Jay Feely’s Fight for Arizona and Iran’s Fight for Freedom
Former NFL star and announcer Jay Feely joins the show to talk about his new Charlie-inspired, Trump-endorsed run for Arizona's 1st Congressional District. He talks about the economy, how faith inspired him to leave a lucrative career for public service, and what it was like to play with Tom Brady. Then, Iranian exile Erica Le Bon weighs in on the uprising in the Islamic Republic and what the prospects are for toppling the Ayatollah's regime. Watch every episode ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com!Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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All right, welcome back.
Hour two of the Charlie Kirk Show.
We are very honored to have a guest in studio now.
He is going to be the next congressman from Arizona's first congressional And that is Jay Feeley.
Jay Feeley, longtime NFL kicker, then NFL broadcaster.
And you are now Trump-endorsed, Speaker Mike Johnson-endorsed. Welcome to the show. Thank you. It's awesome to be on here. Huge fan of Charlie, just watching him. His heart for people, he cared about people regardless of their political persuasion. I just love the way he communicated,
how effective he was, and just honored to be on this show. Well, it's great to have you here. We've been watching the developments of your race But now you're Trump endorsed. Speaker Mike Johnson just endorsed you. We've got the graphics there. You are running for Arizona's first congressional district. So give the audience that's national. We have a national audience,
but we also have a big Arizona audience. Give them kind of a feel of geographically where your district is. Well, it's Scottsdale. If you think of Scottsdale, it's Scottsdale, it's Fountain Hills, it's Paradise Valley,
a little bit of Phoenix. It's that area of kind of North Phoenix. It's a very affluent district that cares about the economy. You know, they over 50 percent of the people in that district have a college degree or more than a B.A. The vast majority are employed by private companies and they care dramatically about the economy and where the economy is going. I think if you look at what President Trump is doing, just the numbers that have come out recently, they're going to love that.
Over 4% GDP, almost 2.5% inflation, bringing down inflation, continuing to get jobs, investment into our country.
You go back and you look in the 80s, we had positive net investment in other countries.
And at minus $1 trillion, Warren Buffett said it was unsustainable.
In 2024, we had minus $26 trillion in investment into our country versus out of our country.
And no one talked about it.
And President Trump is doing the work to bring that investment, using tariffs as the threat to make countries invest back in our country, bringing trillions back into our country and continue to make an economy that's going to help everybody.
And you know, you listen to Lutnick the other day on the All In podcast, he was very positive.
They think we could have over 5% GDP in the fourth quarter and going forward, maybe 6% throughout 2026.
That would be enormous for not only the midterms and Republicans going into the midterms.
but for the American people in general. Yeah, the Atlanta Fed had it at, I think it was 5.3, their estimate. They revised their estimate for Q4, so we're waiting to see what that number ultimately is. But that's a huge number that we haven't even dreamed of in this country for a while. And then we've got the Supreme Court is probably going to come down with a ruling on Wednesday,
is what I'm hearing, as far as the tariff ruling. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see there, because I agree with you. I believe that President Trump, I, you know, I believe economic warfare is, you may not like it, you may not like those words, but it is a reality, Right.
We have to have Western hemispheric dominance.
We are.
You're seeing that in Venezuela.
You're seeing it with the way that President Trump is using tariffs as a not only a political or an economic tool, but as a foreign policy tool.
Right.
And these things ultimately are meant to enrich the homeland and enrich your residents in places like Scottsdale, Paradise Valley.
Absolutely.
It's a close district.
Right.
Schweiker holds it.
So it's an our seat.
Now, you know, tell us about some of that.
It's a very it's a it's the margins.
I mean, it's like plus two, plus one.
That's what he's won by when he's held the seat.
You know, it's going to be one of the most important swing seats in the country.
And it'll probably be the seat that the Democrats spend the most money in the country trying to go out and flip that.
And it's why I decided to move.
Ideally, you don't want to move districts.
You know, I lived in Gilbert.
That's where I originally was running.
President asked me to move.
Then Republican leadership asked me to move.
They didn't feel that we had anybody running for that seat that could hold the seat that could win it.
so they all called me and said, hey, Jay. We need you to move into CD1 and run in that district. And I said yes, for the good of the party. The whole reason I decided to leave broadcasting, listen, I love my job. I only had to work five months of the year. I got paid really well. I got to do football. You know, That's what I'd done the last 10 years, after playing for 14 years, and it was a tremendous blessing.
And I decided to leave broadcasting because, you know, I because I felt like God was pressing me to do it, to do something with more meaning.
I think back to something that Charlie always said that really resonated with me, which was, you know, I'm much more concerned about what God wants for me than I am with what I want from God, you know, and and if I was selfish, I would have just said I'm gonna keep my broadcasting job and it's fun and it's easy and I don't risk anything, but I But I've always been more concerned about trying to follow the path of where I think I can help people.
When we were playing, my wife and I always wanted to use the platform that God gave us to have an impact on people.
I view politics the same way, maybe somewhat idealistic, but your job is to create those equal opportunities, those pathways to success for everybody. I think that's what President Trump is doing. It was not the easy decision to try to go after and rebalance trade. He could have just extended the tax cuts,
tried to create energy dominance and more energy production, which is going to bring down inflation, bring down costs, and kind of coasted into the midterms, but they took the hard path, which was no. We have to bring investment back into this country. We have to reset trade parameters. And we've got to look at the long-term perspective because we have $38 trillion in debt growing at $1 trillion every 100 days,
and nobody talks about it. Those are the issues that I think sit out there, and Congress doesn't do anything about. Either side, this massive debt growing, the lack of investment into our country, and who pays the price? And Charlie always talked about it. It was the average working everyday man and woman. That's who pays the price, and that's who paid the price of the Biden policy. You know, with the 9% inflation and the printing of money,
and they didn't care about the impact on America. They cared about the impact on their politics, despite the impact on Americans. Well, and when you have that inflationary environment, too, guess who gets hurt? It's the working men and women. It's a muscular class. The people that don't have investments and, you know, stocks and equities, they're getting out. Value of those equities is outstripping their ability to earn and get into the financial ladder, get that first rung in the ladder. I want to just make sure our audience is aware of this. So, you know,
I've been asking around about you, Jay, you know, knowing that we were going to have you on. And one of the things that came back again and again, and you alluded to this in kind of what you were talking about, why you're running, is that you're just a strong Christian man and your kids are, you have four children, right? We have four of our own, and then we have two that we kind of adopted from Haiti. We didn't legally adopt them, but I started going down and doing projects after the earthquake, rebuilding homes with a group called Mission of Hope down there, awesome organization,
and two guys that were our translators that we just kind of fell in love with, and I decided, my wife and I, that we could help them, and legally they went through. They got an education visa, Wendner did, and he came here, moved into our house. It was the hardest thing I ever did, to be honest with you. As a dad of four young kids, you don't want to do anything that may put them at jeopardy and have a negative impact, but he moved into our house. We got him into Grand Canyon University. He got a degree,
did awesome. I wanted to highlight that because it's something that everybody said about you that I asked, was that he's a really solid Christian guy, and we need more of that. I believe, as Charlie believed,
that this nation will fail if we lose sight of our Christian roots. Western civilization is Christendom. Whether or not people follow it or not, that is our foundation. We need to keep our eyes centered and affixed on God. God has his providential hand on this nation,
I believe, and we need leaders that acknowledge that. So I just wanted to give you a shout out there. But also, when we were coordinating the memorial for Charlie, you had a hand in that. You helped us get in touch with the people, helped us coordinate the stadium. Well, we were heartbroken. My wife and I literally were walking out of the White House when we found out about Charlie. She burst into tears. I was just gutted. And we laid in bed that night and she said, you know, are you sure you want to do this? And I said,
I have more resolve now. I know that God has put me in this place at this time for this reason. And I just reached out and said, hey, what can we do to help? We wanted to donate to you, help defer some of the cost of the memorial. I wanted to bring people that may donate to your organization and just try to support him because I loved what he stood for. I loved that he was willing to have conversations with people that completely disagreed with him,
that he mandated the people there, give them the respect to be able to communicate. And then he communicated with a heart for people. It wasn't just, let me tell you why you're wrong, and I'm so smart, and I know all the things to be able to counter your argument, But he had a heart to try to help people change their viewpoint.
And really, everything started with his faith and his trust in Jesus and trying to have an impact on people for Christ.
And you helped us secure the venue or at least help connect some of the dots behind the scenes.
So if you want to know how we were able to pull that off, look no further than Jay Feely and helping connect some of the dots there to get the State Farm Stadium and get access to that.
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Your background is great.
So you walk in the office and my first question was not about politics at all.
It was the longest field goal.
You kicked.
That's right.
And what was the answer?
It was 61.
It was long when I was playing, but now they're making all the way back to 70 -yard field goals.
61 is a really long ways to kick a field goal.
And then you went into broadcasting.
I did.
And you broadcasted four Super Bowls?
Four Super Bowls.
Kind of crazy.
You were doing sideline analysis at that point, right? Sideline in the playoffs for the Super Bowl, up in the booth. I was the second kicker ever in the booth after Pat Summerall, the legendary Pat Summerall, Susie Wiles' father. So there's a connection to the White House, which is great, and just honored to be able to do that. It was a challenge. People are like, well, what does a kicker know about football? So I love that challenge aspect of it, to go in there and say, hey, I actually know the game, understand the game, I study the game, and I can communicate it on air. And you also told us,
I didn't know this, you lived with Tom Brady for a while, right? Well, we did it like in the summers. Yeah, Michigan. We were in Michigan for four years ago. He was my holder for one year, which is great. I got him, you know, a picture of him holding the balls when I was kicking. And Tom is a great guy and somebody that, you know, just shows real leadership. You know, when you have a heart for service and you care about people and you put them above yourself, that's why the Patriots were so successful when he was there. You know, I hope to bring that into politics. You know,
I care about people. I want to have I think we need people that have the ability to communicate. I think it's one of the things that translates directly into politics from broadcasting. I was live on air for three hours every Sunday on national TV. When we lost Charlie,
we lost one of the great, if not the great, communicator for conservative causes. No one can step up and fill the void that he's left, but we need people willing to step into that void and try to be able to communicate and do it effectively and do it with a heart for people. That,
you know, Charlie was desperate for a Republican Party that was as conservative as its voters. And to hear you, you know, bring that up as an inspiration and then just knowing kind of your reaction to when Charlie was assassinated and the things you did to help behind the scenes,
you know. There's all, it's funny, I was telling Tyler, there's all these conspiracy theories that we, like, planned the memorial six months out or something like that. No, the reason we were able to do it was because we had friends like you that had connections with NFL ownership to help open up the stadium. It wasn't just you,
there was other people helping. I don't want to overstate things. Charlie's enduring legacy is going to be a Republican Party that's remade and inspired by the things that he did, by the message that he presented. My biggest disappointment has been the way the Republican Party has acted. After his death. That we haven't coalesced together. When you look at the parties,
they've never been further apart ideologically. We have so much to go after to show the distinct differences in beliefs and what our vision is for this country between the left and the right. And there's been so much infighting on the Republican Party to try to, I don't know, fill the void of Charlie and where he was. And, you know, we need to come together and not fight against each other, but fight against You know, the people on the other side,
when you listen to Jasmine Crockett and Congressman Omar Ilhan and the things that they believe. And you look at Mamdani and why he was elected. You know, Charlie talked about affordability all the time and the fact that we need young people to have a vested interest in this country. They have to have ownership in this country. If they don't own a home and they don't have ownership,
they're not invested in this country. That's why somebody like Mamdani can get elected in New York. That's why so many young people are disillusioned with the political process because they throw their hands up. They're like, I got massive debt from college. I can't get a great job. I can't buy a job, and interest rates are crazy high. I can't buy a home, so I just want the government to do it for me. We've had a very interesting swerve from the president just these last couple weeks. He's on homes. He says he doesn't want large institutional to own it,
and also he's calling for a 10% interest cap on credit cards as well. So much of our economic system benefits economic incumbents,
right? And so, we have to that was the message that Charlie had for Gen Z it's like, listen, the American dream is alive and well, we have to focus on it because yeah, we had major gains in 2024 with the next generation, but we gotta stay on it, this is not You know, the cement is not dry yet. He brought hope to young people, and that's what our politicians need to do. That's what Republicans need to do. We need to give them a vision of why they should believe in our policies and how they're going to give them opportunity. You can't dictate outcomes because you can't control individual behaviors,
but you can give the right opportunities to people and say, if you work hard and you make the right decisions, here's your pathway to success. I think so many young people right now don't see that. They don't have hope that if I do the right things, that I'm going to be successful. That's our job. is to make that argument and make it understandable for young people. And listen, and for everybody, most people are just trying to work their job, provide for their family. They want the government to stay out of their business,
you know, and they want the right. economic environment to be able to be successful. That's what most people want. You know, they don't want their government in their lives telling them what to do, how to live their lives, what decision to make. They just want you to do the right things. Unfortunately, we had four years of a Biden administration that let 10 to 20 million illegals come in, that raised the price of rent, that raised the cost of affordability. You had prices go up because they got onto Snap and they're using those Snap, raising grocery prices, you know,
and then the interest rates go up You know, we're just going to drive up inflation, you know, and then you get 9% inflation. All of a sudden, the average person is going, what happened? Like, I can't afford even the things I used to be able to afford, and I don't have hope for a future. Well, and I think ultimately, you're talking about giving up on the system. Young people, you're seeing this in Minneapolis. I think a lot of people. They have given up on America. They've given up on the idea of America. They want to see it all burn. These communist front groups are getting funded, and the protesters are organizing,
and you've got the Golden Globes wearing Be Good buttons. It's so hypocritical. I heard you guys talking about it earlier. I loved what you said, because when you look back at Obama and what he did with deportations, 80% of which were without due process. They talk about due process all the time. His deportations were not with due process, but nobody complained. The only person who even said anything was the ACLU. They wrote like four articles about it. But nobody in the mainstream media had any issue with it because it was a Democrat president doing it. Well,
and I want to reiterate a point you made. This is going to be one of the most expensive congressional races in the country. Arizona won. Your website is jfeely4congress.com. jfeely4congress.com Please put that up on the lower. Please,
everybody that can, chip in. Jay's a good guy, good Christian man. We're going to keep this seat. We're going to keep this seat because a guy like you has taken the hard route and thrown your hat in the ring and you're doing the hard thing for the sake of your country. More importantly than keeping this seat,
we're going to keep the house in 2026. I'm going to do everything I can to make sure we do that. Okay, hardest question yet. Tony Romo or Tom Brady? Who's the better broadcaster? Who's the better broadcaster? Yeah. Romo. Who's the better quarterback? Brady. I don't know. I really liked Brady over this weekend. He was teaching me how to throw a ball in the wind. That's for sure. Oh man. These are controversial sentences. Yeah. You're going to,
you're going to get a tax after that one. Uh, Jay Feely, uh, thankful for you to be in the race. God bless you, sir. President Trump walked into a catch-22 when taking office. Do nothing and America would be staring at a ticking debt bomb, the kind of crisis that could cripple our future. Instead, he's taken action with strong policies to slow the train and buy us some time. But the effects of past administration's spending are still working through the system,
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We are turning our attention to Iran now that we uh, we talked about this on Friday and we're gonna have Alika Laban, who is an Iranian in the United States and she's been a strong activist advocate for a free Iran, free of the, the mullahs and Khamenei, and so there's a lot going on, and it's very hard to understand exactly what's going on because there is an internet blackout, we've got AI,
Advocate for a free Iran, free of the, the Mullahs and Khamenei, and so there's a lot going on.
And it's very hard to understand exactly what's going on because there is an internet blackout.
We've got AI.
We've got a almost complete media blackout from the West.
we've got a almost complete media blackout from the west.
There has been very little coverage, but there is a lot of, you know, activists we've got.
We have reports of hundreds, some people are thousands.
I've seen reports in around 500, some supposed deaths from clashes between demonstrators and security forces.
President Trump has been weighing in on this.
He said about a week and a half ago he was saying, uh, if Iran strikes on protesters, we're ready to step in.
And then he said this weekend, uh quote, Iran is looking at freedom, perhaps like never before.
The Usa stands ready to help.
three exclamation points. And so there is this sense that President Trump, I guess you might say he might see this as an opportunity similar to Venezuela, where in a normal war you'd need a lot of force, but he may see this as an opportunity where a couple strikes and he can knock over the Iranian regime. Well, can you imagine the psychological impact of the protesters? I currently am against intervention,
military intervention. I don't see it as America first at this point. But, you know, I am hearing reports that there could be carriers headed to the region, straight to Hormuz, that kind of thing. If we are doing economic warfare,
I think you could topple the Iranian regime. Plus the protests with an embargo, if you will, a blockade of the oil coming out of Iran that's usually headed straight to the CCP. So it's good on two different fronts, right? You're going to Choke off the oil flow to the CCP. You're also going to choke off revenues to the mullahs. Okay, so those two things I would be in support of. I do not want to see us militarily get involved,
but it does seem like the Lady G's and that sort of thing, it's happening. They're pushing for a final blow against the Iranian mullahs right now. So we are monitoring that Do you have a clip you want to play? Sorry,
I want to play a clip here real quick. This is, I think, like a fairly dispassionate setting of the table before Elika joins us. 228. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday accused protesters of acting on behalf of U.S. President Donald Trump. Khamenei said rioters were attacking public property and warned that Tehran would not tolerate people acting as, Quote, mercenaries for foreigners.
Videos uploaded to social media on Thursday showed hundreds of people marching in Tehran's streets at night as anti -government protests continued, triggered by frustration with the country's economy and rampant inflation.
Witnesses in the capital and major cities of Mashhad and Isfahan told Reuters that protesters gathered in the streets chanting slogans against the Islamic Republic's clerical rulers.
Protesters tore an Iranian flag in half.
Internet monitoring group NetBlocks said a nationwide internet blackout was reported on Thursday.
All right.
And it looks like we have Elika Laban, who is now ready.
Elika, welcome to The Charlie Kirk Show.
Thank you.
Thanks for having me.
Absolutely.
So one of the struggles with the Iranian story right now is it's hard to get accurate information.
So you are connected with people inside Iran.
You are Iranian.
Tell us what the truth is, what's really going on, the extent of the protest, please. Yeah, well, I mean, first of all, a lot of what the media says is that this is, you know, protests that are instigated because of economic conditions. But the reality is that what these people, what the people of Iran are protesting,
is the oppressive regime that has sort of had its boot on their necks for the past 47 years. It's just impossible to count how many Iranians have taken to the streets. From what we're hearing from people inside Iran,
essentially everybody and their neighbor and their parents and even their children have taken to the streets. And it is a total nationwide protest to try and oust the regime. At the same time, the regime's narrative, which we have to remember, the regime are in control of the entire propaganda operation. They're in charge of the media. There's no free speech. There's no free journalism. And their story that they're returning back to the world, while the internet has been shut down, is that, you know,
this is a Zionist operation, a Zionist psyop, a form of American imperialism. But what most people don't know is that that is the lie. That drove the 1979 revolution. And it is the very lie that Iranian people have woken up from and are now protesting against today. And how big are the protests? And how widespread? Monumental. I mean,
every city, every, it's across the entire nation. Obviously, you know, it's not like the regime is going to be tallying numbers and sending us back figures to let us know. It's not like Gaza health ministry, where they're going to send us, you know, accurate reporting. But essentially,
from what we've heard from inside Iran, every single city in Iran is is basically has detonated with these protests. So there is a gal online. I'm not sure if you're familiar with her. It's Tamina Debozorgi. Apologies for butchering that. But she had this viral tweet that looks at 5.3 million engagements right now. She says,
So she says the Western liberal media is ignoring the Iranian uprising because explaining it would force an admission it is desperate to avoid.
The Iranian people are rebelling against Islam itself and the fact that shatters the moral framework through which these institutions understand the world.
So she's basically saying this is different than what happened in Palestine or with Hamas.
It doesn't fit the moral framework of Western media.
therefore Western media is not going to cover it. Do you think that's what's happening? Is that what's causing this media blackout from the CNNs and the MSNows of the world? Yeah, I mean, I've posted a similar tweet and similar videos talking about the moral color code, which is essentially that in Western academia, especially leftist academia, and I say this as a former leftist myself, there's this sort of framework that has been taught to American youth about who the good people and who the bad people are,
who the oppressed and who the oppressors are. And we've, so many decades, we've spent educating our youth that the good people in the world are the, you know, the global South or the people of color, and the evil people in the world are the white people, right? And so their rebellion, according to that moral color code, is against all things white. And that is why you saw them coming out in droves to, you know, protest against Israel, which had been Named a white nation of white Jews from Poland,
right? And that was absolutely deliberate. But when you see these, when you see what's happening in Iran, at the hands of an Islamist regime, well, let's not forget that violates the moral color code, because now you're talking about Islamists, who are coded as brown,
and they cannot defy the moral color code and go against the Islamists, because that undoes their entire story. It exposes the contradiction that what they've been protesting for or what they've been standing for this entire time has never been humanity. It has been abiding by, Orthodox, abiding by a moral color code which is built on a farce.
Alika, I was wondering if you could.
Uh, i've seen some discussion.
What type of alternative government do you think the people on the ground want there's been.
Obviously, the son of the former shah has made himself a very prominent figure in all of this.
Do people want the shah back?
Or how do they feel on the ground there?
Do you believe yeah?
So when we're looking at these protests, these nationwide protests from city to city, the one thing that is unanimous is that they are calling back for the shah.
They're saying, which means long live the king.
They're saying, which means this is the last battle and will return.
There's a very specific reason for this, and the reason is that they ousted his father in 1979.
Based on what I call the great lie.
And that great lie was the ideology by the Marxists and the leftists that convinced them that some utopia was going to come if they just ousted, you know, western imperialism.
They called the shah an American puppet, the American elite, and once we would be done with all of this and, you know, we could usher in some Marxist utopia of equality for all right.
And so the Iranian people very soon discovered that there was no utopia, it was just hell.
And because of that That they're calling for right now.
It's essentially an apology.
First.
We made a mistake.
We want the Shah's son back.
We want the Crown Prince, Reza Pahlavi, back.
He will act as a transitional leader, He's not coming as a dictator and authoritarian, He's coming back as an interim leader to transition the country into democracy.
At that point, a referendum will be opened up where the people will decide. Who it is that they want to lead the country, what type of system, whether it'll be a constitutional monarchy, a republic, a democratic republic. But I will say that the polls that have come out of Iran over the past couple of years have already revealed that their number one choice for a leader is the Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi,
because he's the only person that they trust against everything, all of the betrayals and all of the lies that they've experienced heretofore. Wow. And you feel like that is widely shared on the ground in Iran? I mean,
just listen to their words. We don't have to guess. We listen to their words. I have to trust you on that one. I don't know Farsi. That was a big question we had. Was he representative of a larger voice or was he trying to insinuate himself and to be opportunistic? It was an honest question. So that's actually good to know. I don't know. Not that you don't speak the language,
but I was like, why don't you hear them? Yeah, we don't speak it. So the next question here is about US involvement, intervention. Play 226. Yesterday, the leaders of Iran called, they want to negotiate. I think they're tired of being beat up by the United States. Iran wants to negotiate, yes. We may meet with them. I mean, A meeting is being set up.
But we may have to act because of what's happening before the meeting.
So I guess a general thing I'm wondering is, how fragile does the regime seem to be?
Trump is threatening to possibly get involved.
We see the people in the streets.
We see the regime shooting back.
Is it the sort of thing that could be shoved over with not too much effort?
I think the fragility of the regime is directly proportional to how much it can withstand.
And if there's intervention that's coming from the United States, that's coming from the outside, they're not going to be able to withstand the uprising within Iran and the intervention from outside.
So that will absolutely be the thing that topples the regime over.
Without intervention, no, the regime will not collapse because there's already been a massive shutdown and they're saying that the regime is starting to take control. This is Lane Schoenberger, Chief Investment Officer and founding partner of YRefi. It has been an honor and a privilege to partner with Turning Point and for Charlie to endorse us. His endorsement means the world to us, And we look forward to continuing our partnership with Turning Point for years to come.
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To get a sense of how I did, so we've heard about the internet blackout, but to get a sense of how dire the situation is for the government, I'm being told they've also blacked out landline phones.
They're blocking out online banking.
They're blocking out basically anything requiring a GPS signal or, like, location at all.
It's just getting shut down.
Jeez.
Wow.
Eleka.
I want to show this image really quick. 234. This has become an iconic image of this young woman Lighting fire to the supreme ruler and leader, whatever his name is, Khamenei, And using it to light her cigarette.
And, I mean, it's really, like, it's become this touchpoint of the youth -led movement.
Explain that.
How are young people playing a central role in this Iranian protest movement?
Entirely driven by the youth, because we have to remember that.
You know our youth in Iran.
They have access to the internet.
They're on TikTok, they're on Instagram, they're on social media, and what they're doing all day is essentially comparing their lives To the lives of people who are living with the rights and freedoms and privileges that we enjoy.
And it makes no sense to them why they don't have those things.
It makes no sense to them why they have to, you know, have hair coverings, why they're not allowed to sing or dance in public, why they're not allowed to essentially do anything. And they have to follow these laws of these clerics that are completely removed and completely out of touch from the youth of that generation. And it's also important to remember that Many people think that Iran is a Muslim country, And technically it is, but because of the regime.
But the Iranian people are not religious.
They've never been religious because Islam is not something that came to us.
It our original, our indigenous religion, you can say is Orastrianism, and Islam came to us by conquest, and it's not something that the Iranian people ever fully adopted, and so there's an aspect of it that is still foreign to the Iranian people and most especially to the Iranian youth.
So when they're seeing the way that the rest of the world is living on Tiktok, they're making their dance videos too, but they're not allowed to make their dance videos.
They're getting penalized for making dance videos, and they're tired of living under these restrictions.
Yeah, it's very interesting what you're getting at.
I don't think that that feels uh, I guess, logical to the average American.
Right, we've been told our whole lives.
You know, the Iranian Muslim is very repressive.
This is what we've known, but there is this undercurrent within Persian culture.
right? The Persian people, I interacted with them when I was living in Los Angeles. They're amazingly industrious people. I think a lot of them are pretty devoutly Muslim. I would say my experience, you would know better than I, of course, but my interaction, This is my firsthand experience.
They weren't devout.
Were they IRGC?
I don't think I've ever met a person that was a devout Muslim unless they were IRGC.
Well, and that, no, that's really interesting insight.
And listen, you're the subject matter expert here.
But the what I will say is it does it's there does seem to be this.
You see these videos from the 1970s of Iranian culture before.
And it feels very Western.
It feels very liberal.
And I do think that that is a promising sign.
If we're going to see Iran change and leadership change, do you believe that the country would be well poised to sort of be reintegrated into the international community?
Yeah.
And, you know, I tweeted something about this the other day because people talk about this concept of Westernization.
Right.
And they forget that we.
the Iranian people, are the descendants of Cyrus the Great, who basically penned the Cyrus Cylinder, and that was the first declaration of human rights in history. People forget that the Middle East was once considered the cradle of civilization. And so a lot of what we consider,
you know, liberal right now, these concepts of human rights, they did originate with people like our ancestors, Cyrus the Great. And so Iran is sort of like a downstream effect of that type of culture and those types of norms. And that's why it's so important to understand that the way that Islamism has been sort of put on Iran It contradicts our true underlying values. And our underlying values,
it's not that we are Western, we are Persian, but our Persian values mirror Western values very closely. And that's also why you've seen such a close alliance between the Iranian people and the United States and Israel and Western countries, because we share the same. Values. And pre-1979, that's exactly what you were seeing in Iran. The Shah, the last Shah of Iran, he actually instigated something called the White Revolution,
which was a modernization project that gave women's rights, women's suffrage. It was about expansion of literacy, industrial growth, all of these things. And it was actually that exact modernization that caused the Islamists and the Marxists inside Iran. To ally,
to overthrow the Shah, because they called it Westernization. What it really was, was Persianization. It was a return to our Persian values that are very, very closely mirrored with the West, the Judeo-Christian values. Yeah, I mean,
it certainly seems that. I mean, this is why these videos go viral online about the 1970s Iran that is no more, and hopefully will be again. But yeah, go ahead, Blake. All of us would be very happy if,
I mean, Iran's been an enemy of the United States my entire life. If we were able to topple that without needing a giant regime change war, without needing, you know, 200,000 U.S. troops, I think that would be an amazing thing. Yeah, and it, I mean, floor is yours. Elika, what's your message to the American people about Iran? My message to the American people is that it has never been more important to stand behind the people of Iran. A liberated Iran from the regime will free not just the regime,
it will free Israel and Gaza from Hamas, Lebanon from Hezbollah, Yemen from the Houthis and the West from New Clifton. It will be a massive cascading liberation for all. Thank you, Alika. Really well said. Thank you. Thank you. For more on many of these stories and news you can trust,