The Philip DeFranco Show - Olivia Rodrigo Attacked Over Cornell 7 Case & The Truth About Trump's "Fox News Problem"

Episode Date: October 6, 2026

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And then there's more we gotta dive into in just a minute, but first let me thank a sponsor and say, you know, August is a great time for a reset before fall gets chaotic and my closet, it could use some adult supervision. And that's where today's sponsor, Quince comes in. Quince makes fewer better pieces from premium materials, the things you'll reach for constantly. And I really like their staples like organic cotton teas and Mongolian cashmere sweaters at work all day and into the evening. Or basically, clothes that make you look put together without looking like you spend an hour planning it. Their denim and Taylor Chino start at 60 bucks with a fit, structure and quality that you'd expect from a luxury designer brand. And then you've got things like the cotton silk short sleeve crew neck sweater.

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So hey, upgrade your every day by scanning that QR code or going to quince.com slash DeFranco for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. And they're now available in Canada and the UK as well. So that's QU-I-N-C-E.com slash DeFranco. Quince.com slash DeFranco. Maine Kelly's now threatening to expose the Jane Doe and the Coronel 7 case told Olivia Rodrigo to shut up and you now have people calling her a hypocrite. Trump's now threatening to let Iran take out LA and San Diego. Well, you've got people freaking out about Ash Dikes. Texas is now targeting pediatricians for giving kids vaccines,

and McDonald's is facing some heat for using AI to rig its menu prices. We're talking about all of that, and even more, on today's brand new Philip DeFranco show you daily dive into the news, starting with this. Let's talk about this Cornell 7 Megan Kelly situation. Right, you've got a lot of people sounding off on it because Megan Kelly, she just went on this rant and plying at the Cornell Jane Doe, who claims that she was gang raped at a fraternity,

was probably thrilled to be admired by multiple men because she was not attractive. No one will even consider the possibility that this woman made a decision, to get it on with four men total, not seven, and enjoyed it because I'm just going to be honest. She's not the most attractive gal. She's extremely beefy in like her arms and her legs. This is probably a first for her. She's probably thrilled to be so admired because she clearly didn't grow up the incredibly beautiful one.

I'm not trying to be insulting. I'm just trying to tell you the narrative that is likely to have occurred here, in my opinion. and why can't we account for that possibility that the girl who was never the most sought after suddenly had four guys who wanted to have sex with her and she counted this yeah in her inebriated state as a win and liked the feeling of being sexy and desired and wanted it happens sorry it does and that's why she kept saying yes why do we have to go right to she She's a victim. Even she took weeks to get there. Okay, so there's a lot to unpack there.

But most immediately, you saw people mostly horrified that Kelly was bringing looks into this whole thing to suggest an alleged rape victim, should essentially feel lucky. Also with that, you might wonder, you know, how does Megan Kelly even know what Jane Doe allegedly looks like? And while that is because Kelly claims that she does definitely know her identity and is even debating whether or not to publicly expose it. I've been seriously considering just saying it. And the reason I haven't is because I don't want to do anything to hurt this young woman. to get her hurt or to add to the pain I'm sure she's feeling.

My real complaint is that she doesn't get named and the young men do. That's what I'm pissed about. I haven't totally made my decision. I haven't. But these are the considerations I'm weighing. I have no wish to unleash a lynch mob on her. And seemingly as far as how she knows it, she didn't really say anything other than generally noting that people claim to have published her name online.

So there it's important to note that like some of the efforts to name Jane Doe have actually targeted the wrong women. But then also at this, there were other remarks from Kelly that actually made news as well yesterday. Right, and that in part because she decided to go on this tirade against Olivia Rodrigo, who recently wrote on Instagram, shame on Cornell in every institution who protects rapists and abusers over women, saying, I stand with Jane Doe,

and adding her bravery reverberates across the country and the crimes against her will not go unpunished. What she lived through matters and so does the failure of those who could have intervened but chose not to. With Olivia also sharing other infographics about campus sexual assault. And then, in response to that, you had Kelly kind of just lose in it. Shut up and stick to singing. I like you better when you were in front of a microphone singing your weird little depressing songs. Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about.

It's better to keep your mouth shut and let people suspect you're an idiot than to open it and prove them right. Adults are talking, okay? Take your seat. We don't need the participation of no nothing morons who have been auto-tuned into fame and suddenly think they have something profound to say on the culture wars. Sit down and be quiet. Got it? Or I'm going to have to start pulling your music and your lyrics and take a deep dive into exactly the kind of messaging that you are pushing on young women because I guarantee

it's not going to end well for you, Olivia. It's a very weird threat for Megan. I don't know how your analysis of Olivia Rodriguez's lyrics actually poses a threat to her career. It feels like you're more like teasing a video that your audience is like, yeah. But like Rodrigo, she's currently on a sold-out world tour. I don't think she's concerned about a person that got just crushed by Donald Trump years ago to the point that that she had to cosplay like a decent person, pull away from society and then come back, just groveling at his feet.

Right. And so with that, there's been no shortage of people arguing that Kelly, she's just trying to prod Olivia Rodrigo into some sort of attention hoping to get a response from her or her fans. But also like a big thing with this is you've had people noting that Megan's been, you know, talking about this case on her show for a while now. And noting while she claims that she is not defending the accused, she spends most of her time condemning Jane Doe and questioning why it took her several weeks to report the incident. If you were violently gang raped repeatedly over the course of an evening, do you think it would take you three weeks to call the campus police? Right, in that line specifically might be why you've seen Megan Kelly popping up in your feeds. Because you had many arguing that, hey, Kelly herself should know why a victim might take so long

to talk about what they endured and realize what happened. Noting that she was first harassed by her Fox News boss, Roger Ailes, in the mid-2000s, but didn't go public until there was a wave of allegations against him in 2016. She also later told ABC News that when she first tried to tell a supervisor about the encounter, they vouched for Ailes and told her that he was a good man. And since she and Ailes ended up having, in her words, a healthy working relationship after that, she dismissed what happened as him pursuing some kind of affair with her because he was dealing with marital issues. And then also with that, claiming that if she took her allegation public, it would have been career suicide.

And so because all of those on the record things, you had people saying, you know, she should know what a victim's dealing with, what they're wrestling with, even if there's a difference in the alleged crimes. And so there's all of that with Megan Kelly that's playing out right now, But we should also use this opportunity to talk about some quick updates to the whole Cornell situation. Right, and that in part because Cornell's Faculty Senate just introduced a no-confidence resolution over how school leadership is handling the case. And you had a draft of that saying that the faculty senate has no confidence in the ability of the central administration to effectively address the ongoing crisis of sexual assault at Cornell University. And you've got their goal really being to just put pressure on the administration at the school to get them to change policies regarding assaults on campus and to just admit that they messed up in this case.

Also of note, we're seeing this case being connected to other stories off campus. So for example, you had police in Idaho now investigating a group of high school football players who were accused of threatening sexual violence against a female student. And in a group chat, one allegedly wrote, think Cornell was bad, just wait for us. But then others allegedly threatening to rape and kill the female. And so then with that, there's been a ton of outrage in the local community over this, and you've had a petition demanding that those students involved be expelled or removed from the football team. But then, next up from that, content is king, right?

But is it really worth dropping yourself into the middle of the Congo basin and facing the most aggressive wildlife and the deadliest illnesses known to man? That is a question you have a lot of people asking, about Ash Dykes. Right, and a little background on this guy, right? So he's a 35-year-old extreme athlete, an explorer from Wales. And he's actually got five Guinness World Records since 2014.

With journeys across Mongolia, Madagascar, China, and the Amazon. So there's no shortage of experience traveling to some of the most dangerous locations in the world with it. But this Congo Basin trip, it might be one of his craziest ideas yet. Because Dykes, he's set now to travel over 434 miles,

the length of the Sunga River, all the way to the Congo River in an inflatable kayak. But the plan being to post and live stream throughout the whole thing. All while, there are a number of reasons why people do not usually venture over there. And some of the main ones, crocodiles, hippos, elephants, gorillas, snakes, spiders, malaria, dengue fever, and parasites.

This has also been posing these ominous previews that paint a picture of what it's gonna be like. With that, I'll say, you don't need the scary music to understand how terrifying this is. Also, you've got a lot of people focused on the inflatable kayak part saying that it's kind of unserious for such a serious situation. But apparently, there's a good reason,

and you had Dykes explaining. An inflatable kayak is important to the success of this expedition, believe it or not. If we come across a pod of hippos, for example, further down the way, and we're like, it's suicide to continue paddling, we can deflate it, pack it into a backpack, chuck it on our back, and then we can actually walk a huge detour around them to inflate the kayaks and continue. And as Dykes, he's going to be facing hippos and everything else, there are going to be millions of people following along, so of course, no pressure or anything.

With the very least, even in person, he's not going to be alone out there because he's somehow convinced a few other guys to join a local guide and a photographer. And together, they'll cover roughly 20 miles a day, finding spots to set up their tent and camp each night. And while, as of right now, they haven't been dropped into the basin yet, Dykes has been blogging their travel journey, which started a few days ago, with flights from London to Paris, and then Paris to Yaunde. And you had Dykes revealing that the team was actually delayed due to one of their bags getting and it was an essential one, the bag with the pumps for the kayak, as well as the tents, food and water. But fortunately, it showed up two days later, and after that, you're the team picking up a few less things for the mission.

So we've got a couple of machetes that we're getting. We're just passing through this small town. So we need to pick up a few machetes so that obviously we get through the jungle. And from there, with all their bags and their new machetes, they set out on an 18-hour drive to Nola, at the point on the Sanga River where they'll start kayaking. And notably on that drive so far, they've already faced a few corrupt checkpoints, according to Dykes. And yet I'm saying that their driver potentially saved their asses. But also after those few hiccups, they're getting closer to the Congo Basis.

And as this thing gets started, you have more and more people paying attention and asking question. And as far as, you know, what the online discourse is, you know, people are asking, does he want to die on this trip, saying it seems like Dykes is in a place where he's fully aware of the magnitude of the risk, but also taking every precaution that you can with something like this. And with that, you get him telling people magazine, the Congo is the world's most dangerous and deadly jungle for a reason. It's like the diseases are rife and the animals are big. And adding, it is an adventure and as experienced as I am, I can anticipate what might happen and try to understand based on experience how I usually react to those situations. And in his videos, he's talked about the extensive

planning that's gone into all this, including scouting the route, getting the proper vaccines and pills, medical kits, evacuation plans, and insurance. And with this, he does seem to believe that his several near-death experiences have helped him prepare for anything. I faced much tougher before. Madagascar took me 155 days. You know, I was held up at gunpoint. I crossed crocodile-infested rivers. I contracted the deadly strain of malaria.

I had to hunt and gather to stay alive. I was pulling off leeches. I had spider bites, which infected. But also, if you think that he is insane for the Congo Basin, it kind of just gets crazier from there, right? Because the Congo Basin is actually just part one of six expeditions that he's got planned as part of his so-called Project Six series. Right, and Project Six is supposed to be this year-long undertaking with six of the most extreme environments on Earth. And the end result of all this

should be a documentary series. Right, so assuming that Dykes survives the river trip, he's not going to be just going home or going on a vacation afterwards. So there are lots of different opinions on this. Because while many, they're just excited to sit back and enjoy the content, you've also got this other crowd shaking their heads and saying this is typical dumb white guy stuff. Right, some calling Dykes out for posting constantly about his trip, but neglecting to comment at all about the humanitarian crisis there. Others, meanwhile, are expressing concerns. that he might bring back diseases. My thing is who's going to ensure that he's not a biohazard upon return?

Is there going to be a quarantining, a decontamination, a bleaching, a death-alling? And so we'll have to see, you know, how all of this plays out. But also, if you are looking to get into his brain a bit, in a TikTok last month, you had Dykes giving some insight into why he's doing this. I don't even know how to answer this other than when I was young, I had a passion for the world for meeting new people, exploring new cultures, new traditions. I was also highly competitive. I used to fight in boxing, in Muay Thai. I used to love playing football,

rugby, athletics, you name it. So I think my curiosity for the world and that competitive drive to push myself physically and mentally drove me to take on these expeditions. So yeah, good luck to Dykes. And hopefully I am not covering you on the show for any other reasons other than this being kind of a cool idea. And then there's even more that we're going to dive into, in just a minute of it. Really quick, we're going to take a break with a sponsor. I want to give a shout out to all you beautiful bastards that have entered our weekly $500 Seekee Geek giveaway. Because today's sponsor, Seekkeek, they've doled out nearly $60,000 to you guys, get you off the couch and in to the comedy club, the stadium, the concert hall

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That gets you the 10% off and enters you in for your chance to win the weekly $500 giveaway, no purchase required. And for the Siki vets, you're in this too, right? We'd never leave you out. Add code fill 10 to your account and your enter. So yeah, scan that QR code or click the link below, Add code Phil 10 and go make some memories. But then jump from that to other news. As every day passes, the midterms are getting closer and closer. And the picture for Republicans, it's getting worse and worse. Right, as far as specifics, let's start with the polling,

because you have a few more polls that we can talk about now, and they're all pretty much pointing in one direction. Starting with this one from the New York Times and Sienna University that show Democratic Senate candidates leading in Alaska, Ohio, and Texas, all states that Trump won by double digits two years ago. You also somehow have the parties candidates neck and neck in Kansas where a Democrat has not been elected to the Senate in 94 years. And even in reliably red Iowa, the Democrat is narrowly trailing his opponent.

Right, and that says in the House, you have another poll from CBS and UGub, giving Democrats a nine-point lead on the generic ballot. And in fact, yesterday, the House Democrats campaign arm added six more Republican-held districts to its target list. Now, that's set, Republicans have been quick to note that historically, Democrats haven't flipped red districts added to the target list this late in an election.

And you have them arguing that because Democrats are short on cash and so many districts have been gerrymandered, the GOP still has a chance to hold on to power. you're also seeing some Republicans seeing a bloodbath for their party in the coming month, especially if they're retiring and feel free to speak their minds. And so a good example of that is outgoing Senator Tom Tillis, who just published his book How to Lose Friends and antagonize presidents. Well, in it, according to PBS, he writes, all along, we've had multiple chances to get off the path and avoid the giant bronze monster chasing us down, with him

criticizing the tariffs, the ice raids, the war in Iran, and numerous Trump appointees. He even admitted that his deciding vote to confirm Pete Hexeth is the biggest regret of my career in that he also should to stop to RFK Jr. And you then had him going on to write, I know for a fact that there are others like me. Republicans who agreed to go along with the early demands of the Trump team, no matter how ridiculous they were, believing that failing to do so would mean the end of their political career and who now see that things have gone way too far. And you had a matting that he can count at least 30 of his GOP colleagues who have expressed reservations, to put it mildly, about many of the president's actions in private. But when the reporters showed up

with their cameras and microphones, they'd have nothing but nice things to say. And so really quick, just to take things to opinion down, if you will. Just a slight detour. I just have to say this. Fuck Tom Tillis and all you other cowardly motherfuckers who all of a sudden feel like you can speak your mind when you're leaving and or writing a fucking book that you're trying to sell.

Like there is part of my brain that goes, oh, I should, I guess, I guess give some credit for noting that the emperor has no clothes. But then no, even what you just said. You are part of the reason that Pete Higgseth and RFK Jr. are where they are. You and so many others, You're part of the reason why the country is being destabilized from the inside out right now.

And not like destabilized in a good way. I think a lot of people on left and right, they know that the government hasn't been working for them. But when it suited you, you were seemingly fine helping Trump enrich his buddies and himself and his family. But also I'll note with Tillis, he's not alone. Or we've talked before about how some Republican candidates have been distancing themselves from Trump because they view him as a liability right now. And well, with that, you had a new Reuters Ipsis poll putting Trump's approval rating at just 32%. So just absolutely miserable numbers in the worst of his career so far. Despite that, you have Trump still insisting on attaching himself to the party's campaigns,

telling voters to pretend like his name is on the balance. And so with that, he's been tore in the battleground states, most recently in Nebraska, where he gave just this insane speech yesterday. And I mean, he just said so much nutty stuff. I mean, he repeated his promise at least three or four times. If Republicans win the House of Representatives and the Senate, I am going to give all adult citizens in the United States of America $5,000. He also openly boasted that he distributes aid money to states based on whether or not they voted for him.

Pete Ricketts says, I said, I don't want to talk to him. He's always asking for money for Nebraska. And I always give it because you know what? I love Nebraska. I want it. Pete's calling, Sir, it's been horrible. We had a flood. Could you send us $25 million? I said to Pete, that's a lot of money. But you know, I won it three times I say to hell with you, give him the money. So easily the comments that got the most attention came when he was talking about Iran. We're kicking Iran's ass. You do know that, right? And that will end very quickly, one way the other very soon, maybe a little after the election, maybe a little before the, but it's going to end very soon. When that happens,

the oil will come tumbling down. And again, remember, with the war, it's just artificial. It's a little bit high. It's a small price to pay for keeping the world safe, keeping our country safe. They can take out a city. Let them take out law. Let them take out law. Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego. That's, this is a very small price to pay and it's gonna be over with very soon. Right, and despite seemingly part of Nebraska cheering for California to what, get nuked. In addition to those people, you also had a lot of people going, wait, I'm sorry, what?

And so for example, you had San Diego's mayor, Todd Gloria saying San Diego is not collateral damage, we are not expendable, and we are never a small price to pay. Keep our city out of your reckless war talk. You also had Governor Gavin Newsom's press office writing. Let's be clear, the president is advocating. for an attack on 10 plus million U.S. residents in two of America's largest cities. This is not normal. None of this is. Right. And then with all this on the right, you had a lot of people saying, oh, Trump, he's literally just joking. He's just triggering the libs. At least one person who wasn't

laughing on that side was Jim Desmond, the Republican running for Congress in San Diego. And you had him posting, I vehemently disagree with President Trump's comments. So like America must stand up to Iran and defend our interests, but the first responsibility of our commander in chief is to protect the American people in our homeland. And saying as a Navy veteran, I served to protect Americans not write off American cities as an acceptable price of war. Saying no American city is expendable and no American family should ever be treated as collateral damage. Also, if you want to be cynical about why he's speaking out, he is in a neck and neck race right now. So you know, he's probably worried that the president joking about the place he wants to represent getting nuked,

that might affect voter turnout in a way that is not beneficial for him. And with this speech in particular, Trump stood up there and he just attacked the media over and over and over again for almost an hour and a half, like from start to finish. And a big thing is that Trump even went after Fox News, though apparently for him. It was the network whose name shall not be spoken. Al-Sahad in Michigan, I mean, he's a total communist. But you know, the more middle and right, they're always putting like El-Sahad was interviewed just a little while ago on a certain network. I won't tell you which way. They let this guy talk, talk, talk. They hardly fight him at all. Why are they putting these people on our television networks? Why? And it appears like he's referring to this interview that

Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul Al-Sahed gave to Fox's Martha McCallum yesterday. And Trump is correct in so far as the interview was not as hostile as the one that El Sayyed did with Jesse Waters. So that's also because Jesse Waters kind of just bounces between weirdo to fucking unhinged. But the idea that McCallum hardly pushed back on El Sayad in the interview, that's kind of just nonsense. Right, she spent the entire first half of this thing just grilling him about Islamic terrorism. And El Sayette, he just kept responding with pretty much the same thing. Terrorists are bad and war is not the solution. I just want to say there was no war and then there was a war.

And more war has made us less safe. It has increased our prices. We also had a challenging amount of support for single-payer health care. More than half the people who died in England in that year were on the NHS waiting list, and they couldn't get any care. So why would that be a better system for us? Well, number one, I'm not advocating for the same system as the NHS. Number two, we are the richest, most powerful country in the world.

The idea that we're going to point to another country who does something poorly and say, we can't possibly do it better is ridiculous because we're the greatest country in the world. But then the second point I'll make here is that, do you know what the average wait time for a cardiologist in America is, Tommy. Two and a half months. And then even at her fighting him on his support for taxing billionaires. I understand, you know, thinking that some people have too much money. But I guess the question is, where do you draw the line?

I mean, we're the engine of the world for all these things. And some of those people end up being billionaires as a result. But don't we all benefit from being this incredible powerhouse in the United States from their ingenuity? Well, the issue is not that some people have too much money. It's that the engine that created their opportunity to make money is being a underfunded. We talked about public schools. We talked about health care. We talked about healthcare. We talked about infrastructure. But then also one less substantive moment of the

exchange has gotten quite a bit of attention has been McCallum bringing up Hassan Piker. Right in for context, she read out this quote that he gave to New York magazine when it asked him whether he felt abandoned by El-Sayed, given how they kind of put some distance between each other since the primary. And you had Piker there saying, it doesn't matter because he's moving the fucking needle, saying he will push the boundaries on what is permissible on Israel and I trust him to do that. Saying I think he will try to do the very best to hold Israel accountable as a senator. so I don't give a fuck that he's trying to move away from this conversation because, as I've said, over and over again, it's a mine. He's trapped. What do you say to that? Look, this campaign was never

about a streamer in California. This campaign was always about the price of gas and groceries, whether or not you could see a doctor when you get sick in the United States. I know every time I have a conversation here that he's going to come up. And the question is not about a relationship I got with a streamer in California. There's not a relationship. The reason I have a conversation with him is the same reason I have a conversation with you, because I want to talk to the the folks out here who I want to have a conversation with. Yeah, ultimately, the political drama and chaos moves forward another day, and I cannot wait for November 3rd.

And actually, you don't even have to wait till then. Feel free to pause and screenshot, but early voting starts in your state right here. You got it? Make a plan, vote.org. But then next up from that is Attorney General Ken Paxton bullying pediatricians to stay in Donald Trump's favor. That's what you've got a lot of people asking right now,

because also, you may remember that Paxton recently announced that he was opening an investigation, into the American Academy of Pediatrics, or with them accusing them of, quote, deceptively promoting childhood vaccines for financial gain. And he said that they're just part of the sprawling for-profit conspiracy between doctors, drug companies, and insurers to pressure parents into vaccinating their kids.

Now, obviously, you're the Academy at large pushing back against that, saying in a statement that its vaccine advice is rooted in decades of peer-reviewed science. Also adding that Paxton's investigation serves only to undermine public health, so confusion and put more children at risk of preventable disease. And you then had Dr. Catherine Edwards, a professor of pediatrics at Vanderbilt University, saying, Everybody thinks of pediatricians as these mild-mannered people who have animals on their stethoscope and would not fight their way out of a bag.

And adding, this is another attempt at intimidation, but they're not being intimidated because their moral core is about the well-being of children. And despite Paxton's promise that his investigation would be directed toward the state's largest medical providers, vaccine makers, and health insurers, this New York Times report revealed that it's actually the little guys that are bearing the brunt of it. Where with the Times talking to a small Texas pediatrician who they called Dr. Rachel to preserve her privacy, Dr. Rachel said that she recently received a notice from Paxton's Consumer Protection Division demanding her vaccine purchase records over the last 10 years. And you had that notice saying they believe her to be in, quote, possession, custody or control of material involving potential misleading or deceptive acts regarding incentives associated with the administration of childhood

vaccines, which they said could be against Texas deceptive trade practices law. And then on top of that, they also demanded her practice's vaccine policy and made a point as saying that citing the childhood vaccine schedule recommended by the CDC would not be enough. So Dr. Rachel, she had to spend nearly $15,000 in legal fees in order to answer the demand of her records. Records that by the way consists of receipts for $18 vaccines given a decade ago and details about a $40 batch of cookies a vaccine makers representative brought to her office. But then even still, she sent in the records only to get hit with another demand from Paxton's office dismissing some of the initial responses as frivolous or improper.

And so she's gone back and forth with them twice now and is currently waiting with no idea what's coming next. And before all this, she planned on keeping her practice open for years to come, but now between the stress and the legal fees, she's reconsidering that stance. telling the times that the very idea that she was getting something out of encouraging parents to vaccinate their kids or that she's motivated by greed is offensive in adding. I took it very personally because I take pride in what I do. It felt like it was such a slap in the face and an insult. And that's something that you've seen echoed by a lot of pediatricians.

Right, this claim that they're raking in dough from vaccines is ridiculous. Most of the time, they have to pay for the vaccines up front, store them and then haggle with insurance to get them covered. And then the craziest part about all this isn't even that Paxson and is investigating pediatricians for literally doing their jobs. Which includes protecting kids from potentially deadly diseases. But the crazy part is that Paxton might not even really care about this. Saying that this whole investigation, it smells like a political maneuver on Paxton's part, and he's saying, damn, the consequences. Right, and more specifically, of some saying the entire investigation was just an attempt

to try and get and maintain Trump's approval in the competitive primary earlier this year, and then the tight general election against James Tilarico next month. And with that, you would Dr. Heidi Russell, a pediatrician and director at the Center of Health Policy at Rice University in Houston saying that, leaning into the anti-vax thing, it means that Paxton aligned himself with RFK Jr. And doing that got him the Trump endorsement. But also, actions have consequences, and we could be seeing a serious ripple effect here. Or we just don't know yet how many small practices like Dr. Rachel's have been targeted in Paxton's investigation,

and we don't know how many are considering closing their doors like she is. So you've got advocacy groups like immunization partnerships saying, this whole thing can make a lot of pediatricians think twice about opening practices in Texas altogether. And then there's even more we got to dive into in just a minute, but really quick, another break with a sponsor. The internet has reached this fun point where one bad click, it can turn into, I'm checking an email to, cool, now I have a cybersecurity problem. Right, because fishing links, fake websites, sketchy downloads, they're getting harder to spot,

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And then diving into the final block of today's show, let's talk about some more news you need to know pretty quickly. First up, you know, they've spent over a century committing lynchings, burning down people's homes, and terrorizing black people. But now you've got the KKK looking to rebrand. Because for the last decade, you've had experts warning about how right-wing politics and social media

they're feeding into this revival of white supremacists. And now you're getting reports from actual clan leaders like Pastor Thomas Rob, claiming that it's given their numbers a boost as well. And Rob, he's the head of what used to be called the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. But now, you've got them shortening that to the Knights Party, saying that they're rebranding to focus on family and faith. You could also say that's been part of their branding this whole time. Family is in anybody who's white, and faith is in Christian nationalism.

But since Rob took over in 1989, he's tried to tweak what that's looked like to get more supporters. He said that people are often hesitant to become a member, which I'm sure has to come with a territory of being known for brutal racist murders. But then also with that, one of the changes that he's made is that new members can now participate confidentially through the mail, so no one has to know what kind of shit you're supporting. He's also working to distance the group from the violence they've been known for with that type

of outreach. He's even changed his title from Grand Wizard to National Director to try and sound a little less clanish. But then with all that, one thing has stayed the same, and that is the racism. He said that they're still based around their white nationalist church, so the social and political beliefs, they haven't budged. So for example, he said in a recent interview that he doesn't see politicians like Zoran Mamdani and Abdul Al-Sayed.

as Americans, claiming that only the children of white foreigners can count there. So it seems more like the rebrand is more of a repackaging. It genuinely seems like you're getting the same old KKK just with a different aesthetic. Which also makes sense because you could just start a new group. You could be like, hey guys, I started a whole new different thing. But according to Rob, this has been working for that. And while he said a lot of experts, you know, they credit Trump for the rise in white nationalism, he says it actually started with Obama. Saying since then, people have said that they've been angered by what they see happening to the country. I mean, they're seeing more interest because the Knights Party gives those people a voice. Also with this, I'll note that he's refusing to provide any membership numbers to prove that the movement is growing. Though it is, I will say at the very least, off-putting, that things are like so bad with politics right now. And at the very least, you could just look at the landscape and make claims like this and have them sound believable. Also, you've got McDonald's in the news because they are now being accused of using AI to rig its menu prices. And they could actually be facing a class action lawsuit because of that.

Right, because last week, you had reports saying that McDonald's pricing engine uses machine learning algorithms to attract transactions across almost 14,000 restaurants. And they reportedly use that data to generate what they call the optimal price. for each menu item, which changes depending on the location. Apparently, the pricing tool alerts franchise owner if their location showing any sensitivity to price based on things like customers' willingness to pay. And while with that, McDonald said, hey, the owners are free to set their own prices,

framing the software as a tool, not a mandate, then had owners claiming that the company pressured them to use it. And you have reports saying that McDonald even keeps a record of anyone who doesn't follow its pricing recommendations in their stores. And so now this new lawsuit filed by Michael Thomas in Illinois says that they violated U.S. antitrust law by working with independent franchises

to fix prices using algorithms trained on non-public data. And you've got Thomas's lawyer arguing that McDonald's is leveraging its troves of data and its franchise system to nickel and dime consumers down to the last French fry. Though, I will say you have McDonald's pushing back on that saying at the reports that we got last week were speculative and uninformed. Reclaiming that AI does not set the price of a Big Mac or any other menu item and that the use of price recommendation tools is widespread across industries. But for now, I'll say this still has to be court certified and so we're going to see what actually happens from here. And then last step today, it is official. Paramount, they just merged with Warner Brothers creating one of the largest entertainment companies in the world. led by David Ellison.

And if you've been following this story with me, you know this is coming after tons of pushback with from Hollywood and Washington. Ellison had to settle lawsuits with 12 states and the Writers Guild of America before we could move forward with this. Got a Nusa, A.G. Rob Bonta, LA Mayor, Karen Bass. They all got a lot of heat behind that as well.

After all that chaos, you're now looking at a mega company valued it more than $110 billion. And hitting on just how big it is, I mean, Mission Impossible, Harry Potter, the DC universe networks like CBS, CNN, obviously Paramount Plus and HBO Max, those are now all under the same umbrella. And you've got Ellison calling

this juggernaut company Skydance, which he said was meant to retain the individual entities of Paramount and Warner Bros. Studio rather than combining them under a new brand. And now with that, he's about to get to work with his new co-CEO, Enon Kreis. Apparently, the first to do is to figure out how to combine these companies while delivering on their $6 billion cost savings plan. They're already expected to be about $80 billion in debt when the dust settles with this. So you've got the financial pressure on and reports say that they're going to be trying to get up their streaming numbers, keep money flowing to their cable networks and put asses and seats at theaters. And also, of course, and this is going to be one of the bigger things, they're going to be looking to cut

costs ASAP. And really, it feels less like are they going to cut and more how much are they going to cut, whether that be projects, people, whatever. And that, my friends, you beautiful bastards, is the end of your Tuesday show. As always, thank you for watching, like and subscribe and being a part of these daily dives into the news, wherever you're getting it. And hey, whether you leave from here or you click this video, because YouTube thinks that you really want to watch this video. No matter what you do, I'll see you right back here tomorrow for another daily dive into the news.