The Megyn Kelly Show - Tucker and Lemon Firing Fallout, and Dark Brandon Returns, with Victor Davis Hanson, Emily Jashinsky, Michael Moynihan, and Vivek Ramaswamy | Ep. 536

Episode Date: April 25, 2023

Megyn Kelly begins the show by breaking news about Tucker Carlson's relationship with Fox News, and how he hasn't actually been fired at this point. Then Victor Davis Hanson, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Emily Jashinsky, host of the Federalist Radio Hour, and Michael Moynihan, co-host of the Fifth Column Podcast, join to talk about the strange and disrespectful way Tucker is being treated by Fox, whether Fox corporate executives caved to the establishment and left efforts to cancel Tucker, AOC's deplatforming statements and how phony she is, the media reporting about what caused Tucker to be fired, the reality of the Abby Grossberg lawsuit, insane reaction from MSNBC, The View trying to excuse Don Lemon's behavior, Don Lemon's lies about his own exit after he was fired, Tucker's ability to have nuanced conversations, what's next for Lemon and Tucker, and more. Then Vivek Ramaswamy, GOP presidential candidate and author of "Capitalist Punishment," joins to talk about his argument with Lemon and what happened behind-the-scenes, how the interview may have led to Lemon's firing, Bud Light seeing a massive sales decline after going woke, Joe Biden's divisive "Dark Brandon" video announcement about his re-election bid, specific ways Ramaswamy would govern differently from the way President Trump did, DeSantis fans who are critics of Ramaswamy, why DeSantis is an executor not a visionary, and more.

Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations. Hey, everyone. I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show. It has been a wild 24 hours since we were last together. Joe Biden made it official he's running for re-election. Dark Brandon is back. And the firing of Tucker Carlson and Don Lemon on the same day continues to cause heads to explode. We're learning a bit more about the details behind at least one of those. Actually, both of those. We're going to get to it all with a great lineup of guests, including the man who some say is at least partly responsible for Don Lemon's demise. I want to, I think, break some news for

you. Tucker Carlson hasn't actually been fired. He's still an employee of the Fox News channel. What happened was Suzanne Scott called him, she's the CEO, on Monday morning and said he was not going to be allowed to do any more shows and that he had been kicked out of his company email. And now they're going to have to negotiate an exit. Some reporting to me suggests that she said it's going to be an amicable parting. Right. Isn't it? Completely catching Tucker off guard. But Tucker's not fired. That's my information, that he still needs to negotiate the exit and that right now he's not free to launch a podcast or a digital show or negotiate with other employers at all because he's still under contract. They pulled his show off the air. They also fired his executive

producer, Justin Wells. And though he tried to find out why, they wouldn't tell him. They refused to tell him why. I mean, to me, that's just so disheartening. He's been at the company for years. He'd been in the primetime for seven years and saw Fox News through one of the most difficult times in its history, the immediate era post Roger Ailes, where they didn't know left from right. They didn't know up from down. They really didn't have strong management leading the company. And they had lost two of their biggest stars, Bill O'Reilly and me, at least at that time. So Tucker takes over. It's a huge order that he was given. And he did it. He smashed the ball out of the park. And he took a lot of risks. And he was heterodox.

He pushed against the orthodoxy on so many different things. And typically, Fox News liked that. So why? Why now? What was it that led them to treat their number one star with such disdain? I mean, dripping disdain to the point where he can no longer access his email. He doesn't get to tell his own team. He doesn't get to say goodbye. I mean, it's absolutely disrespectful to him. And unlike Don Lemon, he hadn't been immersed in controversy after controversy inside the building against his own colleagues. Yes, the leftist media had been coming after him repeatedly. And in the case of Dominion, to some extent, lawyers, though he wasn't their primary focus. So what was it? What would

make your own company turn against you like that? The Fox News audience is clearly mad, and I don't blame them. It'll be interesting to see what the ratings were for the 8 p.m. hour last night. Brian Kilmeade hosted it. It's a rotating cast for now. And we'll see what they decide to do. There's not Brian's fault. I mean, here's Brian. FYI, here he is in a moment where he is kind of acknowledging what happened. I'll just play the 14 seconds. It's not 21. Hi, everybody, and welcome to Fox News tonight. I am Brian Kilmeade. As you probably have heard, Fox News and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. I wish Tucker the best. I'm great friends with Tucker and always will be. But right now it's time for Fox News Tonight. So let's get started.

Kilmeade's a sweet guy and he's a company man. I'm sure he wasn't thrilled to be asked to do that show on that particular day, but he did it. He's a loyal employee and Fox news is banking on its audience, not leaving it on its audience, being more in love with the Fox news brand than they were with Tucker. Uh, and we'll see, we'll see whether or not that's true, but I just think the way they handled it was disrespectful and gross. And I think Tucker Carlson deserved better. I certainly hope that he uses brian friedman my old lawyer uh to get the remainder of his contract the wall street journal reporting that tucker was making around 20 million dollars a year and that they will pay him out on his deal i don't know

when it expired but he was in the process reportedly of negotiating a renewal so they should pay him out and they should let him out of his non-compete so he can go out there and get his voice on the air now when his audience will most be missing it. Joining me now to discuss both media shakeups,

the one at Fox, the one at CNN, and by the way, NBCUniversal fired its head-head honcho as well for an alleged affair with an underling, is the brilliant

Victor Davis Hanson, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and host of head honcho, as well for an alleged affair with an underling, is the brilliant Victor Davis Hanson, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and host of The Victor Davis Hanson Show. Victor, welcome back. I know you've been on Tucker's show many times and on other Fox News shows. Let me just ask you, I haven't heard it, your reaction to the news about him. Well, I was supposed to go on there tomorrow night. So I had been talking to the producer each week I go on and I was shocked because there was no adequate explanation and he's the lead in.

So when you have a lead in that anchors the subsequent shows and he's getting all of this and his audience had gone back up, way back up, then it has to be something egregious. But so far, I mean, there's been leaks that, oh, he brought Ray Epps, and he said that Ray Epps was involved. But Ray Epps said right on the air, you know, we've got to go into the Capitol. We've got to go in the Capitol. I orchestrated. All Tucker did was quote him verbatim, and the words speak for themselves. And then these other things about the voting machines, well, we saw that Tucker was pretty critical. So they haven't, and whatever narrative that keeps coming out, there's not any substantial evidence that that narrative is going to convince

people. And it's kind of deja vu because I think that, you know, Arizona could be legitimately called or not. That's not the question. But if you're a center right show and you're the first to call Arizona and you see these radical swings on the board, you might just want to take a deep breath and see what the consensus is before you get out ahead of the pack. So that got people angry and then people doubled down. And I think a rule, and you know better than I do, you don't attack your base. So Tucker has become a spokesman for conservatives who feel that a lot of people are afraid to say things that they know is true. And they turn into him every night for him to be explicit and candid and take the heat for them. And then he articulates something. And it's pretty tough sometimes, but I don't think it's

unfair or inaccurate. And so to silence that voice, you're going to get back to, I think they're going to have a large defection from the audience. And I'm somebody who really supports Fox News, because I feel there's no other outlet with that reach. So they have, I guess what I'm saying, Megan, is they have responsibilities beyond just the corporate level. They have responsibilities to traditional America to offer them an alternative voice if it's done professionally and candidly, and he does that. And to take that away without an adequate explanation

is going to, I think, alienate a lot of people. And we've seen that before, and it took months to regain the confidence of their loyal supporters. So that's what I hear. I hear all these people, you know, and as a guest, I don't know what's going on, but people will call you and say, what's going on? And where's our Tucker? And what can we do? And then when you have the left leading up to this, like AOC saying he should be off and he should be silenced and we got to get that guy off. And Schumer, everybody was attacking him. And then he's off. It also empowers that leftist narrative that they have veto power over the media in particular. And this follows the FBI with

Twitter. And so everybody is saying, why is the left controlling the free flow of information? And why do people on the conservative side allow them to influence? Whether that's true, they influence or not, doesn't matter. That's the world. I can find one in which they bowed to the more establishment Republicans who have also been after Tucker for quite some time and maybe made a decision to move the channel back to that more establishment type programming. I don't know that that's what they're doing, but I could see at least that happening. I will say my reporting also has led me to learn from a source close to the Murdochs that it was Rupert's decision and that it was reportedly a personal decision, that it was not necessarily for any reason other than Rupert's personal feelings. And I don't know exactly what that was based on, but what you're seeing now in places like media.com, they're reporting that this was a decision made by

Lachlan Murdoch and Suzanne Scott. And that's not true. This was a decision made by R Rupert as of course it would have to be. But now I've been told that by a source very well positioned to know it came from the big, big boss himself. Of course, Lachlan and Suzanne are throwing themselves on the sword because they never want the old man to have to take the responsibility for something like this. And, um, he somehow turned on him and I don't, I don't know why he turned on Tucker because he'd been supporting him through controversy after controversy, which you're going to get if you're in the prime time of Fox News. And you're really going to get if you're Tucker, who's totally fearless. It's interesting, Victor, to me that it happened. And by the way, some reporting that the decision was made on Sunday night. It wasn't. It was made on Friday night. That's that's my information. Friday night, what happened? Tucker went and gave a speech

at the Heritage Foundation. And, you know, it was steeped in messaging we've heard from Tucker, you know, before that night. But I did think it was kind of interesting, his messaging that night about good and evil and with some religious tones in it. Let me give you a sample. It's Sat 20. If you want to know what's evil and what's good, what are the characteristics of those? And by the way, you know, I think the Athenians would have agreed with this. This is not necessarily just a Christian notion. This is kind of a, I would say, widely agreed upon understanding of good and evil. What are its products? What do these two conditions produce? Well, I mean, good is characterized by order,

calmness, tranquility, peace, whatever you wanna call it, lack of conflict, cleanliness. Cleanliness is next to godliness. It's true, it is. And evil is characterized by their opposites, violence, hate, disorder, division, disorganization, and filth. So if you are all in on the things

that produce the latter basket of outcomes. What you're really advocating for is evil. That's just true. By the way, there's a rhetorical device by Tucker that I love. That's just true. I love that he said, it does make you accept whatever he says. And that particular statement is true. But I do wonder, you know, sitting here today, I don't know the answer.

What was the last straw for Rupert? Yeah, I don't know either. But I think one of his unique characteristics is that he is willing to attack the corporate right. And so he brings on people like Glenn Greenwald, he brings on people like Robert F. Kennedy. They're not traditional conservatives, not all the time. Sometimes they are. He brings in all of those guests. And then just when you think that he's a mouthpiece because he's on Fox for conservative view, he'll attack Mitch McConnell or Paul Ryan, who's on the board. So I think in their way of thinking, he can say anything, anytime, anywhere about anyone. And sometimes that can be disturbing, but that's what wins him his loyal audience. And you saw there that he's talking in philosophical terms, historical terms. And so the way he looks at the news, it's not necessarily, if i attack this person will somebody from the rnc call me up or will this person get angry and not you know say something about he doesn't care he's at a point in his life he doesn't care and that's liberated him and people sense that so they feel that he will tell

them what he feels and and what what does he feel he feels feels that corporate America is joined the woke. And the woke wouldn't have been successful had there not been Romney-like people on the McCain right of the Republican Party. and Antifa, they were not willing to stand up for their generations past, the dead who created this country, the values, and the Republican traditional conservative movement wasn't doing that. And yet, the people who were doing it was Donald Trump, and yet he didn't come off as a Trump megaphone. He was critical of Trump in many ways. So I don't think people could categorize him as easy as they thought. That's what drove his former neoconservative colleagues at the Defunct Weekly Standard or the Bulwer. They absolutely despised him because he was liberated. He didn't react. Usually when people speak as candidly as he does and they say something that really hits home, then they backtrack or they tweet, I didn't mean it, or I was misquoted, but he doesn't. And so that made him both a big target, but it gave him enormous credibility and affection for his audience.

And I can tell you, just being on his show each week, I'd have people come up and say, they didn't say, congratulations, you're doing a good job. They said, I wish you could tell Tucker what a good job he is. And so he had a loyal audience and that loyal audience, as you know better than I, I'm not a media person, but that undulated and that wave rippled throughout the entire evening shows, all of them. Oh yeah. He was, of of course he was a great lead-in for hannity if his numbers go go down the entire prime time will go down as well i will say this um i did some digging and found out from sources who are in a position to know that there is no pending sale of fox and they don't even have anybody looking under the hood or kicking the tires right now but the daily mail is reporting that Carlson

has told people he believes his show is being taken off the air because the Murdoch children intend to sell Fox at some point. Now, what's interesting to me about that, Victor, is that would make sense. That to me actually would make sense. You've got Rupert right now, who's got four, I think, voting shares. You've got Lachlan, James, Elizabeth and Prudence, his four older children, each of whom has one voting share. You know, there's a question about who's going to take over. He wants it to be Lachlan. But when Rupert goes, it's unclear how those other three are going to align. James and Rupert, James and Lachlan hate each other.

They don't speak. And the two older female sisters are anybody's guess. Elizabeth's been more liberal, but she was also seen with Rupert at a sporting event recently and Lachlan was there too. So we don't know. It's very much like succession. The reason I raise all of this is if the children are eyeing a sale of Fox News, it might be easier without Tucker for the reasons that we've been discussing. And Tucker, while a juggernaut ratings wise, was not a jug show made 100 million dollars a year in advertising. And that was back in 2015, 2016. So it would be higher now if, you know, assuming I stayed. Tucker's show, I'm sure, wasn't making anywhere near that because of the boycotts, the nonstop media matters, sleeping giants, boycotts that these advertisers bent the knee to hobbling the income of that of that particular hour in a way that is really unfair and gross uh and so but i what the reason i'm saying all this is i could see some decision by the board or by the murdoch's to say long term

we can put somebody in there who gets 70 of his ratings and maybe we earn even more money in that hour because the advertisers will come back and then we we can sell the channel and F Tucker and F his audience. We made you and helped you fall in love with him. We don't care. And to me, that's kind of one of my main takeaways. Don't trust them because as soon as you fall in love with somebody, they don't care. Whatever their considerations are, they'll yank the host and they won't even have the decency to tell you why or tell him why. Yeah.

Well, I think the problem is what you put your finger on. It's not an isolated episode. So the viewer says this is episodic now. You and Bill left and then it was down and then they worked hard to build it up. And then all of the conundrum about the election really spiked Newsmax and they lost about a third of their audience for a while. So there was that second episode and now there's this third. And so what a viewer wants is he wants a predictability. He comes home, he goes to work, he's exposed to woke all day, he hears it everywhere, he looks at the NBA, he looks at the Oscars, it's everywhere.

But he just wants a sanctuary, a monastery of the mind that he can relax or she can relax and be reassured she's not crazy. So they go to Fox. But if Fox cannot offer that continuity and that reinsurance because of these periodic radical transformations that also suggest that there are other reasons, maybe they're not or maybe they are, about why people leave that may be ideological beyond just the corporate bottom line, then it can't offer that reassurance. So when you think that, well, maybe the children want to buy it, well, who would buy it? The people

who would buy it would be conservative, I think, because the other market is kind of saturated. I don't think there's a market for a Romney, no offense from Mitt Romney, but a Romney or Mitch McConnell station, I don't think is going to get anybody left or right in that cable market. So it's going to be sort of a conservative group. And then when they look at it, they think, well, I know Tucker may not have got the revenue dollars I would need, but that is somebody that is the anchor for the whole evening that does become profitable. Just to add to that, Victor, he drives audience. And audience matters when you go to the cable subscribers and say, pay us three cents more

for the Fox tab, the Fox News channel on your lineup. Look at the numbers we draw. So it's not like Tucker was brought no value. I'm just saying in the ad dollars. No, it doesn't. But for sure, he drove numbers subscription. It would be if I used an old because I'm an old man. If I said it would be like the San Francisco Giants trading Willie Mays in his prime and then saying buy the Giants now because of what? And people would say, well, the corporation is not, it's not maximizing its base. So I don't thinkdoch children and I wanted to sell it, then I would, if I was angry at Tucker, I would hold my nose and be quiet. And then I would make sure that he had a big audience and support him. And then I would sell it. So I think what I'm getting at, and I'm not informed at all, but it seems to me, and that happens a lot in the corporation. You saw it with Disney. People make decisions in emotional parameters sometimes and they don't think it through.

Even the smartest people. Elon Musk said on Tucker's interview, he said, I guess I'm a very smart guy, but I paid $40 billion. I'm glad he did buy Twitter, but he said, I paid $30 billion more a billion dollars more than I needed to for Twitter. So people make decisions that are not always what they do. And if I were the people at Fox and I'm not, and I owe him a great deal to go on there with the host, but I think I would just take a cooling off period. And then I would have a press release and said there was a misunderstanding. And we are going to work through this and Tucker will be on in two or

three weeks. I don't know if Tucker would do that, but that's what I would do if I were the owner. I know he might, Victor, he might. I think I think Tucker was truly stunned that at the decision. I think he thought they were working toward a contract renewal in good faith and doesn't know where this came from. But you do have the left celebrating this. I mean, it was to the point yesterday where on Twitter, it almost looked like Tucker, God forbid, had died. People were, all the conservatives were posting like, when I was down and out, Tucker invited me to Thanksgiving dinner. When nobody would platform my book because it was too controversial, Tucker put me on. It was like, okay, now take a deep breath. Tucker is alive he's okay he's gonna be fine but the left their messaging was the same

in a different way like ding dong the witch is dead was essentially what they said we played the view clip yesterday look at the difference i mean so you have somebody like chris matthews excuse me chris wallace who's on there who's got from a famous name, he does a good job. But then he is angry and lets it be known that Fox, he feels is too far right for his professional integrity or something. And so he leaves voluntarily, but maybe there were ratings problems. Who knows the story? But yeah, there were, he wasn't resonating. So he lost his base or his audience. But my point is that when those people leave, they act as if they're not forced out, but it's their own private choice or it's their own volition. But when you have a conservative, they always leave, it seems to me, because people are doing something to them and that's not good in other words drawn and quartered in the public square i mean just absolutely he left with more telling leaking it to dylan byers who broke the story yes within 10 minutes of telling tucker

i know why would you have chris matthews uh chris wall Wallace's departure done with more calm and professionalism than Tucker Carlson position because the Republican Party is bifurcated. And whether they like it or not, we're never going to go back to a John McCain, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan, and Mitt Romney messaging, you know, a flexible porous border. All we care about is capital gains cuts. We just have any type of libertarian trade policy. If China beats us, well, we're going to get more competitive, and that's good. And that's over with. It's now not a party of the very rich. It's a party of the upper middle class to the lower middle class. And I think a lot of people like the Disney people or American Airlines or all of these corporate people can't quite adjust to that yet. Because in some ways,

if you look at the congressional districts by income, or you look by zip code, it's just overwhelming that the Democratic Party is represented by the very wealthy, and they outspend Republicans two or three to one. And so for somebody, somebody in a conservative show has to reflect the new Republican Party, and that's going to be by definition, very suspicious of corporatism, and one worldism, and globalism, and all of that stuff at the expense of the people in East Palestine, for example. So if Biden or Buttigieg won't go to East Palestine, then somebody is going to champion that. And that had traditionally not been a Republican. It is now. So you have to have people in the Fox community that represent that new base of support. It's growing. And sometimes I understand that.

If I may add, not just that, people who aren't just glomming on, you know, like Tucker was able to give voice to those people because even though Tucker has a privileged background, I would be the first to tell you that, he just got it. He just gets it. He's an avid reader. He's consumed news for long enough that he understands where the factions lie. And he's very anti-elitist. I think others over there drafted behind Tucker and would wait for Tucker's messaging before they then change their own messaging. It'll be interesting to see if they can do it without him. Because what we hear from the left these days is we're not cancel culture. We're not pro cancel. There is no cancel culture. There's no cancel culture. I give you AOC and her little online video on Tucker yesterday. Tucker Carlson is out at Fox News. Couldn't have happened to a better guy.

I also kind of feel like I'm like waiting for the cut scene at the end of a Marvel movie. And then you see like the villains like hand reemerge. Deep platforming works. And it is important. Yeah. Deep platforming works. And it is important. Here's a wannabe Marxist, and every time she's on film, it's either she's posing as if she's a Hollywood celebrity or she's fixing her makeup or she's in some designer dress.

She's about as Marxist as, I don't know, she's a big phony, and she has zero credibility among American people. And it's innate to the whole woke movement. The woke movement has no popular support in the sense of 51% want the transgender agenda. They want the six and a half million illegal entries. They love what happened in Afghanistan. They want a blank check in Ukraine. They don't have that support. They do have it in the institutions, and the institutions are corporate America, K-12, academia, Silicon Valley, and they love people like that. But she's not a revolutionary. She has no popular support. She's an artifact of a bi-coastal, bankrupt, upper middle class, wealthy elite. And so that's what she's catering to. But all of these left-wing movements, whether they're Bolsheviks or Jacobin or the 60s, intrinsic to them, they have to be authoritarian. They all are authoritarian because they cannot trust the will of the people because people,

whether it's Nicaragua or Cuba or Venezuela or the EU and Brexit, people get sick of it. It's contrary to human nature. And so they have to be cancel culture. And if we had an ACLU like we used to have in the 1950s or 60s, they would have been speaking out against all of these suppressions of free speech on Twitter and everything. But we have none of them anymore. They're all become Jacobin, Marxist, Bolsheviks. And I'm not trying to exaggerate. So I think that it's intrinsic. It's part of their DNA to suppress free speech because that suffocates their position, transparency and open debate. You saw that with Don Lemon in his last debate when he was interviewing the presidential candidate, the new guy, and he couldn't debate him. All he had to revert to was, I'm a black man. I'm a black man as a black man. And that was just a retreat into nihilism. He had no arguments because there were no arguments

to make that were not based on our superficial appearance. That's incidental, not essential to who we are. I'm sure you're all broken up about, what morning show are you going to watch now, Victor? Now that Don's gone. They're very different cases, aren't they? One person walks away with three and a half million audience and the other has basically 150 or 200. And one person is being sued, I guess, by a female who says his cast was unfair to her. I don't want to prejudice that case, but Tucker is not that way. He's never said anything that were sexist or misogynist on air. Don Lemon has. And it's very funny that he had no audience and he was overtly misogynist. Yet if Tucker who's being sued or his staff is by

women for something that it's not apparent on the air from tucker and he's very successful and yet they're trying to collate the two yeah it was very brilliant on cnn to kind of package it tucker used some nasty words about sydney powell which he admitted to and we're in writing but it's a different story than you're actually diminishing the chances of one of the first female presidential candidates entirely by saying you're past your prime because you're 51 years old. That's just the latest example we could keep going on. And his diva like behavior and abuse of his colleagues and blah blah. We could keep going. Victor, thank you for coming on with your input. Thank you. Thank you. Coming up, two of our favorites join us with more reaction to the breaking news. Emily Jaschinski and Michael Moynihan

with their thoughts on Don Lamont. And we'll show you the reaction from the CNN hosts, his co-hosts this morning. Here with more reaction to the media world shakeup, Emily Jashinsky, culture editor at The Federalist and Michael Moynihan, co-host of The Fifth Column podcast. Guys, my read of the various reporting on this, I mean, it's all over the board. Everybody claims to know why he was fired. Nobody knows why Tucker was fired. That's what you can glean. I'll tell you my own reporting. It was Rupert's decision and it was some sort of personal reason. It was Rupert's opinion that he should go, not necessarily because of a sale, but there could be one potentially down the road in the offing.

But I'll just give you some flavor. NPR, David Spokenflik saying, I've spoken with three people with knowledge of Fox's ouster of Tucker. They say his digital exchanges captured by the Dominion legal team echo the suite of concerns alleged by his ex producer, Abby Grossberg, that his show's workplace was defined by sexism and bigotry. I don't believe that for one second. I don't believe the Abby Grossberg thing had anything to do with Tucker's ouster. I reject that. Although it's absurd how this woman and her legal team are trying to act like they got him fired. I mean, it's just if you read that, they're like, this is a first step in accountability toward Abby. Oh, come on. If you think he was fired over that, you're nuts. I guarantee you he talked to Abby Grossberg maybe once to say hello to this person when she joined his team and never again.

I guarantee you. OK, Brian Stelter quoting The Washington Post. Dozens of communications from Carlson and other Fox personnel remain out of public view, redacted at the request of Fox attorneys in the Dominion lawsuit. But they've been seen by talks, top Fox executives suggesting that there are far more damaging exchanges in there by Tucker about people in management. That is a possibility. I am open minded to that, that they he said some bad things about executives that tick people off. Daily Beast. Locker Murdoch and Suzanne Scott made the call on Friday night, again, no, it was Rupert, to can him in his show. Thanks largely and surprisingly in part to vulgar comments he made about Sidney Powell as evidenced by the discovery in the Dominion case

and Tucker's lawsuit or deposition in which he admitted to calling her the C word and said he was embarrassed about it. Zero chance. No way. There is zero chance Fox fired him because he used that word about Sidney Powell. It just didn't happen. No, no, I reject that. Okay, let me just move on. Wall Street Journal. Now that's owned by Rupert. So now we're getting closer to the possibility of at least what Fox wants the messaging to be. Carlson, whose contract was renewed in 2021, found out he's being let go about 10 minutes before the network announced his departure. Let's see. I had it here someplace, but I think they, too, were saying revelations in the Dominion lawsuit um caught them off guard and so on so i i still don't know the answer you guys but let's just spend a minute on this abby grossberg who is alleging toxic work environment she worked for tucker as far as i can tell one month she was

hired on his team in august and then she got deposed in in september and fired fired because as soon as she got deposed by Dominion, she came out saying Fox twisted my words. They made me work with a lawyer who tried to change my testimony. I'm filing a lawsuit against you. And Fox is like, oh, you revealed a bunch of privileged information. You're fired. Anyway, what's your take on where we stand today? Emily, start with you. Yeah, that's really interesting. Really interesting point. The idea that these hardened media executives had retreated to their fainting couches after hearing Tucker used the C word about Sidney Powell is just unbelievable to the point of somebody who they found politically to be a problem for them. They didn't want to sort of be backing the populist message. And I know Victor Davis Hanson talked a little bit about that earlier. I think that's really what it is, is that like Rupert had had enough to your reporting, Megan,

and all of this after the Dominion decision snowballs into giving him a really convenient excuse to just say we're done. It's over. Tucker Carlson obviously had, there are a couple of things where in any normal workplace, if a man is using the C word and it comes out and discovery or whatever, yeah, you get reprimanded, but this is the top person on their network. Let's not act like a human resources dispute is all Fox needed. That was just a bridge too far for them. Now, he's insulting the executives. Everybody who's worked in journalism knows there should always be a hostile relationship between the business side and the news side that's not unfamiliar to Fox whatsoever. So to act like all of this, this was just the final straw for them,

I think is ridiculous. But I do think it's the final straw in terms of having a convenient excuse to get rid of somebody that they they're sort of politics. They were no longer comfortable espousing or supporting as a network. That's the best guest, the best guest that I have. But it's it's very strange to see it. Fox leaking to the media and getting closer and closer to what their perspective is on this, because I don't think it's actually the truth. Here's just the background, as I understand it, on this producer. She worked for Maria and she wound up complaining, I couldn't fact check Maria because we were understaffed. OK, that that's no excuse. You're a producer. You can fact check. Fox News has a lot of resources, including this huge resource called The Brain Room, which was fact checking the Sidney Powell claims. You didn't need to do it yourself. So that to me sounds already like somebody who's got some sour grapes about her experience and is trying to blame somebody else for something she fell down on. Not excusing Maria here, but I'm not excusing Abby Grossberg for the behavior either. Go call the brain room. They did fact check Sidney Powell.

So then here's what happened. She joined Fox News in 2019. She worked for Maria. In August of 2022, she started to work with Tucker's team. In September of 2022, she sat for her first deposition in the Dominion case. Then she filed a lawsuit in March. So what's that? Six months later, March 20th, 2023, she filed a lawsuit against Fox saying

your lawyer tried to strong arm me at that deposition into saying nicer things about the staff than I wanted to say. They made me run cover for people like Tucker and it was misogynistic because they were trying to hang me and Maria out to dry. And this is a misogynistic place. And I've been taping people. And apparently she's going to air some of her tapes later today on MSNBC. And as far as I can tell, Tucker has never even met this person. So whatever misogyny she was subjected to, I suppose could have been amongst his staff. But Moynihan, the idea that that's what led Rupert to cut ties with Tucker, his number one star, is laughable.

I mean, it's laughable. I'm literally laughing. It's laughable. If you know anything about Rupert Murdoch, I mean, even the most sort of baseline stuff about how the man built his empire, you know that he's not a fool. And he's not someone that will, you know, crumble to a 20 odd year old woman who worked there for a month. And by the way, who is taping people? Is that a normal thing that you should want to expect to be taped by a new hire, who then is going to sue you a few months later for misogyny and various other things? It literally makes no sense. But when you know, it's a mug's game to try to figure out why Tucker got fired, right. But one of the things I think is quite revealing about it is when I've been kind of

consuming all this stuff for the past 24 hours, it shows you kind of in a way why you can't trust the media. Because I don't think this is deliberate. I don't think people are doing this deliberately. But people are very willing to run with sources who work inside the News Corp building, say they know something, just to be first. Because you have mainstream people from The Wall Street Journal to The Washington Post to The L.A. Times to every web publication like The Daily Beast giving you a different story. We know this is what happened. And it's all rather different, isn't it? So who does one trust? And now you transpose that to other things. You're like, well, geez, when they're trying to get stories out really quick. I mean, and this was from somebody that I normally trust, too.

But this is the wild thing about this, is that when it's compacted like this, and you see the kind of how the sausage is made, you're like, man, that's one math problem with 50 different answers. And that's kind of worrying. Well, that's what's I mean, to me, it's like this Daily Beast report is the one saying his the vulgar comments he made about Sidney Powell. Now, the Daily Beast, that's a that's a left leaning publication that has zero sources inside Fox who would be in a position to answer why Rupert made this decision. Right. So that's probably why they wound up with such an absurd theory that it was the Sidney Powell name calling that got him fired. The Wall Street Journal is Rupert's publication and their reasoning,

they said it was because the executive saw more Tucker correspondence in the course of the Dominion lawsuit than the rest of us saw that ticked off Rupert and other executives. Well, they've been in possession of that for months, for months and months and months. And, you know, all indications were that they were on their way to renewing Tucker's deal. And I know Tucker had a personal meeting with Rupert Murdoch very short time ago that went well. So, you know, what what changed? He had already been alerted to the negative comments, if any, in that I just don't buy any of these excuses. Something else happened. Something else is going on to explain this termination. And I don't exactly know what it was, but I do want to talk about the absolute meltdown over it in the media.

This is a montage that was put together of some of the most extreme reactions. You guys might enjoy watching this. It's not 15. The worst thing about it is that Tucker, to me, was always a dumb person's idea of what a smart bigot sounded like. He arguably has done more on cable television to spread the gospel of hate, fear, and paranoia than anyone since radio propagandist Father Coughlin in the Nazi era of the 1930s. And as a result, whomever succeeds Tucker Carlson

in Fox's coveted 8 p.m. time slot will be contending with an audience that has grown accustomed to watching the man who curated the most racist show in the history of cable news. This doesn't mean that Fox is going to course correct, are they? Because there's a whole hell of a lot of other people at Fox that need to go also. Okay, that's a point ahead father coglin same thing that's what rachel maddow said too yeah father coglin and rachel maddow just did a very bad podcast that um uh references father coglin so i know she knows what she's talking about because father coglin was a radio

priest from michigan who was a raving anti-semite I mean, first he was a big supporter of the New Deal, and then he quite outspokenly said, Jews are controlling the world and they're ruining the world. If you think there's a parallel between Tucker Carlson and someone who was effectively like a Nazi, like a real Nazi saying that the Jews control the world, that is the wildest thing I have ever seen. I mean, this is an expectation from MSNBC.

But Megan, I have a bone to pick with you. Because when this happened, I said, I have to listen to Megan's show yesterday. So what do I do? Pottering around the house. I listen to your show. And you do something that no one else does, that it intrudes upon my life with the fucking view. I have avoided this thing for so long. And I only come across

it on your damn show. And this woman, I don't even know her name, but she starts singing. Nana Navarro. Hey, goodbye. Yeah, Anna Navarro, who is like one of these conservatives that was a conservative for five minutes, so she can be a conservative on The View. And I thought, I was thinking about this. And I said, this is the funniest, most deranged thing in the world. It's almost as if, you know, if Steph Curry was going to be traded from the Golden State Warriors, people say, oh, he's done. He's out of basketball. No, he's on a different team now. You're not getting rid of him. Three and a half million people watch him and they love him. Do you believe that he's gone? And they're like, now he won't have any

influence. Like, oh, just like ben shapiro has no influence and joe rogan has no influence whatsoever like none well okay by the way because i knew you were coming i baked this cake for you from today's view moynihan watch and enjoy i am stunned because i don't and i i hate that people are comparing tucker's firing Don's firing. That's a false equivalency. And just to put a button on it, Don, yes, said some things that were sexist and I think ageist. He apologized for them and received formal training. You know, he has been on the air for a long time fighting bigotry, whereas Tucker has been fomenting bigotry.

So there's a big difference there. And yes, he did say some dumb things. And apologized. And Tucker never apologized for anything. But I only know if you're concerned that somebody is a misogynist, why would you put them with two women to do a show? If you feel that way, if you feel that concern. It's CNN's fault. The misogyny is CNN's fault. I mean, listen, she was raising a good question because according to Variety, he has

a long history of misogyny at CNN. Why did they put him with those two co-hosts? But she's too stupid to actually figure out, oh, wait a minute. he actually might have a long history of misogyny. Go read the reports. And the big difference, by the way, that Sonny was talking about there, actually, the really big difference is one is very good at his job and the other is very bad at his job. And popular. Yeah, exactly. And it took CNN a really long time to fire the guy who was bad at his job. And Fox News took what seems like a pretty quick opportunity to get rid of the guy who's really good at his job. And I'll let listeners because they're smart enough to distinguish between what might be the difference there. It could have something to do with their politics. But it's just so funny to hear them cheerleading the ouster. And by the way, we take for granted, because everyone here knows that, of course, the media repeats these awful things about Tucker Carlson that are not based in fact, night after night, even if you don't like Tucker Carlson, even if you agree with

you don't agree with him to smear him as a racist along the lines of Father Cockney. I mean, just unbelievable. But they're repeated uncritically on MSNBC and CNN. And it's just no big deal that you're smearing someone baselessly as an act like a virulent anti-Semite racist bigot. And it's just a shrug. And they just take their plaudits for it and move on. I want to get back to him. Like virtue signal points for it. I want to get back to Father Coughlin one second.

But can we just spend one minute? Wait a hand on Don Lemon apologized and received formal training. He went to the camp. He's been reeducated in about 48 hours and now he's fine. Look, the thing about that is like, that's not the reason you should fire Don Lemon. Honestly, you should fire Don Lemon because he's bad at his job, as Emily said, I agree. And it's reflected in the numbers. I mean, it is a false equivalent, 3.5 million to what, 200,000? Yes, literally under 300,000. That's what his morning show drops. What did he have the eight o'clock slot and then he's put into the morning and he can't produce anywhere. If he was producing, I think there'd be a little more forgiving but the idea that he said something stupid like look cable

news is about saying stupid things i mean media exists for stupid things right we enjoy this and don lemon has said some really stupid things and i was reminded the other day i was talking to my friend and the friend of the show too camille foster and i said do you remember when he said that the uh missing plane was eaten by a black hole? It was like, oh yeah, yeah. This is maybe guy is not great at his job. And that was the first indication to me. Yeah.

And by the way, to those dumb asses over at The View, he did not apologize. He sent out a Twitter attempt at an apology. He never said anything on the air apologizing to Nikki Haley or the millions of women that he did offend with that comment. So maybe you need a little reeducation. And the camp didn't work because we just showed the soundbite of him dismissing his co-anchor Poppy Harlow on the air yet again. She was trying to give a nice goodbye to Vivek Ramaswamy.

And he she he had to jump in like, no, no, we're moving on. Goodbye. It's over. He's just unlikable. And eventually CNN got it. I want to give Poppy Harlow an amazing amount of credit because it forced me to watch that clip when he was fired with Vivek. And in the middle of this ridiculous, horrible interview,

it's not a good interview. There is a moment where you can see Poppy Harlow picks up up her phone and starts texting which i thought was the best response you can actually see that she's just like this is ridiculous i can't even believe i'm on television with these people this is ridiculous i i love that but you know that's a good example of why i should be fired this is absolutely awful interview emily said texting chris licked just just putting the sound on speaker save me please by the way

so Don was off the show for like a week and the ratings went up now this is not a way to keep your job you can't both be an ass and have shitty ratings and then when you're off have the ratings go up and think you're going to keep your job but his his statement yesterday was like, I am stunned. I had no warning.

And then we learned today he had plenty of warning. So on the subject of Don Lemon and his co-hosts, here's a little sample of Poppy and Caitlyn, I mean, grinning ear to ear this morning when they made their announcement that Don was no longer with CNN. As you may have heard yesterday, CNN parted ways with anchor Don Lemon. In a statement, CNN CEO Chris Licht thanked Don for his contributions over the past 17 years. Of course, Don was a big part of this show over the last six months. He was one of the first anchors on CNN to have me on his show. That's something I'll obviously never forget.

I agree with Chris. We wish him the best. Yeah, we certainly do. Don was one of my first friends here at CNN. I'm so thankful to have worked alongside him and for his support for nearly 15 years here. And I wish him all good things ahead. Our priority is you, the viewer. We're grateful you welcome us into your home each morning. Yeah, you can just tell they're in a good mood there. It's a happy day. And there's nobody, I mean, if you read reports in Daily Mail and elsewhere, there's no one shedding any tears that Don is gone. No one. Well, they had also clearly been leaking against Don, both of them, to Page Six and other tabloids for a very long time. And to your point, Megan, about media just

being disgusting, like that is it on a silver platter. That is what you need to know about media. Exactly. And by the way, I think the first person to give Caitlin a job in journalism was Tucker Carlson. Tucker Carlson. Yes, that's right. And by the way, she Caitlin Collins dumped Jay Suarez, her agent at UTA because he was Don Lemon's agent too. That happened about six weeks ago, according to the New York Post. And that was a smart move because when you have an agent who's got loyalty to the person you're warring with and not to you, which is the suggestion here, you shouldn't stay with that agent. So this was, the writing was on the wall for a while here. And, you know, you can tell that there's nobody there and at CNN who's shedding any tears about Don's departure. We'll see what he does. I think it's a totally different situation for him.

I think Tucker will have a huge career no matter where he decides to go next. And it'll probably be independent. And I don't think Don Lemon will at all. I really don't. I think he's going to be like, you know, we talked about Moynihan when you guys were on last week. The Chris Cuomo project podcast and how he alleged he bumped up to next to somebody in his car. People jamming it in the streets of Manhattan, just with their tops down, listening to Chris Cuomo. It's just getting warm. How fun is this? Was it Andrew Cuomo?

It was the lesser known Steve Cuomo. That's going to be Don's future. Yeah. Well, look, he doesn't have an audience. He's a guy on TV. That's different, right? I mean, you know what it reminded me of? It reminded me of another person who had been fired a long time ago at CNN.

And now I'm forgetting his name, the man who made the supposedly anti-Semitic Rick Sanchez. Whatever happened to Rick Sanchez? I mean, he had a big show that had better numbers than Don Lemon had. And he was fired for a couple of dodgy comments and never heard from him again. I mean, people aren't clamoring for Don Lemon's opinion on things. I mean, he can barely clamoring for Don Lemon's opinion on things. I mean, he can barely formulate a sentence. You had a clip before of a guy at MSNBC. And this is like the oldest, most boring thing that one can say is it's a stupid person's idea of a smart person. That's actually a thing that stupid people now say because it's repeated like this mantra.

But that's actually ridiculously untrue about Tucker. I mean, I have known Tucker for a long time. I disagree with him on a lot of things these days. We were a lot closer when he was like a fellow at the Cato Institute, referred to himself as a libertarian in an interview with me a long time ago, even tried to hire me at one point. And he's gone much more to the populist right direction. So I disagree with him on a lot of things, a lot of things. But the guy is really whip smart. And he's a great writer. And everyone acknowledges this. When he used to write for George magazine, talk magazine, mainstream, the New Republic, incredible stuff. And people don't remember that the most famous thing in

George W. Bush's election campaign in 2000 was the Carla Faye Tucker thing. When Carla Faye Tucker, who was on death row in Texas, Bush mocked her. That came out because of a profile that Tucker Carlson wrote, and it was a very, very good one. And this guy's really bright. He writes all those monologues and everything himself. Don Lemon, in that Vivek interview, could barely formulate a sentence. He was saying, well, you don't talk to a Black man like this. It's like, by the way, Vivek has pretty dark skin. I guess maybe he's saying a cultural thing. I'm not sure. But that is the level of argument that you get from him.

Yeah, that's exactly right. And I love the fact that that montage ended with Ali Velshi saying, oh, Tucker built the most racist show on television. I will never forget. Roger Ailes used to use Ali Velshi as the example of what not to do on television about why I think it was CNN at the time he was there was failing. Like, look at that guy. Look how bad he is. He's such a joke. And here now he's at MSNBC still getting zero ratings just by running around calling everybody a racist, Emily. No, that's actually really interesting, because I think what Allie Bell, she does is a very bad impression of Don Lemon. And it seems like he was the Don Lemon model of how to anchor on CNN, which is to be excessively smug, but also excessively ignorant, a wonderful combination that is sure to draw viewers

night after night. But it works for this like tiny little audience. And you can see that's all they're able to draw in either at MSNBC or CNN. MSNBC obviously gets a little bit more of it because they're willing to at least be slightly honest sometimes and say they're outright liberal. But it is so unappealing. I can't imagine sitting down at a television set and watching Ali Velshi just condescend to like 90% of the country day after day or Don Lemon. And that's the thing that Don Lemon doesn't have anything to take with him because he's not interesting.

And he kind of used to be slightly more interesting when he used to talk about race in a way that he thought would get clicks. And if he, if Tucker Carlson had said any of the things Don Lemon had said back then, he actually would have been canceled maybe. But it's just like, he's completely uninteresting. He has nothing worth listening to to say because he's allowed himself to were saying, Moynihan.

He's like a dumb man's vision of what a smart man sounds like or what a smart bigot sounds like. That condescension. Like if you like Tucker, you're a dumbass bigot. You're stupid. And the only reason you like him is because he shares your dumbass bigotry. That's what he was saying. And to parlay on what you said with that comment, Moynihan, what you just said, Emily, about the condescension of Don Lemon, who shares exactly that worldview of Jason Johnson, we pulled just a short montage of some of that, some of that piece of Don, which was a massive turnoff. He used to be more reasonable. That's when I knew him back in 2014,

15. And then he went super woke. And I do believe broke is about to follow. Here's a little bit. Twenty seven. The people who ate and abetted Trump are stupid, but lived in several red states. There are a lot of friends who I had to really get rid of taking down the statues and crime is rising as they defund police. Oh, my gosh, it's so bad. You voted for Trump. You voted for the person who the Klan supported. You voted for the person who Nazis support. If you're not going to get vaccinated, you don't want to social distance, you don't want to wear a mask, then maybe you don't want to go to the hospital when you get sick. We have to stop demonizing people and realize the biggest terror threat in this country is white men. We have to stop coddling people when it comes to this and the vaccine saying,

oh, you can't shame them. You can't call them stupid. You can't call them silly. Yes, they are. The people who are not getting vaccines, who are believing the lies on the Internet instead of science. It's time to start shaming them. What else? Or leave them behind. Weirdly, Emily, his transition to morning TV didn't really work. They weren't able to forget all that in the new, more Republican leaning CNN. So weirdly, they had a memory. Just imagine waking up in the morning and drinking your coffee, sipping your coffee and just being told the entire country is full of racist bigots. Like that's nothing invigorates you for a hard day

at the office, quite like being implicated in widespread racism and bigotry. And with him, it's like, I can't even believe some of that stuff is real because again, it's so it's such bad journalism that in another era, it would have stopped right away. I mean, people acting like that would have stopped right away, but it was rewarded time and time and time and again at CNN because they just look past all of it. And his I mean, with Chris Licht, obviously, I think it's interesting. He hired what Zucker's ex mistress immediately to do PR for him. Don Lemon did. And I thought, yeah, and it's it's so interesting because it shows that he was very much in the Zucker brand, the Zucker mold.

And when that was when the time was up on the Zucker brand, the Zucker mold. And when that was when the time was up on the Zucker mold, the time was up on Don. You're so right. Longer. But no, that's a great point. All those clips were during the Jeff Zucker era. That was primetime Don Lemon who failed as well. That was a disaster of a show. And that's why he was so upset when Jeff Zucker got fired. That's when he went on the air and reminded everybody I'm a black gay man, black gay man. Just in case you forgot who's sitting in this slot, black gay. Uh, thanks to Jeff Zucker. He's the one who put me here. Hint, hint, Chris licked and Chris lick came in and is trying to change CNN. And I don't think it's going to work, but good for him for at least

trying. And, um, he's dealt with this. He's got to deal with this, this hangover, right. Of like all these nightmare comments and so on and decides to move him out of primetime. Yes. But out the door should have been the next stop. And instead he moved him to the mornings, which of course was a disaster waiting to happen. Didn't work. The co-host hate him according to the post and all the, all the stuff. And now Moynihan, what we get the daily beast, I mocked their reporting on Fox saying it was about Sidney Powell, but they are of the left. And I'll bet you they have they have some good sources at CNN. And this is what they report on Lemon. His fate had been sealed for weeks.

People with knowledge of the matter told us because, remember, he claimed in a statement yesterday I was blindsided. I had no idea this was coming. His fate had been sealed for weeks and he was keenly aware of his coming exit, calling around over the last week for a crisis communication specialist to help out. He ultimately decided, as Emily just pointed out, on Alison Gollist, who previously ran comms for CNN and resigned from the network two weeks after former CEO Jeff Zucker was fired for not disclosing his relationship with her. Well, I mean, come on. Alison Gollis was also forced out of CNN after she'd been humiliated. She'd been promoted up the line of PR over other deserving women at a time when she was screwing the boss. So yeah, that can lead to problems if you stay in your post and then try to run comms. That's who he hired. So he knew it was coming. His feigned indignation yesterday was an act. And CNN has already already said we wanted to talk to you directly we would have let you said goodbye say goodbye in the air instead you threw a hissy fit with your little twitter statement like i can't believe this yeah do you know who else knew it was coming

anyone who read the new york post if you it was like has he not been fired yet i can't believe he hasn't been fired yet i love love, by the way, that montage because it has one of the greatest, you know, three second clips where he says, we really have to stop the demonization in this country. You know, the problem is white people. Did he actually just say it like that?

Is he that unaware of what he just said? It's like that person probably probably shouldn't be on tv but like chris licht like look i actually appreciate the fact that he's i mean i don't think he's been successful at it so far obviously because you don't put don lemon from a failing show at eight o'clock into the morning show i mean like if you have bad players in the team you don't shuffle them to different positions you trade them you get new players and i think that's probably what they need to do at this point. But, you know, look, I appreciate the idea of trying to make CNN kind of trend a middle path. Because in the past, when I was in a hotel room, and that's essentially like you make the only time I watch cable news, I would turn on CNN because I just, you know, was, you know, my job is to be a jerk about politics. And I want to hear someone talk about it, you know, down the center, I would turn on CNN. But look, there's after Donald Trump,

there's diminishing returns of that kind of constantly beating the drum about how psychotic his supporters are, how psychotic he is, etc, etc, etc. I think the reason that people like someone like Joe Rogan, is that it's contemplative. It's long. We were told a long time ago, like when you're doing a podcast, make it quick. People have very short attention spans on the internet. And it turns out people like three hours of Joe Rogan because he has interesting people on. He asks very probing, searching questions.

He's willing to be wrong about things. You see a guy with Don Lemon, he is so sure about himself in such a clumsy, dumb way. That's off-putting to a lot of people. Partisans love it, I guess, but that's not the recipe for a successful TV show, I don't think. It's so true. What is it? Off and wrong, never in doubt. Tucker is the opposite. I would say sometimes wrong, always in doubt. Tucker is so self-deprecating when he talks about himself and the many things he's gotten wrong and the many times he's learned from his mistakes. You fall in love with the guy. I mean, you see he is not what the media tells you he is. And yet back to Father Coughlin, listen to Rachel Maddow. She's lost her mind. Somehow she managed to rope in Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, and Tucker into this

montage. You'll see it. Watch. Something like a quarter of the entire population of the United States was listening to him on the radio every week until they weren't. His name was Father Charles Coughlin. When he started explicitly telling his followers, I choose the road of fascism, that was awkward for his bosses at the church. The next closest sort of one shadow of that guy's influence was this guy, who in the late 1980s started an AM radio career. At his height, he really seemed like his potential was limitless. Until it didn't. Then after him, there was this guy, who also built a fast-growing audience. But at the Fox News Channel, he was their fastest-growing star,

which they must have been very happy with at Fox News. Until they weren't. Then it was this guy. This guy actually was the biggest host that Fox ever had. He was the most dominant voice in right-wing television ever, until he wasn't. Now there's this guy, their latest, biggest thing. And he's out today as well. He's been fired. Overtime, whoever the dominant figure is, gets smaller and smaller and smaller over time. Dominance inside conservative media doesn't tend to cross

over into any other kind of major influence. Oh, right. Oh, now, why is that, Rachel? Because you lefties control the media and you control Hollywood, you control sports and you're trying to take over corporate America. But when voters go to the polls, the country's 50 50. So you can dismiss conservatives in this country as powerless all you want. But there's a reason they took back the house and there's a reason they could very well take back the Senate and possibly the white house next time around. And your people will not always be in control. And by the way, you step down from your show.

You only do a show on Monday nights now and are far less powerful with your voice than you ever were before to just the smug, disgusting satisfaction. And to compare those conservative giants, Emily, to Father Coughlin is absolutely disgusting. She's shameful. I was surprised she didn't hit for the cycle and bring Hitler in, too, actually, because it seems like that's where she was going with it. And again, like this stuff gets repeated on primetime MSNBC. Nobody has to apologize. And of course, Tucker was subject to how many boycott attempts by really well-funded, well-coordinated left-wing groups that pulled advertisers, were successful at pulling

advertisers off the air. People are not doing that to Rachel Maddow. And if they did, it wouldn't be covered positively in corporate press like it was every time someone came after Tucker. And by the way, Tucker and Rachel Maddow previously used to have pretty nice things to say about each other. They were both at MSNBC at the same time. He gave her her start. I think he gave her her first on-air appearance. And what's interesting about that is it's such a sad case study in the arc of American media because Rachel Maddow, like Tucker, used to be very thoughtful, contemplative. The word Michael used is perfect because also, Megan, you mentioned how he's self-deprecating. He actually was always self-deprecating. He was just at the Heritage Foundation on Friday night

talking about how he completely changed his views on a lot of things when he realized that he was wrong. And he did that on his show night after night. Rachel Maddow still hasn't said a word about what she got wrong during the Russia collusion hoax that I'm aware of in really serious contemplative fashion. And so you used to have way more thoughtful, good faith interactions in American media. You used to have way more thoughtful, good faith interactions in

American media. You used to have Buckley, William F. Buckley, bringing Gore Vidal on, hosting debates between Phyllis Schlafly and Betty Friedan or whoever it was. And that used to be a fixture of American media. We used to really appreciate that. But now you can never envision Tucker Carlson and Rachel Maddow sitting down, hashing out these conversations. Why? Well, it's not the fault of Tucker Carlson. It's the fault of Rachel Maddow and everyone who controls these corporate media networks, believing that Tucker Carlson is a racist, saying that he had the most racist show ever on American television, repeating that uncritically in all of these platforms, New York Times, NBC, doesn't matter. And that's the problem is fundamentally, they are the roadblock to that healthier media and they're trying to profit off of it and it's absolutely disgusting. You've got to go, you know, to the Father Coghlan place in the wake of Tucker being fired. Like that's that's where you want to go. Even Keith Olbermann was saying similar things, comparing Tucker to a Nazi. He also, for good measure, decided to tweet about me because I said Tucker is going to be better off without Fox and said something to the effect of you got fired from Fox and NBC. What would you know about it? So first of

all, you misstate the circumstances of my departure from NBC, sir. That's all I'm allowed to say about it. And as for Fox, there were widely reported facts that I was offered a hundred million dollars to stay there. But the record's very clear that I left voluntarily because I wanted to raise my family, something you don't know anything about because no one would marry you and you have no children. You have a cold, lonely life in which you become a bitter, bitter man, something I wouldn't know anything about because my life is joyful and I've managed to raise my own children. And someday, I hope you have that pleasure, but I don't have high hopes it's going to happen. But Moynihan, the left- Does he have a job?

No, no, he's got a podcast. What he does have is a podcast that nobody's listening to that we crush. So in any event, but the bitterness and that brings me to Joy Reid, who is equally angry. She's got to be the next to go. I mean, we'll see. But here was her messaging on Tucker's fall. No grand send off for Tuckums. No final show for him to sign off with his viewers. It's almost hard to believe that just months ago, Tucker wielded so much power, Kevin McCarthy traded him 40,000 hours of exclusive January 6th footage in his hostage deal to become speaker. Yet today, Tucker has officially achieved something that I don't think anyone else in our industry can claim, being let go by all three major cable news networks. MSNBC, yes, he used to work here.

He arguably has done more on cable television to spread the gospel of hate, fear, and paranoia than anyone since radio propagandist Father Coughlin in the Nazi era of the 1930s. Doesn't she hate gays? Isn't that the person who had a whole blog? No, no, no, no. Megan, I'm not going to let you spread misinformation about an account that was brutally hacked. We still haven't found the perpetrator. OJ's looking for the hacker.

But yeah, she was hacked to say that she didn't like gay people. Like, look, actually, Joy Reid, I think I had done a radio thing with her on Sirius, you know, maybe eight years ago. And she was a very different person. I mean, she was a person of the left. But this cartoonish thing, it was quite funny. They accused Tucker of this. And, you know, I, again, have to reiterate when what Emily was saying, you know, Tucker

at Heritage said he changed his mind when he realized he was wrong. I think the things that he says he was wrong about, he was actually right before. He's probably wrong about now. But the thing I like about Tucker is that, you know, I can have that debate with him. I'm sure if I ran into him, we could have a spirited discussion about it. Enjoy that echo chamber of Jory Reed's show and on MSNBC. I'll give you an example of this. I saw an episode of Tucker's show that made my veins pop. I was so annoyed by it. But he had a guest on and they were talking about American foreign policy. And look, it was a no, it sounded

like Noam Chomsky on Fox News. But you know what? I was actually happy about it. I'm like, oh, we'll talk about it on the fifth call. And I'm glad that this is being aired. I'm not somebody who wants views to be suppressed. And they say, oh, no, no, no, Tucker's gone. The ideas aren't going anywhere. You have to win on the battlefield of ideas rather than say, well, he's gotten fired. It's all over. Where did those 3.5 million people go? And by the way, that montage of people saying, oh, you know, he's done.

These people disappear. Well, that's partially true in the sense that, you know, a band that was popular in 1980 and playing stadiums is probably playing clubs now. And that does happen, but not now. I mean, you think that if Tucker is going to take this audience, he's going to leave it? He's going to have more people. I saw this article in the San Francisco Chronicle this morning, like, he's all done He had this huge audience and look they just you know axed him. Good luck Tucker by same thing You don't think that he could parlay that like Ben Shapiro into a much bigger audience. You can do this stuff on demand You don't have to watch it at 8 o'clock. You don't have to tivo it or whatever the hell people do now You can just call it up. He's gonna have like, you know, he's got three offers. What, you know, Ben Shapiro's made one, Glenn Beck has made one,

all these, these conservative networks, Newsmax, Chris Ruddy made him one. He's not going to be without a home. And he's going to have a big audience because someone like Tucker, as I said before, in comparison to Don Lennon, Don Lemon, they have an audience that follows them because they're following Tucker. Look, the thing is, Tucker will probably have fewer people over the age of 65 watching him. That's true. Sure. The digital world is much younger than the cable news world. But he will have huge numbers, just like I do, just like you guys do.

Millions of people watch this show every week. Millions of people. And that's power. And while Rachel Maddow may not be watching this show or the fifth column or the Federalist, millions of other people are taking in these products voraciously because they're looking for alternate voices to the ones they hear like hers on MSNBC. And frankly, like the things they are hearing on Fox News that they've been hearing forever. The thing that made Tucker special was he was different. Now they're back to the same, you know, it's, I like a lot of these guys. I'm just saying it's a, it's an old formula.

It's not the way of the future. And so just because Rachel Maddow doesn't hear Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly doesn't mean they don't still hold enormous influence, especially Glenn, who's got a whole media empire that he built. It just shows their little liberal elite circles, Emily, that they never leave, that they think these people have just washed up and gone away. Oh, right. Like, OK, sure. Yeah. Don Lemon, by the way, that montage, he sounds like someone who's never met an actual Trump supporter in the wild that isn't like a CNN person who he's having on a show to dunk on. I think that's an important point. And also this idea, this argument that Fox News is tantamount to mind control, right? Like it has manipulated millions of boomers

into pulling the lever for Trump and becoming racist populists is like completely wrong and also completely insulting. it also tells you what they think of their own audience by the way that they are just manipulating your feeble minds with their propaganda that that's what television is it's where you do mind control and it's just like clockwork orange you can change the entire country and turn them all into like completely stupid sheep with your propaganda on tv that's not to say it isn't powerful. But if anything, Tucker was following the audience. He learned, like a lot of people did, and like a lot of people didn't in 2016, that there was some stuff going on between the coasts and that people had different ideas, for instance, about American foreign policy than the

neoconservatism the Republican Party wouldn't breathe a word against. And you would rarely hear disagreement with on a place like even Fox News primetime, you know, Bill Riley, Sean Hannity. And he picked up on that and learned from it. And so it's if anything, he's the one that was following the audience. So you can bet a whole lot of people will follow him in ways that they're not going to follow Don Lemon or that they wouldn't follow Rachel Maddow. So last question, what does this mean for Fox? You know, they've weathered storms in the past. Tucker's a unique talent and the audience is mad.

So what do you think, Moynihan? What does this mean for Fox? I mean, it can't mean anything good in the short run. They haven't been great in talent developments. I mean, they've had a lot of the people that have been there for a long time and some of them are great. I mean, they've had a lot of the people that have been there for a long time and some of them are great. I mean, like my friend, Greg Gutfeld, who, you know, I think Roger saw this actually

at a show called Red Eye that was on at 3 a.m. And at that point, by the way, at 3 a.m., he was beating CNN in the, I think the nine o'clock and eight o'clock spots at 3 a.m. And I used to do that show all the time. And Greg was obviously a talent. And now his show, which is what, 11 o'clock or something like that, is beating all the late night comedy shows. Because it doesn't feel like you're being lectured to in school.

And it's a little looser. But, you know, if they could manage to kind of get somebody else like Greg. I mean, I know some people have suggested Greg move over. But that show is way too successful for them to throw it out the window and have him try to inhabit that eight o'clock spot. And I know that Roger really liked him. But I think there's a lot of, you know, young people out there, I would say, if they want to kind of, you know, be back in the game in a way, and I think they're going to be out of the game for a little bit with this, because Tucker was their biggest, biggest property. I mean, the five being the second one, I think you look outside to

where the other people are, where the kind of internet people are and say, who are the great talents here? And maybe try to just, you know, call someone up from the minors and just give them a spot on the big show. Like, you know, NBC did with Conan O'Brien in like 1992. That was what I would do if I were Fox at this point, not sort of recycle somebody from inside. What they're up against is they don't have Roger anymore, who is a great talent scout and a great talent developer. And he, I said this yesterday, but he told me that Gutfeld was the only one he could put in for O'Reilly when O'Reilly's out and get a number. But now you're not going to pluck him from his show and turn him into the new O'Reilly, the new Tucker in a solo position. That would be a waste. They might try some harebrained scheme of

moving his 11 o'clock show to eight. Remember when I left the nine, remember for the short term, they moved the five to 9 p.m. That was their first move. And it didn't work because it's weird. It's weird. So they got smart. They moved it back to five. That was when they had that show with like Eric Bowling and other people on at five, the five the independence i can't remember what it was anyway then they got rid of that show they moved the five back to five and tucker went to nine and then o'reilly got fired and they moved tucker to eight um so i don't know like their history isn't so great at being able to figure out oh there's a slot this is exactly how we should fill it i don't think the answer if they anybody cares what I think, is moving Gutfeld's current show to AP. Though I do think if they hadn't launched that evening show, he would have been the next best choice. He would have been a great choice to put

in that slot. Now, I don't know what they're going to do because they don't know how to develop talent. Emily, I'll give you the last word on it. Yeah, I'll just say, I think these are all holdovers from the Ailes era. And in the post-Ailes era, it's a real struggle, I think, you know, these are all holdovers from the Ailes era and in the post-Ailes era. It's a real struggle, I think, for Fox News. And I also to find someone that's actually capable of holding that hour. And I think one of the biggest situations here is like if this is indicative of a pattern at Fox News of them for legal reasons, whatever, clamping down on populist voices that make people in the C-suite uncomfortable, then they're in a really difficult, then they're actually in, I think, business trouble. And you sensed how deep they thought the business trouble was just in the, they were worried about competition from Newsmax and One America after that Arizona call. I mean, it was strange to see how panicked they were about

that stuff. So if this is indicative of a pattern that continues, I think they're in real trouble. If they find someone Tucker-esque, they might not be able to put up the same numbers, but it will show that they have a commitment to giving voice to populists and real conservatives around the country and can still continue down the same path. But if they're not committed to that, I think they're in serious business trouble. It's one of those things like I learned from 17 years at Fox. Yes, the relationship between the host and the audience is important. And they did a good job back in that era, at least of picking people who would resonate with the Fox news audience. But one of the things that makes you watch Fox news, you may not even know it is the flashy graphics, the pace of the programming, the story selection, you know, the content you're getting, and the reporters who

will come on and update you on what they've been out covering. All of that is part of the Fox News machine, and it explains a lot of the success, and it will still be there. It'll still be there at 8 o'clock too. So I think the smart bet would be on Fox News. They've done it before. They could do it again. The audience is loyal. They don't know why they love Fox and find it so compelling, but they do. But I think for sure, short, short term, probably the audience

is going to make them suffer and try to send them a message. Not quite Bud Light-esque, but some sort of message. Guys, thank you so much for coming on. Great to see Emily. You too, Michael. Joining me now,

author of the brand new book, Capitalist Punishment, how Wall Street is using your money to create a country you didn't vote for vivek ramaswamy he's also a 2024 gop presidential candidate vivek great to have you back welcome back to the show it's good to be on megan how are you good so we almost covered this exchange last week because it was so contentious and unpleasant. But in the end, we have had enough of Don Lemon. And so has CNN, apparently. So you went on CNN because you've said very openly you'll go on anywhere. You're running for president. You'll talk to anybody. And it didn't go particularly well. Here's a little bit about you challenge of Don challenging you on your

appearance at the NRA. And Don Lemon takes issue with your opinions on this issue because you're not a black man. You said something about American history and race. And I guess you're not allowed to opine on that unless you have black skin, according to Don Lemon. Here was a bit of that. Your telling of history is wrong. You're what you think the history was wrong. The Civil War was fought. You're making people think that the Civil War was fought for black people, only for black people to get guns and for black people to civil war was fought for black people in this country to get freedoms, a noble mission. Black people secured their freedoms after the Civil War is a historical fact. Don, just study it. Only after their Second Amendment rights were secured.

You are discounting Reconstruction. You're discounting a whole host of things that happened after the Civil War when it comes to African-Americans, including the whole reason that the Civil Rights Movement happened is because black people did not secure their freedoms after the Civil War and that things turned around. People would try to change the freedoms that were supposed to. And you know how they got it? They got their Second Amendment rights and they actually got

the NRA played a big role in that. But today, down the NRA did not play a big role. That's a lie. That's not the NRA did not play a big role. This is just historical fact. It's not a historical fact. We didn't even include the best part where he basically says, you know, he's he basically suggests he has a higher claim to the argument because of skin color and went on to diminish you. I don't know what kind of race you are. I don't know what your back. I mean, it was actually really offensive the way he ended that interview with you. And then his colleague came on. Actually, we have this cut to his colleague came on to try to give you a

nice goodbye. And that upset him, too. Here's more. The part that I find insulting is when you say today, black Americans don't have those rights after we have gone through that civil rights revolution. You are sitting here telling an African-American about the rights and what you find insulting about the way I live, the skin I live in every day. Here's where you and I have a different point of view. Black and white that black people don't have in this country and that black people do have. Well, here's where you and I have a different point of view. I think we should be able to express our views regardless of the color of our skin.

We should have this debate without me regarding you as a black man, but me regarding you as a fellow citizen. That's what I think we should say. Whatever ethnicity you are explaining to me about what it's like to be black in America, I'm sorry. Whatever ethnicity I am, I'll tell you what I am. I'm an Indian American. I'm proud of it. But I think we should have this debate. Black, white, doesn't matter But I think we should have this debate. Black, white doesn't matter. I think we should have this debate on the content of the ideas. You should do it in an honest way and in a fair way. And what you're doing is not an honest and fair way. We appreciate you coming

on. With due respect, Don, I look forward to continuing that conversation. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Papa. That you are explaining what it's like to be black in America. That's not what happened. You were not trying to speak on behalf of black people. You were talking about America's history. And the reason I go through that exercise of vague is they are, there are several reports out today that that was the last straw for CNN management.

If you watch the longer clip, um, go on, you will see Poppy Harlow trying to give you a nice goodbye, saying we'll talk about China. The next time you come on, we'll get more into depth into your policies. And Don Lemon clearly wanted to move right on saying goodbye. It's it's over. You know, move on. So what do you make of the fact that you may have had a role in CNN's ultimate decision to get rid of him?

I think I did. And I think that that's a net positive. Look, I actually want to be really clear about this. It all comes down to what the mission of your organization is. If CNN's mission is to advance a woke progressive orthodoxy, Don Lemon is a perfectly fine host to have on air to cut off guests, to tell people they can't speak based on the color of their skin, because that represent a world view that exists in the country so if that's aligned with your mission as an organization that's a perfectly sensible

decision to keep that person but what Chris Lick the new CEO of CNN who I've met with an open exchange dialogue with you know number of number of weeks or months ago if he means what he says and it sounds like he does

that they want to be moved towards being a more open platform for diverse views then I don't think that type of host actually makes sense in that organization. So to me, it's not just about cancel culture in the other direction and saying that, hey, Don Lemon, it's a good thing he's fired. The question is, what's your purpose as an organization? And if CNN's purpose is to air multiple different perspectives on air, then I think that you can't have TV hosts who tell guests, whoever they are, that they can't speak or express an idea about post-Civil War reconstruction history in America

without thinking about what their skin color or race is first. The good thing about me, Megan, is I didn't take particular offense to that exchange. I actually found it really useful. I'm glad we did it. It was a little bit awkward to be on set in the Larry David sense of awkward, but that's okay. I can handle that. That's not a problem for me. I think it's actually really important that we surface some of these dogmas and unspoken expectations that have otherwise been simmering beneath the surface of American discourse. I'm all in favor of actually speaking those hard truths. Let those boil over. I think we need to do that as part of our, let's just say, national self-therapy to get to a place where it's not the way that other guests might have approached it to say that, well, because Don Lemon is black and we're talking

about a sensitive issue relating to the history of African-Americans in this country, I'm going to tread around that differently. I did not. I spoke to Don Lemon the same way I would have if he were white or any other race. It doesn't matter. But what was amazing was he had the nerve to call you out on that as though it were improper, that you as a brown skin man didn't have a working knowledge of U.S. history when it comes to American black people enough to opine on it while sitting across from a black man. I mean, that there was some sort of racial hierarchy that would have required you to defer to his opinions about America's history, about historical fact. So that is what the theory of intersectionality, as you well know, is all about. There's a hierarchy of whether you're an oppressor or whether you're oppressed. And if you're lower on that hierarchy, according to that set of rules, you have to either step up

and stand up and speak or step back, as they say in their language of the woke movement, to step back and not speak to give the person of the lower rung on that ladder the chance to speak. I reject that worldview. I think we're all co-equal citizens. Everyone's voice and vote counts equally in the open debate and marketplace of ideas. But in the case of Don Lemon, I was on set with him, Megan. I can tell you what I actually saw happening was that his head exploded a little bit when there were two conflicting ideas that I brought to the fore. And I didn't want to talk about the NRA speech particularly. They're the ones who brought it up. They put an excerpt of my speech up, asked me to

respond to it. So I did. The two conflicting ideas were one, if you're in Don Lemon's headspace, civil rights are a good thing. Second Amendment rights are a bad thing. That's just an ossified worldview. And part of what I taught him, it's part of history. It's part of American history. We just got to go study it, is that actually the civil rights of black Americans were never secured until they actually enjoyed Second Amendment protections. In fact, part of the Black codes that were passed in the Reconstruction era were designed to take guns and gun ownership rights away from Black Americans. That's not an accident. The Dred Scott decision, which preceded the Civil War,

Chief Justice Taney famously and ignominiously said that part of the reason Black people couldn't be citizens in this country is because it would give them the right to own guns. So this is fundamental stuff, even in Supreme Court doctrine. So I was exposing that history, but that made Don Lemon's head explode because to him, Second Amendment bad, civil rights good, and I'm committing some sort of cardinal sin by mixing the two together when it's just a fact of history that actually one was fundamental to securing the other. And so the audience should know

that Vivek went to, in addition to his success on Wall Street and so on, went to Yale Law School. I mean, he graduated from Yale Law School. So you know the law. You were prepared for a debate

or a discussion on that. But the irony is, if he actually expected you to cede the arguments to him because he's a black man and you're not, he shouldn't have had you on the show.

He should have just looked into the camera and offered his own opinions on all these matters. He invited you to be interviewed on his program and then got upset when you actually offered your view and explained why you made the claims about gun rights and so on. And so his intersectionality approach doesn't work. If you want that, go be a pundit. Don't be an interviewer on a national cable show. Yeah, I tend to agree with you on that, Megan. And my whole point is I actually go to these forums precisely because right now there's two alternatives.

I present a third. Alternative number one is you go on there, but you have to actually follow the orthodoxy. You have to effectively bend the knee quietly without saying it. Acknowledge that when you're talking about certain subjects to people of a certain race that you have to tread around it. I don't do that. Option number two is you do that. You come out looking like a villain, which is how they're ready to portray you. I pick a third path. Let's be dignified. Let's actually stick to our arguments without compromising on our principles, but do it unapologetically in a way that surfaces the actual tension underneath that

implicit assumption that other people don't talk about. And I think it would be a mistake here to just focus on Don Lemon. I mean, he's, I think, look, I think there's better models for how to succeed in your career as a journalist in staying close to the truth than following Don Lemon's path, but it's not all about him. He's representing a worldview. I mean, take Congresswoman Ayanna Presley of the squad. She's not a journalist. She's in Congress, but she basically said the same thing even more concisely than Don Lemon did a couple of years ago when she said, we don't want any more black faces that don't want to be a black voice. We don't want any more brown faces that don't want to be a brown voice. That's an exact quote. I don't fit her description of

what counts as a brown voice because I reject the premise that your skin color ought to predict anything about the content of the ideas you're allowed to espouse. That is true racism. That is definitional racism to say that I can predict something about the content of your ideas based on the color of your skin. And yet that's become quietly accepted in much of mainstream culture in America. I will say, Megan, though, I'm optimistic. I think the fact that we're having this conversation on the back of CNN making the decision to actually remove Don Lemon from air, hopefully replace him with somebody who's a more thoughtful journalist. I do think, I'm actually quite optimistic that we're a domino effect, a hair's trigger away

from a national revival that rejects this woke orthodoxy that's been an assault on American excellence. You saw it from Netflix about a year ago after the Dave Chappelle controversy. I think this is a good move that Chris Licht has taken at CNN. I think if we keep our optimism alive, right, I think a lot of that wokeism that has infected institutions over the last several years, people are hungry for something new. I think it's up to conservatives in this country. This is why I feel called to do it, to lead the way with an affirmative vision of our own, not just being victimized by the victimhood culture, but by actually leading the way with our own vision. Well, we've heard people like Joy Reid explicitly say about black people in America who have

heterodox views on this whole woke ism. They're skinfolk, but not kinfolk. That's you know, that's how they dismiss anybody who sees things the way you do, but happens to be a black man or a black woman. It's absolutely disrespectful and it's racist. I do want to ask you, first of all, did you have that conversation with Chris Licht, the new head of CNN, took over for Jeff Zucker after that exchange with Don Lemon on the air? It was before it was beforehand. I was, I was, uh, I thought it was my place to leave them be. Uh, I think there was a lot of discomfort after that. And they were very respectful of the people who had booked me right after I was off air, but I left that. Well, let me show you the ending. Let me show the audience the end, the very, very last part where he Poppy tried to save it. I mean,

this is what you do when you're a co-anchor. I've been there. When something tense happens, you try to diffuse the tension a little, keep things nice with the guest before they leave and say a nice goodbye, which she attempted to do, and he was clearly irritated by her. And he always lets his irritation show. This is one of the reasons why that morning show is a disaster. They have record low ratings. And his co-hosts very clearly can't stand him.

But here was his last parting remark in the whole exchange to Poppy. We appreciate you coming on. With due respect, I look forward to continuing that conversation. Well, thank you for the conversation. Thank you. Thank you. We'll talk about China. Yes. You come back. Oh, thank you. Much to say on declaring independence from China. OK, something you can add on China. Thank you. Thank you. So we can move on now, please. And so the reports are that they'd had it between his reported diva moments and his sexist remarks. The Nikki Haley thing. There's a report this morning. I think it's in the Daily Mail talking about how so many staffers at CNN were actually really ticked off and offended by saying, you know, Nikki Haley's pastor prime. Sorry, a woman's pastor prime when she's out of her 20s, 30s, maybe at age 40 and on and on. There's lots of examples. Don Lemon not liking women. He doesn't doesn't like women. That's my opinion. It seems pretty clear. He blames everything on women. Anything goes wrong on the set interruption. It's the woman's fault. Trust me, that's his M.O. Blame the woman.

And so I do wonder, Megan, there's a funny connection there just to just to briefly draw it. So he's a man who feels particularly totally free to talk about when women are or are not in their prime and to criticize women for being women, but somehow believes that if you're not black, you can't actually even make a comment about some post-war history. So there is a certain rich irony in that if you observe it. That's how the woke are. They have a weird hierarchy that you really have to be immersed in it to totally understand it. So after that moment, when they said goodbye to you, Vivek, what was that? What was it like? It's always kind of fun to get a behind the scenes, you know, wrap up of what happened on set after something like that.

Yes. So I had a nice exchange with Poppy. I felt bad for her, to be honest, because I think she had been sidelined in the conversation. She was trying her best. So I told her, look, we have a conversation in China later on. I walked off. I went out of my way to really be thankful to the producers and those who were on set as well. I think it was awkward for everyone there,

so I tried to do my part to bring a lighthearted tone and say they're doing great work and to keep up the beautiful set. That's what I think I told them, which is a nice looking set, I guess. And then I left. And they were very decent about it. Afterwards, I think they reached out to my people who did the scheduling to effectively apologize for that interaction. But I don't need apologies. I think that this is good, actually, for our country to be able to air this kind of underlying tension in our discourse. It's just so crazy. It shows the craziness. It's like somebody saying to me, like, women didn't actually, they got the right to vote, you know, in 1920, but they didn't actually get their power until 1970.

And me saying, no, actually, the data show that in the 1960s, they were really coming of age. And somebody being like, no, actually, the data show that in 1974, that's when it started. And me being like, you're a man, I'm a woman. Shut up. People do that. Shut up. People do say that kind of stuff. It's ridiculous. Thank you for calling it out and giving us a good, good example of how they operate. Now you mentioned something because crusading against these woke, woke, you know, pushes in corporate media in corporate America and so on has been a big issue for you. This is one of the reasons why I love what you're doing. There's an update in the whole

Bud Light disaster today, which is just, I think, spectacular. So, of course, their stock price fell in the wake of the boycott after they partner with trans activist or trans person Dylan Mulvaney. And their core audience and core purchasers revolted across America saying, what are you doing? We don't want you dabbling in this stuff. Just service our beer. For the love of God, shut up and service the beer. And they tried to be quiet. It failed. Their stock price was dwindling and their sales were dwindling. Then their stock price went a little back up. And the people who are against you on the woke stuff, Vivek said, oh, it went back up. Ha ha ha. But the real question was, how about the sales? How about the sales? The stock's going to do what

the stock's going to do. Well, how are they doing on the sales of Bud Light? Well, now we have an answer to that. And by the way, they, um, they saw these numbers before we did that. The people at Bud Light, uh, the reading from the New York Post today, Bud Light has suffered a staggering sales hit following its disastrous marketing tie-up with transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. The latest data showing a 17% drop in sales. 17. It only went down, I think, 8% or 6% in the first week after the controversy. And now it's almost triple that, the drop in sales, and probably going to go up even more. They've now put the woman who made the decision, we're told, Alyssa, on leave of absence, though it was clearly not her idea. And I don't think she's ever coming back, as well as her boss, also on a leave of absence. And I think't think she's ever coming back as well as her boss also on a leave of absence.

And I think this is a huge victory. I'd like to see them fight. I think they're fired. So I'm taking the W. However, I think this is an inflection point in these in the battle that you've been fighting and yours truly as well, to a lesser extent, to get these corporations to stay in their lane and just do their thing. Sell your beer, sell your facial cream, but stop trying to woke-ify America. That's what makes America great, is that we have a system of capitalism that is insulated, or at least historically has been, from partisan politics. First of all, that makes companies more successful. Bud Light's just one example among many. Megan, that's what the whole book is about, the Capitalist Punishment book that's out today. That is about why companies are more successful when they are not encumbered by these environmental and social agendas. But there's something even more fundamental than that, Megan, which is that actually Tocqueville, Alexis de Tocqueville,

he made this observation about America. We're a diverse, divided democratic society. We're not supposed to last for more than a couple of generations unless there are these apolitical spaces that bind us together, that literally bring us together. Bud Light is liquid fuel that brings people together at football games, at parties across the country. It's uniting. When that itself becomes politicized, that's really the beginning of the end of the American experiment, if we lose those apolitical sanctuaries that are supposed to hold us together. And Tocqueville said that back then too, is America requires what he calls these intermediate

institutions. Capitalism is the biggest of those. And so for me on a personal level, it's not just because I think it makes companies less successful, though that's definitely true. And we see that example on display here. It's that it makes America and our constitutional republic itself less successful. It won't survive if we don't have those spaces where we can come together across the divides of identity politics or partisan politics. I'm with you, Megan. I think that we are at a potential turning point here. I think people, you know, the woke movement, what it did is the analogy I sometimes have used is, it's like when young people are hungry for a cause, they tell them you satisfy your moral hunger

by going to Ben and Jerry's and ordering a cup of ice cream with some social justice sprinkles on the side. I mean, effectively, that's been the culture for the last several years. I think that you don't satisfy a moral hunger with fast food. You sort of get that hit initially, but then that starts to fade away and you still realize you're still hungry, hungry for something more substantial, purpose that you derive from something other than corporate virtue signaling. And that's the opportunity in front of us for the conservative

movement. Can we fill that void with a vision of American identity that's actually more powerful, that dilutes the woke agenda to irrelevance? That's a question of whether the conservative movement can rise to that occasion or not. That's why I'm in this presidential race. The way it used to be in this country. The way it can be. And the way it can be. How, how, how, how, how? That's the problem. I'm with you, 100% with you. But how on earth are we going to get these young people to get back to that? I mean, yeah, teaching civics, what, we're going to force them to go back to church? That's up to their parents.

Americans are moving away from religion, away from more children, away from civics. It's depressing. But how can a president push us back in that direction? Look, I think part of this is, and there are many hats to wear here. One is a policymaking hat, and I can come to that. But some of this is through the kind of leadership and national character that you set. I don't think we have had a president in this country since Reagan who tied the what, what we're doing, the motions we're going through, to the why, to the principles that actually set the country into motion. And I reject this political worldview that both parties

seem to espouse, that human beings are somehow just these biological automatons walking around and we're supposed to bean count them to see how they'll vote. I believe in the power of persuasion. I think people are, especially young people, Megan, are hungry to be led. I went to, you know, we've done these bus tours for the last few days. I was in New Hampshire on a bus tour. I was in Iowa on a bus tour. South Carolina is a bus tour later this week. We stop at college campuses on these bus tours. I went to one, New England College in New Hampshire, where I was told that other Republican candidates didn't want to show up at some of these college campuses. Well, you want to know why? It's because they're going to get the kinds of questions that I got, which aren't that different than

interaction with Don Lemon on set. But the thing about, unlike Don Lemon, who's making, you know, was making millions of dollars while claiming to be a victim, the difference with young people on these college campuses, they don't really believe the stuff they're fed and spewing back. They're hungry, they're lost. And I think if we can fill that void with even a sense of leadership,

talking about understanding that our worst hypocrisies as a nation are actually our best evidence that we have ideals at all, because to be a hypocrite, you at least had to have those ideals. I think we bring these people along, Megan, because here's the other thing about being 21 years old or 19 years old. You want to stick it to the man. You want to stand up to the system and be a hippie and be countercultural. That's what made the woke movement popular in the first place is that that was sticking it to the system of the people who were in power. Well, now we've come full circle where what began as a challenge to the system has become the system. I think we can actually tap into young

people's desire to be heterodox. You don't want to be heterodox? Call yourself a religious conservative on a college campus. See what that does to you. And I think it takes a certain voice. And I think it takes us, I'm 37. I'm the first millennial to ever run for president as a Republican. But I want to use these attributes to reach that next generation. I'm actually optimistic that that opportunity sitting in front of us just through persuasion alone on policy. I could give you a lot of my ideas on how to do it. But actually, I think this other cultural character is almost more important than the

policies just follow naturally from that. I am. I'm gleaning. It's almost like you don't feel our current president has this ability. But Vivek, perhaps it's because you have not seen his announcement rally that he held today with thousands of people cheering him on. So, oh, wait, that didn't happen. He announced that he's running for reelection on videotape. And the message was, well, I'll let you react. Here's a bit of it. All around the country, MAGA extremists are lining up to take on those bedrock freedoms, cutting Social Security that you paid for your entire life while cutting taxes for the very wealthy, dictating what health care decisions women

can make, banning books and telling people who they can love, all while making it more difficult for you to be able to vote. When I ran for president four years ago, I said we're in a battle for the soul of America. And we still are. I feel uplifted and optimistic about America. How about you? Well, that really sounds like a man who says he wants to deliver national unity by labeling his opponents, people disagree with him as MAGA extremists. Joe Biden said he wanted to run on a vision of national unity. If he was going to deliver it, it would have happened already.

By the way, the single most unifying, he had his chance. It was teed up for him. He had his chance to unify this country. You know how he could have done it? Is when Donald Trump was arrested and indicted by Alvin Bragg, a member of Joe Biden's political party. If Joe Biden had said what I said at that same time, as somebody who was also running against Trump, that this is a politicized prosecution, it's persecution. And even though you shouldn't elect Trump, you know what? This is wrong and we should not arrest our political opponents. That was his moment for national unity. I don't think he cares about that. But here's the thing that's deeper, Megan. I think it's the joke and the farce in all of this that we may as well call out. Joe Biden's not really the one running for president. Let's just call that for what it is,

right? He's over twice my age and then some, but it's not even the age thing. It's his cognitive deficits. They're not a bug. They're a feature for the managerial class who would rather have a hollowed out husk in the White House. They're almost needling the American people. They're almost needling the citizens of this country, laughing, saying, you know how much we rule you

as the managerial class, the three-letter acronymists, bureaucratic soup in Washington, D.C.? We can put that guy up, barely mentally competent, present even as a human being. That's who we can put up, and we're still going to run the show for you. That's what this really is. And so when I see myself running against Joe Biden in this race, I'm not running against Biden. I'm running against the puppets, like the Wizard of Oz, the front front man for a managerial class that's behind it. That's really the heart of what's going on. And we might as well see that for what it is. And it's also why the DNC, by the way, doesn't want to have debates because they want to

make sure the front man for that managerial class isn't subjected to debate from the likes of RFK or Marianne Williamson or anybody else. And so I think it's worth seeing through the farce that somehow this is about Biden and his failure. He's just the stooge who's the front man at the end of it. Let's get to what's behind it. That's really what we're up against. And they're going to allow it. I mean, they're going to allow it. They are saying that they're not going to be debates. So RFK Jr. is not going to get this shot to go after Biden, nevermind Marianne Williamson or whoever else might try to throw their hat in the ring. But meanwhile, this is what they're up against. NBC News poll released Sunday. Should

Biden run again? 70% say no. Only 26% say yes. You look at the numbers. Okay, this is the Biden voters from 2020. Only 53% of them think that he should vote again or run again. Only 53 percent. He barely has a majority of the people who voted for him last time who want him again. And amongst young people, 18 to 34 year Democratic primary voters who say he should not run. The answers are he's too old. He's ineffective. There's a mental health problem. He's forgetful. He's not as sharp as he needs to be. We need someone younger.

By the way, Trump did not do well in this poll either. But right now we're on Biden. And what you are saying is reflected in the polls of his own party. But he is running again. Dark Brandon is back. That's how he chose to make his announcement. And not only is he not going to debate Vivek, he's going back down to the basement. The fact that this is on tape and he didn't have the ability to stand in front of a camera live and say these comments, never mind actual people and make his own re-announcement. That's it. As we get news reports, he's at a record low for press conferences and interactions with reporters, one-on-one interviews. He can't talk to anybody. I literally think he might be at the

point where he cannot. It's not will not any longer. He cannot. And we're really approaching crisis, a crisis point here. I mean, the fact that this is a form of elder abuse, that's just a cost of doing business for the managerial class. Same reason they want John Fetterman in one of those U.S. Senate seats. Right. I don't even blame these people at all. I feel bad for them. They're being used by a managerial bureaucracy that actually, this is how it works. And it's spitting in the face of their own base, by the way, right? This is the managerial class versus the everyday citizen. That's the struggle across the American and Western landscape today. It's even beyond America. It's definitely true, even within the Democratic Party, as you pointed out. But Megan, I think that if you look at those numbers and take

them seriously, this is the opportunity of a generation for the conservative movement, for the Republican Party to rise to the occasion and actually deliver what Ronald Reagan did in 1980, a landslide election. He did it in 1884 again, a landslide election that's the single most unifying thing that could bring this country together.

So I'm running this campaign, not even on Republicans versus Democrats. It's about whether you're pro-American. Do you believe in the ideals that set the country into motion? Free speech, open debate, rule of law, self-governance over aristocracy, merit. Who would have ever thought about that idea?

Versus a culture that wishes to apologize for the existence of a nation founded on those ideals. View it that way. It's not 50-50 anymore. It's easily 80-20 in our favor. And I think half the 20 are young people younger than me who never learned those ideals in the first place. 1980 can be a small landslide compared to what 2024 can be if we in the conservative movement in the Republican Party

actually step up and capture that opportunity. I'm in this race because I'm worried that's not the direction we're heading. Okay. Yeah. As a 37 year old. Let me stand you by that. That's a good place to pause it. Let me squeeze in a break and we'll come back and we'll talk about the gorilla and how you get past the gorilla, the 800 pound gorilla in the room because you are not the only one running for president and in particular for the GOP nomination. Stand by Vivek stays with us. And I'm also going to ask him about his thoughts on Tucker's termination at Fox News. And Vivek went on the 8 p.m. hour last night.

So the gorilla Vivek is Donald Trump. He's already been president, which definitely gives him a leg up going into this contest. And some have been critical of you running it all saying if you're not going to take on Donald Trump directly and tell us why you're better than he is, not just, you know, younger, but why are you a better choice? Then what's the point of this? Oh, I have been, Megan. I think a lot of those people are thin skin supporters of certain other candidates who actually suffer from thin skin themselves can take on criticism very poorly. My view is if you can't take the criticism, you shouldn't be sitting across the table from Xi Jinping. But I've absolutely been very clear about why I'm in this race vis-a-vis Donald Trump versus Donald Trump. Look, Trump went as far as he was going to go.

I'm an unapologetic America first conservative. I think I can take that America first agenda even further than Donald Trump did. Because to put America first, we need to rediscover what America is. And I tell grassroots audiences across the country this, Megan, America first does not belong to Donald Trump.

It doesn't belong to me. It belongs to the people of this country. Reagan actually ran on an America first agenda. It wasn't born in 2016. It was born in 1776. And the reason I think I'm gonna go further- What specifically? Beyond the rhetoric, get specific. Yeah, sure. So look, affirmative action. I push Trump's people on this. Why didn't you end race-based affirmative action? That's something that a US president can do. Lyndon Johnson started it by executiveS. president can do. Lyndon Johnson started it by executive order. You can end it by executive order. What they told me was

that was a political hill they didn't want to die on. Well, I'm not afraid of touching that one. I've said on day one, I would end executive order 11246. That's the end of a national cancer on our soul of affirmative action. The climate cult, not just talk about time horizons. I'm wholesale against the anti-carbon measurement framework itself, and I'll run the federal government accordingly. Trump will put Betsy DeVos on top of the Department of Education. I like Betsy DeVos plenty. You don't reform an administrative agency top down. You have to be willing to shut it down, which is why I said I would abolish the Department of Education. Trump's been saying that more recently. He's been saying that and people have been saying, why didn't you do it when you were president? Yeah, keep going.

Yeah, I mean, exactly. So look, I think, and this gets to the why, which I'll get to in a second, Megan, but there's plenty of contrast. Not just build the wall, use the military to secure that wall, secure the border itself. And I think there's a strong legal case for why you absolutely can use the US military to secure our own border, even though the defense establishment recoils at that idea. So you wanna ask for contrast? I've been unafraid about saying it, is that I think I will go further

with the America First agenda than Donald Trump did because I'm doing it based on first principles and moral authority, not just vengeance and grievance. And that's not a stylistic difference. That's an effectiveness difference. That's why Reagan was able to do what he did over the eight years from 1980 to 1988. I think I can do the same thing eight years starting in 2024, January 2025 when I take office. But I will tell you this, that is something that the America First base, the Trump base is actually hungry for and open to. And that's how I think I'm demonstrating

that contrast to not only go further with the agenda, but also to unite the country in the process. And I'm in this because I think I'm the single candidate in either party who has our last best chance of unifying this country, not just on show in the middle and saying, let's hold hands and compromise and sing Kumbaya. Certain other candidates might want to do that. I think we deliver national unity by embracing the radicalism of the ideals that set America into motion, stand on principled footing, and the other side will come after me, but I won't make it as easy for them to do that as Donald Trump did for himself. I will be living many of the values that I preach about, family values, belief in God. We're unapologetic about these things.

But when you lead with moral authority, I think you get to go further and unite the country. And it is a little bit of a laughable narrative. I think it's pushed by a lot of DeSantis' people because Ron DeSantis has very thin skin. He won't talk to people who disagree with him. And so if you're criticizing DeSantis, then he's jealous that I'm not criticizing Trump. To the contrary, I will talk very openly about why I believe I'm the best candidate. But just because I differentiate that from DeSantis doesn't mean that I won't differentiate that from Trump or any other candidate either. That's been a little bit of a laughable talk track. Yeah. One of those critics who I think does like DeSantis a lot is uh our our friend charles cw cook he comes on the show a lot but he was not your fan

as i know you know um he he wrote now he did reel me in with the beginning of his column because he referenced pride and prejudice which you know pretty much every woman i know absolutely loves and he was comparing you to mr wickham the fake he was comparing you to mr wickham he is a! He was comparing you to Mr. Wickham. He is a Brit himself, Charles C.W. Cook. Now he's an American. And he said, I first became aware of Vivek Ramaswamy at an event in 2021. Like Jane Austen's Mr. Wickham from Pride and Prejudice, he said you did the following,

which was a line from Mr. Bennett, Elizabeth Bennett's dad, as portrayed here in the 1995 version of the movie Pride and Prejudice. Listen. He's as fine a fellow as ever I saw. He simpers and smirks and makes love to us all. Simpers and

smirks and makes love to us all. That was the BBC version, which is amazing. I watched that whole thing on videotape. I have all the tapes. There are like 10 of them. Well worth your time if you're ever homesick. Okay. Anywho, his point is as follows, Evake. And I'm not trying to just rub your nose in a nasty column, but I've heard people raise this criticism and I know you have thick skin. He says, Vivek, he's not really running for president. He hasn't really given up his job.

He's transitioned into another one. He's not really thinking about what it means to be an American. He's building a ginormous mailing list. He's not really selling a vision that I have personally developed, quote unquote. He's running as Donald Trump's obsequious press secretary. That's an as, not a to be. As a candidate, Ramaswamy is not running to be Donald Trump's press secretary. He is running as Trump's press secretary. Ramaswamy seems set to become the first contender for president in American history whose approach to the race is to sell the virtues of the frontrunner better than the frontrunner can himself. And he goes on to say as follows. It was inevitable that at some point, a talented entrepreneur would come along and truly industrialize the process. And so it has come to

pass. Ramaswamy 2024. Buy the book, the ETF and the imminent show on Fox Business weekdays at 7 p.m. Eastern time. Your thoughts on it. I think it's pretty funny. I don't know the guy. I think it's an embodiment of why the National Review brand of conservatism has actually gone the way of irrelevance that it has in this country. Because the sense of respect that I exhibit in this race, that he mistakes for being for one man about Donald Trump is actually for the people of this country who I'm running to serve. Okay. So I think that the disrespect, the quiet condescension, I think there's a wing of the Republican party, frankly, that looks at the MAGA voter the way that much of the democratic establishment looks at black people. Shut up, sit down, do as you're told, because we're going to do better for you than you know

how to do for yourself. And I think that Charles Cook, I don't know the guy, but based on his writings, I think seems to embody that worldview of old school republicanism that I think is long out the door. And I think that I have to confess, I only read the first, thanks for reading me the rest, because it seems so far off the mark, I decided it wasn't worth my money to pay for the paywall to see the rest of that article. So I got something out of that exchange that you just delivered. Look, for me personally, this is table stakes for getting into race. You're running for US president. You better be willing to take the heat and take a little bit of criticism or else you shouldn't be asking the American people to sit across the table from autocrats abroad. It's my main issue with DeSantis is I think that he refuses to take that heat. I'll take that heat. I have no problem

with it. But I think here's the thing. I mean, the first part of our conversation, I don't know if that sounded very much like a press secretary for Donald Trump to you, Megan. I have no problem with it. But I think here's the thing. Here's the thing. I mean, the first part of our conversation, I don't know if that sounded very much like a press secretary for Donald Trump to you, Megan. I'm drawing a contrast on why I will take this much further than Donald Trump ever did. And I'm- Yeah, absolutely. That's why I asked you. What are the differences? And I've heard you say differences between you and Trump before. Yeah, I think Charlie, I love Charlie and I love National Review, but I do think that they're definitely more drafting behind DeSantis right now. They're not necessarily Trump fans and they- Of course they are. Yeah, of course they are. You haven't won them over so far. DeSantis right now. They're not necessarily Trump fans. Of course they are.

You haven't won them over so far. DeSantis loves that. I mean, we can talk about DeSantis separately. That's beside the point. Well, let's do that. Let's talk about him because he was in the news yesterday. I just want to finish on this point, though, just to finish this. The most funny part about that is I think that you quoted the price of the books, a book for $27.99. If you think I'm making money off books, that tells you exactly, or that's what I'm making my money. That's how far off base you are in your analysis. So you've never told me how much you're worth, but there are definitely reports that it starts

with a B. And I will say in our own past history, without really even knowing each other, more than once Vivek through other people has reached out to me to help people who have come on this show who have been canceled or hurt by cancel culture or had their lives ruined. I'm not even going to embarrass you by telling the stories, but extraordinary acts of kindness for these people who are in trouble. So I know it's not about money for you. I know that it is a heartfelt situation for you. And I'll tell Charlie that when I talk to him. Yeah, that's okay. Let's spend a minute on DeSantis. He, yeah, sure. There was this,

he's going to lie. He's going to want, he'll learn to love. Trust me. Um, the, uh, DeSantis was in the news yesterday for this kind of weird exchange and I don't totally understand what happened with it, but he looked a little deer in the headlights. He it's more of a clip for YouTube. So our listening audience, try to use your imagination to picture him kind of blinking and looking a little off when he was asked in Japan about, I think it was Trump's criticisms. Here's a bit, SOT11. Governor, a poll show you falling behind Trump. Any thoughts on that? I'm not a candidate, so we'll see if and when that changes.

The polls show you falling behind Trump. So what's your response? And just a very sort of weird moment with the facial expression. when that changes. The polls show you falling behind Trump. So what's your response? And just a very sort of weird moment with the facial expression. What do you what what do you think's going on in that? Because it went totally viral yesterday. I think there's a lot of insecurity. I mean, look, I actually shared a stage with Ron DeSantis once at an event. You know, we both spoke. I was in my Woking book tour. He was the main speaker. People came to hear him, not me. But I was also on that stage. And, you know, I got a standing ovation. He got a more muted response. He left and stormed off stage. He was supposed to stay for the dinner. He didn't. And I got coached afterwards. Be

careful not to upstage him again. It's the kind of thing that you look, I think he's been quite a good governor, actually. Look, I think Christine Ohm did a fantastic job on COVID. I think Ron DeSantis followed her lead, did a great job, too. He's somebody who actually does a good job of following other people's great ideas and executing them. And that's not a criticism. That's a compliment, actually, to be able to see other people's great ideas. You don't have to be the visionary. You can be the executor. I think that's part of what's made him a successful governor. I think that we live in a moment in American history now, though, where we need not only somebody who can execute but somebody who can actually be a visionary in the white house because we have an entire generation that needs to be inspired around what it means to be american and i think if you're

the guy who's going to say i'm not going to talk to nbc news because they're not nice to me i go take i go toe-to-toe with chuck todd i've done it just like i did with don lemon i have no problem with that i won't go to a college campus because the script isn't set about what kinds of questions you're going to get. Won't tell you whether you got the second COVID shot or not. I think you're not suited to sit across the table from Xi Jinping actually with a spine and represent American interests at the top job. And so I think that a big part of this is he's doing a fine job, a great job, I would say, where he is. We require many foot soldiers in this national revival. Governors are important to do this at the state level. But when you have the combination of thin skin without actually

having real vision of your own, I think that that actually just falls a little bit short of what we need in this country. And very honestly, Megan, I tried to squint and see every way from Sunday to really get excited about maybe this is a guy I can get behind because there's easier ways to do this than to spend gobs of our family's money and the time and the sacrifices we make traveling across this country. Life was good starting businesses and writing books, raising a three I think he could be a good troll of the left. I think he's an excellent troll of the left at times. But I think when we're looking for a leader of a nation that's going through a national identity crisis, that just ain't it. about putting the country first. We can't have somebody whose ego needs to be massaged and thin skin need to be managed because the world it's, it's the rule of the jungle on the global stage, which Xi Jinping or otherwise, I think we need someone with an actual spine. Some of these plans are outlined in capitalist punishment. And the way that what I love about the way Vivek writes is it's very easy to understand. He makes it like clear for people

like me who don't have a lot of time to pour over the book at night and we're tired. And so he is, he's very pithy, but his ideas come across very clear and you can learn a lot about what's happening with his ESG nonsense and his plan to stop it. But in the time we have left, I've got to ask you about Tucker Carlson, because now there are jokes going around that you are like the grim reaper. You were set to go on Tucker show last night. You were on Don Lemon show last week and you did, you didn't know Tucker was going to get fired, but you did go on last night. So how, how did it go? And was that uncomfortable for you? It's it wasn't kill me. Here's the, here's the, the meme Don Lemon. It's like Don Lemon with the door and blood coming out

Tucker Carlson with door open and blood coming out. And then there's Vivek as the grim reaper knocking on the third door. Who's behind the third door? Joy Reid? Who's there? I think that that was true for Don Lemon. Tucker's a friend. Look, I respect the heck out of the guy, Megan, because the thing I respect most about him is he's willing to buck any orthodoxy, even in the GOP. I was just watching, I don't watch the shows, I don't watch TV super often, but I happened to be watching it last week and there's someone from PETA that was on the show. I respect that, right? There's somebody who he disagrees with on a lot of things, but there's something he found common cause and agreement with. He was talking about the cancellation or even the political arrest of some black nationalists who he surely does not agree with on a lot, but was saying, you know, it's interesting how the left used to be the

party that said, the movement that said, I will defend to the death your right to say it, even if I disagree with you. I think Tucker Carlson is probably one of the best embodiments of that party that said, the movement that said, I will defend to the death your right to say it, even if I disagree with you. I think Tucker Carlson is probably one of the best embodiments of that in America today. And so, look, I think he's a friend, but at the end of the day, I don't know what went down there. I do think that whatever it's going to be that he does next, I mean, there were some people were asking me yesterday if I thought he should enter the presidential race. I said, that's a decision for, I can tell you from first personal experience, you should do that only if you are called to actually do it. But yeah, but my point is whatever he does, I'm sure he's going to have a continued

positive impact on the discourse of the country. In the meantime, I think that we're going to each have to continue speaking truth. And I had a good conversation with Brian yesterday about why I think the 2024 election is teed up for success if we step up and capture it. You raised such a good point on the left's old message. I may not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it. Contrast that with AOC. De-platforming works. I mean, my God, what a shift on the left. That's why it's important to have voices like yours out there. Vivek, thank you. Thanks for the book. Thanks for coming on. Again, the new book is called Capitalist Punishment.

It's out today. If it's anything like Vivek's other books, it's going to be a bestseller and well worth your time. Great to see you, my friend. Thank you, Megan. Appreciate it. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.