The Charlie Kirk Show - How Trump Can Win the ICE Showdown And the Midterms

Episode Date: January 27, 2026

Who is going to win the midterms, and more importantly, why will it matter? Two different perspectives come onto the show. Patriotic historian Larry Schweikart explains why Democrat retirements and voter registration numbers make him confident the GOP will hold onto Congress. Political reporter Mark Halperin dissects Donald Trump's attempt to deescalate in Minnesota, and predicts how the nationwide ICE showdown is likely to be resolved. 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.

My name is Charlie Kirk. I run the largest pro-American student organization in the country fighting for the future of our republic. My call is to fight evil and to proclaim truth. If the most important thing for you is just feeling good, you're going to end up miserable. But if the most important thing is doing good, you will end up purposeful. College is a scam, everybody. You've got to stop sending your kids to college. You should get married as young as possible and have as many kids as possible. Go start a turning point USA college chapter. Go start a turning point you would say high school chapter.

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The Charlie Kirk Show is proudly sponsored by Preserve Gold, the leading gold and silver experts and the only precious metals company I recommend to my family, friends, and viewers. All right, welcome back. Hour 2, the Charlie Kirk Show is underway. I'm excited about this next guest. He's a contrarian. He's a filmmaker. He's an author. He's a historian.

We had him on when, I think, in the campaign season quite a bit with Charlie ahead of 2024, and he had a way of looking at things that will make you think. And if you are prepared or willing to black pill right now, don't. Because there's actually things you need to be looking at. looking at that will give you hope optimism, whether that's the midterms heading into 2028, about deportation. That's Larry Schweiker, the real Larry Schweiger. Again, he's an author, historian, Ph.D., New York Times, number one bestselling author, filmmaker, rock drummer, America's history teacher. Larry, welcome back to the show.

Yeah, don't forget the rock drummer part. That's really important. A study came out today showing that bison are returning to the Illinois prairie to drumming. I thought, okay, about time. Bison? Yep, bison. For the first time in 200 years, like wild bison? Yeah, I don't know. Probably leaving Minnesota because it's so crazy.

Yeah, right. They're avoiding the... I'm just thinking of driving. I don't want to... Man, hitting a bison would probably really... Yeah, I think about that sometimes as well. You know, like I sort of bemoan the loss of the real west, the frontier, but then I think, you know, I don't bemoan it. I'm contending with grizzly bears and actual wolves and bison.

and would not be a German by heritage so I feel that like deep deepness in my soul if you fly over like Europe and you see everything subdivided into the little plots of like developed land so we conquered the West. I like going to South Dakota and just seeing agriculture as far as the I can see. I'm a conservation

especially because it keeps lives from moving there. Well that's true. Well open carry keeps lives from moving there too. Larry I I love the way your mind works. You and I spoke briefly on the phone last week So, I mean, there's a lot of doomerism happening. There's a lot of blackpilling, especially with, you know, you look at Minneapolis. It's basically a war zone. You have a different way of seeing what's happening right now in the country. Give us your 30,000 foot view. Are you optimistic? Are you pessimistic? What are you thinking? What are you seeing? Well, I think a lot of concern is over the 2026 midterms. And I'm not concerned. Today, Eleanor Holmes Norton of D.C.

announced her retirement. She is Democrat number 25 to do so. Now, last year, a whole bunch of Republicans announced their retirements, and I'm not sure why. A lot of them were older. A lot of them were anti-Trumpers. And I said, just wait, the Democrats will catch up. And so far, the number is 30 R's and now 25Ds. And I think some of those R's have already been replaced or are being replaced like Marjorie Taylor Green. So I think when all the redistricting is done, the Republicans are going to have a four or five seat lock on the house because there are just not enough toss-up states to make a difference. The Republicans are already sitting at around 210 to 212 solid safe seats. And so when you look at all the redistricting and so forth, you're probably already over 218.

in terms of voter registration, this has been moving toward Republicans for almost 18 straight months, and Democrats have no answer for this. So they kept saying, well, wait until 2026 and the numbers start to come out. Well, we had Arizona's number. Arizona's first out of the gate for 2026. And guess what? Every single county in Arizona moved to the right, including PeaN. Let's go.

Which has lost almost one full percent of its Democrat lead in the last year and a half. So these are staggering numbers. You can't find one state where Democrats are consistently putting up any winning numbers. They're all moving to Republicans to the point that in North Carolina, that state became a red state last month. It's astounding. It was Democrat plus 175,000. in 2025, 2024. Florida obviously is now off the charts. It's 1.4 million Republicans' advantage. But every state where we can measure it is moving right. And I think that's a terrifying

omen for Democrats. So you go up to Minnesota, and I've harped on this, I think Minnesota is ground zero for breaking the entire Democrat Party, the voter fraud, and obviously the illegal immigration fraud up there. I think that it's tentacles stretched to every other state, but particularly to California, which is the big enchilada. That'll be the one to be targeted after Minnesota Falls. And nobody's giving up, nobody's backing down. I love to see it despite all the hand-wringing Rhinoes and all the Democrats calling for a government shutdown, nobody is backing up. I see, see, this is why you need to always take a step back. When everybody else is losing their minds, you got to stay competent, you got to stay confident, and you got to stay calm.

You got to focus on these things because this is what turning point action is doing. So, you know, yeah, there's all this hand-wringing. There's people that are freaking out about Minneapolis. You've got Governor Stitt. you've got Lady Graham. These people are blinking. They're bending the knee. Meanwhile, turning point action is building a standing army of ballot chasers in what we're calling the Red Wall, New Hampshire, where we have an advantage, more conservatives than liberals. It's the independent vote that will swing that state. But still, it's a really good sign that you have

more registered Republicans, and we're going to keep doing that work, by the way, New Hampshire. Nevada, we're making gains in Nevada. Arizona, we're all over this state. We're making gains every single day. So while everybody else is losing their minds and they're getting weak in the knees, we're putting up wins. We're registering voters in all of these states. And then you talk about the redistricting. We've spent a lot of time on this. We're actually going to be primaring a lot of these state senators in Indiana that, you know, that refused to play hardball now. And apparently they made some handshake deal, Larry, with Maryland. Now Maryland's going to redistrict anyways. They lie. Of course they lie.

Yes. So give us. I'd like you brought up Nevada in New Hampshire. These are two of the states that Seth Keschel and I follow a lot. New Hampshire has moved almost more than a half point redder than it was in 2024, November. Nevada has now flipped to a red state, not by a lot, by about 3,000, but it was 18,000 Democrat lead in 2024. And it was 88,000 in. 2020. So everywhere you look, these numbers are marching steadily toward the Republicans. Now, you mention Indies. And the independents, of course, are important everywhere. But one thing that I think these numbers are telling us is that people do not want to be associated in any way, shape,

or form with the Democrat Party. It is as toxic as any party in American history has ever been. And it's a two-step process. They leave the Democrats in step one. and step two, they become Republican. So I think we're in phenomenal shape as far as that goes. What's your vibe on the independence when it comes specifically to this topic of immigration? If anybody's going to get weak on it, if they're going to give in to the sob stories, I think the conservative base has developed antibodies and immunities from the same old tactics of the left wing ink that gets spilled.

Oh, you know, this is terrible. Obama comes out with this statement talking. about masked agents and they're rightly upset and we need to our values are under assault more than ever before. Republicans don't hear that stuff. They look at that and they rightly are skeptical. They rightly push back. Independence, where are they at on immigration? They are probably far more susceptible to these kinds of heartstring messages. But the good news is that independents are all over the map in terms of what is the most important issue to them because usually it almost always comes down to the economy.

And so if the economy, as it has already done, continues to pick up, you start to see more and more jobs, prices continue to fall, and by, say, mid-summer, everything is looking really good in terms of the economy. Believe me, the number one issue for independence is not going to be immigration or what's happening in Minnesota. It's going to be, the economy's pretty good. I'm not going to mess that up. Yeah.

So the good news about Indies is they are not. wedded to a single issue the way either the left or the right is. Yeah, I think that's a smart analysis there, Larry. Folks, let me tell you something straight up. I'm extremely picky about what I put in my body and what companies we support here. Blackout coffee checks every single box. This is a family-run American company roasting fresh coffee in the USA, built by people who believe in hard work, freedom, and America.

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And for an even better deal, sign up for Blackout Coffee subscription. Save money, get free shipping, and earn free coffee through their rewards program just for drinking what you already love. Your coffee shows up fresh on schedule and you never run out. That's blackout coffee.com slash Charlie. Check it out. Promocode Charlie. Larry, I got two questions for you. You mentioned the economy and that that is a huge piece of the here, especially for Indies. The problem is, if you just look at historical precedent, you're a historian, you know, you look at HW Bush. The recession ended in the spring of 91. He lost the election in 92. You've got inflation from Joe Biden that is, I mean, you still go to the store. It's obscene

when you try and feed a family. Those prices are not going to drop all the way back to their pre, you know, 2020 levels. Emotionally, is the electorate, do we have enough time to sort of see those gains and that growth and the GDP and real wages catch up with inflation to the point where we get electorally rewarded? Yeah, I think so. Not all prices are falling, but I can look at my gas price on the corner. It's already dropped by 50 or 60 cents since the last year. And we have gas from California, which is always 20 or 30 cents higher.

The stickiest part of all prices is not the grocery store, although that's still a little bit high, but it's in housing. And we have this disconnect in the housing market that is impartially due to having illegals involved in the entire housing market, all that kind of stuff. The tariffs are going to kick in. All those investments that the foreigners made last year and promised to Trump are starting to break ground. So, yeah, I think enough is going to change that. it will affect the independent voters. And we don't need a lot. We don't need to win them by five or six points.

We need to win them by one point because, as I say, the Republicans are winning the voter registration game almost everywhere. So, yeah, and I'm looking at some numbers here, 275, if you want to throw it up. But it looks like, you know, we're getting good numbers on transportation, utilities, but education, housing, health care, having a family, those are all tricky, right? And those are not numbers that you can move quickly. But I hope you're right. Listen, if we put up a few more numbers of 4.5% GDP growth, 5%. I mean, that would be amazing. I can't remember the last time we saw numbers that high. I do believe that's going to have a psychological impact. Second question for you,

Larry, though, is this redistricting. If you would, we got four minutes left in this segment. go through a couple of the states that you're watching. Obviously, we gained some in Florida, Texas, we lost some in California. That's getting challenged in the courts. You think we're going to be at 210, 212 safe Republican districts. And are those really safe? Because I hope those models aren't looking at, like, you know, Hispanic votes from 2024 because we're losing, we've lost a little bit of ground off those numbers. Well, the constantly shifting redistricting numbers show that North Carolina's added two red, Ohio's added two red, Texas has added five red, Missouri's added one red, Kansas supposedly is going to redistrict will add one red. Florida will redistrict. They will add between two to three red. You've then seen one lost seat in Utah. due to the court decision there. So that's one blue. You have arguably five in California, but as you mentioned, that's being challenged. And California is a little tricky

because in order to get those districts, they've had to cannibalize some very, very close Democrat districts. So I don't think it's a given that all five of those end up in Republican, in Democrat hands. Or I don't think it's, they may get all five of those and lose one or two others. don't think it's necessarily a net gain of five in California for Democrats. Indiana was a disappointment. These people are just idiots. I don't know what else you can say about them.

When I go through all the numbers, and again, they keep shifting, I look at the GOP gaining between two and four more seats in redistricting, which would put us up in the neighborhood of 216, 217. But then you have the elephant in the room, which is the racial redistricting decision. coming from the Supreme Court. And what no one can answer me, and I've asked this to my court guru, Zen master, I've asked it to other people who deal with the court, how many of the racial redistricting seats are going to be covered in the seats that have already been redistricted in many of these states?

And nobody can give me an answer on that. Louisiana does plan to redistrict. That'll be another red seat. So let's assume we pick up two or three from the racial redistricting, you're over 218 right there. Now, how many are safe, safe, safe? I'm just going by Cook. And I think Cook is probably a little pessimistic for Republicans.

So if Cook is saying 210 to 212 safe, I think that's a pretty good starting point. Yeah, I mean, one of the things that I just continue raging against is this botched census in 2020. You know, we should not be counting illegals on a census. There is no reality in which that makes any sense. to the founder's vision. Blake, sorry. Well, I mean, that we struggle with the fact that there's like court rulings to that effect and everything.

What's outrageous to me is just the way they will sometimes estimate things. And also just that the census happened in 2020. And so it happened absolute bizarre moment for the country in so many ways. I think Larry or Lutnik should just call a new census and let it get challenged in court. Fight it. If we lose, we lose. It would be cool. The challenges you'd have to fight.

And we'll find the funding. We'll pull it from somewhere. Trump could do a, you know, a TikTok fundraiser and raise that money in 30 seconds. I would donate to it. We would do, we would do promotions on the show to raise for it. Larry. The last important thing about Minnesota, I want to make this point. Seth Keschel has said twice that Minnesota would have voted for Trump had it not been for all the fraudulent votes there. That's something else to keep in mind, a reason to win in Minnesota. Yeah, well, and certainly the demographic replacement immigration with all the Somalis is certainly playing a role there too.

Larry Schweiker, thank you for the white pill. Now we're going to have Mark Halperin on for the black pill. So little yin and yang, a little to and fro. Every day, Americans make choices that shape our country's future, right down to which cell phone provider we support. Here's what most people don't realize. Patriot Mobile isn't just a wireless provider. They're an activist organization funded by selling time. top tier cell phone service. They've been on the front lines defending our freedoms long before it was cool to do so, standing in the gap when others wouldn't.

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Take a stand today. Call 972 Patriot today or go to patriotmobile.com slash Charlie. Use promo code Charlie for a free month of service. That's patriotmobile.com slash Charlie. Or call 972 Patriot and make the switch today. Mark Halperin joins us now. Mark, welcome back to the show. Editor-in-chief of Two-A-Way TV and host of Next Up on the,

the Megan Kelly Network. Mark, you have a very, you are one of the most, I would say, plugged in, commentators, thinkers about this space. I'm fully expecting you to give me bad news about the politics of deportation that we're losing the information battle, especially with what's going on with this recent shooting. Am I right? Is that where your head is at? Well, it was true four hours ago. It's clear that the White House, after getting a lot of input, including directly of the president this weekend are shifting, and it's happening in real time with Caroline's briefing. It's a three-pronged process. One is to make Homan's the face of this as opposed to Secretary Noem, and he's headed to Minnesota, and I'll be curious to see how much TV he's doing as compared

to Secretary Noem and Stephen Miller. Two is to acknowledge that there need to be changes in how this goes to minimize the chances that there are images that are damaging to the president's agenda and to this mission. And there's no doubt they've been damaging. You can cite all sorts of mitigating factors and concerns about signal chats or whether someone should show up to protest with a concealed weapon. There's all sorts of things people can raise. But the reality is there's no ambiguity. The president suffered political damage over this. And then lastly, as Caroline's doing right now, is to emphasize the portions of the president's immigration agenda that are not just somewhat popular, but that are exceedingly popular, and to try to get more of the conversation to back on that terrain,

as opposed to what has been the view of many Republicans who are super supportive of the president, a failed mission, not entirely, but in many respects in Minneapolis. Yeah, Mark. So we can see that there's some of that effort to pivot. You've been an observer of politics for a long time. And what's your sense on how successful that's likely to be? Because I think about there's sort of two competing impulses, which is people will remember the most resonant, emotional, visual moment, which could be this. But also the Trump administration news cycles move so fast, we could be on a completely new thing two weeks from now.

I think about the Greenland drama, which already feels a century ago. Two weeks from now, two segments from now, we could already be on something new. Look, the president sending homins taking a call from Governor Wals and having a readout from the president on Treat Social saying it's a positive call. The president's one of the best politicians any of us have ever seen. And if he wants to turn the page and send this in a different direction or take it off the front pages, he's got a pretty good chance to do that. And that's what we're in the midst of doing. So if you're asking me what the chances are, I'd say better than 50%. as usual he's up against the liberal dominant media as usual uh he's he's got to uh you know do many other

things this isn't his only focus but the president has a lot of power to change the narrative and i think i think we're seeing that happen right now in real time and i think chances are better than 50% to put this back on more favorable terrain without disappointing those who say can't give the liberals a win or those who say the immigration mission must continue. I think he can do both those things. He was responsible. Take the last thing I'll say. Take the politics out of it.

Some people think that's naive. Well, he's not the campaigner in chief. He's not the president of the Republican Party or the MAGA movement. He's the president of the United States. And doing something with ICE and Border Patrol in an American city is better done, more effectively done with the cooperation of the mayor and the governor. and I think they're going to try to secure that now. So the flip side of this is the president can make the moves he wants,

but there's also the Democrats. We've heard Senator Schiff and others talk about, let's make a giant defund the government showdown over whether ICE gets any more funding, whether the Border Patrol gets any more funding. Do you think Democrats will want this battle where they'll escalate to massive war over the Border Patrol and ICE, or do you think they're likely to back down

if the president is giving them a bit of an office? Well, last night they wanted the fight. Let's see with the changes the president's making if they still want it. And remember, as you know, ICE is funded. Ice was funded by the big beautiful bill. So this budget showdown that the Democrats say they're willing to precipitate, even if it leads to shutting down the government, is not going to actually get them what they want. But the president should want some cooperation for the symbolism and the optics and the politics, but also the substance. So if Republicans have to give something to make the mission work more effectively, they may want to do that. And if that gets the Democrats to the table to keep there from being a

shutdown, that seems like a win-and-win. So I don't think it's impossible to avoid a shutdown, in part because, as I said, the Democrats don't have the leverage they might because ICE has already funded. So, Mark, I know you're reacting to this readout from the Tim Walt's call, that President Trump put out, I still, you know, I'm incredulous that this would actually happen the way that you're suggesting that there would be actual cooperation like we experienced in the Obama years, right? Obama, I think, is, you know, listen, it's a good talking point for us, deporter in chief. What was really happening there was that blue districts were, blue municipalities were

coordinating with immigration enforcement. They were handing over criminals in jails. prisons when there was a detainer request. Is that what you're suggesting is going to happen in Minneapolis that this could be the the compromise that's reached? Well, cooperation between Governor Walts and Donald Trump is as far-fetched and outlandish as a friendly Oval office meeting between Mayor Mom Domney and the president. You know, that happened, dudes, right? Now, the level of cooperation between them remains to be seen, but apparently they took that meeting and made themselves texting buddies. One of the things,

as the Caroline said at the briefing and that the president's talked about over the weekend is, they want to have Congress outlaw sanctuary cities. That's not going to happen. But there is a middle ground between Walt's capitulation completely and Walt's cooperating. And I think one of the big measures, two big measures that I've heard both sides talk about as possibilities. One is the local police should be helping here. They shouldn't be just, you know, turning their heads the other way and not showing up when there's, you know, activity on the streets that they could help defuse. And then number two, you know, it's a sanctuary city, but they can find a way to make the process of deporting people who leave local law enforcement control and then can be deported. They can make that

easier. They don't have to completely turn their heads away from that. And I think if those two things are done, that would allow ICE and Border Patrol to make their footprint in the city small, And this is a, this is the George Floyd City. This is a very blue city. The people who are protesting have not quite become professionals yet, but they're semi-pro. But I think if those two things happened and the footprint decreased, people could go back to being Minnesotans rather than warriors for protesting and lawful and approved federal law enforcement activity. And Mark, I love where your head's at. I mean, all this makes sense, but nothing makes sense when you're dealing with these radical leftists. They feel very amped up to me. I can't help but wonder if Democrats might want to back off, but I see, I can see the people on TikTok. You can see the people on TikTok, on Blue Sky. They're saying, like, we need to shoot ICE officers.

So let's game this out here, Mark. So they're winning currently as of four hours ago, the information war, right? I saw it on Twitter X all weekend. I mean, the shooting unleashes them. they win when bad things happen because ICE are getting confronted in the streets. Somebody gets shot, somebody gets killed. That's actually a win for them. So why would they want to back down when this tactic is seemingly working?

Why would Governor Waltz hand any cooperation or any sort of political win to President Trump? There are some who wouldn't want to, but I believe, having spent a lot of time in the Twin Cities, I believe that the majority of those people would like normalcy. the majority of the city, regardless of an individual's politics and the suburbs would like the chaos to end. And like I said, this is a harder city to calm down. That's why this has happened. They've got a post-George Floyd mentality. The liberals there don't like the president. But if the footprint gets reduced, you have to realize what it's like for them now to have a federal force on the ground, large, than their police force by a lot. So will all the people on that signal chat want to stand down? No.

But I believe that most of the electives will, including the governor and the mayor. And I believe they'll have a story to tell, which is the president can say, we won because we got local cooperation and we've already arrested a lot of people. And the Democrats can say, we won because they've really reduced the federal footprint here. And I think that's the recipe to calm this down and to get all but the most professional protesters to stand down. Yeah, well, and again, we talk about where this started. Yeah, it started with Joe Biden letting in millions of illegals. That's obviously the starting point originally. But also, there's this fraud story. And you've got these Somali fraud rings that are bilking taxpayers and sending the money,

who knows where. That, you know, millions and millions of dollars going through MSP, right? So, you know, I don't know, I'm sitting here going like, yeah, I would like to win the information war. I think the base is completely committed to this. I think we're building up immunities to the, to the sob stories and this information war. But I don't know that about Indies. And I don't know about that about sympathetic, you know, middle of the line, moderate Dems, if there are any. So I do want to win the information war, but I also want to get rid of these fraud rings. I also want to get people in our country that shouldn't be here out. So I'm sitting here. I'm hearing you, but I'm also. feeling conflicted. I got to be honest. So where can people follow you? 2A.tv and at Mark Halperin or at Mark Next Up Halperin, all those places to see and listen to my shows.

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Just go to whyrefi.com and tell them your friend Andrews sent you. More with Mark Halperin, 2A TV. And next up on the Megyn Kelly Network. Okay, so Mark, there's going to be, and we're going to talk about this every time you probably come on for the rest of the year here. But, you know, everything is sort of angling towards midterms, right? You can feel that. This is why we always encourage, have courage during the off cycle years. That's when you need to be aggressive because you're going to get a lot of these weak need Republicans.

You're going to get these moderates. We're seeing Lisa Murkowski. You're seeing Governor Stitt already sort of blink on this. Minneapolis. Maybe we're going to see a messaging pivot from the White House. But there are larger themes happening, right? got economic news. You've got President Trump at Davos. You've got foreign policy disputes. You got Greenland. You got Venezuela. What does the president need to do, in your opinion? You said, take this off the front page and kind of pivot to the next thing. If you were in the room, what would you recommend the president do next? Well, a couple things. First of all, I think Governor Stitt would laugh if he said he was a moderate, Governor of Oklahoma. I've met Governor. Stitt, by the way. You think he's a moderate?

When he goes on CNN and says, what are we really doing here? Yeah, he's, by the way, I never will trust, Mark, call me a cynic. I will never trust a governor or a senator that's already said I'm I'm not running again or, you know, listen, you never know what kind of

and I'm not accusing Governor Stitt of this, but I've seen it too many times. You know, what gig are they angling for next? What rubber chicken dinner do they want to get invited to next? It's all I'll say. For all we know, he wants to be Abby Abby Phillips' main substitute host. Yeah, let's see.

Okay, so again, I say this for respect. I'm not a political analyst or a political reporter. I'm an American analyst or American reporter. And I think to just relentlessly focus on the midterms, again, I say with respect, is not the right thing for the country, even in an election year. The president's job is to do well in the midterms by doing good things for the American people. Same with Congress, same with Governor Walts. So the focus should not be, I think, on sort of the tactics and the fundraising, at least not yet.

This is hurting the president's poll numbers, and it's hurting the brand of the Republican Party, and it's hurting MAGA, because people don't like what they're seeing. And they don't like what they're seeing because it rubs up against their sense of what American government should be, what America should be. People don't want to see government officials telling bald-faced lies that are contradicted by what they can see with their own. their own eyes. They don't want to see American citizens shot on the street by government officials. And they don't want to see an enforcement operation that creates chaos when the whole point of this is to create more order and less chaos. Okay. So those are all things that I think the president can be behind and before and help him in the party politically by working on them. If he does that, if he gets the focus on the extraordinary achievement of shutting down the border and the achievement of

going into these cities with federal officials and taking out the bad hombres, taking out the people who are dangers to the community, and then deporting others as bandwidth allows, then I think one of the great promises made promises kept will be the focus of a lot of voters in the midterms. This is not just Democrats and this is not just moderate Democrats. I talked to Republicans for the last 72 hours, including some major supporters of the president who don't want to see this continue the way it's been going. Again, they support the president's immigration agenda.

They just don't want to see this. And I think if the president can work that out to emphasize the parts of this that have worked and can continue to work and mitigate the prospect of American citizens being shot by federal officers, I think that people will give him the party credit for making a mid-course correction. So, Mark, there's obviously, despite your advice, there is a lot of fixation on the midterms. And there's definitely on the right, I've seen this sort of all or nothing attitude that if the midterms are bad, it's all over for the administration or something. But it strikes me, as you noted, they already funded ICE, for example, for a long time with a big beautiful bill. The president has obviously a lot of power to do things, even if he doesn't control Congress. How much do you think it actually matters for President Trump's agenda that he control Congress? And what do you think is likely to happen if he loses it?

Are we actually likely to see, for example, the impeachment every week that some people have talked about? And if they do impeach Trump every week, does that actually matter? Well, it's not just impeach him, right? It's investigate him. There's 100 things they'd like to have subpoena power to investigate and to call members of the administration up to Capitol Hill to testify. All those things are not just a distraction and a bandwidth suck, but they can create a lot of news because the media would love to see a 14-day investigation into, you know, the Trump family's crypto holdings or an investigation into policymaking around ice. So it matters for that.

It also matters if the president wants to pass anything. The president can do a lot by executive action. But there's some things like the budget that Congress has to do. And I'm a big believer that the president does lose the house. He can turn that into a virtue by starting to pass some things in a bipartisan way that the current balance of power wouldn't let him do. Now, that won't be popular with everyone in MAGA because it'll mean the president making deal with Ikeem Jeffries. But the alternative is perhaps getting nothing done because they don't have 60 votes in the Senate.

I think that right now the president's chances of keeping the House are underrated. It's not the most likely outcome, but it's underrated. And the Senate is still better than even to stay Republican. So he needs to, again, the best thing he can do to make sure that he's got the best possible chance to keep the majority is to do things the American people like, to do things that are popular and to let Republicans talk about those things. And if he does that, you know, it won't take care of itself, but it will be the biggest down payment he could make on success in the midterms. Yeah, and I think you're right, Mark, you know, I'm willing to concede the fact,

something we've talked about on this show is that, you know, the whole masking of ice agents, it strikes, I guess, the majority of Americans is un-American. But they are getting docks, and we do have the sanctuary city issues where, they're not, you know, willing to cooperate like they did with Obama, like they did with Clinton. And it's, it's TDS on the local level. I mean, if we, if there is some sort of detaunt that's possible where they actually, you know, L.A., Portland, Minneapolis, New York are willing to say, hey, smaller footprint, but we'll cooperate at the local level, we'll hand over detention requests of illegals. I think that would be a huge win for the country. And by the way, it would be safer for agents and

cities and illegals. If you care about the immigrants, it would be safer. I agree. I agree. You need, I totally agree, you need rational policies. And, you know, we haven't talked about this. You guys may have talked about it earlier in the show. I was doing other stuff so I wasn't able to listen. You know, to be so twisted to have every administration official out on Sunday saying, if you show up with a gun, you're a threat. That is, that is a twisting of the Second Amendment. It's a twisting of the MAGA attitude towards the Second Amendment. And so you've got to get policies that you can defend. And they can defend, uh, the mission here. They can defend what they want to do with deportations. They can't defend saying a guy who shows up with a gun is is a threat automatically. They can't defend claiming the guys of domestic terrorists without any evidence. I agree. That's why you're seeing Tom Homan's who says, let's have an investigation go in. Tom Homan's isn't going to say, I'm quite sure, anyone who shows up with a gun is a threat. No, I think we bungled the messaging right at the jump. I think that's fair. And we can do better. And we will. Mark Halpern, thank you so much.

Thank you guys. Good to see you. For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to charliekirk.com.