The Megyn Kelly Show - What Democrat Panic Means for Biden and Trump, and San Francisco Suddenly Cleans Up, with the Ruthless Podcast Hosts | Ep. 669
Episode Date: November 14, 2023Megyn Kelly is joined by Josh Holmes, Comfortably Smug, Michael Duncan, and John Ashbrook, hosts of the Ruthless Podcast, to talk about a new article describing all the ways President Biden is incapab...le of running a "normal" campaign, Democrats panicking over the general election polls, the hypocritical freakout from the left and media after Trump signaled he'd weaponize the DOJ and FBI against his political foes, the media spinning how the DOJ has been weaponized against Trump, whether Trump can execute on his immigration plans in a second term, Trump gaffes and reaction to saying "vermin," Trump's huge crowd response during a UFC event, the truth about Trump's 2024 general election chances, the latest front in the Vivek Ramaswamy vs. Nikki Haley war, Vivek reinventing himself as a version of Trump and Tucker Carlson, how Vivek and Haley represent different wings of the Republican party, who has the upper hand between Desantis and Haley, San Francisco suddenly cleaning up and fixing its homeless problem ahead of Presidents Biden and Xi visiting, Gov. Gavin Newsom admitting the truth about the reason for the sudden action, and more.More from Ruthless: https://youtube.com/ruthlesspodcast Follow The Megyn Kelly Show on all social platforms: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/MegynKellyTwitter: http://Twitter.com/MegynKellyShowInstagram: http://Instagram.com/MegynKellyShowFacebook: http://Facebook.com/MegynKellyShow Find out more information at: https://www.devilmaycaremedia.com/megynkellyshow
Transcript
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Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, live on Sirius XM Channel 111 every weekday at noon east.
Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show. Sometimes when we wake up in
the morning, we are faced with a slow news day. And then there are days like today where we need
eight hours for this show. We have San Francisco miraculously cleaning
up its homelessness problem and its crime problem just ahead of President Biden and President Xi's
visit. Amazing how they were able to do that. Meantime, there are new reports about Mr. Biden's
inability to run a normal 2024 campaign. Wait until you hear what Politico is saying about that.
And we have updates on just about every GOP 2024 candidate. Oh, it's getting uncomfortable
between Vivek Ramaswamy and Nikki Haley. It's like a little drama, a little drama for you today.
Plus, Megan Rapinoe thinks her career-ending injury is proof there is not a God.
The fact that she's leaving the national scene proves there is.
Thankfully, we have the perfect guest for it all here with me for the full show today,
Josh Holmes, Michael Duncan, John Ashbrook,
and the man known to his minions as Comfortably Smug Together.
They are the Ruthless program.
The program can be found now on video at youtube.com slash Ruthless Podcast.
Guys, welcome back.
Great to have the whole gang back together today.
I know.
Look at this full house.
Wow.
We have such a big shot now that somebody is hosting debates and things like that.
Yeah.
Thanks for having us.
Good lord. We're happy we got on are you in a suit i am does it look bad on me no what's going
on here did you have to do your day job today or something yeah job interviews
so dapper um you gotta listen to the ruthless program to find out what these mean mean men
ashbrook in particular did to poor michael Duncan, who forgot his jacket before the last debate.
Men are mean to one another.
That's how we show one another we love each other.
Yeah, that's true.
That's right.
I'm also, I'm a little brother and I can't, so like, they do it to me because they know I'm a little brother and I always take the bait and it always makes the joke funnier.
I can't help it. It's in my DNA.
Michael, what's wrong with the jacket, Michael?
Let's just say instead of a jacket store, he may have been redirected to I heard the word girdles on your program.
What are they, 70?
I don't know. South Florida, Megan. You never know what you're going
to get. You don't. Okay. Let's get into it. There's so much to get through. All right.
Let's start with politics. I heard you guys were interested in this story. And so am I.
Politico. Politico takes a hard look at how Biden can turn around his terrible poll numbers.
All these polls, New York Times, CNN, CNN, Bloomberg,
they're coming out showing him losing in these swing states
and other terrible news, losing with black men.
I mean, since when does a Democrat lose to the Republican
when it comes to black men?
In any event, this is Jonathan Martin at Politico
with the advice for President Biden
on how he can turn this around,
saying it will be an extraordinary election and it demands extraordinary measures. That's in part for President Biden on how he can turn this around, saying it will be an extraordinary
election and it demands extraordinary measures. That's in part for reasons Biden refuses to accept
his capacity to do the job. The oldest president in history, when he first took the oath, Biden will
not be able to govern and campaign in the manner of previous incumbents, he simply does not have the capacity to do it.
And his staff does not trust him to even try, as they make clear by blocking him from the press.
Biden's bid will give new meaning to a Rose Garden campaign, and it requires accommodation
to that unavoidable fact of life. In response to which Charles C.W. Cook of National Review writes,
I must stop Martin right here. This is not extraordinary. It is disqualifying. He does not have the capacity
to run or govern as a normal man. They're giving it up. I guess in any other sane world, they'd be
saying you really need to step aside. But the fear is so great of what will
happen with Trump. I don't know. What are the Democrats thinking that Biden's their man,
notwithstanding all these swing state polls? Why is Jonathan Martin trying to save him?
I mean, you got what you have to love is the point that you just pointed out, which is like,
oh, man, we got a candidate. He actually can't speak. He's like a Roomba in a room when he gets
out of it. He can't he doesn't go up from down.
We only get about half an hour, a good time.
How are we going to reelect him?
How are we going to make sure that this guy serves the American people?
We're going to have to be innovative.
They're like, well, we have to make sure that the American people
don't realize he's incapable of performing the job.
That's how we're going to run this.
We're going to band together.
Yeah, well, you guys talk about how he's like the Roomba in, you know, bumping into the walls
and the legs of the chairs, you said.
And it's true.
And we saw that when he was trying.
All he had to do was go to the wreath laying ceremony at Arlington the other day.
It's like every president does it.
Just go up there.
You do it and then you leave.
He couldn't even do that.
Look at this.
Doesn't know where to go.
Stutter steps. Turns around. Nope. Back over here, sir. Over here. All I can think of is,
again, again, back and forth. All I can think of is my cousin Vinny. Over here, dear.
Yeah, but to the point you made earlier, Megan, I think the only thing keeping him in this race and keeping Democrats hopeful that they have some shot to pull an inside straight here and reelect Joe Biden is Donald Trump's up by 40 points in the Republican primary.
And, you know, him being there, the 800 pound gorilla in the room is, I think, the only thing keeping Biden in this race because Democrats think they still have a shot.
Didn't they look at those polls I just mentioned?
Yeah, but I think they look at everything coming off their side of the ledger, whether it's black
men, right, or black voters or Hispanic voters. And they think we can bring those people home
if Donald Trump's the nominee, that it's just like a lack of enthusiasm for their choice in
the Democratic primary. They don't have one. And so they're expressing their displeasure in the polling
and saying, I'm not going to support Joe Biden.
But if you look at the rest of the polling there,
when they test generic Republican or Nikki Haley or Ron DeSantis,
they're winning too.
In fact, generic Republican leads Biden in all of those swing states.
He's the big winner.
By 15 points.
15 points.
We got to get that guy.
Yeah. Generic Republican. Who is that guy?
It's Stout. Draft generic Republican. Well, of course, but that's it's all, of course, a farce
because there is no such thing or person. And once a real person steps into the suit of generic
Republican, he or she has problems and inconsistencies in their past. And those numbers
come down. So it's fine to sort of say generic Republican,
but there's gotta be a body.
I mean, I feel like Mitt Romney
was as generic a Republican back then, not today,
as you could get, and he lost.
A little bit accurate.
No, it's very true.
But I think the point of Jonathan Martin's piece,
which I'm glad other people are picking up on at this point,
is when you're running a campaign,
every single person of any sort of consequence has moments of high negatives across the board.
And then you got to look at your policy matrix, and you got to look at your candidate,
and you have to figure out a game plan to try to win people back over. I mean, I'll remind people
of 2012 when you looked at Barack Obama, his numbers were not dissimilar from where Joe
Biden's are now. They were very, very tough. But Barack Obama, you knew you could barnstorm the country and he
was a pretty compelling speaker and he could make the case to the American people that he deserved
reelection. With Joe Biden, what Democrats are doing is looking at this and being like, well,
whatever hole he's dug for himself, there's no chance that he can dig himself back out of it.
So literally, the only thing we can do at this point is try to draw the Republican down
to where Biden is.
And I think to Michael's point, they see that with Trump right away.
They think that almost no matter what, they could run a cadaver against Donald Trump and
have an even odds shot at winning.
So I think that's the calculus.
I think that's what was captured in that Politico piece. And at the very least, this might be the first
election in history for president where the party out of power, the candidate out of power,
the election is a referendum on them because Donald Trump is going to spend the whole next year
battling these various court cases. And so like in a weird way, it's kind of like 2020 and Biden's basement
campaign. It's like actually let Donald Trump suck up all the oxygen because all that oxygen
ends up being negative for him. I think that's the fact. He doesn't think so. Did you guys see
he went into the Georgia trial is going to be televised because it's a state case in Georgia
and they allow cameras in the courtroom, but federal trials are not televised. They don't
allow cameras in for federal courts. And he went into that D.C. courtroom with that
judge who can't stand him, Tanya Chutkin, in the Jack Smith case on January 6th. And Trump is
asking for cameras in the courtroom, which I predict will be denied, as it would be by virtually
any federal court judge. But he's asking for cameras there. He definitely thinks
the trials, the persecution is helping him. And so far, he's been proven right on that.
Well, I mean, look, what he does best is put on a show. That's what he's done best for 50 years,
is put on a show. And, you know, I mean, he's had the number one show on television. I would
argue for the last six years, he's had the number one show on television still, right? It's just
everyone's channel. So of course he wants to do this. He wants to make a big show out of all of
it. I don't think it's going to help him in a lot of these cases, however, because look, their court
reporters are going to get an even readout of what's happening there, even from the conservative side of the ledger. It's tough. I mean, there's not a lot he can do, but try to make it a show,
in particular, as Duncan always talks about that documents case, which I think is the one that's
the toughest one. And in that poll that we were talking about earlier, they asked if Donald Trump
is convicted of one of these cases, does that change your opinion of him it's a 20 point
swing against donald trump with independent voters a general election audience so yeah i mean clearly
it's helped him a lot to be the guy fighting in this primary it's helped all of his bull numbers
but it's i mean it's a general election suicide yeah i mean i think it's incredibly important to
reiterate that point is that independent voters are incredibly shaky on donald trump if he's so
much as i mean there's what 50 charges 70 charges that he's facing right now 91 91 92 yeah when i do
two counts if he's convicted as so much as one of them independent voters are gone and the election's
lost well because he's just going to say i mean the dems are going to say convicted felon convicted
felon convicted felon and biden's going to say, I'm not debating a convicted
felon. Hell no. I'm going to stay in my basement or the Rose Garden, what have you. And it's
definitely a plus. But I don't know. Everything in the criminal lane has helped Donald Trump so
far. You know, Molly Hemingway over at The Federalist posted this graph of what happened
the day Alvin Bragg indicted him. That was the first one in New York.
And it was just, you know, he and he and DeSantis were like this with Trump a bit above DeSantis,
but it was still, you know, it was a ball game. And I mean, as of that day, Trump went off the
map. Biden started going down. And those two trajectories have never changed since. But wait,
I'll get to more of that in one second. I just want to stay on the political piece for one more minute because I love this. I love this piece of
it. So this is why we need more people who are right-leaning to write pieces in places like
political because, okay, I think most of us damn Republican independent can agree on what he's
saying here about how Biden does not have the capacity. OK, but then they get to the solutions. Here's this is him advising advising Biden.
I spoke with dozens of Democrats and anti-Trump Republicans about what the president can do
to to improve his prospects. The level of despair was striking. Here's a sample of what Biden can do. OK, number one. Get Liz Cheney. Liz Cheney
must be deployed and do all she can to bring other prominent figures with her, including
Dick Cheney, her father and former President George W. Bush. Liz Cheney is the answer
to their problem. That's solution number one they have here. Number two, Rahm Emanuel.
Bring him back. He's Biden's envoy to Japan. He needs to come back and chair the reelection. As for the Mideast, you have to bring
in Bill and Hillary Clinton because Biden cannot handle it all. And the last two I actually agree
with heave Bidenomics into the dumpster. Correct. And talk about abortion every day. Those two
things will help them. But what do you make of the Liz Cheney rescue plan?
Does that work, Johnny? I'm not buying it. I mean,
I mean, just to put it bluntly, if his plan is to call Liz Cheney and then call the Clintons, I really think that Joe Biden has a tougher road to reelection, even against Donald Trump. He has
a tougher road to reelection than these early polls suggest about what happens if Donald Trump is actually convicted. People are fed up
with Biden. They're fed up with the economy. They're fed up with what they're seeing on a
global stage. And they want something different. And this could be a different election than we've
seen in a long time with new candidates injected into the conversation. You know, there's
conversation, you know, RFK, how many states is he going to be on the ballot? Will that have an
impact? Would Joe Manchin be on a ballot? Will that have an impact? I mean, we could see a very
different cycle this year than we've ever seen before, simply because people are so dissatisfied
left, right and center with with Joe Biden. I don't know if
you saw this poll that came out just yesterday. Maybe it was two days ago that showed just how
dissatisfied people are with the state of the economy. There were more Democrats, Democrats,
more Democrats said that they were extremely dissatisfied with their state of their own
financial affairs than Democrats who said they were extremely satisfied. Democrats are fed up with Biden. And so I just think that we are in
a situation like we've never seen before. You also notice here is like, let me give you just
a little flavor and then I'll let you take it home. Biden's comms director is speaking to this,
the problem with the economy, the problem with Bidenomics. And here's how the team at the White House sees the issue. Listen to South 15.
Labor Department numbers came out for the third quarter. Nearly 8.4 million people in this
country are working at least two jobs. That's the highest number since 2019. So when people
are looking for that economic shift,
they don't feel it. To that woman, you say what?
Yeah, I'd say that that's precisely why we need another four years to continue to finish the job.
I think it's important, too, that the president, of course, wants to get all of this done. But we
have to be honest about the brick wall of MAGA extremism that we continue to run into when we're
trying to get things done for the American people. Wow. It's so good. It's like somebody who goes in for like a nose job
and it comes out all messed up. It's on the other side of your face. And this plastic surgeon says,
I just need another try. That's all. Just give me more time. You can get back under the anesthesia.
I swear it's all going to go great next time around. No, thanks.
Yeah, that's why you need another nose job. No question about it. I was going to let who broke it, fix it. I think that's a fair point, a reasonable point. I think one that most Americans
can follow along logically, fairly clearly and easily. I was going to say to your point about
the Cheney and Rahm Emanuel and the Clinton thing, you guys
noticed that everything that happens in the democratic world sort of like stopped in the
second term of the Clinton administration? Yeah. Like there's not a single name that's ever
surfaced in democratic hierarchy that's not like, well, he was second chair at the Department of
Labor in 1998. So I think he knows what he's talking about. You know what I mean? It's incredible to me that they've not surfaced a fresh face
anywhere in the apparatus from the candidate on through the entire operative selection process.
The only new thing they ever brought to the table was a geriatric named Bernie Sanders,
and they dispatched him quickly, as quickly as they took him off stage. And they're
like, no, then they buried him. More Clinton people. So back to the subject of Trump and his
legal challenges. He gave an interview to Univision this week and made some news. He's been
news about him. And this plan has been circulating in a few different publications. So he was asked whether he has sort of a revenge plan
in mind if he is to win a second term. And in classic Trump fashion, he kind of said,
yeah, yeah, he didn't really run from it. Here's what he said in SOT6.
You say they weaponized the Justice Department, they weaponized the FBI. Would you do the same
if you're reelected? Well, if they do this, they've already done it. But if they want to
follow through on this, yeah, it could certainly happen in reverse. It could certainly happen in
reverse. What they've done is they've released the genie out of the box. You understand that.
They've done something that nobody thought would happen. They've taken a president who is very popular.
I got 75 million votes, much more than that, I believe.
They've done indictments in order to win an election.
They call it weaponization.
And the people aren't going to stand for it.
But yeah, they have done something that allows the next party.
I mean, if somebody, if I happen to be president and I see somebody who's doing well and beating
me very badly, I say, go down and indict them.
Mostly that would be, you know, they would be out of business.
I have to say, I love I love his honesty.
I do. Like, I love how he'll say, yes, I'm going to do that.
Obviously, it's in the context of hello.
That is what they're doing to me.
And these are the risks of doing this to me.
That's very, very clearly what he's trying to say.
But what's great about this, obviously, them putting out in the press and then him saying it on camera here, is it did exactly what he thought it would do. The Democrats melted down, completely clueless,
un-self-aware reaction to this alleged plan as they're like, what? Who would weaponize the
Justice Department against a political foe? It's un-American. This is absolutely wrong. Here's just a sampling of that in Sot5.
A bunch of fat white pink boys, a bunch of phony populists that are going around talking tough and
unfortunately making threats that we, those of us who love democracy, those of us who actually
believe in the American experiment all these years later, have to be worried about.
We try to either call him out on the lies that he puts out there or not cover just frivolous stuff that he says that is lies.
But in this case, you have to look.
Guess what? Joe Biden isn't perfect. No candidate is, by the way.
But we have to understand what the alternative is
here. If elected to a second term, Donald Trump would prosecute anyone he deems an enemy,
unleash troops on protesters, and essentially unravel the rule of law as we know it. But sure,
Joe Biden is three years older and occasionally trips over things. So what would a second term
look like? It would look a lot like Vladimir Putin in Russia. It would look a lot like Viktor Orban in Hungary.
If he's weaponizing government against his
opponents, boy, are we in trouble.
He's already said he's going to come after
people like General John Kelly.
What about us? Try it. Go ahead, try it. We have
this show every day, okay, Donald?
Oh, jeez.
Okay, Joy.
What a fool.
You know, honestly,
I have a kind of a wild opinion on this. Okay, Joy. What a phone issue. You know, honestly,
so I have a kind of a wild opinion on this.
My greatest criticism of Trump is he never did the stuff the media accused him of.
I think they've created this monster of Trump
who's like this incredibly capable guy
who crushes his foes
and will use whatever levers of power are available to him
to do what he needs to get done.
And you know, that might
not have been the worst thing. And I mean, for so long, we can like complain about hypocrisy of like,
wow, can you imagine if a Republican did this? And like, at what point is it that we're going
to be like, you know what, let's just give them what they've given us. You know, I think there
has to be a point where it's just like, you know, mutually assured destruction was the way that you dealt with with with with the USSR, with the Soviet Union.
Give the Dems.
I mean, they're essentially the communists now at this point.
Give them a taste of their own medicine.
I'll never forget right after he won in 2016.
He sort of made up with Hillary Clinton.
Like after all the locker ups talk and everything, then there was no follow through on on any
of that.
What I think is most interesting about all those clips you played, like Jen Psaki and everything, is what you see in this when when, you know,
if Donald Trump is the nominee, you can already see the blueprint for how mainstream media,
liberal media, the Democrat Party has to have a therapy session with their voters to get these
people back on board. I mean, they're showing you exactly what they're going to do all next year. Yep. A hundred percent. And that's but that's always been
their cheat code in these elections. You can have a party that's ruining the economy,
that's diminishing America overseas, that's creating chaos in the Middle East, that's doing
like basically everything you would not want them to do. And yet they win in elections.
That's the reason, because they're really, really capable. And right now, the Democratic
hierarchy is really good at manipulating a Democratic voter into believing that Trump is
the worst of the worst. And it's it look at like John Fetterman in Pennsylvania. I mean,
this guy couldn't put a sentence together at the end of his campaign. And yet all those polling things that we talked about with with the Biden, what he's losing with
black voters and young voters and all these other things. Same was true of Fetterman on election
day. What happened? They voted for him. They voted for him. Same is going to be true again
in this exact circumstance because of what you're seeing play out.
I but I just can't get over how clueless these Democrats sound
and these media figures sound. We've been following the news. Trump is under four
criminal indictments. He's facing two civil fraud trials. Who do you think you're kidding?
And then you've got Kristen Welker out there on Meet the Press like,
well, I'll let you listen to it in SOT7.
He essentially threatened to indict his political enemies if he wins a second term.
Does that essentially make the Republican Party take a stance of the Republican Party stands for revenge?
What do you think of that messaging?
You know, I'm not going to get involved in rhetoric that's happening during a contested campaign for our presidential nominee.
I will say a lot of Republicans, Kirsten,
feel like there's a two-tier system of justice,
that Republicans are getting prosecuted
or persecuted through prosecution,
and they see it with President Trump.
Bob Menendez has been indicted.
The New York Democratic Mayor, Eric Adams, just had his phone searched by the FBI.
How can you guys continue to make that argument?
I think when you look at what's happened with the Biden family and what's been uncovered
since we've taken the House- Well, Hunter Biden's been indicted too.
I always think if this were Donald Trump Jr. getting that money, there'd be a big issue.
Good for Ronald McDaniel, by the way, 100 percent right.
Oh, 100. Biden's been indicted. You've got to be kidding me. Anybody paying two minutes of
attention to the news understands no one in the Biden Justice Department wanted to do that. They
were forced. Their hand was forced by that one federal judge who caught them trying to give him
immunity. Yeah, it would be so nice if we could just stop the dumb fuckery for like five seconds
you know if it would be so great if there was a democrat out there that was like
you know that is a really scary proposition to totally prosecute your political enemies
to make an entirely two system tiered of justice what are we doing that could, oh, wait a minute. We might have a problem
with that here. You know, no, give it, maybe it's what we create. They talk about how brilliant
Jack Smith is. They defend all the players involved in the prosecution against Trump.
They make a hero out of Letitia James, the New York state attorney general who ran,
who ran for office. Here she is. Here's just a little, Hannity put this together. It was very good. Look at side eight.
I will never be afraid to challenge this illegitimate president when our fundamental
rights are at stake. I believe that the president of these United States can be indicted for
criminal offenses. That man in the White House
who can't go a day without threatening our fundamental rights. Yes, we need to focus
on Donald Trump and his abuses. We need to follow his money. We need to find out where
he's laundered money. We need to find out whether or not he's
engaged in conspiracy. It's important that everyone understand that the days of Donald
Trump are coming to an end. I look forward to going into the office of attorney general every
day, suing him, defending your rights, and then going home.
This is the thing. What kind of a party? What kind of a party would use the courts as political revenge, guys?
The Democrat Party.
I think this is honestly central to their DNA at this point, is they are no longer interested
in competent leadership or making lives better for Americans.
That's very clear when you look at the economic data and the communications director says, yeah, well, we need four more years of this.
But if you look across the board, whether it's all these prosecutors that left wing
dark money groups, George Soros has funded to essentially unleash just legalizing crime
coast to coast across this country, or you look at how they're trying to pack the courts,
they're trying to get rid of Justice Thomas.
This is what their party is about lawlessness.
They want to have total control and they can't do that if voters are standing in their way.
They can't get these policies done like, you know, loan forgiveness, which the Supreme
Court had to step in and say, wait a minute, you can't just use taxpayer money to pay off
kids student loans.
That's not allowed.
They had to any policy that the Democrats want does not pass muster at the ballot.
So they have to take power by any means. And they're using the legal system to do it. Democrats are always guilty of what they
accuse Trump of. And they have been since the beginning when they accuse Trump of working with
foreign actors to influence the election was actually Democrats in the Hillary Clinton
campaign working with foreigners to influence the election. Now they're accusing Trump of going
after his enemies. And every single day, that's
all the Democrats do is they go after Republicans. I just I just love the idea that protecting your
fundamental rights includes investigating Donald Trump and whether he inflated the value of Mar-a-Lago.
Right. Defending you. I mean, do with inflation. So they're they're pivoting off of in part this Washington
Post report from November 5th, saying that what he wants to do is use the federal government if
he gets reelected to punish not just his opponents with the DOJ, somebody who might be giving him a
challenge electorally, but to go after people who he thinks betrayed him,
like John Kelly, Bill Barr and Mark Milley. I don't believe for one minute Trump's actually
going to do that. I really don't. I think he will actually go after somebody in the way that
they're coming after, like of like a Biden type or a Hunter Biden type. But does anybody really
believe he's going to actually sick the DOJ on John Kelly? Maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'll be proven
wrong. But this is what they're
reacting to because these are people that's a different like those you go after Joe Biden
and try to get him whatever criminally prosecuted. That's tit for tat. You go after Bill Barr,
your former attorney general, like some weird trumped up criminal charge. That's a different
story. I just don't to your point before smug. I don't actually think Trump would ever actually
do that. I think he likes to say that stuff because it makes him feel good.
Yeah, I mean, I think if we're all being completely honest of what a second Trump presidency would look like is it would look a lot like the first in terms of what gets done. you know, all these world leaders realize they can't essentially just do whatever they want.
The United States, it's the irony of when the Biden administration came, they said,
oh, finally, the adults are back in charge. And essentially, carnage was unleashed across
the entire planet. The Afghanistan withdrawal, the botched Afghanistan withdrawal that Biden
was responsible for, let the world know that, OK, these guys, you know, Biden clearly does
not know what he's doing. You saw Ukraine then gets invaded.
You see what's happening in Israel with the terrorist attack.
And now you have a State Department telling Israel to stop defending itself from terrorists.
You know, it's free reign for bad actors across the planet.
You never saw that under the Trump presidency because, you know, it's a lot like Nixon with
the madman theory of world leaders don't know what this guy is capable of.
And that fear keeps them in line.
And for the rest of the policy, OK, the border is going to be secured again.
I don't think there's any indication that we have that.
Oh, my gosh, he's going to turn like, you know, this country into a fascist dictatorship and he's going to show up and arrest Joy Behar while she's recording the view. How unserious are these people when Americans right now are suffering economically?
Inflation's going through the roof.
People can't buy a house.
The American dream is being choked out in front of our eyes.
And they're trying to say that, well, we got to worry about the price of Mar-a-Lago.
And is Joy Behar going to be able to have her TV show?
Heaven forbid.
Now, here's the other thing.
People are worried about the economy.
It's obviously the number one issue.
But a close second, maybe not a close second, but the second is immigration.
And they're not totally unrelated either.
But immigration in all the polls for all Americans, they care.
But Republicans really care about what's happening at the southern border.
And so in the midst of this, Trump, through his old pal Stephen Miller, who ran immigration policy while he was in the White
House and now is running the America First Legal, where they're filing all these really good
lawsuits, I have to say, Stephen Miller's been kind of on fire. He gives an interview to the
New York Times talking about what Trump plans to do to shore up our border and deal with the illegal immigration
problem. Now, I feel the need to say, because I do read Ann Coulter's substack, she'd be here saying,
bullshit, you didn't do it the first time. You're not going to do it this time. That's why she
turned on Trump. So take that for what it is. But this is what they say he's planning. He's going to round up undocumented people already in the United States.
He will revive banning entry by people from certain Muslim majority nations.
He will reimpose COVID-19 era policy of refusing asylum claims, bring back Title 42.
He will scour the country for unauthorized immigrants and deport people by the millions per year. He will reassign other federal
agents and deputize local police officers and National Guard soldiers to help ICE carry out
sweeping raids. He wants to build huge camps to detain people while their cases are processed
and as they await deportation flights, because right now we just send them right out into America
and we never track them or anything. He wants to revoke the visas of foreign students who participated in the anti-Israel protests.
He wants to end birthright citizenship.
He already said he would do that and he's saying he'll do it again.
But when I interviewed him, he said the lawyers told him he couldn't do it.
So that one's got a bigger question mark on it.
And he will expel suspected members of drug cartels and criminal gangs, quote, without due process, says The New York Times.
I obviously see this as a New York Times hit piece.
Like they're they're excited to tell their audience how extreme he is.
Have you heard of a more motivating plan for the Republican base when it comes to this very important issue?
What I was going to say is, wow, this sounds like a pretty great plan.
The border has been. We've talked about this before important issue. I thought I was going to say, wow, this sounds like a pretty great plan. The border has been,
we've talked about this before, Megan,
the border has been a disaster
for a very, very long time.
And it is way, way overdue for a fix.
And everything that he laid out,
he talks about camps.
I don't know if you've seen
where Eric Adams has immigrants
up in New York,
but he's got giant tents and camps
where he's put these migrants.
And The New York Times is acting like, oh, well, you if if if a Republican does something similar
to that, that's a problem. What Trump is talking about doing is shutting down the border. Now it
has to happen. He's talking about removing people who aren't supposed to be here that aren't here
legally. He's talking about getting the
terrorists out of this country. And anybody who saw with horror what happened in Israel on October
7th, when these terrorists came over the border and into the country, and the same people know
that Hamas is here now, they want to terrorize American people. People are afraid. They're
scared and they want the government to do
something about it. Democrats aren't doing anything about it. And Donald Trump is saying
that he's going to get serious. And I think that a lot of Republicans are eager for that sort of
thing. I think I'm kind of with Ann Coulter on this, though. And I think I hear you.
Here's the thing is like we saw what happened in 2020 when BLM and these rioters and these anarchists were burning down American cities.
And you talked earlier about deputizing the National Guard.
Donald Trump tweeted law and order a bunch of times and took his advice on crime from Kim Kardashian, not Tom Cotton.
That's the reality.
That's the reality. That's the reality, is when push came
to shove and he had to make hard choices for law and order, he didn't do it.
I mean, that's the thing that I keep picking up on all this. I mean, look, the plan,
some of it's executable, some of it's not. The problem that I have with everyone saying,
well, Trump is the only one that can do it, is that he actually had the opportunity to do all
of those things and he didn't. Part of it is because they didn't think about it. Part of it is because they couldn't
build consensus around the things that required legislative activity, like, I don't know,
funding borders and things like that, which require Congress. Heads up, everybody. You can't
just roll into the White House and sort of tip your cap. You're going to get the exact same
treatment out of the Supreme Court that Joe Biden has for forgiving student loans. All this stuff requires a know-how and consensus
building to actually get done. The funny thing is, I think there's tons of consensus over two-thirds
of that list that you just talked about. There is a massive amount of Americans, center, left,
and right, that believe we have to secure this border and you have to do extraordinary things
to get it done. Could you put that kind of thing in front of congress if you actually worked with congress to do it yeah i bet
you could i bet you could figure out how to do that problem is is that there's not been any
demonstration at this point of the ability to do that lastly we keep talking about the deep state
and who's going to eliminate the deep state and it seems like the number one talking point of the Trump campaign is this is the guy to eliminate the deep state.
Has there ever been in the history of this country a greater victim of the deep state
than Donald Trump? I know a lot of presidents, Republican presidents that have come in
who have been victimized in one form or another by a deep state. They made some changes and tried to figure it out,
but I've never seen anybody who's been completely thwarted by the deep state. That happened. It
happened for four years. So now we're revisiting all of this and planning on this guy being the guy
who's able to do it, except he's the only one in the field who's demonstrated beyond a shadow of
a doubt he couldn't. That's my problem. One thing I actually want to rebut something that Duncan said of,
you know, taking Kim Kardashian's advice on the law. I think that's more like Trump 90 chess.
He was like, you know, maybe if I do some felony criminal reform, this might help me out later down
the road and that might help him run the election. He'll be glad he did that.
Well, honestly,
that could be true because Jared Kushner
was pushing it.
He's looking out
for his father-in-law.
Jared Kushner partnered
with Van Jones
and Kim Kardashian.
And before we knew it,
we let a bunch of felons
out of prison.
Go ahead.
Jared was like,
listen, I have a dad
who's been in jail.
Let's make sure
it doesn't happen to you, Tom.
You want to hear the inverse?
The inverse of 9D chess is the criminal penalties
for taking national security documents and mishandling them have been increased. Right.
Do you know who increased them? President Donald Trump. It was a campaign promise after he beat
Hillary Clinton, because remember, Hillary Clinton with the server and 30,000 emails.
Donald Trump increased the penalties for mishandling classified information.
And then did the thing.
And then did the thing.
Allegedly.
Allegedly.
It'll all play out.
All right, stand by.
I'm going to squeeze in a quick break.
And then there's so much more to go over.
My God, we have just an embarrassment of riches to talk about today.
More with the Ruthless fellas straight ahead.
So fear not, because if you are not a Donald Trump fan, he has committed the gaffe of all gaffes.
This is the one that's really going to stop him. If you just tune into Morning Joe and The View, they will make clear to you how this is the thing that's going to put voters over the top because he's really
crossed the line this time by referring to his enemies as vermin. Listen.
In honor of our great veterans on Veterans Day, we pledge to you that we will root out
the communists, Marxists, fascists, and the radical left thugs that live like vermin
within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections. The threat from
outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous and grave than the threat from within. So, I mean, cue virtually every left wing critics comment that that is,
quote, straight up Nazi talk. He's dehumanizing people, dehumanizing
presidential historian Joe Meacham on MSNBC. Morning, Joe. Because to call your opponents
vermin. Now, he said they were like vermin. But in any event, to dehumanize them is to not only open the door, but to walk through the door toward the most ghastly kinds of crimes.
Trump campaign spokesman spokesman says these people are clearly snowflakes grasping for
anything because they're suffering from Trump derangement syndrome. So I don't like I'm amazed
that they still cover comments like that with the
breathlessness, but they do. What do you mean? These people are in no position to lecture us
when they've been trying to say from the river to the sea is actually a very friendly thing to say.
Right. Right. It's just it's aspirational. Yeah. The left is literally marching in the
streets saying kill the Jews. But Donald Trump said ver vermin so let's stop the presses and let's start talking
about that it's just incredible i think and i think donald trump this plays into his hands
right like he's been doing this since 2015 it's like he he will ramp up the rhetoric to suck up
all the oxygen to get the media to write and light their hair on fire and it always benefits him in
the end it's also so amazing that like the media
uses this decoder ring to be like, well, what they really meant was every time Donald Trump
does something, it's like, well, what he really meant was Nazis are great. And what he really
meant in here was a genocide. And except then you got like a substantial part of the left that was
like Nazis were great genocide. And then you have the White House that's
out looking at like, well, I don't know. There's a lot of anti-Semitism around. What we need
is a commission to study all this anti-Islam. That's what we need.
And like New York Times is doing hit pieces on him for his Nazi-like rhetoric in referring to people as vermin, they literally just hired somebody who
said, Hitler is great. Love Hitler. Yes. Go Hitler, go. But Donald Trump's saying like vermin,
that's a bridge too far. They've given up the whole gig. So meanwhile, like we saw in 15, 16,
21, Trump is not particularly obsessed with what the times or anybody else is writing about him.
Trump is doing what Trump does. And he showed up at the UFC.
I don't follow sports and I certainly don't follow UFC, but UFC fighting.
I don't know. Madison Square Garden. There was some sort of a fight run by UFC.
I don't understand what it is. It's mixed martial arts. Forget it.
I'm already off on a limb. I don't know what I'm saying, but they fought and he was there and look at him come in. He is with Kid Rock, Tucker Carlson,
and Dana White. Okay. Okay. So that would be what we'd call base play a base play right to get that like
does Cora Maga want to see people any more than they want to see Kid Rock Tucker and Trump
together like I don't I'm not sure who you could throw in there to make them even happier but what
do you make of it because it seems smart to me I know it's like suburban wine moms,, way outside of anything you saw from Romney
and Bush and Clinton and everybody before him,
this sort of state approach to office.
And a lot of people argue that's the right approach,
but he gets people excited.
He's very entertaining.
And to the extent that he can continue to entertain people,
they want to see more.
I mean, the energy levels were off the charts in that clip.
And everyone was talking about it when it happened.
And it's like this level of mania that he can generate where people are like, does this
mean Tucker's going to be the vice president candidate?
Like people lose their minds in that excitement.
And that's a very powerful thing for when he runs for election.
And he's always had this, you know, this way of putting himself in cultural space
to make himself relevant. I don't know if people realize this, but like Donald Trump did,
I think like WrestleMania, like 25 years ago, and it's still rated of like the highest
WWE programs of all time, of all time. So like very early Donald Trump realized
where his audience was. They,
they, you know, weren't people that read white papers. They cared about politics on a cultural
level that was totally different and adjacent to conservative values of the Republican party,
but wasn't it wasn't the same thing that the other candidates are going for. And so all of
these things he benefits from when he shows up at a place like that. I also think part of the allure to it is the utter shock from the left who had probably
not encountered anybody who's voted Republican in 30 years to see a stadium full of people
yelling and screaming for Donald Trump.
They're probably like, oh my God, what is this?
Who are these monsters?
Morning Joe said this wouldn't happen.
Yeah, in New York City, no less.
It feels like they're, you know,
like they're watching zoo animals at some level.
It's like, this is a culture I don't understand.
And I think it's that,
that combination of him understanding, like you said,
the stadium culture and all of that
with the reaction from the left.
It's like, my God, we've got big trouble.
To me, like a part of what I see here is how feckless the mainstream media is, how they're irrelevant.
They just don't drive opinions anymore. Are there any two individuals in America that they have
tried to convince us more are horrible, racist, misogynistic assholes than
Trump and Tucker. Right. Like, right. It's a fail. It didn't go so well. I'm sure there I know there
is a core piece of the left wing base that believes that. But that was a hero's welcome.
And I realize it's UFC. It's a certain niche. But as he pointed out in that interview,
75 million Americans voted for him. The New York Times does not drive the opinion of the mainstream or even the center anymore.
Well, remember, they tried to convince the entire country that Mitt Romney was a misogynist in the
middle of that campaign. And I think that that's one of the I was just like one step on this like
long, slow trajectory to people not believing
anything they read or anything that they, they see on television. They're just look, that's why
people are looking for alternate media because they're looking for something that's actually
the truth, not the lies that they keep hearing over and over again. I get that. But then like,
I look back at 2022 and realize like a lot of these races, these Senate races and swing states across the country
are really decided by not people that watch UFC,
but like suburban women and stuff like that.
And it is still a concern.
I mean, like-
Yeah, I don't want to fly by that.
And like, no, this means he'll win.
We haven't won, truly won an election since 2016.
I don't think any of us should be like-
There is that pesky fact.
Well, you know, gosh, it's just that everybody loves him so much.
All right, wait, I do want to pick this up because I'm interested in the wine moms and
what they're going to do. I love that it's been changed from soccer to wine.
Because I will say there's going to be a certain group that looks at that and says
toxic masculinity.
And they're not all Dems. They're not all lefties. So we'll pick it up there and we'll
talk about the attacks on Trump because now he's made a few gaffes. The Biden team's picking up on
it. The DeSantis team is picking up on it. And we'll get into that between Vivek and Nikki next
as the guys from Ruthless stay with us for the full show. Don't forget, you can check out more of our show at YouTube dot com slash Megan Kelly.
If you'd like to watch all these wonderful clips that you're listening to, check it out.
OK, so the wine moms, the soccer moms, they're maybe they're not having the same reaction.
Right. As you said, you say it as the UFC fans to Trump, maybe not even to the immigration plan. You know, let's face it. They are a bit more moderate Republican voters. That's why he didn't do as well with them. And Biden did a little better with them enough to make a difference in the 2020 election. So I think the conventional thinking is they're so fed up with this Biden economy and the open border and all the bullshit, they're ready to
pull the lever for him anyway. Are we losing something? Are we not seeing the truth if we
jump to that conclusion? Yeah. No, I mean, we are not seeing the truth if we come to that conclusion.
The reality is in 2022, the best measure of all of this is
the exit polls that came out after the election, where it showed definitively that Republicans won
the argument over the economy. They won the argument over crime. They won the argument over
immigration. They won the argument over this administration's excesses and periodic tilt off the left-hand side towards socialism,
suburban moms, I mean, they bought it just as well as anybody else. And you know what else they did?
They voted Democrat. They voted Democrat. And part of the reason for that is that they don't
trust the Republican Party under Trump, that they are concerned about a whole range of issues dealing with how he conducts
himself, whether there's fealty to Trump over the Constitution, all kinds of different nuances.
But underlying it is this tonal problem that they will believe and do believe strongly
that Republicans have a better policy prescription for this country than Democrats do.
And they still do not trust it.
You got to ask yourself at that at that point, is this a brand problem?
And what is that brand?
I don't know how you come to a different set of conclusions.
I mean, literally, we just had an election last week.
You have a president at 33 percent.
And you granted, I think Republicans did better than is being portrayed in the media.
But they didn't wipe out the Democrats. Typically, over the last 20 years, when presented with those kind of numbers, there's a wipe out one way or another.
It didn't happen. Didn't happen in 2022 with very similar circumstances again if we're being serious about this and we're just looking at outcomes and poll numbers i don't know how you come to a different conclusion and we must
be serious about this keep going i mean yeah i mean that's dire but i think that's just gospel
that's god's honest truth all of it i mean a difficult thing that we're facing and i remember
in 2022 like i saw some of the ads and some of the commentary from mainstream media about, you know, January 6th or the threats to our democracy and
all of these sort of things. And like, you know, hand up, I was wrong. It was persuasive to those
suburban moms and those independent voters, those moderate voters that live in the suburbs of this
country. And they vote a lot, you know, like they vote in every election. And if you can't win those people back, you do not have a majority.
You can't make it up with black men growing vote of Hispanic.
I'm just thinking of typical Dem groups that are migrating red.
Yeah, but I mean, look, that was tried in 2020 by Donald Trump.
Remember, the first Super Bowl ad in 2020 was Alice Johnson and criminal justice
reform. And the Trump people said, like, Donald Trump has this unique swagger and he's going to
attract minority voters. And it didn't happen. It didn't happen in 2020. And when they look at
that poll that we mentioned at the top of the show, Megan, where like he's leading Biden,
all these swing states, they will also make the argument. He does really well with Hispanics
because he's different. He's not a conventional Republican. But again, we talked about it. Nikki Haley's
numbers are even better than his. Ron DeSantis is right there with him in the same place. Generic
Republican is winning by 15 points in all these swing states. So it isn't like Donald Trump has
this unique prescription that if like walk a flock of flame endorses him and like all these other
rappers come out, that suddenly he's going to
do a lot better than Republic. I mean, it's I hate to I feel like I'm the bringer of all the bad news.
I'm sorry. No, we need truth. I think that's just reality. Is Waka Flocka Flame an actual rapper?
Yeah, seriously. Yeah. Megan, I thought that would be on your playlist.
Harden the paper. I thought that was a joke. I think your audience would love it.
No, it's real.
And I think he actually did endorse Donald Trump.
Yeah, he did, for sure.
Excellent.
Well, I think the bigger problem, though,
is if it's anybody other than Trump,
the Trump people are probably going to stay home, right?
I mean, isn't that the biggest challenge
the GOP is facing right now?
If they decide to dump him,
not only is the Trump base not going to want the new
person, but he Trump will make sure that the new person fails. I so I don't buy into this thought
that Republicans, unlike any other rational human, will be like, you know what? Everything is
terrible. Over 80 percent of Americans in that poll, which was conducted by the Ross School of
Business at Michigan, over 80 percent of Americans said that they are economically worse off today than when Joe
Biden became president. That is going to be motivating to a ton of voters. My worry specifically
about the, you know, the the white the white mom demographic is this is like a very hardened
leftist group. Like you will not find more committed leftists in a lot of these instances in the middle
of Brooklyn than you have in parts of this country where, I mean, you look at the cause,
like when there were the BLM marches going around this country, it was about 75% suburban
wine moms.
Oh yeah, I know half of them.
There it is.
But I think it's, I mean, look, it's easy.
There is that, for sure. But then you also have suburban demographics
and people who voted for 20 years for Republicans
that all of a sudden stopped
and are the ones I was talking about
that believe in all of these Republican policies.
And, you know, it's easy on a piece of paper
or just rhetorically to be like,
well, we traded out the suburban wine moms
for a growing Hispanic voter base
or a growing African-American voter
base, neither of which are particularly true, by the way. There are places where multi-generational
Hispanic voting blocs have increased, for sure. But if you look at the states that matter in the
context of a presidential election, you're dealing with trading out a population that is far larger,
far more frequent to vote than everything else that you're talking about here.
Right. We're talking about just Ohio, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin.
I mean, all of these, Georgia, all of these places we're talking about trading out a population that
literally makes it possible to get to 51. Arizona. I mean, like 75% of the vote
will be in Maricopa County,
in one county,
one county or outside.
And what are they?
They are McCain voters.
Is it like Scottsdale?
Yeah.
Is that suburban?
Yeah.
That's suburban.
So like you wonder
how it is that you could win a state
for 35 years
and then all of a sudden lose it
in four straight election cycles.
Like, I don't think this
is particularly difficult. It's like just putting blinders over your eyes, pretending you're going
to have a different outcome. Well, here is the other problem emerging with the GOP front runner.
Not to say he's in Biden's league, but he is not in DeSantis or Vivek's or Nikki Haley's league when it comes to mental acuity.
That's just the reality for most guys who are 77.
Not all.
Dershowitz, I put up again.
Dershowitz has better mental acuity than I do.
And he's 85.
But in any event, Trump, for sure, he's lost a couple steps.
And Ron DeSantis is pointing it out.
He's getting a little bolder and calling it out.
Ron DeSantis tweeted out this video of Trump falling down on the job with it when it came
to the word things. And Biden retweeted it. The Biden campaign retweeted it. My God. I mean,
that's an interesting dynamic. Here's a mashup of Trump. He keeps calling Biden Obama. The first time I thought it was a genuine slam,
like Obama's the puppeteer and Biden is his puppet. But you can tell in the context of
listening to these clips, it's not intentional. It's a slip. He's messing up sort of where he is.
That can happen. But just if you look at the greater context of the number of times this
keeps happening, you start to pay attention. Here it is. And we did with Obama. We won an election that everyone said
couldn't be won. Almost 500 miles of wall. Even the Obama administration says it in their stats.
Fauci became big in the Bush administration in the it's almost the same thing in the Biden
administration. He would order the Defense Department to use special forces to inflict maximum damage.
I didn't say that. People said I said, why would I say that? I didn't say that.
Furthermore, I will order the Department of Defense to make appropriate use of special forces to inflict maximum damage.
OK, you would send special forces and other military assets to Mexico.
I didn't say that.
Somebody said I said that.
The beauty was when I came here, everyone thought Bush was going to win.
They thought Bush because Bush supposedly was a military person.
Great.
You know what?
He was a military.
He got us into the Middle East.
How did that work out?
We would be in World War II very quickly. Big hello to a place
where we've done very well. Sioux Falls. Thank you very much, Sioux Falls. So Sioux City, let me ask
you. Okay. So you confused Sioux Falls, South Dakota versus Sioux City, Iowa.
So what do you guys make of the montage and whether this is a problem? Because one of the
biggest issues with Joe Biden is his age and yes, infirmity. So I think it falls into the category
of you live by the sword, you die by the sword, right? When you have made over a period of time somebody else's mental acuity, the focus of all of your attacks,
yours comes under greater scrutiny as a result. Now, I think that there is a massive difference
between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. And I would take Donald Trump 10 times out of 10 in any sort
of mental- Trump is not a Roomba.
Yeah, exactly.
He is not a Roomba.
I wouldn't want to be held to the same standard of having to be perfect on stage all of the time,
which unfortunately, that is where he is when you make that a center of your attacks.
But as to the age thing itself, look, that's part of the deal.
I mean, he's not going to erase his chronological age. And that has been a core critique of all of his primary opponents.
It's going to be an issue. And I think he's going to have to overcome that a little bit
in order to keep that alive for Joe Biden. I think part of the other issue for Donald Trump
right now isn't the acuity. It's the focus. I mean, I think this is a guy who's distracted.
He's indicted 91 times. If you just want to see how distracted he is, go to his true social page.
And like, he's up at all hours in the night arguing with Letitia James about, you know,
the value of Mar-a-Lago and then arguing about documents or arguing about January 6th and all
that stuff. And it's like, that takes a toll. That takes a toll on any human being, having their time divided on all these other things that you want to attack and not be
focused on the job at hand, which is like winning the election. Right. You know, the other thing I
think that's worth pointing out here is that his primary opponents need to be doing more of this
stuff more often if they want any chance at closing this giant gap he's opened up. And it's kind of
wild to me that more of his
opponents didn't do this stuff early on. I mean, maybe Trump's rise wouldn't have been
as rapid through the summer and through the fall if these primary opponents had taken him to task
in such a clear way as Ron DeSantis is doing right now. And I think that he's going to have
to do a whole lot more of that if he wants to close the gap in Iowa. No, there's a real question about whether it's it's too little,
too late. We saw Tim Scott bail out of the race. And I mean, there's I don't think there's another
nicer guy in politics, but he did not resonate this time around. It was actually kind of a
stunning exchange. I'm sure you guys saw the clip when he was on with Trey Gowdy on Fox.
And according to reports, even Tim Scott's campaign staffers, or at least some healthy collection of them, did not know he was going to announce he was, quote, suspending his campaign.
That's how they say it now. They're dropping out. So we have the clip. Take a look.
I love America more today than I did on May 22nd.
But when I go back to Iowa, it will not be
as a presidential candidate. I am suspending my campaign. I think the voters who are the
most remarkable people on the planet have been really clear that they're telling me
not now, Tim. I don't think they're saying, Trey, no, but I do think they're saying not now.
And so I'm going to respect the voters and I'm going to hold on and keep working really hard and look forward to another opportunity.
I, you know, I feel a pang of sadness.
Such a good guy and a good guy like that should be able to make it in american politics in the gop primary race
and yet he obviously couldn't um what do you guys think of it i saw charles again cw cook he's
getting a lot of mentions this week because he's brilliant saying he bailed out because he actually
was running for president and he yeah this is not an ego play for him or a vanity play for him
yeah i mean look i think it's one of the differences between this field and the 2016 field in a lot of different ways is that people,
when they chose to run for president, knew that it was going to be an uphill task, but thought it
was an important one and thought that voters deserved a very real choice against a former
president that they see the world differently from. You saw this happen in former vice president
Mike Pence. You've now seen it with Tim Scott. The field is beginning to winnow here much quicker
than it did in 2016.
Does it ever get down to that one-on-one point where this is actually a real race?
I don't know.
But if there's at least a chance of that because of people like Tim Scott who were running
to try to win this thing, and when they knew it wasn't their time, they think enough of
the Republican primary electorate to give them a real choice in that regard.
That's such a patriotic thing to do.
But meanwhile, not everybody feels that way.
I mean, we all know Chris Christie has virtually no chance, you know, with all due respect
to the former New Jersey governor.
I realize he's playing a different role.
He's sort of being a Trump antagonist.
But, you know, there are just no numbers behind his campaign, even in New Hampshire, where
he's supposed to be putting most of his stock,
he's not looking that good.
And you can't win by just winning New Hampshire, right?
You got like, anyway, he's still in it.
And as far as we can tell,
no plans to bail before he gets to New Hampshire.
And then you've got Haley DeSantis and Vivek.
Now, things are getting interesting because really
right now at the top of that triad are Haley and DeSantis. And Vivek is considerably lower than
those two in the polls. But the fighting right now at the debates and elsewhere has been between
Vivek and Nikki Haley. And DeSantis is kind of like trying to stay out of it. And they're not
really coming for him. She's tried to come for him a little. He hasn't really engaged. It's kept him out of the fray.
I don't know if that's good or bad, but I want to bring you up to speed on what's happened between
Nikki and Vivek as of late. You saw the third debate, right? Where they had their back and
forth. She called him scum. He brought up her daughter. It was unpleasant.
He went on Vivek Ramaswamy with Clay and Buck.
And Clay, Travis put it to him very frankly, like, she doesn't like you.
Why doesn't she like you?
Because she definitely doesn't like you.
And it led to a very interesting answer.
Take a listen to it in part.
Why do you think she dislikes you so much?
Because it does seem personal, like the way that she's gone after you i mean you raised the point that her daughter is on tiktok her daughter's
grown um and she was i mean she this is not acting right she seems to genuinely not like you
where do you think that comes from i think it comes from a deep-seated envy of sorts, actually.
I mean, there's a woman who's never made an honest dime in the private sector but clearly aspires to be wealthy and sees me as, I think, a young buck who has not – I didn't mean that in the buck sense of –
I get you. I get you.
A young buck who, you know, I think hasn't put in the kind of earned the kind of stripes that someone like her has.
You know, funny story. The first time we met was actually her reaching out to me.
There was something striking about it. I mean, she was it was a very calculating move.
Right. This guy could be a player. I want to be the first person probably to reach out from getting him on my side.
He ends up blurbing the back of the book. So this is somebody who for her entire
career has proven she will do literally, and you can look at the full extent of her past in South
Carolina, she will do literally whatever is required to get ahead. To her now to say that
out of turn to challenge her past to power, I think that she does take that very personally.
But frankly, even in this conversation, I think we've spent too much airtime on somebody who is really just
another manifestation of a modern Dick Cheney that has no place in the modern Republican Party.
He is just so annoying of that. He is so he's just so annoying. I mean, just so pompous and
narcissistic. And Nikki has what, three times the poll numbers he does.
And he sits there and talks down to her like he's the future of the Republican Party.
Pal, you got five points in the polls, five points. And he had a little boomer after the
first debate because people were like, wow, this guy's interesting. And he seems really,
really smart and articulate. And then his poll numbers cratered because he's the kid
in the first chair in the classroom begging for more
homework from teacher. It is just annoying. It's like I just don't think I mean, people call me
after these debates, you know, family, extended family. I have not heard a positive thing about
Vivek since the first debate. What did you think, Michael, about his criticism on the honest dollar piece of it. Well, I mean, Vivek Ramaswamy, you know, he he bought
a pharmaceutical drug that had failed clinical trials like four or five times and then repackaged
it and IPO the drug made like a ton, a ton of money and the thing failed again. And he's going
to lecture everyone on business acumen. It's patently absurd.
Like, I mean, he has hundreds of millions of dollars. I mean, yes, he does make money. He
does. And you know what? Tim Scott had all the money in the world to keep in this race. And he's
a patriot who was like, it's not my time. The voters have said that guy's got like twenty five
million dollars of candidate money. And he got out of the race because he wants to do the right
thing. Don't you see? Let me ask you this, Duncan. Vivek doesn't care. I see him, at this point, Vivek knows he's not going to win the nomination.
I see him more like a Ron Paul.
Remember how Ron Paul used to stay in it
just because he wanted us to hear his libertarian views
and it was just a platform to sort of get his thoughts out into the mainstream
and get them discussed and considered?
Don't you think Vivek is doing something like that?
I'm so glad you said that because I think it has reconstituted. I think it's reconstituted the very online Ron Paul world of 2012 that was like
brigading drudge polls to make it look like Ron Paul was going to be the nominee. But it just
hits different, Megan, when it comes from nice grandpa who looks like a teddy bear than when it
comes from Vivek. Because Vivek is just grading and it feels like he's lecturing you
and he tilts his head and points his finger in the air.
And I just think the visual representation of that
is just annoying.
Also, I think it's a wild thing
that Ron Paul's policies sound more sane than Vivek's.
When Vivek is like,
I'll find everyone in the government,
we'll see who has an odd social security number.
At the end, if it ends in an odd number, you're fired.
It's an awful approach.
I said at the time, it sounded like the Cato Institute was being run by Anton Chigurh.
Like we're just going to flip a coin and some sociopath is going to decide whether you have
a job or not.
Well, I'm fine because mine ends in an even.
So I don't know about the rest of you people who also have a job.
So I'm pro.
But I do think like
the words he was using were very interesting that she has a deep seated envy of him because he's so
wealthy that if you listen to a whole clip, he says, she came to me, he talked about a little
bit there where he says, I was putting woke ink out and she called me up and she saw me. He says,
and that, that, Oh, he could be a player. He said, I was a rising star.
And she came to me and like sort of tries to schmooze him,
wound up blurbing his book.
She doesn't look wonderful
if you hear the full context of, you know, the clip.
And then you tell me what he's implying at the end.
Cause he says she will do literally
whatever is required to get ahead.
He named Boeing.
He's trying to do the Trump thing. He's trying to do the Trump thing.
He's trying to do the Trump thing.
First he said, but let me just finish,
because he said Boeing.
She scratched their back,
then they put her on the board.
He named another company.
She scratched their back,
then they put her on the board
or they did something for her.
Then he said, even personally,
and I'll let you go do your research on that.
It was like, this is pretty explosive
stuff. Yeah. I just, it's so bad though. I mean, to act like, oh, she was this huge up and comer
and that's why that she went to go see him. No, no, no, no. She was running for president son
and you have a billion dollars and she would like your support. That is the way that this works.
I am very, very surprised that
you've gotten into this line of work without doing that 101 homework, which is basically what that is.
Those were not your friends. Surprise.
But I mean, look, beyond all of that, we had Nikki on the program today for your listeners
who want to check that out. And we asked her a similar line of questioning about why it is that she's got this thing going on. And she's like, I'll be honest with you. I
went into this debate intending not to even look at him. But she's like, I just can't. I can't
help it. And what he tries to do to engage her over and over and over again is on his side of
the ledger, not really hers. And when you invoke somebody's daughter and that daughter is sitting in the front row
and you know that,
you know you're going to get a reaction, right?
So that's what he's doing.
Look, he's a talented guy in a lot of different respects.
Is he wholly unqualified to be on that campaign stage?
Unequivocally, yes.
Unequivocally, he has absolutely no business
being on that campaign stage.
But if you like a little top hat and cane routine every once in a while, a little different version of events that doesn't actually exist in facts here in the United States of America, he's a great one to look for.
Don't you think that he's reinvented himself since the beginning of this campaign. You know, I knew Vivek prior to any prior to him
getting close to politics when he wrote his books and he was writing op eds for The Wall Street
Journal with a friend of mine from Yale Law School. And he was interesting and he was a woke
anti woke warrior. So he was very interesting and he kind of came into this with a much different
message. Then it seems like he found a lane in trying to be like sort of like a Trump junior or a Tucker
junior and got a lot of clicks, got a lot of attention. And now he's like firmly in that camp,
but it doesn't really match up with the way he entered. I don't know. Am I wrong?
That's the strangest thing about it, Megan. And that is why I'm so angry about it, is like I read Woke Inc.
And we met Vivek before he ran for president. And just go back and read that book. I mean,
he has flip-flopped on all the positions that he had in that book. Look in particular the way that
he describes January 6th and Donald Trump's role in it and what he should have done after 2020.
And then compare it to what he's saying on the campaign trail now. It's like it's night and day.
The guy's totally reinvented himself because he thinks there's this lane to get clicks,
to be an influencer, to not really try to run for president, but basically be on a troll,
be a troll on the debate stage against Nikki Haley.
It's just like it just seems so dishonest.
And like, that's what really upsets me.
I mean, you guys like you seem to like Nikki Haley.
You seem to like Haley DeSantis.
We used to like Nikki Haley. You seem to like Haley DeSantis. We used to like Vivica.
What about, I know, okay,
but he's representing a wing of the party
that is important, that needs to be brought along.
You know, that diehard Trump crew,
they don't really like Nikki Haley
and they don't really like Ron DeSantis.
And like, I see him up there serving a purpose.
You know, like I'm always looking at these guys,
like, do you serve a purpose still in this race?
And I see the purpose he's serving in addition to those libertarian
things that we talked about, like that Trump lane. They cheer everything he does. They're like, yes,
sicker, get him. Neocons fight. So I've actually noticed kind of a sea change, which has happened.
I think this somewhat indicates the reason that his poll numbers started faltering is
Trump folks have started going after Vivek being like, oh, you know, he's
part of the whole Davos crew. He's got this whole history of saying that Trump was a horrible person
because of January 6th. So they are starting to take notice. And I think that's starting to hurt
him. It's kind of like catching up to him, like Duncan said long ago, like anyone who'd actually
read the book would know these things. And I've noticed a lot of the Trump folks are trying to
put that message out because they're like, we don't want this guy to try to, you know, ride our coattails and try to steal our
message. Right. He was like a fun toy for the Trump voters to pretend like they supported him
because they knew he was a stalking horse for Donald Trump and he hurt the other candidates
in the race. But I think the joke is where then even on the Trump people.
Donald Trump is not as simplistic as what Vivek is talking about, like the idea that you sort of abandon Israel in the middle of a conflict.
I mean, one of the other reasons that in addition to what you just said, Smug, that his poll numbers are having a problem is because the world's really coming into focus over the last six weeks.
And it requires a president that knows how to deal with these kind of things.
And you mentioned Nikki Haley.
She obviously does.
I think Ron DeSantis does as well.
I think Chris Christie can figure that out
pretty quickly. I know, and everyone knows, who's ever spent a minute listening to Vivek Ramaswamy,
that that would be a catastrophe if he was sitting in the Oval Office amidst the crisis that we're
facing. You need some experience to deal with it. It's not about ideology. The ideology that he's
sort of ascribing to Donald Trump and the America first people is not one that was effectuated in the four years that the
president was president. He's the guy who dropped the Moab. He's the guy who took out Soleimani.
He's the guy that was threatening North Korea and Russia with any sort of aggravation around
the world. Like that is not some isolationist. That is what he has prescribed to Donald Trump
that actually didn't happen.
That's very interesting.
Let me ask you about Christie because I want to move on without mentioning him.
He is in danger of not making the next debate.
You got to have, according to the RNC, they keep raising the requirements to make the
debate and it's working in winnowing the field.
Mike Pence was not going to make the last debate and he announced working in winnowing the field. Mike Pence was
not going to make the last debate and he announced it. He was dropping out. I don't know about Tim
Scott. He did it right after the last debate, not not right before the fourth. But now we're going
into the fourth and it happens on 12-6. And in order for Chris Christie to make it, the other
three, I think, are going to make it. But in order for Chris Christie to make it, he's got to have 6% in a national poll. You can either do it in two national polls, 6%
or one national poll and one from an early primary state. So if he's pulling 6% in New Hampshire,
plus one national poll, he's good. We looked it up. The national poll has to have happened.
I think we said after September 15th.
And so he just needs one. But that's actually a tall order for Chris Christie. You also need 80,000, at least 80,000 unique donors. And we believe he has that.
So it's really the polling that could keep him out. So if he does not make the debate, first of all, do you think he'll get that?
Tim Scott's out.
I don't know if he gets any of Tim Scott's support and it drives up his poll numbers enough to 6%.
Do you think he'll get it? And do you think he'll stay in if he doesn't debate? I mean,
technically, I think Asa Hutchinson's still in. Isn't Doug Burgum still in?
Even though they didn't make the, right? So what do you think?
Well, Chris Christie is not Asa Hutchinson. He's in it for a serious reason. I think he got into it for a serious reason. I actually think that he falls into the category of former Vice President Mike Pence and Tim Scott in New Hampshire where he would help to qualify there and the national polls.
I don't know what that looks like.
I think you're probably right that that's going to be a stretch, but I think it's a
chance that he could be on that stage for sure.
And he has had some popularity with small dollar donors.
So I think that part of it is there.
But more importantly, he has a serious conversation with people even when they don't want to hear
it, which I think
is an admirable trait. You watch candidates roll around, and I've been very critical of some of
them, where I know that they're saying things that they don't believe, and they're afraid of
the electorate that they're speaking to, and that's not Chris. And as long as that's what
Chris is doing, and he can qualify for these debates. I don't see any problem in him being on that stage.
Now, you may not agree with him.
And polls would suggest vast majority of Republican voters do not agree with him and do not like
him.
But just because of that doesn't mean that he needs to immediately get out.
I think Chris would make that decision if he came to the conclusion that he could not
compete to win New Hampshire.
Will that happen next week?
Will that happen after Iowa?
I don't know.
But that's my guess.
And I think also, I think Christie's decisions inform about what he sees the other primary
candidates doing.
And we played that video earlier of Ron DeSantis putting out the missteps of Donald Trump.
Like, I think Chris Christie really wants this primary to be a referendum on what Donald Trump did and did not do when he was president.
But he's not mentioning him that much.
He's not mentioning that. He's mentioning him a lot more than the other candidates are.
I don't remember Christie mentioning Trump at all at this third debate.
I'd go back and look at it.
But he kind of abandoned it.
Well, he was asked it specifically. That's why. Yeah. I think bringing up Christie and the debates is critical to understanding the situation.
Because ahead of the first debate, he had that reputation of like, okay, when Christie's on the stage, he could kill somebody.
Like, you know, this guy's dangerous.
And people want to see the fireworks of like, who's he going to fight?
This is going to be entertaining because people love like the Coliseum aspect of a debate. Like we're going to see blood. This is going to be
awesome. And he's had three shots on that debate stage and he hasn't bodied anybody. And I think
that's led to a lot of disappointment. I think he has a lot of, of those small donor donors probably
are giving it, uh, giving money because they're like, we want to see him, you know, go after
somebody on stage. We want to be entertained by this.
And I think he's had three shots at, you know, making his presence felt and bringing back,
you know, what he did to Marco Rubio the last time he was on that debate stage.
And it hasn't materialized.
And I think that could be a big problem.
Donald Trump's not on the stage, right? And I think that's ultimately the issue is Chris has been sort of defanged by the fact
that the guy that he wants to ultimately attack is not in the room. And I agree with you, Megan. I think the national poll may be the ultimate
problem here. I don't know if he's going to qualify because of that issue. I think he will,
obviously, in New Hampshire, but it's that national poll that's going to be the issue for him.
We looked at the polls so far for him. So far, real clear politics average in Iowa,
nothing above 5%. New Hampshire, USA Today,
Suffolk poll released October 4th, did have him at 6%. South Carolina, there was one Trafalgar poll
released in mid-August. That's too long ago. It's 7%. So he'll probably get one in New Hampshire,
but whether he can get it at the national level, we do not know. We'll find out together.
All right. Now, wait, I am going to take a break. But before we do that, we should talk about
DeSantis and Haley. Hello. They're in a death match. That's the real match right now. Of course,
we've talked about Trump, but she's on an upward trajectory in her poll. I heard you guys saying
she kind of peaked at just the right time, you know, when you go to Saratoga, that's right by
where I grew up. And you bet the horse, you don't want the horse to be first when it comes out of the gate,
you want it to hang back. And then when you're almost at the end, you want it to be in third.
And then boom, he takes off right at the end. That's literally what she's done.
And DeSantis has been stagnant. He's not kind of, he's not going down anymore exactly,
but he's kind of stagnant. So, you know, if you're at Saratoga,
do you put your money on this DeSantis horse? That's kind of in the, not totally the middle
of the pack, but not leading the pack exactly. Or do you put it on this other horse that like
is super fast. It's in third and it's moving up towards now tied for second first in some places.
You guys tell me. She, she is on rise, and it's very interesting to watch.
And I sort of have a little bit of a different take on this whole thing, Megan, to be honest with you.
I think it's actually going to make Iowa an interesting race to watch from here on out.
Because if you look at the history of Iowa, it has, for the last 20 years, finished as a very close race.
Mike Huckabee, Rick Santorum, Ted Cruz,
all of them won by very, very slim margins. And when Ted Cruz won in Iowa, Trump was leading him
in the polls the entire time, and then Cruz snuck it out and won at the caucuses. What's different
this time is the ground game that the Trump campaign has for 2024 that they didn't have in 2016.
But he's not the only one with a ground game.
Ron DeSantis has a very smart operative leading the way in Iowa.
He has the endorsement of Kim Reynolds, the governor in that state.
That is very, very good for him ahead of a caucus that is traditionally a very sort of
inside who are you talking to type deal. But Ronnie D is not the only
guy who has people on the ground in Iowa. If you look at some of the latest announcements
from Nikki Haley, she actually has Kim Reynolds, campaign manager, running her program in Iowa.
She has endorsements from a lot of Iowa luminaries. So it's going to come down.
It could really come down to the wire in that state. The last president who finished above 40
in Iowa was George Bush in 1999, 2000. And didn't Nikki Haley just buy $10 million worth of ads?
And was it, is it Iowa and New Hampshire? Yeah, spread apart, spread across the two
states is what she told us. Yeah, I think ultimately, you know, ads and it was it is it iowa and new hampshire yeah spread apart spread across the two states
is what she told us yeah i think ultimately um you know what the desantis people will tell you
is he's the only candidate with crossover a few uh appeal into the maga base and if you don't have
that crossover appeal you can't actually beat donald trump in a one one-to-one you know heads
up match and that nikki haley's electorate is you know primarily made up of more moderate voters
independent voters suburban women and that their propensity to actually turn out in a complicated And that Nikki Haley's electorate is primarily made up of more moderate voters, independent
voters, suburban women, and that their propensity to actually turn out in a complicated system
like a caucus may actually be lower than the more conservative voters that support Ron
DeSantis.
And he has an incredible organization on the ground.
And I agree with you, Ashbrook.
And that probably does benefit him as we get closer to the night of the caucuses.
But like, you know, the map gets a lot better for Nikki Haley in New
Hampshire. Right. Especially if Chris Christie gets out of this race. And then the third is
South Carolina, which is her home state. Right. So like you could see a scenario where her
and Tim Scott's gone. Right. So you can understand that. And then also like on Nikki's side here,
wouldn't it be great if we did better with suburban women, independent voters and moderate voters? And I feel like everybody looks like the
candidates who aren't named Donald Trump. Look at all of this. It's like a static thing where like
if as consolidation happens, you know, their voters become my voters. And it's like that's
not always how it works. Like what happens if those independent voters or moderate voters decide
to stay home because no longer is Nikki Haley in the race. Right. And so it's like the math isn't perfect there. It's it's you know, it's tough
odds for both of them. But they both have an argument to make. Yeah. But what what how does
Ron DeSantis do it if he wins Iowa? Let's say, I mean, honestly, like Trump is crushing them all
in all these states. I feel the need to reiterate that list. Anybody out there
who's voting for a non-Trumper, get excited. He's crushing them in all these places, but who knows?
So let's say DeSantis wins Iowa. He's not going to win New Hampshire and South Carolina. Is he
like he's he's not polling particularly well there. So it looks like maybe Nikki Haley will
win New Hampshire. I mean, I guess maybe Chris Christie, but okay.
Not win.
I guess I'm saying win amongst the undercard,
you know, come in second.
Then you go to South Carolina.
Yes, she'll probably win.
She could win South Carolina.
So like, then where are we?
It all gets decided in Super Tuesday?
Well, there's a lot of things that happen
when you start counting votes, right?
I mean, it has a way of focusing the mind.
If you look at the last few presidential elections, including the Democrats back in 2020, I mean,
Bernie Sanders won by massive margins in Iowa and New Hampshire until Democrats got their act
together and was like, you know, maybe it's not a great idea if we nominate a socialist against
Donald Trump. And they began the consolidation process and endorsements and got behind Joe
Biden. Like Democrats are better at that than Republicans. I don't expect that to happen here. But you're getting into a scenario after the first two states,
after New Hampshire, where it's like three go in, one comes out. It's like a cage match situation.
There is not going to be a lot of tolerance amongst a Republican. And there's at least
half of this electorate that doesn't want Donald Trump to be renominated.
There's not gonna be a lot of tolerance
for the John Kasich routine
from somebody who's just sort of hanging around
with no prayer to win this.
I think like if I'm a strategist here
and I'm Ron DeSantis camp,
I gotta get second in Iowa,
whether I'm third or even fourth in New Hampshire,
sort of immaterial.
I gotta have a really strong showing,
maybe just behind Nikki in South Carolina. But then I got to make the case that my donors haven't
abandoned me, that I've got money to spend, and I'm ready to go hit Super Tuesday hard to try to
winnow that field even further to a point where you've got something close to a mano a mano for
Super Tuesday. In that scenario, weird things have happened, right? I
mean, you saw in 2016 where somebody like Marco Rubio, who they lost everything by massive numbers,
ended up picking up delegates and winning a couple of states on Super Tuesday. It widens the
aperture from what it is that we've been looking at to a bunch of different states that we don't
have quite as close a handle on. That's what I would be looking at if I was in Ron DeSantis camp.
With Nikki, I think if she's second in Iowa and she's in second in New Hampshire
and she's going into her home state, I think she's thinking,
how can I choke this guy out?
He may not make it to Super Tuesday.
That's what my strategy would be.
The thing is, if everyone were to be honest,
would you rather be with the Haley campaign right now or the DeSantis campaign?
Because I think the really unfortunate thing- Wait, can I see that? Make them answer that,
Smug. Raise your hand if you'd rather be with Haley. Raise your hand if you'd rather be with
Haley. I just don't know how to ballpark that right now. No one's raising. No, no, no. Come
on. You have to do it. This is the end of the presidential debate. Raise your hand. to ballpark that. No one's raising. I would say I would say I would say I would say I would say
Haley, because expectations are very, very low for Ron DeSantis in Iowa. Expectations couldn't
be higher if he doesn't finish close to Trump. They're going to, you know, very close. It's
harder to meet that bar. You're right about that. It's much harder. DeSantis actually needs
a second place in Iowa. He does. Nikki does. Yeah. That's the thing is his camp. So it's so I would all be Duncan's kind of raising his hand. Are you raising your hand to speak? I would also raising your hand. Yeah, I would also want it. I would prefer to be Nikki in this scenario for one other reason is she there's nobody in the field who's done more with less. She's had less money than everybody else in this race up to probably now this moment in all of these debates where she's gained all of this momentum. So like Ron
DeSantis has $150 million super PAC, right? And I know that the Trump people have been attacking
him. They've spent like 20, $25 million attacking him. So his numbers have taken a hit, but like
Nikki has gained all this momentum and traction, and now she's going to have the resources to go
out and tell her story more. So I have to think like the momentum is a little more with her on that.
The one caveat I've got to this, and I think you saw it last week in this debate,
is that it feels to me like Ron DeSantis for the first time in this campaign has found his
authentic voice. He does not seem hesitant. He does not seem like he's searching for how to
find an opinion somewhere. It feels to me like he is doing everything he's doing because that's
where he is. And that's what everybody fell in love with in a Republican primary electorate some
a year ago. If he can recapture some of that, you can see where you could start building back up.
It's like your racehorse analogy.
When a horse is leading in the final stretch, sometimes a horse just needs to see another
horse before he takes off again.
And that could happen here.
I just think it's incredibly unfortunate, the situation that he's found himself in,
where I think as a candidate, he's incredibly strong.
He's got a great track record, and Republicans love him.
He got that big win in Florida, really energized people that, OK, you know, we're heading in a good direction.
But I think his campaign has done him a tremendous disservice until he's been allowed to have an authentic voice where he's not being overcoached or he has, you know, Jeffro leaking memos to the press of being like, here's what Ron DeSantis needs to do with the debate.
Like, it's been a mess that he's dealt with,
and it hasn't actually had anything to do with the candidate,
which is the problem.
And I think that's why, with the momentum that Haley has.
Yeah, but he's the CEO.
He's the CEO.
He said that.
You know, I mean, my number one piece of advice for Ron DeSantis,
not that he needs my political advice, but he could use it.
He should stop doing that weird little smile at the end of his answer.
I totally agree.
I totally agree. I totally agree.
It makes me uncomfortable.
Nobody likes it.
It seems affected.
It doesn't seem sincere.
It's unnecessary.
You don't have to be smiley.
We don't need smiley.
We need competent.
Don't make the weird smile.
He's got one consultant saying you need to smile
and one consultant saying, remember, don't smile at the end.
And then he's thinking of both.
He's going to smile.
Smile if it's natural.
If you actually feel like smiling, then smile.
Otherwise, don't force it.
Hasn't somebody told him you do not have a convincing fake smile?
Yes.
You're not exactly like the happy warrior.
You're the guy who's supposed to tell like hard truths and be like, I win and this guy lost and you should nominate me. Like that doesn't have to end in
a smile. Like you can be real and authentic to the voters. And also, if you're going to force
a smile, do it instantaneously. The thing that kills me is the you got to commit to it. Yeah,
the pause in between the end of the answer. And then the smile is like and i saw and they're gonna be stone cold
dead and so now he's gonna be like okay i have one consultant saying smile one consultant saying
don't smile megan kelly saying just do it fast and so he's gonna do the smile listen to me
in half as much time no here's my rule to Number one, don't do it. Number two, only smile if it's genuine.
Oh, look, we have the video.
Oh, now they got the whole thing.
Come on.
Come on.
If it's genuine.
Let's see.
He sees he's holding his pen.
He's making his...
Here it goes.
I'm so right.
That's so tough.
I'm never going to run for president man
everyone's going to call it out when you mess up
I am helping him
I bet I have a million weird affectations that I don't know about
but if I were to run for president
you smug
not a one you'd be good
you're not wearing pants I don't know if you do that
no one told me
look at these gams. All right,
standby. Quick break. Back with the fellas in two seconds. Republican primary debate. SiriusXM's Megyn Kelly returns to the moderator's seat.
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City leaders are making sure the city shines. Caltrans repaving major roadways like the
Harrison Street off-ramp from the I-80. BART doubling down by deep cleaning their stations
overnight more often.
Scrubbing and power washing is happening all over the city.
Yeah, the bottom of my shoes look clean.
It's noticeable how clear the streets look and how few homeless encampments there are on major thoroughfares.
Public Works is installing decorative crosswalks in North Beach and Chinatown,
and the Webster Street pedestrian bridge in Japantown was recently repainted.
The Yerba Buena gardens at the Moscone Center are decked out with new colorful landscaping
and murals paid for by the Clean California grant.
Just in time for the 20,000 high-profile CEOs and heads of state coming into town.
Unbelievable.
Gavin Newsom and San Francisco London Bre, clean up the city just in time for the Chinese leader to show up there with Joe Biden.
They're important, but the actual residents of San Francisco can pound sand.
When Gavin Newsom was asked whether this is in fact what you've done, he well said the following. Listen. Anytime you put on an event, by definition, you have people over your house,
you're going to clean up the house. You have 21 world leaders. You've got tens of thousands of
people coming from all around the globe. What an opportunity to showcase the world's most
extraordinary place. Folks say, oh, they're just cleaning up this place because all those fancy leaders are coming into town.
That's true because it's true.
But it's also true for months and months and months prior to APEC.
We've been having different conversations.
What do you guys think of it?
I mean, I had a bit on our show today about how it was sort of like when my wife would clean up the house. But unlike our show, she actually listens to yours. So I'm not going
to do that bit. I'm just going to thank Gavin Newsom for proving beyond a shadow of a doubt
that it's not that they can't clean up the cities in America. It's that they choose not to.
In one week, he can make that city hospitable for all the citizens there.
And he chooses not to. With all the money that we owe to China,
you got to make sure their investment looks good when they get it.
And this is the before picture, by the way.
Why wouldn't he leave Xi's customers there who are on fentanyl? I mean, you want to be like,
yeah, you're doing a great job. Yeah,, she. Yeah. This is his real work.
This is she's real work in the city of San Francisco.
All the people hooked on fentanyl and drugs.
It is so offensive.
But yeah, when somebody comes over to the house, you clean up the house.
Yes.
Most of us don't live in a pigsty day to day.
We have some small clutter to clean up.
It's not a complete overhaul of where we choose to raise our children.
That's what's needed in San Francisco.
He doesn't give two shits about the children there, Ashbrook.
None.
He doesn't care about them at all.
I think we know that.
He's proven it over and over and over again.
And look, we know who he likes better
than people in California.
It's she.
Yeah, apparently.
It's so offensive.
And I love that he just gave it up.
That's true because that's true.
He's been taking speech writing from Kamala Harris.
He's been in competition for the job of president.
Guys, what a pleasure.
Thank you so much.
You were awesome as always.
It's great to talk to you.
You're the best, Megan.
Thank you for having us.
Thank you so much.
Ruthless variety program.
Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show.
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