Primary Topic
This episode primarily explores the political ramifications of JD Vance's decisions and comments within the context of an election, with heated debates between prominent political commentators.
Episode Summary
Main Takeaways
- JD Vance’s panic-deletion of anti-abortion content highlights the sensitivity and divisiveness of the abortion issue within Republican circles.
- Trump’s continued influence in Republican politics is critiqued amidst discussions of his potential ceiling in voter support.
- The episode illustrates the sharp ideological differences between left and right commentators, especially concerning the role of rhetoric in fueling political division.
- The debate touches on broader societal issues such as free speech, big tech censorship, and the role of misinformation in shaping public opinion.
- The discussion extends into the personal impact of political figures on public policy and election outcomes.
Episode Chapters
1: Opening Remarks
David Pakman sets the stage for a debate on the current state of American politics, touching on recent political events and controversies. David Pakman: "Welcome to the show, everybody. MAGA World is in panic because of the following word sealing."
2: Political Analysis
Analyzes the implications of JD Vance's actions and Trump's political strategies. Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II: "Conservatives, especially under Donald Trump, have been responsible for increasing the hostility and political divisions in this country."
3: Ideological Clash
Captures a heated exchange on the source of divisiveness in American politics. Dennis Prager: "The hate-filled rhetoric and divisive rhetoric of this country is largely due to Donald Trump rather than to the left."
4: Consequences of Political Actions
Discusses the potential and real consequences of political figures’ actions on public policy and elections. Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II: "Donald Trump is literally known in the entire world as being the guy that makes fun of people."
5: Closing Statements
Summarizes the discussion points and reflects on the broader implications for the upcoming elections. David Pakman: "That’s a good thing for those who want to support democracy, for those who want to see things go in the right direction rather than the wrong."
Actionable Advice
- Stay informed about political candidate's histories and stances, especially as they may change over time.
- Engage in discussions that challenge your viewpoints to gain a broader perspective on political issues.
- Critically assess the role of media in shaping public opinion, recognizing potential biases.
- Participate in the electoral process to have a say in your governance and hold political figures accountable.
- Educate others about the importance of understanding the context behind political decisions and statements.
About This Episode
-- On the Show:
-- Dennis Prager, Host of The Dennis Prager Show and co-founder of PragerU and Steven Kenneth "Destiny" Bonnell II, streamer and political commentator, join David to debate Project 2025, political divisiveness, Donald Trump vs Kamala Harris, and much more
-- Donald Trump appears to have hit his polling ceiling, receiving a mere single point bump from the Republican National Convention, his selection of JD Vance, the debate against Joe Biden, and his failed assassination attempt
-- Donald Trump is interviewed by Fox News host Laura Ingraham and is unable to explain why JD Vance is a good VP selection
-- Vice Presidential candidate JD Vance panic deletes a horribly anti-abortion section of his website
-- Donald Trump explodes on Truth Social after new Fox News polling has him losing on favorability to Kamala Harris in critical swing states
-- On the Bonus Show: 5 primaries to watch in Arizona and Tennessee, Roy Cooper bows out of Kamala Harris veepstakes, NYC Mayor Eric Adams overrules law limiting solitary confinement in NYC jails, much more...
People
Dennis Prager, Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II, Donald Trump, JD Vance, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris
Companies
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Books
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Guest Name(s):
Dennis Prager, Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Content Warnings:
None
Transcript
David Pakman
Welcome to the show, everybody. MAGA World is in panic because of the following word sealing. It appears that Donald Trump has hit a ceiling, getting essentially zero bump from selecting JD Vance, from the Republican National Convention, from the failed assassination attempt, and from a performance that was, I guess, better than Joe Biden's in the June 27 debate, but certainly nothing particularly exciting to write home about. The peak for Trump may be right now, and he can't even get to 48% of the vote. Let me explain why this is so critical.
We know that if we look at 2016, Donald Trump got 46% of the popular vote. And after everything that transpired in the four years between 2016 and 2020, Donald Trump in 2020 also got 46% of the popular vote. Now, by a fraction of a point, it was a little more in 2020 than in 2016. In 2016, he just eked out an electoral win. In 2020, he lost electorally, in both cases, coming down to relatively few votes in just a handful or even fewer states.
This time around, we were led to believe Biden is so unpopular, the administration is failing so poorly, eggs are so expensive, fill in the blanks, that it was going to be a disastrous situation for the democratic nominee for a long time, expected to be Joe Biden, and it was just going to be awesome for Trump. And then Biden's failed debate performance and then the excitement of the RNC, and then Trump being shot at and surviving and coming out victorious with his fists raised, saying, fight, fight, fight. This was going to be explosive.
And then all of a sudden, we look at the polling, and there is essentially no bump.
There's nothing else he can do at this point. And with hundreds of millions of dollars pouring in to Kamala Harris's campaign, this might be it. And this is why they are so panicked. So let's take a review of the numbers we have across real clear politics. Average polling, a 1.7 percentage point lead for Trump. Now, most of this polling, most of this polling does not yet account for Kamala Harris being the presumptive nominee. But the incredible part is that you look at the chart of polling, which there's this. If you're looking at this chart, there's this vertical black line, which is when President Biden withdrew. So to the left of that line, it was Trump versus Biden. And to the right of that line, it's Trump versus Harris. And bear in mind, we have a truncated y axis here. So the gap between the polling looks very big, but it's actually extraordinarily small. If you look at June 26. Okay, this was the day before the debate, June 26, Trump was leading by 1.51.5. Was the Trump lead on June 26. And we look at all of these different things as we carry forward the June 27 debate and then selecting JD Vance and then getting shot at and surviving and getting all of this great press about how awesome and fantastic he is. And we go to where we are today, and the lead is 1.7.
Okay, one think of the math of that. June 26, Trump leading by 1.5.
After all of these supposedly great things, he's leading by 1.7.
The big, arguably some of the biggest upheavals we have ever seen in a presidential race. A truly bad performance from Biden, probably the worst since Nixon.
Surviving an assassination attempt, choosing your vp after months, if not years, of speculation.
And what you get out of it is 0.2 percentage points. So Trump may well have hit a ceiling here. It's hard to make any argument for Trump getting more than 47 or so percent of the vote in November. And so what we can see is that it's going to come down to turnout. It's going to come down to what slice of voters in the critical swing states decide to vote third party or stay home. And meanwhile, as Trump seems to have hit this ceiling, Kamala Harris seems to just be getting started. Now. This is not a prediction, it's not a guarantee. It's nothing other than an assessment of where we are right now. And there's a reason that mag oworld is panicking about the fact that JD Vance seems to be turning voters off rather than turning them on. That's why there's panic within MAGA that Donald Trump seems unable to articulate why he even selected JD Vance. And that's what I want to talk about next. The walls are just, everything's coming off the walls around Donald Trump. Why JD Vance?
Why did you only gain 0.2% in polling after surviving an assassination attempt? Having a terrible debate performance by Joe Biden, the RNC. What? Zero? Why did you only get 0.2? And why is JD Vance hurting us? These are the questions panicking MAGA world right now. Well, Donald Trump appeared on Fox News last night with Laura Ingram and Laura Ingraham. Gives him a chance to explain it.
Reassure us, sir, that JD Vance was the right person to select. Trump's response is unintelligible. It's a complete and total rhetorical collapse. Take a look at this knee jerk.
Laura Ingraham
Conservative, you know, et cetera, et cetera. But some of it's coming from republicans who I think want to go back to the days of open borders and perpetual war?
What do you, how do you expect to use him in this campaign? And what can you say to our viewers tonight to reassure them that this was an excellent pick?
David Pakman
Yeah. Please, everybody's waiting.
JD Vance seems terrible. We're all waiting to hear from you. Why is he such a great pick?
Here's Trump.
Donald Trump
Well, first of all, he's got tremendous support, and he really does among a certain group of people, people that like families. I mean, you know, he made a statement having to do with families. That doesn't mean that people that aren't a member of a big and beautiful family with 400 children around and everything else. It doesn't mean that a person doesn't have, he's not against anything, but he loves family. It's very important to him. He grew up in a very interesting family situation and he feels family is good. And I don't think there's anything wrong in saying that.
David Pakman
What did he say?
What did he say?
Family is good according to JD Vance.
That's why he's a good vp.
What?
And then they get mad when we hear this crap and go, man, that was, that was really weird. To quote George W. Bush, that was some weird s. Next week I'll be able to say it. Okay.
It's bizarre.
It's bizarre. That doesn't mean anything. This was his opportunity to say, here's why you should all be on board with me. With JD Vance. He thinks family is good.
Disaster.
Disaster.
And the countdown clock seems to be above JD Vance's head. Trump asked, why not debate Kamala Harris? Again, completely unintelligible answer, why not debater?
Donald Trump
We'll wait. But because they already know everything.
She wants to defund our police.
She wants no bail. She wants no cash. You just, you kill somebody and we're going to release you immediately. They call it cashless. Cashless.
That's it. By the way, this has been a horrible thing for our country. This has been what I just said.
David Pakman
Remember, the question was, why won't you debate Kamala Harris?
Donald Trump
But we know where she is. She wants high taxes.
Laura Ingraham
Well, they're gonna say you're afraid of debating her. That's what they're gonna say.
Donald Trump
Well, they said that with Biden, too. You know, I was afraid.
David Pakman
Right. The difference being he debated Biden.
Donald Trump
I did great with Biden. And I did great in every debate. I've had a lot of debates.
Laura Ingraham
But you're winning all the issues.
Donald Trump
But, you know, I'm leading in the polls. By, I think a lot. I don't know. I hear different numbers, but I'm leading in all of the polls. I'm leading big in all of the swing states. Why not debater? We'll wait.
David Pakman
Something's wrong.
Something is very wrong. He can't answer a single question. Laura Ingraham also asked Trump in this gong show interview about when he told christian voters, if you vote for me in 24 and I win, you won't ever have to vote again.
And arguably the worst answer of the entire interview.
Laura Ingraham
They're also attacking you for other ridiculous reasons. They're saying that you said to a crowd of christians that they won't have to vote in the future.
Donald Trump
Let me say, what did I mean by that? I had a tremendous crowd speaking to christians.
I mean, this was a crowd that liked me a lot. I think I'm at 97% or something. And they're treated very badly by this administration. Okay? Catholics are treated unbelievably. They're like persecuted. And if I might say before I go into the other jewish people, if you're jew, Bush and you vote for.
David Pakman
Biden or, hey, what about when you said to christians you'll never have to go to vote again? Do you know what Jews are up to, Laura?
Donald Trump
Democrats or Kamala or whoever's going to run, I guess it's going to be her. But if you voted for her or the Democrats, you should have your head examined because nobody's ever been treated so badly by this. This administration is destroying Israel, etcetera, etcetera. So with respect to like a statement, like I made, that statement is very simple. I said vote for me. You're not going to have to do it ever again. It's true, because we have to get the vote out. Christians are not known as a big voting group. They don't vote. And I'm explaining that to them. You never vote. This time, vote. I'll straighten out the country. You won't have to vote anymore. I won't need your vote. Go back.
Laura Ingraham
You meant you don't have to vote for you because you have four years in office.
Donald Trump
Look, look, christians are known. You know what?
David Pakman
He won't even answer. He doesn't answer anything. And I don't think it's because he's unwilling. I think there's a malfunction happening here. He just isn't able to take what is being given to him, synthesize it, and respond in a relevant and meaningful way. It's all abstract, tangential speech to this guy. And then finally in his continued quest to control everything women do. Trump says that thanks to his criticisms, I guess Kamala Harris has changed the way she laughs.
Donald Trump
She got rid of the laugh, I noticed. I haven't seen that crazy laugh that she goes, she's crazy, that laugh. That's the laugh of a crazy person. But I noticed that she's not using that laugh anymore. Somebody convinced her, don't laugh. Just don't laugh. Don't laugh under any circumstances because I.
Laura Ingraham
Like laughter, but sometimes not her laughter.
David Pakman
Speaker one right, her laughter's no good. Trump wants to control everything about women. And how dare a woman even run against him with that laughter. So given the opportunity Trump to clean up a bunch of the messes that he's made, christians won't ever have to vote again. JD Vance seems to be disgusting to even many republican voters. Come clean it up, sir.
And it just gets even worse.
Let's make sure that he doesn't get the chance to make even more messes from the Oval Office. Just prevent this guy from winning. Make absolutely sure, please, please make absolutely sure that you are subscribed to the YouTube channel. We are pushing to 2.5 million subscribers. Hit the subscribe button. Let's take a very quick break and we'll be back right after this.
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Well, today we have something exceedingly special, I would say. We are going to be speaking with Dennis Prager, host of the Dennis Prager show. He's been on with me before, co founder of Prageru and also Stephen Kenneth Destiny Benell II, known to some just as Destiny, known to some as Stephen, online streamer, gamer, political commentator. It's really great to have both of you on, and we've been working on this for a little bit. So many things have transpired since we kind of decided we were going to do this. So just to start somewhere and get the state of american politics right now, we had this assassination attempt against the former president, which, as I say, I am really glad did not succeed because I want to defeat people with votes rather than bullets. That being said, Stephen, you've been criticized because you said you did not feel, and I hope I'm not putting words in your mouth, particular sympathy for what happened to Donald Trump, in part because when the victims have been on the left, you do not feel that there has been sympathy equivalent to that from the right. Can you tell me if I'm correct in characterizing what you said and maybe tell us what you feel now?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Yeah, I think that conservatives, especially under Donald Trump, have been responsible for increasing the hostility and the political divisions in this country in an unprecedented way over the past eight years. I don't think that's just a byproduct of what Trump does. I think that's explicitly and specifically why people like Donald Trump. It's because he bullies people, he calls people names. He's, you know, he's boisterous, he's loud, he's angry. He represents what you really says, what you want to hear. So if that side is going to engage in that on the rhetorical level and then on the policy level, if you've got people who, you know, attempt to coup the government, leading insurrection on January 6 in order to circumvent the peaceful transfer of power, when violent things start happening, it's very hard to look at that side and go, my God, I feel so horrible that these things are happening because this is, like, exactly where your rhetoric leads. Like, where else would it go to but this.
David Pakman
What do you think, Dennis?
Dennis Prager
So it's interesting. In preparing for this, I got to know Stephen a little better.
And I watched him and Ben Shapiro for about 1015 minutes, and it was excellent.
And one of the things that I think you, Stephen, noted was the staggering. I remember you used the word brain, but I don't remember the other terminal, about the staggering difference between left and right. And it's definitely one arena where you and I would agree that you believe that the hate filled rhetoric and divisive rhetoric of this country is largely due to Donald Trump rather than to the left, does offer what I always say, and I have for 40 years on my radio show, I prefer clarity to agreement.
We have great clarity in that you believe that. I think it is beyond belief that you believe that if it weren't for Donald Trump, there would be just as much divisiveness in this country. When you call virtually everybody who is conservative deplorable, when you arrest, for the first time in american history, the leading candidate of the opposition party and a former president, when you paint the would be president or a presidential candidate as the new Republic, one of the leading left wing magazines does as Hitler and use the term regularly. When the inaugural address of Joe Biden, easily the most divisive president in american history, spoke of white supremacy as a threat to America and meaning, obviously, those who vote for Donald Trump and then say Donald Trump is responsible. If Donald Trump had been assassinated, God forbid, and I would say God forbid about Joe Biden as well, there would be not one diminution in the divisive rhetoric coming from the left. If Ron DeSantis were the, were the nominee he would be called Hitler as well.
David Pakman
So, Dennis, to be clear, you're saying you just disagree. You agree with Stephen that there is a difference in terms of violent rhetoric and incitement to violence from left and right, but you believe it is the left that has been inciting the violence?
Stephen.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
It'S just a deeply unserious opinion. There's no way to, like, factually engage with that. Donald Trump is literally known in the entire world as being the guy that makes fun of people. He literally is the guy that gives nicknames, divisive nicknames or derogatory nicknames to his political opponents.
Sleepy Joe Biden, crooked Hillary.
What? What did he say about Ted Cruz's dad? Might've been the Zodiac. Like, he just has so many out of pocket things that. And then it's just.
It's another world. I don't know if, like, conservatives listening actually believe this, but when people say things like, oh, yeah, Joe Biden is so unbelievably divisive. Really? Joe Biden, the guy that gets on stage and that we've seen, like, has trouble stringing together sentences. This is the insanely divisive president of fiery rhetoric. When he gets on stage and he's like, mega Americans. And when I say maga, I don't mean everybody, I just mean the ones that deny the election. Right? This is the guy that's insanely divisive. But when Trump says things like, you know, well, there was the Second Amendment. They're coming for that, and we can't do anything about it. Well, maybe the second Amendment people, you know, can, and everybody laughs. But when Joe Biden, in a private meeting to donor, says, we need to put a bullseye on Donald Trump, like, that was a. That's a violent. That's a violent rhetoric. Give me a break. This is one serious opinion. Well, what about.
David Pakman
I mean, what, what you mentioned the reference to white nationalism or white supremacy and Joe Biden's inauguration speech. But what else has Joe Biden done, in your view, to incite violence?
Dennis Prager
Oh, I didn't say he incited violence. I thought the issue was divisiveness. Who was more responsible for divisive? Also, Donald Trump is one man.
Calling people sleepy Joe or little Marco is not in the same moral ballpark as calling people Nazis. And depicting your opponent as new republic in its last issue, painted, painted Donald Trump as Hitler.
The staggering amount of lies. It's the whole left world.
Donald Trump is one man.
The whole left is filled with hate.
The lie that Donald Trump said that they were fine people who were Nazis in Charlottesville, even snopes, which is left of center in its fact checking, said it was false that he ever said that the Nazis in Charlottesville were fine people. He wasn't referring to them. The New York Times continues that lie to today, Donald.
Joe Biden said that's the reason he ran for president, because of that horrific statement, the lying from the left and lying of smearing. This is not just Donald Trump. This is not just Joe Biden. The left smears. That's what they do. When I spoke at Arizona State university a year and a half ago, 34 professors of the 42 at the college that I spoke to at Arizona state said people should not attend because I am a bigot and a homophobe and an islamophobe and a racist and a. This. That's all they do. I invited all of them onto my radio show. Any one of you 34, all 34 can come on my radio show. Not one accepted the invitation. Did one invite me into their classroom? Of course. Nothing. So constantly referring to Donald Trump. Donald Trump is nothing compared to the whole world. From the New York Times to Joe Biden, the world of the left is a world filled with smearing hate.
David Pakman
Stephen, let me give you the last word on this before we move on.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Yeah, I mean, if. If Biden was invited to speak about a particular BLM riot, and Biden would have ever uttered the words antifa. Stand back and stand by. Like Donald Trump said, for proud boys, stand back and stand. Stand by. I think that the conservative sphere of media would have erupted in anger. If you want to talk about, like, who's more divisive or not, you just need look no further than the legislation passed in Congress. You know, President Trump ran for how long on repeal and replace the ACA? He wasn't able to replace it. He ran for how long on infrastructure. Biden was the one that passed that bill. Donald Trump didn't. And in terms of Donald Trump just being one man, Donald Trump is not just one man. Donald Trump is the entirety of the conservative party right now. And if you're a conservative politician or if you're in conservative media, you absolutely know that because you either toe his line or you are destroyed.
David Pakman
I want to talk a little bit about what's happening now with the presidential race, which has been upended by Joe Biden deciding that he is not going to seek reelection. Dennis, I know from listening to you that you are not likely someone who is going to vote for the current vice president to be the next president of the United States. I don't think that'll come as a shock to our audience. What I am curious about is do you see her as simply an elected official running a campaign with whom you disagree, or do you believe that there is the sort of danger of a Kamala Harris presidency that some associate with another presidency for Donald Trump?
Dennis Prager
Speaker one, I didn't get the part on the Donald Trump. Do I see her as a dangerous speaker?
David Pakman
There is a view that Donald Trump represents a threat to democracy, and that's a phrase that we hear frequently.
Dennis Prager
Yes.
David Pakman
I'm curious whether you see Kamala Harris simply as an elected official you disagree with, or do you feel that the word threat or danger applies?
Dennis Prager
Yeah, my position and my last column actually was on this subject.
To me, it is completely irrelevant which leftist runs.
David Pakman
Really?
Dennis Prager
Paula Harris, Nancy Pelosi, Adam Schiff, Gavin Newsom. It is completely irrelevant. They're utterly interchangeable. All leftists damage everything they touch. This has been true from Lenin until the current leftists, wherever they are, not liberals.
I have great respect for liberals. I think they're naive, but I have great respect for them.
Liberalism and conservatism have a great deal in common. Liberalism has nothing in common with leftism. Leftism hates liberalism. Leftism is illiberalism, anti liberalism. So I don't care who the leftist is, who runs, whether it's Kamala Harris or Gavin Newsom or somebody else, they are utterly interchangeable. Same with Joe Biden. It doesn't matter to me.
I listed in one of my columns 25 institutions that the left is destroying, from the universities to the high schools to the elementary schools to the American Medical association, which has announced that no birth certificate should list the sex of a child because we don't know what the sex is. The child will determine later. That's the American Medical association. Because the left has taken over the AMA. The left has taken over just about everything and destroyed everything from the Boy scouts to military recruitment to music to art to architecture. Leftism is a shark. It's a destructive destruction machine.
David Pakman
Okay, that's a lot, Dennis. Let's allow Stephen to weigh in on that and a couple of specific points that Dennis made there. One is that there's an interchangeability to who is the democratic candidate. Number two, that leftism destroys everything it touches. And number three, he mentioned Leninism sort of in the same breath as modern democrats. Do you think that's an apt analogy?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I fully agree with Dennis that illiberal people are a danger to society. Right now. There is only one, like, very popular illiberal candidate that is easily Donald Trump. When you want to talk about people destroying democratic institutions, I would argue that probably one of the most important institutions that we have in the United States is the. Is the vote, is the idea, the concept of the peaceful transfer of power. Donald Trump in multiple ways.
Whether it was by encouraging people to lie and submit false electorate votes to Congress, whether it was through a multi channel pressure against his vice president, of which Pence has come out and spoken plenty about to get Pence to throw away the actual votes on January 6, whether it was getting his attorney generals to write a letter to different states to lie about them having found voter fraud, whether it was Donald Trump lying to the american public, to rapids Burger, to state legislatures in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico. All of these things, all of these actions were taken to circumvent the peaceful transfer of power, which I think is probably one of the cornerstones of a liberal democracy, of a democratic republic, of a constitutional republic, where we are allowed to vote on a change in leadership and where that leadership is expected to back down or step down if they've lost the vote.
So far as illiberalism is a huge threat in this country, I agree, but it is exclusively coming from the right. Right now, I don't think that the leftist candidates are leftist at all and that they're socialist or communist. Ironically, as Prager was complaining about calling everybody a Nazi. I know that Republicans have been in the business of calling everybody a communist for decades. I know because I grew up as a Republican and I used to listen to rush Limbaugh talk about the commies every single day. So this idea that all of these candidates on left are leftist, I don't think is true in any sense. The word. They're liberal. That's why the examples that Dennis gives of them destroying institutions are whether or not you list birth on a birth certificate, whether or not you list the sex or the Boy Scouts or music or art or architecture. I think that threats to our democracy or the liberal order, I think, are far more evident when you look at the Republicans attacks on our judicial system, on giving the executive branch, for instance, the power to have criminal immunity when the president takes certain acts, when you talk about trying to overthrow the election, I mean, you can go on and on. The attacks on institutions from the right are far more damaging than any perceived attacks from the left.
David Pakman
What about that, Dennis? Because I hear Stephen arguing that there's been sort of a reshuffling here where the illiberalism or authoritarianism is, he argues, now, coming from the MAGA wing of the Republican Party, even if you don't like leftists, would you concede that he's right to some degree about the authoritarianism?
Dennis Prager
No, because Donald Trump was president for four years, and we had far more freedom under Donald Trump than under Joe Biden.
David Pakman
How so?
Dennis Prager
Well, we could give, okay, the number of mandates, for example, in the government and done by, through the CDC and NIH. If you don't wear a mask, you're fired. If you don't get a vaccine, you're fired. If you speak dissent at a college, you're fired.
The whole culture of speaking to big tech and telling them what you consider misinformation from the government, as the prime minister of New Zealand infamously announced, if you don't hear it from the government, it is not true. That's a left wing position. All truth. And that's why I compare it to Leninism, which was my field. I studied Russia and I went to the Soviet Union a number of times. And he called the soviet communist paper Pravda, means truth. Truth is what the left says truth is. For two years, they lied. The Columbia Journalism Review, published by a rather non right wing institution, the most a sophisticated or prestigious journalism school in America, Columbia University, wrote a gigantic piece, a major piece, on how much the New York Times and Washington Post lied about collusion between Trump and the russian campaign.
And if you differed with that as you differ with anything, you were dismissed and you were misinformation and the way in which they have taken over Google. But all of this is nothing compared to Donald Trump. But Donald Trump was president for four years. What did he do during those four years? Forget for the moment, I know you can't, because it's, everything is based on January 6 up till January 5 of 2021. What did Trump do in four years in power that compares to Biden's and the Democrats suppression of freedom in this country?
David Pakman
Speaker one. Well, let's let Steven answer. And I think, to be fair, Dennis, I'm just kind of an arbiter here. Some of the things you mentioned with regard to masks and vaccines, I believe they happened while Trump was president, not Joe Biden. But I'll let Stephen, if he wants to address that, address that. But to Dennis's question, up until January 5, 2021, what was the illiberalism from Trump?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Speaker two. I would argue that the illiberalism from Trump was Trump's inability to work with Congress and trying to usurp as much power in the executive as possible to do things unilaterally as the executive, without getting any kind of congressional approval or legislation from Congress. Congressional, obviously. So, like an example of this might be he was unable to bring Congress together to get anything done insofar as the border or immigration goes. So instead, he relies on his executive power during times of great emergency to send the military down to the border. That's a usurping of power by the executive to try to run immigration policy on the executive. I don't think that was a very good thing because he couldn't get Congress together to do it. I think that his undermining, even if we ignore January 6 itself, and I'll ignore the electorate for fraud and everything else that he did leading up to December 14, and beyond all of the claims that Donald Trump made about how the vote is going to be rigged, mail in ballots are going to be rigged. Notice that if you listen to his rhetoric, he never says, this is what we need to do to secure mail in ballots. This is what we need to do to make sure that our election is safe. All he wanted to do is get rid of mail in ballots because he knew that Democrats were more likely to vote that way than Republicans. He had no desire to make the election safe. He only wanted to make sure that the election was going to be won by him. When you talk about, like, big tech, and you talk about trying to take away freedoms using big tech, well, we just had Twitter being purchased by Elon Musk, who is, if you watch any of his tweets, is clearly a right wing supporter.
All of his speech and all of his support goes to right wing candidates or right wing talking points. And if you talk about a threat to the freedom of tech, well, the biggest threat that was represented to tech was when conservatives wanted to bash Twitter and Facebook over the head with restricting their section or rescinding their section 230 protections, which would have allowed you to sue, essentially, people that hosted other people's posts for things that those people posted. You want to talk about destroying big tech or censoring big tech, removing section 230 protections would have been the number one way to do it. And then when you talk about, like, uh, like requests made by Big Tech, if you want to call those censorship, we got the full Twitter files leaks. And as much as republicans try to rewrite the record, um, Taibbi himself said, uh, when it comes to the New York Post story, for instance, there was not a single example. There was no evidence whatsoever of government intrusion into Twitter to ask them to remove that story. But you better believe when that one comedian lady said that Donald Trump was a, I think, a pussy ass bitch. She tweeted, Donald Trump sent in a request to Twitter to have them remove that tweet because he didn't like it. So if you want to talk about, like, big tech censorship or attempts to do so, we could talk about Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter. We can talk about the types of requests that Donald Trump sent into Twitter as opposed to the Biden administration, who, when they sent in requests for specific tweets to be taken down, it was because they were of pictures of Hunter Biden.
I'll just say that. Not even close to comparable. And, yeah, when you talk about, like, authoritarian actions, I think that one of the largest authoritarian actions you can take is to try to usurp as much power for yourself as possible. And that might be done in terms of running things that should be done by Congress, like immigration policy, by using the military, and that might be done in ways of, like, undermining an upcoming election and saying that the election is going to be fraudulent, or it might be done in ways of, like, avoiding ever being held responsible for things that you do for criminal activity. Right. The Supreme Court's granted him criminal immunity. He wasn't impeached in the Senate because they said, oh, well, we can't impeach him. He's already out of office, and he pardoned almost every single person that worked with him. Why would he pardon people like Paul Manafort? That's so crazy. I understand why people might want to argue for pardons for maybe, like Flynn or maybe Stone, but Paul Manafort, why? It was so crazy. You can look up how many pardons he's done on the presidential website. It's insane compared to any other. The president.
David Pakman
What do you think, Dennis? I mean, certainly it sounds like a lot of unilateral action, for sure. Do you defend all of the things, do you dispute that Trump did any of the things Stephen mentioned? And if you don't dispute it, do you defend it? Speaker one?
Dennis Prager
Yeah, he started to build a wall that was. I don't know whether it's in his province or not. I don't know. I don't know what the law is, but it is true. He could not get Congress to agree because the Democrats since Ted Kennedy in the 1990s have worked to open the border. You cannot have a civilization with an open border. That is a given. I assume Stephen would agree with that, that open border and keeping a country intact are mutually exclusive. Can we agree on that?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Yeah, that's why nobody asks for an open border.
Dennis Prager
Oh, yes, the Democrats do. I mean, if you deny that that's good. You'll be on record then as saying.
David Pakman
Speaker one, we'll define it as policy. Dennis, so we could agree.
Dennis Prager
Really critical. Really critical. Do you believe, Stephen, that the Democrats have been for a controlled border and not for an open border in the last ten years?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Speaker one, I think the Democrats tried to pass comprehensive legislation that was written by Lankford, a Republican in the Senate. I think Donald Trump and the Republicans are the ones that killed, and that was on public record. No, the Democrats have not.
Dennis Prager
The Democrats are for a closed border. Okay.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Close. They're open communities.
Very complicated thing.
It is very complicated.
Dennis Prager
It's not complicated.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Much information about immigration or the border.
Dennis Prager
Yeah. All right. As I said, I prefer clarity to agreement.
David Pakman
Can you define open border? Dennis yes.
Dennis Prager
Letting anybody who wants to come into this country come in. It's not complex.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
And then to be clear, you think that that's the case right now?
Dennis Prager
That's the case right now. And that is the case. What the Democrats want. That is correct. So somebody, they have sanctuary cities all over my state.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Excuse me. Sanctuary city has nothing to do with immigration policy. Oh.
Dennis Prager
As far as it does, if you are here illegally, we will not allow ICE or anyone else to take you away. You can come. That's what sanctuary city.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
That is not what a sanctuary city is not what a sanctuary. Sure. I can tell you what it means when it comes to enforcing immigration. That is exclusively in the purview of the United States government. Now, it tends to be the case that if you're a state official, you can collect information about whether or not a person is here legally or not. And if you want, you can turn that information over to federal authorities like immigrations and custom enforcement or like the Department of Homeland Security. You don't have an obligation to do so. And some cities explicitly say we won't. So a sanctuary cities city, where they arrest you, they're not going to do an immigration check, and if you fail, they're going to turn you over to the federal authorities. As somebody that is a conservative who I imagine would have an appreciation for the concept of federalism, but the important protections of states rights, because that's what we said when we threw abortion back to the states, you should champion a state deciding whether or not they would want to cooperate with a federal authority when it comes to turning somebody over for matters of deportation. But a sanctuary city does not legalize illegal immigration. It's just whether or not a city wants to cooperate with federal investigators when it comes to turning over an undocumented or immigrant.
Dennis Prager
Speaker one okay, we can continue.
David Pakman
Speaker one do you agree with that, Dennis? I mean, do you, do you recognize that it's an issue of state?
Dennis Prager
Speaker three the issue of people crossing a federal border is a federal issue. It is not just a state issue. Okay. It is so elementary. It's a national border. It's not just a state border.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I'd be really careful with that because that wasn't Abbott's argument when he wanted to enforce the border in Texas. He said that the Texas National Guard should be that way. You just use the Biden administration because.
Dennis Prager
There'S no federal, no federal oversight because the Democrats are happy to have a great number of people come in, their potential democratic voters. In their view.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I think it's so, Dennis, is there a single lawmaker or is there a single prominent Democrat that said, we want open borders?
Dennis Prager
Speaker one no.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Okay.
David Pakman
And so what are the open border policies? Dennis?
If the sanctuary city you can see.
Dennis Prager
Is not relevant, but the answer is no. Okay, go ahead.
David Pakman
Speaker one if you concede that the sanctuary cities themselves are not the border, what are the open border policies that are at issue that you would want Stephen to either defend or denounce?
Dennis Prager
Speaker one we have to have only legal immigration. I don't know.
The rendering of a simple concept complex is a way to avoid the moral issue, the political issue. The real issue. The real issue is that under democratic influence since Ted Kennedy, it's not new, and, but it has been hastened. Under Joe Biden, the border has been essentially open to millions of people to come into this country illegally, and you can't even say illegal alien. You can't say alien and you can't say illegal. You now say undocumented immigrant. The very fact that they have changed the language is proof that they are for it.
David Pakman
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Stephen, I'll go first to you. Project 2025 fears that we're hearing about from the left media ecosystem right now. Well founded fears or overblown or hyperbolic.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I'm going to be completely honest with you. I don't really focus much on policy for conservatives because I don't think conservatives have or run on policy anymore. I think that all of the fears around Donald Trump have to do with his disdain for a constitutional democratic republic that we have and his desire to usurp as much power into his sole position as president as possible. And that's what I focus on. I know that I've seen people talk about Project 2025 and people have fears of Project 2025, but conservatives know nothing about policy, and they don't even care to run on policy anymore. So I just personally don't focus much on the particular aspects of that platform. Although I, I wouldn't be surprised if Donald Trump and his administration wanted to push a lot, given some of the quotes that have come out, I think, from Donald Trump in the past, and I think JD Vance about it and the association, like the Heritage foundation, everything else. But it's not a thing that I particularly focus on.
David Pakman
And to be clear, Stephen, it's, you don't focus on it because you don't genuinely think Trump knows anything about it or cares about policy or because you think it's unlikely to be implemented.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I don't know what the final versions of it would look like when it comes to implementation. I don't know if republicans will have the necessary majorities in the House or Senate to pass it. My concern is far more singularly with Donald Trump as the head executive than it is with any particular policy platform, because Donald Trump is just not a very effective leader. He's not a good politician. When they were in office, they couldn't pass any policy. They couldn't actually get any legislation passed. So I'm not as concerned about a policy platform as I am about what Donald Trump wants to do as the president or as the executive.
David Pakman
Dennis, what about you? What are your thoughts on the discussion that's been growing certainly in the last few weeks?
Dennis Prager
We largely agree 2025 is a relevant to the Trump administration, and he has said so. No, I don't know anyone who's read it. It's 800 pages. I haven't read it. Stephen presumably has not read it. It's, the Heritage foundation is a conservative think tank. There are left wing think tanks, liberal think tanks, conservative think tanks, right wing think tanks, and they're all permitted to put out whatever they want.
Am I permitted? And I'm not being cute if I'm not, I'm not. But can I, can I ask even a question, please? Okay. So, Stephen, how do you stand on men who say they're women competing in women's sports?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I'm assuming the question has to do with trans people competing in sports.
I think that my personal view is that sports up through probably high school are just there for people to kind of like, play games and get along with each other and, you know, like, build camaraderie and stuff. So I don't really have much of a concern past up to that point. Once you get to NCAA or professional events, I think that the dividing between the sexes is very important for athletic competition. So I'm generally opposed to trans people participating in the gender they identify with.
Dennis Prager
Know then that the, that the Biden administration has extended the, the anti discrimination legislation passed to protect women. They have extended it to trans people. You, you are aware of that?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
That they've done what?
Dennis Prager
They have extended it to trans people. So that.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Extended what to trans people?
Dennis Prager
I'm sorry, you cannot discriminate against trans people. If a man says he is a woman in college, he should be allowed to play in college, for that is the Biden administration's position.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I'm not aware of that right now. I thought it went the opposite. My understanding, just to be clear, my understanding is that right now they can't.
Dennis Prager
Speaker one, so what is your position? Since I think the whole left stinks. You think Donald Trump stinks? So I'm going to, I talk about the left. So let's go to Gavin Newsom in California, where I live, there is a law. It is a law. It's not a recommendation that if a kid, an eight year old says that she is a boy and the school is not permitted to tell the parents that the girl thinks she is a boy and goes by a boy's name at, in her school. Do you think that that is a moral and good law?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I don't think about this. I'm so sorry, but when I look at Donald Trump, this is a man who tried to overthrow the election and resist the peaceful transfer of power. I can't think of the thing that I think less about than, wow. Where trans people say, just to be clear, for people that don't know. Just to be clear, people don't know my background.
Dennis Prager
Every day for.
David Pakman
Hold on, we'll wait.
Dennis Prager
Dennis.
David Pakman
If Steven doesn't want to answer the question as you see it, allow him not to answer it.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
But let's answer it. I'll answer it.
And I was banned from twitch for opposing the integration of trans people into sports. I don't think it's appropriate. I probably stand in opposition to a lot of the very, very far left.
Dennis Prager
What they are they the law. Okay, so let me just go on record. I can give you the rest. We could talk.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Sure. What's the California law for the eight year old? Go ahead. What was it?
Dennis Prager
Yes. You cannot, a school cannot tell a parent. And not. Not. Doesn't have to. Is not allowed to tell a parent. If a child identifies as the other sex in a California school, that would.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Probably something I'd be opposed to as a parent. I think I would want to know that if my kid was identifying as a different gender in class.
Dennis Prager
So, so you see, if it weren't for Trump, you would have to spend the time with me or anyone else defending the left. And there's scummy little laws like that that ruin lives of kids and have girls get, get their breasts cut off at 18 or even younger. What has been, it's like every. Nothing matters. All that matters is January 6. Every time I raise an issue, we go back to January 6.
David Pakman
Because it wasn't.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
He tried to rebel. It was a rebellion against the people.
Dennis Prager
To go peacefully to the. To the halls of Congress.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Speaker one, he told Mike Pence, why were they going there? What were they going there for?
Dennis Prager
To protest the results of the election.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Exactly.
Dennis Prager
It was cheating.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Exactly. It was an insurrection. They thought, no, you're not allowed to protest with violence.
Dennis Prager
Throw. But you were allowed to protest. Speaker one.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
When they were going there to support Mike Pence. What do they want Mike Pence to do?
Dennis Prager
Yes. They, they wanted Mike Pence not to accept certain electors from certain states. Speaker one.
David Pakman
Exactly.
Dennis Prager
Yes, that's right. Okay. But they. But, okay.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Which was against the ECA, right. That was illegal under the Electoral Count act. Right.
Dennis Prager
But I don't agree with that. And that's, that.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
That's fine. I don't agree with insurrectionists either. But you understand the ridiculousness of wanting to have a man who has now usurped criminal immunity as the president. So a lot of the illegal actions that he took, remember, Roberts, in his opinion, said explicitly when Donald Trump told his acting and his deputy attorney general, can you guys write fake notes to the state legislatures to say that we found evidence of voter fraud that wasn't there? We can't even criminally review that anymore. Right. So a man who's now criminally immune, who tried to overthrow the government, yeah, that's going to stand out more in my mind, even if they failed at it, than whether or not eight year olds in California, their teachers tell their parents if they're trans or whatever. I didn't say it doesn't matter. But some things matter more than other things, right, in the date.
Dennis Prager
All right? It matters on January 6. January 6 is wildly overblown. It was the, if it wasn't an insurrection, not a single person has been arrested or indicted on insurrection. Donald Trump was not accused of fomenting insurrection. The term is a left wing lie about what happened on January 6. I don't like January 6. I condemned it when it happened. It was not an insurrection. That the language that the left uses, fascist nazi insurrection.
Misinformation. Disinformation. This is the language of division that you denied the left engages in.
David Pakman
Speaker one.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
First of all, I've never denied that the left engages in divisiveness. Of course they do. I'm just saying that Joe Biden himself doesn't, which is evident enough by how much joint legislation he's passed. This guy's got 40 years, you know, in government. Of course this guy, you know, has relationships with people, isn't as divisive as he seems. And I think that's evidenced by what he can pass to say that the insurrection is the language of leftist. This is the language that came to us in the 14th amendment after the reformation when, surprise, surprise, after the civil war, people in Congress didn't want leadership. Again, that was part of the civil war. That shouldn't be that shocking. There's nothing left wing about that idea. That should be a very american idea. We don't want people that were trying to insurrect the government to fight against it. Also, if we want to talk about health issues, we're welcome to talk about it as well. But I care way less about the leftists. Have some crazy views on eight year olds being trans, which I think is really stupid, by the way. And I agree that that's stupid. But I care way more about the fact that I don't know if we're ever going to have a new vaccine in this country that is going to have mass protests against it now because conservatives become the party of anti vax. I think that's a far more pressing public health matter than trans kids.
Dennis Prager
Yes, because the CDC is in cahoots with big pharma and lied to the american people about masks, about distance and about lockdowns and ruined a whole generation's lives because of the lie that lockdowns were necessary for kids. Sweden didn't lock down one day for kids. Not one kid died of that. You defend the CDC, the NIH and the Democrats, and for that matter, any Republicans who supported lockdowns, it will not be something you will be proud of when you look back at your career.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
And the entire world was all in cahoots for all the people you point out. Sweden. Compare Sweden's death rates to every other european country, even the other scandinavian countries that did enact lockdowns, and more people died in Sweden.
Dennis Prager
I have compared them.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Okay, then you know that Sweden fared about the worst of any of those countries.
Dennis Prager
Only if you compare them to Scandinavia. And Finland has announced that it would do exactly what Sweden did if it ever happened again. They were wrong in locking down their students. If you are. If you're on the record as defending nearly two years of lockdowns of students.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
And how did this come to just lockdown of students?
You know the lockdown's affected more than just the students. Right.
Okay.
Dennis Prager
Because you said that like this. Because kids were hurt more than adults were because of the lockdown. That's why I'm noting kids.
David Pakman
Sure.
Dennis Prager
Because it was particularly irrelevant because kids were not dying of COVID whereas old people were.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Sure. But the issue was that teachers tend to be older people and they were the ones that were worried.
Dennis Prager
Yes. Whether or not the lockdown teacher died in Sweden.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Whether or not the lockdowns died in Sweden.
Dennis Prager
The lockdowns were despicable. Despicable.
Whether or not that is the reason that people are very, very suspicious and should be. I was never.
My brother is a professor of medicine. I trusted doctors like I trusted my own parents. I trusted the medical community. I don't any longer. They've lost my trust.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Now you trust Joe Rogan and Donald Trump. Yeah. Now we trust podcasters who have every vested interest in lying to you. About things in order to make more ad revenue and to sell you more products for whatever vitamin boost or whatever. Like if you, if you want to talk about lockdowns and them being good or bad. I think at this point, I think the evidence is out that the lockdowns were probably too aggressive. I think most people agree with that. The issue isn't debating whether or not they were good or bad, it's that you conservatives assume that they were done maliciously. The entire world came together to maliciously lock. It's not irrelevant. The motivation for why you.
Dennis Prager
I don't give a damn if it was malicious. It ruined societies. It ruined children's lives the new year.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
You don't think the intention of a policy matters when it comes to trusting them in the future? You don't think knowing if they were acting maliciously or not isn't important to deciding if you would trust them?
Dennis Prager
No. And by the way, well, I will say this with regard to the vaccines and the fact that they were not tested and they were unleashed upon people, and that they told children, they still told little babies should get these vaccines when babies aren't dying. Of COVID I think there was an element of maliciousness, not in the sense of we want to hurt people, but we want to, we want to have the profits that big pharma enables us to have. Because big pharma, do you think. Let me ask you, do you think big pharma has only the interest of the public in mind?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Speaker one, I'm a liberal capitalist. I think that big pharma has the interest of making money. The goal is the FDA and the government to regulate, to make sure that they're adhering to what they're supposed to do. Now, if you want to take the position, if you want to take the position that every corporation around the world that would have had plenty of investment in calling us out, by the way, why didn't J and J say that the mRNA vaccines were rigged? If you want to say that every academic institution across the entire world, especially in other countries, weren't calling out the horribleness of the mRNA vaccines. And if you want to make the argument that every country in the world, even those that didn't utilize our vaccines, like China, Russia, Iran and Qatar, they would have every incentive to say, by the way, those mRNA vaccines are killing Americans. It's strange that all of these people seem to be silent on this issue, but thank God we've got Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson to tell us about how corrupt, and Brett Weinstein tells how corrupt, I guess big pharma is. I thought that conservatives used to be proud of large american businesses. This was an operation under warp speed from Donald Trump. A Donald Trump warp speed, a globalist, capitalist like thing that Americans should be proud of. We can't even take pride in it because you're so conspiracy brained on it now.
Dennis Prager
The issue is not conspiracy brain, and sometimes there really are. Look, I will admit to you, I defended the big pharma nearly all of my broadcast career. I have been awakened to the corruption that is now involved, I am sorry.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
To say, awakened to something called audience capture. I think audience capture is what we awaken to.
Dennis Prager
I never took Robert Kennedy seriously on the issue of vaccines and kids, and now I do. I admit it. I have been chastened by the facts.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
The guy that said more people than it saved you. Okay.
David Pakman
We could go endlessly on vaccines, but we have come to the end of our time. The last thing I want to ask you, and it really should be just a one word, a. Dennis, you first. Who do you expect to be the winner of the November election?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Speaker one.
Dennis Prager
So I feel bad in not giving you a yes or no or a one person answer from Harris.
I never answer predictive questions, okay. I'm only interested in what I think we need to do, and the thought of four more years of the left governing the country frightens me in terms of liberty, so.
David Pakman
All right, but you're not making a prediction, Stephen. Who do you expect to see the win in November?
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
I'm feeling good on Harris right now.
David Pakman
Feeling good on Harris. Gentlemen, we haven't quite said it all, but we've said a lot of it. Dennis Prager, Stephen Kenneth, Destiny Benell the second. Thanks to both of you for joining me today.
Dennis Prager
Good. Good to be with you again, David.
Steven Kenneth Destiny Benell II
Thanks for having us.
David Pakman
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JD Vance's website disappears along with his anti abortion message following the announcement that he was Trump's running mate. He has apparently scrubbed his Senate campaign website.
Governor JB Pritzker was on MSNBC, and he pointed this out in exquisite detail.
JB Pritzker
I'm going to be out there fighting for Kamala Harris. I mean, she genuinely cares about middle class Americans, about fighting for workers rights, making sure that we're guaranteeing women's right to choose. These are hugely important issues. And I love how the Republicans, Republicans love to, well, they like to throw names on people and cast aspersions, but they don't have issues. And in fact, they've been hiding their issues. I don't know if you noticed that JD Vance wiped away all references to abortion on his website because his positions are so extreme. He's a fraud, right? He's been avoiding answering questions around that. Donald Trump is, of course, a 34 time convicted fraudster.
David Pakman
And of course, Pritzker is absolutely correct. We have the scrubbed anti abortion message from JD Vance. His website, it was a section called straight up and abortion. What a winning message in this post. Roe v. Wade environment. End abortion, quote. I am 100% pro life and believe that abortion has turned our society into a place where we see children as an inconvenience to be thrown away rather than a blessing to be nurtured. Eliminating abortion is first and foremost about protecting the unborn, but it's also about making our society more pro child and pro family.
The historic Dobbs decision puts this new era of society into motion, one that prioritizes family and the sanctity of all life. It's very ironic in a sad way. Ironic is an understatement. It's really tragic. But there's an irony to hearing the now scrubbed statement from JD Vance talk about making society more pro child and pro family. Except it's only families that fit the exact mold they approve. And it's only pro child when it's not even yet a child, but it's an unborn fetus. And then it becomes a child is born. Now all of a sudden, they don't want child tax credits. They don't want free school lunches. Oh, they might get spoiled by the free school lunches. So it's another example of something about which I have an entire chapter in my book, which is principles that they obsess about that they abandon as soon as the principles are inconvenient. They know they are losing on this abortion issue. And JD Vance doing everything he can to just scrub it all from his website.
Donald Trump is having a complete and total meltdown over the devastating new Fox News poll. Mind you, that shows Kamala Harris with a higher favorability rating than Trump in all of those critical swing states and more. As a reminder, here are the results we discussed earlier this week. In Wisconsin, Kamala Harris leading Trump in favorability. In Pennsylvania, Kamala Harris leading Trump in favorability. In Minnesota, leading Trump in favorability. And in Michigan by ten points, leading Trump in favorability. Now, one quick note. Some people wrote to me, they said, David, these add up to more than 100. How is that possible? Again, these are favorability or approval rankings. You can approve of both in such a poll.
This is not who are you going to vote for? That's why the numbers can add up to more than 100. Trump instantly. He's been losing it for days on truth social over this poll, immediately posting conspiracies and attacks on Kamala Harris. By the way, in the midst of it, he posted a conspiracy theory arguing that Christopher Wray, the FBI director, who, by the way, Trump chose, this is Trump's FBI director, ordered the assassination of Trump. And you need only scroll down to find horrible attacks on Kamala Harris. United States border czar Lyon. Kamala, of course it's a lie that Kamala Harris is the borders are enemy of the people.
Kamala Harris being held up by enemy of the people, corporate media, Iran's useful idiot retruth. If you want this cackling moron out of office, really vile stuff, and you just keep going. And it's crazy after crazy after crazy. Trump flipping out within hours, posting endless videos and memes saying she's unfit, that she covered up Biden's diminished condition. You, I mean it. This entire time, I've been talking. I've been scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. And a ton of this stuff is related to Kamala Harris or others. I'm going to stop scrolling because there's so much, it's just endless, endless, endless.
What needs to be said here? That is maybe the most important thing. What is maybe the most important thing is that he wouldn't be doing this if he weren't terrified, if Trump weren't terrified about what the introduction of Kamala Harris to this campaign does to his chances, he wouldn't be making these kinds of attacks. He would be saying, I'll absolutely debater and I'll do really well, rather than coming up with ten different, sometimes conflicting explanations as to why he's not going to debate her, he is absolutely terrified.
That's a good thing for those who want to support democracy, for those who want to see things go in the right direction rather than the wrong. We've got to make it happen in November, though. And if their fear is any sign, we are very well positioned to make that a reality if we get out and vote. As a reminder of what the stakes are, you can check out my project 2025 white paper at David pakman.com project 2025. Also, my new book is available for preorder at david pakman.com echo. David pakman.com echo. We've got a great bonus show for you today. There are primaries happening tonight, and we will talk on the bonus show about five primaries to watch in Arizona and Tennessee. We are going to talk about Roy Cooper saying, no, thank you. I don't want to be Kamala's vp. I am graciously bowing out. And we will also talk about New York City Mayor Eric Adams issuing an order to overrule the law that limits the use of solitary confinement. I believe solitary confinement is a vile institution. We will talk about what was done, why the New York City mayor claims he did it, and we'll talk about the nature of solitary confinement a little more broadly. All of those stories and more, you know where on the bonus show, oh.
JB Pritzker
The bonus show where you want to make money, everybody else that makes money to fund themselves is bad.
David Pakman
Sign up@joinpacman.com. you can use the coupon code, savedemocracy 24 if you'd like to. I'll see you then and I'll be back here with you tomorrow.