The Megyn Kelly Show - Steve Bannon on Biden's Cognitive Decline as National Security Threat, Fighting Lawfare Against Trump, and Preparing For Prison | Ep. 826

Episode Date: June 28, 2024

Megyn Kelly is joined by Steve Bannon, host of "Bannon's War Room," to talk about the massive political fallout from President Biden's disastrous presidential debate, the way Joe Scarborough, one of the biggest Biden's sycophants in the media, has gone from telling critics to "f off" if they say Biden isn't mentally sharp, to saying Biden should step aside as the nominee, the national security threat of having Biden in charge after the debate, the potential constitutional crisis ahead, the truth about Biden's mental fitness, the potential massive political damage to Democrats in the House and Senate if Biden stays in, who Democrats might replace Biden with, the likelihood of Michele Obama being the pick, how Republicans should play it politically, the significance of the New York Times and prominent Democrats going public with their Biden criticism, the donors who are dropping from Biden now, how the right should fight Democratic lawfare against Trump, the massive Supreme Court Fischer ruling that will help Trump and January 6 defendants, Supreme Court clamping down on big government, his prison sentence starting on Monday, the Biden administration's weaponization of the courts, and more. Plus, Megyn and Bannon discuss Breitbart's past attack on Megyn, her rocky relationship with Bannon for years, the lawfare that ended up bringing her and Bannon to this interview, how Megyn differentiates her personal life and her public "brand," and more. Bannon- https://warroom.org/

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. We have major, major decisions out this morning from the U.S. Supreme Court, two of them, in fact, and a race for the White House where we are no longer even sure who the Democratic candidate will be this November. To say this is a massive news day would be an understatement. Just a little over an hour ago, the U.S. Supreme Court gutted the powers of the executive federal agencies in one ruling. This is a huge decision. And in another rule, the Department of Justice overstepped its use of obstruction charges in its January 6th prosecutions. You guys know this second case. This charge had been used in over 300 cases. lane that could be very helpful to Trump, a case that if it's overturned, could be very helpful to Trump, even though Trump is not a defendant or a party in this particular case, because it goes

to whether the the heart of the case against Trump in Washington, D.C., that Jack Smith has brought against him in front of Judge Chutkin, whether that the heart of the claim is going to live or die. And the Supreme Court ruled today it dies, that the Justice Department had no business expanding this obstruction of an official proceeding charge to try to encompass what the January 6th protesters did. There is zero chance that that ruling won't expand to what Donald Trump did. And so it is a huge victory, not only for these J6 defendants, but for Donald Trump. And honestly, that's the least of his wins in the last 24 hours, as you know. As for the debacle of a performance that the president, Joe Biden, put in last night at that debate. At this hour, Mr. Biden remains defiant. Despite what the nation and world witnessed

last night, CNN is reporting per an advisor to the president that not only does Joe Biden plan to stay in this race, he wants to do the second debate in September. I'm just there's no there's zero chance of that happening. Zero. And by the way, there there's zero chance of that happening zero and by the way there's probably zero chance of him remaining the nominee he of course he's going to say i'll stick with it until the party elders all go to him and say you cannot you may not you must not which according to reports may be in the works right now. It remains to be seen what the Democratic senior apparatus will do. They've got blood on their hands. They're responsible for what we saw last night.

You know, the term the big lie. This is the big lie that was told to the American public about his ability to sit as the U.S. president for this term. Never mind a second. Politico this morning citing an unnamed Biden ally in the House as follows, quote, The movement to convince Biden to not run is real. But the president's wife this morning, who, according to every source and every article, is crucial to whether he remains on the ballot. Dr. Jill Biden is still pretending that everything is fine, despite the historical embarrassment her husband brought on himself last night. You heard Joe's heart tonight on the debate stage. He wakes up every morning

thinking about how he can make the lives of Americans better. He's the president we need, the president you deserve. Just the mere fact that she's standing up there doing this, right? Like, did Michelle Obama have to do that after Barack Obama whiffed at his first debate in 2012 against Romney? And do you remember Melania Trump coming out and trying to cover for Donald Trump when he didn't have the greatest first debate last season? Why is the first lady coming out to run cover for the commander in chief and leader of the free world? This is an embarrassment. They are not going to get away with it now. They've been getting away with it for three years, hiding or at least trying to hide and deny his cognitive struggles. what do we expect now in these critical next four months? There is no better guest to react to what we witnessed at last night's debate than the man who will join me for the full show today.

We have an exclusive interview with Donald Trump's former senior advisor, Steve Bannon, who now hosts the hugely popular show Bannon's War Room. This interview will be Mr. Bannon's last before he begins serving a four month prison sentence that is set to start today. A prison sentence that was brought upon him by Joe Biden's Department of Justice after he was found in contempt of Congress for not complying with a subpoena from the J6 committee. Merrick Garland himself was just bound in contempt for not complying with his obligations in producing the videotape of Joe Biden's interview with his special counsel, Robert Herr. But guess what? Merrick Garland decided not to pursue himself with criminal charges,

so he won't be going to prison like Mr. Bannon's about to. Steve Bannon, as I'm sure many of you know, was key to Donald Trump's 2016 election win. And while he's not an official member of the Trump campaign this time around, he is still playing a very key role as the voice of the MAGA movement. So his reaction to last night's debate matters. And there's arguably no better strategist on how to react to massive political shifts than this man. Today's interview on a personal note is extraordinary for yours truly. I think it's safe to say that neither one of us, neither Mr. Bannon nor I would have predicted this interview would even take place a few months ago, hell, even a few weeks ago. And we'll get into that later in the show. Mr. Bannon believes, despite the spin coming from the White House and the president's

campaign, that Joe Biden will be replaced on the Democratic ticket. But he believes there is a deeper problem afoot as well. He says what happened last night is now a national security issue. And I agree with him and that there should be congressional investigations into how Joe Biden remains president and who on his staff has been covering up the president's obvious impairment. A cover up aided by sycophant media personalities like MSNBC's Joe Scarborough. It is safe to say that Scarborough has been President Biden's number one defender on TV. And Morning Joe is a show we know Joe Biden himself watches religiously. Joe Scarborough constantly bashes anyone who dares to criticize the president's mental fitness.

Once going so far as to tell the president's critics less than three months ago to, quote, F off if they didn't see and agree with the president's brilliance. He might misplace a word here and there, but you talk to him for hours at a time. Is he slower? Does he move slower? Yeah, he's moved slower. Is he stiffer? Yeah, he moves stiffer. Does he have trouble walking sometimes? Yeah, so did FDR. I've said it for years now. He's cogent. But I undersold him when I said he was cogent. He's far beyond cogent. In fact, I think he's better than he's ever been.

Start your tape right now, because I'm about to tell you the truth. And F you if you can't handle the truth. This version of Biden, intellectually, analytically, is the best Biden ever. Not a close second. And I've known him for years. The Brzezinski's have known him for 50 years. If it weren't the truth, I wouldn't say it. We started our tape and you're a liar and you owe the country answers for those lies you told to cover up the fact that our sitting

president is non-compassmentis. Scarborough this morning is now in a panic. He was snippy and nasty to his co-host and wife on that show because obviously he is, I assume, worried about his reputation, which he has repeatedly undermined being wrong on the facts. And he is even more worried that former President Donald Trump is going to win this race in Scarborough's view, unless the Democrats now replace Joe Biden on the ticket. He's seen the light miraculously. Here's Scarborough this morning. Well, I think I should start by saying, without any apologies, that I love Joe Biden and Jill. And as do so many people who watch this program and who fear just how dark of a place a second Donald Trump term will take America. Then I think it's critical that we ask the same questions about this man I love. I spent three hours with this man, maybe back in March. Three hours, cogent, on top of the issues, on top of every issue around the world.

And last night, he simply was not on the biggest debate stage ever. I'll even use the word tragically. He tragically did not rise to the occasion last night. And he went on to admit it is time to reassess whether President Biden is the man for this job and whether he should stay on the ticket. Joining me now with reaction to all of this, Steve Bannon, host of Bannon's War Room. Steve, thank you so much for being here. It's great to have you on. Well, Megan, thank you. And I don't think we could have picked a more historic day, given everything that's that's gone down and is going to go down.

No, I don't think so either. I feel almost shaky this morning about the security of our country. That's the thing I'm most worried about, that we can talk about whether he should stay the candidate for reelection. But how can he remain in office for another seven months? We've got two wars going. Our troops are at risk and leaders around the world saw what we saw last night. No, I think I think you got to bifurcate this. I think you put the political to the side for a second and we got to figure out that you got to put the country first. And I think you have to

I think you have a national security crisis immediately because you can imagine what the gangsters in Moscow Tehran and Beijing were thinking and you can imagine what our allies or friends in Taipei Jerusalem and Kiev were thinking uh this is a national security crisis and part of that is exactly what goes on every day in the White House who's making decisions who knew about this and the media concurrence on the on the on the cover-up and it's leading quickly and I think very quickly in the next 48 to 72 hours to our constitutional crisis this is going to be a major constitutional crisis there's just impossible for this individual to be the commander-in-chief it's just the combatant commanders report to him he's got obviously the nuclear codes but you have so much more going on and look I think

the one in biggest Jeopardy right now could be uh our allies in Taipei in Taiwan I imagine the CCP that has done everything they can to kind of push us around the Straits of Taiwan at the South China Sea about those advanced chip plants are thinking, hey, why aren't we going now? So this I think it encapsulates what the issues we have in this country. But last night and I got to give it to Donald Trump because I was adamantly opposed to this debate. I think he did this for the nation. He agreed to do it their time, rules all of it and obviously was to show this guy but what he really is so this is the whole political track to me is going to be that's

going to be a whole firestorm itself but that's off to the side right now i haven't heard one democrat i've heard pelosi or anybody behind the scenes are saying i haven't heard one person put the country first and say well hang on for on for a second. We have the beginning of the third world war, the kinetic part happening on the rims of the Eurasian landmass from Ukraine to Israel, to the Red Sea, to the South China Sea in the Straits of Taiwan. And this is the biggest, we have to deal with this today. I think the, I think president Trump's got to step to the, to the stakes, to the sticks and say, this has to be addressed. And I think that you're going to see Speaker Johnson and others in the

House take immediate action on this, on hearings, on subpoenas, on exactly, they ought to subpoena the combatant commanders, the Pacific Fleet. I hope the Pacific Fleet, I hope the Pacific Fleet went on high alert last night in the Straits of Taiwan. Yeah, you'd have to think if you were an American enemy that you watched that last night and you relished it and that they too had jaws dropped as they watched just how infirm our commander in chief is, just how disconnected with reality, his faculties, his ability to communicate. There is zero question. If you had a president Trump back in 2020, who spoke like that and reasoned like that, they would be 25th amendment name him immediately. So where are the cabinet secretaries, right? Why, why aren't we hearing in the news that there's an immediate meeting

of the cabinet secretaries right now to talk about removing him from office? You haven't heard any of the political leaders. You haven't heard anybody in the House or the Senate. You haven't heard any of the Democratic. They control the Senate. You haven't heard armed services. You haven't heard foreign affairs. You haven't heard heard intel nobody stepped up to talk about the country not the politics of this and you certainly haven't heard any cabinet officials uh and to be brutally frank

you haven't heard any really media uh figures the the fact i started the show today with a guy as you know him scott jennings who's one of mcconnell's Jennings and Steve Bannon have never, we couldn't agree on the day of the week or the time of day. And Scott Jennings was a profile in courage because on CNN, they had Axelrod and Van Jones. They're all sudden like prescriptive, prepared to throw Biden over the bus, talking about under the bus on the politics of it. And Jennings goes, hey, hang on for a second.

What happens in the white? We gotta talk about the White House. What happens moment by moment? What happens day by day? That's right. And to your point, the people who have enabled this and covered up for him are target number one in asking for answers of how did this happen?

Who knew? That's how you put it. That's exactly right. Who knew? But in the meantime, you know, we we have to deal with a presidential contest in which right now this White House is saying he's not going to step aside, right, that he's not going. And maybe that's true, Steve, because it's very rare for a man to step down from power voluntarily. And Joe Biden has already been pushed for months now. We know from some

corners, I mean, James Carville tweeted out last night, I tried, I tried and wouldn't do it. So if he stays, is there any way for the Democrat apparatus to get rid of him at this point? There's a National Review has an article up pointing out he's already got 99 of the democratic parties nominating delegates so would there be a way of forcing him out they always talked about do you have a convening authority got to remember let's step back this party is a party that shredded the constitution look you're you're a lawyer and you know the constitution you started covering the supreme court this is we're living in a post-constitutional america because they've shredded the constitution uh they shredded the 2020 election these people will do anything to hold on to power so i i agree with you technically it looks like that could be tough

in particular with kamala harris but you have a group here that understands that right now if you go right now if you go with uh if you go with um uh b he's going to lose by 10 or 15 points. We could pick up 56 or 57 Senate seats and pick up, last night in the Hill, they have Democratic operatives talking, we could lose 20 House seats. You could pick up another 10 in the House. You could wipe out a generation of Democratic politicians right now, a generation of it. And I think those people and their donors and supporters are not prepared to stop for this. I think the process of Biden, and I think that's why it's in tandem with the issues for the country on national security and 25th amendment, the constitutional crisis, the political crisis is going to be, is going to be Biden, these guys trying to figure

out the people around Biden that talk him out of coming. And I think Pelosi is the big one talking about staying. Then it's going to be the search for the Messiah or the Messiah group of which the mainstream media will be all in. And then the honeymoon once they're selected. So if they keep with Biden, there's no chance President Trump should ever get on the debate stage with this guy again. No, no chance. He gave him a shot and not do it. And it's one and done to do it and it's one and done and and right now it's a 10 or 15 point loss you're going to pick up 56 or 50 senate senate seats you're going to have 225 uh house seats uh you're going to wipe out the democratic party so if that's what they want and they won't stand for that their donors won't stand for that

so the political side and they're searching for a messiah, whether it's Michelle Obama or, you know, Gavin Newsom. Gavin Newsom, if you think about the apparatus in the deep state as a Praetorian guard, he did exactly what the generals did when they were shifting out emperors back in the middle years of the empire. It was those generals that stepped up and were loyal on the surface like Gavin Newsom did. He did a soldier's duty last night. He was so positive on Biden. You got to have his back. That's the type of guy they're going to look for.

A Gavin Newsom, a Michelle Obama, a Gretchen Whitmer, you pick it. Maybe Pastor Warnock down in Georgia. But that's a political search that's going on right now. You're absolutely right. When you hear the numbers, as you just laid them out, massive losses in the Senate, massive losses in the House, a complete takeover by the Republicans, a generational loss of leadership for Dems. It's an existential crisis for the Democratic Party, what they're going through right now. And so it's ultimately it is up to Joe Biden, but there's only so much pressure he could withstand. I mean, if who would it take to go in there and convince him, Steve, you must step down. You it's really not up to you for the good

of the country. You must step down or we're all going to come out and have a press conference against you. We know John Holman said that I had Charlie Spearing on last week. Charlie worked with me at Breitbart and now is the senior one of the senior political correspondents for Daily Mail. He had this story last week about how it would take it would take a collection of Obama, Clinton, Schumer and Pelosi to collectively convince Jill Biden in the way, you know, they would have to meet or talk. And then one of those would go convince Jill Biden and the way you you know they would have to meet or talk and then one of those uh would go to Joe Biden and make this transition happen selling on the selling on the deal the um and I think John Howman said today on Morning Joe and these guys

laughed in my they said look at when it first came out we said oh Daily Mail is a British paper Daily Mail is a tabloid Etc and they said entit, he said, I went to six of my best sources at the senior most levels in the Democratic Party. And they said, hey, guess what? This story is directionally accurate, that they know it would take that group and they know that that's how they would have to do it. Nancy Pelosi, as Howman said today, because the Clintons and the Obamas have had differences with Biden before. And Axios had that story yesterday morning, no coincidences, on the day of the debate that said Michelle Obama is not a partisan. She's a uniter. And more importantly, she detests the feral dog nature of the Biden family, it would have to be Nancy Pelosi. Nancy Pelosi is the key person here. She's the one that could go make the deal politically to have Biden step

aside. And the truth is, these are partisans. These are not as much as they want to say they love Joe Biden, they love Jill Biden. They're partisans. And so when they see those numbers that you just ticked off they're seeing what you're seeing they know what the truth is that they're setting trump up for a landslide victory where his coattails will be enormous they'll do it won't they i mean i just don't see them not doing i don't i don't see their love for joe biden trumping their concern for their party a hundred percent they're going to If you couple politically what has happened, let's leave the national security

and the constitutional crisis. If you couple what's happened in the last 24 hours with particularly today, the Chevron deference being overturned and Lawrence Tribe coming out and saying, you're seeing the death of the administrative state, plus the overturning of Fisher, which is going to get into a whole massive investigation

of the Department of Justice and maybe even the federal judiciary. No, they can't. They which is going to get into a whole massive investigation of the Department of Justice and maybe even the federal judiciary. No, they can't. They're not going to sit there. And particularly people like the governor of Pennsylvania and other people to aspire to the presidency are not going to sit there and have Trump and MAGA have a sweep to pick up 55. I mean, maybe even get to the point that the senate with maybe a couple of the conservative democrats could be filibuster proof and that the house with the investigate with with the strength of coming into the house on this mega agenda it's it's not going to happen

you're going to have these these the democrats play smash mouth and last night they understand that's not sellable that's not sellable to the american people like i said the crisis is upon us now but the political crisis the democrats they're going to make a move and you know the media they're going to go through the phases they'll do this after president trump's i believe strongly is going to be sentenced to prison on the 11th of july maybe with deferred reporting probably with you know some sort of uh and it's a probation suspended sentence what under court supervision immersion so he can make sure that you know he's got tracks of him going to Wisconsin Ohio and places where he's got a campaign Nevada um but then you're going to have the search for them you're going to have the move on Biden you'll have the sentence of Trump which is very

different than me found guilty very different to being ind. Now he's actually going to go to a prison on a date certain. And they're going to use, then they're going to go into the search for what I call the Messiah or the Messiah group. And then that Messiah group is going to have a honeymoon period like you've never seen before. The media is going to pile in here because they realize the only thing that stops a landslide by Trump, the America First movement, and MAGA is that. And that's where, you know, politically, I never, I always thought it was a bad idea to do this. We essentially gave Biden a free option. It should always be who the Democratic nominee was going to be. But I think President Trump put the country first, feeling that this had to go. And I agree with you. I think the most important thing for the people in the United States is how do we get as a country to 20 January of 2025? That's seven

months. And that's going to be probably the longest seven months in the history of this nation. What should the Republicans be rooting for? Right? Like that Biden stays the nominee or that they sub in some late nominee like a Gavin Newsom, who's extremely radical. I like what should they be rooting for? I think here's what I what I would advise is the two tracks. Number one, you have to put the country first and let's do that. And I mean, we need a full accounting of exactly what's going on and to try to get ahead of this constitutional crisis but there must be a change this cannot go on that that what what stood up on that stage last night cannot be the commander in chief of the most powerful military in the history of the earth particularly you know we're on the

today's the 110th anniversary of the assassination of the archduke in sarajevo by the serbian nationals that kicked off the bloodiest century in mankind's history which people thought was kind of this odd event we cannot do that we cannot let history repeat itself so that's number one number two i think it's very simple we have to make the pain the the lying to the american people the obfuscation of this how this was going and so their search for Messiah and all that we have to make the pain of the transition so horrible that it sticks to that stench sticks to them regardless of who they bring in and and obviously will fight those people on their own policies

but the process itself has to become an issue if we make the process this Americans guys go yeah what in the hell is going on have we ever changed out a guy like this what's going on didn't people know about it you make the process part of the politics and the American people will have complete and total revulsion of this this is not America this is not how this Republic this is not how we grew this is not how we freed more people and created more wealth and sacrifice more for people throughout the world that is not what the United States of America is about and you make it that they put raw naked politics ahead of the good of this country and her citizens and that will stick and I think that can lead to also maybe not as big a landslide as against Biden, but a big enough.

Maybe we don't get 57 seats, but you get 50, 52, 53, 54. And you pick up you hold the house and pick up a couple of three. And Trump's got the wind to his back for his second term. That's why if I was doing it, that's what I do. Make it you make the pain so make the process so painful that the American people notice what they did. That's right. That their their switcheroo will be held against them as well, because they're the ones who put the country in this position. Do you think that all holds true, even if they somehow convince Michelle Obama to step in? I don't think, you know, I don't need to tell you this, but Mike Allen and Jim Vanderhay

are two of the smartest media. I mean, they formed, came from the Washington Post, formed Politico, sold it for a billion dollars and started Axios. I think the value of that's a couple of billion dollars. These are very, very smart people. And they kind of, Axios kind of is the Washington consensus. It's not a random event that they had the Michelle Obama as the scoop and the lead story on the morning of the

the morning of the debate and particularly the way they framed it that she she doesn't like the way the Biden's role so all the personal problems all of that the money and and all that because the Obama's never took a penny and they're you know they're they're very untainted that way but also the fact that they they emphasize the fact that she doesn't like politics. She wouldn't do this. She's not partisan. She really wants to be a uniter. I think they'll make a hard play for Michelle Obama. I think Michelle Obama is the only one I see that could really make a run at President Trump.

And anybody they pick, I think if we do this transition right and make the process, President Trump will win and I think could win big. But I would think a ticket with uh Michelle Obama that also takes care of obviously the Kamala Harris situation I think Michelle Obama in and uh in Gavin Newsom or Michelle Obama and Gretchen Whitmer or uh you know Gavin Newsom and and Pastor Warnock some combination of that but no think to me, Michelle Obama would be the most competitive because it would go back to the nostalgia they have for the Obama administration. And clearly, Barack Obama, President Obama would be very involved in that campaign.

Well, it's interesting, Steve, isn't it that you've got David Plouffe, Axelrod, Ben Rhodes, all the Obama guys out today saying he needs to go. He can't be the nominee. Just needs to go. When CNN came back to the panel, this is what was so, it was too in your face. You came back and you had Van Jones from the Obama White House. And you had David Axelrod, his chief strategist. And there was like a script. And they were going, essentially, this is more in sorrow than in anger. And they had it laid out right there.

And you had on MSNBC, you had Plouffe in the same exact thing. No, it was too much. And obviously, there's been all kind of rumors about who really is calling the shots in the White House in the first place, with Ali Jarrett and Susan Rice and others. So I think the fix is in. I think the fix has been in on this. But now it's about the process right fix is in. I think the fix has been in on this. And but now it's about the process right now is important, both the national security process and constitutional and the

political process, I think will run parallel on the Alstom interchange. Yep. Let me ask you, when you say we're facing a constitutional crisis, and you said that after I said, should he be forced out under the 25th Amendment for infirmity? What do you mean we're heading for a constitutional crisis? I mean that. I mean, it's going to have to be because you're going to have to get the combatant commanders. As commander chief, he has a whole set of relationships and things that must be done. The 25th Amendment here clearly has to be brought up. And I would hope that the service chief service chiefs not just cabinet members but

service chiefs are coming forward i would imagine i would like to know immediately and i would ask the house armed services committee to call an immediate hearing i would like to know uh what came out of the uh the pentagon last night to the combatant commanders and i would particularly like to know what the seventh is the seventh fleet on higher alert today than it was last night if it's not that's a problem you've given an open invitation to beijing you've given an open invitation to the mullahs in tehran and you've given an open invitation to uh to putin and the kgb criminals in moscow i mean i think zielinski already put out kind of a panicked uh message today about trying to end the war this is this is a crisis of not just in the governance of the country as an entity it is a national security

crisis about what our military apparatus is and particularly the fact that we're spread over Hell's Half Acre around the rim of the Eurasian landmass in kinetic wars that are going on two two major kinetic wars are going on right now and the most important one is in a pre-kinetic war stage in the south china sea and straits of taiwan so this is a crisis and this is you're the constitutional lawyer about the 25th amendment the cabinet members they have a whole process of doing it but you also have the military and i think armed services we we need transparency right now. We've had last night showed us that the media is part of the problem. Joe Scarborough.

I think that, that your, your, your cut was from, from a couple of weeks ago. I mean, they are an active part of protecting this guy. It's a protection racket.

So you can't trust any of them right now. March. He can't trust. I think, I think think he had I think he had to visit in March I think this actually might have come afterwards he said I just did this in March and then the Wall Street Journal hit its hit him uh hit Biden and that was Scarborough afterward exactly and look at that that was adamant I wear three dang the best the. You're telling me in a couple weeks you got what you got last night? No, it's a lie. All of it's a lie. And so here we have to put the nation first.

And I think we have to look at the commander in chief. And I think we have to talk to the combatant commanders. You have to talk to members of the joint chiefs, which are not, the chiefs are really not in the direct line of the combatant commanders. But I think you have to talk to Pacific Fleet and you have to see. Look, we just had to carry a battle group to the eastern med a couple of days ago why because of the persian militias in hezbollah in in northern israel and in southern lebanon which the israelis are telling us they're pivoting out of gaza and they're going to get it on and that's a real war that's not a go against a group of terrorists that's light infantry close air combat support and you've got to carry a battle group with another 10 000

american kids in the eastern mediterranean and so now this issue is not about politics this issue is about the thing itself is about what we are as a republic so and i think people have to be forcing the action here i think you're going to have to have a forcing function because they're going to try to bob and weave on this. And they understand, I believe, that there have been crimes committed. How this was withheld from the American people, what exactly went on, what has been on these meetings, what the media knows about it. I want to see every text message. I want to see every email. I want to know about every conversation.

Exactly how we arrived at last night. I want to just underscore, as you were talking about the dangers that are posed to us right now as a result of his infirmity, thinking back on his three years, Steve, the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, which was executed so poorly by a man who was obviously already compromised. This did not happen overnight. No one was held accountable. There was absolutely no one fired whatsoever for that decision and the way it was handled last night, getting up there and saying he hasn't lost a single troop while commander in chief, ignoring the 13 dead Marines. They are in addition to those who were killed more recently in Jordan. And then think about what he was saying in the

lead up to Ukraine, to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Well, minor, minor incursion, you know, minor incursion might not result in anything. And then Putin moves in. He's already spouting off on matters with messaging that is not approved, that is not necessarily consistent with policy as approved by our Pentagon. And it's weakening us. It's exposing us. There's already a history of it. So what happens over the next seven months when the man who couldn't even give us a straight answer on the abortion trimesters last night, who couldn't understand the difference between the abortion question and illegal immigration, who conflated the two in a confused and meandering answer, has to deal with these complex issues you just outlined in a way

he never could over the next seven months, because it's four to the election, but it's seven until we get a new president sworn in. We're already in danger. Let me just pause it right there for one second. I do have to take a commercial break, but I want to get back to your central point. Who knew? And were there crimes committed in the cover up of his problems? And we'll give you a taste of what they'd been saying. Our audience remembers, but we have the receipts and the video as Scarborough told us to keep, which we did to show you more with Steve Bannon ahead on a big day. We have a thousand trillionaires in America, I mean billionaires in America, and what's happening? They're in a situation where they in fact pay 8.2% in taxes. If they just paid 24%

or 25%, either one of those numbers, they'd raise $500 million, billion dollars, I should say, in a 10-year period. We'd be able to wipe out his debt. We'd be able to help make sure that all those things we need to do, child care, elder care, making sure that we continue to strengthen our health care system, making sure that we're able to make every single solitary person eligible for what I've been able to do with the COVID, excuse me, with dealing with everything we have to do with, look, if we finally beat Medicare.

Thank you, President Biden. President Trump? Oh, my Lord. That is just one of the, to put it charitable, senior moments that Joe Biden suffered last night in front of our very eyes. Steve Bannon is with us today. And Steve, he's the host of Bannon's War Room. There are multiple reports of focus groups who are watching Democratic focus groups with their heads in their hands, cringing. The panic was unfolding fast and furiously amongst the Democratic elite, understanding exactly how bad things were. But to your point, those in the media, those with access to him, those like Joe Scarborough,

who've had multiple meetings with him, have been spinning a very different tale publicly for some time. And I'll give you just one example of some of those leaders in SOT 8. How many 30-year-olds could travel to Poland, get on the train? He is younger than I am, so I don't know what the problem is. But I can tell you, having traveled with him a fair amount, sometimes he's hard to keep up with. Come work out with me in the morning. Oh, my gosh. He's the president of the United States. You know, he I can't even keep up with him.

What about the respect for elders thing that we talk about? And he has a steady hand when you look at what's out there right now with Donald Trump. I think his schedule reflects an active person mentally and physically. I don't know what more they're asking for. So they lied. And your question is, should they be investigated? But for what? Well, I think the focus groups that I think we're most that we want to hear from are the focus groups in Moscow, the KGB, the mullahs in tehran and and the chinese communist party in beijing that's the focus group that matters right now not simply american politics and that's what these lies are you

know as a young man i came off sea duty and i was fortunate enough to be an aide or special assistant to the chief of naval operations first tom hayward and and then Jim Watkins back at the beginning days of President Reagan's administration. And I sat in and took the notes as a junior officer for the conferences they had at this thing called the CNO Executive Board. He was the chief of naval operations and a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And he would go over to the situation room. These discussions about what you're doing on military activity, on kinetic military activity, when you're putting American young men and women in harm's way in the nation's interest, in respect to the nation,

in direct line of fire, are enormously complicated. And when you're going through this, it's enormously complicated. You know, 30 or 40, 40 50 years later i was able to sit there with president trump in the situation room and see the complexity this is what this is about the the individual stood up there last night it's just no way you can handle the complex nature particularly of modern warfare now with drones and artificial intelligence and if you think about it it's the chinese communist party in in in the straits of taiwan and south china sea against taiwan it's the Chinese Communist Party in in in the Straits of Taiwan in South China Sea against Taiwan it's Russia with its vast military resources in the Ukraine and I'm not a supporter of the Ukraine war at all but then you've got our ally Israel with their back against the wall not just

with the Muslim Brotherhood in Hamas but really with the more serious threat of of Hezbollah and the Persian militias and Persia and Tehran coming for him and so you expect me to believe and particularly with the source people look at the New York Times this morning you had Tom Friedman he had Frank Bruni he had Nicholas Christoph you had the most well-sourced people in the New York Times the paper of record that are dialed into the National Security apparatus and dialed into the White House and all of them had these oh woe is me they you know this is terrible we got to replace him no we need immediately for the nation to get in back of this issue and we can't play around with this this is why somebody somebody in the republican side we need leaders to step up here this is about

leadership this is not about politics it's about putting the country first we need leaders to step up here this is about leadership this is not about politics it's about putting the country first we need leaders to step up and say hang on for a second what exactly is going on here what did I see and what how we're going to solve it and then kind of who knew about this and how we got in here that's why I think the politics is secondary and I think if people treat the politics as secondary the American people will say okay that's in a very dangerous world at the beginning stages of the kinetic part of the Third World War. I see who the leaders are. I mean, I don't know that whether they'll do that because of their fear of Trump. But you're right that we're definitely seeing something we have never seen before. We pulled some of those New

York Times headlines you just mentioned. Tom Friedman, Joe Biden is a good man and a good president. He must bow out of the race. Frank Bruni, Biden cannot go on like this. Patrick Healy, I'm hearing high anxiety from Democrats over Biden's debate performance. Michelle Cottle, Ross Duterte and Ezra Klein, is Biden too old? America got its answer. And then I'll give you this clip from the New York Times Daily podcast called The Daily, which is must listen podcasting for virtually all Democrats this morning. After one of Biden's more meandering answers, Trump responds with a quip that really said what everyone was thinking. President Trump, I really don't know what he said at the end of that sentence. I don't think he knows what he said either.

Look, saying that I don't know what Biden said at the end of the sentence and I don't know if he does either. This is the first presidential election since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. It feels like a strong topic for Biden in this part of the debate was going to be abortion. Which returned the issue of abortion to the states. And the moderators bring it up. And it felt like low-hanging fruit, an opportunity for Biden to blame Trump for the fall of Roe versus Wade and score some real points on the board. But it didn't feel like that's what happened. No, it didn't.

He kind of botched that framing. We had three trimesters. The first time is between the woman and the doctor. Second time is between the doctor and an extreme situation. The third time is between the doctor, I mean, between the woman and the state. He was trying to seemingly make an analogy about trimesters that didn't really come through very clearly. And so that, I think, was a moment where when the moderator brought it up, you would feel Democrats think, OK, this is something that might play better for us than the economy or immigration.

But like a lot of things in this debate, Biden just didn't seem to put it together that well. Steve, they would never have done this if they did not believe there was a chance they could get Biden off this ticket. Because if they don't think that, then they're just bloodying up their nominee and they really do see Trump as the devil.

So they would never do this if they didn't think there was a realistic chance of bouncing him out. Megan Kelly, you just found the buried lead. You're 1000% correct. Axelrod and Van Jones

would have never said that when they came back. None of this. The New York Times, that podcast is massive. That podcast is massive. Like Morning Journal, it sets the narrative for the day. No, no. They know they have an issue, and they know they kind of think they have a solution for it. They never would have done this because all that's going to be able to play back.

That political train has left the station, I think think you're it's just how you exit it's all about execution now i what about on the subject of execution what do they do about kamala because you know for months now we've had some prominent liberal voices like sonny Hostin over at The View saying, you can't just bounce us out. You can't just take the black female vice president and bounce her out and think we're going to accept that just because you happen to bounce in a female black woman like Michelle Obama. She's not bounceable. And yet, you know, as well as I do, the Democratic Party doesn't like Kamala Harris. Well, and I think they gave her a small tryout last night. Megan, it's pretty extraordinary on a night of a presidential debate, particularly one that's so historic and coming so first that

they rolled her out past the CNN and MSNBC, and she once again failed miserably. She can't even answer a straight question with coherent thought. I mean, she's only a couple of notches down from the impaired Joe Biden. So these people are all about power. They play smash mouth. And I agree with you. It's a problem, but it's not an unsolvable problem. You have Pastor Warnock in Georgia. You have Michelle Obama.

There's not going to be a perfect fit. And that's why, quite frankly frankly like i go back to the process we have to make it as painful as possible on the political side we have to make it as least painful on the countryside with the crisis in the constitutional crisis we have to make it very painful on the process on the political side and this is where this comes in they don't have a simple and easy solution i don't think they have an elegant solution unless it's somehow uh michelle obama and they're gonna you know get soda my year to step down and put uh kamala harris on the supreme court there'll be some three-card money to this uh but you nailed it they're not they're not going to come out these guys the the day before it's all biden biden biden

and and then to have that shift i I mean, when you went back to MSNBC on the panel, it was like they were sitting Shiva right there. It was like it was an Irish wake. They were stunned. You contrast that, Steve, with what we saw after the Trump conviction or the Trump indictment, for that matter, where they were positively gleeful. They really looked like someone died last night and it was their presidential hopes. It's true. This just in from Kenneth Vogel, a New York Times reporter. I am hearing that some Democratic donors are backing out of Biden's fundraiser tonight at the Hammerstein Ballroom in Manhattan with Elton John. And this this could happen over and over. The first comment is don't let the sun go down on me. But the sun is going down on this man's hopes of winning a second term.

All right, listen, we've got to talk about so much more, including Chevron. That was huge. What happened at the Supreme Court this morning, the gutting of the January 6th case against Trump by this other case, Fisher, in which Trump wasn't actually named. But we've been talking about this for months on the show as a critical case, maybe even arguably more critical than the question of presidential immunity, which is a long shot to get every single thing he did covered by immunity. But but gutting the J6 case, which, you know, they're trying to fast track would be extremely helpful. And it just happened. So let's pick that up with Steve Bannon next after we squeeze in this quick break. My God, what a day. I would love to know your thoughts on it while I have your attention. Send me an email. It's Megan, M-E-G-Y-N at megankelly.com. And let me know your

thoughts on where things go from here and what's on your mind this morning. I'm Megan Kelly, host of the Megan 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 SiriusXM channel featuring lots of hosts you may know and probably love. Great people like Dr. Laura, I'm back, Nancy Grace, Dave Ramsey, and yours truly, Megyn Kelly. You can stream The Megyn Kelly Show on SiriusXM at home or anywhere you are.

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Offer details apply. As I mentioned at the top of the show, there's a lot of history between yours truly and Steve Bannon, my guest today. Over the years, I think it's safe to say we've been less than kind to one another. He's called me the devil and once threatened to call me from the herd. In return, I've referred to him as a misogynist. Not nice stuff. It all started after the GOP presidential primary debate back in August of 2015, when I asked then candidate Donald Trump the now famous question about his past interactions with women. In 2019, Frontline PBS asked if I would take part in a documentary about the 2016 election. Steve Bannon also took part. PBS did a great job detailing what happened in the days and weeks after that debate,

the tug of war that broke out, which forever changed the conservative media landscape. Watch. I thought it was an unfair question, but you know what? The answer was just the beginning. Are you going to call Roger Ailes about it? At 340 in the morning, he lit up Twitter. Wow. Megyn Kelly really bombed tonight. People are going wild on Twitter. Funny to watch. On the phone with CNN, he went further. What is it with you and Megyn Kelly? She starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. And, you know, you could see there was blood coming out of her eyes,

blood coming out of her wherever. Trump recognized that it was a good storyline, and he kept fuel going under that fire because he knew some portion of his audience loved to see him challenging, you know, a powerful woman, never mind a woman at Fox. And so he accurately deduced that this would drive his numbers up with some segment of his base.

Trump had a powerful ally in the attack on Kelly, the right-wing website Breitbart and its leader, Steve Bannon. Fox has chosen a side. It's so evident in that debate that they're there to kneecap Donald Trump, OK? They're there to take him out. And that's when we go, okay, we run 20 stories on Megyn Kelly.

I get Tony Lee and Matt Boyle, my two hammers. They go right after Megyn Kelly. We're going to Linsky her, right? We're going to cut her out from the, call her out from the herd and just hit her nonstop. That's when all war broke out. That's when Breitbart,

that's when you had to choose sides. In taking on Fox, Bannon and Trump were inciting the kind of conflict Breitbart readers thrived on. She is a lowlife. We need to chop her off at the knees. Do not. You look at the comments section, these things are getting 10 and 15 thousand, 20 thousand comments. Meghan's a type for a quickie in the men's room. The whole Trump, all the Pepes, all these Trump guys were pounding in here. Kelly needs to be put in her place, vast and hard, by all of us.

It was scary at times. And Breitbart kept lighting the fire over and over. And, you know, I had and have three young kids, really young kids, and the security threats were escalating. And we were doing everything in our power to convey to them that they needed to stop. It was one debate question, just one debate question. And he handled it fine, you know, he did. So get off of it. And they couldn't have cared less.

Roger Ailes ran Fox News. Ruthless and powerful, Ailes was a force to be reckoned with. Ailes calls me up and says, you gotta knock off these stories. She's crying, she's all upset, she's getting death threats. That guy sounds like a personal problem. I said, we're not backing off. We're gonna put more stories up tomorrow. If Kelly can't take the heat, go back to the kitchen. Trump should commission a statue of Miss Kelly on her knees and place it in front of Trump Tower. Under the onslaught, Ailes eventually backed down. I would go on to moderate another debate with Mr. Trump during

that election season. I eventually went to Trump Tower, had a heart-to-heart with him, and eventually interviewed him for a TV special. And as you know, Mr. Trump also joined us last fall on this show for a fair but tough interview. But Steve Bannon and I have never spoken to each other, ever. So why now? It's because I have come to respect his opinions and yes, even his tactics. Earlier this month, while covering the former president's conviction in the business records trial brought against him by Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg, I had a conversation with Harvard professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz about whether Republicans need now to fight fire with fire and start going after political opponents to those who have committed crimes who normally would not be prosecuted,

though. Dershowitz argued against this in this exchange that later went viral. It's on. The norms have been broken. It's going to continue happening because now they've succeeded. I agree, but you fight a lack of principle with a principle defense. You don't get down into the gutter with them and allow the pendulum. You know who we need? No, I, you know, I thought I'm going to utter words. I never thought I would utter in my life. You know, we need Steve Bannon.

That's how I feel today. Bring it on. Get somebody who knows how to fight dirty, calling the shots. We're losing. They're taking out our people. This is about the presidency and the future of the country. Until lawfare is unleashed on the left, in my opinion, it won't stop. They've breached such egregious lines and norms that we won't restore normalcy without treating fire with fire. It's just that simple. A few days after my remarks, Mr. Bannon said the following on his show. Megyn Kelly and I have gone at it for nine years. And why did I go after her for nine years? Because in 2015, in August of 2015,

she took the first shot at Trump and tried to kneecap him right out of the box. And you know why? Because she was the most powerful person on television at the time, and an amazing talent. That's why she was chosen by Murdoch. But of all the stuff that's come out,

she's probably been most on point. We have to go Old Testament. There's a couple things we have to do. Obviously, and I've been walking through this, we have to build this, we have to do this. But some part of us, some group has to go on offense. She's 100% correct. And Megyn Kelly is 100% right. And Professor Dershowhowitz these guys are wrong

obviously we have to be principled but we have to be ruthless and now today steve bannon is my guest i'm very happy to have him here steve that that really takes us back down through memory lane but i I have to tell you, with now all this time to reflect on that whole story and the time that's passed since, I learned so many lessons from all of it, including the following. Number one, politics and political journalism are a blood sport, and you shouldn't be in the lane if you can't take it. It's not to say any of that stuff was pleasant for me or to, you know, say it was, it was all great, but I did learn a lot about myself and I think I got stronger and I understood how to protect myself, you know, mentally and emotionally in a way I

never would have otherwise. This is the blessing of great challenges that could get thrown your way. And while for a while there, I was angry with you and my assistant was very angry with you. Um, I got to the point where I just didn't feel anger at all anymore. And I saw what you were doing in the political lane in a way that was extremely effective against the same, I mean, forgive the term, but enemies that I feel I have on, on, and I mean that in terms of issues that we're fighting on. And I thought he's a powerful ally. He knows how to win fights and he doesn't care about not sure my assistant, Abigail, fine and supports it, I am past all of it and was really looking forward ultimately to this exchange today. How do you see it? I say the same way, though.

The only the front line thing was fantastic, except the end. And this is what I told Ailes. You were the most powerful person in all media at the time that that if you go back in time and i just had a different world view you know i'm not i'm not a conservative i'm not a republican i mean i'm i i registered as republican so i can vote but i'm a populist nationalist and our world view is that you've had a managed back in 16 15 16 you had a managed decline of our country by our elites and that the republican party and particularly fox news and the murdochs and a little bit roger ailes who i revered or what we call controlled

opposition and so it doesn't shock me today of where we are as a country in this fight. This is what our belief was back then. And that first debate, remember, it was only I think 45 days into the into the campaign and we were all in for Trump as a, as a he was going to be the instrument for basically saving the country stopping of stopping Hillary Clinton, eventually stopping her from getting Merrick Garland in as a permanent member of the Supreme Court. And I think we were just ahead of the curve at the time. And Fox was the problem. And you, as the most powerful member at Fox, and quite frankly, in all media at that time, were a huge problem. You could have taken Trump out.

There's no doubt about it. You came very close on that if it hadn't been for his just natural quickness. And that's why, you know, it's information war. We're at war. We're not, I'm not a media guy. I'm not a journalist. I've never done journalism in my life.

I'm not, I didn't go to journalism school. This is an information war war and what shocked me even with Roger Ailes who are revered he still didn't quite get that it was you I was coming we were coming it was Murdoch's but it was you and if we didn't stop that it's like I say today if you don't stop it it's the same things happening in law for if you don't stop that, it's like I say today, if you don't stop it, it's the same thing's happening in law. If you don't stop it, it's going to continue. And we did. And you said, we play inside the lines hopefully most of the time, but we're not adverse to sometimes playing outside the lines.

If it is to, we're about victory. And I remember Roger called me and said, Hey, she's got, you know, at first he sent a Paul Peter Johnson down. We called first and they said, hey, she's got, you know, at first he sent Peter Johnson down. We called first and then he said I'm going to send my lawyer down. And Peter came down and Peter's a good man. And Peter was kind of like implying, you know, threats and lawsuits. I go, hey, you got to go back and tell Ailes. We're not going to back off this.

What are you talking about? We just started. And here's the thing, you know, Tucker was at Daily Caller. Bill Kristol was at Weekly Standard. Rich Lowry was at National Review. We had always avoided, in fact, I told people when they came to work for me, you will not be on Fox News.

You will never be on Fox News. We don't really have a relationship with them because I told people at the time, after Andrew died and after I'd been in the saddle for a while, this was back in 2012, I said, there is going to come a time in the future that we have to go against fox and i mean really throw down hard and we have to be ready for that because they're

neoliberal neocons we're populist nationalist america first and we don't share the same sort of values they're controlled opposition and we're about saving this country and so that fight was i think a heavyweight title fight and you hung in for a long time you hung in for a long time I know it's terrible I mean Ailes told me he said he says look she's she's got security threats I said dude you're a twelve billion dollar company get her the best secure you know all the Navy Seals get a good security because we're not stopping and you know we don't think anybody's gonna happen because all the petpe's are just all talk but I said we're not gonna stop and I tried to

tell him I said hey you know no offense you're not the most powerful guy if it you know you want me to talk to a principal let me talk to her she's the principal you're just a you're just that you're just an agent you're an intermediary so it was we have we had a ton of tough conversations, but. We and if we hadn't won that, Trump would not have been president. Trump would have been gone in 30 days if that if that debate and you had continued on, given your the respect the audience had for you, not the fan base, but you had a central part. Look, you're sitting in the middle right there for a reason. You were Fox News and you were by far the most powerful personality in Fox News, because unlike even Hannity and O'Reilly, you are a journalist.

You're a lawyer. You brought the complete package. So, no, it was unpleasant, but we're at war, and we're not prepared. I understand, Steve. I am never prepared to back down. I get it. With some distance now, I get it like the stakes are just very high and i've since learned in the process in the process of being a public figure to differentiate between megan kelly the person and megan kelly the brand right like this person

who's out there public facing with journalism responsibilities, et cetera. And the attack was on Megyn Kelly, the brand. It wasn't, you didn't even know me as a person. It wasn't about what's going on in my personal life or trying to hurt me personally. And I'm the one who put myself in the public arena. And I'm the one who asked that very tough question and it was, had no right to be free from controversial fallout or negative opinions about me or my question, you know, which I still stand behind. Um, so I, I've just come to see it very differently. Again, I, you look back on how it was at the time and it was traumatic for sure. And we were, we were definitely in danger. Um, but I understood, I understand what's happened because it was about the presidency and the stakes were far bigger than me or, you know, my personal complaints.

In any event, we had to go through it because there's no way of having you on without taking a little walk down that lane to figure out where we got. All right, we'll take a quick break. There's a tease for you, audience. How can we use those Steve Bannon tactics to save our country, to fight against the lawfare that's being unleashed against presidential candidates, not to mention people like Steve Bannon, and restore some sort of normalcy in the country. Well, we'll pick it up there with Steve Bannon. The question is, how do we take that Steve Bannon knowledge of how to fight and fight the way the Dems do and fight back against the lawfare campaign that they've unleashed against Donald Trump, among others.

Well, listen, you've got your look at John, you I mean, John, you you know, is one of the most reason guys in the in the Republican legal apparatus. He wrote that piece, I think, over at National Review, which is had a reputation not being in the fight club. And he said, it's got to be it's got to be tick for tick. We have a constitutional responsibility and obligation to do this because it's not going to stop any McCarthy. They both say what you've said. And when you cut off Dershowitz, I thought was fantastic. It's not going to stop until we stop it. And I think you've got all kind of allies right now. And today, I got to tell you, the Fisher case, I think is huge.

And you're going to see a firestorm about this. This gets back to how Nixon was. Fisher is the case where in which the J6 charge of obstruction of a congressional proceeding was just struck down. Keep going. Yeah. Andrew Weissman on Enron, which is really about documents. They work together, they collude together, they jerry-rig this thing, and then they have people rot in federal prisons. Not just coming after Trump,

it's coming after the J6, some of these, quite frankly, innocent J6 people that they just, they created this charge and they worked with the judicial, they worked, this is the scandal of it. And this is why the overturning at six three is so important. You're going to see collusion between the Justice Department, people on the Hill, on the J6 committee, the Justice Department and the federal bench and ex parte meetings. This gets back to how Nixon was really removed from office. Remember, Jeff Shepard, the great guy,

the guy was a junior guy in the Nixon White House Counsel's Office, spent his entire life since then going through about House Sirica and the federal bench with the DOJ kind of, you know, because DOJ was run by Nixon's guys. But the guys down in Planet, the kind of deep state, the administrative state guys, plus on Capitol Hill, took Nixon out. This is exactly what has happened here. And so we have fighters on our side. That's why I keep saying courage is contagious

when people like you step out there, when people like John Yoo. And John Yoo and Andy McCarthy are not MAGA, are not Trump people. I think you're in a transition, right? So, but we have to unite everybody. You're Trump and MAGA adjacent, but that's a journey. And I think this is why people, we have to unite. You're you're you're Trump and MAGA adjacent, but that's a journey. And I think this is why people we have to know we're not in normal times.

What happened last night is not normal. It does not happen. It should not happen in this republic. We're in extraordinary times and extraordinary times require ordinary people to take extraordinary measures. And I think that's where we are today. And that's why I think people are prepared to fight. And look, you're going to be bankrupt. You're going to be deplatformed. I don't need to tell you you're going to be deplatformed, debanked. The IRS is going to come after you. You're going to have your law license taken away. You're going

to be kicked out of the bar. Eventually, you're going to be sent to prison. This is the kind of political warfare we're in right now. But these are literally things that are happening to rudy giuliani to john solomon and to steve bannon we'll get to what they're doing to you in in one second but also happened citizens it's happening to the women the 75 year old women woman at the at the uh at the abortion clinic i came from my blue collar family started. I went to a military school. We had a church there. They eventually helped start a tridentine, you know, Latin mass church back in the 70s. That grundunes, right? As they were, they were raising extremists. What this, what this apparatus has done is the most radical thing that's ever happened in our nation's history. And that's why, yes, Steve, this is why last night it was so insane at the debate when the one question about misusing the federal government against one

and one's enemies, unleashing retribution against one's political enemies, went to Donald Trump saying, you know, you've threatened that you could you could engage in some sort of revenge once you're actually the president, as opposed to the sitting president who's doing that to Trump right now. And who tells us that is the Supreme Court today? This six three on Fisher is my I think this is much bigger than immunity. Because I think immunity is going to work. It's huge. This cuts to the heart of the problem of the weaponization.

And let me just, let me give the audience a quick overview of Fisher. So, because you mentioned it, so we'll get them up to speed and then you can talk about it. So Fisher is a case against one of the J6 defendants who's been charged with this

obstruction of an official proceeding. And this law, this Sarbanes-Oxley law, was put in a place after Enron collapsed. And Arthur Anderson, which was Enron's accountant, was caught shredding documents so that they wouldn't have to produce them over to federal investigators. And Congress decided we need a law to capture that kind of nonsense where they're trying to obstruct an official proceeding where we're trying to look into the collapse of a bank like Enron. So that's how this charge obstruction of an official proceeding came about. And laws like that are drawn for specific purposes and they can't be a catch all to cover all kinds of behaviors that might technically mount amount to that decision. So the Supreme Court had to look at the language of the statute and say, look, it's got specific examples in there of what would be obstruction of an official proceeding.

And then they have a general catch-all at the end of these phrases. And the question was whether that general catch-all could expand the statute to include even things like showing up at the Capitol on January 6th, where they were trying to certify the vote for president. And the lower courts had said yes, and the Supreme Court today said, no, you cannot do it. This is too far in a 6-3 decision, which was not the six more conservative justices against the three libs. It was five conservatives, one conservative, Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee in the dissent, along with two libs, Kagan and Sotomayor, and Katonji Brown Jackson, a Biden appointee, joining the five conservatives in the majority. Extraordinary. But in any event,

what this means now is effectively the January 6th case against Trump is dead. There are two other charges. There are BS charges there. They're just looking it up because I forgot they're so inconsequential conspiracy to defraud and conspiracy against rights, which is this kind of made up thing. But for all intents and purposes, that case is dead that it got killed in Fisher, even though Trump had nothing to do with it. So now you've got Atlanta with Fannie Willis, which is dead. She's going up on appeal on the failure to disqualify her. And I think that appellate court will disqualify her. But the whole thing shut down for now while they do it. January 6th just died today against Trump. Mar-a-Lago is going terribly

because they've got a judge who's actually fair and is putting the government through its paces. And we know what happened in New York where he was convicted. And but, you know, in all likelihood, won't actually serve time behind bars no matter what this judge rules on july 11th trump is winning slowly but surely the lawfare because it's so extra legal steve well this i want to get back to last night and connect dots here the servings actually was obviously about the internet stocks and you had to you know you had to have better reporting the central figure in this in the prosecution was andrewissman. This is my point last night on CNN. Of course, they're going to ask Trump because they would never.

They're in on the fix. And MSNBC is worse. When these investigations take place, and there will be investigations of Lisa Monaco and the attorney general of the United States, exactly how do we get into this situation? Andrew Weissman and their media co-conspirators and collaborationists are going to be a part of this. What was Andrew Weissman's role? How did they come up with this charge when Weissman's the guy on Enron? I remember he put a Price Waterhouse, I think he had Price Waterhouse go into bankruptcy, that was then reversed for

what he did of the things he did like Jack Smith in the Enron situation. The connection, connective tissue of this is Andrew Weissman. And the question has to be guys like Weissman on the J6, people like Matthew Colangelo, which I believe Merrick Garland perjured himself. You tell me the number three guy at Justice takes goes up to New York, a seconded to New York, and you don't know anything about it it just it strains credulity so no this all started back in november of 2022 uh went on that same day i think a couple of days after trump announced he was running for president

he had all this activity with the justice department matthew colangelo with with uh with wade uh the boyfriend of uh then the prosecutor on on Fannie Willis, spending eight hours in the White House, all of it. So this has all been a vast conspiracy against Trump and Trump's followers. And people have to know, we're going to do so many positive things when President Trump comes in, like seal the border, start the deportation, stop the endless wars, stop the madness of that clip you played earlier. The Biden sitting there saying $50 billion a year for 10 years, $500 billion is going to solve anyway. The massive $2 trillion deficits were running annually, and he has no intention of ever taxing billionaires at 24%. It's insanity. But the central thing we have to do at the same time is we have to begin a fundamental investigation of exactly what happened, what happened on the

2020 election, what happened on J6 and what happened with the weaponization under Merrick Garland and the federal bench. But the one thing about the federal bench that we can take heart in is the Supreme Court, because right now they're doing the right thing. Time and time again, they are, which has got the left pulling its hair out. But but today, what you know, what's so significant about both of these decisions? The Chevron is the second one which we can talk about is the Supreme Court said no. They said no to judicial or lawfare overreach by zealous prosecutors who are trying to shoehorn not great, but not illegal behavior into criminal statutes when they don't belong there. This is the Supreme Court saying you don't get to do that. Defendants are entitled to notice of what's a crime and what's not.

You can't just arrest people and threaten to put them in jail for years without it being very, very clear what lines they have to cross in order to become within the criminal arena. That's what Fisher just did today. Chevron is a different case, and I think probably bigger in its significance and its reach. a case that was decided decades ago where the court decided we're going to be super deferential to administrative agencies within the executive branch. We're kind of going to fill in the blanks when things are ambiguous about what, say, the EPA can do, which gave these bureaucrats an enormous amount of power over the rest of us when it came to, for example, enforcing the Clean Air Act or the Clean Water Act. We never elected these people. And yet they were legislating over us to kind of fill in the blanks on congressional statutes. And finally, the Supreme Court said, no, we will not be deferential to these unelected bureaucrats. We, the courts, are the ones who interpret the laws, whether they are ambiguous

or not. And ultimately, it goes back to to Congress if a new legislation must be passed. It was the right decision. It was a long time coming. And it's a huge step in shrinking the administrative state, the deep state. Take your pick. But it's a big decision, Steve.

Lawrence Tribe tweeted out immediately after it came over, it came over that the administrative state is dead and it died today. This is a monumental opinion. And please keep in perspective, if Hillary Clinton had won, Merrick Garland was on the Supreme Court. Because President Trump defeated her, Associate Justice Gorsuch is on the Supreme Court. And he is the intellectual leader in thinking this through.

People have talked about for years, heard politicians go on all the time and say, we've got to cut the bureaucracy. You know, the government's too big. They're in everywhere. And no action was ever really taken. This is the the judicial version of what we're trying to do on Project 2025 and others to deconstruct the administrative state. And this was to go to the heart of it. The Mac Daddy, the thing that ties it all, the Leviathan altogether is this deference where they basically defer not to the companies, not to individual citizens and their liberty, not to the entrepreneur, but they defer to they defer to the administrative state, the bureaucrats themselves. And this is why the Leviathan has continued to grow.

And this is why it's metastasized beyond all control. This will be the beginning. You will see now we had five this year, administrative state cases. You're going to see five or 10 now every year as it's deconstructed. This is monumental. And the irony that it would come on the day after this fiasco we saw of of a Praetorian Guard administrative state. Just I think it's divine. This is quite providential of how this has happened in the last 24 hours. What a day for Donald Trump and Republicans and people who love the country. The founders never envisioned the executive branch to be so big and bloated and seizing of power, drunk on their own power. Never. This is not the way we wanted it. And

if you have any concerns about the size of the administrative state being shrunk, you'll feel differently once Joe Biden or once once President Trump wins. Right. These Democrats who don't like today's decision are going to be thrilled once President Trump gets in there. And it's all of his bureaucrats who we put in these agencies. But the point is to shrink it down no matter who's in the presidency. We don't have a king. These people aren't our rulers. We're their rulers. OK, I want to continue the discussion of lawfare because what's happening to you is just mind blowing. This is your this is your last weekend of freedom. You're going to jail on Monday because of this criminal contempt finding against you because you were subpoenaed by this J6 committee. Your understanding was that Trump had clearly asserted executive privilege,

which is the president's right. Even arguably, it was a point of contention over people who had formally worked for him. That was ultimately rejected. You were willing to work with them in any event. They said, no, you got prosecuted. You got found guilty. And now where are you going for four months on Monday? Danbury, federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut, actually requested Danbury. I believe in our checkings, this only happened twice in the history of this republic, once back, I think, in 1950 with the great

writer Ring Lardner, Jr., and he went to, my understanding is he went to Danbury when he stood up against the House Un-American Activities Committee on the witch hunt for, and don't get me wrong, I'm a big supporter of Senator McCarthy. There were a lot of communists in the State Department and the government, but they were going after certain writers, certain creative people. I think some of that got a little over the top. And he stood up to him and said, no, I'm not going to do it. He was sent to prison for a year. I've been, you know, I've been ordered to prison for four months. I spent three, three and a half, four years on a Navy destroyer a lot of that time in the not just Western Pacific, but the North Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf back in the hostage crisis in 79.

So I'm fully prepared to go if look, it's a political persecution. There are other people like the J6 guys because of this bogus charge have been in prison for years and held even before their court dates. It's the way they roll. If it has to happen, it has to happen. You know, I've had a you know, it's God's will. If I go, I go. But if I go, I'm ready to go. And quite frankly, we'll make sure that my voice, that the war room does not suffer at all. They're trying to shut down the war room, obviously. But if Merrick Garland and these guys are determined

to do it, they're determined to do it. And we'll just take it one day at a time. I mean, just so the audience knows, we've had Attorney General Eric Holder found in contempt of Congress, Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress. The question comes after that when Congress says, OK, they didn't comply with our subpoena within the DOJ. Will the DOJ step in and prosecute this as a criminal matter, as opposed to a civil lawsuit to enforce the subpoena, to turn over the documents or the testimony, what have you? And it's very rare for the DOJ to do that. They didn't. In the case of Holder, they just said, we're not doing that to Garland. Shock. What a shock. But Steve Bannon, different story. Peter

Navarro, different story. These Trump allies and administration officials. So you do have an appeal up to the Supreme Court, of course, very unlikely that they will step in. And short of that, Steve, is there anything that would stop this from happening on Monday? Well, the case itself, because part of the case is reliance upon your attorney. So this is a very technical about I think it's like a vola about I just depended upon my attorney told me what to do, and I depended upon his judgment. That happens to be a technical aspect that the court, I think, is quite interested in reviewing. So it's not my appeal on the overall case itself with the different areas of, you know, depending upon your attorney, the whole structure of the J6 committee being illegal and still the issue of executive privilege with people who have been either previous

advisors or just American citizens. Remember, FDR in World War II would literally not just talk to hundreds of people. He would send people to Europe and think about deals that would be cut. He wanted more information. And he was never challenged on just talking to average citizens or businessmen, et cetera. So that's all three of those are massive issues. Now, the bail is is is something else. You know, we argue that, hey, until I go on bonk to the entire to the entire appellate court and sitting in full and then until I take it to the Supreme Court and see if I get cert that I sure may not bail. But they'll make those decisions or whatever decision. I got a great legal team.

Whatever decisions they make, they'll make. I will continue to pursue this on the merits of the cases all the way through the Supreme Court. I'm prepared to fund that. I've told my lawyers that these issues and particularly the situation about depending upon your lawyer for advice, but also the other issues I want to pursue all the way to the Supreme Court is about the structure of the J6 committee. This is one of the things, this is the beating heart. But now the House has gotten involved over the last week or so. And if I got to go to prison because of this, then so be it that we at least initiated action. We have to get back to that J6 committee. We just can't let it sit there.

Let's talk about that. OK, because we just learned Trump referenced it in last night's debate that Nancy Pelosi was on camera saying this is my responsibility, the security of the Capitol. I fail. We failed. We my team and I to actually staff the Capitol adequately when we knew that a threat was coming. And we know that because the House is now the GOP controlled House is now investigating what actually happened on January 6th and what happened with this January 6th committee, the one that found you in contempt. And so we know that that J6 committee was burying facts that didn't support their narrative. Why should they like their authority to pass judgment on who's in contempt and not complying with what was clearly a corrupt process should be called into question. And yet it seems too late.

Well, there's a technicality about that, too, that's got, I think, also got to be addressed. But let's go back to the J6 committee. The reason, and they just had the poll in The Washington Post where President Trump is leading on who's the best guardian of democracy. I mean, they're central. By far, by a lot. Among independents, I think it's 13 percent. And who's the best guardian of democracy. I mean, there's by a lot among independents. I think it's 13 percent. And here's the reason is about the structure of the committee. They did not structure it like Watergate. They did not structure like Iran Contra. In the history of the Congress, what you do on these committees is that you have the majority,

but then you have a ranking member, a senior member of the opposition party, and they have minority counsel. That counsel gets all the documentation, the same as the majority gets, and you can cross-examine witnesses. This is what drove the tension in Watergate. It drove the tension in Ron Contra, and that's why they stay in people's minds and had such a huge impact. Nancy Pelosi didn't take Jim Banks and Jim Jordan. McCarthy decided not to press it. She picked into just apparatchiks and Cheney and Kinzinger, who eventually, you know, turfed out of the Republican Party. But they had an ABC, as you remember, an ABC News producer came in. And this is the reason the thing kind of laid flat. They thought they were doing great, but it never really got the attention of the American people because there's no traditional courtroom tension there. They just put up, you know,

Cassie Hutchison with, you know, Trump grabbed a Secret Service guy by the neck and the thing. It had no traditional tension or the saying in the case I'm making is that it wasn't structured properly in the first place. It was illegitimate. So how can they be issuing not just subpoenas, but not going after people civilly, which is normally how you do it, but go right to a criminal contempt charge. And I think that's what's all got to get worked out. Like I said, the basic thing of relying upon your lawyer for advice. Number two is the structure of the committee. And number three is still to resolve who can actually the president, who can actually the president talk to and can presidents exert

executive privilege out of their after out of their office on things that happened when they were in office so these are all this is normally we're going to get normally they look at the sitting president and say do you support this claim of executive privilege and in this case joe biden said absolutely not of course because they're all for the lawfare and this is one of the questions back to our earlier discussion of what do the Republicans do now? We're not talking about, when you and I are talking about fighting fire with fire,

we're not talking about fining innocent people and accusing them of crimes they haven't committed just because we don't like their politics. There's plenty of criminals over on the Democratic side who don't get prosecuted because we're following norms where we don't normally go after them. There's a question right now, the GOP-controlled House is looking into whether the president's son, Hunter, and the

president's brother, James, should face potential perjury charges. And while this DOJ is not going to pursue them for that, the those charges don't expire until twenty twenty nine. Andy McCarthy was pointing this out in a recent piece. And so we could have a Trump administration that really has to ask itself whether those two should be held held to account. To me, that's where that's where the fight should happen. It's fair game. If you're going to pick Steve Bannon and you're going to get Peter Navarro and you're going to get Trump of all, he's, of course, the greatest example. Then the other side, the other side has to pay. They have to pay or they won't learn. They're not above board. They're not highbrow. They only understand

bare knuckled politics. And I don't know where it stops. I don't know how far out of control we have to get before the lesson's been learned. But what do you think? How far down that lane do we go without completely sacrificing the republic? First off, it all has to be legitimate inside the constitutional rule, obviously. But they're so egregious. This is why people, I think, feel you have to step up and you have to fight fire with fire. Otherwise, they're going to continue to roll. Look, as we speak right now, Anna Polina Luna has a proposal to put a proposal to put on the floor today. And that's not going to come today. But we understand the speaker is working with her to put it forward on a charge of inherent contempt since they don't believe the attorney general will actually go after and prosecute anybody in

justice in the Department of Justice about and particularly Matthew Graves, the the the U.S. attorney for D.C., who prosecuted all the J6ers on something the Supreme Court just threw at six to three and sent all these people to prison for years and destroyed their families and had people commit suicide. He will not go after the criminal contempt charge of Mayor Garland. She's put in inherent contempt. Now, inherent contempt is where the sergeant at arms can call for the D.C., the Capitol Hill police and the sergeant at arms to arrest the attorney general when he comes on to Capitol Hill and maybe even go down, I think, to the Department of Justice and arrest him. This is where we're going now. And Annapolina Luna is that new breed of young Republicans that's come in with Trump over the last couple of years that are fighters like the Matt Gaetz's, the MTG's, Annapolina Luna, others who are looking to throw down and just not backing off because their constituents are sitting there going, what are we doing here? We have to start taking the fight to them.

So I think this thing is going to get more and more and more intense. OK, so now I want to I more and more and more intense. Okay. So now I want to, I want to say this about Fisher. I forgot to point out. Um, this means that at least 29 cases where J six defendants have been put in jail just because of this BS charge are now going to get vacated. Those convictions will be vacated in those men, and I guess women, will be let out of jail. And it could affect, I read up to 115 cases where multiple charges were brought against defendants, including this one charge that's going to go away.

And then we're back to you. Well, hang on one second. The rumor has it that justice is trying to think up some other things right now. They're not going to release these people right away. My understanding is that the Justice Department is going to try to think of something else because to have them released, as you can imagine, is catastrophic. So they're working around the clock to think of something else.

These people. Can I tell you something, Steve? On that front, it's not just with respect to the J6 defendants. Listen to Joe Biden moments ago, back on the campaign trail, trying to, you know, make people forget about what happened last night when asked about the lawfare against Trump. Watch. He's got more trials coming up. Did you hear that? Lock him up. Lock him up.

Laughs. There's time for that. And again, I go back to the CNN debate. The only question about using government to engage in lawfare against one's opponent was put to Trump as a threat of what he might do with completely ignoring. Look at the celebration, right? You've got a hard time giving to trump for saying for his supporters saying lock her up about hillary there they are cheering and the president united states

says there's time for that there you have it they can't beat him at the polls you've seen that they can't even beat him on their key topic of democracy which you know trump just shows you through his actions he doesn't he just says biden a bigger threat. He's leading by 13 points among independents in swing states. This is what they've got. This is their last firewall was the lawfare when they can't beat him any other way. And they're not going to back off it. People got to understand this. I'm going to go to prison. Other people are going to be bankrupt. These people in prison that have been in federal prisons for years. Right. The suicides, the bankruptcies, the families destroyed. They're

not going to let them out right away. They're going to fight everything until we fight back. It's not going to stop. It's a good point. I mean, there have been suicides. There have been bankruptcies. There's been a lot of hell that these individuals were put through. And we're not talking about the guys who assaulted cops and so on. They face different charges. These charges are brought against people who showed up, who went inside the Capitol. We've seen the video in some cases of cops waving them in. So make no mistake about it. These charges were misused against people who had no idea. In some cases, they were committing crimes. But I want to get back to you because, look, you've never been in jail before. You served your country honorably years ago when you first

got started. You had a very successful career, the short time at Goldman Sachs, then went on to become a big movie guy, which I knew at some point then forgot about you, made a bunch of money off of getting early rights to shows like Seinfeld and so on. And now you're going to go into prison with some guys who have committed violent crimes, Steve. I mean, you're 70 years old. It's not it's not Joe Biden territory, but, you know, you're not not a 30 year old guy. Is there any are you scared at all? Like what? How are you? No way. No way. It's just it's it's it's a I serve my nation in the in my 20s on a Navy combatant. I'll serve it in a federal prison in my 70s. If it happens, it happens.

Clearly, life will be much easier and doing the show will be much easier and getting our message out will be much easier, you know, out. But again, I've got a great team and an audience. Look, it's also next man up. People have to understand the company. You can't lean on Trump for everything. You can't lean on like Rudy or you can't lean on Tucker. You can't lean on Steve Bannon. You can't lean on Megyn Kelly. It's next man up. People have to understand this populist movement. If you don't bind together and say, we're going to stop this madness and we're going to take this country back and we're going to restore this republic to her former glory, it's not going to happen. It's all about human agency and human action. So, yes, I will be off the playing field behind in a federal prison for a couple of months. Right. But this show has got to go on. I tell people, don't look at me. Don't come whining to me.

It's your responsibility to think about what happened over the skies of Europe with the Air Force or Normandy or Saipan, this nation in the revolution, the Civil War. We've gotten ahead because not leaders and not the elites, the American War. We've gotten ahead because not leaders and not the elites, the American common man and woman were next man up. And if we do that now, we're going to be fine. And trust me, they're looking for a fight. They are they are sick of what's going on in this country. And last night and just having the mass ripped off it and to have all these people for so long cover it up and hide it. They saw the, quite frankly, the cadaver.

And it was scary. And I think people are saying now we're not going to tolerate this anymore. We're going to fight for our country. So, hey, for me, it's always been like Nelson and Scipio Africana, some victory or death. So this doesn't doesn't faze me one bit. Well, you're going to Connecticut. That's where I live. I'll come by and pay you a visit.

Find out how it's going. I have to tell you, I blame myself. No sooner do I go on camera saying we need Steve Bannon. Later that afternoon, the headline is Steve Bannon is going to jail. I'm at my power, Steve. I had no idea. I'm sorry. That's OK.

No timing. No, by the way, I'm not having any visitors. I'm not getting any mail. I'm not. I've got a 24. I spend 20 hours a day working on the show or with other groups like get out the vote and people to stop the steal. So that will somehow continue. I'm not there to, you know, contemplate my future. I'm there to work as hard every day as I work to make sure President Trump gets back in. And it's importantly that we get we take the Senate. We increase our percentage in the House.

We take state legislatures. We take school boards back, which are vitally important. Big town. I got to go because I literally have twenty nine seconds till we get cut off. Quick, quick, quick. Last question. Who should be the VP for Trump? It's I'm indifferent.

Totally. I would love I'd love to have a woman, but it looks like it's not going that way. I had I had a long list of women, but it looks like it's going to happen. So I'm indifferent. Totally. I would love to have a woman, but it looks like it's not going that way. I had a long list of women, but it looks like it's going to happen. So I'm indifferent. Fascinating. Okay, Steve, what a pleasure. Thanks for being here and all the best to you. Good luck.

Thank you, ma'am. What a week. Wow. We're back on Monday with Charlie Kirk. Send me an email. Megan at megankelly.com. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.