if you're a young man growing up today, you
came of age during the COVID lockdowns, you came of age during the BLM era where you were told
that you were inherently and intrinsically evil because of your sex, because of your race.
And so there is a justifiable resentment that has been bubbling up for many years.
But I think that the best way to address that is through eliminating DEI, de-legitimizing BLM
ideologies, and then kind of tapping into those essential pillars of building.
our civilization, economic opportunity, great institutions, strong families, and offering young men
a way that is not nihilistic, but a way that's actually going to make their lives better in
the real world. Conservatives can't do that. We need to keep thinking. Yeah, I agree. We've got to offer
them a better vision. Christopher Rufo, host of the new show, Rufo and Lómez, two really great,
great guys, thought leaders in the movement. Thank you, Chris. We'll have you on again soon.
Thanks, gentlemen.
For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to charliekirk.com.
