The Dan Bongino Show - I Changed My Mind (Ep. 2509)

Episode Date: May 6, 2026

Find the video podcast of The Dan Bongino Show exclusively on Rumble at ⁠https://Rumble.com/bongino⁠ In this episode, I'll explain why I changed my mind about the death penalty. Also, what you should know about the elections held across the country last night. America Is in a Red State https://www.wsj.com/opinion/america-is-in-a-red-state-897f6855 Alleged Palisades arsonist became ‘fixated’ with Luigi Mangione, said blaze started ‘out of resentment of the rich’: prosecutors https://nypost.com/2026/05/04/us-news/palisades-arsonist-became-fixated-with-luigi-mangione-before-deadly-blaze-prosecutors/ Tanner Lynn Horner sentenced to death in Athena Strand murder https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2026/05/05/tanner-lynn-horner-sentenced-athena-strand-murder/89771873007/ Sponsors: All Family Pharmacy - https://allfamilypharmacy.com/bongino - code: Bongino35 Patriot Mobile - https://patriotmobile.com/dan Helix Sleep - https://helixsleep.com/dan Birch Gold - Text BONGINO to 989898 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

All America all the time. Sit down, buckle up, and get ready for the Dan Bongino show. So warning in advance, today's show is going to be quite an emotional roller coaster because I don't change my mind on topics often. And that's for a reason. I don't mean topics about parenting and kids. You learn new things every day. I'm talking about on politics.

Now, why is that? Well, I believe in conservatism, you know, conservative ideas. The whole essence of conservatism, if you're ever explaining it to friends or your kids, what does it mean to be a conservative? Is the idea that there are timeless principles, economic liberty, political freedom, you know, tax-oriented, growth-oriented tax policies, respect for life, from conception to natural death, the idea that they write, to bear arms is given to you by God to defend your life. The idea that you're free to practice

your right to assemble, to petition, religion, all of that. These are timeless principles. They're not supposed to change. Like, lick your finger. Where are the political winds going? I change my mind. I don't believe in freedom or religion anymore. The First Amendment, the right to speak out. You either believe in this stuff or you don't. They are timeless principles. They don't change with time. That's what timeless means. But folks, that doesn't mean you have to be ironheaded either. And I've had a major, major kind of life-changing revelation. And it's happened over the course of time.

It's not this one thing. But if there was a road to Damascus moment, so I don't want to prolong. I'm not trying to tease it or anything. I'm going to get to it in a minute. But there's kind of going to be some good news, bad news, beginning of the show. It's the case of Athena Strand, the six-year. old young girl brutally murdered by the FedEx driver. You probably aware of the case, folks. It's, I haven't discussed it for a reason. Why? Some legal, no, no, I'm not involved in the

case at all. I just can't. It's such a, I struggle for the words to describe the scale of the tragedy in the case. I mean, you rarely see cases where the whole. whole courtroom is crying at the same time listening what happened. It's just, so without, I'm going to get to that because I'm not that. I don't want to pride before the fall is the worst thing. And I was, I'm wrong on I am. And I'm going to explain to you why my position on the death penalty has definitely changed. than this is, if there was a road to Damascus, knocked off the horse moment, this was it. I have that.

I got some good news to start, though. However, I don't want to just hit you with all of this emotional overload. You know how this show is. I got Vince Colon Ace also, the great Vince. You know, we love him. Part of the Bongino family there, Bongino Inc family coming up later too.

We're going to talk about all kinds of things. We love Vince. So we've got a big show for you today. Some good news to start, okay, before we get to the tough stuff. Hey, if we're serious about making America, healthy again. You need a pharmacy that's making it happen. Get 10% off at all family pharmacy.com slash bonjino. Use code bonjino 10 prescription provided if appropriate. I've been using them for

NAD, methylene blue, all of it, all family pharmacy.com slash bonjino code bonjino 10. Check them out today. Today's show also brought to you by my favorite cell phone service, Patriot mobile, for a couple reasons. Number one, I'm putting this first because it matters. I'm a business guy. It's just damn good cell phone service. But number two, they're always going to have your back. They have been longtime backers of the show, the Christian conservative movement, economic freedom and liberty. They have been in the parallel economy as long as it's existed.

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Take a stand today. Go to patreonmobile.com slash Dan or call 972 Patriot and use promo code Dan for a free month of service. Great deal. Don't wait. That's Patriotmobile.com slash Dan or call 972 Patriot. Thank you, Patriot Mobile. All right, fellas, let's go.

As always, a thank you to the best, greatest, most solid, loyal audience in the business. I love you guys. You've been there for me the entire time. Through the show, through the TV show on Fox, do the radio show at the FBI. Back here on the podcast with you, you have always been there for me. I am ferociously loyal to you. I cannot thank you enough for riding the wave, good times, bad times. You've always been there for me.

I just saw this on stream charts on Twitter the other day. This one's not about me. We were the number one Rumble live streamer this month. Great, fantastic. Who cares? I love it. However, the loyalty component, look who just cracked the top 10. Bongino Report.

Who's on the Bongino Report channel? Vince and Haley. That is just after just a year or so in business with Haley, Karinea at noon and Vince at 8, the Bongino Army's made him a top 10 rumble channel by peak viewers. And you're up there with some ringers, man. You Tim Poole, Steve Crowder, you got some just rock stars up there.

So thank you so much, Bongino Army for support. And you can see them at the Bongino report, Rumble channel. rumble.com slash Vince, rumble.com slash Haley goes there too. So thank you guys so much. Really appreciate it.

On the good news front, ladies and gentlemen, I am cautiously optimistic that we may be able to preserve in the midterm elections a hopefully pretty decent outcome if we don't fall prey to the doomers are like oh nothing is happening don't show up and vote cut that bullshit out right now why folks receipts matter bring the receipts or shut up i'm just telling you here's where we stand today a thousand things could change but don't fall into this there's going to be a blue wave thing don't get

it to red wave stuff either but don't just go out and do the do matters talk is bullshit okay talk is great. You got to do stuff. You have to do stuff. You have to go vote and bring 10 people with you. UGov tweet on Congress. I thought we were told we were getting smoked. Everything sucks. Nothing's happening. Trump's historically unpopular. It's over, really. U.Gov, no friend to the Republican Party here, by the way. If the midterms for U.S. Congress are being held today, who would you vote for it in the district you live? Democrat candidate 44, Republican candidate 41. However, look at the trend line. Last week, it was Democrats 46, Republican 41.

It's not great news that we're down a couple points here, three points. However, it's starting to converge as some of the economic activity starts to pick up. As the war in Iran starts to, you know, slowly tail off and resolve. They announced yesterday, you know, the end of offensive actions over there in Iran. Now you're starting to see the fruits of a lot of this. Factory orders picking up, the economy picking up. You know, inflation is still relatively tame compared to the Biden years. Job numbers look good.

GDP numbers look pretty good. Now you're starting to see this all the gas prices and gas futures, oil and gas futures, oil and gas futures down today on potentially some resolution with the straight. Don't fall into the panic, man. Please, I'm begging you. Not to mention, put up a playbook first. I know I'm a little out of order, but the Trump endorsement and the Trump endorsement. And the MAGA movement, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not getting to this with Vince again later, is gold.

Nobody votes for endorsements, period, except for Donald Trump. They don't. Who was an endorsement you voted on the past? No, I'm dead serious. Like, you only voted on the endorsement. Maybe 10% of the audience will say, yes, I vote for who other people tell me to vote. People don't vote for endorsements. They're nice to have.

They may give you a temporary bump. They just don't vote for endorsements, except Donald Trump. Indiana Republicans thought it would be a good idea not to redistrict the state to make a more fair map and get more Republican seats. Donald Trump warned them, hey man, no surprises here. Redistrict the state or we're going to primary you.

It's our choice. We're going to pick different people. Playbook. Biggest takeaway from last night's primaries in Indiana. Pre-midterm southern state redraws became a whole lot more likely. After the Supreme Court ruling, they said, gutted the voting.

Get the bullshit there. The Indiana Republicans last night. who voted against redistricting their state, most of them lost. Hat tipped James Blair, by the way, for an amazing political operation up there from the Trump team. Those southern states, redistricting's looking a lot more likely now. You want fair maps, then you damn well better be willing to fight for them. Not only do we have a guy in charge right now in the White House, a president,

who has just massive political power. This MAGA movement is not going anywhere. can keep wishing it and trying to make fetch happen. It's not happening. Donald Trump's movement that he started, the MAGA movement, is not going anywhere. You can keep telling yourself that. It's not happening. Tell Gretchen Fetch is not happening, man. Look at this guy, by the way. Here he is in the Oval Office yesterday, President Trump. This is why this president is just hard to get away from the movement the bench is strong the maga movement is strong there's going to be some ups and downs in the poll numbers you get good news and bad news it always fluctuates in politics but when you get a guy like

this in the white house which is so relatable he's going to be hard to beat his endorsement's going to be hard to be hard to beat too check this out i don't think we'll have to worry about you yes sir you're going to do good are you a strong person yes sir good you think you can take me in a fight I think it could. Hey, that would be embarrassing. I play that cut for a couple reasons. Yeah, it's funny. Well, he's playing funny stuff.

We can watch it anywhere. Okay. Get past the relatable funny part. Being relatable is a huge part of politics. That's Bill Clinton, whose saxophone appearance on Arsenio Hall is widely thought they've turned the course of that election. You can just Google that yourself if you're bored.

I remember it when I was in, when I was in college when that went down? He's sitting there on a saxophone. playing on Arsenio. Everybody's like, wow, look at this, a cool guy, whatever. Being relatable matters. But that's not why I played that clip too. I played it for another reason. Donald Trump understands that this Maha movement,

Secretary Kennedy, is Make America Healthy Again Movement, which we're going to get to, by the way, today we're going to cover that just relentlessly. There is a huge pocket of voters, folks, who are now voting on basic lifestyle issues for them. Don't poison me with pharmaceuticals. that don't work, don't poison me with food additives that are maybe destroying my health.

Let me choose my own health care freedom moving forward. It's a huge movement. Donald Trump, by reinstituting this presidential fitness test, having Bobby Kennedy around this Make America Healthy Again movement fully understands the politics of building coalitions moving forward. Bank on it. You think this stuff is an accident? You think Trump's stupid? He just hasn't been in there because he cares about a presidential fitness test. He knows exactly what he's doing. and the bench is deep. The bench is deep. Stop what you're doing.

Unless you're driving, don't stop that. I need you to listen to this. Marco Rubio yesterday, Secretary Rubio, was filling in for Caroline Levitt at the daily press briefing. Folks, this may be the single best answer about the profound, unparalleled greatness of America. I've ever heard giving off the cup. I've seen really good answers

and written speeches in advance. He doesn't know this question's coming. He's not reading off any notes. If you're listening on Apple and Spotify, watch the video yourself, but you can just believe, he's not reading on it. He's just watch Marco Rubio respond to this answer. It's about a minute, but this is worth your time.

Stop what you're doing and listen to this. And tell me how the Republican Party magic. movement is going to like die with President Trump. It's not. He has started a revolution in America. That is going to be Donald Trump's legacy, if he ever makes it to a Mount Rushmore status, is going to be everything he did, but everything that happened after him that he started. Check this out.

My hope for America is what it's always been. I think it's the hope. I hope we all share. We wanted to continue to be the place where anyone from anywhere can achieve anything, where you're not limited by the circumstances of your birth, by the color of your skin, by your ethnicity, but frankly, it's a place where you are able to overcome challenges and achieve your full potential. I think that should be the goal of every country in the world, frankly. But I think in the U.S., we're not perfect. Our history is not one of perfection,

but it's still better than anybody else's history. And ours is a story of perpetual improvement. Each generation has left the next generation of Americans freer, more prosperous, safer, and that is our goal as well. But it is a unique and exceptional country, and as we come upon this 250-year anniversary, I think we have a lot to learn and be proud of in our history. It is one of perpetual and continuous improvement, where each generation has done its part to bring us closer to fulfilling the vision that the founders of this country had upon its founding. Chat's going nuts right now.

Who just said it? Someone in the chat, Rubio is amazing. Patty 84, J.D. Vance, Rubio, 2028. DJ Marco Rubio is doing us proud. Scratchin McGroin. You, McGroins, you guys got the best names out there. Is there anything Rubio kid? Justin's video a day.

I didn't know he's going to pick that one. It's way too early in the show, but he said, that must be really. good. You haven't even seen the other videos. I guess I had. I did the show prep today. It doesn't matter. You got to play it on the show before it's official. Is there anything this guy can't do?

I told you, folks, the bench is deep, deep. Brandon Gill and the congressional side, Vance, Rubio. We've got just studs in this administration. Notice he's not looking at it. Someone said

in the chat too, forgive me, order. He don't need no binder. You don't need no binder. Remember the binder? That was just off his head, top of his head. You know, and trust me, I'm not comparing myself to Marco Rubio. Got it? I don't even think I'm making this about, I'm not. I'm just telling you, I don't write speeches down myself. I try to keep just bullet points in my head. And I was at a dinner one time and someone asked me, well, how do you do that? And I said, well, I just love what I'm talking about. I mean, if someone asked you, hey, tell me how great your kids are and why you love him.

Do you need to write a speech? You just say it. That's why I'm, Ruby O.G., tell me why America's great. He just loves the topic. Boom, boom. No notes. No binder. Folks, politics, listen to me.

Politics are two things. Chad, help me in. Help me out. What are the two things in politics? What matters more than that you? You got to know this. You're a P1, you know it. Soundby.

and snapshots. That's it. You don't know that. Don't get into political space. It is about sound bites and... Why are you doing that to the audience? Bringing back bad memories. There's the binder, but...

Justice. Politics and snapshots like that and soundbites. That's what it is, folks. White papers are great. I love the idea that people think things through on white papers and proposals. Politics are...

snapshots, i.e. photos, and soundbite. That is it. People right now, this younger generation, through TikTok, Snapchat and elsewhere, the attention span for content in this massive pool of content out there. It's not like it was back in the day, ABC, NBC, CBS, everybody tune in for a half an hour. Watch Walter Cronkite. That's not the way we roll anymore. People are getting their news from X, Facebook, Instagram, Reels, Snapchat. They're on the web, they're off the web. They're ever, cable news. Some people still read old school newspapers.

My father still buys the newspaper. He needs to look at the newspaper. In this fragmented environment, you need a snapshot and a soundbite. Why do I say that? Guys, I don't live in L.A., but I do cover, you know, obviously politics. If you're not following this Los Angeles mayor's race, you are missing out in what could be a PhD course. in politics. I know you're like, what do I care about the LA mayor's race for? You should. Because there's a guy running named Spencer Pratt. He was in a reality show earlier on in his

lifetime. The guy's house burned down in the palisades fire. He's now running for mayor against Karen Bass, kind of an entrenched Democrat, establishmentarian, far-left liberal. I don't know who put this ad together. It's obviously AI. I don't think it was his campaign, but this thing went nuclear yesterday. If you have not seen this, I don't want to call it an ad because I'm not sure. I think someone just generated on AI, but it was all over. This ad about the California mayor's race, if you're listed on Apple and Spotify, you need to go back and watch this immediately on the show. I want you to check this out. Maybe one of greatest things I have ever seen. And remember the entire time, snapshots and soundbites. And you'll see why this is so effective. Check this out.

Please, I'm begging you. There's homeless drug addicts in front of the schools. My children aren't safe. Look, if you were a transgender migrant, I could get you a free pussy. Let's move the drug addicts closer. Bass already solved crime. I endorse her. Next! I just want to rebuild my home.

It's been over a year. This is a machine. If we want to burn this town to the ground, I feel so close. You can do it, Spencer. That's the greatest thing ever. Justin's not even a dancer. Justin's like a six-foot-two gringo.

He's got hips like a fire hydrant. You know, Shakira's hips don't lie. Justin's hips lie all the time. And Justin's up there dancing. That is the single greatest. I can't call it out because I don't think it was. I think someone just put it together. AI and you may be like, well, it's over the top, the Batman thing.

No, bullshit. That thing was everywhere yesterday. Look at the chat going effing bananas. And I just said, I'm trying to get a hold of it. You got mudleys in there. We haven't seen that you're going to break the chat and rumble. You're going to break it again. I haven't seen the chat move like this in days going freaking bananas.

Mudley's everywhere. That is the single greatest thing I think I've ever seen. Absolutely incredible. Then lied by Gavin Newsom in the beginning If you look at it's your transgender, I could get you a new cat Snapshots and sound bites kids You may not know a damn thing about Spencer Pratt You may not know a damn thing about Karen Bass

You're busy living your own life. You may not live in L.A. I don't blame you. You got your own things to worry about. Man, that's just I can see it out of the corner of my eye. Still going banana. Now it's really going back. It's so great to be here we do every morning. I told you.

You know, I was chatting with Vince earlier this morning about his success. Look at that thing. Look at that chat. I see it right on the corner of the screen right there? And I said to him, you know, haven't done radio like he's doing now in podcasts, but back to just the podcast. Look at it. Still going crazy.

The best part about being here every day at 10 a.m. for the live stream, you know, I appreciate you watching on demand too, though. It's like having, what do we have, 52,000 people, 24,000. minutes in. It's like having 52,600 callers into a radio show at the same time. It's your show. Look at the snapshots and sound bites, fellas, ladies. That's what it's all about. And this Spencer Pratt, Karen Bass Race, if he pulls this mega upset off, I'm going to say, shame for not paying attention because it is a PhD. You know what it reminds me? It's a PhD course in politics. I should have finished my thought.

You know what it reminds me of? And I'm not comparing the candidates. I'm just comparing the tactics. I want to be clear. Because I don't know a lot about, Mr. Pratt. It reminds me of Trump 2016. The renegade tactics. It just does.

It's just like move fast and break stuff. Try what works. Now, showing you that this stuff matters. Because, yeah, we can show you ads and, you know, we can muttly them and laugh about them. But this isn't funny. Like, this is the exercise of raw political power. The L.A. mayor seat is probably one of the five most powerful positions in the world.

Head of Russia, head of China, mayor of New York, mayor of New York City, U.S. President, like mayor of Chicago. These are like top five, top ten most powerful positions in the world. You can move world markets with announcements. That's the exercise of raw power. This race does matter. Mark Penn is a Democrat political pollster. It was on Fox the other day.

and Mark Penn was talking about something you need to, you know, I always say it, brain tattoos, you need to tattoo this on your brain if you're ever going to get involved in politics. It's an activist, a candidate or elsewhere. There are basically two ways to create a winning environment in an election. And one of them is a contrast, a contrast. You can't just say, we're great, where great, where great, where great. You have to paint for your audience the contrast of why the other guy or woman is so bad. And that's what that ad does so effectively.

Listen to a pollster. Guys, a Democrat, too. He's a Democrat. He's not one of us explaining exactly how this works. Check this out. It's closer than people think it is. People are unhappy with the economy. They're unhappy with the Republicans, but they're also even unhappier with the Democrats.

And so you have to say, is this election going to be a referendum on the Republicans, in which case that's bad, or is it going to be a choice? And are the Republicans going to be able to make it a choice? If they do that, when I ask, who do you have more confidence in to handle the economy? Trump and the Republicans or the Democrats in Congress, Trump and the Republicans win that 53 to 47. So, yes, people are really suffering in terms of the way they perceive the economy, and they're unhappy with the way it's going, but the Democrats haven't stepped up and shown that they will do a better job.

And that's why I think this election, although usually the in-party goes out, is still closer than most people think. I saw some of you in the chat commenting on that video. I think it was Charlie B. Curran on X, that Spencer Pratt video. But this point by Mark Penn is brilliant. I don't care he's a Democrat. He's correct.

We cannot make this election a pure referendum on Republicans. Why? Because there are a lot of people out there, Democrats, independents, and some folks who just didn't want any kind of hostilities in Iran at all who just aren't happy. It's always going to, you're never going to have Donald Trump has really high approval, no doubt about it. But Donald Trump's not on the ballot in every state. If it was Donald Trump running at every Senate and congressional seat, I'm perfectly happy with where we are right now. But he's not. We can't make it a referendum purely on Republicans. We have to engage in part two.

We have to make contrasts. We have to paint a picture of what the other side looks like, too. Full circle, that's why this Spencer Pratt video, I'll call it, is so powerful. You're reminded that even if you don't know who Spencer Pratt is, you know who the hell Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom, and Karen Bass are, and they suck. We can't make this midterm a pure referendum. I'm comfortable in our record, happy with that record, but some people just have a different policy position on stuff.

But once that policy position, well, I don't like the warring around. Okay, you want Joe Biden inflation? You want Joe Biden open. Well, I don't want that. Okay, we win. I'll take it. You get it? Listen to me.

Brain tattoo. Referendum choice. Referendum choice. You always want to make it a choice election because we are just better than them. Our solutions are better. Our policies are better. Our growth policies, our policing, policies, public safety policies, all of it.

Brilliant by Mark Penn. All right, I'm going to take a quick break, and this is going to be a little difficult because I don't like being wrong about stuff, but I'm pretty convinced I was. I'll find out one day from the Almighty, and so will you. And hopefully I'm on the right side of that. But I don't change my mind often, but I did about this. All right. Ooh, man.

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mattress in the business. Folks, the public safety contrast is going to be important moving forward. Make no mistake. The Democrats have been the party for decades now of defund the police or war on law enforcement. You know that. That's fairly obvious if you just study the history of the matter. It's already happened.

There's no running away from it for the Democrats. I am proud to have been part of a Trump Justice Department that took the exact opposite approach. We are going in and pulling violent animals off the street. So if you haven't heard about this case and you're not ready for this, I understand if you want to tune out now because it's not an easy segment. And no, I'm not going to play the video of the FedEx truck. I'm sorry. I'm not doing it. I can't.

I don't want to see it. And I, but there is an animal. I don't want to say animal because Lucy's an animal. A demon by the name of Tanner Homer who was sentenced yesterday to death. for the murder of Athena Strand, a six-year-old young girl who was kidnapped, put in the back of a FedEx truck where this individual was a driver. What happened to her was caught some of it on video, some on audio. The audio was apparently so disturbing, the cries for help and elsewhere.

It's just hard to talk about, man. I'm really sorry that the people in the courtroom are all in tears. So I'm just going to play this for you. This is the judge. The sound is not amazing. It's a little low, but it's worth your time. It's about 30 seconds of a sentencing where this demon is sentenced to death. So just take a look at this.

You will be caused to die in accordance with the rules and regulations established by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice until you, said Tanner Horner, are dead. Said execution procedure shall be determined and supervised by the director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. The clerk of this court shall issue a death warrant in accordance with this sentence directed to the director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice for that purpose. Clerk shall deliver such warrant to the sheriff of this county and to be by him to, deliver to the director of the Department of Criminal Justice together with you, and you will remand to the custody of the Terry County Jail to await transportation. Tanner, Horner, I don't want to mention this, this, this, I don't know, I don't know.

It's a talk show. I don't, I don't, I don't really have the adjectives or adverbs to describe this level of evil. I'm not playing what happened. It's a conscious choice. If you want, I suggest you don't watch it. I, or listen to it, I really do, because it will scar you forever like it has me. Ladies and gentlemen, this case is so deeply impacted my life that every time I go on to Twitter, I've had to like mute words.

That's how disturbing it is. Now, in the past, I have not been a supporter of the death penalty. And I'll tell you, there have been, there have been really very few shows. over the years where my own audience has kind of rebelled against a position. That's okay. This is not a monarchy. Dan Bongino show, we're not collectivists. I am not your boss. I'm not your king. I'm none of that. I'm one of you. I'm just a guy with an opinion that may differ from you. And I was not a supporter of the death penalty. And I think I owe you an explanation as to why I've

explained in the past, but some of you are new to the show. I felt that given this modern technological advancement we have of sophisticated incarceration, that if there was even a mild chance at salvation, that being a Christian, albeit not always a great one, but I try, that if Jesus wanted to save someone, that we should give them the shot. That was my reason. However, I think that's a luxury modern society affords us that are, ancestors didn't have. When you didn't have technologically advanced prisons and human beings were living in tribes and small communities, the chance of someone getting out escaping

like this individual and doing this again was great, so was high. So sometimes, a lot of times, they had to take drastic action and make harsh decisions like the penalty of death. I think I've been satiated by that luxury that, oh yeah, you know, one day Jesus could save them. And Jesus can do what he wants. He's omnipotent. But this is an evil so great that the only solution is death. The only solution is death. That is a malignancy so dangerous that the idea you could contain it in some kind of a capsule It's so unfair to other kids if that capsule were to break and this would have happened again. The blood would be on the hands of people like me who did not support extinguishing it. And it is really unfair to the audience to continue to support that position. I can't.

And maybe it's because, like I said, this has been a gradual change. I've been thinking about this for a long time. I don't take policy positions like the death penalty, which is obviously tautologically final lightly, ever. I've been thinking about this for a while, but if there were some Paul getting knocked from the horse on the road to Damascus moment, if there were me watching that video and listening to that sound, there's some evil so profound that the risk is just too great. It's one of the most horrifying things I've ever seen. So as I said to you before, is my audience, you deserve the truth from me. And when I'm wrong, I'm wrong.

And I was wrong about that. And I should have probably listened to some of your feedback. I forget when I did the show. It doesn't matter three or four years ago. But I had mentioned, I just mentioned it casually. I don't even think it was a subject of a segment. And man, we got so many emails. And some of your emails were spot on.

I remember one I saw off. And I don't even like to say, but what if it was a member of your family? And I said, you know what? You're right. That's kind of hypocritical because I'd be the first one out there, you know, probably violently killing this person to get my own retribution. But then when it's someone else's, it just, you were right. So I want to thank you, the audience for number one, staying on top of me and not treating this show like I'm some kind of, you know, special deity. I'm not. I have no X-Men superpowers. I'm just a guy. I, I, do politics and issues for a living because I enjoy it. However, this has been one of the more unenjoyable but necessary segments I think I've ever done. Folks, having said that, I'm going to tell you something. I have never in my life been prouder, ever about accepting the role I took over the past year. And having seen a lot of this stuff, I'm just here to tell you to the public safety moms and dads out,

there who see this story and say that better never happen to my kid this stuff happens a lot it's not caught on video and audio as often it doesn't get the media attention but this is not an isolated case i'm not just talking about the kidnapping i'm talking about violent crime in general to women to men to kids to teens some of the stuff we would hear every day in fbi i headquarters will change your life and I'm not talking about for the better. We've got a choice coming up in the midterms as well. And ladies and gentlemen, law and order is not negotiable. So I am begging those public safety law enforcement, safe streets, moms and dads to please make a choice. Because when you see crime like this, up close and personal, all that defund the police shit, you can roll it up in a ball

and shove it right up your Chai over at Libs at TikTok put out this tweet yesterday. It was about police body cams. Again, going back to the video of the FedEx the FedEx demon with the young girl. She knows police body cams

ended the entire BLM grift. This might be the greatest backfire in history. You are damn right. Look at some of the imagery from police body cams. We were told about all these everything's racist to them. There's nothing to do with it. The majority of this crime is perpetrated on minority communities, including the black community.

Look at some of the images from police body cams. These are years ago before police body cams. Greatest backfire in history. And I had said this. You know, if you listen to my show, I've said this over and over. There were some people, a small group of people on the right, body cams are intrusive. They're going to be abused. And I said, the body cam is the greatest invention ever.

Because I know cops. I've been with the NYPD, the Secret Service, and the FBI. I think I'm the only person ever done those three. I've seen it all. And the cops out there I know are good guys. And when you see those images, put those back up there, you're going to tell me like this was racism? I'm not telling you there's not use of force incidents that shouldn't have happened

and we should prosecute those vigorously and harshly. I'm just telling you, forget the stupid race arguments and all this crap. There was a video I saw an X yesterday. I think his name is, forgive me if I'm saying it wrong, Alex Caracatanis, he's talking about this body cam issue, how liberals are now so disturbed that their racist cop, racist cop narratives are falling apart because people are seeing it. They're seeing it now.

They're like, gosh, I would have done the same thing, defended my life. They're seeing what crime looks like. You even have the mayor of Seattle. Katie Wilson wants to pull down police cameras in the street because she doesn't want you to see what's going on because she knows you'll never vote for the defund the police Democrats again. Here's this guy, Karakatanis, freaking out about police body cans because they realize it their entire defund the police grift,

is going away. Check this out. In the wake of Michael Brown, we'll market it to low information, people in the public to well-meaning, liberal people, will market it as accountability and transparency. And so they totally shifted, and then they were able to get hundreds of millions of dollars toward their goal of outfitting every single cop in the United States

with a mobile surveillance camera that the police control, they control when it's on, when it's off, what it captures, when something is captured is released to the public. So if the police capture, let's say, an undocumented immigrant committing some crime, That's out on Fox News in the New York Post within hours, but if they capture the police doing something horrific, the public may never see that video. So body cameras are a mirage.

And as I write in the copaganda book, and it's really critical to understand exactly how it happens, not only do they not reduce police violence, but they have been an essential propaganda tool in convincing so many well-meaning people across our society that the authorities care about police violence, that they want accountability, that they're doing something, right?

And it distracts people from the core important kinds of changes that we need, which is to reduce the size and power of these bureaucracies. You believe this bullshit? This guy's not concerned about reducing the size and power of the criminal workforce. He's concerned about reducing the police bureaucracies, a euphemism for defund the police. Why? Why does he hate police body cameras so much?

because the truth has always been the enemy of liberalism and progressivism. Always. Every single thing they tell you is bullshit bumper sticker politics. Defund the police. Tax the rich. Health care for all. You're like, well, damn, those things all sound great if you're a liberal until you realize defund the police results in people getting killed quickly in the street.

Tax the rich and they leave and you have no job. health care for all means health care for none as they start to ration health care. See, we've had to tell people the truth. And the body cam, the body cam and crime have completely destroyed the left-wing narrative on policing in America. There is no body cam for tax to rich. There's not a liberal mayor with a body cam at the border of Florida watching, you know, Katie Wilson watching a Washington resident crossover and on body cam.

Hey, I'm Katie Wilson, the mayor of Seattle. Why did you leave Washington? Because if you're shitty tax policies, you don't see body cam evidence of that. The liberal racist cop defund the police argument is entirely collapsed. And now the same liberals who swore body cams were the solution, the panacea, the elixir, are now freaking out because the story they told their people about the racist cop, violently mowing down unarmed black men in the street turns out to be a total. Total fabrication and bullshit.

So now they want to hide it. Now they want to hide it. Folks, the greatest honor of my life was that last year. I'm telling you, man, there's nothing like it. I was up in D.C. Maybe I'll show you some time. Cash gave me this nice little plaque you had put together. It's really kind of more in my heart a little bit.

I wouldn't expect than that. I was up there for someone else. but he's still knocking it out of the park, man. And I say he, I mean him and the agent's doing the work. I want you to look at this yesterday, Operation Iron Pursuit. A lot of people out there claiming to care about kids and child abuse. I don't understand why they don't want to talk about this stuff. We've rescued thousands of children from criminality.

Thousands. We had enduring justice, restoring justice. Here's another op. I'm obviously out. This was his. I'm not taking credit for it. Now for three months, however, Operation Iron Pursuit, 200-plus child victims located, 350 subjects arrested,

the highest number on a similar op in the last 14 months. Nationwide child abuser takedown. All 56 FBI field officers participated, lives saved, families reunited, violent criminals crushed. You want to save kids or not? Or you just want to talk about it on X. This stuff is happening. This is on the ballot.

What do you mean? Cash isn't on the ballot. The Trump agenda is on the ballot in the midterms. You want to go back to, you know, endless subpoenas for Trump officials, for cracking down on child predators, rather than actually going out there catching child predators, vote for Democrats. Because that's what you're going to get. Cash was on Hannity's podcast, hang out with Hannity.

And here's about a minute. He was talking about the violent crime push. Folks, this is real. You do not want another incident like that incident with the FedEx driver. I can't look at another one of those. I can't hear about it. That's the end is, that's got to stop right now. You got a guy in charge now who gets it.

He understands the assignment. Here he is talking about what we did on violent crime. The numbers are staggering. Check this out. In 2025, in one year under President Trump's leadership, this FBI arrested 40,000, violent criminals. That's not the total arrest the FBI had. That number's closer to 80,000. But the 40,000 violent criminals we arrested, Sean, was a 112% increase from 2024.

A hundred and 12% increase. If this FBI under Donald Trump did nothing else but that, that is the only thing the mainstream media would be talking about if it was a president, Kamala Harris. Now go behind the numbers. How can there be 40,000 violent criminals to arrest by just the FBI in one year. Break that down by state. 50 states, you do the math. We're talking murderers, rapists, pedophiles, gangbangers, terrorists, everybody that wants to harm our way of life that President Trump stood up and ran on and said, we're going to crush violent crime. That's what we did. That number alone is emblematic of two things. One, President Trump is the absolute most successful president in U.S. history in reducing crime in the history. In the

history of America. And two, why are there so many violent criminals in the United States of America? And you hit on it. The open borders policy and the lax rules laid out by the opponents of President Trump to be pro-crime. Remember, these are the defund the blue movement people to defund law enforcement. Trump resourced law enforcement and the FBI. So that number, 40,000 violent criminals, a 112% increase in the first year under President Trump. Hat tip over to news for cutting that for us. Folks, the reason I played that clip of cash is a couple of things. Number one, notice how he puts credit where it is you guys voted for President Trump.

You didn't vote for me or cash. That's just the fact. President Trump appointed people, but it's his mission. We just put the pieces and the tactics together to do it. I appreciate him doing that. You, you met people, yes. Well, thank you, Justin. That's very nice you to say, but votes are, he said, people are policy, but votes are policy too.

You voted for President Trump. You guys made this happen. Those violent criminals will be on the street right now. That's a fact. And you'd see other cases like Athena Strand. But second, a part I frequently leave out is President Trump was adamant. Cash brought up part two. It's not just getting the violent criminals.

He says, why are they here? A lot of them are here because of Joe Biden. Obama and others, weak-need Republicans in the past, and their unwillingness to do anything about illegal immigration where a lot of these gangbangers were coming into the country. President Trump said, no, get them the hell out. And now you're seeing massive reductions in a homicide rate in crime across the board. Folks, that is all on the ballot in November.

Make no mistake. You want safe streets or you want endless congressional subpoenas. It's your choice. You voted for this change. And thank you for doing it. You want to see what's on the ballot, too? I'm not going to be a hypocrite, right? I told you, well, Dan, paint some contrast.

You just told us the good news, violent crime getting crushed, all of this stuff that was accomplished under President Trump's DOJ and FBI. Great. You want to see the contrast? I saw this video of Ilhan Omar. Ilhan Omar. She's like a goddess on the left. They love her.

Small G. Here she is talking about what the Democratic. are going to do if they win with the courts. You want the Supreme Court Pact, the Supreme, the Democrats, they're not hiding it. They're not dancing around it. They're not using euphemisms. They're outright saying, we want to pack the courts. What does pack the courts mean to you?

Packing the courts means every single level of the federal court system will be populated by liberals who don't believe in the rule of law, legislate from the bench, every victory we've had. Budget victory, school choice, abortion, guns, all of it. Pro-life movements, all of it will get thrown out because the courts, I told you, through judicial activists, are now the most powerful branch of government because they've used power from the other two. Here she is.

Here's her. Just talking about it. I don't need to use my words. Just listen to hers. Check this out. Congress can change the number of justices on the court at any time and has done so seven times throughout our history. Since 1989, the last time the court was expanded, the U.S. population has won by over 800 percent. Yet the court has stayed stagnant at nine justices.

In the face of a stolen seat, a sitting justice implicated in a coup attempt and a dangerous crisis of legitimacy, this common sense reform should absolutely be at the table. Who do you want the midterms governing? Do you want Ilhan Omar as a chair of a committee in Congress, you know, subpoenas for impeachment again? Or do you want Besson, Rubio, Vance, Trump, people like Brandon Gill out there? It's your choice. You have made the right choice over and over.

Thank you, the American voter, for picking Donald Trump and Donald Trump for picking people, Justin's correct, who are instituting policies leading to a better America now. But you got to, that concrete has to dry. That concrete has to dry. Do you want that, Ilhan Omar, a PAC Supreme Court, or do you want the Trump administration and all of the positive news about the border, about the economy, public safety, violent crime? It's your choice. We got to. We got to. to get out and do. Talk is no good. Here's another contrast. You want to make the United States more like California? California is part of the United. It sure is. California has picked a certain direction.

Here is a CNN segment where they almost accidentally stumble on the truth. Remember I told you Democrats never tell you the truth? Defund the police. That's why body cams don't work for them. Because body cams showed you what crime actually looks like and the whole racist cop narrative went out the window. Here's a CNN segment that's like a body cam on liberal Democrats complaining about gas prices. Oh, gas price. Meanwhile, the Biden administration's had a far bigger problem with gas prices than the Trump team, and they've only been acute and temporary. Why is California struggling with high gas prices?

Maybe it's because California taxes the shit out of their citizens at the pump. Watch CNN just back into this and be like, well, you want to contrast? Keep voting for Democrats, and you will California. the United States, and you will be paying more for the pump, no matter what happens in the straight. Check this out. Oh, my goodness gracious. I mean, just take a look at the price of gasoline for a gallon of gas. The national average right now is 448, but you think that's bad.

Go out to the left coast. Top in the United States, $6.13. There's even a gas station out there where the cost is about $10 per gallon. And, of course, if you've ever been out there, you always know that the prices in California, for a gallon of gas are just simply put absolutely outrageous, running well ahead of the national average, the folks in California really getting hurt by this increase in gas prices. Part of the reason for that is they have a higher gas tax, right?

That's exactly right. One of the big reasons why you see this big difference right here is, in fact, the gas tax out in California and our partners at USAFACs helped provide this data for us. Take a look here, the state gas tax and fees per gallon. You know, on the average state, it's 33 cents. California, again, the top in the nation, more than double that. It's 71 cents.

That's an economic body cam. Police body cams debunk the racist cop narrative. That's a CNN economic body cam. Lifetime footage of why you're paying a lot for gas in California. You're paying way more in taxes than an acute temporary hike due to what's going on in the street has ever caused you pain in your wallet. It's your state government, your blue state government, helping you by taxing the shit out of you.

There's CNN, like, walking backwards into it. Well, you mean it's because of the gas taxing? Yes. You have a choice. Just like Spencer Pratt and that video player, you have a choice. You want Karen Bass, Gavin Newsom, Ilhan Omar, AOC, Bernie Sanders, Liz Warren. You want more pow-wow chow? You got a choice, brother.

You got a choice, sister. You got to go out and do. Your country's not going to take itself back. You have to do it. You got to do it, man. Oh, my goodness gracious. Oh, I heard them inside. There's like a little bubble in there.

It's hard to hear that. I heard Justin. Oh, my goodness gracious. Harry Enton, man. I really enjoy his segments on seeing it. Not real great. Sometimes the poll numbers aren't good. but he seems to be given you a pretty balanced picture.

Folks, this movement is real, man. I'm telling you, we have an opportunity here to take the country back and let the concrete dry. Don't give up, by the way, on the Virginia gerrymander. The Virginia gerrymander, here is a liberal commentator. Just everyone's about to freak out, we're going to lose all these seats in Virginia. There is a chance.

This may get wiped out in the Virginia Supreme Court. It's not a great chance, but it's a chance. I want you to listen to Dan Turrantine talk about exactly this. There's a shot that could get thrown out to, which would be even worse for the Democrats in the midterm.

Check this out. I talked to some of those same people yesterday, and what I was told is they now think it's less than 50% that the court will let the certification go through. And what really triggered it, they said, was when the court didn't rule by Friday afternoon. They, they, the time they don't believe is on their side. And what apparently transpired over the weekend and this person would know they're in contact with the people I'm about to say is that the governor's staff is now sniffing at the Senate majority leader and House speaker that they warned them last fall.

This would not pass legal review. Okay, one more piece of unbelievably good news for you, which the pillars and the doomers don't want to hear about for the midterms that you need to go out and vote and take your country back. Here's a quick Fox segment. Not only may they lose in Virginia and not get the four seats they thought they were going to get, Democrat seats in Virginia and the midterms, due to the Supreme Court now making illegal racially discrimination,

discriminated districts, which the Democrats love, and I'll talk to with Vince in a minute about, Fox is reporting that some redistricting efforts in southern states may net us a couple more seats in the midterm. So I don't want to hear the dumerism. Check this out. We're looking at a situation where Democrats may not actually pick up the seats that they wanted to pick up in Virginia,

and Republicans might end up picking a total of five if you include Alabama, Tennessee, and Louisiana, obviously in Louisiana, that was the court case that the Supreme Court ruled on where they have no choice but to go back and actually change those maps. And they could be looking at changing those maps down to just one Democrat district. Folks, don't give up. Don't give up. Oh, my goodness gracious. Do not give up. Get out there and do 10, 10 and 10. Get 10. Get 10 people. the polls. Email them, call them, make 10 social media posts. That's our job. Your forefathers

sacrificed a lot to give you this amazing country that's finally on the right track again. Let the concrete try. Give President Trump two more years. Give cash two more years. Give Besson two more years. Give Ratcliffe two more years. Hegset two more years. They need it. Folks, when there are supply constraints out there on commodities, what happens? You know, you've seen it. Prices surge, the laws of economics. You saw it with fuel prices with the straight, the blockade there, and you know what else is a limited commodity? Gold, one of my favorite investments. It's been a staple of mine over time. They mine it out of the ground, and when it's gone, it's gone. Governments can't print more gold. That's why everyone from central banks to savvy savers are diversified with

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Again, text Dan to 9-9-8-9-8-t today. Message and data rates apply. Welcoming back to the show, we're lucky to have him every other Wednesday, and I do his great radio show every Wednesday. So one of us is on each other's show every week. The great Vince, Colin aces at rumble.com slash Vince, Vince, thanks for joining us today.

I appreciate it. Dan, oh my gosh, as always, thanks, man, for having me. Well, I have to thank you. Listen, it's been such an honor to work with you. You brought you on board with the team. You were gracious enough to fill in for me when I was gone. I just saw this from stream charts yesterday. The Bongino Report channel, which you anchor number 10 Rumble video channel by peak viewers. So you're just absolutely crushing it. Listen, man, you're in a spot.

You kind of own the 8 a.m. but it's not the easiest spot in the world. And you pretty much dominate there. So congratulations, man. Really great work on that. I love it. I mean, I love doing it. I love the audience. We, you know, we really have such a great audience, Dan, between the two of us. And I love that right now we're book-ending Rumble. It's like the whole Rumble chart is controlled by us right now. But I'd like to nestle my way up even closer to where you are. I feel like you need some company up there. So I'm heading my way up there. You're getting there. Listen, it's not the, I think, you know, we could kind of both acknowledge that this is like the live stream environment for politics right now.

It's good, but it's not great. It's kind of like right around election season, midterms and, you know, three, four months prior. And for a presidential, that's like the Super Bowl. That's when political talk radio just explodes. Your radio ratings are going to go bananas. They're already great, but they'll be, they're just better. And the analogy I try to give people is you can be the most interesting political commentator in the world. Imagine just trade out politics for sports.

A week after the Super Bowl, I don't really care. You could be Mike and the Mad Dog or whatever. People are just, like, kind of done for like Super Bowl's over, you know? So I'm really proud that you've succeeded, pulling a massive audience, and that the Bongino Army continues to show up. And, I mean, I think we have to be candid. Having Donald Trump in the White House doesn't hurt. Like, this guy's just a news machine every day.

He is. Let me also add one other element. And I don't know how interesting this is the audience, but I just want to say this. I haven't said this to you yet. But I learned a lot about this format by sitting in your chair for the year that I did because I thought I knew what I was getting into. And the truth is I really didn't. You don't know it until you do it.

And, you know, radio is a different, is actually a very different vehicle. Like I had, I've had success in radio. I understand the format. And what people especially have relied on me for in D.C. was news. Like I was bringing them the latest news. I'd give them some analysis. But in podcasting, what's different is the relationship you have. with the audience is so essential. It's so intimate. And I had watched you for years. I had seen the way you had done it, but I hadn't really internalized why you were such a success. And I started to piece it together after I started doing this for a time. And I'm a slow learner. But as I started doing it, I realized, well, Dan personalizes this. Dan, you let people into your life in ways that other mediums don't. And certainly other hosts don't. People know your wife's name. They know what her interests are. They know all sorts of details about you.

And these were not things that I had ever really done. I had kind of guarded against that because I thought it was, I thought it was too inward looking. I thought it was too like kind of talking about myself as not what I'm supposed to do. But it turns out there is a middle ground. People want to know the person they're dealing with. They want to know what kind of person they are and what kind of life they lead. And so for the first time ever, I started saying Allison's name of the year.

I started talking about like my personal life, my dogs and like the things that animate me. And that connection with the audience, that's something I learned from you, Dan. And as a result, I think it's paid off. I think what they come to me now for is not just the news, they can get that on X. People can turn on a social media feed on truth social and they can scroll it. What they want from us is that connection and also that analysis, that sense of, okay, what does this really mean and where is it going from here? Yeah, they're tuning into here a guy they know.

They know. It's an asymmetric relationship. They know you, but you don't know all. But they know you. You talk about Allison and what, you know, date night on the weekend. and you had a good time watching some movie or something. They know you. You may not know every one of them,

but they have tuning in for Vince's take. Anybody can get the news. Go to Bongino Report, Judge Report, Breitbart, whatever. It's not that. They want to hear what you think about it. That's different. Right. And also with the live stream, which is different than radio.

Radio, live stream is like having, you know, if you have 20,000 streamers, it's like having 20,000 callers on the show at the same time, participate. It's totally different than radio. It just is. And I think you haven't been. The other piece of that is I had to learn not to respond to every critique. Like I'm seeing in the, so like we got a lot of great people in our chat. We have all these great people on our chat.

But I remember early on when I was hosting it again in your in your time slot on Rumble, I'd see somebody say something, like some troll came in and say something nasty. And then all of a sudden my attention is just like totally thrown off. And I'm like dunking on the guy for the next 10 minutes. And I was like, what am I doing? Why are I beaten up on this poor sucker? And he would be like, move on, brother. Move on.

He'd be like, we get it, Dan, we get it. Like, yeah, troll 672 in the chat said you're a D-bag. Like, move on. Like, yeah, I'm glad you figured that out. So, listen, move on to some really sad tragic news of the day. I discussed this in the beginning of the show. I don't really change my mind that often. It's not that I'm hard-headed.

It's just the whole essence of conservatism, Vince, is conserving good ideas. And if you believe in good ideas, they should be, you know, longitudinally valid. You shouldn't change your mind all the time. However, I've been considering this for a long time. I was not a death penalty supporter. You know, I believe that while we have incarceration as an option,

if we can isolate the problem and there was a chance at salvation, you know, we should take it. However, having long considered this because my audience really did not like that position, and that's okay, we don't have to agree on everything. But watching this Athena Strand case, I just, it's hard for me. mean, even discussed the six-year-old girl murdered by the FedEx driver who got the death penalty yesterday, discussed it earlier. There's some evil on this planet, Vince, that it's the shot at salvation is not worth the risk of an escape or something like that, and another horrific,

atrocious, demonic tragedy like this. I agree with you. And in fact, I kind of think I've gone through a similar evolution, although I don't know if I was ever hard and fast on the subject. But I always had a temptation to feel like, well, there's always a moment. always some path for somebody, even if they've done something horrible. And who are we to judge in the end and that kind of thing? I've gone through all of that. But stories like this force me to arrive at the same conclusion that you've arrived at, which is that there are some people that we need to kill. We need to kill. And we need to, we need to administer the death penalty in a just way. We need to be real deliberation. We need to be certain that this is the right person. We can't be

in any way doubtful that we've got the right person. I hate to see any mistake made in this in this front at all because this is an irreversible mistake if it's made but a guy like this that soulless that disgraceful that disgusting that that that cow that much callous indifference and requires real consequence uh there there are some people who just deserve the death penalty and this is and by the way as a as a theological matter for like for the catholics out there i'm catholic this has been something that the church has wrestled with forever for real for obvious reasons there's a reason that this has been a big wrestling match because It's about the dignity of the human person.

How do we uphold fundamentally? How do we uphold the dignity of the human person? And if you impose fatal consequences on people who commit the very, the most vile demonic acts on humanity and rob people of their lives, well, that's a good correction. And this is one of those areas where I'm like, hey, let God sort them out. Let God sort them out. Because at this moment, I think it's, I'm convinced. I'm watching you on the screen here, struggling to find the words to describe this incident,

just like I was. Like, what, what, atrocious? It's not a true, beyond tragic, beyond, it doesn't, nothing sums to something. Matter of fact, I see the, I didn't even put it on the show, but the grainy black and white footage from the FedEx truck where this atrocity, again, I can't even happen. And I have to scroll past it. But I've struggled with this for a long time, Vince, because I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, thought to myself, modern society has given us the luxury of this question.

I think this through, like, we're back in the 1800s. You're in a village of people, a tribe, a village, whatever it may be. You have a guy like this who does this to a six-year-old in the village. There's no like incarceration option comfortable. You're not going to have a maximum security, but maybe what are you going to tie him to a pole and like feed him everything? The risk of him doing this again is so great. There really was no choice.

You had to kill them. Like, it wasn't a luxury because the immediate threat was there. We have this modern society luxury of supermax prisons and others where it provides us a level of comfortability where we're like, well, at least a person will be locked away. Maybe there's a chance. And I think I kind of use that as a backstop too much. And I think that's kind of like you brought in the theological component.

This kind of goes to the argument between Pope Leo and President Trump right now. You know, Pope Leo, I think, is oversimplifying these military action. Iran. You know, God doesn't look kindly on those who wage war. Yeah, I get that. Like, death is obviously a bad thing if it's not natural. However, sometimes, like you said, sometimes we just have to kill people to prevent a larger mass killing. How do you uphold the dignity of the human person? That's the question. How do you do that? And you take out the bad guys. You have to. And lower level offenses require lower lower level consequences, but this is the highest level offense. It deserves the highest level consequence. And I, and you, you're so right about like, you know, what did the world used to be like,

how would you just go to go to the simple math here. If this was my daughter and I found out somebody was doing this to my daughter, I would kill you myself. Yeah, of course. I would kill you myself. Right. And so you don't even care if you were given a death penalty. You're like, that's fine. I'll trade my life just to make sure like that person. No, that's exactly right. So under those circumstances, as an individual you assess that, which is sometimes why I'm kind of, like, I'm gratified by street justice and rare occasions. Like, I'm like, I'm glad somebody took that guy out. I'm glad there was a good guy with a gun to take that guy out at that moment. Forget the justice system. We took him out then. That's fine. But this is why we have a civilized justice system to handle this and a civilized

response. A truly civilized response is to put this man to death. You know, it's weird, too, how we as human beings, we have this. You know, it's kind of, it's kind of, kind of good in a way. We have this impulse to want to seek salvation. We always see that guy on, you know, the good thief on the cross story from the Bible. And we always think salvation's around the corner. But the hard reality is we're very primal. I mean, when you and I watch Denzel and Man on Fire, when he's, you know, he's the bodyguard for the young girl gets kidnapped. And he goes out and just like kills every single, all of us are quietly in a movie. The reason the movie was so popular is every one of us was like, yes.

So it's like we're kind of being a little, I know it's a movie at all, but we are very primal in that respect and that. No, that's true. We kind of seek our own retribution. Let me move on to this story. No, I know. I mean, even John Wick, man. Even the John Wickman. His dog gets killed.

He kills everybody. Kills the guy's dog. The guy wipes out the whole Russian mom. No, you're so right. So on a more positive note, that being a horrible story, obviously. I know, because I was just chatting with you briefly before we came on the air this morning about your success and everything. This Trump and. in Indiana. So long story short, the Indiana, a bunch of Indiana Republicans at the state level

did not want to vote to redistrict the state, which would have been, you know, a real positive, net positive. Donald Trump comes in and says, come on, let's get to it, like Democrats are doing this too. Primary last night just cleans up. I think it's what six out of seven he wins. And a lot of these were incumbents, Vince. You've been involved in politics a long time. It is really, really hard to unseat an incumbent. But that Trump endorsement is, as like solid gold as you're going to find in politics. It's a sign of energy, I think, from two important groups of people. One is, I say it's a group as the president of the United States.

But the other group is us. It's MAGA. It's people care about the country. Yeah, they're the one. That's a good point. I, you know, Kurt Schlichter, I showed a post from Kurt Schlichter. I like Kurt this morning on my show. And Kurt said, you know, if any rhino, if any of these establishment people think that this

goes away when President Trump is done, it's not going away. This energy staying. that the the the American people now have a very long memory for the people who've betrayed them and we will come for there will be consequences for you there will be real political consequences for you because we want to stock up the leadership of this country with people who care about it as much as we do and so in Indiana just to remind people of the stakes here if you Stephen Miller had an assessment Stephen Miller at the White House he had an assessment earlier this week that upwards of 40 plus seats right now in the House of Representatives have been stolen by Democrats by virtue of of what they've done through election rigging, through bringing in illegal aliens and through these racist districts that they've drawn. It's just a disaster. So over 40 seats. What were we asking Indiana to do last year? Two. We were asking for two Republican leaning seats in the state by virtue of trying to regain some of that ground in the way the maps were drawn. That's what President Trump was asking for. And he actually made a promise. He said on the day of the vote in the state Senate,

He said, anybody who votes against this, you should know that in the spring, a primary is coming your way. Just to give you a sense of the stakes here. They didn't listen. They voted no. And sure enough. It wasn't a surprise, Vince. He warned them. And they did it anyway.

Sure enough. And so you get this. This is a massive story. And this is not only a big victory for people who believe in saving this country and who actually know what time it is and know precisely how the left plays, which is not by the rules at all. They don't have an appealing thing for voters, so they have to rig the system. This is a warning shot to the establishment in Washington as well. If you're a senator right now who's still sitting on your ass and not passing the Save

America Act and think the rest of us are going to go away, I'm going to tell you something right now. You're going to be out of a job. You're going to lose. You're going to be thrown out. And we're going to put somebody in who will actually get the work of the American people done. So yesterday is not merely some one state event. This is a clear sign to anybody who sits inside of the status quo Republican Party who thinks they can go along to get along, who's happy to be in the minority, who's happy not to have to do anything for the American people. We are going to fire you. Just wait for your turn.

Now, folks, if you're enjoying Vince's content like I do, Rumble.com slash Vince. Give him a follow. It is free. You can join him live every day at 8 a.m. 0800 Eastern Time. You can also watch him on demand anytime. You know, Vince, that gets me thinking about a couple things. The Republican bench, which I'll get to in a second. But second, I had addressed yesterday a multi-point plan that we're already halfway home, that if we were to enact, you would have generational victories for the Republican Party. We just haven't been able to hold.

The Reagan Revolution, the Tea Party, it all got a lot of momentum. And then boom, Democrats come back. We get Obamacare and all this other crap. We're already through with the racial gerrymanders of the Louisiana case, so we're good there. Seal the border. We're good there. get an influx of illegals. Census reform. We need that in 2030. You can't count illegals. You don't count illegals. All of a sudden, you get an accurate population of U.S. citizens. Democrat,

blue states where people who are leaving are going to lose power. Save Act, you just mentioned. Get the Save Act through. You're not going to have any more of this garbage ballot harvesting, cheating nonsense, going to enforce citizenship and ID. Dump the filibuster. I know kind of there's some different opinions on that. That was part of my plan. At least a talking filibuster and some filibuster reform. You do that, Vince. Steve Miller, I saw that tweet about the 40 seats the Democrats have immorally and unethically gained in Congress. We would have a Republican House, probably a Republican Senate. And because of the Electoral College ramifications of population loss in blue states, probably a Republican president, we could have it for 15, 20, 30 years. Yes. And you'd have a

better Democrat party. You'd have a party that actually would have to appeal to voters. Yes. If the rules of the game are enforced, you have to play by them. That's the point. So if you want a two-party system that functions, that's an actual exchange of ideas, that's competing on the margins, just about, okay, which one of these options is better for the country, you should want everything that Dan Bongino just laid out, all five of those elements. And I mean Democrat voters. I mean lifelong Democrat voters.

You should want everything that Dan Bonino just laid out because the current system is not working for you. This Democrat Party right now, again, bears no resemblance to the average American voter. The average American voter does not want to open borders. The average American voter doesn't want to mutilate children. They don't want to convince them they were born in the wrong bodies. They don't want them illiterate by third grade. They don't want them unhealthy. The average American voter wants a sound economy.

They want crime to not happen in their community. They want the law to be enforced. Why is it that all of the common sense positions are only held by one? one political party right now. One. The other doesn't care about any of those things. And in fact, is working against all of them. And that's what the Democrats are doing right now.

And the only reason they're in a position to do that, they're playing to their radicals in their party, is because they think that that chaos is a ticket to power. The more chaos we have in the United States, the more people are going to fall on their knees for big government. And the other element, of course, the biggest element of all is that they're rigging our elections. They're rigging our elections,

through racist districting, through importing illegals. I've gone through the list before. Everything you just said, Dan, would improve the quality of both political parties like that. And the country would be headed in a great direction. Yeah, and I saw a piece of the Wall Street Journal yesterday where they were arguing, was it Jason Riley or someone was arguing that it's not doing the black community in America at large any benefits either by isolating them into these little pockets, insisting they vote Democrat and, you know, not forcing candidates into like appealing to a more,

it's ironic that the Democrats are all about DEI, diversity, but they don't want to appeal to a diverse group of voters. They want to just appeal to a pocket of black voters. They want to, you know, lay upon their backs the anchor of phony victimization, which most of them are waking up to now as they start to move to the Republican Party. It's not helping black voters either. They get a bunch of pandering garbage candidates, and the candidates not actually forced to articulate why what he would do would matter to the broad populace, which is what a representative is supposed to do. It's hard to envision a more permanently shameful organization than the Democrat Party in American history. You know what I mean? Like, the entire history of that party has been using race as a

means to gain political power, the entire history of that party. And the entire history of the Republican Party has been an effort to reject that and to recognize that we need a colorblind meritocracy that recognizes the values of each human individual in the United States. So you look at this and you're like, why would anybody associate with the Democrats? In fact, I remember the madness of 2020 when the Democrats were tearing down anything that they claimed that at any point in American history had represented something racially toxic. And I kept thinking, why aren't they getting rid of the Democrat Party? Why does the Woodrow Wilson Bridge still exist in Washington, D.C.? Woodrow Wilson. The guy was showing KKK films in the White House.

Like this idea that like the Democrats are like the party of inclusion. It's also crazy. So what we just saw from the Supreme Court last week, Dan, is once again, we are removing a racist weapon that the Democrats are using. And as a result, Democrats are losing power. So wait, you're telling me that if you get rid of the racism, Democrats lose power. Yes, every single time. It's the story of our country.

Get rid of the racism. Democrats lose power. Yeah, no, you are absolutely accurate. And I think, you know, Donald Trump is really the first Republican president based not on my opinion, but on the pure number of black voters he attracted to his MAGA movement to just fracture that wall and just be brutally honest with people. Like, hey, listen, the racism's real. It happens.

However, it's being used as a cudgel to get from you and steal from you political power where it would be far more advantageous to you to spread your political power around and make both parties, you know, cater to your needs. in a representative democracy, and that's just not what happened. Well, Democrats, you know, the black voters listening, and I want to ask you about the debt, too, but I got to just get your thought, because you really kind of spurred me that. The black voters listening, number one, our party, we are here for you. It's an open door.

We would absolutely love to have you. We don't look at you like black voters. We look at you like voters. However, the Democrats have got a lot of people thinking in identity politics. The Democrats don't give a shit about you. They just take your vote for granted. They don't care about you at all. I mean, if illegal immigration were to white,

wipe out every black job in a primarily black community. And in Virginia or Maryland in the Delmarva region you live in, they don't give a shit. They know you're going to vote for them anyway, or they assume it. They do nothing to help you at all. Democrats have been a part of orchestrating the entire destruction of the black family. I mean, that's been their project.

I mean, ever since, you know, Lyndon B. Johnson, I mean, the whole concept was to divide the black family. And they did. They had a lot of success in doing it. that, which is really unfortunate, has been totally destructive. Creating more government dependency out of black Americans has been the program of the Democrat Party. And it's just been, it's been sickening to absolutely watch. And I've seen a lot of black Americans who've been waking up to this. You just saw Harry Enton, the numbers enthusiast over on CNN saying it this week. He goes, look,

I'm telling you guys, ladies and gentlemen, black voters are heading towards President Trump to Harrietton. And people should pay attention to this. He's had a lot of movement on this. By the way, voters of all races have been moving towards President Trump. There's a reason that Hispanic voters are now considered a coin toss in the United States is because of the coalition that President Trump has built. And, you know, it's just this, this constant betrayal of black voters by Democrats, it's long past time that everybody wake up to what's going on here. They just are trying to create dependency on the Democrat Party. And they go into black churches. They try and scare black voters into compliance by saying that the other side is going to be racist towards you.

all the all the other side wants to do the trump side wants to do is every every every american an equal chance that success in this great country that's it that's all this is that that's the whole that's the program that's the big scary side of this which is everybody has the same chance that's it and and it's just really sick that the democrats continue to rely on the lowest form of division in order to accrue power well you know it worked for them and you're right it's just not anymore I put a poll up earlier in the show from open source zone covering how Hispanic voters, the Democrats are now plus two. They were like plus 40 something just a couple decades ago.

So that message is dying a rightful, slow and thankfully a death here because we need it. I want to just get your thoughts on this because it's a topic not enough people are talking about. We are in a, and this has been a bipartisan problem. I'm not, of course, hoisting it at anchors solely on the back of Democrats. The national debt's out of control. Wall Street Journal ran a piece about it the other day. We're going to be paying more in interest than we are for our military soon. And in the piece, they talk about the actual real, tangible, touchable downsides to this.

You know how the old adage goes about bankruptcy? It happens gradually. And then all of a sudden, the journal notes how interest rates could spike, how private capital is basically going to be wiped out. Capital for private investment is going to be sucked up by interest. payments on the debt, you have increased risk of a financial crisis. This is, you know, the CBO, which is not known as a particularly, you know, right-wing outlet over there, but this is accurate. I mean, this is just pure math. We're in real trouble. I also worry about the dollar is the

world's reserve currency. Every time there's a transaction in dollars outside of the United States, it's basically like a free loan to the United States because they're using our money. So it enables us to print more without having a massive inflation crisis. That's the bad news. The good news, put up that tweet by that Kobbisi letter, the U.S. dollar is still the world's preferred currency because there isn't a second best option. However, that you see here, the world's using more dollars than ever. Dollar deposits are now 14.5 trillion. But Vince, this doesn't have to last forever. You know, and when a bankruptcy crisis hits, it hits fast. It hits hard. And we need a bipartisan effort right now to get this under control. We could be looking at a real catastrophe.

Yes. Yeah, I totally agree with you. And there's a there's a bunch of obvious reasons. I think it was hard for Americans, I think for years to internalize what it meant to have this out of control spending and how it affected you directly. I know for years we've all sort of said out loud that we were concerned about the state of the national debt. But to feel the real world experiences of COVID, I think was an unfortunate but useful lesson in how the economy actually works. If the government prints too much money, everything becomes more expensive. We all experienced this a inflation as the government was cutting these ridiculous checks that were sent out to the whole country, and there's too many dollars chasing too few goods, suddenly everything gets a lot more expensive. Now, just imagine hyperinflation. Imagine if we were in a situation where everything is just completely out of control. Then you're really feeling it. And chances are it's going to be your children and your grandchildren are going to be destroyed by this. Is that really the future you want to leave them with? Forty trillion dollars in debt is where we're heading right now. We're getting closer to that now. $40 trillion in debt.

And the only way we're going to get that under control is if we get our expenditures under control. It's always been the most basic, obvious thing. Is there any attempt to do that? Yeah, there's been some. You've had the Doge operation by the president. You've had the recisions that they've issued scaling back some of the federal spending. That's been good.

But again, that's just chipping away at this massive, massive problem. The other piece is going after the fraud. I don't think people realize how big the fraud is. fraud is huge. Like we could start right away in securing a couple trillion dollars every 10 years in massive cost savings just by going after the fraud. You're looking at hundreds of billions of dollars of Medicare and Medicaid fraud that are taking place each year. That the Trump administration is very serious about tackling. It's why J.D. Vance is there. It's why they just appointed a new assistant attorney general who reports directly to J.D. Vance to prosecute these monsters. And I love them going after this. But we've got to rein this government in Dan because this is not going to go on forever. If we lose the American dollar as the global reserve currency, we also lose leverage over every country who uses the dollar. It is a huge national security advantage for us. Yeah, I didn't even mention that. You're 100% correct.

I mean, the whole petro dollar anchor we've had forever, that collapses. Forget about the other. It's just energy alone. We're totally screwed. Interest rates go up to 20% tomorrow. You have to think of like a money machine and like a sponge sucking it up on the other end. The reason the money machine we're printing right now is not causing even greater inflation than it did in the Biden years is you're right. At least the Doge efforts paring down the federal workforce by 10%.

It sends a message to the bond market. But if you don't have that international sponge and that demand for dollars, they have to flood into an economy somewhere and they're going to flood into our economy. And that's when you're going to see double-digit inflation. And it just goes back. Remember when people were saying the media was like, what do you mean inflation's higher here? It's higher everywhere. It's not Biden's fault. Yes, it is. the global reserve currency is the dollar. When Biden prints billions of them and sends them out the door, it affects everybody. Correct.

Rumble.com slash Vince is where you can find him every day at 8 a.m. Don't worry if you can't make the live stream. However, we love the live. It's a big audience. Like I said, it's like a big call-in show. We appreciate it. You can watch them on demand anytime. You can also check him out from noon to three on radio stations across the country,

including my favorite, the great WMAL and D.C. It was his home. It was my home. It's where we both got our start. The Big Talker in D.C. Vince Colon-Ase, I'll see you Wednesday on your show, which you can listen to on WMAL at 2 p.m. where I do my regular call-in.

Thanks for joining us today. Thank you, Dan. You got it. Vince Colleenace, folks. You can also check out Haley, Karanea at noon at rumble.com slash Haley, another top live streamer on the Bongino Report channel. We really appreciate it. She's been bringing in some big numbers lately.

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