The Ben Shapiro Show - FEAR AND LOATHING: Reds Take New York

All Episodes

Previous Next

Nov. 6, 2025 - The Ben Shapiro Show

01:03:06

FEAR AND LOATHING: Reds Take New York

Participants

Main voices

ben shapiro

50:45

Appearances

donald j trump

03:04

hakeem jeffries

01:34

zohran mamdani

01:30

Clips

alexandria ocasio-cortez

00:23

andy beshear

00:53

bernie sanders

00:57

brianna keilar

00:10

chuck schumer

00:38

joy behar

00:27

kate bolduan

00:03

marjorie taylor greene

00:21

scott bessent

00:18

Large

Audio Only |

Scroll

Show episode speakers

Speaker	Time	Text
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Zorn Mamdani is the new mayor-elect of New York City, and he is taking off the mask.
		He's doing all the aggressive things.
		How should Republicans fight back?
		What are the dangers for Republicans?
		Plus, President Trump's tariffs on the board at the Supreme Court.
		What happens over there?
		We'll get to all of it first.
		We have less than 2,000 Daily Wire lifetime memberships remaining.
		It turns out that having all access benefits for life is really popular.
		So here are your options.
		You could buy one while they're still available, or you could win mine.
		Yes, I, as a co-founder of the company, do in fact have my very own lifetime membership, but I am willing to give it to you, the people.
		But only if you head on over and download that free Daily Wire Plus app in the app store.
		Open it and tap follow under my picture.
		That's it.
		You are now entered.
		And who knows?
		I could be calling you personally.
		Yes, I, to give you my personal lifetime membership.
		Before any of that happens, you need to download that Daily Wire Plus app and follow me inside it right now to enter to win.
		Well, folks, Zorn Mamdani campaigned as a smarmy, smiling, empathetic gentleman who only cared about affordability and just wanted to help you.
		And he got a bunch of fun videos around bodegas and eating rice with his hands and speaking in various languages.
		And it was all happy-dappy-doo.
		And now here comes the hammer because Zorn Mamdani has made very clear that he wants to actually do all the things he said he was going to do.
		And so New Yorkers are about to find out the ticket that they just bought and they're about to take the ride.
		According to the New York Times, a newly empowered Zorn Mamdani on Wednesday vowed to use his convincing victory in the New York City's mayor race as a mandate to push an ambitious progressive agenda past potential obstacles from billionaire antagonists to albany bureaucracy.
		In a shift from the mollifying tone he had used for months, Mr. Mamdani made clear that while he would govern for all New Yorkers, he was determined to deliver for those who had been agitating for structural change.
		One of my least favorite phrases in all of politics, I'm here to govern for everyone.
		Okay, that's what the government does.
		The government literally makes legislation that affects everyone, but clearly you are not.
		You are here to govern for the people and on behalf of the people who elected you, namely far, far left progressives and third worldists.
		I mean, that is what Zorhan Mamdani is here to do.
		He's here to govern on behalf of socialism and pro-jihadism and chew bubblegum.
		And he's all out of bubblegum.
		He said in a phone interview, quote, I'm also looking to be clear about the mandate that we won over the course of this election.
		It is a mandate to deliver on the agenda that he ran on.
		He had said that he was going to try to find creative ways to pay for his signature policies without radically increasing taxes.
		And then he immediately reversed himself.
		And then he started talking about taxing the rich.
		Quote, my supporters and our movement are hungry for a politics of consistency, a politics that actually focuses on the needs of working people.
		I think our tax system is an example of the many ways in which working people have been betrayed.
		Now, as we talked about on the program yesterday, actually, the amount of tax revenue derived from the top of the top of the top of the income tax bracket in New York City is far out of proportion to their percentage of the population.
		I mean, it is not even close.
		The top 0.1% of income earners in New York pay 25% of all the tax revenue in New York City.
		And he's saying that somehow this is targeting working people, which is an astonishing claim.
		I mean, just on a statistical level, it's an astonishing claim.
		The New York Times is trying to make excuses for all of this.
		His confidence is understandable.
		He's the first New York City mayoral candidate since John Lindsey to win over 1 million votes.
		Now, let's be clear.
		The reason he won over 1 million votes is not because he is so much more popular than all the other candidates of the last 30 years, 40 years, who have not won that number of votes.
		The reason he won over 1 million votes is because there was a competitive candidate coming up behind him who was also a Democrat.
		And so in order to defeat Andrew Cuomo, he had to win more than 850,000 votes.
		That's the reality, but it's okay.
		You know, the good news is that Democrats, again, they're going to have to own this stuff.
		Now, there are no economics behind what he's attempting to do.
		In order for him to actually pay for all of this, he needs the governor of New York to go along with massive tax increases.
		As the Wall Street Journal points out, in order for him to get his proposals paid for, he would need to raise the highest state corporate tax rate from 7.25% to 11.5%.
		Okay, that is a massive increase, a huge increase in the state corporate tax rate.
		And it applies to businesses that have a physical presence in New York.
		and to businesses that derive a certain amount of sales from the state.
		Now, if you think the businesses won't relocate over that sort of stuff, they absolutely will.
		They absolutely will.
		And that requires approval from state lawmakers and Kathy Hochul.
	And so if they acquiesce, it could drag down the Democratic Party.
	Kathy Hochl very narrowly beat Lee Zeldin in the last New York gubernatorial election.
	There's certainly no guarantee that she would defeat Elise Stefanik, who's already running dead even with her in the New York gubernatorial race.
	He also wants a millionaire's tax, a two percentage point rate hike or 51% increase on the personal income tax paid by New York City's highest earners or more or those making more than a million dollars a year.
	The tax rate in New York City alone on the highest income New Yorkers would move from 3.88% to 5.88%.
	And that's on top of the state tax, on top of the federal tax.
	And if you're a rich person, guess what?
	You're mobile and you can leave.
	This is how cities die, truly.
	They destroy their tax base.
	They decide they want to make payoffs to a particular set of citizens at the expense of the taxpaying public.
	And the people who pay the taxes decide, you know what?
	I'm not in.
	I'm gone.
	And then they leave.
	And then the city, in need of more tax revenue, increases the taxes on the next richest group of people.
	And then those people leave.
	And this is how you destroy the tax base of a major metropolitan area.
	Coming up, we'll get into Zorhan Mamdani.
	How much money is he going to spend?
	Where's he going to get that money?
	What the hell is he talking about?
	We'll get into all of that momentarily first.
	Are you aware of House Bill, Section 702, that extends the right of government agencies to legally monitor American citizens and some of their internet activity without requiring a warrant?
	Well, you know, that's going to have some downstream impact, particularly from your internet service provider.
	But you can protect your own online activity when you use ExpressVPN.
	Your internet service provider tracks every website you visit, and they can legally share that data with not only the government, but also with other companies to market to you and keep track of you.
	This is where ExpressVPN comes in.
	ExpressVPN is a virtual private network that reroutes all of my internet activity through secure encrypted channels.
	This means no one, not government entities, data brokers, even my internet service provider, can access my online activity.
	I use ExpressVPN legitimately all the time.
	I am using hotel Wi-Fi right now.
	Well, you know, that means that the ISP for the hotel has access to my info, but, or at least they would, except that I clicked the button and now I'm protected.
	ExpressVPN hides your IP address, the number that identifies you online and allows data brokers to create a profile of your activities.
	It's also incredibly user-friendly, requiring just one tap to activate across devices on up to 14 devices at once.
	We need to demand a better government, yes.
	But until we can change what is happening in our country, protect yourself the way I do with ExpressVPN.
	And right now, if you go to expressvpn.com slash ben, you can get four extra months of privacy.
	Expressvpn.com slash ben.
	That's EXPRESSVPN.com slash Ben.
	Alrighty, let's also talk about something that really, really matters, honoring American veterans on Veterans Day.
	Legacy Box has been with this show for years and years and years, and they've done amazing work for our listeners.
	They've helped preserve the memories of over a million families.
	And now they're teaming up with all of us here at the Daily Wire to give back in a giant way.
	Legacy Box is donating 10,000 bucks worth of legacy boxes to American veterans.
	So those incredible stories of service and sacrifice don't get lost to time.
	Here's where it gets personal.
	If there's a veteran in your family, head on over to get.dailywire.com slash legacy box or click the link in the show notes to submit your story for a chance to feature your legacy right here on the show.
	Even if you don't have a veteran in your life, obviously, you have a legacy worth preserving.
	Right now, Legacy Box is giving all of my listeners exclusive access to this deal in honor of veterans stages $9 per tape to digitally preserve your family memories.
	Legacy Box is the world's largest digitizer.
	They've helped over a million families relive their most important moments, digitizing every tape, photo, and film reel by hand right in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
	If you order right now, you can still get your digitized memories back in time for the holidays so you can relive those precious moments as a family.
	We've digitized enormous numbers of old film reels.
	That means I can see my grandparents, my parents when they were kids.
	They can see themselves as children with their parents.
	It's an amazing thing.
	Whether it's a loved one in uniform or your family's holiday mornings, preserve the stories that shaped you.
	Head on over to legacybox.com/slash Shapiro today to preserve your family's history.
	That's legacybox.com/slash Shapiro.
	The amount of money that he wants to spend is astonishing.
	He wants universal childcare in New York City that would cover children from six weeks old through five years old.
	Meanwhile, he also wants to spend $7 billion a year on new rent stabilized units, $70 billion in municipal debt for a decade, and he wants to freeze the rent.
	Okay, now, freezing the rent, I'm just telling you, will result in no new units being built in the city.
	I'm still in New York.
	No one, no developer is going to build new units in the city if the rent is frozen.
	There's no way to do it because why would you?
	Meanwhile, he wants to spend almost a billion dollars a year on fast and free buses, which, by the way, will just become homeless shelters.
	Because if it is free to ride the bus, then there is no way to kick you off the bus if you have overstayed your fare.
	So people will just live on the bus.
	All of this, as New York City's finest NYPD are freaking out.
	I know people in the NYPD.
	Everyone who can retire is going to retire.
	Everybody who can find another job will find another job.
	Already, the Jewish FDNY commissioner in New York handed in his resignation, Robert Tucker, one day after Mamdani's election.
	He informed Mayor Eric Adams, who would step down from the roles he had held for 12 months on December 19th.
	He's going to go back to running a private security firm.
	Not a shock.
	Many, many more people will follow because Zora Mamdani's team is extraordinarily radical, really, really radical.
	The New York Post has a breakdown on the people who will be in Mamdani's year.
	Now, first of all, Mamdani himself is radical.
	Pretending that Mamdani is not radical is totally insane.
	The man got into politics as a member of Students for Justice in Palestine, a radical anti-Israel and pro-terrorism group.
	Zorhan Mamdani has repeatedly spoken up on behalf of terrorists.
	It's astonishing when I hear Democrats try to claim that he's not pro-jihadist.
	He literally cut a wrap on behalf of people who are in jail for funding jihad.
	The Holy Land Five.
	He literally posed next to an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing who has talked up the value of jihad during this campaign.
	He literally went on national television and said he had no opinion on whether Hamas, a terrorist group, should disarm.
	Spoiler Spoiler alert, if you're anti-jihad, typically you think all terrorist groups should disarm.
	Not just Hamas.
	Boko Haram should disarm.
	Like, sure, why not?
	They're terrorist groups.
	But he had no opinions whatsoever because he actually is not in favor of Hamas, disarming.
	So he is perfectly radical on all these issues, economic to foreign policy related.
	But he's also surrounded by people who are extraordinarily radical.
	So Linda Sarsour, a mentor and friend to Mamdani, is going to be very close to him.
	She, of course, said back in 2019 when she was part of the women's march that Jewish marchers could not take part because, quote, one cannot be a feminist and a Zionist at the same time, which is kind of an astonishing thing, considering that I'm not sure how one could be a radical Islamist and a feminist at the same time.
	Radical Islam does not seem to treat women particularly well or equally.
	The Council on American Islamic Relations and CARE Action are going to be in his ear.
	That group has long-standing and deep ties to terrorist organizations, according to Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton.
	They too were unindicted co-conspirators in a 2007 terrorist funding case linking CARE to Hamas.
	Political action committees connected to CARE donated more than $140,000 to Zorhan Mamdani's PAC.
	They helped mobilize the Muslim vote in New York City, which, of course, got out in big numbers for Zorhan Mamdani.
	Democratic Socialist of America, of which he is a charter member, is backing him, of course.
	The United Federation of Teachers, which destroys public education, is backing him.
	Those are the people who are surrounding him.
	And then they're the people who are part of his transition team.
	His transition team, just as shockingly radical as you would imagine.
	Apparently, he has named a five-woman transition team, stocked with former officials from City Hall, but also he has included Lena Khan, the former FTC chair, a person who is radically, radically anti-business.
	Melanie Hartzog, a former deputy mayor for health and human services under Bill de Blasio.
	Alana Leopold, another Bill de Blasio holdover.
	Grace Benilla, the head of the United Way of New York City and an alumna of Bloomberg, who might be the only sane person.
	And Maria Torres Springer, the deputy mayor to the current mayor, Eric Adams.
	He says he's going to keep Jessica Tish on as the head of the NYPD.
	Nah, she's going to leave.
	She's going to leave.
	You watch.
	She will quit.
	Sometime in the next six months, she'll quit.
	And by the way, she still doesn't have a former job offer, a formal job offer, according to the New York Post.
	The Democratic candidate told Tish they would speak about his plan to keep her as commissioner.
	But, you know, we'll have to see how all of that plays out.
	Now, meanwhile, it is worth noting: Olivia Reingold has an excellent piece over at the Free Press talking about the plan that the DSA has for cities beyond New York.
	And those are very, very shockingly radical plans.
	According to the Free Press, they have now reviewed thousands of pages of internal Democratic Socialists of America documents, which show that the organization's leaders view Mamdani as a tool in their agenda to abolish prisons and borders and ultimately end what they call the barbaric order of capitalism.
	The DSA was founded in 1982.
	It's a political body dedicated to the doctrine of democratic socialism, which is a variety of socialism that simply specifies how it would like revolution to occur peacefully through subversion of democracy.
	Now, again, one of the fun things about the left is that they're constantly screwing around with the definitions of terms.
	Socialism, typically speaking, is the government control of the market-based order, nationalization of resources, getting rid of the pricing system, all the rest.
	Now, you can have touches of socialism in a capitalist economy.
	This is called a mixed system.
	The United States obviously has a mixed system.
	So, by the way, does Denmark?
	So, does Norway.
	Fully socialist countries would become countries like Cuba, North Korea.
	China is sort of an economically fascist system that has maintained aspects of nationalization, but then allowed certain aspects of the private market to operate so they can actually have a workable pricing system.
	When people say democratic socialism, sometimes they mean Norway, and sometimes they mean like the DSA, which is to say, like communism achieved through democratic means.
	The DSA held its annual convention in August with the theme Rebirth and Beyond, reflecting on a decade of DSA's growth and preparing for a decade of party building.
	There, according to Olivia Ryingold at the Free Press, delegates voted to adopt a resolution titled Principles for Party Building, which stated that the purpose of the DSA is to, quote, unite workers to win the battle for democracy and bring about socialism, not to seek a governing coalition with a perceived lesser evil under the current undemocratic political system.
	A socialist party in the United States must be part of a global political movement of the working class.
	So, I mean, these are just communists.
	That's all.
	And they have nothing to do with the traditional Democratic Party.
	And yet, they have more and more play, more and more play.
	They have made it a full-time job to infiltrate school boards and minorities all over the country.
	And they are not being stopped.
	They are not.
	There's going to be a whole new wave of DSA-inspired candidates all across America.
	There's one, Rura Rahman, running for Georgia governor in 2026.
	She, of course, has talked about how Israel is a fascist government, which is sort of table stakes for the DSA.
	She canvassed for Mamdani.
	She is mainly driven, again, by the same concerns that drove Zorhan Mamdani, this sort of radical third worldism that is deeply connected, of course, to anti-Semitism and anti-Israel sentiment.
	Her bid is a long shot in that Democratic primary, but she is running.
	Graham Plattner is very likely to win the Senate nomination in Maine in 2026.
	He, too, is a radical in the mold of Zorhan Mamdani.
	He's taking some hits because he had a giant Nazi tattoo on his chest, which he then denied was a Nazi tattoo and then covered it up with an even uglier tattoo, actually.
	But he is, of course, a Democratic socialist.
	There's a woman named Kat Ubogazala.
	She's a candidate for Illinois' 9th congressional district in 2026.
	She has a lot of followers on TikTok.
	She, like Mamdani, is very socially media savvy.
	She was indicted by a federal grand jury recently for allegedly blocking vehicles outside an ICE facility.
	Apparently, she and other protesters surrounded a federal officer's vehicle, banged on its hood and windows, etched pig on the side, and impeded movement.
	Although she's not formally DSA, her platform basically mirrors DSA.
	There's Shama Sawant, who I actually have met before because she was running for mayor at one point in Seattle.
	Now she's running for Washington's 9th congressional district in 2026.
	She's running as an independent socialist.
	I mean, she's openly a socialist, openly a Marxist.
	Abdul El-Syed running for U.S. Senate in Michigan in 2026.
	He, again, is very much in the mold of Zarin Mamdani.
	Omar Fatah, who ran for Minneapolis mayor, he came in second place in the first round of votes.
	And since no candidate originally received a majority, there will now be a second round of votes.
	These candidates are there.
	They are very much to the left.
	And the Democratic Party seems to have very little systemic immunity to them, like at all.
	All it's going to cost you if they win is all your money and all your freedom.
	This is basically the platform.
	Zara Mamdani, well, one of the fun things about the socialists when they campaign is they campaign on happy dappy-doo, as I say.
	And then the mask comes off and they say, give me your money.
	So yesterday, Zor Mamdani did that.
	Alrighty, coming up, Zora Mamdani, he is in fact implementing socialism because he's doing the first thing socialists do.
	He's trying to take money from people.
	We'll get to that in a moment.
	First, Good Ranchers.
	Okay, Good Ranchers is great.
	Why?
	Well, because it's American meat.
	Recently, I learned that over 4 billion pounds of meat were imported into the United States last year, and that can still be labeled technically product of the United States.
	If labels can be misleading about something as basic as where it's coming from, what don't you know about the meat that you're buying?
	That's why Good Ranchers is taking over the game with quality meat you can trust, all born and raised right here on American soil.
	I would say that my staff and their children are maybe surviving on Good Ranchers alone at this point.
	I've seen the size of the babies in like the Daily Wire family.
	The producers and my assistant, they have children.
	And these children are very large.
	And I think the reason these kids are big is because they're going to be linebackers fed on the great meat of Good Ranchers.
	100% American meat, locally sourced from American family farms and ranches, delivered straight to your door.
	You can also pause or delay boxes anytime.
	It is incredibly flexible.
	Here is the deal.
	Good Ranchers for the holidays is a great idea.
	It's a great idea.
	You got Thanksgiving coming up.
	You got Christmas coming up.
	A lot of big holidays are going to need some meat.
	Go to Good Ranchers right now.
	Here's the deal.
	All new subscribers to any Good Ranchers box using Code Ben will get an additional $100 off your first three orders, $40 off your first, $30 off your second, $30 off your third, and free meat for life when you subscribe.
	So hit up goodranchers.com.
	This holiday season full of delicious meals.
	Again, use code Ben, goodranchers.com.
	Let's get back to the table.
	Also, I just got to tell you, I'm on the road.
	Okay.
	I've told you this a thousand times.
	When I'm on the road, I take Bolin Branch on the road with me.
	That's how good their product is.
	It is just that good.
	If I'm at a hotel and I don't have my Bowling Branch blanket, I'm not going to sleep well.
	I'm just not.
	So I actually like pack it up.
	It's very annoying because I wish that everybody used Bowl and Branch and they wouldn't have to schlep it all over the country.
	But I literally schlep the product all over the country because it is that good.
	And right now, Bolin Branch is having their best sale of the year right now, 25% off everything on the site.
	If you've been thinking about upgrading your bedding, this is definitely the time.
	I'd start with their signature sheets.
	They're great.
	They've nailed that sweet spot between being soft and breathable.
	And that makes a huge difference for getting good sleep.
	The cool thing, they actually get softer every time you wash them.
	They're made with top quality, 100% organic cotton.
	All their stuff is excellent.
	The blankets, the throws, the pillows, the duvets, all built to last high-quality stuff.
	Really great.
	Plus, they've got this 30-night guarantee.
	So if you're not happy with it, you're covered.
	Pretty much zero risk.
	Give yourself and your loved ones the most extraordinary feeling of sleep with 25% off site-wide, plus free shipping and extended returns during Bull and Branch's best sale of the year.
	Shop right now, bull and branch.com slash men with code Ben.
	That's bull and branch, B-O-L-L-A-N-D Branch.com slash men.
	Code Ben for 25% off.
	Exclusions apply.
	Yesterday, he said he needed money from two separate sources.
	First, working people needed to donate money to his transition team because, you know, sure, you're poor, but he needs your money.
	And second, he needs money from the rich people to pay for all of his plans to, you know, destroy the rich people.
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		You know, there were a few months ago where I told supporters across the city to stop donating.
		And today, I am asking them to start once again.
		And I am asking them to do so because of the fact that a transition that can meet the moment of preparing for January 1st is one that will require staff.
		It will require research.
		It will require infrastructure.
		And those are things that we will have to provide.
		And I'm excited for the fact that it will be funded by the very people who brought us to this point, the working people who have been left behind by the politics of the city.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		I mean, that is very exciting.
		I'm sure they are very, very happy to fund Zor and Mamzani.
		I mean, obviously, they're concerned with affordability.
		And when you are concerned with affordability, then you want to give money to people's transition teams.
		Just in my personal view, like there were times, you know, early on in my marriage when my wife and I, we were basically down to like our last couple thousand dollars in savings.
		We were starting to trying to have to figure out, you know, taking out second credit cards and moving some credit around, all that.
		And I remember at that time, I was very much interested in giving money to the transition team for a political candidate of my choice.
		But don't worry, let's be real.
		The people he wants money from are all the people that he also wants to destroy.
		And so he's not asking, he is telling.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		Let's dig into that because you're talking about rent-free.
		You're talking about free buses.
		You're talking about free childcare.
		Can you do that without raising taxes?
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		I think you can do that.
		And I think you have to raise taxes on the top 1% of New Yorkers, New Yorkers who make more than $1 million a year.
		And you do that by raising taxes by them 2%.
		And then you also increase the corporate tax of New York State to match that of New Jersey.
		So that takes us from about 7.25 to about 11.5%, which is what we see in New Jersey.
		These things together raise about $9 billion, which more than pays for our economic agenda and also starts to trump-proof ourselves.
unidentified		But are you worried that can drive a lot of job creators out of New York?
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		So what I've heard from a number of business leaders is that the affordability crisis is also affecting their ability to attract and retain talent.
		The city's inability to provide childcare means that businesses often have to provide stipends for that child care.
		Right now, the absence of universal child care means that a family will pay around $22,500 a year, which is more money than many of them would spend if they sent that same kid to college 18 years later.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		I mean, you got to be kidding me, but this is what they're.
		OK, so here's the question for Democrats.
		You're going to go along with this.
		You're going to go along with this?
		Truly, you have a choice on a national level.
		I mean, you had a choice on a city level too, and none of you had the actual stones to come out and stop Zorhan Mamdani in the primaries.
		But I understand New York, you know, it's not indicative of the rest of the country.
		There are like eight registered Republicans here, and five of them voted for Curtis Leewa.
		I totally get that.
		However, on a national level, is this if you want to play, like, listen, as a Republican, if you wish to embrace Mamdaniism as your future, scary for the country.
		I don't think it's good for the country.
		I think we need two robust parties, neither of which is socialist or communist.
		But if you want to do this on an electoral level, then as somebody who wants Republicans to continue to win, I very much urge you to play this game because play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
		AOC, who's being widely touted as a presidential candidate in the next election, 2028, and again, I think she has some real strength in that area.
		She says that the entire party must surrender to Zorhan Mamdani.
		Everyone must bow their heads.
alexandria ocasio-cortez ▲ ● ▼		He had to not just defeat a Republican.
		He had to defeat a Republican and the old guard of the Democratic Party at the same time.
		He was fighting a war on two fronts and not just one.
		And he still won resoundingly.
		And I think the message that that sends is that the Democratic Party cannot last much longer by denying the future.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		So, yeah, you're denying the future if you deny socialism.
		Well, actually, it seems to me you're more denying the past if you advocate socialism because the history of socialism is literally tens of millions of bodies stacked.
		So there's that.
		But don't worry, Bernie Sanders, a complete lifelong useless person who basically is like old Zorhan Mamdani.
		Like never held a real job.
		Complete useless artist type from when he was younger, like so useless he was kicked off a commune, but somehow has managed to turn that into a leadership position in American politics because it's a great country and anyone here can succeed.
		Here's Bernie Sanders saying his ideas aren't radical.
unidentified		It's not radical at all to say that we should arrest the prime minister of Israel when he calls.
unidentified		It's not the radical thing to say that we should take all the rich people and we should catapult them into the ocean and steal them.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		That's not radical.
		What's radical is to say that not everybody deserves health care of their choice from the finest doctors, paid for by no one by magic tree money.
		Here we go.
		These are not radical ideas.
unidentified		These are just mainstream good ideas for our markets.
bernie sanders ▲ ● ▼		What is a radical idea, if I may say so, is Trump giving a trillion dollars in tax breaks to the 1% and throwing 15 million people off the health care they have.
		That is a radical idea.
		Thinking that climate change is a hoax is a radical idea.
		We cannot become accustomed to a nation in which one guy on top, Mr. Musk, owns more wealth than the bottom 52% of American society.
		So I don't agree with you.
		It is not radical to say that we should have the best child care system in the world if we believe in our kids and if we believe in the future of this country.
		It's not radical to say that we should have efficient and fast and free bus service.
		These are not radical ideas.
		What is radical is that we have more income and wealth inequality than we've ever had.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		I mean, again, you guys want it?
		You got it.
		Meanwhile, Mehdi Hassan, who, you know, fresh off of his latest spate on Al Jazeera, here he was saying socialism isn't a vile word anymore.
		Well, I mean, I think that that's because Americans don't actually have a lot of experience directly with socialism.
		But, you know, for whom socialism is a vile word, people who have live under socialism.
unidentified		But now socialists is not a dirty word anymore, saying socialism is not a dirty word anymore.
bernie sanders ▲ ● ▼		Well, that's why they jump to communists, right?
unidentified		Now they're communists.
		Yeah, you socialistly jump to communists.
		Socialists are not a dirty word anymore.
		Democrats, listen up.
		Take some lessons.
bernie sanders ▲ ● ▼		Don't get on your Ezra Klein nonsense.
unidentified		Don't let Ezra Klein analyze what happened here.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Don't let Ezra Klein, who's just calling for abundance in actual useful regulation and maybe some use of capitalism, the greatest tool for the development of wealth in all of human history.
		Don't let him make the decisions.
		Let Jamal Bowman, an unsuccessful congressional candidate who pulled the fire alarm in order to stop a congressional vote, be your spirit guide.
		Or maybe Hassan Piker, the scion of an incredibly wealthy family, a Nepo baby of Nepo babies, who lives in a $3 million mansion, shocks his dog on air, and preaches socialism at the same time.
		Those guys should have, maybe, maybe Mehdi Hassan, who is a propagandist on behalf of the Qatari government while working at Al Jazeera and then moved here and made millions of dollars ripping on the United States.
		Those people should be your spirit guides.
		I mean, listen, if Democrats want to do this, then go for it.
		Democrats seem a little bit divided on this issue.
		So Chuck Schumer, who didn't say for whom he voted, he said, we're moving forward now.
		We're moving forward.
chuck schumer ▲ ● ▼		I'm moving forward.
		This morning, I talked with mayor-elect Mom Doni.
		We had a very, very good conversation.
		We said that we cared about New York City and that we look forward to working together to help the city and improve the city.
		I congratulated him on running a very, very good campaign.
		And the issue that he has stressed is being stressed by Democrats across the country, from one end of America to the other.
		The high costs that the Trump administration is imposing on us and their failure to do anything about it.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
		Well, you know, I hope that you enjoy your pusillanimous inability to simply denounce the radicals in your own coalition.
		We'll see how it works for you.
		Andy Bashir, the governor of Kentucky, he's doing the same thing.
		They're all dodging.
		They're weaving.
		I didn't even know they could move this well.
kate bolduan ▲ ● ▼		Do you think that he is a leader in the Democratic Party?
andy beshear ▲ ● ▼		I think what we're seeing is it's less about what people call themselves and more about what they're focused on.
		The winner there in the New York mayor's race was unquestionably more focused on people's struggles, on the inability to afford housing, on the inability to pay the bills at the end of the week and at the end of the month.
		And I think people are less focused right now on even the policy proposals.
		But what they want is someone committed to trying to address it.
		And I think you see that across all the races.
		And that should be a wake-up call, not just to Democrats, but to everybody.
		People are concerned the American dream is slipping away.
		And that's a huge threat to the country.
		We have to believe that if we work hard and we play by the rules, we can get ahead.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		We'll talk in a minute about the message that Republicans should take away from the elections that happened a couple of nights ago.
		But Democrats seem to be very divided on what the future of their party looks like.
		Representative Debbie Dingell over in Michigan, she says, you know, everyone keeps focusing on Mom Downey.
		You might want to focus on like Abigail Spanberger, who won by 11 points in a purple state, and Mickey Sherrill, who also won a pretty wide victory over Jack Chitterelli in New Jersey.
brianna keilar ▲ ● ▼		Do you have concerns about Momdami and the labels that this affords Republicans being used as a weapon against Democrats?
unidentified		Okay, Republicans tried to make Nancy Pelosi the enemy in Europe's past.
		I'm going to focus on the election of Abigail Spanberger, who is clearly a moderate, as is Mikey Sherrill.
		Both women that had strong military and national intelligence background.
		What I think the message from last night is people are worried.
		People are scared.
		They cannot afford their groceries.
		They're worried about their housing costs.
		They're worried about their utility bills.
		And they're worried about the health care.
		The Republicans can try to avoid that that's what Americans are feeling, but I am the person that back in 216 said, we're in trouble as Democrats because we weren't hearing what working men and women were talking about.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay, well, I mean, again, it'll be interesting to see how all of this plays out.
		Hakeem Jeffries is doing the same exact thing.
		What's fascinating about Hakeem Jeffries is doing here is he's tacitly admitting that Democrats have downplayed one of the key agenda elements that they were trying to push for the last 10 years.
		The trans issue absolutely destroyed the Democrats.
		And now Democrats have basically put that in the rearview mirror.
		They have.
		Mom Donnie mentioned it a little bit in New York, but New York, again, a very leftist jurisdiction.
		When it comes to New Jersey or when it comes to Virginia, the Democratic candidates basically tried to run away from the trans issue by not even answering the question.
		And it basically worked for them.
		So long as that was not an elevated issue on everybody's mind, and so long as Democrats weren't militantly saying you must acknowledge that a boy is a girl, they've been able to sort of elide the question.
		And Republicans should get used to the idea this is what Democrats will do, that they may lie about their positions on trans issues, but they are certainly going to downplay those positions in order to focus on other issues.
		So that baton is not going to be nearly as potent in the future because Democrats have learned to avoid the baton.
		Here is Hakeem Jeffries basically admitting as much.
hakeem jeffries ▲ ● ▼		Abigail Spamberger focused on the issues that matter.
		Here's what Republicans did.
		They spent tens of millions of dollars trying to weaponize the transgender issue.
		It failed.
		And they spent tens of millions of dollars criticizing Abigail Spamberger for Deeply inappropriate text messages that were sent by the attorney general candidate.
		But not a dime in actually talking about what they would do for the people of Virginia because Republicans have nothing but a failed track record and a bankruptcy of ideas.
		But that playbook failed spectacularly.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		I mean, well, the reason it failed is not because Abigail Spamberger was right on the issue.
		It's because Abigail Spamberger ducked the issue.
		So Democrats are going to duck those issues in the future.
		Okay, coming up, the government shutdown continues.
		We'll get into the politics.
		Will the filibuster be nuked?
		We'll get into all of it first.
		Folks, let's say you like shooting already.
		Great, you know, like me.
		But what if I told you you're only getting half the experience?
		Here's the reality.
		Shooting suppressed isn't just quieter.
		It is much, much better.
		Less recoil, tighter grouping, no more ears ringing after you leave the range.
		Silencer Shop helps take your shooting experience from ordinary to extraordinary because your firearms should be both fun and functional.
		Now, here is the good news.
		Silencer Shop is the easiest and fastest way to get a suppressor, period.
		They've helped more Americans get silencers than anyone else.
		They're making getting one faster than ever.
		Their expert team helps handle the paperwork, connects you to a local dealer, gets you shooting suppressed with no hassle.
		Silencer Shop isn't just making it easier to buy the suppressors.
		They're fighting to protect your freedoms as well.
		Through the Silencer Shop Foundation, they filed a lawsuit against the federal government to challenge the outdated unconstitutional regulations that still restrict and require registration of suppressors, short-barreled rifles, and other firearms.
		This lawsuit aims to strike down 91 years of federal overreach and restore your constitutional rights.
		So visit silencershopfoundation.org to learn more and to support the fight.
		Also, let's be blunt, gold just hit $4,000 an ounce for the first time ever.
		It's up 50% for the year.
		I recently re-upped.
		And the reason I re-upped is because I am very, very uneasy about the future of the global economy.
		And this is a great hedge against both inflation and uncertainty.
		Central banks right now are doing the same thing.
		They are flocking to gold.
		They are driving up the prices.
		Do they know something you don't?
		I mean, the answer is probably no.
		You probably should, you know, go check it out.
		It's not too late.
		As I say, I recently bought more gold from Birch Gold.
		You can get in the door right now.
		Birch Gold will help you convert an existing IRA or 401k into a tax-sheltered IRA in gold.
		You don't pay a dime out of pocket.
		Just text Ben to 98.98.98.
		Claim your free info kit.
		There's no obligation, just useful information.
		Facts don't care about your feelings.
		The fact is that gold has been a safe haven for literally millennia.
		There's literally nothing else that can say that.
		Text Ben to 98.98.98 right now.
		Claim your free info kit on gold.
		That's Ben to 98.98.98.
		Protect your future today with Birch Gold.
		They make the entire process incredibly easy, incredibly simple.
		You call them up, you ask all your questions.
		Next thing you know, you got the gold in your safe.
		I know I just did this myself a few months ago.
		Go check them out right now.
		Text Ben to 98.98.98 to get started.
		So what should Republicans take away from Zarmandani's victory?
		But also from victories for Democrats, not just in Virginia and New Jersey, but in local races all around the country.
		They won a couple of local races in sort of school boards and a couple of state legislative seats in places ranging from Georgia to Texas to Mississippi.
		So Democrats had a very good night.
		There are a few takeaways.
		The first takeaway, obviously, is that in off-year elections, the out-of-party power.
		The first lesson is that in off-year elections, as we all know, the party that is out of power tends to do very well.
	Because there's always a backlash against the governing party because all problems are now attributable to them.
	And there's no question that the government shutdown plays a part in this poll show that more Americans are blaming Republicans than Democrats for the government shutdown.
	They sort of blame both, but it's affecting the incumbent party more than it is affecting the party that is out of power because people don't understand really how the filibuster works.
	And we'll get to that in a little while.
	But the other lesson for Republicans, truly, the other big lesson for Republicans is that when you are in power, it is not enough to just campaign against the Democrats.
	You're going to have to actually figure out either solutions to problems via the government, or you're going to have to say the solution is not the government in the first place.
	So I think that that lesson that Republicans need some sort of positive message going forward, like a defense of the things that they're doing, or at least an explanation of why government involvement isn't going to solve the problem, they need that because otherwise it just sounds like you're beating up on the guy who's not even in power in the first place.
	All righty, folks, it's time for some fast facts.
	So President Trump has now responded to the election of Zarin Mamdani.
	He gave a speech yesterday in which he ripped on Mamdani and he said, we're going to stop the country from going communist.
	Now, again, I don't think Americans like communism.
	I think that the reason that they say they like socialism is really because they don't know what socialism is because the definition has been futzed.
	And second, because when people think of America, they think of capitalism.
	So things are going badly.
	They don't like the status quo.
	But here was President Trump going after Mamdani.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		And as long as I'm in the White House, the United States is not going communist in any way, shape, or form.
		We'll stop it.
		We're going to stop it.
		Stop this nonsense.
		You know, I said they were voting last night.
		You could have a communist or a thug.
		A communist, and they took the communist, you know?
unidentified		It's pretty amazing.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		So, you know, again, I think that he is right.
		He is right.
		And it's funny.
		But is it going to be enough to stop a blue wave that is going to just kind of hold the DSA a little bit at bay, but also hug them with the other arm?
		Here is President Trump ripping Mamdani's victory speech, which was incredibly militant and wildly communistic.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I thought it was a very angry speech, certainly angry toward me.
		And I think he should be very nice to me.
		You know, I'm the one that sort of has to approve a lot of things coming to him.
		So he's off to a bad start.
		At one point, he says, turn the volume up.
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		So hear me, President Trump, when I say this.
unidentified		To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		How do you respond to that?
		Does that affect anything you're going to do?
		It's a very dangerous statement for him to make, actually.
		And, you know, you talk about danger.
		I think it's a very dangerous statement for him to make.
		He has to be a little bit respectful of Washington because if he's not, he doesn't have a chance of succeeding.
		And I want to make him succeed.
		I want to make the city succeed.
		I don't want to make him succeed.
		I want to make the city succeed.
		And we'll see what happens.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Well, again, we will see what happens.
		Scott Besson, the Treasury Secretary, he said, welcome to Caracas on the Hudson.
		I was thinking Venezuela is coming to New York.
scott bessent ▲ ● ▼		I want to congratulate the people who voted for Mamdani.
		And, you know, welcome to Caracas on the Hudson.
		Welcome to Caracas on the Hudson.
		I don't know who's going to be more responsible for the bump in Miami real estate, Maduro or Mamdani.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay, now, again, all of this is going to be potent, and all of that's true.
		The problem for Republicans is they are the party in power.
		When you are the party in power, things change.
		People tend to attribute the problems in the world to you.
		And so if they go to the grocery store and it's very expensive, and make no mistake, it is very expensive at the grocery store.
		A week of groceries is going to cost you a lot more than it did two years ago.
		It's stabilized somewhat over the course of the last year, but that doesn't mean the prices went down.
		It just means the prices remain very high.
		And wage gains have not really eaten into that yet.
		I mean, the prices of everything feel very expensive to people right now.
		And people are not wrong to feel that.
		And when President Trump says things are becoming more affordable, people don't believe that they are becoming more affordable because they aren't really more affordable.
		They might be more affordable compared to where it would have been if Biden were president, but we are no longer in that world.
		And you can't keep living in that world as the sitting president of the United States.
		Here's President Trump talking about prices.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		We've done so much.
		You know, energy is way down.
		Look at energy.
		We're going to have $2 gas a liter to do that.
		That brings everything else down.
		Groceries are way down other than beef.
		Now, beef is going to come down.
		You know, we have to do that.
		You remember when I started?
		Eggs were up by four times what they were previous.
		Two days in the office that they told me about eggs.
		I solved that because the fact is we have prices way down.
		We have prices down.
		Our country's doing well.
		The stock market's hitting record highs like 48 times during my nine months.
		And just a couple of days ago, it hit another record high, like really record high.
		It's great.
		And that equates, it's not just rich people.
		That's 401ks.
		I mean, that equates to everybody.
		And the country is doing very well.
		But as Republicans, you have to talk about it because if you don't talk about it, you know, I saw that they kept talking about affordability.
		Well, Biden was a disaster with affordability.
		He had the highest inflation rate in the history of our country.
		But you have to talk about it.
		It's no good if we do a great job and you don't talk about it.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay, now he's not wrong about any of that, but there has never yet been a politician who tells people that their feelings about the economy are wrong, who ends up doing well in a midterm.
		I remember when Barack Obama did, he said, well, people, they just don't understand.
		They just don't understand what I'm saying.
		I remember when he did that.
		I remember that Joe Biden used to say, oh, they don't even understand the gains that we're making right now, John.
		And it didn't work for him.
		And so if people just don't feel good about the cost of groceries, you can't make them feel good by telling them things are great.
		It just doesn't work that way, unfortunately, because sometimes people are wrong in how they, but it doesn't work that way.
		And it also happens to be true that people are just paying a lot more in groceries than they did even a couple of years ago.
		And when you go to the grocery store, very often, you don't think about what you paid last year for groceries.
		You think, what did I pay five years ago for groceries?
		And the answer is a lot less, a lot less.
		And of course, a lot of that is Joe Biden.
		And over the course of the last year, again, inflation has really moderated.
		It's down in the 2.7 to 3% range, which is still too high on an annualized basis, but it's a lot lower than it was under Biden when for one year it spiked up into double digits.
		With that said, do people feel good about the price of groceries?
		The answer right now is no.
		They do not feel great about the price of groceries.
		In fact, I asked our sponsors over at Comet, a project of perplexity, how much does a week of groceries cost for an average American family compared to two years ago and one year ago?
		So according to Comet, for an average American family, the weekly grocery cost in 2025 is around $250 to $270 a week, which is slightly higher than the past two years due to continued food price inflation.
		In 2023 and 2024, families were also spending close to $270 per week.
		However, if you ask Comet, what was the average price of groceries for the same families in 2021, the grocery cost for a family of four ranged from about $146 to $289.
		So if you take the low end of that estimate, you are talking about a 50% increase in the course of the last four years.
		And so people continue to feel that.
		According to Comet, that number is about 20% increase in price.
		But if you're thinking like the low end versus kind of the high end now, you're talking about 40% increase, 30%, 40%.
		I mean, these are major costs to families, serious costs to families.
		And so the question becomes: what can government do about that?
		What can government do about that?
		Now, it seems to me that there are a few things the government can do about that.
		Number one, the Federal Reserve's main mandate always should have been not to get to 2% annual inflation, but to get to 0% annual inflation.
		That should always have been the Federal Reserve's mission.
		It is ridiculous that the Federal Reserve always had a dual mission of keeping unemployment low and also keeping inflation low.
		It is not the job of the Federal Reserve to keep unemployment low.
		That means that they get to mess around with the money in order to manipulate the markets every single day.
		And that is a problem.
		Senator Rand Paul is totally correct about this.
		That is a serious, serious problem.
		But beyond that, when people begin to have expectations of their government that are inaccurate, that the government can solve all your problems, you end up with actually bad policy.
		And this brings us to the tariff fight.
		President Trump wants to say that the tariffs that he has imposed are making life more affordable for Americans.
		He said that he continues to say that that tariff fight is making the American economy stronger.
		I see no evidence of this.
		I think at best you can say that the tariffs haven't wildly damaged America's economy yet.
		And that is due to an enormous amount of investment capital that is being deployed, particularly at the top end of the stock market.
		That is because there's probably some embedded price eating that was going on as the tariffs were being negotiated and continue to roil the markets.
		But the idea that we are rich because of the tariffs or the economy is doing better because of the tariffs, I see zero evidence that that is in fact the case.
		But in a country where everyone demands that the government do something, right?
		Let's be clear.
		The Mamdani candidacy in New York is a do-something candidacy.
		People don't even have an idea what he's going to do, but he says he's going to do something.
		And so the idea is throw a bunch against the wall and see what sticks.
		If in this country, the solution to every ill is give me more power on both sides, give me more power and I will fix, things ain't going to get fixed because it turns out that healthy, thriving, growing economies require the government to go hands off.
		Now, President Trump totally understands this with regard particularly to regulation and taxation.
		But when it comes to macroeconomic issues, things like subsidies or tariffs, when it comes to, quote unquote, protecting certain sectors, he goes the wrong way on this.
		Now, I will say that there is something happening right now that counterintuitively could be very, very beneficial to the president.
		So yesterday at the Supreme Court, there was a hearing over whether President Trump has the emergency power to simply set global tariffs on every country, up to including the Penguins in the Solomon Islands.
		Does he actually have the ability to do that by claiming a national emergency?
		That was the question.
		And the hearing at the Supreme Court did not go particularly well.
		As the Wall Street Journal says, President Trump's global tariffs ran headlong into a skeptical Supreme Court on Wednesday, with justices across the spectrum expressing doubt that a 1970s emergency powers law could be read to provide the president unilateral authority to remake the international economy and collect billions of dollars in import taxes without explicit congressional approval.
		Even if the court strikes down the tariffs Trump initiated, the justices gave little indication how they might unwind the policy.
		I mean, well, no, actually.
		What the justice said is the tariffs would have to stop because they're not congressionally approved.
	The question is, what happens to the $90 billion or so of tax revenue that was taken in via the tariffs because tariffs are a tax?
	How does that get refunded?
	And the answer is that it would be a very, very messy process, for sure.
	But Solicitor General John Sauer, on behalf of the administration, took heat from all sides as he pressed the administration's argument that the president's power to regulate foreign financial transactions when he declares an emergency includes the authority to impose tariffs.
	Now, again, the idea originally was that the president can regulate movement between territories that affect like terror groups, for example.
	It wasn't that the president just gets to completely remake the economy by saying national emergency, not enough soybeans getting exported.
	Now we got to have a tariff.
	Tariffs are taxes.
	They're congressionally allocated powers under the Constitution.
	To demonstrate the scope of Trump's claim in what I thought was the most important moment, Justice Neil Gorsuch said, quote, could the president impose a 50% tariff on gas-powered cars and auto parts to deal with the unusual and extraordinary threat from abroad of climate change?
	And the administration said yes.
	Now, I ask you again, as conservatives, is this a thing you want to do?
	Is this a thing you want to, do you want the president of the United States, who very easily could be a Democrat inside the next four years, do you want President AOC having the ability on the basis of a national emergency to cancel all gas-powered cars imported into the United States, for example?
	Is that a thing that you would like?
	Would you like her, on the basis of national security, to be able to shut down trade with allies, for example?
	or open trade with enemies.
	Every power that is delegated to the office of the presidency is not delegated to a person.
	It is delegated to the office.
	The tariffs were always unconstitutional.
	They were.
	I said it the day that President Trump announced them.
	Okay, now, whether you like tariffs or you don't like tariffs, if you like the tariffs, go stump for them with your congressman.
	Tell Congress to pass the tariffs.
	But if you, ironically, if you want the economy to actually take off like a rocket, if you want the stock market to increase by 10%, have the Supreme Court strike down the tariffs.
	The stock market has been, I know so many investors, all of whom have been like, you know, I'm going to invest.
	I'll probably put it at the top end of the stock market where the returns are good, the Magnificent 7.
	The AI companies aren't subject to tariffs really so much because, of course, they're high-tech and a lot of what they do is cloud-based.
	But if you want the rest of the stock market to actually grow, what would be great is a solid free trade regime and then let the president go and negotiate further free trade agreements with our allies, places like Japan and South Korea and the Philippines, and then box in China and then go after China.
	I mean, that's how this should have been done in the first place.
	So with outside expectations comes outside's responsibility.
	And so if Republicans hope to survive the midterms next year, they're going to either have to come up with solutions that please the American people or they're going to have to explain why governmental solutions are not available and power ought to be delegated back to the American people.
	Okay, meanwhile, this government shutdown continues.
	We are now in day 37 of this government shutdown.
	No one understands why we're doing this.
	Truly, no one understands.
	A clean CR has been available.
	Continuing resolution to fund the government at current levels has been available this entire time.
	The Republicans in the House passed it.
	The Senate has now voted on it 14 separate times.
	Democrats keep voting it down.
	The only way Democrats can do that is by invoking the legislative filibuster.
	They say you need 60 votes in order to be able to get this clean CR passed.
	Democrats continue to maintain this is the case, even as SNAP benefits go away for a huge number of people.
	Even though flights are now going to be delayed at 40 airports, they're reducing 10% of their flights in order to deal with all of this.
	Democrats seem to show no qualms about what it is that they are doing at this point.
	Apparently, according to Axios, Senate Democrats are taking a moment after Tuesday nights resounding off your wins before making any firm moves to reopen the government.
	Victory is emboldening the party's hardliners.
	Centrist Democrats seem stuck.
	Now, again, not all Democrats are similarly placed.
	If you are a Democrat in a purple state and you have to go home and explain to your constituents why you continue to vote for the shutdown, that's a very different thing than if you're a blue senator in a blue state where you get to go home and have all the people cheer for you because you stood up to Trump.
	Yay.
	Senator Chris Murphy, who of course is from Connecticut, which means that he's a blue senator from blue state, he said, quote, I think it would be very strange if on the heels of the American people having rewarded Democrats for standing up and fighting, we surrendered without getting anything for the people we've been fighting for.
	House Democrats are warning of hell to pay if their Senate counterparts compromise too quickly.
	But if you are a senator from, you know, Maine, which is a purplish state like Angus King, or if you are a senator from Pennsylvania, as Senator John Fetterman is, you might have some different thoughts on that.
	And Democrats should really consider whether the interests of their parties are well aligned if, in fact, they lose a bunch of seats in these purple states that they need to win.
	Ironically, actually, in the purplish district, the resistance is very happy about the government shutdown.
	The real question is, in the purple districts that are flippable for Republicans or purple states that are flippable for Republicans in the Senate, is this shutdown going to benefit or harm Democrats?
	And I think in moderate areas, it ain't great for Democrats, which is, of course, the entire impasse.
	The Democratic Party itself is split on this issue.
	Hakeem Jeffries continues to maintain that the GOP needs to make some sort of concessions in order for a clean CR to pass.
hakeem jeffries ▲ ● ▼		But unfortunately, Republicans have continued to take a my way or the highway approach.
		That's what they did in their one big ugly bill.
		Largest cut to Medicaid in American history, ripped food out of the mouths of children, seniors, and veterans with $186 billion cut to snap.
		They did that in July.
		And all of this was done so they could reward their billionaire donors with massive tax breaks.
		The American people are rejecting that level of extremism.
		And it's certainly our hope that Republicans will see the need to change course, sit down with us as Democrats, and we can find our way out of this, unfortunately, very painful shutdown that the American people have been experiencing.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Now, President Trump, as a piece of leverage, it's unclear whether he means this sincerely or whether he's trying to use this as a piece of leverage.
		He is saying Democrats are showing zero interest in reopening.
		This part is true.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		So as you know, we are in the midst of a disastrous Democrat-created government shutdown.
		And it is Democrat-created, but I don't think they're getting really the blame that they should.
		That's now officially the longest shutdown in American history.
		The Democrat radicals in the Senate have shown zero interest in reopening the government.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Okay, and of course he's right.
		But then he says, actually, let's nuke the filibuster.
		So the filibuster is what Democrats are using in order to stop the clean CR.
		It requires 60 votes in order to get past the filibuster.
		Democrats are not lending the Republicans seven votes in order to get past the filibuster.
		And so President Trump is calling for a thing that many Democrats have called for in the past and some Republicans, the nuking of the filibuster, the use of the so-called nuclear option, whereby you go to the Senate parliamentarian, you ask if the filibuster can basically be overruled.
		And then with 51 votes, you pass a resolution in order to change the filibuster rules.
		The filibuster goes away.
		And now for the rest of American history, 51 votes in the Senate will allow you to do anything.
		Now, I like the filibuster.
		I think the filibuster is good.
		Why do I like the filibuster?
		Because the Senate was supposed to be originally a deliberative body, which is where the deals got made.
		And one of the obstacles to precipitous action was the filibuster.
		It made people actually get together and talk with one another.
		And you couldn't get anything done unless you had a broad consensus because 60 is, of course, a lot higher than 51.
		I promise you, if the filibuster goes away, if by either side, if the filibuster goes away, within 10 years, Democrats will have added at least two states to the Union, both Democrat.
		Democrats will have rewritten the electoral rules in the United States.
		They already tried to do this in the last congressional session, and the filibuster stopped them.
		Democrats will do all the magical things that they have been pledging to do.
		They will.
		Fundamentally, the form of government of the United States will shift.
		The filibuster is sort of the last vestige of a system that requires some level of popular approval for a policy beyond bare majoritarianism.
		So I'm very, very anti-killing the filibuster.
		Here's what the president had to say, on the other hand.
donald j trump ▲ ● ▼		I think it's very important.
		We have to get the country open.
		And the way we're going to do it this afternoon is to terminate the filibuster.
		And it's possible you're not going to do that.
		And I'm going to go by your wishes.
		very smart people.
		We're good friends.
		But I think it's a tremendous mistake, really.
		It would be a tragic mistake, actually.
		It's time.
		It's time.
		If I thought they weren't going to approve, I'd sort of be with you.
		It'd be fine.
		I'd be neutral to with you.
		But knowing that they're going to pass it as soon as they get any semblance of control, they'll pass it first thing.
		Then it's like we have to do it first.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		Now, again, this point that he's making here is not a bad point.
		Trust has been lost to the extent that Republicans do believe that Democrats are going to nuke the filibuster at the first available opportunity.
		And so the proposal that I have made is on my proposal.
		My friend Jeremy Boring originally made this proposal, and I think it's right.
		Republicans should say, we want a constitutional amendment to enshrine the filibuster, the Senate legislative filibuster.
		We want a constitutional amendment to do that.
		That requires widespread approval in the Senate to make that a permanent feature of the political landscape.
		And if we don't get it, then we're nuking the filibuster because we're not just going to wait around to find out whether your goodwill ends and you decide to nuke the filibuster and destroy the necessary checks and balances that have been on the wane so long in American politics.
		That I think would be a good policy to propose.
		But the president's proposal that the Republicans nuke the filibuster, I'm going to assume this is a piece of leverage that the president here is doing this because he's saying to Democrats, listen, if you really want to play hardball, we'll play super, duper hardball and we'll just run you right over.
		So you may as well get on board because we'll kill the filibuster and we'll pass the CR.
		I assume that's what's happening.
		It's unlikely to actually become reality.
		There's just not enough senators who are going to destroy the filibuster right now because, you know, basically you'd need 51 senators or 50 plus the vice president to vote to break a tie in order to kill the filibuster.
		I would assume that there are still 5, 10, 15 Republican senators who are not on board with killing the legislative filibuster in the Senate, probably much, much higher than that.
		Okay, meanwhile, there's been a lot of talk recently about people who are quote unquote splitting the right.
		One of those people, very clearly, because she's not attempting to hide it, is Marjorie Taylor Greene.
		Marjorie Taylor Greene has spent the last several weeks apparently planning for her own presidential run, which, you know, all luck to her.
		Frankly, I think that would be clarifying.
		I think that it would be wonderful if Marjorie Taylor Greene ran for president of the United States and won 7% of the vote.
		I think that would be great because Marjorie Taylor Greene's ideas are not popular ideas with the American people.
		And it would be fun to watch her try, frankly.
		She says that she believes she is real MAGA and that other Republicans have strayed.
		I mean, to be fair, she also thinks that President Trump is not real MAGA, and she's basically said just as much.
		She's yelling at Republicans all the time.
		She's going on the view to hang out with people who despise President Trump, despise Republicans, and despise conservatism.
		And she's being treated with kid gloves.
		Here was Joy Behar.
		Okay, I have a rule.
		If Joy Behar is saying that you are a wonderful person, like truly great, you've done something wrong in your life.
		Here is Joy Behar on the View yesterday, glossing MTG.
joy behar ▲ ● ▼		I have to say, Marjorie Taylor Greene, who was on the show yesterday, her timing couldn't have been better.
		I mean, she's basically turning on the Republicans in several areas.
		Of course, continuing to say she loves Trump because why wouldn't you?
		Because the retribution against her would be horrible.
		So she stays there.
		And then today, the Democrats pulled it out of the air and did it.
		So she was right.
		She's smarter than we thought.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		She's so much smarter because she agrees with Joy Behar.
		That's why Joy Behar thinks you're smart is if you agree with Joy Behar, because Joy Behar is the kind of person who legitimately, if intellectual firepower or electrical wattage could not toast a piece of bread on both sides lightly.
		Her saying that she's very smart, Joy Behar saying that you're a smart person is a good indication you are not a very, very smart person.
		So, you know, there are, in fact, people who spend all day long firing inside the tens and then presume to proclaim that if you notice that, then somehow that's splitting the party.
		It's sort of a fascinating phenomenon.
		Speaking of which, she continued her grievance tour against the Republican Party, of course.
		She appeared on NewsNation last night where she talks about how she yelled at the Speaker of the House.
unidentified		Like if you were to be able to talk to Mike Johnson right now, you would tell him what?
marjorie taylor greene ▲ ● ▼		Tell him the same thing I told him last week and I yelled at him on the phone on our GOP conference call.
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		What'd you say?
marjorie taylor greene ▲ ● ▼		Is that is where is our health care plan?
		It's non-existence.
		Democrats created this problem years ago, but Republicans have never fixed it.
		And I said we need to be back at work and not being in session is basically pathetic.
zohran mamdani ▲ ● ▼		What'd he say to you?
marjorie taylor greene ▲ ● ▼		He gave me the same talking points he gives to the press every single day.
ben shapiro ▲ ● ▼		So clearly she's for unifying the Republican Party and victory.
		Clearly.
		Clearly, that's what this is all about.
		Alrighty, folks, coming up, we're going to jump into your questions in the Vaunted Ben Shapiro show mailbag.
		Remember, in order to have your questions answered or to even see it, you have to be a member.
		Head on over to our Daily Wire Plus app.
		Become a member.

▲