The Ben Shapiro Show - SHOWDOWN: Trump vs. Powell

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July 25, 2025 - The Ben Shapiro Show

01:14:18

SHOWDOWN: Trump vs. Powell

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	All righty, folks, a packed show today.
	President Trump takes on Jerome Powell in a tete-tete for the ages.
	Plus, we get into President Trump fighting homelessness in America's major cities and accusations of starvation in Gaza.
	But who is actually to blame first?
	You ever see a guy fight like his life depends on it because it actually did?
	Joe Pfeiffer didn't just beat the odds, he beat the hell out of them.
	Here's a look: a journey to the UFC.
	I don't care what you did in your career the last five years.
	What are you going to do tonight?
	Be fired up to fight.
	Try to finish the fight.
	If you want to get into the UFC and this is where you want to be, beat Joe Pfeiffer.
	Pfeiffer left home at 16.
	He spent the next few years homeless, bouncing around.
	The pain that I know that kid went through and overcame, if you want to beat him, you got to kill him.
	The second you lose, everybody forgets you.
	I wasn't ready to be forgotten.
	I was ready to be forgotten.
	Thank you.
	Bye.
	That's Journey to the UFC, The Joe Pfeiffer Story.
	Watch the premiere now only on Daily Wire Plus and at DailyWire.com.
	Well, as you all know, a few months back, President Trump called people who are critical of his Liberation Day tariffs panicins.
	And the point that I made with regard to his Panikin comment at the time was, it isn't panic, it's concern about bad policy that might have an impact.
	Well, the Panikins are back, but they are panicking now over supposed polls showing President Trump's decreased popularity.
	And those Panikins, like actual Panikins, are people looking at the Gallup polls and saying that Trump is in the high 30s and this is the collapse of his presidency and it's all Epstein.
	And okay, let's get real for just one second.
	The actual statistics on President Trump's popularity are about where they have always been.
	And I think it's worthwhile noting that because despite all of the water that he has supposedly taken on with things like Epstein, it just isn't really true.
	According to the Wall Street Journal, buoyed by voters' improving views of the economy, President Trump's political standing is showing notable resilience.
	A new Wall Street Journal poll finds, despite the unpopularity of the GOP's big tax and spending law, dissatisfaction with Trump's tariff plan, and high suspicion, the government is hiding important information about its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.
	Some 46% approve of his job performance unchanged from April, with 52% disapproving.
	88% of GOP voters approve of his job performance and 66% strongly approve.
	Okay, so what does that mean?
	It means that President Trump, his support is durable.
	And the real reason why his support is durable is because life is as good or better than it was back in February or March in the United States.
	That is the actual real reason.
	We have not seen the sort of economic collapse that many people were predicting, largely because Trump backed off of many of the tariff rates that he was pushing on Liberation Day.
	Instead, we are seeing trade deals brokered by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessons.
	As I've said before, President Trump is not chickening out here.
	This is called responding to reality.
	Life in the United States is safer because President Trump took concerted and brave action in bombing the Iranian nuclear facilities, despite actual panickens in the Republican Party, suggesting that it was going to lead to World War III.
	Not only did that not happen, it put Iran on its back foot in a serious way and may completely reshape the Middle East.
	A lot of people, again, freaking out about the One Big Beautiful bill, but the reality for those of us who actually have been following politics longer than five minutes is that all of the concern over deficit spending in the One Big Beautiful bill, all of the people who are concerned about that must have been ignoring the fact that the deficit in the United States has been blowing up for decades and that the One Big Beautiful bill did not actually change that trajectory in any way except a little bit downwards.
	Because in order for you to believe that that bill radically increased the debt and the deficit, you would have had to assume a snapping back into place of the Obama tax rates from 2015, which was not going to happen.
	Republicans were not going to let that happen.
	Okay, why is all of that important?
	Well, it's important because I think that the American people, the markets, we have gotten used to separating the wheat from the chaff when it comes to President Trump's policy, which is the best way of looking at a president.
	Not just the stuff that he says, particularly President Trump, but the stuff that he actually does.
	So yesterday, there was outsized focus on a tete-tete that he had with the Federal Reserve Chairman, Jerome Powell.
	So President Trump went to the Federal Reserve and he took his criticisms of Jerome Powell directly there, face-to-face, made for good TV.
	He went to visit the construction that was happening over at the Federal Reserve building.
	It's a $2.5 billion renovation of two historic buildings designated as part of the Federal Reserve headquarters.
	There is a bit of a back and forth in which Trump was putting pressure on Powell because he has been suggesting, so have other Republicans, that Powell is overspending on the rebuild of the Federal Reserve.
	Now, just open question here.
	What is Jerome Powell's interest?
	Unless he is one of the contractors who's putting money in his own pocket or something, what is his interest in spending too much money on the rebuilding of the Federal Reserve?
	He's not going to be there in a year and a half.
	So this whole sort of narrative that's been retailed about Powell, that he's somehow involved in a crony corruption scandal in which he is spending oodles of money rebuilding the Federal Reserve.
	Well, have you seen a lot of federal buildings that have not gone into cost overrun because of union contracts, because of regulations and all the rest?
	So at one point, President Trump got pissed at Powell and started arguing with him about the cost of the renovation.
	And Powell came back at President Trump and he said, well, actually, our costs have not gone up, Mr. President.
	You're just mischaracterizing this.
	Here was the back and forth.
	So we're taking a look at it looks like it's about 3.1 billion.
	It went up a little bit more last.
	so the 2.7 is now 3.1 i'm not aware of it yeah it just came out i haven't heard that from anybody's effect our note said about 3.1 as well 3.1 this came from us yes i don't know who does that are you including the market that's our entire couple and you just said You just ended in the third building.
	It's a third building.
	No, it's been built in 500.
	Okay, so again, in a normal era, people might panic over this because there's the president of the United States chiding the Federal Reserve Chair in front of everybody about these construction supposed overruns.
	Trump clearly came prepared.
	I mean, he had an actual paper in his pocket with the costs on the Federal Reserve Reconstruction, and he handed it to Powell and Pow immediately Looks at it and he goes, Mr. President, you're including here a building that we completed five years ago.
	And so, Powell happens to be right about this.
	The bottom line is that President Trump seems to be playing around the edges with the idea that perhaps someone will get rid of Jerome Powell for alleged corruption, that maybe somebody in Congress will do something about all this.
	Trump was asked about cost overruns.
	What would you do if you were leading a construction project and somebody went into cost overrun and President Trump said I'd fire him?
	Real estate developer, what would you do with a project manager who would be overbunded?
	Generally speaking, what would I do?
	I'd fire him.
	Okay, so President Trump really wants to do that and Jerome Bellow is standing right there.
	The reason I'm laughing about this and the reason it's funny is because he's going to do it.
	He's not going to fire Jerome Bell.
	It's not a thing that is going to happen.
	And obviously, it's from trying to exert pressure on Powell to lower interest rates.
	He literally says that.
	I mean, he slaps Powell on the back and says, I'd love for this guy to lower the interest rates.
	Are there things the chairman could say to you today that would make you back off some of the earlier criticisms?
	Well, I'd love him to lower interest rates.
	Other than that, what can I tell you?
	Okay, now, anybody who thinks that this is sort of a serious threat, it is not, which is why the stock market did not react with panic yesterday.
	And President Trump himself said, I don't think it's necessary when asked if he was going to fire Powell.
	To do that is a big move.
	I don't think it's necessary, Trump said.
	I believe he's going to do the right thing and lower rates.
	But again, even if he doesn't, quote, do the right thing and lower the rates, he's not going to fire Powell.
	And the reason he's not going to fire Powell is because the markets would freak out.
	And President Trump does not want the markets to freak out.
	Now, I have many friends who disagree with me on politics, who are on the left, who are very freaked out about President Trump being elected.
	Oh, my God, it's going to be the end of the world.
	He's so crazy.
	It's going to be what.
	And the thing that I always said to them is that there's a beauty to the American constitutional system, and that is that it's going to sift out most of the stuff that actually is quite bad, that the judiciary will prevent President Trump if he seeks to from trying to really violate the Constitution.
	And the judiciary has done that.
	They've told President Trump many times not to do a thing, and then he abides by the judicial rulings.
	And in many cases, he's been right.
	He's been right.
	And the Supreme Court has ruled in his favor after a lower court does the wrong thing.
	But there's something else about President Trump that is unique, and that is that President Trump, when he runs up against the guardrails of reality, steps back from the brink.
	And so when it comes to Jerome Powell, and again, there's a lot of outsized panic today, at least in the commentary about Trump and Powell.
	He's not going to touch Powell.
	He's not going to, because if he were to do so, then the markets would react badly.
	And Trump does not want the markets to react badly.
	So that's what reduces this to the level of essentially vaudevillian slapstick comedy.
	Now, there is a case to fire Powell.
	That case was made by Mohamed El Arian, the former chief economic advisor to Alianz.
	I'm friends with Mohamed.
	He's been on the show before.
	And Mohamed says that Powell should step down, mainly because his keeping of the interest rates where they are is now perceived as a political act.
	I've been critical of Chair Powell for a while.
	He made a major policy mistake that saw inflation go up to 9%.
	We had supervision of banks problems.
	There were insider trading allegations to his committee.
	There's mission creep.
	The list goes on.
	I think that Chair Palmer has decided to redefine his legacy in terms of protecting the independence of the Fed.
	But by staying on, he's actually threatening the independence of the Fed.
	So those of us who believe that an independent central bank is critical to economic outcomes think that the right thing for him to do is to step down.
	Now, if you were to step down and President Trump were to put, for example, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant in his place, that has been one of the conversations.
	Kevin Hassett has been discussed as a possible Federal Reserve chairman.
	There's some other people who have been discussed.
	If that were to happen, they would likely also not lower the interest rates at this point in time, given the fact that there is a little bit of upward pressure that we are seeing on inflation in terms of prices.
	And really, the only thing that's holding that back is lowered demand.
	That yes, tariffs are or would increase prices, except that demand has fallen off at the same time.
	And so what that means is that prices have basically stayed stable.
	So if President Trump would like for the interest rates to decrease, then he should cut a bunch of trade deals and then the interest rates are going to go down, whether it's Powell or anybody else.
	Bottom line here, though, is this.
	And this is the important thing, again, about President Trump.
	President Trump is pursuing heterodox policies.
	Many of those things are good.
	He's breaking a lot of the stalemate that has characterized Washington, D.C., a lot of the traditionalist thinking that has characterized Washington, D.C. on everything from economics to executive policy to the Middle East.
	This is just what he does.
	President Trump likes to break things, and many of those things deserve to be broken.
	But President Trump also understands that if he is about to irrevocably break a thing that is going to hurt him politically, he just will not do it, which is, again, why the visit yesterday to the Federal Reserve was more funny than anything else.
	Already coming up, New York City, they keep telling people that no one can make it because if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere, but apparently no one can make it anymore.
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	Meanwhile, President Trump pushing forward on an attempt to fix America's major cities.
	He's directing federal agencies to find ways to make it easier to forcibly hospitalize homeless people with mental illness and addiction for longer periods, an effort to fight what the administration calls vagrancy threatening the streets of U.S. cities, according to the Washington Post.
	An executive order signed Thursday pushes federal agencies to overturn state and federal legal precedent that limits how local and state governments can involuntarily commit people who pose a risk to themselves or others.
	The order says that shifting homeless people into long-term institutional settings will restore public order.
	The order says surrendering our cities and citizens to disorder and fear is neither compassionate to the homeless nor other citizens.
	This is 100% true.
	This is 100% true.
	A huge percentage of people who are living on America's streets are either mentally ill, like seriously mentally ill, or drug addicts or both.
	And the notion that it is some sort of act of benevolence to keep those people living on the streets in penury, in terrible conditions, that this is an aspect of American freedom, that a core liberty involves living on the street in your own feces while you are diseased and you have a disease of the mind.
	Like why that is a good thing is beyond me, absolutely beyond me.
	Now, I have relatives who have been mentally ill.
	If they were simply allowed to lie around on the street, that would not be a good thing.
	That would not be a worthwhile thing.
	The executive order says federal resources could ensure detainees with serious mental illness are not released into the public because of a lack of bed space in jails or hospitals.
	Now, this would, again, one of the reasons we left Los Angeles, my family, my company, is because of the rampant homelessness and vagrancy that had taken over the city, which very often turned into like a public threat to order, created crime problems, created chaos on the streets, people sleeping in the gutters next to open needles, you know, stuff that would happen like in residential areas.
	I remember one morning outside of our house in Los Angeles, fairly decent area.
	We open the gate outside the house, and there's literally just a vagrant lying in the gutter, lying in the gutter with open needles on him.
	I mean, like that, that is not a good way of living.
	That is a terrible thing for that person and for the society around them.
	The president moving on this is definitely a very good thing.
	I mean, if you're wondering what percentage of homeless people either are mentally ill or have drug addiction or both, I asked our friends and sponsors over at Perplexity.
	And the answer is about 67% of people experiencing homelessness in the United States currently have a mental health disorder based on recent systematic reviews and large-scale studies.
	The lifetime prevalence is even higher, reaching 77%.
	Estimates for severe mental illness among the homeless, like schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, or bipolar, range from 20 to 25%, with some sources indicating at least 25%.
	These are, of course, extraordinary numbers.
	And those extraordinary numbers mean that you have people who are living in terrible conditions.
	And again, it is just a demonstration that misplaced sympathy is a bad idea.
	You should have sympathy for people who are homeless, but that sympathy should not extend to violation of the law.
	The laws exist for a reason.
	And the best thing that can happen for a lot of these people is to be placed in a situation where they have to take their meds, for example, where they actually have people looking after them, where they are drying out.
	Like that is a good thing.
	So good for President Trump for taking that on.
	Meanwhile, President Trump's DOJ is looking to sue New York City for protecting illegal aliens with sanctuary policies.
	Again, a move by the president to clean up America's major cities.
	This goes back to why the president retains a fairly high level of popularity, particularly for President Trump, who's, again, he's been president before.
	His popularity rating is still 46%, according to the Wall Street Journal, which is near his historic highs.
	Why?
	Because he actually is focused on improving life of people, even in places that didn't vote for him, like New York City.
	According to Breitbart, President Trump's Department of Justice has now filed a lawsuit against New York City, New York, Mayor Eric Adams, over the city's new sanctuary policies that shield illegal aliens from federal immigration enforcement.
	And this, of course, is another problem that has plagued America's major cities, is people who are living off the books and who are violating the law and who are affecting quality of life.
	And again, that is not unsympathetic toward people who are crossing the border for economic reasons.
	That is just a reality is that American citizens deserve to be protected and defended and their cities should not be turned into repositories for poverty and crime through no actual will of their own.
	On Thursday, Attorneys General Pam Bondi announced a lawsuit against Adams and other city officials for their enforcement of sanctuary city policies that DOJ prosecutors say are a violation of the supremacy clause of the United States Constitution.
	The DOJ lawsuit notes events of this week when two illegal aliens who had been set loose by New York City's sanctuary policy ended up allegedly shooting a customs and border protection officer in the face and leg during an attempted armed robbery.
	Both of those aliens entered the United States illegally and were repeatedly arrested for criminal behavior since.
	In fact, after an April 5th, 2024 arrest for fourth-degree felony, grand larceny, and petite larceny, ICE placed an immigration detainer on one of the aliens.
	New York City PD instead ignored that and released him onto the streets where he ended up shooting a member of Homeland Security, a customs and border protection agent.
	And so the Trump administration, again, taking action on that as well.
	And as long as Democrats are continuing to double down on stupid, as long as they continue to move toward people like Zoran Mamdani as the solution to their city's problems, nationally, they can do what they want in their cities.
	These do have national impacts.
	If America's major cities are all dominated by radical Democrats who do not care about crime rates, Like Brandon Johnson in Chicago, or they do not care about the problem of homelessness, like Karen Bass in Los Angeles, or they are totally fine with the destruction of America's major financial centers like Zoran Mamdani.
	Republicans are going to be able to use that to run on.
	That is just a reality.
	Raihan Salam has a really good piece over at the Wall Street Journal asking, who are the supporters of Zoran Mamdani?
	And he says that essentially it's the downwardly mobile elites.
	He says, drawing on decades of IRS research, researchers at Opportunity Insights and Economic Policy Institute found that among Americans born in 1940, 92% earned more than their parents at age 30.
	For those born in 1984, only 50% did.
	And that decline has political consequences.
	Researchers at the Social Economics Lab have found a strong correlation between perceiving yourself to be less well-off than your parents and zero-sum thinking, or the belief that gains for some people come at the expense of others.
	Roughly 40% of the nation's 72 million millennials, people born between 1981 and 1996, live in high-cost, hyper-competitive metro areas where milestones like owning a home or paying off student loan debt can loom as distant dreams.
	Between millennials who are worse off than their parents, those who believe that they're worse off, and those who live in dysfunctional blue state metros where househunting can feel like the hunger games, America has a critical mass of people whose expectations of intergenerational progress have gone sour.
	Billionaire-bashing political entrepreneurs like Mom Donnie have figured out how to scratch that psychopolitical itch.
	That is exactly right.
	And I want to point out here that it's not just that there are millennials who are worse off than their parents.
	Millennials are making different choices than their parents.
	They have lower marriage rates.
	Many of them are not in the workforce.
	There are a bunch of difference in lifestyle choices that are happening for millennials.
	Because if you look at the broader overall economy, there is no question that people in 2025 are better off than people in 1981 when these people were born.
	I'm a millennial.
	I am better off than my parents.
	And that is not because I grew up rich.
	I did not grow up rich.
	I understand that this is one of the favorite things for people on the left to claim is that everybody who is now rich was once rich.
	That is not true.
	I grew up in an 1,100 square foot home in Burbank, California.
	It was a home with two bedrooms.
	I had three sisters.
	All four kids were in one room.
	My parents were in the other bedroom.
	We had one bathroom for six people.
	That was not a terrible life.
	It was a good life.
	And then our life got better because my parents moved into a 2,300 foot square foot home in North Hollywood, California, where I finally had my own room for the first time at the age of 11.
	It was not a huge house either, but it was a good life.
	And now we live in a much bigger house.
	And my parents live in a bigger house than we did when we were growing up.
	Part of that is living in the state of Florida, but that is just the reality is that upward mobility is not remotely dead.
	But liars in both parties, and they are liars, have a desire to tell you and they make political buck off of telling you that you're worse off than your parents, that your life is harder than your parents, that you have it worse off than anybody in modern American history.
	And that's just not true.
	For the vast majority of people, that is not true.
	All righty, coming up, we'll get in some culture talk.
	It's a Friday.
	Emily Austin stops by to explain why Pedro Pascal, you know, the fantastic floor guy, why he keeps like being handsy with his co-star.
	In any case, my work schedule has been, you know, really busy lately, especially because all the travel.
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	Also, summer is here.
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	The reason that, for example, house prices have gone up in most areas is because houses are now bigger than they were when you were growing up.
	The reason that you feel that you cannot afford as many things is because there are more people living in metro areas and more regulation, which means there's not enough building.
	But if you move out of the big cities, you can certainly find places in the country where you can find a house that is not wildly expensive.
	Also, your parents got married younger than you did and started their income earning trajectory younger than you did, in all likelihood.
	But politicians have a consistent desire to tell you that the system is rigged against you because then they make buck off of unrigging the system, by which we mean additionally rigging the system.
	There are people for whom life is harder than it was for their parents.
	But overall, in the broader American economy, would you rather live in 2025 or 1981?
	I mean, all you have to do is think about the things that are available to you in 2025 as opposed to 1981.
	The vision of the economy as a giant zero-sum game in which redistribution is the goal or equality of result in terms of just pure dollar amount is The goal ignores all of the subsequent economic and lifestyle development that has happened since 1981.
	You have a magical machine in your pocket your parents could not remotely have conceived of that allows you to not only get any piece of information at any time with a few clicks of a button, but also allows you to order any product for significantly cheaper than it would have been for your parents.
	Yes, significantly cheaper than it would have been for your parents.
	Power is less expensive than it was for your parents.
	Everybody right now is complaining about rent.
	So I asked our friends at Perplexity, our sponsors, what percentage of people's income was spent on rent in 1981?
	How about in 2025?
	According to Perplexity, in 1981, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development adopted the 30% rule, officially defining affordable housing as costing no more than 30% of a household's gross income.
	And by the early 1980s, the average percentage of income spent on rent for American renters was close to this 30% threshold.
	How about 2025?
	Well, as of 2025, the typical U.S. renter spends about 27 to 32% of their income on rent.
	So about what they always did.
	But that varies widely among locations.
	For example, renters in high-cost metros like New York City or Miami might spend between 35 and 55% of their income on rent.
	Less expensive cities fall below 20%.
	And that is after all of this over-regulation.
	So where you live basically defines what kind of rent you pay.
	So when you're talking about those downwardly mobile elite, as Raihan Salam is talking about, the reality is that a huge percentage of discontent is because you have many people in power who are failing in their regulatory policies and who have promised redistributionism and economic boom times and all the rest, who are blaming a system that they are attempting to overthrow for people's discontent.
	And they are lying to people by claiming they're not upwardly mobile anymore.
	They just keep lying.
	And this is unfortunately true for a lot of people in both parties.
	Here is the reality in the United States of America.
	If you do the following things, you will not live in poverty in the United States.
	If you finish high school, if you get married, if you get a job, those three things, get married before you have kids, finish high school, get a job.
	You will not live in poverty in the United States, which means that you will be upwardly mobile.
	It turns out responsible decision-making in a free society makes you richer.
	That's not true for every single person.
	Of course, there's luck involved.
	Of course, there are bad things that happen to people.
	But this sort of widespread perception, mainly by millennials and younger in urban areas who have chosen to live in these areas that are more expensive, where a latte will cost you 10 bucks.
	If you choose to do that, as opposed to making different decisions, of course that's going to impact your life.
	And people like Zora Mamtani are going to lie to you.
	They're going to tell you they can fix all of your problems by pushing this zero-sum politics.
	People are moving less than they ever did in America, even though moving is now easier than it ever was in America.
	Your great-great-grandparents had to get in a covered wagon and cross a continent filled with hostels in order to get to a place where there was nothing and then build a house out of nothing.
	And now we complain about having to move from city to city, which costs you the flight, the cost of a plane ticket and the moving company that moves all your stuff for you.
	All of this leads.
	This does not mean that people don't have real problems.
	It doesn't mean the economy is working perfectly.
	Of course, it isn't, largely because of left-wing policy.
	What it does mean is that when people like Zorn Mamzani lie to you, they make your life worse.
	Right and left.
	This is my problem with economic populism is that it tells a series of lies that are unsustainable.
	That free market economics is a quote-unquote system designed in order to impoverish you.
	It is not a design system.
	It's an evolutionary system, free market economics, springing from basic concepts of freedom and private property.
	And it is that that has made the world inestimably richer by every available metric.
	And this is the part that drives me absolutely insane.
	So yes, complain if you want about your personal situation.
	Let's try to find solutions to your personal situation.
	Complain about policy.
	Many policies are bad.
	But the general idea that America, where people are richer than at any point in literally all of human history, is some sort of hellhole backwater.
	Literally visit another country.
	Seriously, like spend some time there and see whether you think that's true or not.
	The Zorin Mamdanification of the Democratic Party is wrong and bad.
	And President Trump should take advantage of that.
	I think Republicans are going to take advantage of that.
	They should look at America's major cities and say, these places are worse off because of policies like those of Zorin Mamdani.
	And if citygoers continue to believe in that nonsense, then frankly, you get what you bought.
	You get what you voted for.
	Andrew Cuomo is still running in that New York City mayoral race.
	I've said it before.
	I think Andrew Cuomo stinks.
	I think he's terrible.
	Eric Adams should drop out.
	So should Curtis Lila.
	It is ridiculous to run multiple candidates against Mom Dani at this time if you care about the city of New York and the people who inhabit it.
	But if New York votes for Mom Dani, they're going to get what they asked for, good and hard.
	Even Andrew Cuomo is now saying that the shift to far-left politics has paralyzed the city of New York.
	I think the problem with New York City has been twofold.
	Number one, you've had an incompetent government.
	Basically, since Mayor Bloomberg, that's 12 years, where you just haven't had a competent mayor in charge.
	Second, in this city, you've had this shift to far-left politics that has paralyzed the government.
	So he is right about all of that.
	Are people of New York smart enough to see that?
	We're going to find out in very, very short order.
	All righty, meanwhile, there's a lot of focus on what's going on in the Gaza Strip.
	Obviously, there is a starvation issue in the Gaza Strip.
	The question is, from whom?
	Where is that starvation issue arising from?
	So the media are jumping all over this, obviously, because what they hope to do is essentially preserve Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
	That's what this is all about.
	Hamas is responsible for the starvation in the Gaza Strip on a wide variety of levels.
	One, if Hamas surrendered, if leadership went into exile today, and if they surrendered the 20 live hostages they're still holding who have now been held for almost two years, if they did that, this war would be over.
	It would be done.
	Two, the aid is there.
	It's just being stolen by Hamas or held up by the UN.
	Hamas has been operating based on stealing humanitarian aid going into the Gaza Strip since the beginning Of the war.
	On a per capita basis, there is no war zone on earth into which more humanitarian aid has entered than Gaza by a multiple.
	An enormous amount of aid has gone into Gaza.
	The problem is that Hamas steals all of it, which is why the price of flour in the market in Gaza is like 50 shekel for a kilogram of flour.
	Why?
	The reason is because Hamas steals an enormous amount of it, and this is how Hamas makes its money.
	You wonder how Hamas can continue to operate?
	The answer is by stealing humanitarian aid.
	And actually, the shift of the humanitarian aid away from the UN, which is a tool of Hamas, without a doubt, UNRWA is simply an adjunct organization for Hamas.
	The United Nations does the bidding of Hamas.
	The minute that the humanitarian aid in Gaza shifted over to organizations that were not working with Hamas, Hamas's funding started to dry up.
	That is not a coincidence.
	According to the Washington Post, Hamas is facing its worst financial and administrative crisis in its four-decade history, facing stiff challenges and mustering resources it would need to continue to fight Israel and rule Gaza.
	With its coffers depleted, Hamas' military wing can no longer adequately pay the salaries of its fighters, though it is still able to recruit teenage boys for missions like keeping lookout or placing explosives along Israeli military routes, according to Oded Elam, who is a former high-level Israeli intelligence officer and current IDF forces officers.
	The group has been unable to replace the well-equipped tunnels and underground command centers Israeli forces have destroyed in their bid to uproot Hamas.
	Hamas can't pay people because they have lost access to the aid.
	That aid is the funding mechanism for Hamas.
	It always was.
	That is why you are seeing, by the way, there are some Israelis who are protesting aid going into the Gaza Strip, not because they want Gazans to starve, but because they know that Hamas is going to hijack that aid and use it to prolong the war.
	If you want to get to the end of the war, Hamas has to be starved out, not the Palestinian people.
	That is why the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is in there trying to separate the wheat from the chaff, trying to ensure that actual Palestinian civilians, non-Hamas affiliates, gain the aid.
	Okay, so what exactly is going on?
	Well, people are starving in Gaza because Hamas is literally shooting people in the lines or shooting at Israeli soldiers from the lines.
	They shot a rocket just two days ago at the Israeli soldiers and members of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation who are handing out aid.
	This has been a regular feature of everything happening with the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
	A bevy of GHF workers have been killed trying to hand out aid by Hamas, which is actively attempting to monopolize the distribution of aid so that it can steal all of that stuff for itself, resell it, use it as leverage over people.
	This is what they do.
	And the reason the media are covering this the way that they are, it really is disgusting, is because they've been doing the bidding of Hamas since the very beginning.
	Let us be very, very clear about this.
	Hamas launched a war it could not win.
	They launched this war betting that the media would save them, that the legacy media in the United States, in Europe, that European governments would step in and save them.
	And that's happened over and over.
	They're right.
	How did they know that would happen?
	Well, because those organizations have always been pro-terrorism in the Middle East.
	They've always been sympathetic to the quote-unquote decolonialist, anti-colonialist case made by Hamas up to and including violence.
	They've always soft-pedaled this stuff, and they continue to do so, pretending that it's somehow Israeli intransigence that's leading to shortages in the Gaza Strip, which is a lie, a full-scale, ridiculous lie.
	It is not in Israel's interest to starve people in the Gaza Strip.
	It's in Israel's interest to starve out Hamas, but not the Palestinians, which is why, again, the distribution of food aid in the Gaza Strip is going on a pace.
	And yes, Hamas is stealing it.
	Here, for example, is some video from just a couple of days ago of members of Hamas gorging themselves on aid that was brought in not for them, but for Gaza and civilians.
	People holding bananas, dates, meat, rice.
	Hamas terrorists in their tunnel, enjoying their food.
	Chanting about mangoes, bananas.
	By the way, this is a recruiting tactic as well.
	Because if you can show people that you have the food, that if you join Hamas, you'll get fed, maybe you're able to garner more terrorists.
	Here's footage from just a couple of days ago of massive amounts, 950 trucks worth of undistributed food aid.
	Why is it not being distributed?
	Because the United Nations refuses to allow distribution inside the Gaza Strip of this food aid by the GHF.
	And Israel doesn't want the UN distributing it except at approved IDF sites because they believe the UN is working with Hamas, which, of course, they are.
	The entire goal of the United Nations at this point is to maintain Hamas dominance.
	By the way, that is also the goal of the Qatari government.
	The Qatari government has been undermining negotiations between Israel and Hamas via Steve Witkoff, the negotiator, the special envoy in this area, for legitimately a year.
	Every time a deal looks like it's going to be cut to end the war or at least get some hostages out on the basis of a ceasefire, Qatar steps in and changes the terms.
	And one of the things that has happened here is repeated attempts to achieve a ceasefire.
	And then there'll be a spate of media articles or announcements, as we'll discuss, by people like the ridiculous French president Emmanuel Macron, that there should be a Palestinian state or that Hamas should be given more humanitarian aid.
	And so Hamas then pulls out of the talks, which is precisely what happened yesterday, by the way, according to the Washington Post.
	The United States is withdrawing its negotiating team from Doha Qatar for consultations, according to Trump envoy Steve Witkoff.
	He said that while U.S., Qatari, and Egyptian mediators have made a great effort, Hamas does not appear to be coordinated or acting in good faith.
	By the way, Qatar could end this tomorrow.
	Qatar could end this tomorrow.
	All Qatar would have to do is call up Hamas and tell them their financial support is gone and they need to go into exile right now and release the hostages and that Qatar would take them and would put them up at their five-star hotels.
	After all, Qatar is used to that.
	They were keeping Hamas's top negotiators like Ismail Khania, political leader, in Qatar for years on end at five-star hotels.
	Israel had accepted the latest Witkoff proposal for a 60-day ceasefire, during which it said it would withdraw its troops from certain parts in Gaza in exchange for the release of some of the remaining hostages.
	By the way, that ceasefire would have likely been the last and the remaining hostages would be killed because Hamas is not going to release all the hostages or it's over.
	Now, all of this is tied into Emmanuel Macron and the rest of Europe attempting to do the work of Hamas.
	Can you imagine that the result of October 7th, the result of the mass slaughter of Jews and non-Jews, by the way, in Israel on October 7th, the taking captive of 250 people, the murder of babies with bare hands, which is what happened to the Beabuz kids, that that would be met by the French president declaring a Palestinian state?
	Well, that's basically what's going to happen right now, which shows you exactly where the French are.
	I know that Candace Owens is currently being sued by the president of France and his wife for her claims that Brigitte Macron has balls.
	Well, if Brigitte Macron does have balls, that would make the only member of the pair that does.
	Because Emmanuel Macron is a ridiculous and stupid figure as the president of France.
	He put out a statement yesterday, quote, consistent with its historic commitment to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.
	I have decided that France will recognize the state of Palestine.
	Cool.
	I recognize the state of Narnia.
	Exciting stuff happening all over the place.
	What are the borders of the state of Palestine?
	Who is the government of the state of Palestine?
	Who are the governing bodies of the state of Palestine?
	If you can't name them, it doesn't exist, my friend.
	That's the reality.
	I will make this solemn announcement, says Emmanuel Macron, before the United Nations General Assembly this coming September.
	Woo-hoo-hoo!
	The UN General Assembly, the most isolated of international politics, a wretched hive of scum and villainy.
	The urgent priority today is to end the war in Gaza and to bring relief to the civilian population, he says.
	Well, you know what would end that?
	Hamas not being there.
	That's what would end that.
	By the way, the best possible solution here is the setting up of a humanitarian aid zone in which GHF runs the distribution of aid.
	So it's not Hamas doing it and it's not the UN doing it, where Israel is basically using its military to ensure that people who are entering that humanitarian aid zone have security and safety in that zone, presumably in the south of Gaza.
	That would be the actual solution because we are now in the Gaza Strip.
	That right there is a counterinsurgency operation.
	That is what they have right now.
	And the only successful counterinsurgency strategy ever devised is to create safe zones for civilians, non-combatants, and non-terrorists that are safe and secure.
	That is the only way.
	And then allow people who want to leave to actually leave.
	I can't think of another war zone on planet Earth where the rest of the world is dedicated to keeping people in the war zone who want to leave.
	It's an amazing thing and demonstrates what the actual goals are.
	Macron says, peace is possible.
	Cool, cool, cool.
	So if peace is possible, why don't you name the terms?
	How's that going to work, Emmanuel?
	By the way, he should declare a state of Palestine in France.
	It seems that the Islamic radical population of France is dictating policy over there.
	So why not just set up a state over there?
	Why not?
	Huge percentage of your population is antithetical to traditional French principles and politics.
	So you can do it on the Riviera.
	That, of course, is the suggestion of America's ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee.
	Here he was yesterday.
	First of all, it's incredibly inappropriate in the midst of a war that Israel is dealing with to go out and present something that I think increasingly Israelis are steadfast against.
	October 7th changed a lot of things.
	If France is really so determined to see a Palestinian state, I've got a suggestion for them.
	Carve out a piece of the French Riviera and create a Palestinian state.
	They're welcome to do that.
	Good for Ambassador Huckabee.
	Macron said, we need an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and the massive humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza.
	Okay, so, I mean, Israel just tried to do that.
	Hamas said no.
	You may have noticed.
	We must also ensure the demilitarization of Hamas, secure and rebuild Gaza.
	Cool, cool.
	Does he have any ideas on how to accomplish that other than the idea of just extirpating Hamas?
	Or is it empty verbiage from the ballist president of France?
	And finally, we must build the state of Palestine, guarantee its viability, and ensure that by accepting its demilitarization and fully recognizing Israel, it contributes to the security of all in the region.
	But you're not doing any of those things.
	Those are all preconditions.
	You're just recognizing a non-existent state that doesn't do any of those things, literally any of them.
	Ridiculous person, Emmanuel Macron.
	By the way, him trying to suggest that the Palestinian Authority will be the governing body in the Gaza Strip is just plainly ridiculous.
	The Palestinian Authority cannot even govern itself in the so-called West Bank, Judea and Samaria.
	When we talk about Hamas being the obstacle to peace in the region, Hamas keeping people in starvation conditions and not just coming to a ceasefire agreement, you know who understands this very clearly as President Trump here he was this morning.
	They pulled out of Gaza.
	They pulled out in terms of negotiating.
	It was too bad.
	Hamas.
	Hamas didn't really want to make a deal.
	I think they want to die.
	And it's very, very bad.
	They got to beat it to a point where you have to get the fucking hostages.
	And they know what happens after you get the fucking hostages.
	And basically, because of that, they really didn't want to make it the election of that.
	So they pulled out and they're going to have to fight and they're going to have to clean it up.
	They're going to have to get rid of it.
	We'll get to more on this in just a moment.
	First, this just in from the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews.
	Right now, the situation across Israel remains fragile and urgent.
	Israeli neighborhoods were destroyed.
	Dozens of Israelis were killed in that last round of fighting with Iran.
	Whether in peacetime or at war, the people of Israel know an overwhelming number of ballistic missiles could fall at any moment.
	And when the sirens sound, they could have just 15 seconds to reach a bomb shelter.
	But there aren't enough bomb shelters, especially in Tel Aviv and also in Israel's north, where there have been a bunch of attacks.
	That's why the fellowship is working around the clock to build and place hundreds of concrete reinforced bomb shelters, each of them ready when the next rocket strike occurs.
	The fellowship is deploying 60 new bomb shelters, including 10 immediate placements and 50 upgraded models with blast-resistant steel doors to protect vulnerable Israeli communities from future threats.
	To learn more about IFCJ's life-saving work, visit benforthefellowship.org.
	That's benforthefellowship.org.
	They're doing an enormous amount on the ground, all the way up to and including in southern Syria, where they're trying to help the Druze.
	The IFCJ is doing amazing work, and you can help them at benforthefellowship.org.
	Again, that's benforthellowship.org.
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	All of this, again, is designed.
	It is designed by the Europeans.
	It is designed by the EU and the UN.
	It is designed in order to maintain a Hamas presence in Gaza.
	If you want the war in Gaza to come to an end, if you want humanitarian aid to flow freely into Gaza, you cannot have that humanitarian aid being used by the terrorist group that has tyrannically dominated this area for 20 years.
	You cannot allow that aid to get to them, which is why the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is the only body that should be distributing aid in the Gaza Strip.
	Speaking of which, yesterday I had the opportunity to speak with Johnny Moore, who's the head of the GHF, taking his life in his hands legitimately in order to ensure that Gazan civilians get aid in the worst possible situations.
	Here's what our interview sounded like.
	And joining us online is Johnny Moore.
	He's the executive chairman of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, a U.S. and Israeli-backed nonprofit focused on food aid distribution in Gaza.
	Johnny, thanks so much for taking the time.
	Really appreciate it.
	Thanks, Dan.
	Good to be with you.
	So in a second, I want to get into the origins of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, what led to its creation, but let's talk about, obviously, the vast PR attempt by Hamas and its allies in the media and in European governments, apparently, to suggest that Israel and the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation are complicit in a mass starvation campaign against the Gazan population of Palestinians.
	What exactly is GHF doing?
	Where are these allegations coming from?
	What's happening in the food lines?
	Well, first of all, it's coming from Hamas.
	So the Hamas health ministry, the Hamas, the government media office, every single day, they create some fabricated story and the media just runs with it.
	And by the way, Ben, it's not just stories.
	I mean, today, this morning, we had a rocket attack.
	So literally, Hamas shot a rocket.
	Thank God it missed, but it was aiming for one of our distribution sites.
	And the net effect is that there are many, many people in Gaza that the one thing Hamas wants to do is make sure that they don't get food.
	And while I'm talking to you now, I mean, today we will surpass 90 million meals of food delivered to the people of Gaza.
	We're doing that with the whole UN against us, most of the press against us, Hamas threatening us, trying to literally killing our local Gazan aid workers a couple of weeks ago.
	It's just absolutely unbelievable.
	You know, when we talk about what Hamas is doing in the complicity of the United Nations, a lot of people are suggesting Hamas obviously wants the UN to distribute the food in Gaza because they work with the UN.
	I mean, the UN RWA was essentially a wing of Hamas.
	What they're hoping is the UN will bring in the food, just give it to Hamas.
	Hamas's very survival at this point is essentially reliant on either hijacking, stealing, or being given enormous amounts of food aid, not because they need it to eat, but because they then resell it at these Gazan markets at inflated prices.
	And then they use that money in order to obtain further weaponry and do what they need to do in the Gaza Strip.
	Is that the dynamic?
	Because it's pretty obvious that right now they are openly negotiating to not have GHF be the food distributor and to have the UN be the food distributor in any sort of hostage deal.
	Yeah, it's actually worse than that.
	So not only has the UN become the press secretary for Hamas, the UN actually is, I believe, complicit in the whole thing.
	I mean, while we're talking right now, this is crazy, but it's true.
	There are 950 trucks of UN aid, not outside of the Gaza Strip, inside of the Gaza Strip, ready to be distributed, but the UN won't distribute it and they won't let us distribute it for them.
	In fact, they boycotted us from the moment we started.
	You know, we started because on May 5th, President Trump said in the White House, he said that Hamas was stealing the food of the Gaza people and the United States was going to do something about it.
	And so we have one mission, which is to get food to the people of Gaza in a way that Hamas can't steal it.
	Because not only are they selling it and taxing it, and not only have they made a billion dollars from it over the course of the war, they also were using the UN aid convoys to pass messages to their fighters.
	They were moving fighters from one part of the Gaza Strip to another part of the Gaza Strip.
	And the UN has the, they won't meet with us, by the way, but they have the audacity to say that we're not neutral because we've delivered this, our sin is delivering 100 million meals for free to the people of Gaza that a terrorist organization can't steal.
	So why is it that the UN is still in control of how aid is being distributed in the Gaza Strip?
	Who makes the decision as to, you know, where do those trucks go?
	You say that all these trucks are on the Gaza side of the border, not on the Israeli side of the Karen-Shalom crossing, but on the Gaza side.
	So why is it the UN deciding that they should just sit there and molder in the sun?
	The UN is playing politics.
	That's what they're doing.
	They're playing politics with people's lives.
	So they're sharing the Hamas propaganda.
	They're actually basically a willful participant on the Hamas side of the negotiating table in the ceasefire negotiations by refusing to distribute aid and spreading this narrative around the world that the people of Gaza are going to starve if Hamas doesn't, in effect, get its demands at the negotiating table.
	I mean, this is so unbelievably corrupt and profane.
	But what we've discovered over the course of this operation, one of the reasons why the UN boycotts us and never boycotts Hamas, why they oppose us at all costs and want us dismantled and shut down, is because unfortunately, this whole system, this isn't just a Gaza problem.
	This is a global problem.
	There isn't a conflict in the world that hasn't been exacerbated and prolonged by this broken UN system.
	And yet the United States of America, until this administration, has willfully funded it.
	Our European allies, I mean, it's the official policy of the EU and of Germany, gigantic Germany, to continue funding UNRWA as the main source of aid.
	And so the UN has basically said, it's UNRWA or else.
	And UNRWA, of course, is, you know, they're not just corrupt.
	I mean, UNRWA employees held hostages.
	You know, there's one report I read that as many as 49% of UNRWA employees actually were directly connected to Hamas.
	So the UN has basically decided they're going to save UNRWA, even if it means if Palestinians die, the war is prolonged.
	I mean, I have never seen something so corrupt in all.
	In fact, I told our guys the other day: you know, is it legal?
	Somebody asked somebody in the State Department, can we just take the UN aid and distribute it?
	Yeah, so let's talk about what can be done.
	Because as you say, if the UN is still very active in the Gaza Strip, why are they still very active in the Gaza Strip?
	Is that a decision by the United States, by Israel?
	Does the UN have some sort of independent authority?
	Why are they the ones who get to decide whether aid is distributed or not?
	It's because actually we let them do it, and we don't put enough pressure on our allies to join us in fixing the corrupt system.
	I mean, the truth is only right now, as I'm talking to you, only members of Congress basically that are in opposition or aligned with the Hamas side of this discussion are vocal about this at all.
	I mean, Republican members of Congress, unfortunately, we had our Iran war, we had, you know, the big beautiful bill, everything going on.
	Everybody's sort of asleep at the, you know, at the will.
	We have a once in a generation opportunity here to fix a broken system that is prolonged.
	If you are a peace through strength, if you don't want war, you know, in this world, I'm a peace activist.
	I don't want any more war in this world if we can all avoid it.
	But the system that was created to avoid it has become the rocket fuel for every conflict around the world.
	And it's time members of Congress step up and say enough is enough.
	The UN should not get a dime of American money as long as they don't work with GHF.
	The UN should not get a dime of American money if they can't guarantee their food isn't taken by armed actors and used by a globally designated terrorist organization.
	Yeah.
	And this, I think, is one of the keys that people need to recognize is that it's not just what happens in Gaza that's dependent on the GHF.
	It is dependent.
	The entire Middle East is basically waiting for this problem to be solved.
	And it can be only solved if the GHF is distributing aid as opposed to the UN or the UNRWA or any other UN-linked agency, because there's so much waiting on this.
	Everybody wants to get to the end of this war except for Hamas.
	Hamas would like to prolong this because the minute the war is over, they're no longer in control.
	So anybody who's allied with Hamas, particularly maybe perhaps members of the Qatari government, are interested in prolonging this.
	But it seems that every time a negotiation takes place and the United States or Israel say, okay, fine, we're going to get the aid in.
	We're going to clean up the place.
	GHF is going to handle the aid.
	One of the main demands by Hamas is that GHF not do this because Hamas recognizes that the danger to them lies in somebody who is not Hamas affiliated doing this.
	So if you believe that the Abraham Accords of Saudi Arabia, for example, are dependent on an end to the war in Gaza, that can only happen if GHF is the one distributing the aid in safe areas protected, presumably, by the Israeli military, because that is the military force on the ground.
	Any other quote-unquote solution is not a solution.
	It is a prolongation of the war at the behest of Hamas, at the behest of Hamas's allies.
	So if you're looking for a more peaceful Middle East, if you're looking for an end to war in this arena, you need people distributing food to people who are not, in fact, terrorist organizations or helpers of terrorist organizations.
	That's why this issue is important.
	And frankly, it's why the Trump administration ought to be getting full scale, not just partially, full scale behind GHF is the only solution to aid distribution in the Gaza Strip.
	That's exactly right.
	And the clock is ticking.
	We don't have time for people to play politics on this.
	We need to figure it out now.
	And organization, it's not just the UN, it's other organizations, the UN World Food Program, it's UNICEF, it's all of them.
	And by the way, the United States should be more influential in appointing the leaders of these organizations as well.
	Well, it's Johnny Moore, Executive Chairman of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
	Johnny, I just want to give you a chance to talk a little bit about how you got into this.
	Why are you doing this?
	Because whenever there are humanitarian organizations that are formed, there are always allegations that are made, particularly by the media, about some sort of ulterior motive.
	What is GHF?
	How did it start?
	How did you get involved with it?
	Yeah, I mean, for me, first of all, I'm a volunteer.
	So I'm a Christian, and I can't think of anything more Christian than feeding people who need food.
	I got involved because the U.S. government asked me if I would step in and help provide some leadership over this important initiative.
	But the ironic thing about GHF is that the idea actually originated more than a year and a half ago as everyone was recognizing that the one problem that was prolonging this war is that every single truck of aid that got into the Gaza Strip was immediately stolen by Hamas.
	And then Hamas would use the aid.
	They would tax it.
	They would sell it.
	They would manipulate it.
	No one was willing to solve this problem.
	And the whole international system considered it the cost of doing business.
	And so the U.S. government decided to make a difference.
	It took Donald Trump to actually do it, to do something unconventional, to test and take on the whole system.
	And it will only take the full strength of the United States government to succeed, not only in ending this war and getting the food directly to.
	And by the way, Gaza needs more food.
	We can't do it alone.
	And despite our disagreements with the UN, every single day we extend our hand and say, look, we can work out our differences later.
	We got to feed the people.
	But I did it because I really, really care about the entire region and we have to solve this problem.
	And by the way, then we have already served over 800,000 Gazans.
	I mean, half of the Gaza Strip, we've already provided food for.
	And if the world actually got behind us and the UN partnered with us, we could actually provide food for everyone in the Gaza Strip.
	We could meet all of the needs, except for the ways in which Hamas uses the aid for their nefarious purposes.
	We could solve this problem if everyone stopped playing politics and did what they say they care about, which is feeding hungry people.
	Well, that's Johnny Moore, Executive Chairman of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
	Thank you so much for your hard work and thanks for helping people truly in need.
	And obviously, we hope that both American-Israeli international policy change in accordance with the real interests of people in the regions.
	Appreciate your time, Johnny.
	Thanks for having me.
	Meanwhile, President Trump signed another executive order yesterday laying out new rules for the payment of college athletes.
	Joining us online to discuss is David Cohen.
	He, of course, is the co-host of Crane and Co, Our Sports Show here at Daily Wire Plus.
	David, thanks so much for taking the time.
	Thank you for having me, Ben.
	So why don't we start off by having you explain exactly what this EO does?
	What is it designed to do?
	Well, first off, all you need to know is the title, Donald J. Trump Saves College Sports.
	So there's not really anything else that you need to know about it because he fixed everything.
	If this guy had an action movie, it would just be Donald J. Trump Saves the Day at the end and you wouldn't really need to watch the rest of the movie.
	So that's good to know.
	But before we dive into the specifics of the executive order, I just want to sort of update you and some of your listeners who may not be that familiar with the current landscape of college athletics.
	You know, when I was playing college football at the University of Michigan from 2006 to 2010, not only could I not be paid, I couldn't even receive a cup of coffee on the house.
	I couldn't sign an autograph and sell that.
	I certainly couldn't sign some, you know, third-party endorsement deal with Nike.
	Okay, so with these class action antitrust, and antitrust is the key term here, with these lawsuits that have happened over the past 10 years, this is O'Bannon v NCAA, Austin v.
	NCAA, and then most recently just this summer, House v NCAA, we have the current landscape where, you know, the courts are saying to the NCAA, no, you can't limit the earning potential for individuals to monetize their likeness.
	So we get this term name, image, and likeness, or this term NIL, which gets thrown around all over the place.
	Well, it didn't take that long for these two, the name, image, and likeness payments and pay for play, which is a completely different thing, to be conflated.
	And you have athletic departments and ADs and coaches who say, wait, I want that kid over there, that recruit, to come play college football here.
	Let's just give them an NIL payment on the off chance that they're going to be really, really good.
	But then you can't punish them if they're not a good football player because you're not paying them for their pay for play.
	Now, most recently with this House VNCAA settlement that just happened a couple weeks ago, basically for the first time ever, college athletic departments can share their revenue directly with athletes.
	And that figure is going to start at $20.5 million per year and it's going to tick up every year over the course of this 10-year agreement.
	Okay, but that doesn't then limit the NIL potential.
	So you may have the University of Texas, the Longhorns, who have $20.5 million to spend, but then can spend another $20 million from oil boosters and categorize that as NIL payments.
	All of a sudden, they have $40 million to spend on college sports, whereas a program like Wake Forest may have just a fraction of that.
	So in comes this executive order from Donald J. Trump saving college sports.
	And there's a couple things that we need to hit here.
	One, prohibiting third-party pay-for-play.
	Well, that sounds really good based off what I just told you, right?
	The only problem is the NCAA already does that.
	So this is a bit redundant.
	The second thing, provide evidence of fair market value.
	Well, that's very difficult to do.
	I mean, Ben, if you wanted to start a university and start a college football program called Shapiro U and you're like, look, we got to get started here.
	Let's go find the best quarterback in the country.
	We're going to pay him $20 million.
	That's what you're valuing them at.
	And we even see this in the NFL.
	Look, the Cleveland Browns paid Deshaun Watson a quarter of a billion dollars, has proven so far not to be a great move.
	That broke the quarterback market, even in the NFL, where you have a salary cap.
	And also, if you're thinking about signing a quarterback, Ben, I have an extra year of eligibility, but we can talk about that later.
	And then another point here, the requirement to preserve where possible, where possible, the revenues for women's sports and non-revenue generating sports.
	Well, again, that's going to be very difficult.
	Just take, say, Vanderbilt right here in our backyard in Nashville.
	Vanderbilt is not a great football program.
	They don't have a great basketball program, but they're excellent in baseball.
	They're excellent in golf.
	Well, those programs don't generate a lot of revenue.
	They make far more money on being average at football or basketball.
	How is an athletic director supposed to split the money that they have on baseball, football, basketball, golf?
	And how are they supposed to preserve non-revenue generating sports with an executive order when that may not be what's best for the program moving forward?
	So what you're telling me is that actually this isn't saving college sports, which makes me sad.
	But in any case, it has become much more complex.
	What is your opinion on what should be done with regard to the payment of college athletes?
	I mean, my typical sort of gut reaction is let people pay them whatever they want.
	The real reason that most of these kids who are actually getting paid to play sports at college are there is because the college wants them there as sort of the face of the college, not because they're there to get their degree in Biz Econ.
	A huge percentage of the players who are actually going to get paid here are looking to do this professionally afterward.
	And so essentially, the reason these teams exist is not because the college athletic system is designed to make sure that the third string linebacker gets his degree.
	It's much more about making money for the college.
	So just let the colleges pay what the colleges want to pay.
	And if you want to set up a salary cap, set up a salary cap.
	No doubt.
	And one of the reasons that we're in this mess right now is because of the exploitative nature of the NCAA regarding those third-party endorsement deals.
	There should have been no rule whatsoever in 2006 that prohibited me from making a couple hundred dollars for being in, say, a local car or a local car dealership commercial or something, which is probably the most that I could have commanded.
	But if you have someone like Arch Manning right now who can make millions of dollars by signing a Nike deal, the NCAA should not have a say in prohibiting that.
	Obviously, you know, they've tried to have the best of intentions by saying, well, no, wait, we're just going to have programs that pay you for your NIL.
	And yes, that's exactly what has happened.
	But at the same time, I do hate to see that we're at a point now where the education and the diploma you get means absolutely nothing to some of these kids.
	Because even if you go to the NFL, and look, I was pretty good and I didn't even get close to making it to the NFL.
	But even if you go, the average career span is 2.2 years.
	And, you know, you're going to be able to have a lifetime, a career full of opportunities based off the diploma that you get and the connections that you made while at college.
	With that being said, I'm all for the kids getting paid the money.
	They're the ones doing the work on the field.
	And I come from the American South.
	I've never heard anyone who's obsessed with college football say, I love the sport because those guys aren't getting paid, right?
	Like this is America.
	If you have a skill set that commands value and commands compensation, I think all of us are in favor for that.
	The problem is that there are no unified rules and it makes sense in a sport that has been mostly regional.
	The attempt now to take it national, and that's one of the things that Donald Trump is trying to do in his executive order is have, you know, a federal legislation rather than this state-by-state approach.
	Again, you're going to have a lot of universities who push back on that and say, wait, the NCAA has been so wrong in so many of these areas.
	Let's don't just yield all of our authority back to them again now that they have the federal government backing them.
	I mean, it really is kind of bizarrely reminiscent of the amateur versus professional divide in professional golf going back to like the 1930s, this idea that you were a good person if you were an amateur, like Bobby Jones maintained his amateur status his entire golf career.
	And meanwhile, there are professionals who are making actual money at it.
	And then eventually the American people just moved on from that.
	There was this idea that this sort of gentleman golfer thing didn't exist.
	If you want to play golf professionally, then get paid.
	And again, you mentioned the short career span for a lot of the people who actually make the NFL.
	Well, that just actually is an argument in favor of people getting paid when they're in high school or college, because if you can only make money for a certain period of your career, then you'll finish.
	You might have more money than you would have had otherwise.
	And then if you want to go to college, you go to college.
	No doubt.
	And I love that you bring up professional golf there.
	Your sports bag is quite deep.
	And Bobby Jones is the greatest example of that because he was so proud of his amateur status at a time when it was sort of looked down to play golf professionally and receive money for it.
	Yes, everything that you're saying is right.
	And not only is it an opportunity to make money while you're in college, there are some instances now, Ben, where if you get drafted in the seventh round of the NFL draft, because of their pay structure and because of salary caps and the way that works, it is more beneficial for some of these guys to return to college and get these NIL payments.
	It truly is the wild, wild west right now in college athletics.
	And that's the thing that we're all hoping can be fixed so that we can operate with some sort of uniformity with the sport that we love.
	Well, that's David Cohen.
	You're going to get great commentary over at Crane and Co.
	over at the Daily Wire website and everywhere the show streams.
	David, really appreciate the time and thanks for the insight.
	Thanks so much for having me, Ben.
	Well, folks, it's a Friday.
	As you know, I sometimes miss the big cultural stories because, frankly, I'm interested in the very serious news of the day.
	But the culture stories are the thing that more people engage with just in general.
	And that does have cultural and political ramifications.
	Joining us on the line to discuss the latest in culture is Emily Austin, journalist, TV host, and political commentator who began her career in sports media hosting for MTV, Sports Illustrated, and D-A-Z-N.
	She's contributed to Newsweek.
	She appears on Gutfeld.
	You've seen her in a lot of different places.
	Emily, thanks for taking the time.
	Really appreciate it.
	You always get to be here.
	So let's talk about the pop culture stories of the week.
	Obviously, the biggest one that broke yesterday was the death of Hulk Hogan.
	A lot of folks, obviously big fans of Hulk Hogan, the president of the United States, paid tribute to Hulk Hogan.
	He, of course, spoke famously at the RNC last year, where he gave an incredibly memorable speech before ripping off his shirt to reveal a Trump shirt underneath.
	What's your take, Emily?
	I mean, honestly, it's just very humbling when someone as legendary as Hulk Hogan passes away.
	I mean, he wasn't just a legend in his sport.
	He kind of defined an entire era.
	Like he walked so that Dwayne, The Rock Johnson, and John Cena could run.
	Like he set up the stage for all of these celebrities to take over the WWE.
	And I don't know if my generation fully understands that.
	And it's weird when I speak to people my age and they're like, yeah, he's the Trumpy.
	And I'm like, oh my God, he's an athlete.
	Well, it was kind of staged and he did a lot of steroids, which is sad.
	And I think heavily contributed to his death.
	Obviously, I'm speculating here.
	But it just kind of shows you like everyone's, like everyone has their time.
	Nobody's untouchable.
	And someone as famous and as prestigious as Hulk Hogan, you know, aside all the scandals is dying at 71.
	It's not that old.
	Trump is older than Hulk Hogan and it scares me a bit, but it's very humbling.
	It's a humbling day.
	So, you know, Hulk Hogan, obviously also famous for taking down Gawker, which was a service to the world for sure, which terrible publication.
	He took them down because they released a state that involved him and they had basically violated his privacy rights.
	There are a lot of things Hulk Hogan did.
	By the way, he converted to Christianity in the last 18 months of his life, which is an amazing thing.
	So that's very cool as well.
	Well, in other sort of broader cultural news, apparently there is an app that has now gone viral called T. And I need you to explain this to me, Emily.
	I have no idea what this is.
	Let me tell you, it's every woman's worst nightmare if the rules were reversed.
	So picture, I'm sure, a female founder.
	They started an app where women share photos and information, basically doxing men that they're dating to get feedback.
	Now, the owner claims that they started this app to prevent girls from getting catfished or prevent girls from dating abusers.
	But think about how many psycho ex-girlfriends are going to use this app to bash, berate, humiliate, and dox a guy, maybe because they don't want them moving on or because they have like unfinished business or just bad history in general.
	And how many girls lie about the men that they dated to prevent them from moving on?
	I think the woman's intentions may have been good, but I don't trust a million users on this app to fairly and honestly report their dating experience.
	And it's turning into now speculation like, oh, he has nice abs or he's not tall enough or like he's not good in bed.
	And it's really sexualizing men, which I know very well.
	If they did this to a woman and say, oh, her breasts aren't big enough or oh, her butt's too small, the world would be outraged at it.
	But when it comes to doxing and sexualizing and humiliating men, it's okay.
	It's fine.
	That's where we draw the line.
	Like, it's very hypocritical, honestly.
	I think it's disgusting and it should be illegal to dox people's private photos and addresses.
	And it's really, I don't know how there's no legal issue here.
	I mean, it's sort of bizarre how we've moved very quickly beyond the Me Too era into not just post-MeToo on behalf of men, but also post-MeToo.
	Maybe it never existed for women, but the sort of willingness to allow this sort of stuff to promulgate in the name of feminism is definitely a bizarre thing.
	Can I give you my hot MeToo take that I think people understand these days?
	The whole Me Too movement is not women's empowerment.
	It actually showcased how many women were willing to sleep their way to the top.
	Now, I'm not saying didn't happen, but I'm saying most of The Me Too allegations were women who found an easier way to climb the ladder by having with men, which, by the way, is taking advantage of men in some way.
	It's mutually taking advantage of one another.
	You slept with someone for a service, you received most of the people that slept with Weinstein did, in fact, become actresses.
	And, you know, a lot of it, it really took over what the Me Too movement was supposed to be, which was like abuse.
	And now we're just kind of flipping it onto men.
	So ironic.
	Now, speaking of sort of the post-MeToo era, so Pedro Pascal, he checks all of the woke boxes.
	He says all of the right things about trans because his brother is a trans woman who is now going to get some sort of TV jobs, I guess.
	And he's been touring around with Vanessa Kirby in expectation of the premiere of the Fantastic Four movie.
	And the video is super weird of what Pedro Pascal does.
	So he claims that he has social anxiety, which is a little strange because actors are not typically known for having wild social anxiety since that is a very, very social job.
	But he also is extremely handsy with her and she's also extremely handsy with him.
	What the hell is going on there?
	And how does Pedro Pascal get away with this?
	So I had to do a bit of a deep diving here because I know these names, but I don't know who's married, who's single.
	So the woman that he keeps touching in all the videos is actually pregnant.
	So she's a married woman to another man that's not Pedro.
	And then every video of the promotional, you know, tour that I've seen from the Fantastic Four, he's touching her belly, touching her neck, her chest, hugging her from behind on the carpet, rubbing her arm, caressing her.
	And in my mind, like, if my boyfriend or husband was okay with me acting like that, I can tell you for certain he doesn't care about me.
	And the fact that he's getting away with it.
	You know, no, I'm sorry.
	If the woman's allowing it to happen, I can't say he's getting away with anything because I've yet to see anyone shove the arm, move the arm.
	I've seen one video of one boyfriend of a woman getting upset at him, but then put him in his place.
	If the women are allowing this behavior, you're setting the precedent that it's okay and he keeps doing it.
	But the social anxiety BS, I saw a really funny meme that should reach to his explorer page.
	Weinstein said, damn it, I should have just said I had social anxiety.
	Then it would have been okay.
	And that made me laugh because it's true.
	Well, that is Emily Austin.
	Again, you can go check her out online.
	She's on X as well for all of her other content.
	Emily, really appreciate you stopping by and informing me on the actual news of the day.
	You got it.
	All righty, folks, the show continues for our members right now.
	We will be getting into, you know, the latest on Epstein.
	Yes, more Epstein talk.
	Remember, in order to watch, you have to be a member.
	If you're not a member, become a member.
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