The Megyn Kelly Show - Jewish Man Killed in California, and Key Election Races to Watch, with John Podhoretz, Christine Rosen, Andy Ngo, and Chris Stirewalt | Ep. 664

Episode Date: November 7, 2023

Megyn Kelly is joined by John Podhoretz and Christine Rosen, co-hosts of The Commentary Magazine Podcast, to talk about the rise in anti-Semitic violence in the U.S. and worldwide, including the Jewish man killed in California, the way Jews have been prepared for what we've seen since the terror attack, differences between pro-Israel and anti-Israel protests, the mentality of those who rip down hostage posters, and more. Then Andy Ngo, senior editor at The Post Millennial, joins to discuss the anti-Israel violence he witnessed in the U.K., the connection the anti-Israel protests and riots has with BLM and Antifa in previous years, what we've learned from the "trans" Nashville shooter's manifesto that has been made public by Steven Crowder, the efforts to censor and suppress it, and more. Then Chris Stirewalt of The Dispatch joins to talk about the key states to watch tonight on Election Day, including Virginia and with Gov. Glenn Youngkin's potential rise to power, the governor's races in Mississippi and Kentucky, the mayor race in Bridgeport, CT, and more.Podhoretz and Rosen: https://www.commentary.orgNgo: https://www.andy-ngo.comStirewalt: https://thedispatch.com/author/chris-stirewalt/ Follow The Megyn Kelly Show on all social platforms: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/MegynKellyTwitter: http://Twitter.com/MegynKellyShowInstagram: http://Instagram.com/MegynKellyShowFacebook: http://Facebook.com/MegynKellyShow Find out more information at: https://www.devilmaycaremedia.com/megynkellyshow 

Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, live on Sirius XM Channel 111 every weekday at noon east. Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show. As the anti-Israel sentiment across America grows, we are expecting to hear from law enforcement in about an hour updating us on the death of a Jewish man in California and wait until you hear the circumstances. On Sunday afternoon, 69-year-old Paul Kessler was spotted waving an Israeli flag as dueling protests took place between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian supporters. Exactly what went down a little later is still unclear, but we do know some core facts. We know there was some sort of physical altercation between Kessler and another person.

Some have suggested a man threw his megaphone at Kessler. Video showed Kessler on the ground bloodied. A pro-Palestinian woman and others appeared to help him. She was later seen laughing and smiling shortly after helping this man. And then the paramedics arrived. Kessler was taken away by ambulance. And while paramedics treated him, a man continued to shout anti-Israel slogans with Kessler's blood visible on the concrete watch. As a man being taken away on an ambulance, this is the kind of respect these Palestinian protesters are giving. Wow. On Monday, Paul Kessler died. The Ventura County Sheriff's Office says the medical examiner has determined the cause of death was indeed blunt force head injuries and the manner of death has been classified as homicide. So far, no one's been arrested, but this would hardly be the only incident of

anti-Jewish hatred we have seen over the past month since Israel was attacked by terrorists. According to the Anti-Defamation League, there has been a 388% interest percent increase in anti-Semitic attacks in America since Hamas launched its attack on Israel exactly one month ago. Just a few examples. On October 8th in Clifton, New Jersey, a car with individuals holding Palestinian flags appeared to intentionally swerve out of its lane, nearly hitting a Jewish family. October 12th, Indianapolis, an Indiana man carrying an Israeli flag was allegedly assaulted by a pro-Palestinian protester. On August 15th in New York, a person allegedly punched a Jewish woman in the face at Grand Central Terminal. When she asked why, he responded, you are Jewish.

We told you, for example, what happened down outside of the Tulane campus when a young Jewish man was punched in the face. Anti-Semitic attacks are always also on the rise now in places like Europe, where they've had basically open border policies for the past 10, 15 years. In Germany, Molotov cocktails have been thrown at a synagogue. Molotov cocktails thrown at a synagogue, among other anti-Israel incidents. In the UK, there have been more than 1,000 reported anti-Jewish incidents in the past month with 47 assaults, 47 assaults, and schools and children have been targeted. In France, which has the largest Palestinian or Muslim population in Europe, on Saturday, a 30-something year old Jewish woman in France was attacked in her home. She was stabbed in her home. She did survive. A swastika had been painted on her door. This is a truly scary time for Jews in America and throughout the world.

And yet we get lectured by this administration every other day on Islamophobia. My guest this hour, John Podoretz, editor of Commentary. It's a wonderful publication in the magazine. And if you haven't been listening to the Commentary podcast, I highly recommend it to you. One of his co-hosts on that podcast is Christine Rosen. She's a writer for Commentary and also a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. She writes in particular on media. They're both co-hosts of the Commentary magazine podcast, making their first appearance on this show. John and Christine, I'm a little starstruck because I listen to commentary pretty much every day and have for years now. So it's lovely to have you here. Thank you so much for being on. Well, thank you so much for having us.

And Megan, I missed you because we used to live on the same block and I used to occasionally see you coming out of the building, taking your kids to the school bus or as I was taking my kids to the school bus. And then you sanely, I think, decamped to wiser places to live. But I'm still here. I'm still here looking for you on the you and Doug on the corner. I've been thinking about you nonstop because of that, because, of course, you know, the Upper West Side, New York has become the site of a lot of these crazy protests. It's like, wait a minute, New York, New York is heavily Jewish. What's happening? Why in Brooklyn are we having you know, I heard you talk about the Crown Heights protest. It's like of all places and be and Jews being told, don't come, don't stay inside. What do you, I want to kick it off with

this, John, because I heard on commentary, you say this joke recently, which I was like, oh, okay. I'm starting to get it. Because one of my questions has been where, where are our Jewish friends and their allies like us in the streets? Why is it all these pro-Palestinian nutcases who are out there chanting from the river to the to the sea? Right. Like where's the other side who says, you know what? We'd like to live in peace. Wouldn't that be nice? October 6th was better than today. And now we're starting to see a little bit more of it. But you told a joke on commentary that made me kind of understand. And forgive me, because I'm going to ask you to tell it. But I think it was about two Jewish people who had been sentenced to death by firing squad right can you tell this joke it kind

of helped me understand sure so it's a very uh two jews are in front of a firing squad and the commandant of the firing squad says do you have any last requests and one of them says i would like please a blindfold and the other says Sam don't make trouble so this this is the mindset of the Jew the Jewish person through history powerless without any real means to fight back and the only hope that he has is that somebody will take pity on him and let him be. And that is the situation that Israel was created to make unnecessary any longer. That is why Jews have fought for the last hundred years to get their share in the United States, to achieve a certain level of political and economic and social authority so that we are, A, not brought before firing squads, and B, we are not reduced to the level of begging for a blindfold so that we don't have to be witnesses to our own death and here we are in 2023 there was a rally yesterday there was a big rally here in new york on central park west uh of uh people supporting uh jews juda Judaism, and Israel in the wake of October 7th.

And much of what was going on on the screens was simply an endless roll of the hostages, the 240-odd hostages who are in the maw of Hamas. And you look at those pictures and you think, well, my guess is they're not standing there asking for a blindfold. These are Sabra, unless they're very little kids who don't know to ask for a blindfold. These are Sabras. These are Israelis. These are proud adults and they are either fighting back or they are maintaining their dignity and unbelievably undignified and horrible circumstances. And it is a horror that we are living here in the United States being forced in some sense to defend our right to defend ourselves against unwarranted, unprovoked attacks of such savagery

that the people that I know who have witnessed the videos or walked through the crime scenes at the kibbutzim in the Gaza envelope, which is where the massacres took place, say that these are images that are seared in their minds that they will never forget and that they are going to have to get psychological treatment to cope with because they cannot sleep because of the horrors that they have seen. And remember, just to finish my monologue here, these 5,000 casualties that were inflicted in Israel, 1,400 dead, more than 3,500 injured, took place in around eight hours. Think about that. And this was hand-to-hand stuff. It wasn't a bomb being dropped on a building. These were people being killed systematically, bloodthirstily, in a relatively short period of time in what can only be called a massacre rampage of psychotic evil proportions.

30 days later, people are yelling at people like us because we do not believe that a ceasefire that would essentially let off the murderers of our people, that they would let them go scot-free that is what a ceasefire means essentially right it's stop the fighting stop doing things there's no corollary to that like hey you know what there should be a ceasefire so that hamas can surrender en masse and be tried for the 5,000 crimes that they committed on October 7th. It's just have a ceasefire and then let things go on as normal. And that is...

I almost feel like, John, they're worried Israel's getting the job done. Israel actually is destroying Hamas. And they're like, you know what? We need to stop this. Some people genuinely care about civilian casualties, but I think a lot of people really don't want to see Hamas destroyed. I mean, we're hearing it on college campuses. Hamas, it's not a terrorist group. You've misunderstood Hamas. You don't. I think we have that just today from where was it, guys? Hold on

a second. It was from. Yeah, you pen. Of course, you pen. Oh, yeah. I mean, six one way, half a dozen the other you pen or yell where she's out there chanting. This is shared by Bronx representative Richie Torres, who's a Democrat, has been very good on this whole issue. This woman putting her perspective on what really happened with Hamas. Take a listen. Do you guys remember the photo of the kids and men laughing and smiling as they sat on top of the Israeli military jeep captured by our freedom fighters? Yes. Do you remember that picture? Yes. How about the photos of the bulldozer breaking through the deadly borders? Do you remember that picture? Yes. And the several

other joyful and powerful images which came from the glorious October 7th. I want you to picture those in your mind. I want you all to remember how you felt when you saw those images and heard the news. I remember feeling so empowered and happy, so confident that victory was near and so tangible. I want all of you to hold that feeling in your hearts. Never let go of it. Channel it through every action you take. Bring it to the streets. Yes. Go down to the streets every day and don't ever let them feel that you quietly accept this genocide. Freedom fighters, in her view, this just in, she's going to be interning for Rashida to

leave this summer. Um, this, this is the message, right? You, as you point out one month later, Christine, you've been covering the media and, and the campus insanity on all of this. She's UPenn that was in Philadelphia, you know, steps away, but that's the message. It was a glorious feeling of joy. Never forget it as we cheer on our freedom fighters. And as John is pointing out, it wasn't just hand to hand murder. It was torture. Everyone seems to want to gloss over that, that the Israelis were tortured. Children were tortured, forced the, the, the one child who had his hand cut off and, and had to bleed out right there. The other children had to watch

their dad's eyes get gouged out before the terrorists turned on them. There are so many stories. I just want to like gloss gloss on by that and talk about the glory of the day. Well, this is actually something it's it's downright Orwellian what's happening and despicable in our mainstream media in particular. She used a word there that she shouldn't have used because it's the incorrect word. She used genocide. So what we have seen is the mainstream media pick up a narrative, a very pro-Palestinian narrative, that is accusing Israel of genocide. And you're absolutely right that they have glossed over the barbarity and inhumane and, quite frankly,

documented war crimes, documented, by the way, not by the IDF that came in to rescue civilians, but by the terrorists themselves who filmed it on GoPro and often live streamed it back to their friends and family in Gaza while they were murdering innocent women and children. So the fact that very quickly the story and the images that we're seeing in all of our newspapers and on most of the mainstream media television broadcasts are all of children in Gaza. Now, as you said earlier, and I know John agrees with me on this, nobody wants to see innocent civilians harmed. That is not the purpose of what is happening right now in Gaza. But innocent civilian deaths in Gaza are the responsibility of Hamas because Hamas has put them in harm's way with its actions.

Hamas prevents them from leaving areas where the IDF is moving forward with military operations to root out terrorists. Hamas is responsible for those deaths. But in the West, what we see is this narrative of Israel's committing genocide. Every victim is on Israel's head and responsible for them. These are war crimes. None of this is true. But all of it is being repeated over and over and over again and has been unfortunately for decades really taken root on campuses in various studies programs and in these arguments about colonial

oppressors and whatnot. And it's all come to fruition. And what is driving so much of it, what we see clearly on the streets is hate. It's anti-Semitism. And they can put whatever academic and ideological gloss over it that they want to, but it's very clear their actions and their words are now starting to match. The actions and the words incited by, for example, a representative in Congress, Rashida Tlaib, who has been having all kinds of anti-Semitic statements that she posts on her social media, such as phrases like from the river to the sea. Everyone knows what that means. And she is denying its own meaning while inciting people to take action. And as the woman in the video clip you just showed us did,

to take to the streets. That is incitement. That is calling on people to do violence. And that's wrong. You saw yesterday. Yeah, go ahead, John. I was just going to say that there's a deli in L.A. on Fairfax called Cantor's. Yeah. So it's the like premier Jewish deli in Los Angeles. It's been there since 1925. On the wall at Cantor's Deli outside are pictures of Cantor's Deli and its growth over time. And sort of pictures of Jewish LA. Cute, black and white, you know, historical pictures. All of them in the last couple of days defaced by things like from the river to the sea

palestine will be free f israel all of that now there is nothing in israel in the cantor's deli photographs cantor's deli is a restaurant that serves pastrami and blintzes and latkes and cream and you know cheesecake uh and it is being targeted in response to a massacre of jews in israel that has triggered anti-semitic acts all over the world and it's simply the the vandals are drawing no distinction between what it is to be a Jew and what it is, what Israel is, which is why for 40 years, people like me have been making the argument that when people say that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are two separate things, that you can be an anti-Zionist, someone who does not believe that the Jewish people should have their own state on Earth, but there should be a binational state with Jews and Arabs, however you want to slice it, that these are two different phenomena, that anti-Semitism is simply a matter of hating Jews and is therefore a bad thing, and anti-Zionism is a political position. you attack Israel, there's some kind of fight against Israel, and now in Indiana, a woman is

taking her truck and driving it into a building that she thinks is a Jewish day school in order to kill Jewish children in Indiana because she's mad about Israel. Anti-Zionism is anti-Semitism. There is something very fascinating that needs to be studied about the fact that this massacre was perpetrated mostly on Jews, though not exclusively on Jews in Israel. There are at least 40 hostages in Gaza who are Thai, who are Thai workers working in Israel, who were taken hostage, and others. Massacre of Jews in Israel that you would think would cause worldwide sympathy for people who have been attacked in this way. And instead, it has ignited an anti-Semitic frenzy, almost as though a button had been pushed that said, as one of my favorite quotes in movies, the Blues Brothers, Frank Oz, the director says, as the head of the Chicago Police Department, use of excessive force against the Blues Brothers has been approved. That's what's happened. Suddenly, use of excessive force against Jews, you can drive a car into an Indiana building thinking that it's a day school so you can kill Jewish kids. Somebody yesterday, people walking out of a building in Brooklyn were pepper sprayed by somebody. Visible Jews wearing kippot or talit or tzitzit

or the visible manifestations of being Jewish, right? And then, of course, you have all these people tearing down these kidnap posters for reasons that should be known only to them, their psychiatrists, their priests, and St. Peter at the pearly gates of the world to come so they won't be going there i'm glad to hear that this is not my it's not my cosmology so that's very i got a direct line my nan is up there i got it on good authority they're getting

the boot on the forehead and i'll give you you another pop culture reference on what happened here as we continue to hear calls for a ceasefire. It's from Animal House, which I know you guys love as much as I do, because we're all on the older side. It's the line when they come back and they took the one guy's car and it gets completely damaged and messed up. And he looks at him and he says, you fucked up. You trusted us. That's that's to those people are like ceasefire. What do you think was happening on October 6th? Israel was letting the Palestinians in. They were letting people from Gaza into Israel, letting them work amongst them, trying to forge a peace and prosperity that was firmly rejected. And we now we know that those Palestinians were mapping out the kibbutzes, figuring out where the babies were, where the most vulnerable were so that they could return

and know right where to inflict the torture. It's just that the ceasefire now crowd is disingenuous. I think we know that this woman who he mentions, who John mentions, Christine, who plowed her car into what she thought was a Jewish school. OK, Indiana, we mentioned her name is Ruba Almata. And she hit this institute thinking that she was going to kill Jews. There were several adults and children inside. Police now calling her a terrorist. She said, I did it on purpose. I wanted to, quote, help my people back in Palestine. And of course, it wound up to being an Israeli school affiliated, I guess, with the black Hebrew Israelites, which the ADF labels extreme and anti-Semitic. So she had her facts a little confused, but her intention remains the

same. We've seen so much, so many stories of the rise in anti-Semitism and attacks, including the one I began with, with this poor man, Kessler, Paul Kessler. And the media coverage that we've seen just in the past 15 hours of Paul Kessler's death is right on brand. I mean, I would say it's shocking, but you and I both know it's not shocking. I'll just show the audience a couple of headlines and you can weigh in. Um, here's NBC man dies after hitting head during Israel and Palestinian rallies in California, like just dies. Like what did he, did he have like a heart attack? What do you mean? He hit his head and he had a heart attack. NBC, what happened? Walk us through it. You're, I think you're missing some things. Here's the ABC seven California tweet. Elderly Jewish man dies after confrontation with pro-Palestinian protesters again. What do you

mean? Did he die like from stress? Did he did he have a stroke? What happened? No, he died because they appeared to have hit him in the head with a megaphone causing blunt force trauma that resulted in a homicidal death. That's what the medical examiner says. Here's New York Times again. Jewish man dies after altercation at dueling protests in California. I mean, how about Jewish man was killed? This is reminding me, Christine, of the truck mows down protesters. Yes. In Wisconsin. Right. Right. This is this is Eli Lake, our mutual friend, corrected The New York Times headline for them. Instead of Jewish man dies after altercation at dueling protests, he changed it to Jewish man was killed by pro-Palestinian protesters in California. The Times, NBC, ABC, they never have this hesitancy

when they're dealing with a BLM protester who got hurt or anybody who's perceived as on their side. Absolutely. The unwillingness to name what has happened and that we see with our own eyes that happened and that we have footage of what is happening is why I keep coming back to this term Orwellian. It really is Orwellian.

There is a concerted effort on the part of the mainstream media to not tell people what's happening. And we need to ask why that is. One reason is that they are trying to protect an administration that, as you said at the beginning of the show, is very keen to always attach any condemnation of anti-Semitism with Islamophobia. We've seen that over and over again. There is no moral equivalence here. Anti-Semitic acts, anti-Semitic violence should be called out. End of sentence. There is no reason to equivocate or to tag on other forms of hatred. And it's an unwillingness of the Democratic Party to deal with its extremist

fringe, which is vocal. It is proud. It's loud. And as I said earlier, is encouraging people to go to the streets and fight about this. The past, the use of the passive voice here is deliberate, despicable, and it needs to be called out every single time it's happening. And it's not just rhetoric anymore. It used to be, I mean, and as John knows, we have for very many years been talking about a lot of the anti-Semitism on the far left and the far right, the kind of rhetoric that people listen to and are galvanized by and why that's wrong. We are past the moment of just calling out the rhetoric. We need to act. We need lawmakers to start making sure that laws on the books are enforced, whether that's hate crime legislation, whether that's, you know, just simple assault in many cases, like the young woman who is trying to prevent someone from tearing down posters in

New York this week and who got flung to the sidewalk. That's assault. That should be prosecuted. These people need to be taught a lesson, whether that's through the rule of law or through a bit of public shaming, which is also happening. There need to be consequences for this behavior. It's not enough just to call it out. And I think state by state, we are seeing efforts. I know Virginia is one state that's done this. Florida is doing this as well, where lawmakers are actually trying to get a working definition of anti-Semitism on the books so that these laws can be enforced when these sorts of crimes occur, when these sorts of threats are made. There are threats every day to Jewish day schools, to synagogues all across

this country. Those aren't even being fully reported. It's happening all the time. But we need to do more than just call it out. We need to actually act. Okay, I want to connect the dots between what happened in Indiana, what Christina's talking about and the world in which, excuse me, I live. So Paul Kessler was killed apparently murdered uh by somebody who flung a megaphone at him and then whatever happened happened the blunt force trauma seems to have begun with the megaphone being thrown at his head well a week earlier in new orleans uh uh right near Tulane University, there was a protest and a counter protest. And a kid at that protest, a Jewish kid, had his nose broken because a megaphone was thrown in his face. I know that kid.

I knew that kid when he was three years old. He was in my daughter's nursery school class and was in her grade for seven years. And they went to a Jewish day school, exactly the kind of institution that Ruba sought to drive her car into to kill kids like my son. My daughter is now in college. My son is still going to that school. Now, it is a hardened school in the middle of New York City. You're not getting in there.

So don't even try. There are bollards. There are security guards. There is immense security at the school that was put in place as it was being built, precisely seeing the possibility of a future like this, particularly after 9-11. But what I'm talking about here is violence against Jews, Jewish institutions, and its purpose is not simply to make a statement. It is to kill people, and particularly to kill kids, and particularly to try to kill my kid. And I'm not going to stand here and ask for a blindfold.

That doesn't mean I'm going to go out and find the real killer. I'm 62 years old. I'm well past my due date on stuff like that. But what I mean is, if you are, and you'll excuse me for naming people, but if you are Mehdi Hassan on MSNBC making apologia for Hamas, I am not going to let you get away with it. Every time you do it on Twitter, every time you do it on MSNBC, I got a hundred and something thousand followers on Twitter. I have a magazine here. I have a physical presence. You are going to hear from me every single time. And that should be true of the Jewish community entirely in the United States and

across the world. That is our challenge because we're not the lawmaker. You know, I mean, if you're Chuck Schumer and you're a Jewish lawmaker, you're then in a position to do what Christine is talking about. But holding accountable the people who are making apologies, are using euphemisms for mass murder and support of a doctrine. Remember, Hamas's charter calls for the murder and elimination of Jews. That is the charter. That is the declaration of independence of Hamas is killing Jews. That is the charter. That is the declaration of independence of Hamas is killing Jews. That is its purpose. Its purpose isn't to build a civil society where all can live in peace under a wonderful Muslim rubric. It is to kill Jews. And they went and killed thousands of Jews. They want to kill thousands more. And all of these supporters, what am I

supposed to think? They like Hamas? Maybe they want to kill Jews too. And maybe they'll do it here. And they're trying right now. And they just killed Paul Kessler. And they're spraying pepper spray in people's faces. And what if that incident that Christine talked about on the city street, where there was an altercation between these two girls, one of whom was trying to stop one from pulling down the kidnap posters, and she threw her to the ground. But what if her head had smashed against the pavement

and she had had a brain aneurysm and died? It's not like that's unthinkable or beyond the bounds of possibility. We're going to show people that in one minute. We've got that. I do want to say this too, though. You don't, you don't have to believe the Hamas charter. You don't have to go back and look it up. You don't have to spend time wondering whether they had a change of heart since then. One of Hamas's top leaders came out within the past seven days and reiterated what will happen going forward, whether there's a ceasefire, whether there's not a ceasefire, no matter

what happens at this point, he made their plan, Hamas's plan perfectly clear for those like Queen Rania of Jordan, who's out there again saying we have to have a ceasefire. This is mass punishment, the whole thing, collective punishment. Here's what he said will happen. Israel is a country that has no place on our land. We must remove that country because it constitutes a security, military, and political catastrophe to the Arab and Islamic nation, and it must be finished. We're not ashamed to say this with full force. We must teach Israel a lesson, and we will do this again and again. The Al-Aqsa flood is the first time, and there will be a second, a third, a fourth.

Because we have the determination, the resolve, and the capabilities to fight. Will we have to pay a price? Yes, and we are ready to pay it. We are called a nation of martyrs, and we are proud to sacrifice martyrs. The occupation must come to an end. Occupation where? In the Gaza Strip? No, I'm talking about all the Palestinian lands. Does that mean the annihilation of Israel? Yes, of course.

On October 7th, October 10th, October 1 million, everything we do is justified. Well, there you have it. I mean, as a prosecutor in a court of law, that would be the spike the ball in the end zone moment, Christine. Yes, the martyrs he refers to, those are civilians. Those are the civilians that we are being told Israel should have a ceasefire for to protect. Their own leaders see them as cannon fodder, useful tools of propaganda and hate that they are happy to sacrifice on the altar of their own pursuit of martyrdom. That is what he means by the martyrs. Yeah, and the occupation. I mean,

there's a lot of misinformation in there, but I believe him in his call. They're calling it the Al-Aqsa flood is what they're calling the October 7th terrorist massacre. And he says, we're going to do it over and over and over and over again. So what would you do if you were Israel? Just sit back and wait for more babies to be murdered in their cribs? Or would you make sure that you eradicated this group before they could continue murdering your civilians? It's so obvious, and yet people refuse to see. And it could be because they have an ideology that's woke and they put it into skin color. It could be because they already hate Jews or simply have absolutely no empathy for them.

But there's way more of it in the United States than I ever knew existed. And I think a lot of people are seeing the amount of anti-Semitism putting them on their heels. Stand by one minute. We're going to come back with John and Christine, and we're going to get into a little bit more of this poster teardown thing and how it's escalating more and more. Stand by. Despite some people losing their jobs for taking down flyers of the Israeli hostages, keep in mind, these are children. These are children who we believe are being held underground by Hamas terrorists right now. And many people trying to call attention to them, many Americans trying to call attention to them, their relatives, by posting their flyers, their pictures in places like New York and elsewhere. And that this so-called pro-Palestinian

crowd seems to be more pro-Hamas, pulling them down. We continue to see it happening. They know they're risking their jobs. They just can't help themselves. But like John said moments ago, we're not going to let them just get away with it. I have been avidly retweeting, stop anti-Semitism, which has been doing a great job documenting all of this because I'm perfectly happy to name and shame these people. Perfectly happy to name and shame them. I'm perfectly happy to name and shame all these college campus losers who are saying this stuff. It's not cancel culture. They're free to say whatever the hell they want, and I am free not to hire them, and so are you. First up today, an attorney for the city of New York

recorded tearing down photos of missing civilians kidnapped by Hamas. Watch. Why are you taking down pictures of missing children? Why are you taking down pictures of missing children? Why are you taking down pictures of missing children? Why are you taking down pictures of babies? First of all, I love that, like the high voice of the woman doing the, the photography, like videotape. Good for her. It sounds like a small woman, doesn't it? Sounds like a petite, maybe young college age woman. Good for you, sister. This is how you fight back. She didn't want to tell us her name in the video. We now know it's Victoria Ruiz.

And we now know who she was because of that brave girl with the high voice documenting the bad acts. Victoria works as a New York County public defender. Good luck to you if you're a Jewish person who finds themselves on the wrong end of the criminal law and she winds up being appointed to you. She quickly apologized when she got caught, but it was not genuine. It was just to keep her job, since she only apologized to her employer. When the New York Post reached out to the defender's office about Ruiz, a spokesperson responded, quote, Ms. Ruiz has apologized to those who were hurt or confused by her actions. We weren't confused at all. After an internal review and a pledge by all involved to do better, we accept this apology. What exactly does a pledge by all involved to do better mean? Does it mean going forward,

the defender's office pledges it won't hire anti-Semites? Because cool, good. Or maybe the hostages themselves should have done better, what with all the getting kidnapped they were doing. The babies should have been more quiet. How is it that anyone other than Ms. Ruiz needs to do better? Next up today, a Hunter College student caught tearing down posters and when confronted on her actions, quickly took the coward's way out by trying to hide her face. What is your name? Show your face. Show your face. Oh, so brave, tearing down the hostage photos, but not quite brave enough to actually own it. But thanks to Stop Antisemitism Again, she's been identified and

her name is Frances Hamed. She's a Macaulay Fellow, which means she goes to college in New York City for free. And yet she seems to really hate Western ideals. And when hiding your face doesn't work, just cry racism. Go back to the old playbook. This next video has gone completely viral. It's the one we talked about briefly in the first block. It shows a young black woman taking down the hostage signs in New York City. She's then confronted by a Jewish woman and a fight breaks out. Watch it. What the fuck? Yo, what are you doing? You know how scary it is to be black and get dragged off for no reason? No, you don't. Ah, play the black card. It's almost unbelievable. You know how scary it is to be black and get dragged off for no reason? No, you don't. Ah, play the black card. It's almost unbelievable. You know how scary it is to be black and be

dragged off for no reason? I bet those hostages know how it feels to be dragged off against your will. And yet she doesn't seem to have a lot of empathy for them. That woman has not yet been identified, but she will be and we'll bring you her name once we get it. Back with me now, John Podoritz and Christine Rosen of the Commentary Magazine podcast. Don't be a freeloader. Pay, support them, and listen to them as often as possible. Thank you. There's always tons of wisdom.

And I know- We're there five days a week like you, yeah. Yes, it's not, and of course, you know, you guys have an intimate connection with Israel and the Jewish community. And so this is a particularly close story to your hearts. But your political analysis is always fun to listen to the media analysis. It's good on a number of levels. I love commentary. And my pal Noah Rothman was great when he migrated over to the editors, which I also enjoy. In any event, you can't lose.

So what do you make, John, of all these morons, these so-called, you know, social justice warriors pulling down the photos of missing children? I think there is a deep impulse here to say that the efforts by people to remain, to put and keep the hostages front and center in the American consciousness so people understand that what happened on October 7th has not ended. It has not ended. It will not end until those people are freed, or even more tragically, until we know what their terrible fates might have been. And the effort on the part of the people who are uncomfortable by Israel's deciding that it has to defend itself, Want people to think that this was like a horrible summer storm that just came up, blew everything away. Now it's over. Ceasefire because the people of Gaza are going to suffer from the Israeli counterstrike and the living refutation of that propagandistic idea are those 240 people

one of whom is 10 months old like my sister lives in israel has two has four grandchildren two of them babies she cannot sleep at night because she thinks about who is changing Kaffir's diaper. Like it is haunting her. She lives in Tel Aviv. Her two relatively newborn grandchildren live have the experience of thinking, as the Passover Haggadah tells us every year, tells us Jews, that it is our mission to think as though and live as though we had been slaves in Egypt. Everyone in Israel is living as though they were a hostage in a tunnel in Gaza. And Israel is not going to relent and they can tear down every poster they see. First of all, people are going to put them right back up. And second of all, the world is going to know who

they are and the heartlessness that they are displaying. And third of all, it's not going to stop one centimeter of Israel's advance because the Jewish religion requires, requires the recovery of hostages. It is a commandment in the Torah. It is very much a subject that is reflected upon at length in the Talmud. Because the taking of hostages was such a common act at the time that the Israelites and thes were functioning uh this is a key element in jewish law and we cannot stop we are commanded not to stop and we are not going to stop so tear down those posters i love seeing seeing the ones with the heavy packing tape around them. And now they're having a very difficult time pulling the tape down.

It's actually very fun to watch them really struggle to get the tape off because they really want the posters. If they would work this hard at their actual jobs, they might actually succeed in life. As it's going, I don't have high hopes. Friends of mine who are very much involved in the posterizing experience have learned things over the last 30 days. Like you can't just put up a piece of paper. It's too hard to tear down. So go laminate them. You laminate them. They're kind of easy to tear down.

But the thing about a laminate is, yeah, if you take clear packing tape and you wrap it around it, that's not so easy. But of course, if you do it too tight, then people can't see the faces. There is a whole process by which this is becoming a professional operation to keep the fact of these people who have been taken by Hamas as human shields, as bargaining chips, and as people. God knows what they're doing to them. God knows what they're doing to them in the tunnels. And can we add the contrast between, John mentioned there was a pro-Israel gathering in New York yesterday. There'll be another large one here on the mall in Washington, D.C. next week.

I've seen several around town. People show their faces. They pray, they sing, they hold up pictures of these hostages. That's how people who are supporting the state of Israel right now have chosen to acknowledge this terrible moment. Look at the pro-Palestinian protests. Look at the people tearing down those posters. They hide. Their shame is felt for a reason. They hide their faces. They run away when they're caught. They know what they're doing. And so I think that contrast is also quite striking to me. And I was thinking back to 9-11 and the pictures all over New York when people were still missing and

people were looking for their loved ones in the rubble of the towers and as well here in D.C. with the Pentagon having been hit. Imagine college students tearing down those pictures and instead draping themselves in the flags of al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups. That's what's happening right now. That's what's happening. Oh, it's complicated. It needs context. By the way, I really think they would do well to take, they should talk to the people who invent and sell scissors and shears because those are absolutely impossible to unwrap when you get them. And whoever came up with the wrapping of scissors would know exactly how to protect the hostage posters. You could never get them down.

It's absolutely brilliant. Yeah, either that or Fisher-Price children's toys. Yes, any children's toy, I was going to say. Children's toy Christmas packaging. Like, try to get one of those toys out of the box. I'm trying to think of like the hardest things to unwrap. OK, I've got to ask you about the disgusting display at the Statue of Liberty and and Jewish voices for peace. Alan Dershowitz says they're not Jewish voices and they're not for peace,

but they've they keep getting cited by the mainstream media is like, see these Jewish people. They're against what Israel's doing. And they went to the Statue of Liberty, which you don't mess with. You guys know, John, you're a New Yorker lifelong. You don't mess with the Statue of Liberty. It's a hard no. And yet here they are in sat nine. now never again for anyone never again is now never again for anyone never again is now never again for anyone um natan sharansky who uh spent 11 years in soviet prisons for the crime of wanting to emigrate to israel finally emigrated to Israel in 1986, became a major, is a major world figure in the matter of human rights, human dignity, one of the great

heroes of our time. He and his colleague and others, his colleague Gil Troy, refers to such people as un-Jews. They've written a piece about the Jews who advocate for causes that are directly injurious to Jews. They're un-Jews because they cannot not be Jews. The Jewish religion says that even if you convert out of Judaism, we still consider you part of the tribe. We are angry at you. We excommunicate you. We do all sorts of things that we can do to you, but you are still a Jew, but you are an un-Jew. The ultimate un-Jews on the planet are the members of Jewish Voice for Peace who use their standing as jews to attack degrade and harm their own people it is an astonishing display first of all i'm sure a whole lot of them aren't jewish to begin with it's a it's a scam operation but it's also there to provide cover for people like Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Cori Bush, others who are either implicitly or openly anti-Semitic, but who can say, oh, I'm not anti-Semitic.

Look, my policy director is part of a Jewish organization. It's called the Jewish Voice for Peace. So how can I possibly be considered anything but kosher? You got to pay attention to that name Jewish voices for peace and of course, students for justice in Palestine who all want the same thing and it's not for Israel to thrive or even survive. John, but or it's Christine Rosen. Next time we'll get a bond. It'll be able to get the whole gang going. Matthew, love him too. He's been on the program before. Great to see you in person. All the best here on the Upper West, my friend. And we'll be right back. Don't go away.

Joining me now, senior editor for the Post Millennial, journalist Andy Ngo. He's been reporting on some of the blatant displays of anti-Semitism that we have seen across the country and the globe, which seem to mirror his past reporting on Antifa and BLM. We've had him on before to talk about some of those incidents, including the ones that endangered his own life. Andy, welcome back to the show. Great to have you. Thank you for having me on, Megan. I cannot believe everything that has happened in your life since the last time you came on and we talked about your coverage of Antifa, how you'd been attacked. You've now sued. You won one. You lost a couple with defendants, but you won as well. very similar is unfolding before our very eyes with these pro-Palestinian protests, which are tending more and more to include violence. We just saw the death of this Jewish man today. Paul Kessler, yesterday it happened. I know you've been over in London where things are

getting very serious. I mean, even more so than we've seen necessarily other than Paul Kessler here with the protests. So talk to me about what you've seen over in the UK as you've been covering the aftermath of October 7th. So most people are familiar with my work on the Antifa reporting that I've done over the years. But before that, one of the beats that I used to write about a lot, and it also made me unpopular, was about Islamic extremism, immigration, separatist communities.

And that skill set I've been able to bring out as I've returned back to field reporting, doing on the ground video coverage. In the UK, we've seen since the 7th of October, there have been every weekend and sometimes during the weekday, very large, ostensibly pro-Palestine rallies. But within these, there are pockets and elements of violent extremism that to the average person, they might miss because the chance may be in Arabic, they may be in another language. And because I have some background in this area of extremism, as a previous reporter on this beat, I've been able to capture some of that video footage, such as those who have been very explicit in calling for jihad,

chants in Arabic about Muhammad's army returning to slaughter the Jews. And all this is building up to, politicians here are quite concerned because this upcoming weekend in the UK is Remembrance Weekend. In the US, it's the same day as Veterans Day. It's a very big holiday solemn day here. And it coincides on Saturday, the 11th of November, with another Palestine demonstration being called the Million Man March. in the US where you see university student radicals, academics and others going out and being not just pro-Palestine, but often quite explicitly pro-Hamas and pro-Hamas terrorism. In the UK, you have that as well, but there's an element of religious extremism to it,

given the demographic differences between the US and Europe, that is manifesting. And it's manifesting in dangerous ways and can potentially be very explosive given that there's a longer history of Islamic terrorism happening here. I mean, just in the days after the 7th of October, there was a deadly terrorist attack in the UK that most people didn't even hear about here or in the US. There was a deadly stabbing attack in the north of England. And authorities have been very tight-lipped about it, just saying that it was by Moroccan, the suspect is a Moroccan refugee. So there's already been deadly violence here in relation to the Israel and Hamas conflict. What similarities, if any, do you see between Antifa and these groups showing up at the pro-Palestinian protests? The huge demonstrations that have been happening in the US and UK have brought out

a wide coalition of, in a way you can view them sort of as strange bad fellows. I mean, what do Muslim immigrants, Islamists, Muslim extremists, and radical white leftists have in common? On the surface, you wouldn't think they have things in common, but they do share often the same targets, the same political enemies, that being America and America's friends and allies. I think the anti-file in the US or the radical left, I should broaden it a little bit. We have now a generation and a half of university students who have been, in my view,

brainwashed into leftist militancy, and they have no moral compass and they have no moral foundation for anything. And because they've been radicalized, it's very easy for them to be directed into the cause of the day. now of Palestinian nationalist propaganda in the West being extremely effective, not only in the media but also through the academy and it's merging and incorporating with various critical race theories and decolonization theories. And this is the cause that has been able to bring people out in ways we haven't seen since 2020 George Floyd inspired riots. And in fact, it's often the same people who were involved then who are now taking to the streets with the goal to destabilize America, to pressure our politicians to turn our backs on our friends and allies internationally. And it's a scary time because I think, I mean, we just, I'm speaking to you a day after a Jewish man was killed in a homicide

related to a Palestine protest in Southern California. So, you know, these are not just peaceful protests that are happening. You have extremist rhetoric. You have people calling for terrorism. You have people praising terrorism. You have coalitions of people that is being built who have already shown themselves to be extremely radical and supportive of the use of terrorism as a tactic. Well, that's the thing. It's not just it's not like this thing broke out two months ago before October 7th.

And we're just right back in the middle of the Israel-Palestinian conflict that we've been arguing over for decades. They're out there chanting death to Israel and wipe Israel off the face of the map. Effectively, that's what from the river to the sea means right after this civilian torture and mass murder happened of the Israelis. I mean, so why wouldn't you be afraid? Why wouldn't you look at this group and say, what exactly is that they support? And am I safe, especially if you're a Jewish person? You got some of this on tape. You've been, I mean, as I mentioned, but you've been great about the reason you got attacked by Antifa was because you kind of embed yourselves within the groups

and then you document what they do. And that made you a target and they did get you, but you survived, thank God, and wound up bringing them to court, which is absolutely the way to handle it. So here you are now out in Trafalgar Square, London, documenting some of what's happening there. This is SOT 33. And here's a little bit more in Sat 34 as we listen to chants of Allahu Akbar, which we keep hearing over and over. Same chant they yelled before they took the Twin Towers down and crashed into the Pentagon in those planes in 9 11. So there's been, um, I think there was just this past Saturday, tens of thousands of protesters showing up at one of these on the streets of London. And 29, this is from your article at Human Events, 29 pro-Palestinian rioters were arrested, charges like assaulting police, inciting racial hatred, other racially motivated crimes. When you walk amongst the crowds, Andy,

what kind of people are these? I mean, are these professionals? Are they all young college student types? Are these people who clearly have never been to college? What kind of demographics are you seeing? Some are practicing, some are not. And then there are white leftists who are there too in a smaller amount. And I'm really glad that you played the video of the Aloha Akbar chants because that has been one of the rallying cries. And I don't think I can overstate how provocative of a chant it is, because on the surface, Allah Akbar is something that is chanted during the daily prayers for Muslims. But these people are not doing it during the prayer for the day on a rug.

They're doing it in the context of, as a political statement, echoing and mirroring the chants of what Hamas did as they were carrying out atrocities on video and slaughtering people and defiling the bodies. And unfortunately, we in the West just sort of expect this as a normal occurrence at these demonstrations. that there's a particular racial and or religious solidarity that they have with their brothers and sisters, I'm using their language, in the Palestinian territories in a way that I think the normie white American or white British doesn't really understand. You have to be on the ground to see the dedication that these people have. And the fact that it is coupled often with either support for violence

or incitement to violence or actual violence, this is a powder keg. And it's actually really terrifying, I think, for the future and in the current reality for Europe. Yeah, well, I mean, we were talking in our last segment about the pro-Israel rally that happened in New York last night. Very different scene. Now, 29 people were not arrested and accused of racial hate

and assaulting police officers. Here's what New York City. Let's take one last time. Let God bless you. So everybody can hear us. my friend was there. She said it was absolutely beautiful. They stood quietly. They were singing songs. They waved Israeli flags. That's it. Uh, you know, weirdly no assaulting police officer inciting racial hatred and other racially motivated crimes that that did not happen. No one was, as they were in London, arrested on suspicion of breaching the Terrorism Act

and on and on the descriptions go. It's just, you know, ABC News can try to describe and dismiss these pro-Palestinian protests as, quote, passionate protests, as we saw from their chief White House correspondent after they were putting fake blood all over the White House gates the other day. That's that's what a passionate protest looks like with the Israelis there. It was more of a vigil in honor of the dead, in honor of an ally of the West, of America's that's fighting for its very existence right right now. I want to turn the page, Andy, because you've been involved in a lot of a lot of news. And it's a story that we didn't get to yesterday because we were just doing too many other things. But I want to talk about the manifesto out of Nashville. Stephen Crowder broke this news. He's been on the program many times and he got his hands on three pages of the manifesto that was

written by the shooter in this Nashville shooting that happened in February of this year. Uh, it's a woman, a young woman who claims she's a trans male. She was sort of trying, you know, posing as a male, um, but biologically female. And she shot up a school killing, um, six individuals, including children. And she died as well. Now, all this time later, we're going on a year later, they have not released the manifesto. And this is very unusual. I do not remember another case in which this has happened as disturbing as it might be. And as they always are, they're always deranged rantings. They released them because the public has a right to know. They can be understood.

They can provide a window into usually madness and potentially motivation. Not in this case. In Nashville, the FBI has kept it. The local authorities have kept it. No one's leaked it. And they just keep saying whatever's in there is so horrific that we can't release it. And all along, it just makes you say, well, what is so awful that we can't release it. It's, and you know, all along, it just makes you say, well, what is so awful that we can't see it? Like they're all awful. No one, no mass shooters manifesto is a nice read. So what is it that's so in any event, what appears to have happened is, and I haven't talked to Steve and I haven't seen his whole presentation, but someone they it's believed to be, and he didn't give up the source. It's believed to be a local

law enforcement who got fed up with this hiding of the manifesto, released three pages of it to him. I understand you've now seen it as well through Stephen. And some pages have been, he's posted, though YouTube has banned them. So what have they revealed to you? So when I spoke with my contacts at Stephen Crowder's show, I did inquire how did they receive these documents, and their quote to me was from a source close with law enforcement. the public has a right to know what this mass school shooter wrote and did in the days and hours leading up to the horrific actions in March of this year. There have been some family members of the victims who have stated publicly that they did not want this release. I hear them, I listen to them, but I think it's in the public interest to know. We don't have the full writings from this notebook. There have been only three pages released through Stephen Crowder. But what they do show is there is a pathological grievance ideology

that is running through some of the screeds through these pages. A hatred of white people, a resentment against their perceived wealth and the privileges they have. And I mean, these are hateful ramblings against children. And I think one thing that one of the pages that was really chilling and disturbing to me was like this, they shoot her wrote out a schedule for the day. And it was so the way they did it was so calm in that early in the morning, there's breakfast and then there's time for lunch. And then there's time to take care of stuffed animals and belongings, and then down, you just go further down, that there's a time for going to the Covenant School. And so this person was clearly very committed to it and viewed it.

I don't know if this person even realized that this was, that they were planning a terrorist attack. It was like just another thing to do on the day. She seemed joyful about it. She seemed very happy about it, very much looking forward to it. It was absolutely disgusting. And this is a person, we don't know what her story was, whether she was on cross gender hormones or some sort of medications to assist with a transition. Um, those can include testosterone, which does, you know, sometimes extreme things to a woman, but she was clearly a mental health patient. On top of all of that, not blaming it on testosterone, just saying this would be the kind of thing the media would

normally be exploring. But because you're not allowed to try to touch trans ideology as having had anything to do with this, we don't touch it. And you and I both know, you know, especially Andy, having covered all the things you have, if this were a white guy wearing a MAGA hat who went in and shot up, God forbid, a school with a bunch of black children, this manifesto would have been released long ago. But what we appear to have here is a female to male trans person who wrote openly about her desire to kill crackers, white privileged, quote, crackers at a, quote, private fancy school. And that does not line up with any narrative of the left or the media, which is the same thing. And in this case,

law enforcement seems to be cooperating with that narrative too, because they buried it. Yeah. And another curious thing is that there was a lot of homophobic slurs written through these pages. Some people are wondering why would an LGBTQ plus person say those types of slurs against homosexuals? Well, as others have pointed out before, and this is speculation, but it's something I think it's analysis of words that is worth considering is that some people who are homosexual and transition to what they think is the opposite gender do it out of the inability to cope with being gay. And we do know that this mass shooter before having a trans identity was lesbian. So that's something to consider and I think discuss. And yeah.

It just looks very much if you look, and I'm not going to put it up on the board, but it looks very much like quotations out of a women's or ethnic studies class at Yale. All the quotations that this shooter puts in the manifesto, you know, what's motivating her, how she thinks about the children at this school. And my heart goes out to the parents. I, no one has any desire to cause them any more pain. It seems like you'd already have achieved the maximum pain possible for a human if this happened to your child. But we do need to understand exactly what infected this person's mind. It is to the benefit of society to understand to the best we can. I mean, to the extent any of these things can be understood. And it is not for the FBI to protect us from the horrors of this

writing. That's and honestly, like if the New York Times got its hands on this, I believe it probably would have published it if it had been leaked to them. I think they would have probably would have gone against their narrative, too. But Stephen did what any journalist would do, which is if you get your hands on a leak like this, you publish it. The only way you don't publish it is if it's is if you've stolen it, if you've been the product of stealing, you know, you've been the thief, then you shouldn't. But as a journalist, if you receive this, this is newsworthy and you publish it and it shame on you, YouTube, for taking it down. That's it's not appropriate. They publish it over on Rumble and good for Rumble. But same

thing. This is newsworthy. And actually, the study of it could actually potentially lead to our ability to understand and hopefully prevent another one of these things. How dare any of these people tell us we don't get to know? Yes, we do get to know. We have children. We participate in the society. And who the hell is the YouTube executive deciding to protect us in her judgment or his? No, you don't have the expertise.

You don't have the background. We'll figure that out for ourselves. It's infuriating, Andy. I also think people need to remember that in the immediate hours and days after the mass shooting in Nashville in March, there were radical trans activists who occupied various state capitol buildings, including in Nashville, demanding trans rights and a list of other things. And one video that I remember then seeing is that in Nashville, I think this was the day after the mass shooting, there was a moment of silence that the trans activists held for the victims of the school shooting. But they held up seven fingers. And that's very curious because the mass shooter killed six,

including three children. And they included the killer as one of the victims. And that is in line with some... Actually, we have that. This is from, I think, from you. But we have that. Let's show it.

It's top 31. Every death is a tragedy, y'all. It's show it. It's not 31. Dead is a tragedy. Y'all said it was holding up seven. I'd say all the protesters have both hands in the air. This is a video from after the, after the new town shooting, the worst mass shooting of all time. time, not in terms of numbers, but in terms of the young, beautiful children murdered. Some people were counting the shooter in the death toll. You don't count the shooter in the death toll. Everyone knows that. You know, just earlier, you were discussing how could the radical left in America be so

openly supportive of terrorism in regards to the Israel and Hamas war? Well, they were supportive domestically of a terrorist shooter who killed children. So you know, that line has already actually been long crossed. And what I'm asking myself is how now do we de-radicalize the universities, institutions in the United States? The institutions are captured, you have a whole generation and a half of essentially an army that can be mobilized at any time given whatever conflict people want to exploit and get people out on the streets. It's a very bad place for the United States right now. No, the die has been cast and it's very hard to uncast it. I want to update the audience on Paul Kessler, the man who died in Southern California.

Andy, you just referred to him. We talked about him in our first hour at this pro-Palestinian and then the counter protesters, pro-Israel protest that happened. This is from the sheriff who just held a presser out of Ventura County. The suspect in this case, so they do have one, is 50. He was advocating for Palestine. Suspect was identified willingly, was identified and willingly remained at the scene, was interviewed by deputies. The suspect was cooperative and indicated he was involved with an altercation with Kessler. Further stated, he was one of the reporting parties who called 911 requesting medical attention for Kessler. Several witnesses were contacted. Witnesses provided conflicting

statements about what the altercation was and who the aggressor was. Yesterday, detectives obtained a search warrant for the suspect, I guess for his home, the suspect was detained and until the completion of the search warrant, uh, and he was released at six 15, the sheriff says, I cannot comment on the results of the search warrant as the investigation is

ongoing. Suspect has not yet been arrested. No arrest have been made and the suspect has not yet been publicly identified. The medical examiner reiterates calling it a homicide does not indicate a crime was committed. So it is not yet correct to call it quote a murder. Lethal impact was to the back of Kessler's head. There were also injuries on the front of his face, which could be consistent with a blow to his face. So there was a killing, but we yet we don't yet know whether we could call this homicide, whether we

can call this murder homicide, though. Yes, that's what he's saying. His funeral is being held today. So more on that case as we get it. Andy, please stay on all of this. Thank you so much for your brave reporting. It's great to see you again. Thank you for having me on. And we're going to be right back to bring you an update on Election Day. Do you know today is Election Day? And there are a lot of important things happening, especially down in Virginia. Something big happening in Kentucky with a friend of the show, Daniel Cameron. And in Mississippi, Ken, a relative of Elvis, who happens to be a Democrat, on seat, the Republican in Mississippi, deep red Mississippi. We'll talk about it next. I'm Megyn Kelly, host of The Megyn Kelly Show on Sirius XM.

It's your home for open, honest and provocative conversations with the most interesting and important political, legal and cultural figures today. You can catch The Megyn Kelly Show on Triumph, a Sirius XM channel featuring lots of hosts you may know and probably love. Great people like Dr. Laura, Glenn Beck, Nancy Grace, Dave Ramsey, and yours truly, Megan Kelly. You can stream the Megan Kelly Show on SiriusXM at home or anywhere you are. No car required. I do it all the time. I love the SiriusXM app.

It has ad-free music coverage of every major sport, comedy, talk, podcast, and more. Subscribe now. Get your first three months for free. Go to SiriusXM.com slash MKShow to subscribe and get three months free. That's SiriusXM.com slash MKShow and get three months free. Offer details apply. It's election day. You probably noticed from all the annoying signs all over your town and contests in Kentucky, Mississippi, Ohio, and especially Virginia will give us a sneak peek at what to expect for 2024. Joining me now with a preview of the races to

watch tonight, Chris Stierwalt. He's a contributing editor for The Dispatch and co-host of the podcast Ink Stained Wretches with our pal Eliana Johnson, one half of the EJs. Chris, so great to have you. You know what I've noticed here in Connecticut? They've gone to just like, you know, Jeb. They're all doing first names now, like the big all the lawn signs. And it's like, Joe, Maria, like I think you got to squint to see the tiny print. Like one was like, keep your taxes low. I'm like, oh, good. Who's that? And you could like get your readers on to see like who who's these are not effective signs in a in an insensibly childish society the idea that anyone would be called by their proper name uh is now some mark of absolute snobbery but as you point out first names are not enough we're allowed to have our surnames and use

them i encourage people to do so please especially if like your name is joe that's not helpful there's one ticket i've been seeing like desantis slash if like your name is Joe. That's not helpful. There's one ticket I've been seeing like DeSantis slash somebody. I'm like, all right, so it's not Ron DeSantis. This person is really up against it because, you know, like everybody's going to be like DeSantis. Oh, the left. I hate him. Forget it. Like if I were that guy, then I would be like, Bob, it's Bob DeSantis.

How far he's fallen from front runner for the presidential nomination to running for town council in Connecticut. It's a real I mean, it's been it's been a steep slide. You know, politics. One day, the bride. Next day, the bridesmaid. Next day, divorced altogether. OK, so I think Virginia is probably the most interesting thing we're watching. Am I wrong?

Well, I don't want to be contrary, and I'm not normal. I should point out I'm decidedly abnormal when it comes to these things. I get why everybody's paying attention to Virginia, because $200 million or so parties have flooded money into Virginia. And because of something that I like to call the Snowmageddon effect, if it happens near Washington or New York, it gets way more attention than it deserves nationally. So there's a blizzard in the East Coast and people in Arizona are like, I don't know, bro, seems seems OK here. But so so there is a geographical thing, but there's also the Glenn Youngkin factor. And Glenn Youngkin has tantalized his donors by saying, well, I'm not going to make up my mind about whether I'm going to make a late entry into the presidential campaign until we're done with these Virginia midterms. seats in the Virginia House of Delegates and all 40 seats in the Virginia State Senate, Youngkin has raised a ton of money. He has campaigned vigorously and he is still popular

in Virginia. He is much more popular in Virginia, which is a blue state, than Joe Biden is. And he has staked it all on this run. And his backers in the national media, both, are curious to see. So if Youngkin has a big night, if they pick up. So basically the Republicans, Democrats have a narrow majority in the Senate. Republicans have a narrow majority in the House. It's going to come down to five seats basically in either chamber. And if Youngkin has a big, big day and the Republicans get unified control that this could be a launch pad for a late entry

into the Republican nominating process. I care about it because we're going to get a nice core sample of what intense voters, what are the, because remember, we have to bear in mind all this conversation. You're looking at half or maybe two-thirds at most of the turnout that you would get in a regular election. So these are low numbers. In Pennsylvania, we're probably looking at a third or 40% of what you would see. So we're talking about the most engaged, most motivated, most intense voters, which means that they're highly partisan. So what we're going to get to see in Virginia is in the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., in the tidewater in southeastern Virginia and outside of Richmond, in the suburbs outside of Richmond, how and how fired up are Democrats

and Republicans? And given how bad the news has been for Joe Biden lately on the 2024 election will be, are Democrats divided? Are the intense partisans in the Democratic Party, is there real disaffection there? So we get to see some of that in Virginia. And I mean, now, I don't know. I mean, we've talked about this before, including with you at length. But there are reports like in Forbes that if the Virginia governor is successful in winning control of the Senate and keeping control of the House or improving the Republican margin in the House, Glenn Youngkin does that. Then billionaire supporter Thomas Peterfy? I don't know him.

P-E-T-E-R-F-F-Y. Is that a name? Peterfy? Anyway. If you've got that many billions of dollars, people call you whatever you want. I think that's the rule. Well, he's a billionaire, so he knows something more than you and I do. Likely, he told Forbes that if Youngkin is successful at this, he believes Youngkin will jump into the White House race despite missing some key deadlines like registering for the New Hampshire primary.

And he says he has several tens of other Republican billionaires at the ready. Quote, I have spoken to Youngkin. I have spoken to many big GOP donors. We are all enthusiastic and waiting for him to win Virginia and enter the race. I have heard that exact same thing myself from a former RNC official who believes that indeed will be the plan. Any thoughts on that at this late stage of the game? I kind of hope for Youngkin that he doesn't have to go through that.

He has been surprisingly successful as governor of Virginia. Again, not a Republican state, hasn't voted Republican on the presidential level since 2004. And he has managed to both be conservative and popular, which is a trade-off that Republican governors of blue states, a combo they're not often able to do. You can be a liberal Republican in a blue state and be popular. We saw Charlie Baker in Massachusetts and other people do that. But being a conservative, being a a what did he call himself? Severely conservative.

Mitt Romney would tell you he was severely conservative. But, you know, yeah, Youngkin has cast himself and delivered on conservative priorities in Virginia. And he's managed to remain popular because he's been an effective chief executive. Because what you know, most people don't care about ideology. Persuadable voters care about, are the roads fixed? Are the schools better? How are the quality of life considerations? And Youngkin has managed to remain popular doing that. If he were to say, okay, I'm getting in, before he even deals with the question of Donald Trump, he's got to deal with Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley, who are getting ready for a death match, right? The two of them are fighting for

the same quarter to a third of the Republican electorate that they need to lock down before they can take on Trump. I don't know why it would be true that Glenn Youngkin, if he parachutes in at a late date, would be able to make either of them go away. Do you see Ron DeSantis saying, you know what? I had my chance. I already spent that $110 million. But you know what?

You go ahead. I don't think that Kim Reynolds, governor of Iowa, is going to say, yep, I'm changing my mind now that you're here. So anything can happen. But I feel like Youngkin's benefactors are putting pressure on him that it would be very hard for anybody to live up to. Yeah. At this point, I don't think it's going to happen. All right. Let's talk about Mississippi next, because I just think it's interesting. There's a guy related to Elvis. He's a Dem. He's trying to unseat a semi popular Republican governor named Tate Reeves.

He's the incumbent. But, you know, it's bad to be in Mississippi and have Elvis's relative challenging you. However, Mississippi is very, very red and the challenger is very, very blue or at least blue. And so this race, I guess, is tighter than the Republicans would like. The Democrats seem to be very excited at the prospect of a blue state. I mean, a red state governor with a blue, you know what I'm trying to say? So is it likely to happen? No. We remember Doug Jones won the Senate seat for an unexpired term, Jeff Sessions' unexpired term, in neighboring Alabama. And it was a big deal.

A moderate Democrat won in Alabama. Wow. Well, what does it take to get that? It takes Roy Moore is what it takes. It takes somebody who was being accused by a lot of women of some really deplorable kind of behavior and a guy who was very radical. Tate Reeves, the governor of Mississippi, is not Roy Moore. He's not super popular. That's true. And he does have that weird scandal. So I don't know that he's been accused of any wrongdoing, but he was in the administration as lieutenant governor. I don't know if you

remember the Brett Favre scandal, which was a welfare scam. OK, so Reeves has the Democrat Presley has zeroed in on this is a corruption election. Presley is running. He says, you know, I'm pro-life, I'm pro-gun. I want to cut your taxes. But Tate Reeves is corrupt and we've got to get him out is basically the argument. Could it work? Maybe. But the Republicans look at next door in Louisiana. So Louisiana has a jungle primary system, which means if you get more than, it's an open primary, all parties go in the same primary. If you get more than 50% of the vote in the primary, then you don't have to have the general election. You just declare it over there. And a Republican in a crowded field of Republicans won next door in Louisiana, which is more Democratic than Mississippi. I understand why this is an appealing story for Democrats, and I understand why it's an

appealing media story, because you've got an Elvis Presley cousin, the most famous son of Mississippi, his cousin running. I get it. But the odds here are very long. Mississippi is an extraordinarily Republican state. And this is could they sneak by in a load? So here's here's the Presley. OK, his name is Brandon Presley. The problem is he doesn't look anything like Elvis. If he could look a little bit more like Elvis, I'd like his chances better. His his granddad and Elvis's granddad were brothers. There must have been an age span there between the two of them. But that's the relation.

They're, I guess, second cousins. I don't know. I see no resemblance. And that's not going to inure to his benefit. You can finish your thought. Well, he needs the lip. He just needs the Elvis lip curl. Maybe plastic surgery if he wants to run again.

But no, it would be extraordinarily long odds just given the partisan nature and also how much Republicans hate Democrats right now, how upset Republicans are. I don't think they're feeling cool about it. Yeah, he can't sing as far as I know. OK, so let's talk about Kentucky. I was excited about Kentucky. I love Daniel Cameron. I just think he's a rising star, a good guy. He came on the show, like one of our first episodes,

very early on before we even had video. And he was the AG in Kentucky. And I remember saying, you're going to be governor. And I wasn't alone in my prediction. It wasn't anything special. I just wanted to note that for the record. In any event, here he is running for governor. And yet, I wouldn't say he's favored.

What do you think is likely to happen in the Kentucky governor's race where the incumbent is pretty popular? And Daniel Cameron, the Republican challenger, seems to have an uphill battle if you look at the polls. I mean, I would rate this one a toss up, basically. Kentucky is a very Republican state on the federal level, but it is schizophrenic on, they've toggled back and forth between the parties four times and twice have there been Republican governors who were both defeated after one term. Bashir, the Democratic incumbent, is very moderate. He's very Kentucky. And he's really focused on the sort of pragmatic, he would be the democratic doppelganger in a lot of ways to Youngkin. He's in the wrong state on the presidential level, but keeps, focuses on quality of life issues and that kind of stuff. Daniel Cameron represents a fusion that Republicans have been looking for for a long time. Here's a guy who can appeal to the MAGA movement and can

talk about those issues and engage on those issues, but he is a protege of Mitch McConnell. This is what Republicans have been looking for, somebody that both sort of the MAGA populist wing of the party and the traditional conservative wing of the party where they can unite. That makes Cameron very potent. Now, the problem that Cameron has is that turnout in Kentucky will. So here's a good rule of thumb. The richer you are, the more likely you are to vote. The electorate skews the middle class and upper middle class people are disproportionately represented in the electorate because they have a higher voting propensity. There's a lot of reasons for that. But basically, the electorate is more educated and up. Now, some of those people, Kentucky is basically three quarters of Kentucky is a very rural state, highly Republican, and one quarter of the state is Louisville. And Louisville is a diverse and highly educated affluent suburbs. There's an

ethnically diverse urban core. It's a democratic city. So basically it goes like this of the 40% of the people who will turn out in 2024, but who don't turn out this year, who are they mostly? And a lot of those folks are from Eastern Kentucky, rural Kentucky, who are big time Trump voters, right? They're big time mega, mega there that that's where they are. But what Cameron has been trying to do is basically nationalize the election and say to those voters, I know you don't usually come out in races like these, but I really need you because we have to send a message to Joe Biden. So what Cameron has had to say about Bashir is basically Biden. Whatever the question, Cameron's answer is

it's Joe Biden. You're just like Joe Biden. You're just like Joe Biden. So that's what he's trying to do. He needs to change basically the shape of the electorate. But that really could happen when passions are running as high as they are and Republicans are as fired up as they are. I mean, he really is a rising star on the Republican Party. He took so much flack for the Breonna Taylor case where he was the AG who was in front of that grand jury and did not feel that they should indict those police officers. And then the grand jury blamed him. And he was stood all of that and stood on principle and said, I don't think the law supports charges against those officers. And now here he is seeking higher office. Very popular. This is something interesting about the race. The David Axelrod, of course,

former chief strategist for Obama, told Politico if Bashir wins the Democrat, he instantly will become part of the 2028 discussion. A young, charismatic Democrat who won twice in a deep red state. There will be a great deal of chatter. So the stakes are significant on both sides. We'll watch that one tomorrow. Kentucky governor got to spend one minute on Bridgeport, Connecticut. Did you see the hot mess that was the voting situation in the mayoral primary? The Democrat, the incumbent. Oh, I love this. This is OK. So the incumbent Democrat mayor was running to keep the nomination on the primary side. And he had another Democrat coming for his position. And he was winning.

No, the challenger was winning in the day of vote. And the incumbent said, you just wait until the absentee ballots come in. You just wait, Mr. Challenger. I'm feeling good about how I'll do. Well, they came in and he won. I think it was like an 8,000 vote. And he won by 200, thanks to the absentee ballots.

Well, the challengers started to go around and kick the tires a little bit on this win. And they found that certain of the ballot boxes had way more absentee ballots than was normal for any of these jurisdictions. And then they pulled the security tapes on those ballot boxes and they saw this democratic city council woman and another local representative representative here i'm showing it to you here she is stuffing stuffing ballot after ballot in their star wall she was so happy to help the incumbent mayor keep the primary nod. And the judge took a look at all that. She went back four or five times.

This woman did the same thing. Stuff. And they put her on the stand because the challenger filed a lawsuit saying this is all bullshit. You got to throw out this win. And they put her on the stand and she pleaded the fifth 71 times. So what happens? Fun. So here's the craziness. So what happened? So the judge said, we cannot possibly let this primary victory of the incumbent mayor stand. This is bullshit, but I can't just declare the other guy the winner. So we have to redo the primary vote. We have to redo the primary vote. But that was just last Wednesday.

The general is today. There wasn't enough time to redo a primary before the general. So the way he did it was the incumbent mayor is going to be listed on the ballot as the dem. The challenger is going to be listed on the ballot as the independent. And then there's a Republican who's not. Oh, what? So here's the what a rip off. If the incumbent mayor wins as the Dem,

then they're going to go back and redo the primary. It won't be certified. So the challenger could win outright. He could win. He could win. The Republican's not going to win in Bridgeport, Connecticut. But anyway, that's one of the many races I'm watching. It's just, I love when people's bad behavior is caught on camera. It's the best, right?

That's fabulous. I love local politics because it's so awful. It's like the old joke about faculty Senate. Why are people so awful? Because the stakes are so low. And the lengths that people will stoop to in local politics is just really human nature, never change. It really is. It reminds me of one of my favorite sayings too is, we got a summer house in New Jersey. And one time we were driving down there and we saw all those terrible power plants in Newark. It kind of starts to smell bad and it looks bad. And you look at it. And one time I looked up, what are these power plants? What is that thing?

And it led to this whole conversation online that I checked in on. Like, what are they saying? And the one person wrote in, where do all the terrible things about New Jersey come from? And somebody responded, from people who have been there. Oh, that's mean. That's mean. I'm allowed to say it because I own property there. Doug jokes.

That's the only reason that we did that. Because so I can exactly see you could have the Jersey. Love you. You ink stained wretch. Happy to be here. Good luck on election night. Stay out of trouble. Thank you.

I'll do my best. You too. We will be watching tonight. We'll bring you the latest tomorrow. And tomorrow we'll have Stu Bergeer and Dave Marcus. A fun pairing. Those guys are always great. And they'll bring you the full rundown of what happened.

Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.